What Happens to Your Business If You Step Away Tomorrow?
Rick Yvanovich has built multiple global companies over the past 30+ years—but his journey started stocking supermarket shelves. In this episode, Rick shares what it really takes to grow a business that can run without you.
From battling long COVID to redefining his role as a leader, Rick opens up about the mindset shift every business owner must make: stop being the bottleneck. Learn why documenting your systems, aligning your team with core values, and stepping back are essential to building a business with transferable value.
You’ll also hear about Rick’s take on the Japanese concept of “Shinais”—businesses built to last for generations—and why personal purpose and culture matter more than most entrepreneurs realize.
If you’ve ever wondered how to grow your company without working 80-hour weeks or how to find team members who actually fit, this episode is packed with insights you can’t afford to miss.
🔍 Topics:
• How to build business value through systems and leadership
• Why most small businesses are unsellable—and how to fix that
• Creating legacy with the “Shinais” mindset
• Letting go of control without losing your vision
🎧 Whether you're feeling stuck or just ready for more freedom, this conversation will challenge and inspire you to lead differently.
Rick Ynanovich: TRG International, Founder & CEO
Website (Personal): https://www.rickyvanovich.com/
Website (Company): https://trginternational.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rickyvanovich/
Podcast: https://www.rickyvanovich.com/podcasts
Newsletter: https://www.rickyvanovich.com/resources/newsletter
Blog: https://www.rickyvanovich.com/blog
#RickYvanovich #TRGInternational #BusinessGrowth #EntrepreneurMindset #WorkOnYourBusiness #Leadership #ScaleYourBusiness #SmallBusinessLeadership #BuildToLast #DocumentYourSystems #LegacyBusiness #Shinais #BusinessStrategy #BusinessCoach #SystemsAndProcesses #BusinessValue #LetGoToGrow #SmallBusinessSuccess #MichaelDMorrison #SmallBusinessPivots #BusinessPodcast #Oklahoma
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, welcome to another Small Business, pivots,
where we bring guests, specialguests from around the world,
and today we literally have onethat's across the world from us
here in Oklahoma, and I knowthat business owners can say
their name and their businesslike none other.
So I'll let you introduceyourself.
Tell us a little bit about you,where you're from, yeah, thanks
(00:24):
for having me, Michael.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Now, before we start, let me first share a core
belief that I hold here.
I believe that all of us allyou listeners as well all of us
have the potential to be what Iam calling an architect of
change.
In the era that we're living inat the moment, which is really
(00:46):
defined by constanttransformation, our task is not
just to keep up, but to activelyshape the path forward.
Now, if you look at me, Istarted out my career stacking
shelves and learning the ropesof people management as a
trainee in a supermarket in theUK, which is where I'm from.
(01:07):
Then I changed to the moreprecise world of accounting yeah
, I'm a bean counter and laternavigating what is now the
constantly evolving landscape oftech, but also people, humans.
My story really demonstratesthe power of transformation and
(01:28):
continuous learning and theimpact that each one of us can
make Every day.
I think that all our actions,whether they're big or small,
they actually shape our future.
And as we discuss stuff today,michael, I want everybody
listening to remember this youare your brand and every single
(01:49):
decision you make and notdeciding to decide in the face
of all of this change that ishappening will define your story
and, more importantly, yourlegacy.
(02:10):
Okay, it's this beliefinspiring each of us to aim for
what I call balance fulfillment.
It's the cornerstone of my workthese days.
It's my life purpose.
So, as we dive into ourconversation today, let's not
just think about adapting tochange, but about how we can
define it.
After all, if we can embraceour unique abilities and you all
(02:34):
have them that's why you're allbusiness owners listening in
you all have them all right andyou strive for that personal
growth you're not just aparticipant, you're the catalyst
in what I call ourever-changing business as
unusual world.
So let's get started, michael.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
All right, well, let's introduce yourself first,
and then we'll introduce theshow.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Who am I?
Okay, my name's Rick.
As you've heard, I'm a Brit.
You might hear from my accent,I am from across the water.
It you might hear from myaccent, I am from across the
water.
I'm currently standing here inSwitzerland, where I spend about
75% of my time, and the other25% of my time I spend in
Vietnam where, until last year,I've been pretty much living
(03:21):
there for the last 35 years.
Pretty much living there forthe last 35 years.
Wow, I am an accountant bytraining.
Things have happened and I'vegone.
You know, I started, I retiredback in 1994, which didn't work
very well, which is why I'mstill working.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Right, this is 2025.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
I know.
I know I know, but it's, it's,it's, it's.
You know, I'm still workingbecause I'm I'm a converted
workaholic, so I used to be aworkaholic and I'm trying to
kill that terrible habit becauseit is a really, really bad
habit.
It is, and that's what it is.
It's a habit, a bad one, andand?
(04:04):
And I started my own company 30years ago.
Actually, this year will be 31years for the main company, trg,
and I'm a bean counter.
Yes, we sell and implementaccounting systems all around
the world, so I haven't gone toofar away from that discipline,
(04:29):
gone too far away from thatdiscipline.
And recently, about seven yearsago, I've pivoted slightly and
I now do coaching as well, aswell as speaking, and I author a
few things like books.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Yeah Well, our listeners need to buckle up
because we have two coaches onthe show today, but let's
introduce our podcast and we'llbe right back.
Welcome to Small BusinessPivots, a podcast produced for
small business owners.
I'm your host, michael Morrison, founder and CEO of BOSS, where
we make business ownershipsimplified for success.
(05:00):
Our business is helping yoursgrow.
Boss offers business loans withbusiness coaching support.
Apply in minutes and getapproved and funded in as little
as 24 to 48 hours atbusinessownershipsimplifiedcom.
(05:27):
All right, welcome back to SmallBusiness Pivots.
My friend, you're a coach.
We were talking earlier aboutcoaching people up.
Architect of Change, you ledoff the podcast with some great
information.
Let's keep that going.
So how can we help others as acoach, as a leader, as a
business owner in our businesses, so that we're not working in
the business, we're not trappedin the business, we can work on
(05:48):
it, and a lot of that has to dowith our people and our
listeners, our small businessowners.
Many of them are stuck, theyfeel trapped, they're working in
their business countless hoursa day and probably don't feel
like they're getting anywhereand they want to get somewhere,
like you have gone.
But that takes a special personto be able to coach the people
(06:10):
you need around them.
So let's start there, if youdon't mind.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Yeah, let's address that.
Working in the business and onthe business.
I was one of those people whostarted off.
You know, one man and a dog,except I didn't even have a dog.
You know, start off by myselfand I think I could do it all,
which is a bit silly because Iwas an accountant and I know my
(06:33):
debits and credits and that wasabout it.
So anything else about abusiness, that was a bit of a
struggle.
You know, what do I know aboutsales or marketing or customer
support or or HR and all of thatkind of stuff?
I don't know.
So you learn it the hard wayand, having learned it, you're
(06:54):
still doing it.
But the mistake I guess that Imade, even as we scaled, is
failing to let go, and what Imean by that is just because I
can do it and I can maybe dosome things, or maybe a lot of
things.
So I thought, better thananyone else, even the people
(07:18):
that I hired, that's not yourrole.
If you are the business owner,why are you working in the
business?
You know that's not your role.
If you are the business owner,why are you working in the
business?
Okay, anything that you can getrid of, because you can get
someone else to do it.
Get them to do it and focus oneither growing your business,
you know, really work on it, or,if you really are, you know
(07:42):
that subject matter expert andyou know it's the unique thing
about your business is thatunique skill that you have.
Okay, fine, just do that, don'tdo anything else.
So what I found the hardestthing to do was actually letting
go.
You know, yes, you hired aperson to do that HR or whatever
but so how come, why are youstill involved?
(08:05):
Why are you still trying to doit?
Or, even worse for me, I'm anaccountant.
I hire a bunch of accountantsto do the accounting of the
company and, yeah, I'm all overthem, you know.
And it just goes on and on, andon and on.
So it's either teach yourselvesor, you know, grab ourself a
(08:25):
coach or a mentor.
And you know we need to seethat we've got to get away from
working in the business.
You know we're supposed to bethe business owner.
All right, it's an investment.
Okay, um, get other people todo it.
Train, train them, pass allyour knowledge to them so
they're even better than you are, and sit back and do whatever
(08:52):
you want.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
How did you let go?
Because I think that is thenumber one challenge for most
business owners.
In fact, I just talked to oneyesterday that said, if I let go
and it doesn't happen, I'm theone that has to take the heat
from the client.
So how does one programthemselves or transition,
(09:14):
transform themselves to let gosystems?
You talk about scaling abusiness and you have scaled an
incredible business TRG andothers.
As you said, how did you gofrom that mindset of I'm a small
business owner to now I canbuild this empire, but I got to
(09:35):
do this, this and this kind ofwalk us through those steps?
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Okay, there, there, there's several, there's several
.
You say red flags that couldcome up.
All right, I'm going to pick onthem in reverse order, all
right.
Okay, all right, I'm a babyboomer.
Okay, I'm a baby boomer, whichmeans I'm supposed to be retired
(10:01):
off in a few years.
I've got to my sell-by date,right.
And you know, when you get tothat stage let's say, all right,
in the next three to five years, you're just going to stop
working.
You look at your business andsaid, if you walk away in that
(10:22):
time period, can it carry onrunning?
Because if you're not going tosell it, can it still continue?
Yeah, you can stay on as somekind of advisor or mentor or
whatever and still pull somedividends in, but you've got to
be able to walk away.
So it runs without you, runswithout you, okay.
(10:49):
So age is one thing, but don'twait until you get to that
expiry date before you realize,because you know it might be a
little bit too late.
Okay, it might be a little bittoo late.
So, rather than looking forwardto really putting your feet up
and and and sort of reaping thebenefits of what you've built up
over the many, many years,you're scrabbling around trying
to piece it all together so itdoesn't fall apart, okay, so
(11:13):
that's an age thing.
That's really driven by that.
Another one is you know what wereally talk about.
There is business continuity.
It's no different.
You know, irrelevant of yourage, you get hit by that truck,
okay, and you cease to exist,all right.
If that actually happened, willyour business continue?
(11:34):
All right.
And for a lot of business owners, yeah, okay, you're doing a lot
of this for yourself, of course, but you're doing it for your
family, right.
You want to pass it on, okay,but if you get hit by a truck
today, this afternoon, you know,and you are not around, will it
still continue?
Okay, and I'm not reallytalking.
(11:56):
You know, on the one hand, youcan say you should have that,
that's business continuity.
But I'm really looking at itfrom the owner's perspective of
all the reasons we giveourselves why we shouldn't do it
.
Hey, I'm still young, don'thave to think about that, I'm
not going to get hit by a truck.
That's silly.
Yeah, all right.
So that's really two things.
What's the third one?
A third one is health.
(12:17):
Okay, when we're young, we canput up with all sorts of stuff.
We're generally a lot healthier.
But unfortunately, as we getolder, things start breaking
down.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Oh, I'm there, I'm there, we don't bounce back as
fast.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
So the first red flag to me was the dawning
realization that, yes, I wasn'tyoung anymore when I started the
company.
Hey, we're all at 20s or 30,something, you know, everyone
was young.
30 years later, well, funnyenough, we're older, um, so age
was driving me and I had ignoredthat one, the.
I have always ignored the beinghit by a truck, um, um, you
(13:02):
know more for me.
I haven't been hit by anything,which is good, but the.
It's the health thing that wasthe real trigger for me.
Um, because, um, when covidcame along, um, despite what was
happening during covid, Ieventually caught covid after
about two years you know, it'sabout 22, uh, and unfortunately
(13:24):
I caught long COVID and it did afew things to me.
Number one it really messedwith my sense of smell and sense
of taste, all right, and Iliterally lost at least half of
it, which is a problem, becauseone of the other businesses I
have is I run a coffee chain andit suddenly became we have
(13:50):
about two different types of,sorry, two dozen different types
of wonderful coffee this isAmerican coffee chain, by the
way, pj's of New Orleans, so bigshout out to PJ's down South
there and it came to the pointthat you know, with this long
COVID, that you could putwhatever coffee in front of me
that I've known because we'vebeen selling it for years, and I
(14:13):
couldn't tell you what it is.
So you could give me a hazelnutcoffee.
You know, beautiful aroma and Icouldn't tell you what it is
and in fact it doesn't matterwhat it was.
It all tasted revolting anyway,just like water, which also
smelt horrible.
Water doesn't smell and ittastes revolting.
So I had a lot of issues, okay,which maybe tripped up that
(14:36):
business a bit, because I waslosing interest, like you know,
what value can I add if I can'teven taste the damn coffee?
I can't do a quality check, Ican't do anything.
I can't even make a cup ofcoffee anymore because I don't
know if it tastes nice or not.
Yeah, yeah.
But the other thing was thisworkaholism thing.
You know I enjoy work.
(15:00):
You know, working 80 to 100hours a week, I enjoy it.
You know that's what I toldmyself and I don't need to sleep
very much.
And then I got this long covidthing and I needed a thing
called sleep.
You know, usually a goodnight's sleep was your
horizontal for six hours, whichmeans you're sleeping for
(15:20):
probably only about five.
Yeah, with with the long, covidis like.
You know that that's a nothing,you know, and even if I was in
bed for 12 hours and I slept forlike 11 of them, I'd wake up
and I'd feel like death, warmedup, okay.
And then there was all the, allthe.
I think I couldn't, I couldn'tthink I could hardly string, you
(15:42):
know, sentences together thatmean anything.
Okay, what did it mean?
It means I can't run thebusiness.
I can't run the business, andso I had to really rely on
people to run it.
And it was a massive wake-upcall that, ooh, I've maybe been
abusing myself for some decades.
It's maybe I should get intoshape and get some sleep and try
(16:04):
and get over all of this.
Okay, I still need a lot ofsleep today, but you know, that
was what now, what two, threeyears ago.
And that was the real wake-upcall, the massive red flag that
says, hey, you know, you reallycan actually not feel very
healthy, not be very healthy,and therefore, if you are not
healthy, how can you possiblydeliver properly in your own
(16:27):
organization?
Okay, you've got to let go,you've got to find people to do
other stuff you know.
And because I'm not going towork a gazillion hours a week
anymore delegate everything,learn how to delegate properly,
just it, okay.
So that was another red flag.
Again, I'm going backwards now.
(16:49):
So these are all the reallynegative things.
Right, you're getting old, youget hit by the track, you get
unhealthy, so you can't work.
So you know that I wouldn'twish that on anyone.
Sorry, can't do anything aboutthe getting older.
So what else?
Another red flag is not havingthe systems, not having the SOPs
(17:11):
, not having the processes.
And who has them?
You do, they're all in yourhead.
You know them all, backwards,forwards.
You know them perfectly and youcan explain to anyone.
The only problem is it's notyou who needs to know them, it's
them.
Right, good, um, so not onlywould that be helpful if you're
(17:32):
onboarding new people, becauseall they have to do is read the
process and they can teachthemselves, rather than you have
to do it or someone else haveto do it is.
Here's the thing for businessowners your business is worth
less.
It's worth less if you don'thave it fully documented,
(17:54):
because if someone's going tobuy your business, they're maybe
okay, buying your brand, brandname, okay, you've been doing
good, fantastic.
They are buying the people thatyou have, maybe the knowledge
that they have.
But the problem is, if theknowledge is locked up in people
(18:15):
, there's no guarantee that theywill remain there.
I mean, just like when youyourself walk away from the
business, you retire or whateveryou do or decide to do
something else, unless you'vedocumented literally all your
knowledge and passed it on intothat organizational knowledge,
all those SOPs and processes,that knowledge has been lost.
(18:39):
So anybody who wants to buy yourbusiness, if they can't see
that knowledge locked into thoseprocesses, why should they pay
for it if it's going to walk outthe door?
And yeah, I've spoken to a fewcompanies who, having had no
(19:01):
documented processes and theywere trying to sell the company
and they couldn't understand whythey were getting a terrible
valuation wind forward a fewyears and they built all the
processes.
They've actually captured thatorganizational knowledge and
then they went for anothervaluation and they're getting
the numbers that they want.
(19:22):
It's going to be very, veryhard to let go if it's not
documented.
Yeah, because how is anybodyelse going to pick up the reins
and run with it?
Okay, um, now it may be again.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
You know, subconsciously, are we
deliberately not documentingstaff so we can still play in
the game, because we don't wantto let go what you're talking
about is almost like arepercussion if you don't do
these things, because, as a youknow, we offer business loans,
but we offer business coachingsupport as well.
(20:00):
A third of our clients are 55and older, and the reason for
that is because their businessis worth nothing.
They went to try to sell it.
They're looking at retiringsoon.
This was all they know.
This was going to be their nestegg.
They're figuring out.
(20:21):
Like you said, it's not worthanything because you didn't do
all these things, you didn'tprepare.
There's no one else that knowshow to do the things you do.
Your kids don't want it.
Uh, mostly because.
Or their kids don't want itmostly because they were working
the 80 hours a week and they'relike I don't want to do that to
my kids, so I don't want it.
Well, if your kids don't wantit, no one else wants it.
(20:42):
It's zero value.
So, thinking of thoserepercussions in that, no matter
what age you are, as a listeneryou got to think of I could be
hit by a truck tomorrow.
It's not.
Your business is worth nothingwithout you if you think about
it that way.
And so those are all validpoints.
(21:04):
I like how you worked backwardsOn that valuation.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
it's obviously worth a lot to you as the business
owner.
You know you've put your heartand soul, your blood, sweat and
tears maybe every dollar thatyou have, into it as well.
You know nothing wrong in that.
But the thing is if, if yourintention was, at some point in
time, that is, to realize thevalue that you've created, so
you can pass it either enjoy ityourself or pass it on to your
(21:34):
own family or to someone else,or whatever charity that you
want to give it to, or or a mix,mix of them.
It's not what you think it'sworth, it's what other people
think it's worth.
Yeah, okay, and um, sinceyou're not going to be there,
all your knowledge, which issystems, processes, must be
(21:56):
captured, because that's whatthey're buying.
It's one of the things thatthey're buying, okay, um, and
and it's not just the processes,it's the people that you've got
.
So you've got to hire the rightpeople.
They've got to understand thoseprocesses.
They've got to be doing themreligiously and doing them well
and improving them, becausethey're not static.
(22:16):
Things change, technology haschanged, so what's right today
is maybe not work anymore in ayear's time, because, hey,
that's outdated technology.
We have to update that process.
When you're trying to sell,people want to buy a going
concern.
They want to buy something thatreally exists and will continue
to exist.
They don't want everybodyquitting within a few months
(22:40):
okay, because you're no longerthere.
They want it to carry on.
So there's an awful lot that weneed to do as a business to
ensure that continuity.
Now there's a Japanese conceptcalled You're listening to Small
(23:02):
Business pivots.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
This podcast is produced by my company boss.
Our business is helping yoursgrow.
Boss offers business loans withbusiness coaching support.
Apply in minutes and getapproved and funded in as little
as 24 to 48 hours at businessownership simplifiedcom.
If you're enjoying this podcastpodcast, don't forget to hit
(23:24):
the subscribe button and shareit as well.
Now let's get back to ourspecial guest now there's a.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
There's a Japanese concept called shin eyes okay,
um, and there are about 30,000Japanese companies that embrace
this and what it means.
It's a company that has lastedfor a very long time generations
, hundreds or hundreds of yearsand it really comes from passing
(23:57):
it down through the generations.
Now I've taken that concept andI've tweaked it a bit, because
one of the things when I look atorganizations and I work with
organizations, coaching them orwhatever, I like to introduce
this concept of the Shinaisconcept and look at it that
we're trying to ensure that ourbusiness is sustainable way into
(24:24):
the future.
So, rather than we're notnecessarily handy across to our
kids, you know, through thefamily, because it might not be
a family-owned company, allright, it's just pass you on to
the next generation.
As I said, I'm a baby boomer,okay, I'm going to be retired
off soon.
I'm not going to be around in30, 40 years from now, okay,
(24:45):
unless something miraculoushappens with healthcare and I
live into my hundreds orsomething.
You're passing on to the nextgeneration of people who are
running the company.
You know, maybe, and if youwere a startup, you know, you,
you attracted all these peoplebecause you, you know a young
startup, great ideas, wonderful,and they all join and
(25:06):
everything is wonderful andgreat.
And, you know, a decade or twogoes by and they get a bit older
.
You know, are they going to runthe?
Maybe they want to be runningthe company.
So when are you going to go?
When did they have their shot?
And then are they able to passit on to the next generation of
people?
So that's the longevity of thecompany.
You know, you can only do thatif things have been documented
(25:31):
and systematized and you'vebuilt that culture of pass your
knowledge, of growing otherpeople.
You know all that successionplanning, who's going to take
over whatever role in thecompany?
Okay, so it's really, reallyresilient.
It doesn't matter what happens.
Yeah, you know, things happen.
People get hit by trucks,people get old, people quit or
(25:52):
whatever, for good and badreasons.
You know, can our businesssustain it?
You know, do we have enoughdepth of succession planning to
cater for that?
The stronger that is, thelonger your business will last,
year after year, decade afterdecade, maybe into the hundreds
(26:12):
of years.
That's the shin ice concept andI think we need to think about
that, because maybe, yes, youare the business owner and you
started the business, but isn'tthat part of your legacy?
You know, a hundred years fromnow, do people want to remember
that you started that companyand it's great because of you
and your principles and valuesare still there and they're
(26:34):
being upheld by these otherpeople and they're continuing it
and expanded on it and grown onit.
Is that how you want to beremembered?
Or would you rather peoplesaying, hmm, how did that
company start?
Speaker 1 (26:49):
Many businesses in the US don't last past the third
generation.
The original founder put in theblood, sweat and tears.
It's got the most value.
Their kids and tears.
It's got the most value.
Their kids, if they take over,might run it.
Well, about 50% of them don't.
(27:10):
And then the grandkids once itgets to the third generation,
all they remember is grandpa andgrandma had a lot of money and
so they're not in it for theblood, sweat and tears, they're
just in it for the money and ofcourse that's not sustainable.
So if you don't have thesesystems and things in place, the
company's people dependent andnot process dependent.
These systems and things inplace, the company's people
dependent and not processdependent.
And so when I say that thebusinesses have zero value for
(27:31):
the companies that haveapproached us when they're 55
and older, it's because theydon't have that stuff, the
things that you're talking about.
And so when they're gone, noone wants it.
No one wants to buy a job.
Right, I can go get a job withless liabilities than own a
business, have a job and allthese bills and responsibilities
.
So everything you're talkingabout is well said.
(27:54):
Speaking of architect, is therelike a blueprint that you would
provide quickly with how toscale a business, kind of like
here I'm thinking about startinga business.
What are some steps to get youto that level of things that you
need to do, in other words,some essentials that you need to
have and do?
We've already talked aboutsystems, but is there a
(28:15):
blueprint of do this, do this,do this Because on your website
you've got core values, all goodstuff, but how does one?
You know, you didn't just comeup with all that at once.
It was a, it was a process.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Yeah, it's a process.
Maybe I learned about it toolate.
It's really, you know, lookingbackwards on maybe what I should
have done.
A lot of it I learned throughthrough my coaching journey.
For the individual who wants tostart a business is really
looking at ourselves, becauseit's the inner work that needs
(28:49):
to be done first.
I believe.
What are our core values?
We need to understand them,because if you're about to
establish a company, you'regoing to have to put some in
that company.
Now, are they going to beidentical to your core values or
are they going to be identicalto your core values or are they
going to be slightly different?
Because that's a company, notyou, the person.
So that's one thing.
(29:10):
What is your purpose?
What is your why?
That's important, and I'm nottalking about a goal.
I'm not talking about, yeah, Iwant a big car, I want a big
house, I want to make a lot ofmoney, I want to do this, that
and the other.
Those are just goals.
They're materialistic things,but you know what's the real
(29:32):
point of view.
Okay, and you're going to beclear on that, very clear on
that, because that's a direction, there's a very clear direction
to go in and everything you doneeds to be going in that
direction, because if it isn't,that's when you feel something's
a bit off.
It's going to prevent yougetting in the flow, it's going
(29:52):
to prevent you feeling balanced.
You're just going to feelsomething is not quite right and
that is not a nice place to be.
That is not a nice place to be.
I believe these days that afterthe pandemic, we had the great
reshuffle, we had the greatresignation, we had the great
insert, whatever words you want,people moving around, and it's
(30:13):
still happening.
And I feel and that's one ofthe reasons why I wrote the book
that I wrote a couple of yearsago called Business as Unusual.
I wrote the book that I wrote acouple of years ago called
Business as Unusual.
It's because it's a lack ofalignment of what people's
(30:34):
purpose is and in a lot of casesthere wasn't one, which really
doesn't help.
And it's a bit like, you know,alice in Wonderland, right?
You know, when Alice isspeaking to the Cheshire Cat, it
says you know which way shouldI go?
And the cat's saying, well,where do you want to go?
She says, well, I don't know,it really doesn't matter where
(30:54):
you go.
And a lot of people are likethat you know.
How can you go in a direction,how can you feel fulfilled if
you don't actually know where itis?
You were going to go in thefirst place.
So there's a lot of inner workthat needs to be done and once
we have that, once we have thatclarity, oh, that's a very, very
strong foundation.
(31:15):
That's a really good startingpoint for that when you
establish your company.
That, when you establish yourcompany, it also needs a purpose
, it also needs values and, yeah, in between those you will have
(31:35):
goals from time to time.
Okay, so it's nearly the samething.
So you do it for the individualyourself first.
You need to make you know youare good and healthy and ready.
And you do it for the companyas well.
And as you bring people intoyour organization, you have to
teach them the same thing.
They've got to buy into thepurpose of the company,
otherwise why are they there?
They've got to buy into thecore values.
But if they don't know theirown purpose and they don't know
(31:59):
their own core values, there's avery high risk.
The reason why they feel out ofalignment with the company and
things don't feel quite right isbecause there's a mismatch
between that purpose and betweenthose core values.
All right, and you know so.
I think one of the greatestthings we can do for people is
(32:20):
to help them realize that, tohelp them establish those core
values, help them establishthose purpose.
So when they make you know ifthey join that company or they
start a company, you know, wealready know where we're going
to go.
You know, we really believe it,okay, and everything we do is
going to be in alignment withthat, rather than we're doing
(32:43):
stuff and it might be out ofalignment.
And if it's out of alignment,it means that we're hiring the
wrong people, and that's acompany error, not the candidate
error.
Amen, okay, yeah, so I'd ratherget it right from the start,
because it's really difficult ifwe're bringing in the wrong
(33:04):
people, as an organization,we've made a wrong choice.
I can't emphasize more that itis up to the company to select
the right people, and too manytimes we select the wrong people
and we try and blame thecandidate.
It's not the candidate's fault,okay, you know.
(33:27):
Why would they know?
We're supposed to know thecompany and what we want out of
people.
Okay, so we should know thetype of people that we want.
All right, and we need to.
You know the onus is on us tomake that right decision.
Okay, and if we get it right,well then, those people are
happy working for you.
(33:47):
You know they're very highlyengaged.
They're probably the peopleyou're going to hand over to
right?
Yeah, you know, it's all good,it's all good.
So there are other things in theframework.
A lot of them are in the book.
You know the book Business asUnusual, where I talk about
(34:08):
different buildings in mymetaphor, which is a castle.
Ok, we can all imagine a castlein our heads, right?
But you know, I give a name anda purpose to every single
building, every single building.
And in order to achieve balancein our lives, just like if we
were building our own castle, weneed to build it in a balanced
(34:31):
way.
Just like you're building anybuilding, you've got to build it
in a balanced way from theground up.
You can't start with a roof andas we're constructing our
castle, it's a lifelong journey.
We're laying a brick everysingle day, and it's consciously
(34:53):
, with intent, deciding where tolay it.
Which bit of ourselves are wegoing to focus on?
Okay, to maintain that balance?
All right, to maintain thatbalance.
And if we can do that and if wedo that, we feel very balanced,
we feel very fulfilled.
We're going to be in a greathealthy state to really do
(35:13):
things, rather than to feelempty, to feel unfulfilled, to
be unsure if we're going in theright direction and we're
hesitating to do things.
So we're hesitating to takeaction, we're unsure if we
should be going this way or thatway, and the moment that we
(35:33):
have that, as a business leader,we're going to lose confidence
of everybody else who's evenlooking at us.
Nobody wants to follow someonewho is indecisive and doesn't
know where they're going.
Speaker 1 (35:48):
I love that and it just reminds me of all the
business owners I hear say whycan't I find good employees?
And to me that is a red flag ofsaying I want to see your
mission.
Where's your core values?
Where's your vision?
It's not.
There's awesome employees outthere, they're everywhere,
(36:08):
you're just not ready for them.
So for those business ownersthat have said that or that are
listening, that say that Iencourage them to hire a coach,
like yourself or any coach, andget these things established,
because that is your problem.
That is the problem why youfeel you can't find good
employees.
They're out there, you justdon't know.
(36:29):
They don't know what to follow.
Speaker 2 (36:32):
At the end of the day , you're not there looking for
them.
If you get it right, you know,and it's very clear, what your
company does and who you are andwhat you stand for.
You know you start to becomethe magnet.
Okay, and a magnet does twothings, doesn't it?
It attracts people and itrepels people, and that's
(36:55):
exactly what you and yourcompany need to do.
You need to attract the rightpeople, yes, and you need to
repel the wrong people.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
And the only way to do that is with the stuff you're
talking about.
Do they align with your corevalues, your mission, where you
want to go?
Kind of give them a peek underthe hood of what this business
is all about.
I love that.
So is that what's in your book?
You kind of walk through thoseprocesses Awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Yes, it touches all different things.
It shows you how to puttogether a life purpose, you
know.
It shows you the importance ofbeing healthy and looking after
yourself.
It, you know, discusses theimportance of networking and
collaborating.
Okay, so it touches all ofthese things.
(37:45):
For you as an individual, okay,irrelevant if you're a business
leader, business owner or not,it's still about people, and you
know.
Going back to what you weretalking about before, you know,
talk about some of the businessowners that you've worked with
and some of the listeners.
(38:08):
I believe it's up to us also tohelp build the right person.
Okay, things are changing sofast that it's going to get
harder and harder to have theperfect person, you know, to
(38:32):
employ the perfect person, andthey know it all.
It's not going to happen.
You know all of you listening,or, if you're business owners,
all the stuff happening todaytechnology-wise.
Did you learn that at school?
No, it didn't even exist, okay.
(38:53):
So even if you take thebrightest sparks out of whatever
school you want to take themfrom their stuff, you know the
stuff that they need to know.
They're not going to know itand it doesn't matter how good
the school was, all theknowledge they've acquired is
(39:13):
going to be out of date in a fewyears and the skill sets that
they need.
If you look at, you know, theWorld Economic Forum.
They do a future of jobs reportevery couple of years.
The last one, if you look atthat, the sort of the top 10, 20
skills that people require.
They're sort of lacking in alot of people because they're
not taught.
A lot of these are soft skills.
(39:34):
They're not actually taught inschool.
Okay, so who's going to teachthem?
All right, so if you want yourpeople to have those skills,
you've got to be prepared toteach them.
So I'm a huge advocate of, as aleader, whether you are the
business owner or not, is you'vegot to be, number one,
(39:55):
coachable yourself.
And number two, you've got tobe able to coach other people
because you're there to see inthem something that that person
can't see themselves.
Okay, maybe you see somethingin them.
Hey, that that that personthere I, I can see that they can
(40:19):
help me run this business inthe next five years or 10 years
or whatever it is.
I know they've just left school, they're in a graduate entry or
whatever they are.
Okay, they don't know anything,but I see something in them.
You've probably seen yourself,yeah, or I see something in them
, right, but you're going tohave to grow that, yeah, you're
going to have to grow that.
(40:39):
We have to grow that.
You're going to have to growthat we have to nurture it.
Okay, and the best way to dothat is to be able to coach them
, to be able to mentor them.
Yeah when can your book be found?
You can find it on Amazon.
You can find it on Barnes Noble.
Best place to go is to go to mywebsite, because it's got all
(41:04):
the links.
So if you want to find me, justGoogle my name, rick Ivanovich,
and then say, wow, this guyreally knows SEO.
Okay, but I'd like to say that,but I'm the only person on the
planet with this name, so that'sa bit of a cheat, isn't it?
Try it, try it, try it.
(41:25):
So my website is my namecom.
Speaker 1 (41:26):
And we will put the spelling of your last name in
the show notes for those thatdon't know how to spell it.
So uh, T R G.
What is it that it does, andhow does that help people?
And then we'll wrap up here,Okay.
Speaker 2 (41:48):
TRG.
Okay, that's, that's my maincompany.
Um, we, we started off umimplementing accounting systems,
or you can call it financialERP if you want to make it a bit
sexier.
Uh, so it's all about financialsystems, accounting systems,
which is great, it's very, veryhorizontal.
Systems, which is great, it'svery, very horizontal.
And we do other related systemsas well, like, for example,
performance management systems,reporting systems, consolidation
(42:09):
systems, all that goodaccounting stuff.
Treasury systems you knowelectronic.
You know making electronic thatprocure to pay.
You know just email in theinvoice, and it all gets
miraculously handled by thecomputer and all the entries are
made into your accountingsystem, no human intervention
(42:30):
type of thing.
All of that kind of stuff we do, and we do it across all
industries, but we have aspecific bias, I suppose, to
hotels.
We've helped thousands ofhotels around the world and,
yeah, we're pretty good at that,I guess.
So that's what the mainbusiness does.
(42:53):
We also have a boutiqueoffshore development center.
This is software engineers forhire.
We've been doing that for awhile.
It's not very big, I thinkwe're about 350 people there.
Another business that we have isI never understood people very
(43:14):
well because I'm a numbersperson I'm the bean counter,
right, I'm the bean counter,right.
But then I found out a secretformula to people in
psychometrics okay, so that'sall the assessments or testing
of people, of their behaviorsand things, because it tells you
all sorts of stuff about aperson, all right, and so that's
(43:36):
what helped me with people that, yeah, we can use these
psychometrics which will uncovercertain skills in people.
Ok, and so, when it comes toselecting the right people, we
can go back to, you know, thosesort of children's games, pegs
and holes.
(43:57):
Each one of us is a uniqueshape and every job that we have
available is a unique hole.
Just find the right shape to gointo the job hole.
So that's very much get theright people on the bus and get
them on the right seats.
Yeah, it's the same type ofconcept and we can use these
psychometric tests to do that.
(44:17):
And for the you know, I know bigcomp, a lot of big companies
use it, you know.
So if there are any listenerswho are looking for a job and
they're trying to join thatgreat, big, multinational,
billion dollar company orwhatever, um, you'll probably
put through a battery of testsand assessments and things.
That's what I'm talking about.
Um, that's another one of thecompanies that we have and it's
(44:39):
highly affordable.
We've made it dirt cheapbecause why not?
We're trying to help people,yeah.
So yeah, we do stuff aroundthat as well.
Oh, and I mentioned coffee.
We do that.
Speaker 1 (44:52):
Yeah, I love it Well for our listeners.
If you're curious what goodcore values look like, I
encourage you to go to thewebsite trginternationalcom.
Go to the About Us sectionunder core values Very well
written.
Very well written.
You'll have to go check themout if you don't have core
(45:12):
values.
This is how they should be done.
I love the examples that yougive.
This is what this core value isand this is what it's not.
A lot of people forget thatpart because our translation of
what one of yours is passion howI describe passion, how you
describe passion are probablysimilar but different.
But you kind of say this iswhat it is, this is what it's
(45:35):
not, and so that's very wellwritten.
Speaker 2 (45:37):
Absolutely.
Now, there's a reason for that.
There's a reason for that.
There's a reason for that.
Again, people talk about theculture of the company.
Okay, now, as a business owner,you might have done your core
values.
They may be stuck up on thewall there and you may or may
not have, you know, the kind ofthe depth that we put into it,
(45:58):
what we expect and what we don'texpect.
But the thing is is that it'show people are really behaving.
That's the real culture in thecompany.
So how do you, as theorganization, the business owner
, how do you control thatculture?
Okay, so, if you've, if you've,come up with those core values,
(46:19):
we have to live them.
Ok, so, if you've come up withthose core values, we have to
live them.
All right, we have to see ifpeople are embracing them.
So one thing that can be done isperiodically, maybe quarterly,
something like that, you cangather people together on a
voluntary basis and anychallenges that they've ever had
over the core values, what isit?
So you might have had a corevalue of, I don't know, passion,
(46:43):
all right, and people may not.
They came across an instance,you know some kind of situation.
They thought which of our corevalues.
Is that and what's the rightthing to do?
Because it's not clear to them?
Okay, and you can use that asan example of.
(47:03):
They could ask that questionand you, the business owner, we
handle it like this.
Great, you've just clarified forpeople how the value is
interpreted, how it's appliedand maybe the preferred behavior
.
You want this and not that.
That's something that can beadded and then, if that
(47:26):
circumstance ever happens again,people know how to act.
Because what's really happeningif we don't make those
definitions?
What happens on all thoseexceptions where it's not clear,
and you are not there toclarify where it's not clear and
you are not there to clarifypeople maybe just use best
judgment and do what theythought was best, which,
(47:46):
unfortunately, is maybe not whatyou wanted and they're going
slightly in the wrong direction.
And if you don't detect that andthat goes on month after month,
year after year, suddenly, hey,what happened to the culture in
this organization?
It's shifted, it's changed.
So the culture is somethingthat's very, very much alive and
(48:11):
that's a lot of hard work tokeep it alive and keep nudging
it in the direction that youwant it to be.
Don't forget that every singlenew person who joins the
organization is going to changethe culture, just like every
single person who leaves theorganization is also going to
change the culture.
Speaker 1 (48:32):
Yeah, Well, we've just barely dipped our toe in
the water and I assure you thatthere are listeners that
probably want to connect withyou, follow you.
What social media are you onthat they can do that?
Speaker 2 (48:45):
Okay, the best thing is, I said, is go to my website.
All the the the social medialinks are there, uh, but again,
since I am fortunate to havethis unusual and unique name,
every single one of my socialmedia is in my name, apart from
one of them which I messed up.
I had to put a number two on it.
(49:06):
I know, on Instagram, I knowit's my name.
I lost control of my own name,so I recreated it with a number
two on the end, and it's justsilly.
Speaker 1 (49:17):
I've got one of those .
I've got one of those.
Well, as we wrap up, I alwaysask a final question, and that
is if you were in front of anaudience of small business
owners, what's a tip, insight, aquote or a book other than your
own that you would recommend,that would be applicable to all
of them, no matter what sizebusiness they have, or industry.
Speaker 2 (49:39):
Just a general Okay, there are a couple of things.
Um, I really really really likethe, um, the the late Maya
Angelou quote, which is you know, people forget what you said,
people forget what you did, butpeople will never forget how you
made them feel.
So, as business owners, you arereally the heart and soul of
(50:06):
the company and you need to makepeople feel something and if
they feel the right way, they'regoing to love the company right
, yeah, they're going to love it.
So, you know, although we tryand do all these wonderful
things okay, it's really can wereally connect with the people
and can we really make them themfeel something?
(50:27):
Okay?
Um, and let's not forget aboutourselves.
So you again, you businessowners who are super stressed
and like where's my business?
Why do people see no value inwhat we're doing?
You know, we've got to feelstuff as well, not just anger or
whatever.
We've got to feel good, okay.
(50:48):
We've got to feel fulfilled,okay.
We've got to feel balanced aswell.
You know, that's what I wanteverybody to feel, because if
you feel like that, you're in areally really good place, and if
you're in that feel good, thatreally strong place, you can
achieve so much.
You really can.
Speaker 1 (51:07):
Absolutely Well.
Rick, you're a blessing to many.
I appreciate you and your timesharing with our listeners, and
I wish you continued success.
Speaker 2 (51:16):
Thank you very much, michael.
You know, I really want toexpress my gratitude for letting
me you know rant on yourpodcast.
Speaker 1 (51:26):
All great information .
Speaker 2 (51:28):
It's been a real fun conversation and I hope our
listeners how pressured it isand I look forward to hearing
from some of you, learning fromyour experiences because you've
got good experience, you havegreat knowledge, okay and
(51:49):
perhaps having the opportunityto share some more in-depth
future discussions.
And remember you're not just aparticipant in this
ever-changing world, you are anarchitect shaping the course of
your life, your career and theworld around you and the people
(52:10):
around you.
I encourage you all to embracechange and define it, not just
adapt to it.
Be that catalyst in ourbusiness as unusual world.
Thank you again, michael, forthis wonderful exchange.
Speaker 1 (52:25):
My pleasure.
Thank you, rick.
Thank you for listening toSmall Business Pivots.
This podcast is created andproduced by my company, boss.
Our business is growing.
Yours, boss, offers flexiblebusiness loans with business
coaching support.
Yours, boss, offers flexiblebusiness loans with business
coaching support.
Apply in minutes and getapproved and funded in as little
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(52:49):
If you're enjoying this podcast, don't forget to hit the
subscribe button and share it aswell.
If you need help growing yourbusiness, email me at michael at
michaeldmorrisoncom.
We'll see you next time onSmall Business Pivots.
All right, welcome to another Small Business, pivots,
where we bring guests, specialguests from around the world,
and today we literally have onethat's across the world from us
here in Oklahoma, and I knowthat business owners can say
their name and their businesslike none other.
So I'll let you introduceyourself.
Tell us a little bit about you,where you're from, yeah, thanks
(00:24):
for having me, Michael.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Now, before we start, let me first share a core
belief that I hold here.
I believe that all of us allyou listeners as well all of us
have the potential to be what Iam calling an architect of
change.
In the era that we're living inat the moment, which is really
(00:46):
defined by constanttransformation, our task is not
just to keep up, but to activelyshape the path forward.
Now, if you look at me, Istarted out my career stacking
shelves and learning the ropesof people management as a
trainee in a supermarket in theUK, which is where I'm from.
(01:07):
Then I changed to the moreprecise world of accounting yeah
, I'm a bean counter and laternavigating what is now the
constantly evolving landscape oftech, but also people, humans.
My story really demonstratesthe power of transformation and
(01:28):
continuous learning and theimpact that each one of us can
make Every day.
I think that all our actions,whether they're big or small,
they actually shape our future.
And as we discuss stuff today,michael, I want everybody
listening to remember this youare your brand and every single
(01:49):
decision you make and notdeciding to decide in the face
of all of this change that ishappening will define your story
and, more importantly, yourlegacy.
(02:10):
Okay, it's this beliefinspiring each of us to aim for
what I call balance fulfillment.
It's the cornerstone of my workthese days.
It's my life purpose.
So, as we dive into ourconversation today, let's not
just think about adapting tochange, but about how we can
define it.
After all, if we can embraceour unique abilities and you all
(02:34):
have them that's why you're allbusiness owners listening in
you all have them all right andyou strive for that personal
growth you're not just aparticipant, you're the catalyst
in what I call ourever-changing business as
unusual world.
So let's get started, michael.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
All right, well, let's introduce yourself first,
and then we'll introduce theshow.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Who am I?
Okay, my name's Rick.
As you've heard, I'm a Brit.
You might hear from my accent,I am from across the water.
It you might hear from myaccent, I am from across the
water.
I'm currently standing here inSwitzerland, where I spend about
75% of my time, and the other25% of my time I spend in
Vietnam where, until last year,I've been pretty much living
(03:21):
there for the last 35 years.
Pretty much living there forthe last 35 years.
Wow, I am an accountant bytraining.
Things have happened and I'vegone.
You know, I started, I retiredback in 1994, which didn't work
very well, which is why I'mstill working.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Right, this is 2025.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
I know.
I know I know, but it's, it's,it's, it's.
You know, I'm still workingbecause I'm I'm a converted
workaholic, so I used to be aworkaholic and I'm trying to
kill that terrible habit becauseit is a really, really bad
habit.
It is, and that's what it is.
It's a habit, a bad one, andand?
(04:04):
And I started my own company 30years ago.
Actually, this year will be 31years for the main company, trg,
and I'm a bean counter.
Yes, we sell and implementaccounting systems all around
the world, so I haven't gone toofar away from that discipline,
(04:29):
gone too far away from thatdiscipline.
And recently, about seven yearsago, I've pivoted slightly and
I now do coaching as well, aswell as speaking, and I author a
few things like books.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Yeah Well, our listeners need to buckle up
because we have two coaches onthe show today, but let's
introduce our podcast and we'llbe right back.
Welcome to Small BusinessPivots, a podcast produced for
small business owners.
I'm your host, michael Morrison, founder and CEO of BOSS, where
we make business ownershipsimplified for success.
(05:00):
Our business is helping yoursgrow.
Boss offers business loans withbusiness coaching support.
Apply in minutes and getapproved and funded in as little
as 24 to 48 hours atbusinessownershipsimplifiedcom.
(05:27):
All right, welcome back to SmallBusiness Pivots.
My friend, you're a coach.
We were talking earlier aboutcoaching people up.
Architect of Change, you ledoff the podcast with some great
information.
Let's keep that going.
So how can we help others as acoach, as a leader, as a
business owner in our businesses, so that we're not working in
the business, we're not trappedin the business, we can work on
(05:48):
it, and a lot of that has to dowith our people and our
listeners, our small businessowners.
Many of them are stuck, theyfeel trapped, they're working in
their business countless hoursa day and probably don't feel
like they're getting anywhereand they want to get somewhere,
like you have gone.
But that takes a special personto be able to coach the people
(06:10):
you need around them.
So let's start there, if youdon't mind.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Yeah, let's address that.
Working in the business and onthe business.
I was one of those people whostarted off.
You know, one man and a dog,except I didn't even have a dog.
You know, start off by myselfand I think I could do it all,
which is a bit silly because Iwas an accountant and I know my
(06:33):
debits and credits and that wasabout it.
So anything else about abusiness, that was a bit of a
struggle.
You know, what do I know aboutsales or marketing or customer
support or or HR and all of thatkind of stuff?
I don't know.
So you learn it the hard wayand, having learned it, you're
(06:54):
still doing it.
But the mistake I guess that Imade, even as we scaled, is
failing to let go, and what Imean by that is just because I
can do it and I can maybe dosome things, or maybe a lot of
things.
So I thought, better thananyone else, even the people
(07:18):
that I hired, that's not yourrole.
If you are the business owner,why are you working in the
business?
You know that's not your role.
If you are the business owner,why are you working in the
business?
Okay, anything that you can getrid of, because you can get
someone else to do it.
Get them to do it and focus oneither growing your business,
you know, really work on it, or,if you really are, you know
(07:42):
that subject matter expert andyou know it's the unique thing
about your business is thatunique skill that you have.
Okay, fine, just do that, don'tdo anything else.
So what I found the hardestthing to do was actually letting
go.
You know, yes, you hired aperson to do that HR or whatever
but so how come, why are youstill involved?
(08:05):
Why are you still trying to doit?
Or, even worse for me, I'm anaccountant.
I hire a bunch of accountantsto do the accounting of the
company and, yeah, I'm all overthem, you know.
And it just goes on and on, andon and on.
So it's either teach yourselvesor, you know, grab ourself a
(08:25):
coach or a mentor.
And you know we need to seethat we've got to get away from
working in the business.
You know we're supposed to bethe business owner.
All right, it's an investment.
Okay, um, get other people todo it.
Train, train them, pass allyour knowledge to them so
they're even better than you are, and sit back and do whatever
(08:52):
you want.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
How did you let go?
Because I think that is thenumber one challenge for most
business owners.
In fact, I just talked to oneyesterday that said, if I let go
and it doesn't happen, I'm theone that has to take the heat
from the client.
So how does one programthemselves or transition,
(09:14):
transform themselves to let gosystems?
You talk about scaling abusiness and you have scaled an
incredible business TRG andothers.
As you said, how did you gofrom that mindset of I'm a small
business owner to now I canbuild this empire, but I got to
(09:35):
do this, this and this kind ofwalk us through those steps?
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Okay, there, there, there's several, there's several
.
You say red flags that couldcome up.
All right, I'm going to pick onthem in reverse order, all
right.
Okay, all right, I'm a babyboomer.
Okay, I'm a baby boomer, whichmeans I'm supposed to be retired
(10:01):
off in a few years.
I've got to my sell-by date,right.
And you know, when you get tothat stage let's say, all right,
in the next three to five years, you're just going to stop
working.
You look at your business andsaid, if you walk away in that
(10:22):
time period, can it carry onrunning?
Because if you're not going tosell it, can it still continue?
Yeah, you can stay on as somekind of advisor or mentor or
whatever and still pull somedividends in, but you've got to
be able to walk away.
So it runs without you, runswithout you, okay.
(10:49):
So age is one thing, but don'twait until you get to that
expiry date before you realize,because you know it might be a
little bit too late.
Okay, it might be a little bittoo late.
So, rather than looking forwardto really putting your feet up
and and and sort of reaping thebenefits of what you've built up
over the many, many years,you're scrabbling around trying
to piece it all together so itdoesn't fall apart, okay, so
(11:13):
that's an age thing.
That's really driven by that.
Another one is you know what wereally talk about.
There is business continuity.
It's no different.
You know, irrelevant of yourage, you get hit by that truck,
okay, and you cease to exist,all right.
If that actually happened, willyour business continue?
(11:34):
All right.
And for a lot of business owners, yeah, okay, you're doing a lot
of this for yourself, of course, but you're doing it for your
family, right.
You want to pass it on, okay,but if you get hit by a truck
today, this afternoon, you know,and you are not around, will it
still continue?
Okay, and I'm not reallytalking.
(11:56):
You know, on the one hand, youcan say you should have that,
that's business continuity.
But I'm really looking at itfrom the owner's perspective of
all the reasons we giveourselves why we shouldn't do it
.
Hey, I'm still young, don'thave to think about that, I'm
not going to get hit by a truck.
That's silly.
Yeah, all right.
So that's really two things.
What's the third one?
A third one is health.
(12:17):
Okay, when we're young, we canput up with all sorts of stuff.
We're generally a lot healthier.
But unfortunately, as we getolder, things start breaking
down.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Oh, I'm there, I'm there, we don't bounce back as
fast.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
So the first red flag to me was the dawning
realization that, yes, I wasn'tyoung anymore when I started the
company.
Hey, we're all at 20s or 30,something, you know, everyone
was young.
30 years later, well, funnyenough, we're older, um, so age
was driving me and I had ignoredthat one, the.
I have always ignored the beinghit by a truck, um, um, you
(13:02):
know more for me.
I haven't been hit by anything,which is good, but the.
It's the health thing that wasthe real trigger for me.
Um, because, um, when covidcame along, um, despite what was
happening during covid, Ieventually caught covid after
about two years you know, it'sabout 22, uh, and unfortunately
(13:24):
I caught long COVID and it did afew things to me.
Number one it really messedwith my sense of smell and sense
of taste, all right, and Iliterally lost at least half of
it, which is a problem, becauseone of the other businesses I
have is I run a coffee chain andit suddenly became we have
(13:50):
about two different types of,sorry, two dozen different types
of wonderful coffee this isAmerican coffee chain, by the
way, pj's of New Orleans, so bigshout out to PJ's down South
there and it came to the pointthat you know, with this long
COVID, that you could putwhatever coffee in front of me
that I've known because we'vebeen selling it for years, and I
(14:13):
couldn't tell you what it is.
So you could give me a hazelnutcoffee.
You know, beautiful aroma and Icouldn't tell you what it is
and in fact it doesn't matterwhat it was.
It all tasted revolting anyway,just like water, which also
smelt horrible.
Water doesn't smell and ittastes revolting.
So I had a lot of issues, okay,which maybe tripped up that
(14:36):
business a bit, because I waslosing interest, like you know,
what value can I add if I can'teven taste the damn coffee?
I can't do a quality check, Ican't do anything.
I can't even make a cup ofcoffee anymore because I don't
know if it tastes nice or not.
Yeah, yeah.
But the other thing was thisworkaholism thing.
You know I enjoy work.
(15:00):
You know, working 80 to 100hours a week, I enjoy it.
You know that's what I toldmyself and I don't need to sleep
very much.
And then I got this long covidthing and I needed a thing
called sleep.
You know, usually a goodnight's sleep was your
horizontal for six hours, whichmeans you're sleeping for
(15:20):
probably only about five.
Yeah, with with the long, covidis like.
You know that that's a nothing,you know, and even if I was in
bed for 12 hours and I slept forlike 11 of them, I'd wake up
and I'd feel like death, warmedup, okay.
And then there was all the, allthe.
I think I couldn't, I couldn'tthink I could hardly string, you
(15:42):
know, sentences together thatmean anything.
Okay, what did it mean?
It means I can't run thebusiness.
I can't run the business, andso I had to really rely on
people to run it.
And it was a massive wake-upcall that, ooh, I've maybe been
abusing myself for some decades.
It's maybe I should get intoshape and get some sleep and try
(16:04):
and get over all of this.
Okay, I still need a lot ofsleep today, but you know, that
was what now, what two, threeyears ago.
And that was the real wake-upcall, the massive red flag that
says, hey, you know, you reallycan actually not feel very
healthy, not be very healthy,and therefore, if you are not
healthy, how can you possiblydeliver properly in your own
(16:27):
organization?
Okay, you've got to let go,you've got to find people to do
other stuff you know.
And because I'm not going towork a gazillion hours a week
anymore delegate everything,learn how to delegate properly,
just it, okay.
So that was another red flag.
Again, I'm going backwards now.
(16:49):
So these are all the reallynegative things.
Right, you're getting old, youget hit by the track, you get
unhealthy, so you can't work.
So you know that I wouldn'twish that on anyone.
Sorry, can't do anything aboutthe getting older.
So what else?
Another red flag is not havingthe systems, not having the SOPs
(17:11):
, not having the processes.
And who has them?
You do, they're all in yourhead.
You know them all, backwards,forwards.
You know them perfectly and youcan explain to anyone.
The only problem is it's notyou who needs to know them, it's
them.
Right, good, um, so not onlywould that be helpful if you're
(17:32):
onboarding new people, becauseall they have to do is read the
process and they can teachthemselves, rather than you have
to do it or someone else haveto do it is.
Here's the thing for businessowners your business is worth
less.
It's worth less if you don'thave it fully documented,
(17:54):
because if someone's going tobuy your business, they're maybe
okay, buying your brand, brandname, okay, you've been doing
good, fantastic.
They are buying the people thatyou have, maybe the knowledge
that they have.
But the problem is, if theknowledge is locked up in people
(18:15):
, there's no guarantee that theywill remain there.
I mean, just like when youyourself walk away from the
business, you retire or whateveryou do or decide to do
something else, unless you'vedocumented literally all your
knowledge and passed it on intothat organizational knowledge,
all those SOPs and processes,that knowledge has been lost.
(18:39):
So anybody who wants to buy yourbusiness, if they can't see
that knowledge locked into thoseprocesses, why should they pay
for it if it's going to walk outthe door?
And yeah, I've spoken to a fewcompanies who, having had no
(19:01):
documented processes and theywere trying to sell the company
and they couldn't understand whythey were getting a terrible
valuation wind forward a fewyears and they built all the
processes.
They've actually captured thatorganizational knowledge and
then they went for anothervaluation and they're getting
the numbers that they want.
(19:22):
It's going to be very, veryhard to let go if it's not
documented.
Yeah, because how is anybodyelse going to pick up the reins
and run with it?
Okay, um, now it may be again.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
You know, subconsciously, are we
deliberately not documentingstaff so we can still play in
the game, because we don't wantto let go what you're talking
about is almost like arepercussion if you don't do
these things, because, as a youknow, we offer business loans,
but we offer business coachingsupport as well.
(20:00):
A third of our clients are 55and older, and the reason for
that is because their businessis worth nothing.
They went to try to sell it.
They're looking at retiringsoon.
This was all they know.
This was going to be their nestegg.
They're figuring out.
(20:21):
Like you said, it's not worthanything because you didn't do
all these things, you didn'tprepare.
There's no one else that knowshow to do the things you do.
Your kids don't want it.
Uh, mostly because.
Or their kids don't want itmostly because they were working
the 80 hours a week and they'relike I don't want to do that to
my kids, so I don't want it.
Well, if your kids don't wantit, no one else wants it.
(20:42):
It's zero value.
So, thinking of thoserepercussions in that, no matter
what age you are, as a listeneryou got to think of I could be
hit by a truck tomorrow.
It's not.
Your business is worth nothingwithout you if you think about
it that way.
And so those are all validpoints.
(21:04):
I like how you worked backwardsOn that valuation.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
it's obviously worth a lot to you as the business
owner.
You know you've put your heartand soul, your blood, sweat and
tears maybe every dollar thatyou have, into it as well.
You know nothing wrong in that.
But the thing is if, if yourintention was, at some point in
time, that is, to realize thevalue that you've created, so
you can pass it either enjoy ityourself or pass it on to your
(21:34):
own family or to someone else,or whatever charity that you
want to give it to, or or a mix,mix of them.
It's not what you think it'sworth, it's what other people
think it's worth.
Yeah, okay, and um, sinceyou're not going to be there,
all your knowledge, which issystems, processes, must be
(21:56):
captured, because that's whatthey're buying.
It's one of the things thatthey're buying, okay, um, and
and it's not just the processes,it's the people that you've got
.
So you've got to hire the rightpeople.
They've got to understand thoseprocesses.
They've got to be doing themreligiously and doing them well
and improving them, becausethey're not static.
(22:16):
Things change, technology haschanged, so what's right today
is maybe not work anymore in ayear's time, because, hey,
that's outdated technology.
We have to update that process.
When you're trying to sell,people want to buy a going
concern.
They want to buy something thatreally exists and will continue
to exist.
They don't want everybodyquitting within a few months
(22:40):
okay, because you're no longerthere.
They want it to carry on.
So there's an awful lot that weneed to do as a business to
ensure that continuity.
Now there's a Japanese conceptcalled You're listening to Small
(23:02):
Business pivots.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
This podcast is produced by my company boss.
Our business is helping yoursgrow.
Boss offers business loans withbusiness coaching support.
Apply in minutes and getapproved and funded in as little
as 24 to 48 hours at businessownership simplifiedcom.
If you're enjoying this podcastpodcast, don't forget to hit
(23:24):
the subscribe button and shareit as well.
Now let's get back to ourspecial guest now there's a.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
There's a Japanese concept called shin eyes okay,
um, and there are about 30,000Japanese companies that embrace
this and what it means.
It's a company that has lastedfor a very long time generations
, hundreds or hundreds of yearsand it really comes from passing
(23:57):
it down through the generations.
Now I've taken that concept andI've tweaked it a bit, because
one of the things when I look atorganizations and I work with
organizations, coaching them orwhatever, I like to introduce
this concept of the Shinaisconcept and look at it that
we're trying to ensure that ourbusiness is sustainable way into
(24:24):
the future.
So, rather than we're notnecessarily handy across to our
kids, you know, through thefamily, because it might not be
a family-owned company, allright, it's just pass you on to
the next generation.
As I said, I'm a baby boomer,okay, I'm going to be retired
off soon.
I'm not going to be around in30, 40 years from now, okay,
(24:45):
unless something miraculoushappens with healthcare and I
live into my hundreds orsomething.
You're passing on to the nextgeneration of people who are
running the company.
You know, maybe, and if youwere a startup, you know, you,
you attracted all these peoplebecause you, you know a young
startup, great ideas, wonderful,and they all join and
(25:06):
everything is wonderful andgreat.
And, you know, a decade or twogoes by and they get a bit older
.
You know, are they going to runthe?
Maybe they want to be runningthe company.
So when are you going to go?
When did they have their shot?
And then are they able to passit on to the next generation of
people?
So that's the longevity of thecompany.
You know, you can only do thatif things have been documented
(25:31):
and systematized and you'vebuilt that culture of pass your
knowledge, of growing otherpeople.
You know all that successionplanning, who's going to take
over whatever role in thecompany?
Okay, so it's really, reallyresilient.
It doesn't matter what happens.
Yeah, you know, things happen.
People get hit by trucks,people get old, people quit or
(25:52):
whatever, for good and badreasons.
You know, can our businesssustain it?
You know, do we have enoughdepth of succession planning to
cater for that?
The stronger that is, thelonger your business will last,
year after year, decade afterdecade, maybe into the hundreds
(26:12):
of years.
That's the shin ice concept andI think we need to think about
that, because maybe, yes, youare the business owner and you
started the business, but isn'tthat part of your legacy?
You know, a hundred years fromnow, do people want to remember
that you started that companyand it's great because of you
and your principles and valuesare still there and they're
(26:34):
being upheld by these otherpeople and they're continuing it
and expanded on it and grown onit.
Is that how you want to beremembered?
Or would you rather peoplesaying, hmm, how did that
company start?
Speaker 1 (26:49):
Many businesses in the US don't last past the third
generation.
The original founder put in theblood, sweat and tears.
It's got the most value.
Their kids and tears.
It's got the most value.
Their kids, if they take over,might run it.
Well, about 50% of them don't.
(27:10):
And then the grandkids once itgets to the third generation,
all they remember is grandpa andgrandma had a lot of money and
so they're not in it for theblood, sweat and tears, they're
just in it for the money and ofcourse that's not sustainable.
So if you don't have thesesystems and things in place, the
company's people dependent andnot process dependent.
These systems and things inplace, the company's people
dependent and not processdependent.
And so when I say that thebusinesses have zero value for
(27:31):
the companies that haveapproached us when they're 55
and older, it's because theydon't have that stuff, the
things that you're talking about.
And so when they're gone, noone wants it.
No one wants to buy a job.
Right, I can go get a job withless liabilities than own a
business, have a job and allthese bills and responsibilities
.
So everything you're talkingabout is well said.
(27:54):
Speaking of architect, is therelike a blueprint that you would
provide quickly with how toscale a business, kind of like
here I'm thinking about startinga business.
What are some steps to get youto that level of things that you
need to do, in other words,some essentials that you need to
have and do?
We've already talked aboutsystems, but is there a
(28:15):
blueprint of do this, do this,do this Because on your website
you've got core values, all goodstuff, but how does one?
You know, you didn't just comeup with all that at once.
It was a, it was a process.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Yeah, it's a process.
Maybe I learned about it toolate.
It's really, you know, lookingbackwards on maybe what I should
have done.
A lot of it I learned throughthrough my coaching journey.
For the individual who wants tostart a business is really
looking at ourselves, becauseit's the inner work that needs
(28:49):
to be done first.
I believe.
What are our core values?
We need to understand them,because if you're about to
establish a company, you'regoing to have to put some in
that company.
Now, are they going to beidentical to your core values or
are they going to be identicalto your core values or are they
going to be slightly different?
Because that's a company, notyou, the person.
So that's one thing.
(29:10):
What is your purpose?
What is your why?
That's important, and I'm nottalking about a goal.
I'm not talking about, yeah, Iwant a big car, I want a big
house, I want to make a lot ofmoney, I want to do this, that
and the other.
Those are just goals.
They're materialistic things,but you know what's the real
(29:32):
point of view.
Okay, and you're going to beclear on that, very clear on
that, because that's a direction, there's a very clear direction
to go in and everything you doneeds to be going in that
direction, because if it isn't,that's when you feel something's
a bit off.
It's going to prevent yougetting in the flow, it's going
(29:52):
to prevent you feeling balanced.
You're just going to feelsomething is not quite right and
that is not a nice place to be.
That is not a nice place to be.
I believe these days that afterthe pandemic, we had the great
reshuffle, we had the greatresignation, we had the great
insert, whatever words you want,people moving around, and it's
(30:13):
still happening.
And I feel and that's one ofthe reasons why I wrote the book
that I wrote a couple of yearsago called Business as Unusual.
I wrote the book that I wrote acouple of years ago called
Business as Unusual.
It's because it's a lack ofalignment of what people's
(30:34):
purpose is and in a lot of casesthere wasn't one, which really
doesn't help.
And it's a bit like, you know,alice in Wonderland, right?
You know, when Alice isspeaking to the Cheshire Cat, it
says you know which way shouldI go?
And the cat's saying, well,where do you want to go?
She says, well, I don't know,it really doesn't matter where
(30:54):
you go.
And a lot of people are likethat you know.
How can you go in a direction,how can you feel fulfilled if
you don't actually know where itis?
You were going to go in thefirst place.
So there's a lot of inner workthat needs to be done and once
we have that, once we have thatclarity, oh, that's a very, very
strong foundation.
(31:15):
That's a really good startingpoint for that when you
establish your company.
That, when you establish yourcompany, it also needs a purpose
, it also needs values and, yeah, in between those you will have
(31:35):
goals from time to time.
Okay, so it's nearly the samething.
So you do it for the individualyourself first.
You need to make you know youare good and healthy and ready.
And you do it for the companyas well.
And as you bring people intoyour organization, you have to
teach them the same thing.
They've got to buy into thepurpose of the company,
otherwise why are they there?
They've got to buy into thecore values.
But if they don't know theirown purpose and they don't know
(31:59):
their own core values, there's avery high risk.
The reason why they feel out ofalignment with the company and
things don't feel quite right isbecause there's a mismatch
between that purpose and betweenthose core values.
All right, and you know so.
I think one of the greatestthings we can do for people is
(32:20):
to help them realize that, tohelp them establish those core
values, help them establishthose purpose.
So when they make you know ifthey join that company or they
start a company, you know, wealready know where we're going
to go.
You know, we really believe it,okay, and everything we do is
going to be in alignment withthat, rather than we're doing
(32:43):
stuff and it might be out ofalignment.
And if it's out of alignment,it means that we're hiring the
wrong people, and that's acompany error, not the candidate
error.
Amen, okay, yeah, so I'd ratherget it right from the start,
because it's really difficult ifwe're bringing in the wrong
(33:04):
people, as an organization,we've made a wrong choice.
I can't emphasize more that itis up to the company to select
the right people, and too manytimes we select the wrong people
and we try and blame thecandidate.
It's not the candidate's fault,okay, you know.
(33:27):
Why would they know?
We're supposed to know thecompany and what we want out of
people.
Okay, so we should know thetype of people that we want.
All right, and we need to.
You know the onus is on us tomake that right decision.
Okay, and if we get it right,well then, those people are
happy working for you.
(33:47):
You know they're very highlyengaged.
They're probably the peopleyou're going to hand over to
right?
Yeah, you know, it's all good,it's all good.
So there are other things in theframework.
A lot of them are in the book.
You know the book Business asUnusual, where I talk about
(34:08):
different buildings in mymetaphor, which is a castle.
Ok, we can all imagine a castlein our heads, right?
But you know, I give a name anda purpose to every single
building, every single building.
And in order to achieve balancein our lives, just like if we
were building our own castle, weneed to build it in a balanced
(34:31):
way.
Just like you're building anybuilding, you've got to build it
in a balanced way from theground up.
You can't start with a roof andas we're constructing our
castle, it's a lifelong journey.
We're laying a brick everysingle day, and it's consciously
(34:53):
, with intent, deciding where tolay it.
Which bit of ourselves are wegoing to focus on?
Okay, to maintain that balance?
All right, to maintain thatbalance.
And if we can do that and if wedo that, we feel very balanced,
we feel very fulfilled.
We're going to be in a greathealthy state to really do
(35:13):
things, rather than to feelempty, to feel unfulfilled, to
be unsure if we're going in theright direction and we're
hesitating to do things.
So we're hesitating to takeaction, we're unsure if we
should be going this way or thatway, and the moment that we
(35:33):
have that, as a business leader,we're going to lose confidence
of everybody else who's evenlooking at us.
Nobody wants to follow someonewho is indecisive and doesn't
know where they're going.
Speaker 1 (35:48):
I love that and it just reminds me of all the
business owners I hear say whycan't I find good employees?
And to me that is a red flag ofsaying I want to see your
mission.
Where's your core values?
Where's your vision?
It's not.
There's awesome employees outthere, they're everywhere,
(36:08):
you're just not ready for them.
So for those business ownersthat have said that or that are
listening, that say that Iencourage them to hire a coach,
like yourself or any coach, andget these things established,
because that is your problem.
That is the problem why youfeel you can't find good
employees.
They're out there, you justdon't know.
(36:29):
They don't know what to follow.
Speaker 2 (36:32):
At the end of the day , you're not there looking for
them.
If you get it right, you know,and it's very clear, what your
company does and who you are andwhat you stand for.
You know you start to becomethe magnet.
Okay, and a magnet does twothings, doesn't it?
It attracts people and itrepels people, and that's
(36:55):
exactly what you and yourcompany need to do.
You need to attract the rightpeople, yes, and you need to
repel the wrong people.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
And the only way to do that is with the stuff you're
talking about.
Do they align with your corevalues, your mission, where you
want to go?
Kind of give them a peek underthe hood of what this business
is all about.
I love that.
So is that what's in your book?
You kind of walk through thoseprocesses Awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Yes, it touches all different things.
It shows you how to puttogether a life purpose, you
know.
It shows you the importance ofbeing healthy and looking after
yourself.
It, you know, discusses theimportance of networking and
collaborating.
Okay, so it touches all ofthese things.
(37:45):
For you as an individual, okay,irrelevant if you're a business
leader, business owner or not,it's still about people, and you
know.
Going back to what you weretalking about before, you know,
talk about some of the businessowners that you've worked with
and some of the listeners.
(38:08):
I believe it's up to us also tohelp build the right person.
Okay, things are changing sofast that it's going to get
harder and harder to have theperfect person, you know, to
(38:32):
employ the perfect person, andthey know it all.
It's not going to happen.
You know all of you listening,or, if you're business owners,
all the stuff happening todaytechnology-wise.
Did you learn that at school?
No, it didn't even exist, okay.
(38:53):
So even if you take thebrightest sparks out of whatever
school you want to take themfrom their stuff, you know the
stuff that they need to know.
They're not going to know itand it doesn't matter how good
the school was, all theknowledge they've acquired is
(39:13):
going to be out of date in a fewyears and the skill sets that
they need.
If you look at, you know, theWorld Economic Forum.
They do a future of jobs reportevery couple of years.
The last one, if you look atthat, the sort of the top 10, 20
skills that people require.
They're sort of lacking in alot of people because they're
not taught.
A lot of these are soft skills.
(39:34):
They're not actually taught inschool.
Okay, so who's going to teachthem?
All right, so if you want yourpeople to have those skills,
you've got to be prepared toteach them.
So I'm a huge advocate of, as aleader, whether you are the
business owner or not, is you'vegot to be, number one,
(39:55):
coachable yourself.
And number two, you've got tobe able to coach other people
because you're there to see inthem something that that person
can't see themselves.
Okay, maybe you see somethingin them.
Hey, that that that personthere I, I can see that they can
(40:19):
help me run this business inthe next five years or 10 years
or whatever it is.
I know they've just left school, they're in a graduate entry or
whatever they are.
Okay, they don't know anything,but I see something in them.
You've probably seen yourself,yeah, or I see something in them
, right, but you're going tohave to grow that, yeah, you're
going to have to grow that.
(40:39):
We have to grow that.
You're going to have to growthat we have to nurture it.
Okay, and the best way to dothat is to be able to coach them
, to be able to mentor them.
Yeah when can your book be found?
You can find it on Amazon.
You can find it on Barnes Noble.
Best place to go is to go to mywebsite, because it's got all
(41:04):
the links.
So if you want to find me, justGoogle my name, rick Ivanovich,
and then say, wow, this guyreally knows SEO.
Okay, but I'd like to say that,but I'm the only person on the
planet with this name, so that'sa bit of a cheat, isn't it?
Try it, try it, try it.
(41:25):
So my website is my namecom.
Speaker 1 (41:26):
And we will put the spelling of your last name in
the show notes for those thatdon't know how to spell it.
So uh, T R G.
What is it that it does, andhow does that help people?
And then we'll wrap up here,Okay.
Speaker 2 (41:48):
TRG.
Okay, that's, that's my maincompany.
Um, we, we started off umimplementing accounting systems,
or you can call it financialERP if you want to make it a bit
sexier.
Uh, so it's all about financialsystems, accounting systems,
which is great, it's very, veryhorizontal.
Systems, which is great, it'svery, very horizontal.
And we do other related systemsas well, like, for example,
performance management systems,reporting systems, consolidation
(42:09):
systems, all that goodaccounting stuff.
Treasury systems you knowelectronic.
You know making electronic thatprocure to pay.
You know just email in theinvoice, and it all gets
miraculously handled by thecomputer and all the entries are
made into your accountingsystem, no human intervention
(42:30):
type of thing.
All of that kind of stuff we do, and we do it across all
industries, but we have aspecific bias, I suppose, to
hotels.
We've helped thousands ofhotels around the world and,
yeah, we're pretty good at that,I guess.
So that's what the mainbusiness does.
(42:53):
We also have a boutiqueoffshore development center.
This is software engineers forhire.
We've been doing that for awhile.
It's not very big, I thinkwe're about 350 people there.
Another business that we have isI never understood people very
(43:14):
well because I'm a numbersperson I'm the bean counter,
right, I'm the bean counter,right.
But then I found out a secretformula to people in
psychometrics okay, so that'sall the assessments or testing
of people, of their behaviorsand things, because it tells you
all sorts of stuff about aperson, all right, and so that's
(43:36):
what helped me with people that, yeah, we can use these
psychometrics which will uncovercertain skills in people.
Ok, and so, when it comes toselecting the right people, we
can go back to, you know, thosesort of children's games, pegs
and holes.
(43:57):
Each one of us is a uniqueshape and every job that we have
available is a unique hole.
Just find the right shape to gointo the job hole.
So that's very much get theright people on the bus and get
them on the right seats.
Yeah, it's the same type ofconcept and we can use these
psychometric tests to do that.
(44:17):
And for the you know, I know bigcomp, a lot of big companies
use it, you know.
So if there are any listenerswho are looking for a job and
they're trying to join thatgreat, big, multinational,
billion dollar company orwhatever, um, you'll probably
put through a battery of testsand assessments and things.
That's what I'm talking about.
Um, that's another one of thecompanies that we have and it's
(44:39):
highly affordable.
We've made it dirt cheapbecause why not?
We're trying to help people,yeah.
So yeah, we do stuff aroundthat as well.
Oh, and I mentioned coffee.
We do that.
Speaker 1 (44:52):
Yeah, I love it Well for our listeners.
If you're curious what goodcore values look like, I
encourage you to go to thewebsite trginternationalcom.
Go to the About Us sectionunder core values Very well
written.
Very well written.
You'll have to go check themout if you don't have core
(45:12):
values.
This is how they should be done.
I love the examples that yougive.
This is what this core value isand this is what it's not.
A lot of people forget thatpart because our translation of
what one of yours is passion howI describe passion, how you
describe passion are probablysimilar but different.
But you kind of say this iswhat it is, this is what it's
(45:35):
not, and so that's very wellwritten.
Speaker 2 (45:37):
Absolutely.
Now, there's a reason for that.
There's a reason for that.
There's a reason for that.
Again, people talk about theculture of the company.
Okay, now, as a business owner,you might have done your core
values.
They may be stuck up on thewall there and you may or may
not have, you know, the kind ofthe depth that we put into it,
(45:58):
what we expect and what we don'texpect.
But the thing is is that it'show people are really behaving.
That's the real culture in thecompany.
So how do you, as theorganization, the business owner
, how do you control thatculture?
Okay, so, if you've, if you've,come up with those core values,
(46:19):
we have to live them.
Ok, so, if you've come up withthose core values, we have to
live them.
All right, we have to see ifpeople are embracing them.
So one thing that can be done isperiodically, maybe quarterly,
something like that, you cangather people together on a
voluntary basis and anychallenges that they've ever had
over the core values, what isit?
So you might have had a corevalue of, I don't know, passion,
(46:43):
all right, and people may not.
They came across an instance,you know some kind of situation.
They thought which of our corevalues.
Is that and what's the rightthing to do?
Because it's not clear to them?
Okay, and you can use that asan example of.
(47:03):
They could ask that questionand you, the business owner, we
handle it like this.
Great, you've just clarified forpeople how the value is
interpreted, how it's appliedand maybe the preferred behavior
.
You want this and not that.
That's something that can beadded and then, if that
(47:26):
circumstance ever happens again,people know how to act.
Because what's really happeningif we don't make those
definitions?
What happens on all thoseexceptions where it's not clear,
and you are not there toclarify where it's not clear and
you are not there to clarifypeople maybe just use best
judgment and do what theythought was best, which,
(47:46):
unfortunately, is maybe not whatyou wanted and they're going
slightly in the wrong direction.
And if you don't detect that andthat goes on month after month,
year after year, suddenly, hey,what happened to the culture in
this organization?
It's shifted, it's changed.
So the culture is somethingthat's very, very much alive and
(48:11):
that's a lot of hard work tokeep it alive and keep nudging
it in the direction that youwant it to be.
Don't forget that every singlenew person who joins the
organization is going to changethe culture, just like every
single person who leaves theorganization is also going to
change the culture.
Speaker 1 (48:32):
Yeah, Well, we've just barely dipped our toe in
the water and I assure you thatthere are listeners that
probably want to connect withyou, follow you.
What social media are you onthat they can do that?
Speaker 2 (48:45):
Okay, the best thing is, I said, is go to my website.
All the the the social medialinks are there, uh, but again,
since I am fortunate to havethis unusual and unique name,
every single one of my socialmedia is in my name, apart from
one of them which I messed up.
I had to put a number two on it.
(49:06):
I know, on Instagram, I knowit's my name.
I lost control of my own name,so I recreated it with a number
two on the end, and it's justsilly.
Speaker 1 (49:17):
I've got one of those .
I've got one of those.
Well, as we wrap up, I alwaysask a final question, and that
is if you were in front of anaudience of small business
owners, what's a tip, insight, aquote or a book other than your
own that you would recommend,that would be applicable to all
of them, no matter what sizebusiness they have, or industry.
Speaker 2 (49:39):
Just a general Okay, there are a couple of things.
Um, I really really really likethe, um, the the late Maya
Angelou quote, which is you know, people forget what you said,
people forget what you did, butpeople will never forget how you
made them feel.
So, as business owners, you arereally the heart and soul of
(50:06):
the company and you need to makepeople feel something and if
they feel the right way, they'regoing to love the company right
, yeah, they're going to love it.
So, you know, although we tryand do all these wonderful
things okay, it's really can wereally connect with the people
and can we really make them themfeel something?
(50:27):
Okay?
Um, and let's not forget aboutourselves.
So you again, you businessowners who are super stressed
and like where's my business?
Why do people see no value inwhat we're doing?
You know, we've got to feelstuff as well, not just anger or
whatever.
We've got to feel good, okay.
(50:48):
We've got to feel fulfilled,okay.
We've got to feel balanced aswell.
You know, that's what I wanteverybody to feel, because if
you feel like that, you're in areally really good place, and if
you're in that feel good, thatreally strong place, you can
achieve so much.
You really can.
Speaker 1 (51:07):
Absolutely Well.
Rick, you're a blessing to many.
I appreciate you and your timesharing with our listeners, and
I wish you continued success.
Speaker 2 (51:16):
Thank you very much, michael.
You know, I really want toexpress my gratitude for letting
me you know rant on yourpodcast.
Speaker 1 (51:26):
All great information .
Speaker 2 (51:28):
It's been a real fun conversation and I hope our
listeners how pressured it isand I look forward to hearing
from some of you, learning fromyour experiences because you've
got good experience, you havegreat knowledge, okay and
(51:49):
perhaps having the opportunityto share some more in-depth
future discussions.
And remember you're not just aparticipant in this
ever-changing world, you are anarchitect shaping the course of
your life, your career and theworld around you and the people
(52:10):
around you.
I encourage you all to embracechange and define it, not just
adapt to it.
Be that catalyst in ourbusiness as unusual world.
Thank you again, michael, forthis wonderful exchange.
Speaker 1 (52:25):
My pleasure.
Thank you, rick.
Thank you for listening toSmall Business Pivots.
This podcast is created andproduced by my company, boss.
Our business is growing.
Yours, boss, offers flexiblebusiness loans with business
coaching support.
Yours, boss, offers flexiblebusiness loans with business
coaching support.
Apply in minutes and getapproved and funded in as little
as 24 to 48 hours atbusinessownershipsimplifiedcom.
(52:49):
If you're enjoying this podcast, don't forget to hit the
subscribe button and share it aswell.
If you need help growing yourbusiness, email me at michael at
michaeldmorrisoncom.
We'll see you next time onSmall Business Pivots.
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