July 25, 2025 • 21 mins
Welcome to the Young Entrepreneur Syndicate—the podcast where innovation meets inspiration, and every episode feels like a fun, engaging chat with friends.
Your hosts, Jim Riley and Rod Kuntz, are not just seasoned entrepreneurs; they’re expert storytellers with real-world experience in coaching, consulting, start-ups, fundraising, and crafting vibrant workplace cultures. Jim and Rod keep it real, sharing lessons learned from the trenches with humility, humor, and a focus on paying success forward. Every episode is packed with relatable stories, actionable advice, and a good dose of fun that’ll make you feel like you’re right there in the room. Whether you’re scaling your business, optimizing for profitability, or navigating failure, Jim and Rod have your back. So, if you’re ready to learn, laugh, and level up, you’ve found your tribe. Welcome to Young Entrepreneur Syndicate with Jim Riley and Rod Kuntz—where you’re not just listening, you’re part of the conversation!
Find out more at: https://www.youngentrepreneursyndicate.com/
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-answer-is-yes--2903418/support.
Your hosts, Jim Riley and Rod Kuntz, are not just seasoned entrepreneurs; they’re expert storytellers with real-world experience in coaching, consulting, start-ups, fundraising, and crafting vibrant workplace cultures. Jim and Rod keep it real, sharing lessons learned from the trenches with humility, humor, and a focus on paying success forward. Every episode is packed with relatable stories, actionable advice, and a good dose of fun that’ll make you feel like you’re right there in the room. Whether you’re scaling your business, optimizing for profitability, or navigating failure, Jim and Rod have your back. So, if you’re ready to learn, laugh, and level up, you’ve found your tribe. Welcome to Young Entrepreneur Syndicate with Jim Riley and Rod Kuntz—where you’re not just listening, you’re part of the conversation!
Find out more at: https://www.youngentrepreneursyndicate.com/
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-answer-is-yes--2903418/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Welcome to the Answers Yes Podcast, where we interview some
of the most interesting people that have said yes to
opportunities in their life.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
We hope that through these stories.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
You can learn to create your own destiny by saying
yes along the way. Join us as we explore the
new series, covering topics such as passion, integrity, and hard work.
I'm your host, Jim Riley, and I hope you enjoyed
these interviews as much as I do. I believe that
everyone has an important message worth hearing. Hello, and welcome
(00:40):
to the Yes Entrepreneurs Podcast. Thanks for tuning in. I
got Rod Koontz here with me.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
How you doing, Rod, I'm doing great, Jim, It's always
good to see you.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Good to be on a call.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
It's great summertimes here. I don't know why we always
talk about the weather. I think because it's so important.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Well, it's important to everybody everywhere. You know, case in
point flooding, case in point hurricanes.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, yeah, you know, earthquakes, blizzards.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Yeah, it's a part of our lives that it affects everyone.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
It really does, really does. I want to jump right
into the topic, so I keep on my desktop a
word document and it's just titled notes for everything. But
you know, I refer back to I might hear something,
you might say something, I'll type of note or read
something Alex Hermosi or whatever type it in there, you know,
(01:29):
Tony Robbins classes and I had it open for a
coaching client I just got off call with and this
stood out to me and I thought that it would
be fun to talk about this. So today's topic is casualness.
Is that even a word casualness? Yes, it is causes casualties.
(01:52):
Casualness causes casualties, and I love that because we're in
a society where everybody wants to be so casual with
everything they do. You know, back in the day my
corporate life, speaking of casualness, we were required This was
at Kettlewan Vodka. European company, think European culture. Think an
(02:16):
office that is filled with Victorian era furniture, thick carpet,
beautiful murals on the walls. It looked like, I don't know,
the Ritz Carlton or the Saint Regis. When I walked
into work, we couldn't even if you took off your coat,
you couldn't put it on the back of your chair.
You had to hang it on the hook behind your door.
(02:36):
No food allowed on your desktop.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
You know.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
There was a lunch room. Yeah you could have a
coffee or a drink, but no food in your office.
You know, things like that. We wore a suit and
tie required every day to work Fridays. Eventually they're like, okay,
no tie. Still you had to wear a suit coat.
I think maybe once in my twelve years there, we
were allowed to wear jeans once. I don't even know
(03:00):
what it was. It wasn't a rodeo, No it wasn't.
But you know what happened with all that is that
we gained a reputation of being, you know, top level
executives in an industry that most people say was crowded
at the Timely in the vodka business, there was nothing
(03:20):
casual about what we did. Even and this is why
I went down that road, is even when we traveled,
they had They didn't require it because they couldn't, but
they requested that. Hey, when you're traveling on the airplane
to go to you know, business whatever, you know, do
your best to present yourself at a professional manner, because
(03:41):
not only are you are you representing you, but you're
also representing the company just through conversation, everybody like you know,
your lord, exercise, what do you do right? So you know,
there wasn't an opportunity to get too casual. And by god,
that company sold for a billion dollars, you know, because
(04:05):
they never had that casualness and there wasn't the casualties
that people experience when they're just you know, flipant with
their with their businesses and how they do things. And
so then I'm I'm inclined to look at how people
present themselves today. I mean, I've seen I think this
was an eastern Montana and nothing wrong with eastern Montana,
(04:29):
but I was in a coffee shop diner, one of
those kitschy ones that you find and yelp with high reviews.
The server was like in a crop top. This was
for breakfast crop top, with sweats that were probably her pajamas,
socks and crocs, and it's like, how are you serving me?
(04:50):
Looking like you just rolled out of bed? Like how
is this a thing? Thank goodness that the chef did
their job and the food was amazing, but it's like
I probably wouldn't go back just because like, wow, is
this place clean?
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Is my server?
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Clean, like, what's the deal here?
Speaker 2 (05:05):
So?
Speaker 1 (05:06):
And I'm sure we have lots of examples like that
in everything that we do and everybody that we interact with.
And I just believe that if we get to casual,
we will lose business because of that. And we might
not even be told because you know what, I'm not
going to tell that that server like, hey, you look
like you just rolled out of bed. You might want
to dress differently tomorrow. It's not it's not my role,
(05:27):
it's not my personality. But I'm sure that they will
lose business based on how they're presenting themselves. You know,
I mean, where do you see this happening at besides
all over?
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Well do you want examples? Oh my gosh, Well you're
touching on something I always think about. And I don't know.
I don't know how far I want to go into
this without sounding judgmental, and we don't want to do
that right right exactly. I don't want to be judgment
but I think people need to be aware. Let's talk
(06:04):
about this from a business standpoint. How you look and
how you present yourself, how you conduct yourself is your brand.
Let's do that. And I will say I am aware.
I am very aware today, Jim, that this is the
second time and all the times we've been together online
on a zoom call, that I have not worn a
(06:26):
button shirt.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
I'm aware of that. This is four years.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
I have not worn And part of it was I'm
in a hurry today and I thought, you know what,
I still look good.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
I brushed my hair. Right.
Speaker 3 (06:40):
It's just I have a brand, and my brand is
if I go to the grocery store to pick something
up i've forgotten, I comb my hair, I look in
the mirror and make sure I don't have food in
my teeth. Sure, I will usually put on a button
down shirt. You won't see me if I've mowed the
lawners something. I still because if I see people that
(07:03):
know me and know what I do, yeah, they can say, gosh,
he looks professional even when he's mowing his lawn.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
So that's my standard. It doesn't have to be everyone's standard.
But there's so much I look back at the era
of the rat pack, right in the fifties, where every
man wore a suit, a jacket, a tie, a hat,
and he tipped his hat to the ladies, right, I mean,
(07:33):
it was common courtesy and what we're talking about here
is a business etiquette. And even if your business is
outdoor sporting goods and stuff, I go to, you know,
the Sportsman's Warehouse or Shiels or Bob Warden's Sons or
Murdoch's right a ranch store, I still expect that the
(07:53):
people who worked there didn't look like they just got
done cleaning a stall.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Right.
Speaker 3 (07:58):
The people who show me how to uh, you know,
go help me with boots or a chainsaw or firearms
look like they're professional and knowledgeable. So it's it's it's
image and it's a brand, and it's not unfair to
have a higher expectation. And now I'm going to give
you an example from yesterday.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Be there. Yes I do, and I work at a
UPS facility.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
It's a morning. I mean this, this is hard work.
This is you know, you dress in loose clothing, uh
not baggy, but you're bending your stooping.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
It's it's hard work. It's heavy work.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
And so you can come you have to have at
least a T shirt on. You can't come in a
tank top or something like that. But there's a guy
that just showed up for his first day, right, this
is orientation he's shown up for his first day of work,
and he's wearing shorts and tennis shoes. And I know
for a fact that you have to wear leather boots
when when you when you take all the orientation stuff
(08:57):
just to go in to get hired, just to the orientation,
they tell you what the expectation is, Bring a water bottle,
leather boots, gloves if you want them. And this kid
comes in and he's walking through with the morning soup.
The supervisor who's showing him all the facility and what
happens and the whole time. Number one, he's not dressed
(09:18):
to work. You know, we'd been written up if we
were like that. But he's got a hat on his
head and a hoodie and the hoodie'es on.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Over the hat, over the hat.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I'm indoors, right, there's not one. There's fifty eight workers there,
Not one of them is walking around with a hoodie on.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Not one.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
And yet here's a new guy who walks into a
facility and he stands out like a sore thumb, and
it's and a couple of the guys at break it
was it do you see the new guy?
Speaker 2 (09:48):
And people are.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
Laughing and they're saying, Wow, what would you do? And
that was the question I asked, what would you do?
And two of the guys said, I'd send him home
and just say, you know, this isn't going to work.
That's right, it's first impression. And you might be if
you're a server in a little restaurant somewhere, you might
give the best service service anywhere. But what if that
(10:13):
person you were serving was looking to hire somebody at
a six figure income and you happen to have all
of the package, right, all of the skills that that
person was looking for. But you look like you just
crawled out of bed and you've just missed an opportunity.
So what I'm saying is package your talent appropriately, yeah, right,
(10:34):
and modestly for women and appropriately for men, and modestly
for men too.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
And chances are if you have that kind of talent,
you wouldn't be dressed that way anyhow, because you got
that talent, you would know, right, that's a soft skill. Yeah,
I would send that person home immediately to So you're
not a good fit. And I think a lot of
employers make that mistake, or people that get into partnerships,
they overlook that uncomfortable first encounter, you know, because it
(11:01):
is uncomfortable, but hey, how you do one thing is
how you do everything. And if that's how you show
up to your first day, gosh. And I know we
shouldn't be dating ourselves with this, but I remember showing
up to my first day of any of my first jobs. Right.
You get a good meal, you know, you take a shower,
you comb your hair, you got a fresh haircut, your shave,
(11:23):
you're all the things, and you're there thirty minutes early,
waiting in the parking lot to walk in fifteen minutes early.
It's like, I'm so excited to start my new job.
They said yes to me, and I'm going to give
them the best I got, you know, And instead you
get somebody that shows up with a hood and a
baseball cap, in shorts and tennis shoes not even close
(11:43):
to what they should be in. And worst yet, you
have a supervisor that's waltzing them around the entire scots.
They need a body, you know, they say, hey, here's
where we're going, you know, and so yeah, that's unfortunate.
You know. No, we don't want to, you know, make
fun of or be little people, but you know, sometimes
(12:07):
it is important to give real, live examples. I love
when Andy Frasella on his podcast Real af he talks
about hiring and stuff like that. He goes, I intentionally
go out to the parking lot and I look in
their car because if their car's a mess, they're probably
a mess. I heard him say that five or six
years ago. I do that now, like I look at
somebody's car, like, this person's probably a mess. Their life
(12:29):
is probably messy, right, And you know what, time and
time again, it proves out to be true.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
It does, It really does.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
And then when you have encounters with those people. And
my wife had an encounter with somebody somewhere. I said,
why would you expect anything different? You know, their cars
are a mess, their house is a mess, their business
is a mess. Why would you expect anything different. She
loaned him something that came back a mess. It's like,
I don't know, Jim, maybe just because I loaned it
to him, I thought they might take better care of him,
(12:57):
Like there's nothing there to show you that they would
do a better job. So just quickly going back to
the name the title of this topic, right, casualness creates casualties.
We're talking about casualties. Yes, you know, and so how
do we how about a few items that can avoid
(13:19):
the casualties? Right, we talked about you know, getting in
our parents, right in all those things, but what are
some other things people can do to avoid those casualties.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
Well, the first thing I want to do is I
want to say that people need to understand you have
to have clear expectations. And if you're raising children, you
should be instilling clear expectations in them. How their room
is is how their car is going to be, right, yeah,
their how their life at home is is how they're
going to be conducting their life. So these skills you
(13:47):
said they're soft skills, and you're absolutely right, But soft skills,
we are proving it here need.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
To be taught.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
We need to teach people that there is an expectation.
So you need to teach your employees what that expectation is.
That should be part of your hiring process. Just like
you said at Kettle one, they told you what the
standard was. Oh yeah, they and then they asked you
even off duty, they requested, Right, they can't tell you,
but they requested. So they made the expectation clear. And
(14:19):
if you're teaching for example, have a teenager in my
house now and I said, I need you know, clean
your room, right, Well, clean your room to me means
one thing, but no one ever told her what clean
your room meant. So she thought, you know, pick stuff
up and that's clean your room. No, to me, you
know military right, it's like clean the barracks. It's like
(14:42):
spit and polish. It's it's you clean. You do a
deep clean. What cleaning is. So if you tell someone
go clean the bathroom, you know, at my first job
at a filling station, yeah, person that walked me through
that said this is how we do it. Yes, And
he walked in and said, this is a women's bathroom.
He said, this one's always going to be worse. True,
he wasn't wrong. And I'm not making a judgment call.
(15:04):
I'm making an assessment here, an honest assessment. But here's
the expectation. This is what we clean. This is how
we clean it. We start at the top, we work
our way down, just like washing a car.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
How do you wash it?
Speaker 3 (15:15):
You start on the roof, you work your way down.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Right, you how you clean? But people need to be.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
Taught the basics sometimes and it's a mistake on our
part as leaders, as trainers, as managers. It's a mistake
on our part to assume that people know.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
How to do the basics.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
We need to make it clear to them, this is
the expectation I have. Have someone show them how to
do it the first time and walk through it. So
that's that's that's number one, and that's for leaders, that's
for managers. The second thing is for the people coming
into that. If someone's not showing you and telling you,
speak up and ask how do you how do you
(15:56):
want it done? What's your expectations? You just want a
quick job or do you do a deep clean every time?
Because if I'm taking an hour in here and you
expect it to be done in ten minutes, I need
to know, right. So make sure that you're asking those
questions what the expectation is, make it clear if they're not.
And the second thing is you brought this up because
you're talking about people going into a job interview for
(16:17):
the first time.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Don't be overdressed either.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
If you've not done your homework, if you've not gone
in and watched the workers at their job walking in it,
what are they dressed like? You know, how are they
carrying themselves or you know, at least get an idea
before you go in. I know there were people who
showed up in our sales. Some salespeople places want you
(16:41):
to be casual. They don't want you to be dressed
up because it can be intimidating to people. So you
don't want to go to a first job that has
that expectation where we're one of the customers, right and
show up in a three piece suit.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Yeah. Oh, and by the way, you can ask HR
is your buddy. You can ask the HR person, hey,
what is the standard a tire? Are the expectation for
a tire? On an interview and they'll tell you yes.
You know, if you don't have the capacity to go look,
ask it's okay, And you know what, they will respect
you for asking, you know. I just there's so many
(17:14):
things that we could be casual about that will change
the dynamics of our business. And I think that if
you can foundationally think about that in your own business,
in your own life, what is it that you can
be better at so that you're not creating a casual
environment that is affecting your bottom line. And by the way,
(17:36):
we love teaching the soft skills and you know, so
I'm learning again in my real estate career how much
I don't know. And sometimes you don't know what to ask,
and you literally need to go to that person above
you and say, hey, don't forget, I'm still new here.
There's a lot of things that I don't know, and
(17:56):
I honestly I don't even know what to ask about.
Is there anything that stands out to you that maybe
we didn't cover in training or that I'm not doing,
Like open the door to receive more information and be
serious about your job and what you're willing and able
to do, because if you get in that casual space
(18:19):
within your job, that's all you're ever going to be,
you know. And by asking good questions, supervisors, partners, investors,
they're all going to look at you differently. Go this
person cares because they're asking, and that is the opposite
of being casual about what you're doing.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
And the other thing is I think sometimes we get
casual because we get entrenched.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
That's part of it. We can become.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
Entrenched in what we do, or we can be so
used to it we've done it over and over and
over and over, right, and so to us it's just
second nature. But we need to pay attention to detail
all the time. When you're driving a car, right, you're
driving down the interstate. Yeah, we get casual. That's why
we eat while we drive. We're tuning the radio while
(19:10):
we drive. Some people are talking on the phone, some
people are texting, some people are putting on their makeup
because they get casual. And casual causes casualties. It causes accidents.
Even if you're a great driver, it's that one time
that you're not paying attention. Yeah, bam, So business is
no different.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
It's interesting. This just came to my mind. We have
had a rotating door the last six years of kids
that come through our house because we have kids, right,
and there's a couple that stand out that you know,
they first come over and.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
Say, oh, that kid is so sweet.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
There's such a great, well behaved kid. And literally you
watch the transformation after they've been here a few times,
they went from being this great little kid to becoming
a casual to you, like, what happened to that well
mannered kid that said please and thank you and you know,
didn't throw their feet up on the you know, the
couch and all that They lose it, right. It's it's
(20:10):
inherent in our nature that we become casual in environments
as we get more comfortable and you spend more time there, right.
But I want to encourage people in business to not
allow that to creep in. I do want to encourage
getting to know people better and being a great resource
(20:30):
and being, if if need, be a friend, a mentor,
and all those other things. But don't be casual about it.
Business is business, and at the end of the day,
you've been hired to do a job, which none of
which I'm sure in the job description says be casual
in your job. It might be a casual dress dawn
on Friday, but they mean, you know, just your attire,
(20:51):
not everything else. So anyways, that's the last time to
say about that. I've seen it live. We've seen it
live a lot of examples. Look inside, don't be casual
because ride it creates casualties.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Right, casualness And that is a word we added any
ss to the back of it. So casualness, state of
being casual does cause casualties. So yeah, pay attention to detail.
We harp on it all the time. I do. And
you know what, take a little bit of pride and
(21:23):
what it is you do, no matter what it is
you're doing, that's right, that's right.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Okay, Well that's another soft skill we're teaching here on
the Yes Entrepreneurs podcast, So thanks for tuning in. If
you like what we're doing, hit us up. You got
a topic for us, we'll talk about it, talk about
just anything over here. So thanks for tuning in. Rod.
Always good to see you.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
Good to see you too, my friend.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
All right, talk to you next week, all right, look
forward to it.
Welcome to the Answers Yes Podcast, where we interview some
of the most interesting people that have said yes to
opportunities in their life.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
We hope that through these stories.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
You can learn to create your own destiny by saying
yes along the way. Join us as we explore the
new series, covering topics such as passion, integrity, and hard work.
I'm your host, Jim Riley, and I hope you enjoyed
these interviews as much as I do. I believe that
everyone has an important message worth hearing. Hello, and welcome
(00:40):
to the Yes Entrepreneurs Podcast. Thanks for tuning in. I
got Rod Koontz here with me.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
How you doing, Rod, I'm doing great, Jim, It's always
good to see you.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Good to be on a call.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
It's great summertimes here. I don't know why we always
talk about the weather. I think because it's so important.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Well, it's important to everybody everywhere. You know, case in
point flooding, case in point hurricanes.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, yeah, you know, earthquakes, blizzards.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Yeah, it's a part of our lives that it affects everyone.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
It really does, really does. I want to jump right
into the topic, so I keep on my desktop a
word document and it's just titled notes for everything. But
you know, I refer back to I might hear something,
you might say something, I'll type of note or read
something Alex Hermosi or whatever type it in there, you know,
(01:29):
Tony Robbins classes and I had it open for a
coaching client I just got off call with and this
stood out to me and I thought that it would
be fun to talk about this. So today's topic is casualness.
Is that even a word casualness? Yes, it is causes casualties.
(01:52):
Casualness causes casualties, and I love that because we're in
a society where everybody wants to be so casual with
everything they do. You know, back in the day my
corporate life, speaking of casualness, we were required This was
at Kettlewan Vodka. European company, think European culture. Think an
(02:16):
office that is filled with Victorian era furniture, thick carpet,
beautiful murals on the walls. It looked like, I don't know,
the Ritz Carlton or the Saint Regis. When I walked
into work, we couldn't even if you took off your coat,
you couldn't put it on the back of your chair.
You had to hang it on the hook behind your door.
(02:36):
No food allowed on your desktop.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
You know.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
There was a lunch room. Yeah you could have a
coffee or a drink, but no food in your office.
You know, things like that. We wore a suit and
tie required every day to work Fridays. Eventually they're like, okay,
no tie. Still you had to wear a suit coat.
I think maybe once in my twelve years there, we
were allowed to wear jeans once. I don't even know
(03:00):
what it was. It wasn't a rodeo, No it wasn't.
But you know what happened with all that is that
we gained a reputation of being, you know, top level
executives in an industry that most people say was crowded
at the Timely in the vodka business, there was nothing
(03:20):
casual about what we did. Even and this is why
I went down that road, is even when we traveled,
they had They didn't require it because they couldn't, but
they requested that. Hey, when you're traveling on the airplane
to go to you know, business whatever, you know, do
your best to present yourself at a professional manner, because
(03:41):
not only are you are you representing you, but you're
also representing the company just through conversation, everybody like you know,
your lord, exercise, what do you do right? So you know,
there wasn't an opportunity to get too casual. And by god,
that company sold for a billion dollars, you know, because
(04:05):
they never had that casualness and there wasn't the casualties
that people experience when they're just you know, flipant with
their with their businesses and how they do things. And
so then I'm I'm inclined to look at how people
present themselves today. I mean, I've seen I think this
was an eastern Montana and nothing wrong with eastern Montana,
(04:29):
but I was in a coffee shop diner, one of
those kitschy ones that you find and yelp with high reviews.
The server was like in a crop top. This was
for breakfast crop top, with sweats that were probably her pajamas,
socks and crocs, and it's like, how are you serving me?
(04:50):
Looking like you just rolled out of bed? Like how
is this a thing? Thank goodness that the chef did
their job and the food was amazing, but it's like
I probably wouldn't go back just because like, wow, is
this place clean?
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Is my server?
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Clean, like, what's the deal here?
Speaker 2 (05:05):
So?
Speaker 1 (05:06):
And I'm sure we have lots of examples like that
in everything that we do and everybody that we interact with.
And I just believe that if we get to casual,
we will lose business because of that. And we might
not even be told because you know what, I'm not
going to tell that that server like, hey, you look
like you just rolled out of bed. You might want
to dress differently tomorrow. It's not it's not my role,
(05:27):
it's not my personality. But I'm sure that they will
lose business based on how they're presenting themselves. You know,
I mean, where do you see this happening at besides
all over?
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Well do you want examples? Oh my gosh, Well you're
touching on something I always think about. And I don't know.
I don't know how far I want to go into
this without sounding judgmental, and we don't want to do
that right right exactly. I don't want to be judgment
but I think people need to be aware. Let's talk
(06:04):
about this from a business standpoint. How you look and
how you present yourself, how you conduct yourself is your brand.
Let's do that. And I will say I am aware.
I am very aware today, Jim, that this is the
second time and all the times we've been together online
on a zoom call, that I have not worn a
(06:26):
button shirt.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
I'm aware of that. This is four years.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
I have not worn And part of it was I'm
in a hurry today and I thought, you know what,
I still look good.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
I brushed my hair. Right.
Speaker 3 (06:40):
It's just I have a brand, and my brand is
if I go to the grocery store to pick something
up i've forgotten, I comb my hair, I look in
the mirror and make sure I don't have food in
my teeth. Sure, I will usually put on a button
down shirt. You won't see me if I've mowed the
lawners something. I still because if I see people that
(07:03):
know me and know what I do, yeah, they can say, gosh,
he looks professional even when he's mowing his lawn.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
So that's my standard. It doesn't have to be everyone's standard.
But there's so much I look back at the era
of the rat pack, right in the fifties, where every
man wore a suit, a jacket, a tie, a hat,
and he tipped his hat to the ladies, right, I mean,
(07:33):
it was common courtesy and what we're talking about here
is a business etiquette. And even if your business is
outdoor sporting goods and stuff, I go to, you know,
the Sportsman's Warehouse or Shiels or Bob Warden's Sons or
Murdoch's right a ranch store, I still expect that the
(07:53):
people who worked there didn't look like they just got
done cleaning a stall.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Right.
Speaker 3 (07:58):
The people who show me how to uh, you know,
go help me with boots or a chainsaw or firearms
look like they're professional and knowledgeable. So it's it's it's
image and it's a brand, and it's not unfair to
have a higher expectation. And now I'm going to give
you an example from yesterday.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Be there. Yes I do, and I work at a
UPS facility.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
It's a morning. I mean this, this is hard work.
This is you know, you dress in loose clothing, uh
not baggy, but you're bending your stooping.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
It's it's hard work. It's heavy work.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
And so you can come you have to have at
least a T shirt on. You can't come in a
tank top or something like that. But there's a guy
that just showed up for his first day, right, this
is orientation he's shown up for his first day of work,
and he's wearing shorts and tennis shoes. And I know
for a fact that you have to wear leather boots
when when you when you take all the orientation stuff
(08:57):
just to go in to get hired, just to the orientation,
they tell you what the expectation is, Bring a water bottle,
leather boots, gloves if you want them. And this kid
comes in and he's walking through with the morning soup.
The supervisor who's showing him all the facility and what
happens and the whole time. Number one, he's not dressed
(09:18):
to work. You know, we'd been written up if we
were like that. But he's got a hat on his
head and a hoodie and the hoodie'es on.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Over the hat, over the hat.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I'm indoors, right, there's not one. There's fifty eight workers there,
Not one of them is walking around with a hoodie on.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Not one.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
And yet here's a new guy who walks into a
facility and he stands out like a sore thumb, and
it's and a couple of the guys at break it
was it do you see the new guy?
Speaker 2 (09:48):
And people are.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
Laughing and they're saying, Wow, what would you do? And
that was the question I asked, what would you do?
And two of the guys said, I'd send him home
and just say, you know, this isn't going to work.
That's right, it's first impression. And you might be if
you're a server in a little restaurant somewhere, you might
give the best service service anywhere. But what if that
(10:13):
person you were serving was looking to hire somebody at
a six figure income and you happen to have all
of the package, right, all of the skills that that
person was looking for. But you look like you just
crawled out of bed and you've just missed an opportunity.
So what I'm saying is package your talent appropriately, yeah, right,
(10:34):
and modestly for women and appropriately for men, and modestly
for men too.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
And chances are if you have that kind of talent,
you wouldn't be dressed that way anyhow, because you got
that talent, you would know, right, that's a soft skill. Yeah,
I would send that person home immediately to So you're
not a good fit. And I think a lot of
employers make that mistake, or people that get into partnerships,
they overlook that uncomfortable first encounter, you know, because it
(11:01):
is uncomfortable, but hey, how you do one thing is
how you do everything. And if that's how you show
up to your first day, gosh. And I know we
shouldn't be dating ourselves with this, but I remember showing
up to my first day of any of my first jobs. Right.
You get a good meal, you know, you take a shower,
you comb your hair, you got a fresh haircut, your shave,
(11:23):
you're all the things, and you're there thirty minutes early,
waiting in the parking lot to walk in fifteen minutes early.
It's like, I'm so excited to start my new job.
They said yes to me, and I'm going to give
them the best I got, you know, And instead you
get somebody that shows up with a hood and a
baseball cap, in shorts and tennis shoes not even close
(11:43):
to what they should be in. And worst yet, you
have a supervisor that's waltzing them around the entire scots.
They need a body, you know, they say, hey, here's
where we're going, you know, and so yeah, that's unfortunate.
You know. No, we don't want to, you know, make
fun of or be little people, but you know, sometimes
(12:07):
it is important to give real, live examples. I love
when Andy Frasella on his podcast Real af he talks
about hiring and stuff like that. He goes, I intentionally
go out to the parking lot and I look in
their car because if their car's a mess, they're probably
a mess. I heard him say that five or six
years ago. I do that now, like I look at
somebody's car, like, this person's probably a mess. Their life
(12:29):
is probably messy, right, And you know what, time and
time again, it proves out to be true.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
It does, It really does.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
And then when you have encounters with those people. And
my wife had an encounter with somebody somewhere. I said,
why would you expect anything different? You know, their cars
are a mess, their house is a mess, their business
is a mess. Why would you expect anything different. She
loaned him something that came back a mess. It's like,
I don't know, Jim, maybe just because I loaned it
to him, I thought they might take better care of him,
(12:57):
Like there's nothing there to show you that they would
do a better job. So just quickly going back to
the name the title of this topic, right, casualness creates casualties.
We're talking about casualties. Yes, you know, and so how
do we how about a few items that can avoid
(13:19):
the casualties? Right, we talked about you know, getting in
our parents, right in all those things, but what are
some other things people can do to avoid those casualties.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
Well, the first thing I want to do is I
want to say that people need to understand you have
to have clear expectations. And if you're raising children, you
should be instilling clear expectations in them. How their room
is is how their car is going to be, right, yeah,
their how their life at home is is how they're
going to be conducting their life. So these skills you
(13:47):
said they're soft skills, and you're absolutely right, But soft skills,
we are proving it here need.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
To be taught.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
We need to teach people that there is an expectation.
So you need to teach your employees what that expectation is.
That should be part of your hiring process. Just like
you said at Kettle one, they told you what the
standard was. Oh yeah, they and then they asked you
even off duty, they requested, Right, they can't tell you,
but they requested. So they made the expectation clear. And
(14:19):
if you're teaching for example, have a teenager in my
house now and I said, I need you know, clean
your room, right, Well, clean your room to me means
one thing, but no one ever told her what clean
your room meant. So she thought, you know, pick stuff
up and that's clean your room. No, to me, you
know military right, it's like clean the barracks. It's like
(14:42):
spit and polish. It's it's you clean. You do a
deep clean. What cleaning is. So if you tell someone
go clean the bathroom, you know, at my first job
at a filling station, yeah, person that walked me through
that said this is how we do it. Yes, And
he walked in and said, this is a women's bathroom.
He said, this one's always going to be worse. True,
he wasn't wrong. And I'm not making a judgment call.
(15:04):
I'm making an assessment here, an honest assessment. But here's
the expectation. This is what we clean. This is how
we clean it. We start at the top, we work
our way down, just like washing a car.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
How do you wash it?
Speaker 3 (15:15):
You start on the roof, you work your way down.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Right, you how you clean? But people need to be.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
Taught the basics sometimes and it's a mistake on our
part as leaders, as trainers, as managers. It's a mistake
on our part to assume that people know.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
How to do the basics.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
We need to make it clear to them, this is
the expectation I have. Have someone show them how to
do it the first time and walk through it. So
that's that's that's number one, and that's for leaders, that's
for managers. The second thing is for the people coming
into that. If someone's not showing you and telling you,
speak up and ask how do you how do you
(15:56):
want it done? What's your expectations? You just want a
quick job or do you do a deep clean every time?
Because if I'm taking an hour in here and you
expect it to be done in ten minutes, I need
to know, right. So make sure that you're asking those
questions what the expectation is, make it clear if they're not.
And the second thing is you brought this up because
you're talking about people going into a job interview for
(16:17):
the first time.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Don't be overdressed either.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
If you've not done your homework, if you've not gone
in and watched the workers at their job walking in it,
what are they dressed like? You know, how are they
carrying themselves or you know, at least get an idea
before you go in. I know there were people who
showed up in our sales. Some salespeople places want you
(16:41):
to be casual. They don't want you to be dressed
up because it can be intimidating to people. So you
don't want to go to a first job that has
that expectation where we're one of the customers, right and
show up in a three piece suit.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Yeah. Oh, and by the way, you can ask HR
is your buddy. You can ask the HR person, hey,
what is the standard a tire? Are the expectation for
a tire? On an interview and they'll tell you yes.
You know, if you don't have the capacity to go look,
ask it's okay, And you know what, they will respect
you for asking, you know. I just there's so many
(17:14):
things that we could be casual about that will change
the dynamics of our business. And I think that if
you can foundationally think about that in your own business,
in your own life, what is it that you can
be better at so that you're not creating a casual
environment that is affecting your bottom line. And by the way,
(17:36):
we love teaching the soft skills and you know, so
I'm learning again in my real estate career how much
I don't know. And sometimes you don't know what to ask,
and you literally need to go to that person above
you and say, hey, don't forget, I'm still new here.
There's a lot of things that I don't know, and
(17:56):
I honestly I don't even know what to ask about.
Is there anything that stands out to you that maybe
we didn't cover in training or that I'm not doing,
Like open the door to receive more information and be
serious about your job and what you're willing and able
to do, because if you get in that casual space
(18:19):
within your job, that's all you're ever going to be,
you know. And by asking good questions, supervisors, partners, investors,
they're all going to look at you differently. Go this
person cares because they're asking, and that is the opposite
of being casual about what you're doing.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
And the other thing is I think sometimes we get
casual because we get entrenched.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
That's part of it. We can become.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
Entrenched in what we do, or we can be so
used to it we've done it over and over and
over and over, right, and so to us it's just
second nature. But we need to pay attention to detail
all the time. When you're driving a car, right, you're
driving down the interstate. Yeah, we get casual. That's why
we eat while we drive. We're tuning the radio while
(19:10):
we drive. Some people are talking on the phone, some
people are texting, some people are putting on their makeup
because they get casual. And casual causes casualties. It causes accidents.
Even if you're a great driver, it's that one time
that you're not paying attention. Yeah, bam, So business is
no different.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
It's interesting. This just came to my mind. We have
had a rotating door the last six years of kids
that come through our house because we have kids, right,
and there's a couple that stand out that you know,
they first come over and.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
Say, oh, that kid is so sweet.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
There's such a great, well behaved kid. And literally you
watch the transformation after they've been here a few times,
they went from being this great little kid to becoming
a casual to you, like, what happened to that well
mannered kid that said please and thank you and you know,
didn't throw their feet up on the you know, the
couch and all that They lose it, right. It's it's
(20:10):
inherent in our nature that we become casual in environments
as we get more comfortable and you spend more time there, right.
But I want to encourage people in business to not
allow that to creep in. I do want to encourage
getting to know people better and being a great resource
(20:30):
and being, if if need, be a friend, a mentor,
and all those other things. But don't be casual about it.
Business is business, and at the end of the day,
you've been hired to do a job, which none of
which I'm sure in the job description says be casual
in your job. It might be a casual dress dawn
on Friday, but they mean, you know, just your attire,
(20:51):
not everything else. So anyways, that's the last time to
say about that. I've seen it live. We've seen it
live a lot of examples. Look inside, don't be casual
because ride it creates casualties.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Right, casualness And that is a word we added any
ss to the back of it. So casualness, state of
being casual does cause casualties. So yeah, pay attention to detail.
We harp on it all the time. I do. And
you know what, take a little bit of pride and
(21:23):
what it is you do, no matter what it is
you're doing, that's right, that's right.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Okay, Well that's another soft skill we're teaching here on
the Yes Entrepreneurs podcast, So thanks for tuning in. If
you like what we're doing, hit us up. You got
a topic for us, we'll talk about it, talk about
just anything over here. So thanks for tuning in. Rod.
Always good to see you.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
Good to see you too, my friend.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
All right, talk to you next week, all right, look
forward to it.
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