Ep.56 - The Slow Death Of Success: How to Spot COMPLACENCY Before It's Too Late

In Episode 56 of Crossroad Conversations, the Lewis Brothers go after a silent business killer: complacency—“a feeling of smug or uncritical satisfaction with oneself or one’s achievements.” They explain why complacency is hard to spot while you’re in it, how success often hides stagnation, and how to put guardrails in place before performance slides. The conversation gets tactical: trimming “dead expense” (including payment processing waste), auditing marketing/advertising for fat to cut, demanding duplication of your best customer experience, and addressing influential underperformers first. The through-line: build a culture that stays hungry, measures honestly, and adjusts fast.

Takeaways

• Complacency is easiest to see after it’s set in—build systems to catch it early.
  
  
• Success can mask decline; “good enough” becomes the quiet default.
  
  
• Run recurring expense audits (payments, ads, subscriptions) to surface waste.
  
  
• Marketing/advertising needs ruthless pruning and reallocation to opportunity.
  
  
• Attack the hard, influential underperformer first—multiplication effect matters.
  
  
• Hold leaders to duplicating the best customer experience every time.
  
  
• Use data to calibrate—but validate context so it doesn’t mislead.
  
  
• Cross-training keeps standards consistent and prevents comfort zones.
  
  
• Daily habits > occasional sprints; culture must reward improvement, not coasting.
  
  

Feel the dynamic energy of the Lewis Brothers as they deliver real stories and lessons that keep local businesses on their toes, and share how experiences in the community inspire them to keep on driving.

Check out all our great episodes at CrossroadConversationsPodcast.com!

Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
This is going to mind blow some of y'all when I
say this because I've only heardthe best of the best leaders
talk about this.
They say when times are reallygood and business is booming,
that's when I'm looking at myexpense accounts and trying to
cut expenses.
That's when I'm looking at wherecan I cut the fat on the

(00:20):
advertising, the marketing, notpeople, but the advertising and
the marketing.
Where most leaders, when thingsare rolling, they're like, man,
we're doing all the business.
Don't sweat that stuff.
And they get very complacent inthat area.
Instead, the best of the bestgo, where can we shave?
Where are we overspending?
And then when business is goingdown, they actually go, where

(00:43):
else could we spend more moneyto generate opportunity?

SPEAKER_02 (00:50):
Hey everyone, welcome to Crossroads
Conversations with the Lewisbrothers, where we aim to share
real stories about running asuccessful family business,
working through adversity, andpouring back into the community
that keeps our doors open.
We're your hosts, Taylor Matt,and Shelby, and we'll bring you
relevant local business adviceand automotive insights that are
sure to change the way you lookat running a business and maybe

(01:11):
throw in a plug for you to dobusiness with us.
Welcome to Lewis BrothersCrossroad Conversation, Epirode
Epipher.
Epiro, episode 56, where we'retalking about the slow death of
success, how to spot complacencybefore it's too late.
Most businesses don't failbecause of one huge mistake.

(01:32):
They fail because ofcomplacency.
They stopped paying attention,they stopped adapting.
They do.

SPEAKER_01 (01:39):
And I'm just going to tell you this is one don't
cut out early for because we'regoing to start talking about
complacency.
And a lot of times it's harderto identify while you're getting
into it, but easy to identifyonce it's happened.
Our goal today is to bring yousome tips on how to identify
that early on before it gets toofar down the tracks.

SPEAKER_04 (02:02):
Yeah.
Complacency.
Let me break this down realquick.
Okay.
Definition a feeling of smug oruncritical satisfaction with
oneself or one's achievements.
That's real.
That's what we're talking about.
That is what we're talking aboutfor sure.
So hopefully you understandwe're talking complacency and
how it creeps in, what's goingon.

(02:23):
And that's today's episode.

SPEAKER_01 (02:25):
Before we go farther than that, I just do need to
recap last week, episode 55,innovation versus tradition,
finding the balance.
And I gotta say, it's hard toargue whether we have the
credentials to go over that ornot, because we've been in
business for 79 years.
And we've really gone throughthat the past couple years of

(02:46):
keeping true to our roots andour vision and mission, yet
making sure that we don't fallinto the trap of just because
we've done it for 79 years thisway means it's the right thing
to do going forward.
And I'll just give you just aquick tip and then you gotta
listen to the rest of theepisode.
But just because something gotyou to where you are right now
does not mean it'll get you towhere you want to go.

(03:09):
And we unpack that fully atepisode 55.
So make sure to check out thatepisode and many more.

SPEAKER_04 (03:14):
Yeah, and absolutely.
Make sure you always dive in.
Whether you're looking for acar, just want to browse, see
what's new, what's going on atLewis Superstore.com.
You can schedule your service,you can see the latest and
greatest deals and kind of seewhat's going on over a thousand
vehicles in stock.
And then pertaining to thepodcast, Crossroad Conversations
Podcast dot com.
Not too long, not too short.

(03:36):
Right in there.
That's where you can see thelatest and greatest episodes,
whether you want to watch them.
That's right.
If you've never watched this,it's a video.
You can see it on YouTube, youcan see it on Spotify, you can
see it anywhere that you getyour podcast, or you can listen
to it and you can subscribethere.
So every single week when itreleases Thursday at 10 a.m.,
you get the latest and greatest.

SPEAKER_02 (03:56):
Absolutely.
Talking about what's in thegarage today, I love this truck.
This is probably my go-to, go-tomost favorite truck.
It is the Ford Ranger, and it islike a mule.
It is the perfect hybrid sizethat people don't think about
because they always want anF-150 or a RAM or whatever it

(04:17):
would be, the truck that has itall.
Well, this truck has it all.
It tows probably more than yourfull-size truck does, has more
payload.
And guess what?
Because of its size andefficiency, it gets better gas
mileage than most small carsget.
And it's all in a truck.
And they start at a great pricepoint in the mid-30s, giving you
all full-size truckcapabilities.

(04:39):
And we have ranges of XLs thatget you in the door in that
mid-30s, all the way up to thecoveted Raptor Edition Ranger
that is full-blown Bahaw, bestbang for your buck off-road
vehicle that you will find barnone.
We have the best selection ofthose.

SPEAKER_04 (04:57):
It's no longer a tiny truck.
Yeah.
Right?
It's no longer, and I lovedthem.
We grew up in them of the seatsthat folded down sideways in the
bonus cab, right?
It was perfect size when youwere a kid.
Uh, but now it's uh it's afull-size, mid-size truck.

SPEAKER_00 (05:13):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (05:14):
And so you're four doors, five passenger, the
technology is amazing, thepower, eco-boost, three
different engines there.
Uh it toasts 7,500 pounds.

SPEAKER_01 (05:25):
And it, man, you hit on exactly, Shelby, what I was
gonna hit on, and I was justgonna take people down memory
lane.
Is you can talk to aboutanybody, and you can say, hey,
by chance, was one of your firstvehicles a Ranger?
And how many people?
Or one of their buddies theyrode around with, it was a Ford
Ranger.
And you're like, man, that wassuch a great truck.
It was dependable, it was tough.
So you take like the roots ofthat, and then you take what

(05:46):
Shelby talked about is it's nowit's an actual crew cab and it
has all the technology, has morepower, can tow more, but still
has the dependability and thetoughness that the ranger came
from.
It it's really you brought agood one today.

SPEAKER_02 (05:59):
Yeah, I I love that truck.
It uh has a lot of value in itfrom all different aspects.

SPEAKER_01 (06:05):
So complacency.
What complacency looks like inleadership?
And Shelby, I'll ask you againfor that definition so we can
remind everybody, but whatcomplacency looks like in
leadership?
And let's start at the rootagain.
Tell them the definition ofcomplacency.

SPEAKER_04 (06:26):
Satisfaction within oneself or one's achievements.

SPEAKER_01 (06:30):
Now, you know what the slippery slope is here is
usually complacency does nothappen necessarily to
underachievers.
And so where it comes into placeis for those that have had some
success or even a lot ofsuccess, and usually that's a
type A personality that's a verydriven person.

(06:53):
That's why we're talking to youabout this.
It's entrepreneurs that havehustled and have gotten after it
and have built a business ortheir book a business or their
awareness and they've gotten toa certain level.
Some people call it plateauing,um, but we're calling it
complacency, where you're like,you know, I'm doing pretty good.
I've worked really hard at this.

(07:13):
That's the tough part where itcreeps in.
If you've had all this successand then all of a sudden it's on
cruise control, but it's not,because we talked about it
before.
You're either getting better oryou're getting worse.
Never staying the same.
They're like, hang on, how doyou never stay the same?
Here's why.
Because the outside peoplearound you, your competition,

(07:34):
they're coming for you.
So as they erode at your marketshare, you may be doing the same
thing, but the results aredifferent.
And that's why it's soimportant.
And I wanted to break that downas some people think
complacency, well, those arejust the people that haven't
been successful.
That's not true.
We all can slip in, and we'veall slipped into that too of
getting to a level of success inan area, and then just kind of

(07:57):
like, okay, whether it's okay,this is good over here, let me
go work on another area, or I'vegot some other things going on.
And then slowly it happens.
You slip into that, and marketshares, goals are missed,
improvements start going down,so on and so forth.
What's your initial thoughts?

SPEAKER_04 (08:13):
You know, initial thought, you talk about that of
uh achievers, overachievers.
Probably a quick example, and Idon't know if you would directly
call it complacency because it'spast the earning point, but it's
if you look at someone who'sbeen an entrepreneur or a leader
or a manager and they go toretire, they don't want to just
retire and do nothing.

(08:34):
Oh yeah.
Because they feel like they'rebecoming complacent or lazy or
non-productive and just theirwhole life they've been
hustling.
And so they have to figure outsomething to task themselves to
keep going, whether it's a hobbyor it's a I start consulting, or
something where they don't feellike they're completely tied

(08:56):
down to the schedule, but itstill allows their mind to stay
in the I'm productive because II've felt complacency before and
I don't want that, even inretirement.

SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
But but that really doesn't happen overnight.
No, like it's slowly, like allof a sudden, you're like, okay,
because you either take youryour foot off the pedal or you
know, you delegate to others,which is great.
Yeah, you know, and then you seesome success happens, so then
you go work on another area ordo whatever else, you know, that
you've earned the right to do,but then slowly it slips in

(09:28):
there.
What what what are yourthoughts, Taylor?

SPEAKER_02 (09:31):
You hit the nail on the head, and I I see it more so
whenever we've pushed so hard toget to a goal in the store, and
we're doing all the rightthings.
And because we're doing all theright things and we're pushing
all the right, it becomes easybecause the machine is just
rolling the way it needs to andhas to be tuned up every now and

(09:54):
then, but it keeps movingforward.
So more times than not, I'll seemyself, other managers in the
department, that it's hey,you're not doing what you used
to do.
You're not going and talking toyour team the way that you need
to that got us to where we are.
Because just as fast it doeshappen slowly, it's not abrupt,

(10:14):
like you pulled the emergencybrake, but just as fast it can
start going the other way ifyou're not maintaining.
No different than your car ifyou're not taking care of
changing the oil on it and youkeep driving, it's gonna start
slowing down.

SPEAKER_01 (10:28):
No, no, it it will.
It will go the other way.
Here's another definition whenwe go through leaders that fall
into complacency.
Here's what they say a leaderthat falls into complacency by
becoming satisfied, think aboutthat, satisfied with the status
quo, losing their drive forinnovation and growth, and

(10:49):
failing to challenge themselvesor their team.
And I'm gonna take us down aroad here for a second so we can
kind of relate.
Let's take before when we werein the old buildings.
There was a level of complacencythat got there that we grew the
business and we're like, we'vegrown it.
Yeah, could we squeeze out one,two, five more souls or a couple

(11:12):
more oil changes?
Maybe so, but we're constrainedby the building or the traffic
or the accessibility or who itrecruited.
And it was, it was multipletimes where then we had to talk
and go, oh no, hang on, what canwe do with the situation we're
in versus falling into thatcomplacency?

SPEAKER_04 (11:30):
Yeah, there's plenty of doubt or reason to say you're
fine with where you're at.
Uh-huh.
You know, you're talking aboutinfrastructure complacency or
staff capability uh complacency,but there's plenty of reasons
because when you're at the topor when you're in the area to
say, hey, I'm not in the dailyoperation, so you see it from a

(11:53):
higher view, and you're saying,hey, I see a hole there.
Offensive coordinator says, Hey,that right guard, he's not
catching that inside linebacker.
He's gonna let him through.
I can see it.
And so then when you do that,the right guard's like, I'm
swamped.
Yeah.
I'm having to pick up the insideguy, and sometimes the outside
lineman is coming his way in,and he's like, No, the center's

(12:15):
picking him up, the tackle'spicking him up.
And so when you do that, thenyour team's gonna give you
feedback.
And newsflash for you, it's veryrarely positive.
It's gonna be negative feedback,and they're gonna say, hey,
here's what I'm seeing, here'swhat I'm seeing.
It's like one of our shopefficiency reports that shows X
amount of bays versus X amountof text versus eight hours a

(12:36):
day.
Here's the amount of hours thatwe should be able to generate
out of our shop.
But then if you see that on anExcel spreadsheet or in a
document or a report, but thenyou go out in the shop and
you're like, well, this text'sgot three different bays with
cars in them, tore down.
You're like, hey, who's workingon those three?
It's like Larry, Larry, andLarry.
It's like, is Larry turningeight, sixteen, twenty-four

(12:59):
hours today?
Yeah.
He's like, no, he's turning 16.
We keep five, five, and tellhim, good job.
Like, well, you're down eighthours.
You know, so a lot of times, uhit's the negative feedback that
if you can't take that and say,I hear you, I understand that.
Let me look and show you from adifferent lens of where there's
opportunity.
So in old building, there mighthave been, well, that's where he

(13:21):
always parks, or that's why he'salways done that, or that's the
only schedule he can work.
Yep.
There are some otheropportunities.
But it easily happens that ifyou just take that, like, okay,
I get it.
I just wanted to see if therewas opportunity.
Maybe you could pick up thatinside linebacker, and you just
take it for Grouchy is gonna begrouchy, then you're gonna get
complacent sleeve.

SPEAKER_01 (13:42):
You've heard us talk about uh the different groups
we're in and the differentpeople outside of our
organization that have helped usgrow, that have helped us
identify opportunities.
And some of them haven't evendirectly said that to us.
No, but you sit and you look atwhat they're doing and you get
your mind going.
Hang, are we doing that?

(14:02):
Are we in the same stuck rut?
Um, and no matter what industryyou're in out there, there's
plenty of associations you canget involved with, even if it's
just a chamber association or ifit's a state association.
Almost every single businessneeds some type of affiliation
or license, and they have groupsor a national group.
I just I encourage you to getaround those people.

(14:23):
And especially if you can getaround like-minded people in the
same industry, but they're notin your trade area, they're a
lot more likely to be able toshare ideas.
And that's the only way we'reable to identify what you just
said, because you're you're farenough up.
There's a reason when we're infootball season, you talked
about offensive coordinator.
There's a reason most offensivecoordinators are up in the press

(14:46):
box.
They're not down at the field.
And I don't know if you guysknew that or not, but head coach
is down there.
Offensive coordinator hasremoved himself from all the
noise going on.
Okay?
He doesn't want to hear theexcuses from the tackle or the
guard or the snap or thequarterback or the receiver.
He wants to see it from a highlevel up where he can quiet the

(15:06):
noise and see the opportunitiesthen to fix.
And then he'll relay down toanother coach to help him or
talk in the quarterback's ear onwhat adjustments need to be
made.
But he's got a clear mind so hecan see that.

SPEAKER_02 (15:18):
You know, and I was thinking about this as we talked
and previously since we movedover here, and I love this.
This will all make sensewhenever I say it.
But, you know, previously,whenever we were at the old
location and complacency wouldcome into effect, we always used
to do these things of off-sitesales and everything at
different, and there aredifferent rules and regulations

(15:38):
of manufacturers of where youcould have vehicles and here and
there.
But I feel like we always didthat to a point that where if
you were back gauging thesituation, you're like, hey,
it's time to insert Ether.
We got to get this going.
It's this time of year.
Because somebody asked me today,like, well, you don't ever do
that anymore.
I said, we have it every singleday because the way we built

(16:00):
this location is all together,and we can do tense events,
whatever we want to do, like wewould always do off-site sales.
So it's so important of youranalogy, like of an offensive
coordinator, stepping back tosee, hey, yeah, there's a hole
there.
We got to insert ourselves andmove forward.
So that's been really fun ofseeing it evolve into this

(16:22):
location of, hey, we don't haveto do the other because we built
it into our process every year.

SPEAKER_01 (16:28):
I think that's that that's so good.
You know, so y'all talked abouta few dealership examples on how
relying on one sales process,service process, or or marketing
way or whatever it may be, andand it's easy then to start
blaming it on that.
Well, the marketing's notworking.
Well, the ad campaign didn'twork.
Well, there's not as many peopleon the lot.

(16:49):
That's a sign of complacency aswell.

SPEAKER_04 (16:50):
Yeah, you can easily blame it on certain people or
certain lead sources, but thatjust allows you for opportunity.
And I'll tell you, when you weretalking about outside sources,
and sometimes it's from thepeople, and sometimes it's just
being around the people and yourmind being clear, no different
than the offensive coordinator.
I remember, and we we looked atthis every once in a while, not

(17:11):
with like a magnifying glass,was like, man, that's an
expense.
Man, that's an expense.
I remember sitting and lookingat our credit card expenses and
pulling reports and pullingreports and pulling reports, and
we looked and it was over$14million worth of transactions.
And so we were looking at thefees that we were absorbing and

(17:34):
chalking it up to a cost ofbusiness.
And so then I was like, okay,this is the next project, you
know, to dive into and to seelike, okay, if if revenue stays
the same, and if productionstays the same and expenses
continue to grow, that's not asustainable model.
Sure.
Right?
And hiring more people, expensescontinue to go up.
And sure, you gain a little bitof revenue, uh, but so I I start

(17:58):
looking at that and researchingwhat everyone else is doing.
And it just happens to be thatI'm I'm at a 20 group, and so
I'm I'm not here.
And we were walking through thetown that afternoon, and uh
someone bought a shirt and theyasked me, cash or card.
I said, No card.
And so they said, You want areceipt?
And I said, No, I don't need areceipt, you know.

(18:19):
I don't I'm not coming back,don't plan on returning it, try
it on.
And so then I just paid for it.
Then I said, Hey, was was therea surcharge on that?
And I said, Yeah, it's a 3%surcharge because your payment
card is okay, perfect, thankyou.
Then we got something to eat at,like a food trailer or
something, and said, cash yourcard.
And I said, Card.
Pulled out my phone and tapped apaid.

(18:40):
And then I happened to get atext receipt and I see 3%
surcharge.
So then I keep looking, I keeplooking, and we've talked about
this for a while.
And so it equated to a littleover$350,000 of dead expense.
Yep.
Dead expense that if you know inour business world, if you take

(19:00):
what your net profit is, I'mtalking about after you paid
everything and do thiscalculation of whatever
percentage that is, it wouldblow your mind if you knew how
low it was.
And took that and calculatedwhat it takes to earn back
$350,000.
It is an astronomical, it'smillions of dollars.
Um, and so I started looking atit, started looking at it.

(19:22):
You know, I don't I don't haveto be the pioneer, but I don't
want to be the skeleton.
Sure.
Right?
Uh and so we look at that andsay, hey, what can we do?
So we go with our current creditcard company, then we look at
other credit card companies.
So we ended up now we have cashdiscounted our services that if
you pay with cash, if you paywith a check, if you're on one

(19:43):
of our ARs, you get that benefitof that discount.
Absolutely.
But if you're paying with acard, like majority of the world
is, it's a convenience factor.
And that fee then transfers toyou.
And we got so much pushbackbecause it was changed.
Yep.
And I said, hey, when you driveby the gas station, look at the

(20:03):
marquee.
Just park and look at themarquee.
It's 10 cents per gallon that itchanges.
When you buy ice cream, when youbuy dog food, when you buy, and
they're like, oh yeah, I didn'tknow.

SPEAKER_01 (20:12):
But what about the government?
What about when you go to theDMV or you go to pay personal
property?

SPEAKER_04 (20:16):
They make me feel silly for using a card.
Yeah.
News flash, majority of thepeople are earning 5% plus plus
by using their credit.
They don't care.
They don't care.
It's your convenience of beingable to pay it and roll on from
there.

unknown (20:29):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (20:30):
What's your calculation?

SPEAKER_01 (20:31):
Well, I first want to teach them the calculation,
okay?
Because this is this is businesstalk, okay?
So if you don't know thiscalculation, just I don't know,
earmark it or something, becausehopefully you're driving or
running, and then you can writeit down later.
If you ever want to know howmuch it you have to generate in
revenue to cover an expense,most people think if I've got

(20:52):
$100 I spend, I just need tomake a hundred dollars.
Make a hundred dollars.
That's okay, that that'selementary math.
That's not correct.
So what you do is you take yourPL or you take your income
statement and you look at thevery bottom.
What is your percentage of netprofit before tax?
What is your percentage of netprofit?
You take that percentage, and ifyour expense was$10,000, I want

(21:16):
to spend on this item, okay?
You take$10,000 and you dividethat by the percentage, and it
will give you the amount ofrevenue you have to generate,
not profit, but revenue you haveto generate to cover that
expense.
So for example, your calculationon the$350,000 that we were
spending in credit card fees.

(21:38):
Credit card fees, we would haveto generate in our business,
because we have a very lowmargin business, high-ticket
items, low margin, we would haveto generate$10 million in
revenue.
Told you it was a lot.
$10 million in revenue to coverthe$350,000.
And I hope if you don't knowthat calculation before you neck

(21:58):
make your next uh decision onspending money.

SPEAKER_04 (22:01):
What do you buy pizza for the crew again?

SPEAKER_01 (22:03):
You know, and some of the expenses are necessary,
but stop thinking.
And I'll tell you the othercommon mistake, and I'm getting
on a tangent here, but the othercommon mistake most people make
is they say, well, my grossprofit, my margin is 35% or 30%.
That that's variable gross,selling gross before you take in
any expense.
Paying somebody, payingutilities, paying benefits, pay

(22:26):
for the building, payingyourself.
Bottom line.
That's why you got to get to thebottom line.
You use that as the percentageto divide into.

SPEAKER_04 (22:33):
But let me tell you this that of 270 employees, I
didn't hear one person high-fiveme and say that's a great idea.
They're not going to be able todo that.
And a lot of people are paidafter some expenses.
So had I taken their advice, Ijust had to properly, properly
everyone train, understand, showthem how this thing makes sense
and how this is what the rest ofthe world does.

(22:55):
But if I stayed complacent, I'dbe I would just be absorbing it,
trying to be the nice guy.
And once again, I would stillnever get a high five for like,
man, Shelby, I appreciate youguys doing good business and not
charging me for this.
So I wasn't gonna get dang ifyou do, dang if you don't.
So might as well make it makesense.
So we continued to, I mean, wesponsored 10 more teams last

(23:16):
week.
Exactly.
10 more local jerseys andfields, and went out to for this
cheerleading program and uhhelped out this academy.

SPEAKER_02 (23:25):
By you making that small, very large decision that
you did a lot of research, butvery small in other people's
mind that they don't know,allows your business, allowed us
to be able to pour back moreinto the company.

SPEAKER_01 (23:37):
Which then generates more opportunities for our
service advisors, oursalespeople, our business.
So by not being complacent, butthe only way you were able to do
that is step outside of thebusiness, clear mind, hear from
others.
Because if you just guys don'tever don't ever go ask your
employees what they think aboutsomething like that.

SPEAKER_04 (23:59):
Especially if it has anything to do with their pay or
income or anyone around them.
Yeah.
Because they will give you verybiased opinions.

SPEAKER_01 (24:08):
It it will.
Because it, like you said,they're not gonna thank you for
absorbing it.
They're not gonna thank you forfor charging it.
Now, what I'm not saying isdon't ever go ask your employee
for any feedback.
You know, if we're talking aboutemployee benefits, if we're
talking about events to do, ifwe're talking about this, that,
don't mess up what I'm sayinghere.
But that that's a great example,Shelby, of where if you had not

(24:31):
stepped outside the business,got around others, doesn't have
to be like industries.
You didn't say the dealershipsyou went to to see what is going
on and just not becomecomplacent of it's a cost of
doing business.
How many people say that?
It's just it is what it is, it'sa cost of doing business.
Yeah sometimes that's the case,but not always.
Yeah.
But not always.

(24:52):
Any other takeaways on that?

SPEAKER_02 (24:54):
No, always adapting change.
I love this yesterday when wetalk about stats and data, and
you'll always dive into data.
You like data, but I love ofyesterday of not being
complacent with the times ofgoing on.
As your year changes, yourbusiness changes of when it
comes in, when it's different.
And we talked about thisyesterday of how this time of

(25:15):
year of fall, our busy day froma Saturday and Monday switches
to midweek because if you're aparent and you're listening on
Saturdays, you are booked, solidwith things going on.
So everyone in the industrysays, hey, things are slower,
everything else.
Well, you pull the data, and Ilove this yesterday.
And I went over in the meeting,I said, There are over 400

(25:35):
opportunities of people in herethat wanted to do business, and
changing to the middle of theweek made all the difference in
the world.
So you have to be able to stepback, whatever it is, step back
and see a change of that is sosmall that amounts to so much,
and then don't let your ears beflooded with, hey, everything's

(25:56):
bad.
This is there, this day isn'tworking anymore.
Step back, make the adapt,change, and move forward.

SPEAKER_01 (26:04):
You've got, I just, this is my biggest encouragement
here.
You've got to get aroundlike-minded people that are
willing to share with you.
That's the great thing aboutAmerica, though, is the amount,
you know, there's way more smallbusinesses out there than
anything else.
And it's the lifeblood of theeconomy in America.
And and those people they'vebeen in the trenches with you,

(26:25):
they want to share information.
They do.
You got it now, you need toshare with them first.
You gotta be the first one togo, hey, here's what I've
learned here.
What have you learned?
You get around those people andit'll keep moving your business
forward.
And then don't forget about thedata.
The data, it's not the end-allbe-all, but it sure as heck fire
cuts through the emotions toshow where opportunities are.

(26:48):
It really does.

SPEAKER_04 (26:49):
No doubt about that.
All right, automotive fun factquiz of the week.
Ooh.
What year did the airbags, notthis, yeah, but the airbag first
become standard in cars sold inthe U.S.?
1984, 1990, 1998, or 2005.

SPEAKER_01 (27:09):
No way it was an 84 or 90.
I'm just saying, because I canremember growing up in the mom
airbag.
Whoosh.
Just like you said.

SPEAKER_05 (27:17):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 (27:17):
You know what I mean?
You know where I think that thatcame from?
That came from before you hadthe diagonal belt coming down.
When it was just your belt andyou could hinge like.
Yeah.
So somehow mom's arm became likea steel post.
Whacked you straight up.
Holding you right there.
You know, holding onto thesteering wheel at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 (27:37):
Yeah, people.
I would have gotten this wrongbecause my my car that's an 88,
it has an airbag.
Maybe.

SPEAKER_04 (27:44):
Yeah, so I guess that's the difference.
First became standard standard.

SPEAKER_02 (27:48):
It's like regulatory.

SPEAKER_04 (27:49):
There was innovators.
Yeah, it's kind of like thebackup camera.
Yeah.
Uh, when they said you have tohave it.
There were people that had itbefore.
Um, so when it became standard,the correct answer is 1998.

SPEAKER_05 (28:00):
Okay.

SPEAKER_04 (28:01):
It took decades for the auto industry to make
airbags standard.
I'm sure they had a lot ofpushback for expenses, so forth,
even though the technologyexisted long before.
Why?
Because they were complacent andresistant to change.

SPEAKER_01 (28:16):
So were people about the seat belts.
You know, so that this is aperfect subject to talk about.
Yeah, if you go back to the samething there.
It's like, can you imagine howmany people were complaining
when they said you can't smokeon the airplanes anymore?

SPEAKER_04 (28:30):
You'd like that one better than the series.

SPEAKER_01 (28:31):
Well, it it's in my rights and it's blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah.
Well, hang on.
Hang on.

SPEAKER_02 (28:36):
Imagine sitting on one of those small planes.
Oh, Lord.
It can be done the goods ready.
Someone has right next to acouple of years.
And they're just ashing on you.
Just ashing on you.
Like, I'd rather walk.
I'd go sit.

SPEAKER_01 (28:51):
I'd rather sit in the bathroom.

SPEAKER_02 (28:53):
You ever sit in the Hotel Transylvania when the
gremlin jams his head out thewindow?

SPEAKER_01 (28:58):
That would be me flying down the I think my point
in that, and whether it's theseatbelts, because you know how
many people complain, well, it'smy right to whether a seatbelt
or not.
It's just changed.
And it's been the same, andeverybody says it's because of
social media these days.
That's always gone on.
Anytime there's change and youmove somebody's cheese, and we
talked about the book, it's agreat one to read.

(29:19):
You gotta be willing to put youremotions down and go, okay, this
changes for the better.
Yeah.
I think the airbag's gonna giveme a black eye, but it's the
same a lot.

SPEAKER_04 (29:28):
Yeah, what's the dash gonna do?

SPEAKER_01 (29:30):
You know what I mean?
Give me the black eye.
Yeah, bust my nose, but save mybrain.

SPEAKER_02 (29:35):
You know what I mean?
That's when they integrated thegood seat belts that were like
on the escort that turned on thetrack.
Oh, yeah, automatically.
That's what they had first.

SPEAKER_01 (29:44):
Whether you like it or not, it's coming back.
So to get people to change, thisis a good one.
But to get people to change inthe EXP and the tempo growing
up, it had it had the belt, thediagonal belt that when you
close the door went just.
And straight across, you have anyou're in.

SPEAKER_04 (30:05):
But sometimes you gotta do that.

SPEAKER_01 (30:06):
Sometimes you gotta force you into it.

SPEAKER_04 (30:08):
You gotta force things into it.

SPEAKER_01 (30:10):
If you know what's good for you.

SPEAKER_04 (30:11):
If you don't charge them the 3%, I'm charging you
the 3%, right?
Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 (30:16):
Okay.
Hopefully that made sense tosomebody.
Tune back in.

SPEAKER_04 (30:20):
Chord number two, how complacency creeps into
teams.
So not just from the leaders.
Yep.
Not just from the top.
From the press box of theoffensive coordinator all the
way down to the field, to thesnapper, to the quarterback, to
the kicker, to the tackle, tothe water boy.
Signs.
Staff stop offering new ideas.

(30:42):
This is a tricky catch 22.
Good enough becomes the norm.
Okay.
And morale drops when there's nochallenge.

SPEAKER_01 (30:50):
Yep.

SPEAKER_04 (30:51):
What's your thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 (30:53):
So I'm going to give you some identifiers here on how
to figure out when complacencyis starting to creep in.
And every one of your businesseshas this, whether you think you
do or not.
And you may have heard me talkabout this the meeting after the
meeting.
So they always happen.
Okay.
You can't stop them fromhappening.
The meeting after the meeting iswhen management or middle level

(31:14):
management or shift leaders havehad a meeting with the team.
The meeting's over, and thenteam members huddle up outside
on their smoke break or walk inthe lot or whatever else they're
doing.
They dissect what was gone overduring the meeting to then talk
about it and go, are we actuallygoing to do that?
Are they going to follow throughthis time?

(31:34):
What did y'all think about that?
So a lot of times complacencywill start creeping in by core
catalyst and influencers withinyour business.
And I'm gonna I'm gonna tell youa quick story about this.
So when I first got back intothe business, um, I was in my
young 20s as a sales manager,GSM and mid-20s.

(31:57):
And at that point in time, GSMis over the sales managers, the
salespeople, and the financemanagers.
I didn't have a singlesalesperson on staff that was
younger than me.
Everybody was older.
In fact, most of the veteransalespeople had been in sales as
long as I am old.

(32:18):
Okay?
That that's a tough situationbecause they're like, what are
you gonna teach me about sales?
You know, I started selling whenyou were in diapers and blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,blah.
So what you have to do to notlet that complacency or that
negative talk come in, youbetter go after the catalyst.
Now, the catalysts are notusually your top performers.

(32:40):
Now, I had one, his name wasTommy.
I'm not gonna tell you his lastname.
Okay, not my uncle Tommy, buthis name was Tommy.
And when it when I got there,Tommy was the only one that had
an office upstairs at the Fordbuilding.
All the rest of the salespeoplehad an office downstairs.
Tommy was the only one that hada cost sheet.
Y'all know our process on costsheets.
There's the cost is irrelevant.

(33:01):
He had a process sheet.
So the only way I could get, andTommy was the, he headed up the
meeting after the meeting.
The only way that I could squashthat was to get Tommy on my
team.

SPEAKER_02 (33:11):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 (33:11):
So it was my goal to help Tommy be more successful
than he had ever been.
What I did for him is I helpedhim get paperwork together.
I helped him get his car washed,blah, blah, blah.
Not his personal one, but theones we were selling.
So he became more efficient.
He sold more cars, made moremoney.
Once I proved myself to himthere, then he allowed me to get
in.
And I'll land this plane.
But once he allowed me to getin, then I was able to start

(33:34):
turning the ship of the personleading the meeting after the
meeting and squash thecomplacency that was going on in
the teams.

SPEAKER_04 (33:42):
I think it's super important to realize how you
turn the ship.
So if you realize that teammembers are getting comfortable,
they're not it's funny becauseit's their money, but it's not
funny.
But uh they'll be okay withselling a few less and a few
less and a few less, which meansthey make a little less and a

(34:04):
little less and less.
And in the end, they will blamesolely on you, not on them.
Uh, but they'll be okay with it.
And their activities willcontinue to dwindle down, and
their lack of try or hustle willstart to dwindle down.
And so seven times out of ten intoday's industry, and it's
funny, we just came back from afour-dealer meeting um three

(34:28):
weeks ago, and I was on theshuttle bus to the airport, and
I heard a general manager behindme on the phone, and he was one
of the three, or one of theseven out of the ten.
And he was talking to a guyphone, he's like, How's business
today?
And it was like 7 a.m.
Maybe they're on the East Coastand they were already going, but
uh, this is gone.

(34:49):
And he was like, Tell thoseMFers, I saw their stats
yesterday, and they're gonnahave to get their blankety
blanks out of the chair.
He said, I'm on my way home andI ain't coming in today.
I was like, Yeah, I can tell.
But when I show up Thursday,they better have their blank

(35:09):
blank in gear.
He's like, tell them they can'tsit in their chairs today.
They gotta get out there andfind a car deal and make a car
deal.
I don't care what they have todo.
This was his pump-upconversation.
It was way before seven.
I don't know why I said that.
I know it was like five, and somaybe it was seven there.
Yeah.
I was like, dang.
And he was just like, and sothen he continued to talk to the

(35:32):
guy like, hey, so man, what youwhat are you doing this weekend?
Like maybe this was his GSM hewas talking to, or maybe this
guy was the dealer principal orthe owner, and he was talking to
the GM.
One of the two.
And then he was like, he wastalking to him about the dogs
and you know what's going on andwhere they're going for this
weekend, like so, which meansthey were used to it, right?
Oh, yeah.
That it wasn't like somethingoverly earth chattering.

(35:53):
So then he was like, No, I'mserious, round them up right
now.
He's like, get on thatspeakerphone, page them, and get
them all in there.
I want everybody.
He said, And you wear theirblank blank out.

SPEAKER_01 (36:04):
And he just got and I was like, oh my gosh.
Their team is not, I mean, I canalready tell you they're not
gonna have a good day.

SPEAKER_04 (36:11):
No, like, and so what it means is by the end of
it, the customer, they're gonnabe like, Look here, Jimmy, you
ain't leaving without a car.
Saddle in chewed my ear off,right?
And threatened me that I wasgonna lose my job if I don't
sell a car today.
You're gonna take a car hometoday.
So CSI out the window.
I was gonna say, so even if hedid take the car, then on Friday

(36:32):
a bad survey comes in.

SPEAKER_01 (36:34):
And then it's in another meeting.
The whole thing again.

SPEAKER_04 (36:37):
So what you said is because how we were taught, and
I don't know if you guys haveever held this rule, but treat
others the way you would like tobe treated.
I don't know anyone that raisedtheir hand and says, hey, just
just dog cuss the fire out ofme.
Just threaten me.
But a lot of people, seven outof ten leaders, will lead that
way, and they think intimidationis gonna rise people out of
complacency.

(36:58):
Not gonna happen.
You can do it completelybackwards.
Matt had to completely get inwith the in-person, the snitch,
or the person that leads themeetings and convince them.
And we have to do that everysingle day.
It's like, hey, can I help youmake a couple phone calls?
I realize you're so busy.
So why how about I make one, youmake one, I make one, you make
one, I make one.

(37:19):
And so then you're settingappointments for this guy.
And so then slowly that creepsthe productivity up.
And then you just said, hey, youare underperforming, and I want
to help you perform at themetric you're able to perform
at.
Sure.
And then they're like, man, lookat Steve.
He's getting all the cheese.
The boss is sitting over therehelping me making phone calls.
He's like, no, he was helping methis, this, and this.

(37:40):
He realized I was behind alittle bit and helped me cut up.
He's coming to you next.
And then they just run.
But there's a complete differentway to do it, and it's very rare
that somebody does it that way.
And you get a whole lot morerespect.
And I think the the shout or themotion lasts so much longer.

SPEAKER_01 (37:56):
I was gonna say, and the reason I picked Tommy
because he was the loudest, mostinfluential.
He was the hardest one.
So, so a couple mistakes thatleaders make.
Couple mistakes.
Number one, they go after theeasy ones to influence.
Those are the ones that startedthe same day you did.
But they have zero influenceover the rest of the team.

(38:17):
Yep.
So everybody else is just gonnashoo-shoo them.
You gotta go after the hardones.
And then number two, what a lotof people what you didn't hear
me say is I took him to lunchevery single day.
I invited him over to my house.
I did this, I buddy buddied him.
No, I was nice to him,respectful to him, but what he
really cares about is how muchdo you care about me hitting my

(38:38):
goals?
And so that's that's what it wasafter.
So as a as a leader, don'tmanage by by threatening, okay?
Don't manage by buddy buddying,okay?
And and don't go after theweakest person so you can feel
like you're accomplished.
Go after the toughest one andhelp them become more

(38:58):
successful.
Because what do you think therest of the team said when
Tommy's like, man, I wasreluctant that I gave this dude
a shot.
I thought he was just in theposition because his last name
was Lewis and because his familyowned the business, but I've
never made so much money.
What'd the rest of the teamstart doing?

SPEAKER_05 (39:14):
Listen, it was an easy end.

SPEAKER_01 (39:16):
The multiplication factor we talk about about
delegating, that same thinghappened right there.
That same thing happened.

SPEAKER_02 (39:21):
You just hit the nail on the head, and I don't
know that everyone reallyunderstands how much that ties
back into previous episodes ofreal deal leading, proving
you're supposed to be in thatposition.
And I love it because dad taughtit to you.
You taught it to Shelby.
Shelby's taught it to me, andI've learned in there, and you

(39:43):
can see it through our wholemanaging.
Could you have walked in becauseof who you were and said
whatever you wanted to and madethat guy sit down and do?
Yeah, absolutely.
You could, and people think youcould have done that, but that
wasn't taught to you that way.
And in turn, and this is foranyone listening out there that

(40:04):
has come up as a secondgeneration or anything else, do
yourself a favor and act likeyou're on the chopping block and
you got to prove yourself daily.
And so many times we'll have newemployees come in and like, why
are you doing that?
Why why are you going out ofyour way to do that?
Why are you helping them thatway?

(40:24):
It's because being taught frombrother to brother, from dad,
and going through of it's somuch more effective.
Whenever you'll take the time,show them your work, show them
you care that they'resuccessful.
Not necessarily that you'resuccessful and hey, I've got to
make a name for myself, but thatyou're successful and you're

(40:46):
gonna help them move forward.

SPEAKER_01 (40:48):
Uh, this is a quote from Theod Roosevelt, okay?
And I really like this one.
He said, employees do not carehow much you know until they
know how much you care.
I love it.
You know, employees do not careabout how much you know until
they know how much you care.

SPEAKER_04 (41:03):
Which is not a telling, that's a showing.
Absolutely.
You know?
So thinking about that, youknow, oftentimes we tell
employees, bring us ideas, bringus ideas, bring us ideas.
And you have to be able toproperly let them down if it's
not a good idea.

SPEAKER_01 (41:19):
Sure.

SPEAKER_04 (41:20):
We you know, our our good buddy Wayne used to, he
was, he knew, he'd been likedropped in the bucket so many
times that he'd said, Hey, I'mjust gonna keep bringing you
ideas.
And if if you slowed down for asecond, listen to his ideas,
it'd be about 10 to 40 ideas atonce.
And so then you're just like,What in the world?
You kind of keep doing whatyou're doing, but you're

(41:41):
listening.
And then if something hit you'dsay, Well, hang on, say that
again, and you'd write it down.
Uh but he's like, Look, I knowI'm gonna say a whole lot, and
then like if I come acrosssomething good, then like we'll
roll with it.
But these are just on my mind.
But and he was okay that if likeone out of a thousand stuck and
Which was amazing.
Which was amazing, right?
Uh, some other people have areally hard time just bringing

(42:03):
you one thing.
And unfortunately, that onething is generally not gonna be
something that in that season orin the way that they pitch it is
not gonna be something you canimplement.
So you have to be able toproperly let them down and show
them an opportunity still forthem to be a part of a new idea
that necessarily wasn't theirsbecause otherwise they will be

(42:24):
complacent, like, I'm just gonnago back to what I was doing.

SPEAKER_01 (42:26):
That's such a good point, Shelby.
You bring up because like wewere used to Wayne and Wayne
understood what was going on,you know, very, you know, had
very wise and had a big trackrecord.
But you got to think about howmuch courage does it take for an
employee to come into youroffice or to give you an idea.
It takes a lot.

(42:47):
And and more than likely, theirfirst idea is not gonna be one
that hits it out of the park.
Nope.
But you you gotta slow down.
I gotta remind myself this too,because I run and gun wide open,
is the influence you have onothers, and you're either
encouraging or you're pushingsomebody down.
And that first time they bringyou something, even if you're

(43:08):
thinking in the back of yourmind, there's no way this will
work.
This is a stupid idea.
We've tried this a thousandtimes.
You still have to emotionallywalk them through it so it
encourages them because fivemore ideas down the road, it
could be something thatpivotally changes your business.

SPEAKER_04 (43:21):
And I'll tell you, there's a couple things that I
always do when someone brings mean idea or someone comes to me
wanting a raise.
Uh I will always task it back tothem.
Absolutely.
So they can see it through.
And generally, when they see itthrough, they'll realize it
doesn't have legs.

(43:42):
And and so hear what I saythere.
When they come to me with anidea or ask for a raise and they
have a specific thing for me, Iwill task back to them.
That's an idea.
Sure.
I think that's something worthchecking out.
Here's what I want you to do.
I want you to help me out.
And there's a delegation here,but there's also some
self-firing a little bit here.

(44:03):
So then they realize one, maybethey don't even have the
initiative to do it.
They just like to be the ideaperson.
And if it's a good idea, grab ahold and help it have legs.
Exactly.
But in order to allow them tofire their self from that idea,
say, hey, I want you to do alittle research, find three or
four different companies thatoffer that right now, even if
they're not in the automotiveindustries.

(44:23):
And I want you to do researchand see what they went through,
what works, what doesn't work,what the cost of that is, and
what the ROI is on that.
And if you'll do that and bringthat back to me, then we can go
from there.
Nine times out of ten, they'llnever bring it up again.

SPEAKER_01 (44:38):
And what that does is then it's on them.

SPEAKER_04 (44:43):
It sh it shows that you care.
Shows that you care.
And then it's on them becausethey let it fail.

SPEAKER_01 (44:48):
And then if they didn't bring it back to you,
they can't blame you.
You know, we do the same thing,and you know, we love sponsoring
teams and events and this andthat, but we get bombarded with
requests on that.
So it's like, how do younavigate through those waters?
Well, same thing.
If somebody just says, hey, Ineed$1,500 for the sponsorship

(45:09):
of this, so man, that soundslike a fantastic program.

Here's what I need you to do: get the details together for me, (45:11):
undefined
how long the season lasts, whereare y'all gonna play, how many
players will be there, averageof attendance, you know, all
those numbers, how this will beused, and then email that over
so then our board can take alook at it.

SPEAKER_04 (45:27):
You have to think about it like a shark tank
pitch.
You do.
Like you can't just like, well,he didn't like me, he didn't
give me$100,000 for 30%.
Like, no, you didn't bring anyrelevant information.

SPEAKER_01 (45:39):
What it also tells us, too, is even more than the
data that the sponsorship peopleare bringing back, what I care
more about is will they take thetime to do that?
Because if they won't take thetime to do that, how good of a
job are they gonna do promotingthat we were our sp their
sponsors?

SPEAKER_04 (45:54):
Yeah, if someone says, Man, I love your jerseys
this year, like they lookdifferent, and they're like, Oh,
thanks, man.
Lewis Automotive actuallystepped up and sponsored us this
year.
They're a local company, youshould check them out.
If they didn't bring you thatinformation back and you did
sponsor them, you were justlike, Yeah, I got an extra$1,500
this month, let's throw it atthem.
Then they'd be like, Hey, I loveyour jerseys.
Like, yeah, aren't they sweet?
Uh Rose jerseys down the roadmade them and they're legit.

SPEAKER_05 (46:17):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (46:17):
They would completely leave out the fact
because they're just not thatpeople.
And it's okay.
Like, they not all coaches ormarketeers are brand people,
right?
No way.
Or we can't sponsor them all.
So we're gonna pick the onesthat are.

SPEAKER_02 (46:31):
Yep.
Uh to you.
Hey, mythbuster time.
Myth, if it isn't broken, don'tfix it.

SPEAKER_01 (46:38):
So I I don't agree with that one.
Okay.
And here's why.
It's it's because what I startedthis off with is some of our
processes that got us to wherewe are were not broke.
But they don't line up withachieving where we're going,
which then they might as well bebroke.
So I think that's what to lookat is what you're doing, it may

(47:02):
not be broke, but is it alignedwith where you're trying to go?
Does it have the capacity?
Can it scale?
Does it line up with whereyou're going?
And if it doesn't, then you needto change it.

SPEAKER_04 (47:16):
So I I think that kind of goes with like the pace
and the speed that you are andthat you're going.
You know, your 200,000 mileToyota Corolla, you're probably
not going to take the engineapart and check the valve
clearance.
Yep.
You're not going to check thering gap.
You're not going to check thecylinder balls for scoring.
You're hopefully you're going tochange the oil, but that's just

(47:39):
your average everyday going toget around.
You're not generally going tohop in it and drive to
California.
You know, it's just, it justworks.
It's like the Ford Ranger.
Now, start looking inmotorsports of how they provide
a living for their family andhow they want to rank high.
They're tearing that engine downmultiple times through the
season.
In fact, top fuel dragsters thatdo zero to 300 in less than

(48:04):
three seconds in a quarter milepass, they tear the entire
engine apart in between everysingle pass.
So they are hyper inspecting.
Yes.
It ain't broken.
And they do break, right?
Yeah.
Uh, but they're inspecting everysingle time because they got a
lot on the line, a lot of peoplecounting on them.
So they're going to be way morediligent to inspect things and

(48:26):
fix it theoretically before it'sbroken.

SPEAKER_01 (48:29):
I got to relate this a little bit of now personal
life and habits.
Okay, because we just talkbusinesses in here.
But in all, guys, especiallysports overlap with business so
easy.
Um, when you first startrunning, okay, you're gonna get
around like-minded people thatare running or local groups or
people in your business,whatever it may be.
And you start off and you'relike, hey, I just gotta get

(48:50):
around some people that won'tdrop me.
I know you're really fast.
Okay, I'm gonna find somebodyelse.
And you're around the 10 to 11minute mile people.
Okay, that's not broke, but yourgoal is to be able to average a
seven-minute mile.
So, okay, you get comfortableand you can run that.
Well, then you might find thenext group up that runs that
eight to nine minute mile.

(49:11):
And then all of a sudden you getcomfortable there, and then you
got to go find the fasterpeople.
So none of those were broke,they just were all stepping
stones to be able to get towhere you're actually going.

SPEAKER_05 (49:21):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 (49:21):
You know, so I think that's the same in business.
It is.
You just got to align that up.
And are you challengingyourself?
And it aligns right up withcomplacency.

SPEAKER_02 (49:29):
So that's definitely busted.
By the time it's broken, it'stoo late.
Great leaders fix things beforeit breaks.
Okay, so we got that on right.
Yeah, yeah.
You're on it.
You're dead in, busted.
You hit it before I evenfinished, but I've gone through
there.
Hey, breaking out of complacencyas a business.
We've kind of talked about this,but using your practical tools
of diving into this.

(49:50):
So regularly auditing yourprocesses and results, looking
in, looking underneath the hoodbefore there's an issue with the
machine, the business, beforeit's throwing red flags up, um,
inviting outside perspectivesin.
Kind of what have y'allthoughts?
Um, examples of that, how youwould bring them to business?

SPEAKER_01 (50:11):
Yeah, I think you know, we're actively going
through this right now.
Uh, we we've been talking tomanagers about this is hey, our
processes right now, do theyscale where we can get way
beyond what we're selling rightnow?
Now, what do you say?
Yeah, we want to sell more.
Okay, are we duplicating thebest experience?

(50:31):
And the way I look at this is ifyou take your most raving fan,
the one that talked about thatthe sales process was so easy.
They gave me upfront pricing,the amount was there for my
trade, everything was there forme to make a decision.
They listened to me.
It was hassle-free.
There wasn't pain points, it'snot what I expected when I came
in here.
It was far better.
And I'll tell all my friends andfamily, how do you take that

(50:55):
situation, put a process inplace and scale it to sell 500,
600, 800, or a thousand cars?
That's what we're going through.
Because it seems like we're hitand miss on it.
Like if somebody's done businesswith us forever, that's the
case.
But you know, then when I remindthe guys is you take our
database of of of 40 to 80,000people, okay, 40,000, that's not

(51:18):
a drop in the bucket to 650,000.
So there's more people thathaven't experienced it with us.
But then there's this gap of howdo I get them to have the same
experience as somebody that'sbought three to five cars from
us?
And so that's we're activelygoing through that.

SPEAKER_04 (51:35):
I'll tell you another way that um that we are
able to audit process uh to getreal world, hey, how is it?
How's it working?
What's wrong, what's right, isall most of our staff is very
cross-trained uh from store tostore.
So all of our processesgenerally are the same, no
matter what store you're at.

(51:55):
So if we have a finance managerthat we need coverage from the
Chrysler store to the Forgestore, if we have a service
advisor from one store to theother, even some technicians,
salespeople do it every singleday.
Uh in the office, uh our teamhas done an amazing job
cross-training there.
And so what that allows to iswhen someone does go on vacation

(52:16):
or someone is out of pocket andthey coverage there, you might
uncover, like, hmm, should theyhave been coding these invoices
to this account?
Yep.
You know, and it's generally nota stealing or a cheating
situation, it's just an improperreconciliation of something,
right?
Or why are we giving thesepeople X plan?

(52:39):
Or why were these people gettinga courtesy vehicle every single
time?
And so our internal auditsystems, while we have lots to
grow on, uh, would continue tolook at that.
And so if you get a differentperson in that position, they'll
give you a differentperspective, and respectively
so, they'll say, Hey, I'm notwriting on this person, but I'm

(53:00):
just saying there's something tobe looked at here.

SPEAKER_02 (53:03):
That's good.
Yeah, that of diving into there,and I think this hits the the
nail on the head of just alwaysstaying involved with your team
and knowing this is what's goingon, because if you're not
involved with them, you're notgonna see that.
You're not gonna notice andacknowledge that that that
process needs to be changed.

(53:23):
We need to to move from that andstep over to this process to
make it better, scalability, andbe better for the the overall
experience for the customers.

SPEAKER_04 (53:33):
I think there's a big thing that you said there to
not skip over, you said beinginvolved with the team.
And we we try super hard to dothat, right?
To be down in the department uhof our every morning manager
meetings, to be relevant for itto make sense.
But as we continue to teachpeople to delegate, or we
delegate, teach them how todelegate.
Sometimes if something miniatureimplodes or there's an issue and

(53:56):
you're like, what the heck?
Yeah.
You know, what the heck?
You have kind of taught them notto bring you everything, which
you need to, right?
Every angry customer shouldn'thave to end up in your lap.
One, they should have to dealwith the wrath of the angry
customer because it wasgenerally what they didn't do.
That's their fault, right?
Uh now you're happy to help andhave to give some direction.

(54:17):
But so, anyways, what we'vetaught and we've created is the
delegation of them handling somethings, but it will remove you
from understanding the truepulse of your business.
And so being involved meansactually sitting on the front
line.
The offensive coordinator says,Okay, I can see what I can see
up here, and I continue to runthis play and it ain't working.

(54:38):
And at halftime they're down, hesaid, I'm gonna come down to the
field and actually see what Ican see from plain view.
Yes, and I'm gonna actually seewhat the other side's saying,
right?
And and so then that allows youto see, and you're like, Okay,
got it.
That's where it is, right there.
I can see it right there.
Little Jerry's supposed to bedoing it, but we've got him over

(55:00):
here doing this.
And so there's a humongous holeright there.
Yeah, and and you see that whenyou really get involved.
So it's not like the phone call,like the one guy in the bust, is
like, hey, how's it going?
Yeah, he ain't gonna like hejust got hollered at.
He's not giving you anythingelse.
You're gonna have to go find ityourself.

SPEAKER_01 (55:18):
I think that's uh that's a great suggestion there.
And at the same time, I hope Ihope what you heard though is
you gotta have a balance.
Yeah.
And it's easy to get sucked intoone or the other.
It's easy to get sucked in atthis C-suite level of just
looking at the data and haulinglike the guy on the bus.
Or it's easy to get sucked in onwhen you're in the trenches a

(55:39):
hundred percent of the time andyou're not up in the press box
and you can't see.
It takes both.

SPEAKER_04 (55:43):
Yeah, because I had a manager the other day who's
like, hey, I'm done with it.
He said, I'm going back in.
I'm this and this and this.
I said, Okay, that's good.
What's your end date on that?
You know, I was like, because itit can't be if it's is to be,
it's up to me, because thenthere's no need for all the
other people.
You can go help them see theproblem, show them how to solve
it, and then manage it from alevel up, but you can't be the

(56:05):
one handling it all.
Otherwise, that was pointless.
That's not our scalability.

SPEAKER_02 (56:10):
It doesn't help at all.
I love this takeaway part.
Completency dies wheneverleaders say curious and push for
growth, even during good times.
If you're constantly stayingahead, no different than you
made the reference of running,of always, even whenever
running's easy, of pushingyourself a little farther,
finding that next group, findingthe next challenge.

(56:30):
Don't ever stop growing, evenwhenever it's easy.
And you've gotten to that pointbecause complacency, no matter
what level you're at, of inbusiness and fitness, health,
whatever it is, if you aren'talways changing, adapting,
moving forward, we always talkabout this, and I love you never
stay the same.
You either get better or worseevery single day.

(56:52):
And that stays true to inbusiness as well.

SPEAKER_01 (56:54):
This is going to mind blow some of y'all when I
say this, because I've onlyheard the best of the best
leaders talk about this.
They say when times are reallygood and business is booming,
that's when I'm looking at myexpense accounts and trying to
cut expenses.
That's when I'm looking at wherecan I cut the fat on the

(57:15):
advertising, the marketing, notpeople, but the advertising and
the marketing.
Where most leaders, when thingsare rolling, they're like, man,
we're doing all the business,don't sweat that stuff.
And they get very complacent inthat area.
Instead, the best of the bestgo, where can we shave?
Where are we overspending?
And then when business is goingdown, they actually go, where

(57:37):
else could we spend more moneyto generate opportunity?
Most people do it the oppositeway.
They don't worry about expenseswhen business is great, and then
they cut expenses whenbusinesses are going down.
And that's the opposite way tothink about it.

SPEAKER_02 (57:52):
That probably provides opportunities you
wished you were able tocapitalize on whenever the
script flips there.
So that's huge.
That's really good.

SPEAKER_04 (58:02):
Yep.
All right, solid summary there.
Now, question for you.
Okay.
Diving in and seeing what youguys' thoughts are.
How do you keep yourself fromgetting comfortable as a leader?
How do you keep yourself frombeing complacent as a leader?

SPEAKER_01 (58:16):
I love this question.
Um, and and here's why I dobecause once you've been there,
and I'll answer it, but onceyou've been there, it's in your
brain forever.
Once you make the shift ongetting around the correct
people and listening to thecorrect people, your business
and outlook will never be thesame.

(58:38):
Now it's important that the wayI make sure that I don't get
comfortable and complacent as aleader is I'm listening to and
talking to people that are at aposition greater than mine, that
have had more success than Ihave, and that have accomplished
things that I want to go to.
I'm not listening to other peersthat are at the same level or

(59:00):
lower.
And you can define that successin many different ways.
I'm not just talking aboutmonetary, but you gotta make
sure if you don't want to getcomfortable and complacent, who
are you around?
Show me your five.
And I'm gonna tell you guysthis, and you guys know this,
but the majority of people thathave poured into me that have
helped us get to that level,they have no clue who I am.

(59:20):
No clue.
I've never met them.

SPEAKER_05 (59:22):
Yes.

SPEAKER_01 (59:23):
I listen to them on podcast, and then all of a
sudden it's like, oh, dang,we're not doing that.
I've read a book by it, I'vebeen to a seminar, I've been to
a live meeting, whatever else itmay be.
You have to surround yourselffrom others that are at a
different level, like whereyou're wanting to go to if you
want to consistently beuncomfortable in moving your

(59:44):
business forward.

SPEAKER_02 (59:45):
Absolutely.
I, you know, I find myself andprobably of moving forward, and
people have a really hard timewith this.
But realizing that you can havea group of friends that you
could hang out with, and it maybe a group that you've Around,
but staying on that who are thefive closest people to you, you
have to check and look and seewho's pouring into you all the

(01:00:08):
time.
Because if it's not beneficialto you, have a great group of
friends that you can go and hangout with, but don't let that be
the majority that is pouringinto you.
Because as a result, if you'rethe top of whatever that group
is, guess what?
You're only getting drained.
You're never getting refilledwith anything else good.

(01:00:30):
So whenever it comes to the nextperson, you have nothing to
offer because you've beendrained the entire time as
everyone's pulling from you.
Which doing that to your team isgood, but you've got to be able
to go over to the other side andget someone to fill you back up.
That's so good.

SPEAKER_04 (01:00:49):
Those are super solid uh answers there.
And I want to throw this in as alast piece of complacency of
being never staying the same,getting better or worse.
So many times, if you'veachieved something in life,
whether whatever it may be, inbusiness and running or anything
physically, you know, just like,hey, I wanted to get where I
could bench 225.

(01:01:10):
I wanted to get where I couldrun a sub six-minute mile,
whatever it was, many time, manytimes have I been humbled after
I had ran a marathon or done aIron Man or ran a hundred miles
and then went to go do it againand hadn't put the work in.

(01:01:31):
This is not Uncle Rico sayingback in 74 I could throw the
ball a mile, because if you havenot put the work in every single
day as a leader, it will show upand it will show out and it will
humble you.
I have death marked for 80 milesfor many reasons, or for 26

(01:01:52):
miles through a marathon throughthe mountains, and thought, you
idiot, you thought you couldjust come out here because you
did it once, you could do itagain.
You idiot.
You thought in business youcould still be best of the best.
You thought you could still sellover a hundred cars, you thought
you could do a thousand ROs, butyou haven't trained your staff
anymore, and you haven't pouredout anything extra, and then

(01:02:14):
you've been in your office justreading the reports and you
haven't been involved, nowyou're gonna suffer.

SPEAKER_01 (01:02:20):
So true.

SPEAKER_04 (01:02:21):
Now you're gonna suffer.
And I've been there many moretimes than I care to wish that I
care to share about, but it willtell you like each day, live it
on its own.
You gotta show up that day andfully pour in to not being
complacent, to be the bestleader, to be the best version
of yourself.
And it's gonna hurt a littlebit.
It is, but at the end, if ithurts so bad, like some of the

(01:02:44):
fastest marathons we ran hurtthe worst.
And your heart rate was 185beats per minute for over three
hours, and then you hit that andyou ran a little faster, and
you're like, it was worth itall.
It was worth it all.
The ones that hurt the worst arewhen you don't put the effort in
and you're like, I'm an idiot,right?
Yeah, like so keep that in mind.

(01:03:05):
However, you relate complacencyand business, don't be
complacent.
Just because it worked yesterdaydoesn't mean it'll work today.
Find the next angle, find thenext thing, challenge your team.
As always, check us out lewissuperstow.com, crossroad
conversations, like, subscribe,follow, share.
Tell us what else you want tohear about.
56 episodes telling you whatwe've done right, what done
wrong, what not to do.

(01:03:25):
But we want to hear from you.
Put a question down there andwe'll roll from there.
Thanks for listening.
We'll see you soon.

SPEAKER_03 (01:03:32):
Hey, if you enjoyed this episode, be sure to give it
a like, share it with yourfriends and family.
Even visit our website, send usthe questions about what you
want to know, what you want tohear.
Tell us about the automotiveindustry, family business in
general.
Who do you want to hear from?
Send them our way and we'll doour best to answer any questions
you have.
But make sure you tune in nexttime or we bring in another
guest and we talk more about theautomotive industry and all the

(01:03:54):
great things going on within ourbusiness.