Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi, everybody. I want to welcome you to another episode
of The Advisor, the Franchise Advisory Board, where we bring
in experts from the franchise community to share expertise, wisdom
and tactical actionable items that will help you improve your
franchise brand, your franchisese performance. And to that end, I've
got a great guest with me today. A lot of
you probably know Scott Greenberg, and if you don't, you've
(00:23):
been under some sort of rock somewhere in this industry
because I see him everywhere. He's been to a lot
of franchise brand conferences presenting as an expert. And yes,
I use the E word, and I don't always throw
that out here, but let me tell you about Scott
just in case you're a little new to the industry.
You need to know him. Scott's he's a writer. He's
written two great books. Yeah. In fact, you can see
him right over his shoulder, the wealthy franchisee stop the
(00:44):
shift show. He is a Dodgers fan, which I appreciate
as well. We didn't talk about that, but well done, Scott.
But Scott's also he's a performance coach. He helps helps
franchise brands figure out how holp their franchisees really thrive,
which I'm sure is what inspired the book, but I'll
let you tell that story. He's also been the creator
of a couple of online courses because he gets pulled
(01:04):
in a lot of directions to present and talk and
share and try to coach. It's hard to do that
at scale, and he's created some online resources to help people.
One aligns extremely well with the Wealthy franchise E course,
and it's called the Wealthy franchise Business Breakthrough.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Is that right, Wealthy Franchisey Business Breakthrough Program?
Speaker 1 (01:23):
Yeah, thank you, well, I almost got it. And then
the other one's called him's the Hourly Employee Management Program.
Any of you guys who are managing hourly folks again,
I think that you might want to look up Scott
take a look at what he's got put together. There
a couple of fun things about Scott I didn't know
before we started chatting. Was two time cancer survivor. Wow, congratulations,
(01:43):
glad you're with us, my friend, And then met his
wife in a club called the Viper Room at a
sex pistols party. That just made you like your badassory
just like went this far up in my mind, right. Yeah,
So anyway, thanks for being here, proud to have two Scott,
tell us it's a little bit more about you and
what you've been working on. Then we'll jump into our topic,
(02:04):
which is about what is it like the ways of
a wealthy franchisee. How do we help franchises really develop?
So before we go there, tell us about yourself a
bit more. Scott.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
You were so thorough you didn't leave much left. So
why don't we just talk about the Dodgers.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Yeah, well, I I want to talk about the Dodgers
after the last couple of games, but we can't.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Right, brutal, brutal, tough times. I actually grew up in
San Diego, So if it does end up being the Padres,
who you know, go to the big show, I'll be
I'll be okay with that, But come on, Dodgers.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
I make a living helping franchise ese grow their businesses,
and I'm interested in the human side of business. So
there's a lot of great people out there talking about
AI technology marketing. Uh, that stuff is so important, and
that's not my area of interest. I'm interested in the
human side of business, how we think, how we lead
(02:53):
and on how we serve. So it's the mindset of
the franchise e all those things that because you know,
most franchises don't really they are the biggest factor in
their business, for better or for worse. So I help
them understand how to make sure that they are an
asset to their own business. But also it's the inter
personal skills, the way they attract or not you know,
(03:13):
great employees, how they engage them, and really understanding how
to lead them and boost performance. And that leads of
course them to the customer experience. We want to turn
our customers into repeak customers who also become spokespersons for
our business. Starts with us, and so that is what
I write about and think about. I'm inspired by what
happened after that first book, a lot of people coming
(03:33):
to me wanting to know more about managing employees. So
I wrote my second book, Stop the Shift Show, which
is about how hourly employees are different from those on
salary and what it takes to engage them, to attract them,
to inspire them and boost their performance. And I'll write
about a lot of great places that have cracked the
code and figured out how to do it. So again,
it's all part of the human side of business. That's
(03:55):
the stuff that I find fascinating and love to talk about.
Excuse me to talk about with different franchise brands.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Yeah, well, I love that. And it's interesting because so
many brands, like normally people think oh, fast food restaurant,
when I think of hourly, so many brands, so many
different concepts depend upon hourly employees. They depend upon these
strategies that you've helped develop to help their franchisees be successful.
And especially emerging brands don't often have the resources to
(04:24):
do the type of coaching that they need to do
to help people help the franchisees become successful. And I'd
be curious to get your take on this guy. It's
a kind of hot take before we jump into the
main topic. But where a lot of the trainings and
programs that I've seen really are dependent upon a lot
of human touch. What are some ways, as we start
talking through these ideas of ways you can improve the
(04:45):
franchise e success rate, what are some of the ways
a franchise brand can create systems and processes around that
that don't depend as much upon like FBC execution.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Sure, well, so it's a great question. And you know,
there's some things that are built in to the franchise
industry that have made this difficult. The promise of a
franchise brand is typically, we're going to teach you everything
you need to know to be successful. Most brands don't
make good on that promise because they don't know everything
that the person needs to know. They know their own
system really well, which in my opinion, should be enough. Yeah, right,
(05:18):
Like if my system can give me great soft skills
and support me and they understand psychology, that's great, but
that's gravy. Like find me a system's got a great
operation that I can replicate and gives me great support
and great marketing, that's great. But then on my own
I need to kind of seek out these other things.
But wouldn't it be great if some of these franchise
(05:39):
brands could offer more support both in terms of understanding
the mindset of the right kind of franchise e so
you know how to manage their time, to know how
to manage their emotions right, so they can embrace change
and and have the good social skills. But then just
as important is you mentioned like how reliant the franchise
industry is on hourly workers. Fifty eight percent of all
(06:01):
jobs in the US are these hourly jobs, probably a
greater number within the franchise industry.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Right.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
It's obvious in things like quick service and hospitality, but
it's amazing how many sectors of franchising rely on hourly workers.
But most franchise brands are reluctant to say anything about
how to manage hourly workers because they've been conditioned to
be worried about being called joint employers. But I think
a lot of lawyers have misguided them because we're not
(06:28):
talking about dictating policy or rules and regulations, hr stuff
you know that might be a joint employer, but teaching
franchisees what culture is and how to build it, how
to motivate people, generally speaking, that kind of support, and
I have franchise lawyers who backed me up on this.
That's not getting in a joint employer territory. So I
(06:49):
wish that more franchise ors provided that support. Actually, now
I'm fine they don't because that's where I come in. So,
you know, I want to position myself as at third
party to offer that kind of training. That's port I
just had a zoom today with a Tommy's car Wash Systems,
awesome franchise brand. They had me speak of their franchise
(07:09):
conference they're bringing back to do a two hour session
for all of their site leaders, all the managers throughout
the company, training them specifically on managing the hourly teams.
So I would love to see more franchise ors get
involved in that. I'd love to be a resource to
help make that happen.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
I love it well. I mean this I think feeds
in very nicely into the topic we were going to
talk about today, which is what are the ways of
wealthy franchisees. It's going to be hard not to incorporate
those things we just talked about into that. But talk
to me just a little bit about these myths. I
think you just talked about one, like the joint employer,
like fear and fear mongering that's been going on, like
it creates a lot of your shrouds a lot of
(07:47):
things and mysticism. But what are some of the other
key myths you find about franchise e success that can
be can hamstring the success of a franchise.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
And I want to call the joint employer thing a
myth because I think it's a leg jgitimate concern, probably
less so today than maybe a few years ago, but
you know, it's something that's real. But yeah, a lot
of the fear around it is misguided. But there are
a lot of misenfranchising as to why there are top
franchisees in a system who outdo everyone else. The most
common one is, well, they just have a good location.
(08:19):
That's just simply not true, because every franchise or will
tell you about you know a great franchise e who
took over a struggling location the first owner thought was
just a lemon, and they built it up and they
made it successful. You know, I personally did that as
I was a franchisee for ten years. I built my
first location. The second one we acquired, it was struggling,
(08:39):
and you know, the first owner thought their location was terrible.
Their first location was adequate. We had a profitable within
a year just by doing the same things at the
first so location that you necessarily need to have a
big business background that maybe these people are the favorites
of the franchise or that successful franchisees work the hardest
(09:04):
or work the longest. That's simply not true. So there's
a lot of things that you know, and look, we
want to when we don't do well, we want to scapegoat,
want to blame somethings out of our control, such as
it's my location or it's because of who's in you know,
I was doing my due diligence interviewing what you're franchise
is for a brand. I was going to speak to
(09:26):
this one guy immediately started blaming politics. In the meantime,
there's other people in his system who are really doing well. Right,
And I live in California, right, which you know, Matt
Howard from IFA loves to call it the People's Republic
of California.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
That's what I actually call it in my slide.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
And in spite of all the business challenges we have
out here, there's a lot of franchises making plenty of money.
I had two of them for you know, for a
long time. So a lot of myths that are there.
So in terms of the ways the wealthy franchise, they
really excel in the areas that matter. Yes, of course
they run tight operations, but that's not the secret to success.
(10:06):
That's just the prerequisite. What makes these people stand out
is mastery of those human elements. So they keep their
emotions in check and make decisions based on data. They
are focusing on continuous improvement. Even they rank number one,
they push themselves to break their own records, and they
never stop wanting to improve. And so part of that
(10:28):
means embracing change. So they're really good when the franchise
or rolls out with the new program of wanting to
try it, and they're willing to fail fail with the
franchise or so at least they're innovating trying, because not innovating,
not doing things differently, as we all know, is that
you know, kiss of death. Right. They manage their time well,
I have a panel coming up. I'm speaking at the
(10:50):
QSR Evolution Conference in a few weeks. I'm going to
be interviewing one person who owns two hundred and seventy
five Papa John's restaurants. Okay, he has the same amount
of hours in a day as a single union owner,
but he's learned how to manage his time in a
way so you can replicate himself. He focuses on the
things that matter and building the business and not just
(11:12):
you know, being the one who's personally making pizza's deliveries,
that kind of thing. So it's all that interpersonal management.
And then the again, they're great with employees, they're great
with customers. They focus on making people feel good. At
the end of I'm spending a long time answering your question,
but it's a really big question. You ask them the
ways of wealthy. So I gotta summarize my entire book.
Let me narrow it down to three things. First, they
(11:36):
control their thoughts and emotions. They keep a clear head.
Number two, they stick to the proven system and work
well with the franchise or Number three, it's broad, but
it makes a lot of sense. They use their business
to improve the lives of everyone. It touches customers, suppliers,
their employees. They wake up thinking, how can I improve
(12:00):
all those around me? And that boomerang effect does magical
things for the business.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Yeah, and I would love, as you might imagine, and
I'd love to dive into a few of those items
with you. This idea that the human element you mentioned
this early on, like you really love and focus on
the human element. Can we talk about the like the
corollary here, So if you've got a franchise owner, let's
say great business background, well funded, uh, and they come in,
(12:27):
but their people skills are lacking. How what do you
typically see? What does the franchise or see in their
performance record? What do they see in their employee effort?
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Like, what are the.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
Symptoms of somebody who maybe is struggling with those people
skills which is so critical to their success.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
I think there are what they see as a performance
ceiling that maybe they have a great location and maybe
they've got some great business sense and that goes a
long way. Those things are important, but they're still going
to struggle with finding and more importantly, keeping employees. They're
still going to struggle getting great reviews from customers and
(13:04):
miss out on the opportunity of turning those customers into
higher paying customers and to repeat customers and spokespersons for
the brand. So they might be able to keep the
business going, but they're leading money on the table. That's
what they see with those kinds of people. And I'm
not suggesting that it's all just soft skills and we
can smile and attitude our way to success. Like the
(13:24):
business acumen has to be there, right, We've got to
like maximize revenue and we need to minimize expenses. We
need to maintain inventory, like we need to deliver and
keep our promises to customers and write products and services,
and we have to tell the right story and market
a whole lot. That allows us to run an adequate business,
but to make it a great business and to outdo
(13:46):
the competition, we need to add that human element that
really is that force multiplier.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
Yeah, well, I appreciate you digging into that with me
a little bit, and we may come back to it.
But there are two other elements that you talked about
I'd like to dig into. You talk about following the
program and innovating. You know, this may feel like a paradox, right,
but it shouldn't be. But let's first like dig into
like why why did the most successful franchise operators typically
stick with the program? How does that make them successful?
(14:16):
And then we want to talk about the other side
of that, which is and then how to innovate in
that space. But let's talk about step one first, like
why is that so critical?
Speaker 2 (14:23):
Well, I think, first of all, a great franchise system
is really good, and it pushes to get even better
because the competition is doing the same thing. So we
have to evolve, we have to change. Consumer tastes are changing, right,
The political environment is changing, the weather's changing. Everything is
constantly changing. So we create a system, prove that it works,
(14:47):
and then make sure it continues to work as everything
around it changes. I think really great franchise ease. They
get into franchising because they want to mitigate risk. So
rather than being a mom and pop and trying to
figure it out on their own, they find a franchise
system that's already figured it out. And they realized that
they're paying. They paid a franchise fee and a royalty
to outsource the innovation to outsource right, So they just
(15:11):
want to align with that proven system now. So we
all know. Franchise ors make mistakes and they make changes.
I was a franchisee for ten years, and I did
not always agree with my franchise or and I would
sometimes speak out and push back and resist, and sometimes
I was right, And if had to guess, I'd say
I was right about twenty percent of the time and
(15:34):
they were wrong. But one day it occurred to me,
if I just do what they say, I can be
right with them eighty percent of the time, which is
a lot better than I would have done on my own.
So you're mitigating risks. All this is a course, assuming
you've really vetted your franchise or otherwise why did you
buy into it. But so you get into it to
(15:54):
mitigate risk, and as soon as you deviate from the
system you're now exposing yourself to that very risk the
originally wanted to mitigate. So I think that these people
do that, but then they understand that a really great system.
Part of it is some good r and d yes,
some good innovation so that they can stay relevant. So
(16:15):
they stick to the proven system, and they evolve and
change with the system. And when the system changes in
a way that's not good or it's a mistake, they
give their input, they give their feedback, but they communicate
that in a way that's constructive, rather than doing what
so many franchises do. These idiots, they don't know what
they're doing, and they're they're greedy and they don't get
you know, hopefully it's a franchise or who's you know,
(16:35):
who's got some skin in the game with company owned stores.
Maybe they've attempted some of these things and and they're
willing to admit when they're wrong. And they learn and
we all move forward.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
Yeah. No, well, and I don't We didn't talk about
this before. My wife and I just sold our franchises
in January, so they would if they were on this call,
they would say, yeah, Dave was the same way I did.
I did like to innovate. We did. We actually help
them develop some new programs that were extremely successful while
we were there. And I love that kind of stuff. Uh,
And also don't love being tolble what to do sometimes,
(17:07):
But being a franchise owner, you have to be tobal
what to do, Like you legally are obligated to be
toble what to do sometimes, and there are good reasons why,
and so like I appreciate your perspective on that. The
twenty eighty rule. I don't know if mine was quite
the same Racetio, but maybe that's more ego talking. But
they were also a lot younger and they weren't as developed,
so there was a lot of kind of white space
(17:27):
to like fine tune things and build and that was
I think what attracted me to them in the first place,
because plug me into a situation where I've got all
this like live in the box. That's hard for me
to personally do so I think it was right.
Speaker 2 (17:40):
I think the younger the system, the more you need
to expect that there's going to be change us and
be okay with that and not think that they're greedy
or incompetent or dishonest because they're advocating. They're learning their
business just like we are learning ours. But if we
can put together a strong collaboration or there's room for
mistakes and room for innovation, but good communication. Although we
(18:01):
can all figure this out together, the alternative is to
go out it alone. And in which case, why even
why did you buy a frame franchising at all? Right?
Speaker 1 (18:10):
Right? Yeah, And we see it all the time though, right,
franchise brand. I work with hundreds of franchise brands and
and we're they're commiserating with me sometimes about the franchise
that was like Dave Hansen, right, be like I've got
this guy. He just thinks he needs to innovate right now,
and really, like we're a burger joint, Like how much
innovation is it? Just go like sell burgers, like sell
more burgers and sell them at a better profit, and
(18:31):
you know, manage your labor and your inventory expense. Like
sometimes innovation is not appropriate and and but you talked
about creating a system, like a system that facilitates innovation
and creativity and communication. What what are I mean? Facs
come right to my mind like that feels like the right.
That seems like a healthy place where there should be
a balance of innovation both ways in creativity, exchange of ideas.
(18:55):
What are some other tools that some of the best
franchise brands you've worked with are using to to foster
your creativity and innovation and communication within a healthy boundary.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
It's such a great question because you know there are
a lot of franchise ors who just say, right, you
know what, We're gonna go ahead and remodel. And now
we're gonna go ahead and we're gonna introduce this new product,
but it's gonna involve construction, right. And my first response is,
all right, well, show me the data, show me where
you've done it, show me where you've seen it, help
me understand the why behind it. And I know you
(19:27):
can't give me some guarantees, but at least give me
some data and give me some evidence. I think that's
reasonable as opposed to force me to be your guinea pig.
You know on my own dime. Yeah, it's not that
I believe that every franchise brand should own their own
company store. I like it when they do because, you know,
for the reasons we just discussed. But I do think
(19:48):
that there should be some data that goes along with
their decisions, just as there should be some data that
goes along with me as a franchise Z. I shouldn't
do things based on gut or what I want to happen.
And so I think good franchise or that they do
innovate to stay relevant. But the first part of any
you know, it's it's the research and development that means
(20:09):
testing and getting the data. So when they announced the franchisees,
they say, here's the change that we're making, here's why,
here's where we've made the change, and this was the result,
Like showing that information so that I'm not so I
can have some buy in here, yeah, and in the
process get feedback from your fac Yeah. Right, Like I
(20:30):
think an FA should be more than just well, okay,
you're our communication system, so we're going to talk to
you so you can talk to everyone else, and then
we'll ask you questions and pretend to be interested in
your answers, so we can say that we consulted with
the FAC. Like the FAC, these are some sophisticated people
who are out there. They should be part of the
R and D.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Yeah, they should be the one the operators that you
trust to innovate. Right, they should be the ones that
you want to here. And frankly, they shouldn't all be
yes men either. You need you need the ones that
I always well, I was on facs, but I've talked
to you some brands that are getting being a big enough,
they needed to create one and they don't go to
conferences and things. They didn't know much about structures and tools.
(21:10):
So I advise them to get an FAC and get
two of the people. If you're gonna have six people,
have two of them or one at least be the dissenter,
the smart dissenter that you know is intelligent, is making things.
And then the other ones. Have a couple of yes
men they are gonna love everything you do, and then
have a couple of neutral parties. But they should all
be respected operators in the ecosystem or else you're wasting
your time. But it's important you have the dissension in
(21:33):
there because you should manage it there rather than manage
it after you deploy. It's so much easier, and they'll
have good ideas, right, they look at things differently.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Yeah, well, look, I think a really great system should
embrace dissent, should want to encourage you to debate. You know,
I learned in college that the whole idea, you know
that you take, you know, a thesis against a anti
thesis antithesis, and then together you get synthesis.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Right.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Our whole you know, government system, you know, in an
ideal world is based off of different ideas coming together,
having healthy debate and then let's figure this out. The
alternative is all yes, men and then go group think.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Right.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
We don't want that, not when there's unknowns and we
have to kind of figure stuff out, so pervides. But
we need to have dissent and disagreement in a way
that's constructive. You and I can totally disagree on something
without being disagreeable. And I think that most franchises and
franchise ors can do a better job of promoting that
(22:39):
constructive communication.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
Yeah, well, I think frankly, let's broaden that for a minute.
I think this world right now needs needs a lesson
in how to disagree without being disagreeable, like it feels
so it's so difficult sometimes family gatherings, hanging out with
friends and somebody's going off about something you don't agree with,
and all of a sudden there's conflict where I feel like,
as a society, we had a lot more intelligence a
decade ago where that just that wasn't normal, It wasn't
(23:03):
okay to be disagreeable. You could be like Steve, I respected,
that's your opinion. Tell me how you how you came
to that conclusion, like maybe explore, be curious, Like it's
so much in fact that I should ask you the expert,
like how can you help a franchise e that's being
disagreeable learn how to disagree with a little more emotional intelligence.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
It's funny you mentioned the idea of like, you know,
our country, like we're literally called there's an adjective in
our name right united?
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Right? Right?
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Are are you know? The word indivisible is in the
Pledge of Allegiance right? The whole idea is is unity,
and that's something I feel like we should all embrace, Regarden,
and it's unfortunate that that is not the case. So yeah,
you get a franchise e who is disagreeable, who actively
(23:51):
wants to create opposition within the system. It start some
Facebook group or some chat that's all about talking about
what idiots you know, corporate is, and corporate might be
idiots and they might be wrong. The question is, does
that chat group address that in a healthy way, right,
(24:11):
or you're just putting fuel on the fire. And how
often those chat groups does someone come back and say, Hey,
actually I talked to someone in corporate and I got
a totally different perspective and it turns out we're wrong.
How often is that comment made in that group? Not often,
or for that matter, on cable news when it comes
to politics, right, it's like, we don't want to change
so the in psychology it's called confirmation bias, right, and
(24:36):
we want to surround ourselves with people who already agree
with what we have, and we can't grow that way.
And so yeah, so I think we need you know.
But one of the reasons I wrote this in the
book why I created my course, The Wealthy franchise E
Business Breakthrough Program, is to teach franchisees what their role
is in this that you got to you know, look,
(24:57):
your franchise or should meet you off way, but you
got to, you know, take care of your side of
the street and make sure you talk to your franchise
or rather than about your franchise or because you're in
this together it's a marriage.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
Yeah, I'm a little more illegally difficult than a marriage. Right.
The franchise agreement harder to get out of, as it
turns out. Yeah, yeah, because you can't sell your asset
in a marriage and get out of it. It's that
doesn't work.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
That way, right, Yeah, But it's the people stuff, and
some people just don't have good people skills, so you know,
and you know, we need to give each other some grace.
All right, my franchise or made a mistake, all right?
Does it?
Speaker 1 (25:37):
Does it?
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Am I sure? They're evil? Am I sure they don't
care about me at all? Like, because that's the things
that people say. It's like, why don't we be a
better version of ourselves? First? So and I'd say the
same thing to franchise ors though, that you got to
give your franchise ease a break, that you have to
give them information that you really have to step I mean,
I don't hold franchise or is less accountable or less
(26:00):
responsible for these things than to do FRANCHISESE but that people.
But you could have an awesome system with a great
products and services market really well priced perfectly not do
well because the people stuff. Yeah, we just need to
do a better job with that.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
I mean that there are even Chick fil A's that
aren't operating well somewhere, I'm sure, right, But like, how
do you mentioned channels? And this is something I've seen
abused in franchise systems, not I mean personally, but just
in brands that I've worked with. How do how do
you help brain in? Do you have any advice for
let's say I'm a franchise or I've got franchisees that
are that are using a uh, you know, slack or
(26:40):
using whatever internal you know, chat communication to kind of
rage or really there's a lot of negativity in there.
Have you found a way that you can help that
franchise or start to regain some dignity in the platform
or help help reach like how does it work or
how have you seen that work well? Because I feel
like there are some that would probably desperately want to
know an answer to that question.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Yeah, well I think you do it. One franchise e
at a time, right, And maybe you start off with
with those franchisees who are trusted, who are reasonable, who
are level headed, and you know those franchisees are influencers.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Right.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
So I think you continue to do your job as
a franchise or you serve your franchisees whether they appreciate
it or understand it or not, and you help them
make money. Right, But you got to be transparent, You
got to be good, but you also have to forge
those relationships. But I meet some franchisors who are obsessed
with wanting to be loved, with wanting to be liked,
(27:41):
wanting to keep franchisees happy. In the process of doing that,
they're not always in service their franchisees. If I did
everything that makes my kids happy and just give them
whatever they want, I'm really not going to be a
good parent. Sometimes there needs to be some tough love
and some boundaries if I want to be of service
to my kids. And so there's a balance that's there.
So I think we have to be the best franchise
(28:02):
or that we can be to work in service of
our franchisese. We have to communicate and be transparent explain
the why behind what we're doing, you know. But what
I found that when they start to happen is suddenly
there's less participation in those slack groups. Some of those
people stop showing up at convention and they kind of
just start to self isolate and they become increasingly marginalized.
(28:24):
So we got to do the best that we that
we can. But again, I don't want to suggest that
franchise ours don't have responsibility, because a lot of franchise
oors through report communication or not being the best franchise
you know, that contributes to that. But I think for
every franchise or that really is greedy and competent one
hundred times over their franchise ors who really are good
(28:45):
and have the right intentions. But franchisees believe they're greedy
and competent because the communication hasn't been great. And that's
one of the myths that I like to help people know.
I want people to know you actually might have a
better franchise e than you think. You might have a
better business than you think, but until you embrace the
ways of the wealthy franchise e, you're never really gonna know.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
Yeah, I think that's totally fair. As you were talking,
I was you have you seen Ted Lasso? Sure? I
love love the show. I'm a former high school athletic coach,
and so I just I love I love some of
the craziness in the show. But the thing that I
was thinking of as you were talking about that was
early early on season one, where he's there. The team
hates him. They're like, who is this incompetent dude? And
(29:28):
they do the suggestion box. You remember the suggestion box scene? Yeah,
and pretty much everyone says wanker and he gets ones
like and the pressure could be better in the showers,
and so he goes and gets it fixed. He listens,
he takes action on something that was important to somebody,
and feedback and then and he didn't go and rub
it in the face. He just fixed it. And then
and it kept doing the same thing and kept doing it,
(29:51):
kept looking for ways to improve. And I feel like
sometimes like that that that relationship is similar in franchising,
and it just shouldn't be. It really shouldn't be, because I
think both parties, like you're saying, franchise or a franchisey,
they both wanted to work. They really do in most cases. Right,
But it really comes down sometimes to listening taking meaningful
action where it matters. You can't listen to the suggestion
(30:13):
box and do everything everyone wants because sometimes their ideas
are not coming from a place of a lot of
maybe foresight or long term thinking.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
Look, if if you want to be loved, then don't
be a franchise or because just the nature of the
think about all the tension that's they're just baked into
the system of all these people who want to be
independent business owners, but they're held accountable to a system.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
Right.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Uh, you have two parties who think the others should
be doing more marketing.
Speaker 1 (30:44):
Of course you have one.
Speaker 2 (30:45):
You have one party who you know makes money from
top line sales and the other it's only through bottom
line sales. Right, if there's profit, you know there there's
so many ways in which they're there is conflict, that's
just there. It's a miracle that any of them work.
But look at how so many of them do. But
(31:06):
those tensions are baked into it. And so we really
have to be the best versions of ourselves in order
to see how good our businesses are.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
Yeah, I love one and let's shift into that. So
because this human factor really does make a difference. It
really does. And we've we've hinted at a bunch of
these things already. What are what are some of the
core elements of like and when we talked about the
human factor, maybe let's break that down first. What do
you mean by the human factor here? Just so everyone
is really crystal clear on what's inside your head about
(31:36):
that that term.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Okay, so we have operational things. I tell people in
my presentations, there's three factors that impact our business. First,
is everything circumstantial. Circumstantial the outside factors such as politics, laws,
the weather, the economy, and even policies that are imposed
on us by the franchise or or by the industry
(32:00):
that we're in, all things over which we have no control.
Right now, a lot of franchises love to point their
finger at the White House, the governor's mansion, this political party,
the economy, the franchise or they're scapegouting, right, I say,
they point their finger in three hundred and fifty nine
directions with reasons why the business isn't doing well. Not
(32:21):
that these things don't matter, they absolutely do, but they
don't tell the whole story. Now, that's why those people
are complaining someone else is making money in similar territories.
So the second factor is everything operational, our policies and
procedures and pricing and sales and marketing. Right, all those
things are vitally important. But I meet so many franchisees
(32:44):
in the same system, doing the same thing in similar circumstances,
in similar territories, with a huge disparity and performance. It's
not because of the operation, it's because off of this
third factor, which is all these human elements that directly
impact how we execute operations. Because great marketing is not
just about advertising. It's all us about patience and faith
(33:07):
and the guts, you know, to make the investment in
the first place. Managing employees can't just be about finding people,
training them, putting them to work, and also ask to
be about engaging them and inspiring them and teaching them
about teamwork. Two people can, you know, serve burgers to customers, right.
One can do it like, Okay, here's your order, thank
(33:28):
you very much, have a good day, next in line. Well,
the other is smiling and saying hey, come back, and
like kind of engaging them, creating an experience that feels
good so much so that they want to repeat the
experience because there's that dopamine release not just from the burger,
but from the whole experience of being there. And they
bring friends with them. Ye right, so these human in
(33:51):
the opposite is also true that I can be a
jerk to someone but think, well, they got their burger.
That's all that matters. You know, no soup for you
like that, Like it's only about the soup. Your soup
better be damn good in order for you to be
in order for it to be okay to be, you
to be rude to people, right, So we can provide
a great product or service but a bad experience and
(34:13):
ruin our business that way. So that's what I mean
by the human factor. It's managing ourselves, our thoughts and
our emotions and then outwardly our relationships and how we
make others feel. That really is the X factor, And
that's what I'm referring to.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
And how have you. So there are many franchise owners
that aren't wired that way, you know, a little more introverted,
maybe a little less self aware. How do we help
somebody who's struggling. Let's let's give it like an example,
someone who's got personnel challenges on their team, and they
don't really, they haven't had experience, they haven't been trained. Really,
I feel like experience can often be trumped by proper
(34:52):
training and then systems that help reinforce the training. Right,
But how do we help that person to connect with
the individuals.
Speaker 2 (35:00):
It's a good question, you know, and and it's such
a big thing in franchising, right, How often does a
franchise or say in order to buy a franchise, you
have to have had five years of experience managing employees.
No one says that, Yeah, zero, I've never seen that.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
I never even heard that.
Speaker 2 (35:14):
Right, But is managing employees important to the business?
Speaker 1 (35:18):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (35:19):
Usually vitally so, right? Or maybe someone has come with
a ton of management experience at a bank, at an
investment firm, managing teams of educated, white collar people who
are self motivated. Not that there aren't issues, but it's
a completely different group than those who are coming in
and boxing pizzas, right, Like, it's totally different groups. They
(35:44):
don't have experience with hourly employees, so it'd be great
if that training were there. And I'm sorry, I guess
I forgot the actual main question you had asked.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Yeah, about the problem you're going, Well, you're going right
down the path though it is like how so the
question was how do we help that owner that operator
got it okay, so figure out how to start to
start to go down this road of you know, the people,
the human factor of improving that.
Speaker 2 (36:09):
Sure, So it's a skill like anything else. There's some
people are naturally naturally have business acumen, right, well, they're
in an advantage. There's some people are naturally outgoing, you know,
unlike the introvert you mentioned. They're extroverts and so they're
good talking with customers that kind of thing. I don't
think you have to naturally have that trait in order
to run a great business. So maybe you as the owner,
(36:32):
if you're not good at the people skills, but maybe
you're really good with bookkeeping and looking at your p
and ls and finding those opportunities.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
Maybe what you can be really.
Speaker 2 (36:39):
Good at is writing a really good help wanted post
to bring in the outgoing people who can provide the
customer experience, right who can do that? So it just
has to be done within the business. It doesn't necessarily
have to be done by the owner, and all of
us have to keep our thoughts and emotions in check.
Speaker 1 (37:00):
Yeah. Well, and you bring up a good point. So
if I'm an owner and I some people, they really
they will not ever be people people right like, they
just they don't want it. It's not they're not wired
that way. They're awkward that way, and that's okay. But
they need to be self aware enough. They need to
be aware that that's that's important and they need to Then,
as you're saying, then they can go and hire the
(37:22):
person to be maybe the shift managers. They know they
all have to be bubbling jars of energy and enthusiasm
because they're not, so they can hire people that can
compliment them and where they're weak.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
Yeah. One of my favorite books I used to read
to my kids when they were young. It's about Anan
Sea the spider, and he gets lost. He's got these
six sons and they all have their own talent. You know,
one can build a road, and one can drink lots
of water, and one can skin an animal, and they
all set out to rescue the father, and each one
of them uses their talent their superpower to contribute to
(37:54):
saving them. So in the end he asked them, which
one of you is responsible? For saving me, and they
kind of argue about the answer is obviously all of them.
Speaker 1 (38:01):
Right.
Speaker 2 (38:02):
So in a business, you need people who can use
one part of the brain where they're social and have
emotional intelligence, but then you need other people who are
more about like the prefrontal cortex, which is about problem
solving and analyzing things. It's different skill sets, different part
of the brain. And so you know, I think we
need to recognize where am I good, where am I strong,
(38:25):
and where I'm not. I could force myself to do it,
or even better, how about I outsource it and I'll
hire someone else, right, So I I you know, I
think I'm probably more on the extroverted, more outgoing side,
but I had other people, you know, that I brought
in to kind of take care of some other things
where it wasn't my skill. But we have to have
this stuff covered. But all of us are impacted by
(38:48):
our own thoughts and emotions and we need to keep
that in check so we could make good data based decisions.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Yeah, and that's tough. I think ego gets in the
way a lot, you know. Owners they that's where that's
where they start to struggle, is when ego gets in
the way, it's hard to keep emotions in check. Or frankly,
a lot of people put their lives on the line,
right they put they put their o their lives, but
like their livelihoods on the line, they're all their nesting
everything into this business opportunity. It's very stressful where that's
(39:15):
your sole source of income. You got to be drawing
out of the profits of the business and you've gotten
none yet. And like I understand why there's a lot
of strain there really is in the system.
Speaker 2 (39:23):
In the wealthy franchise e. I use this metaphor of
hot air balloons that are designed to fly, but what
holds them down our sandbags. So I go through the
most common franchisee sandbags ways in which we hold ourselves down,
and one of them is exactly what you said, David's ego.
Because ego is the enemy of service. Because if I
have an ego in my business, I'm making it about me.
(39:46):
So I'm talking about usome I am, and how this
business can't run without me. Well, that's not going to
help you when you want to sell the business, then, right,
I want to make my business about my employees, about
the customers, because that's who matters, right, I'm not here
to build ego. I'm here to build my business, to
build my income, to improve my life, and I'm going
to improve my life by improving the lives of others.
(40:08):
So what's interesting is, you know, throughout the Wealthy Franchisee,
I profile the wealthy franchise e and in every chapter
I have a different sidebar where I focus on different
wealthy franchisees from all these brands, and I asked all
of them, what makes you great? The most common answer
was I don't know, or I got lucky something like that.
(40:30):
The second most common answer, I've got a great team
around me. Well, they didn't get lucky by having a
great team. They built and maintained a great team. None
of the true wealthy franchisees said, well, it's because I'm awesome.
Because I'm so, it's because I'm better than others, right,
Because they're servant leaders, their focus isn't on themselves, it's
(40:53):
on other people. So we want to replace that ego
with humility. So when I moderate panels, which I do
a lot of, like Great franchise ease, you know this
is you know this happened for outdoor living brands they
brought me into moderate a panel and they had like
(41:13):
five different brands. We brought in the top franchise e
from each brand. I said, why are you number one?
And one person says we do a lot of marketing soccer.
One says we treat our employees well. Third person says
we get out in the community. And the audience was
so underwhelmed because who wasn't treating employees well or getting
out in the community, right. But what I pointed out
(41:34):
is is we got to know these panelists. They're all
very humble. So the lesson there humility is one of
those really great traits, right, definitely not ego.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
No, and we all have some ego, right, like we
all do. Humility is interesting. I joked I was joking
with my kids because they're all teenagers now so they
get sarcasm. But we're having dinner last week and somebody
I was I was, I was joking about something kind
of in a braggadocious way, and the kids like, oh wow, dad,
And I said, well, you guys do know that humility
(42:06):
is one of my greatest attributes, right, A total joke,
and they were all like, right, and but but they're
putting the jokes aside, like we have to. I always
I've worked with a lot of CEOs over over many years,
and the ones that really struggle are the ones who
(42:27):
read their own headlines. Uh. And and that's where I see, like,
we have to we have to recognize, like we might
be good at stuff, but really they're everyone. Any any
factor of our life, someone's better than us. But we
have to we have to, I don't know, eat the
humble pie every now and then just recognize that maybe
we're doing well, but we're not. We don't walk on water,
you know, Like I find that's that's a challenge, And
(42:48):
there's a challenge with successful franchise owners sometimes, but the
really one it's like Jim Collins level ten leadership, Right,
do you remember that part of Good to Great he's
talking of he's describing these people you're talking about of, Like, Yeah,
these guys that ran these crazy impressive businesses were super
unimpressive and they were just kind. They cared about their people.
(43:08):
That was like the universal one of the universal truths
about all of them. So I love what you're sharing,
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
For They're putting value out there and humility doesn't mean insecurity,
doesn't mean it can't be really confident. If I'm really confident,
it means I believe that I can accomplish something. Eager's
about thinking I'm awesome.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
Yeah, it's the comparative, right, It's the I'm better than
rather than doing well. You could be confident that you're
doing well. You and I both are right you were arrogant.
Does that mean no, those two things don't have to coincide.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
Yeah, Like for me, I mean, I you know, I
give information for a living, whether I'm speaking or writing
or consulting, and the implication there is I know something
you don't, so here, let me give that to you.
And that might be the implication. That's not how I
feel like. I don't know what you know, but I
want to share what I've learned, and if it helps
(44:01):
some people, it's great. It doesn't mean that I don't
want to do a lot of reading, a lot of
listening to other people. One of the great things about
my job is I actually do a much more listening
than I do talking, and I get a lot from that.
And so when I'm talking, I'm sort of getting a
book report. I'm sharing what I've learned. I'm not talking
down to anyone. And I just think that we all
(44:26):
need to put value into the world. We need to
make ourselves useful and use our businesses to improve the
lives of everyone else. That's going to build our business
because it comes back to us.
Speaker 1 (44:37):
Yeah, I love that and everything we've talked about today.
We talked about all of the aspects of the human
factor and being able to stay focused on what you're
not folks worried about the circumstantial, the operational, but really
focusing on that. We've talked about how do we I
love the metaphor about the United States of America, one
(44:58):
under God, indivisible, like being able to help people recognize
that we're all part of the same system. We should
be working together. Like all of these things are elements
that of franchise brand can do to provide value to
the franchisees. And you said it's a second ago, and
I remind people, we got two years and we got
one mouth. So there's a reason, like God put those
on us and to remind us that we need to
(45:19):
listen more than we talk. And I think that's true
across both sides of the aisle. Right. The franchise ors
also sometimes need to stop acting like they got it
all together and just listen, because they've got one hundred
operators who are brilliant that are operating their model that
might have ways to make it better. And that, in
my mind, is the true superpower franchising. It's not the model.
It's not the model. It's the genius of all the
(45:42):
individuals who are operating within the model, and all those
iterations naturally are going to inspire great, great changes that
can make the whole system better. If we harness that power,
I think every Brandy becomes much better. But then it
circles back to the last point we just made, which
is humility. Right Like franchise ease need to operate with humilities,
franchise ors need to operate with humility. And when you
(46:04):
see those get out of whack, the usually see conflict
and challenge. So Scott, to help us take us home
for a minute. This is kind of wrap up down.
Those are my thoughts are what are a couple of
things you hope that somebody would take away from our
ramblings today as we met.
Speaker 2 (46:16):
Well, first of all, the thoughts you just shared are awesome.
The only thing missing was the mic drop. Maybe we
should end on that I guess I mean to kind
of sum up the whole thing is this is that
we have more control over things than we realize. We
don't control everything, but we control a lot, and we
have a lot of control over ourselves. Until we are
(46:38):
our best version of ourselves in the business, we don't
know how good the business is, right unless you're embracing
the ways of these top franchises, not just what they
do or how they market, but how they think and
how they manage emotions.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
Right.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Until you control your thoughts, until you're creating a great
work experience for your employees, until you're creating a great
experience for your customers rather than engaging in transactions, You're
never gonna know how good you can lead. You're never
gonna know how good your employees can be. You're never
going to know how much money or customers are going
to spend. And so I think the ways the wealthy
(47:13):
franchise e can be game changing for people. And I'm
thrilled any opportunity, any chance I get to discuss it,
because I just feel in my bones that this stuff
is real.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
It's what I've.
Speaker 2 (47:23):
Experienced, it's what I've observed, and it's what I hope
to see a lot more.
Speaker 1 (47:26):
Of well, and I can just say that's got a
lot of people. I swear by your book and love
high fiving in the hallways, so it can't be all
that bad. You got you gotta have something there that's valuable.
Speaking of given valuable. If people want to get in
touch with you, Scott, what's the best way. If somebody
heard this and is like, man, I need to follow
up with Scott, I've got a question. How should they
reach out?
Speaker 2 (47:45):
Social media? I'm most active on LinkedIn, so I'm there,
But my website is Scott Greenberg dot com. Be e
erg uh. If you type b U RG you'll still
get there. I pay extra for that, and it has
contact information information on my programs and services kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (48:00):
So either way, fantastic. Well thanks for being our guests
and for sharing so much value I know as a
part of who you are, and I appreciate you making
time for it.
Speaker 2 (48:07):
It's a great conversation. Thanks for all the value you're
putting out there, Dave.
Speaker 1 (48:11):
Thanks Gutt