What Does It Take to be a Successful CEO? - Greenland Advisory & Accounting

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00:20 Yay. Good morning, Claudine. Good morning. What’s happening? Well, the sun is out beautiful and new. You’re enjoying it. It’s not too hot yet. I know. I think it was, um, was it last week? It got up to the nineties and, uh, I remember we were outside and I thought, Oh, I can’t believe it’s so hot. My God. And then I wait a minute, this is going to be seem cool in about a month. So let’s enjoy a while. It’s here. Mother’s day weekend is here. It’s going to be a great weekend for all the mothers out there. Yeah. Even if you’re not a mother, maybe you have somebody to celebrate.
00:50 Yeah. There’s, it’s a full weekend of celebration for us. You know, my wife, mother of three teenagers, and uh, we, uh, we’re gonna make sure that she’s encouraged and there’s my mother-in-law and there’s a bunch of other moms that I know and there’s that church two on Sunday tomorrow. And, um, it’s a good weekend. Gosh, it seems like there’s a lot going on as always. Right? Right. Uh, business, there’s a lot going on in the business side and then the legal side and, um, uh, we can fill an hour of all the things that are going on with a different clients in a different situations in the, in the economy. But with that said, we have a great show for you guys today. And, and by the way, uh, we’ve been getting, um, hits, uh, emails and calls to us and, uh, so which means that you’re actually going to our websites, uh, and, uh, calling us and asking questions. So, and, and that makes me very happy because, absolutely. Because, um, what we do, because we’re actually making you think, right? Hopefully we’re making you think about business
01:55 or maybe just affirming some of the things that you’ve been doing and you’re not really sure. Maybe you’re feeling a little bit more validated or affirmed, like, like you’re on the right track.
02:03 Yeah. So, um, you know, I just love the feedback and, uh, um, you know, we’re here to help, uh, we’re practitioners. We’re actually doing, we run in businesses and, um, and we’re creating a brand and we want to create a community of business owners who we may or may not be getting the answers out there in the marketplace. There’s nothing worse than me to try to find something on Google. Now let me Google it and find out what we know 10 99 versus, you know, W2 is, or what do I do if I have a partnership or what if I do, if I want to scale my business, what if I do, if I want a franchise, there’s a lot of resources out there and you can spend hours if not days looking for things. But what we want to create here is a community where we’re going to be able to give you a lot of the answers to questions you already have. Yeah.
02:49 Well, and, and we have resources that the average person doesn’t have. I know, particularly in our case, we have, um, really well laid out practice guides and, um, great opportunities for research where we can kind of zero in on particular issues. So, um, and that, that stuff that’s not just available to just the, you know, anybody, I mean, of course the law library, library law library in Modesto is open. Um, and that’s a really great resource. But, um, knowing how to do the research to get to the answers that you’re looking for is really half the battle. Um, I know that there are attorneys that I work with that are just fantastic at research and you can ask them a question and, and Harpreet and he’s, he was a guest on the show a number of weeks ago. He’s absolutely fantastic at research. You know, ask him a question and he’ll have an answer for you. And in a matter of minutes, he’s just so quick at it.
03:38 And it’s so great to have people like that on your team who are passionate about getting the right answer.
03:43 Right. I mean, and don’t slow down and don’t give you the answer just because it’s something you want to hear, but we really, really want to give you the right answer, even if it’s something you don’t want to hear because we want to protect your interests.
03:55 Yeah. So we love doing this show. This show has been good to us already and I’m just grateful for the opportunity to come out and in just talking about subjects, topics and matters that, that you care about. And if you’re a business owner, if you’re driving to and fro on a Saturday morning and it’s 10 o’clock, you know, and please share this with your friends. You know, who are having to be B. We speak to specifically to business owners. Uh, whether you are starting out or where do you have 15, $20 million in revenue. I am sure that you are going to have questions about business and legal side. So with that, um, we have a fantastic show for you today for you. Don’t mind me saying so I do. I think it’s going to be a great subject and it’s a little on the lighter side. Yeah, it’s a little funner. So do you want to tell us what the topic is for today? After all you can do the research, leave it to me to do the research. Um, yes.
04:49 So what we’re going to talk about today is, um, you know, what does it take to be a successful CEO? I think for the listeners, we want to use the word CEO interchangeably with business owner or you know, head of the business and maybe you’re not the the owner or the CEO, but you are in that key management role where you’re at, you know, maybe the top one or two, um, positions at the company and being a successful CEO is a completely different job than working your business. And I know so many of us, um, have started businesses where we were the one person doing the business. Um, I know when I started out as a one man woman show, I was a one woman show for quite awhile and that’s not, not just in, in the legal practice, but also in several other businesses.
05:35 Um, you have an idea and you think, Oh, you know, I want to make widgets and these widgets are really cute and I can sell a lot of them online. And the next thing, you know, there comes a point in time where you have to transition over from being the person who’s working the business or working in the business to being the person who works and you have a different, um, set of skills and requirements. I know even now for me with, um, several attorneys in house and you know, support staff, it’s very hard for me to pull away from just being a lawyer to being a CEO. And I thought that this is one of the reasons why I thought the subject would be interesting, um, is because what, at what point do you do that?
06:19 Yeah, I think we’re both going through that. Yeah. You know, I think it is sort of the, um, the natural progression of entrepreneurship in my opinion. Um, you come in with a great idea for a product or service and then if you were to have everything you needed to gather everything you needed to have a perfect business plan, the right amount of money, the right temperature in the marketplace, I think 99% of businesses will not ever get started. Right. Because Mo, you will suffer from analysis paralysis. So you’re good at one thing and you go do it right. You know, one of the things I love, one of the quotes that I’m not sure who said it, but it’s if you’re gonna fail, fail fast and fail forward. So every time you have something that doesn’t work, learn from it and move forward. Momentum is everything. So before we get into the thick of it and some of the, they have questions and, um, uh, content, uh, for today’s show. Any updates on your side, on the legal side, anything juicy that we should know about here in the central Valley?
07:21 No, I don’t have anything particularly juicy in the central Valley.
07:26 No. No. We have no legal problems in the central no world.
07:31 Not yet. You gotta have some, I think we ironed out a lot of problems this week. Had some really great results for clients. Um, and that’s really exciting and can’t go into detail of course, but, um, had two cases that we’re working on where we were able to get results quickly and, and it was atypical. Oh, excuse me. It was not atypical. I guess that’s the other way around. Um, both cases were situations where we fully anticipated some, some heavy lifting before we could even start seeing some results. And, um, turned out both of them came, came together really, really quick. One is in involved a governmental agency up North. Um, and anytime we’re dealing with governmental agencies, it’s a little bit different. Yeah. Things take time. Um, and you know, we were able to get the client in and, and fantastic resolution. Everybody’s now working together and, um, the client’s going to be able to complete a very lucrative contract for, um, a governmental agency.
08:28 Um, and we had run into some wrinkles in the rug, so to speak. And I think, man, I think we, we only spend a few hours on it, which, which was really, really exciting. Um, and I, I said it out loud and I think several people in the office looked at me. I said, Oh, that was great. We only spent a couple of hours on that and look at the result we got. And I think that’s some what counterintuitive to my industry where, um, a lot of folks look for how many billable hours can I possibly get out of this case. Um, we’re a lot more goal structured. And so our first instinct is, Oh, we reached the goal and it only took us three hours since you’re a good lawyer. Well, we’re, you know, we’re good lawyers, but we’re probably probably more importantly, we’re hard workers and we want to get the goal achieved and, and move on down the road. So that was probably the biggest and exciting thing that happened to us this week. That’s really good. Go home with a good feeling and a little bit of a high, you know what? Now that I think about it, I, I, I don’t have any Jews either. No. NARS,
09:25 no. It’s just nothing that sticks. I mean, no major. Um, uh, nothing that I can think of that is worth mentioning here today before the show, but, um, there’s just, there’s, there’s just a lot of fluidity. Um, we’re still recovering from, you know, post 2018 regulation of the tax code or you know, the or the tax code. Um, but you know, we’re, we’re going into this, you know, growth, you know, we’re, we are, um, trying to just get momentum into the second quarter, which is very, very important. So, um,
10:02 I think, I think, you know, it’s, we don’t have to have drama I guess. No, no, no. But aren’t you seeing growth within your customers, your clients? I mean it’s, it’s happening, um, with clients as fast as, as it can happen.
10:17 Well, good point. Typically there is emergencies going on. There is a lot more stress going on when you’re actually in a downward cycle where people are actually losing money or there’s disruption in the marketplace for particular industries. But right now in all the industries that I’m involved, there is growth. So we have growth problems, we have growth problems. That’s a really good way to put it. You know, which you need, you need to forecast and cash forecasting and that sort of thing. But anyway, so we’re going into break and we are going to be right back. You’re listening to business, illegal talk with Leah and Claudia and stay tuned.
11:22 Hey, what’s up everybody? We’re back, uh, business legal talk with on a beautiful Saturday morning, mother’s day here. Um, and um, May 11th, 2019. So we’re talking about, okay, so here’s the thing guys, we’re talking about what does it take to be a successful CEO. And I know that is something that has been resonating in your head that you’d been thinking about this or the in for some time. Tell us all about it.
11:46 Well, as I was saying to you, um, when we were prepping for the show is this subject is something that, um, I know that I wrestle with. Um, and in pro probably part of it is because our business is tied to ours. So, you know, we build based on hours. There’s only so many hours in the hours, right? And so, um, you know, if, if I’m doing non-billable things during the day, at some point I have to make time for my billable hours, which, um, you know, we, we all have to have a certain level of productivity. Um, and that will probably be the case for some time. Um, but so when I’m away from the office, when I’m doing networking or when I’m meeting with clients and I’m, you know, I’m not necessarily, um, you know, on the clock so to speak, um, I have to start to kind of calculate how much is okay to be away and then wait a minute, what is it I’m supposed to be doing as the, the, the chief chief in charge here.
12:45 So what you’re saying, what is in the job description? What part of the job description on the CEO should I be doing right now? Right, right, right. And so what, what, you know, and, and in thinking about this and kind of looking into, um, you know, what do CEOs do? And again, we’re using the term CEO kind of interchangeably. Yeah. Loosely. Yeah. Loosely. And just that the leader of the company is really responsible for the vision and the direction of the company. And, and you have to be seeing on the horizon. I’m was listening to a podcast, um, somebody that we, you and I both listened to and I think you listened to him pretty pretty regularly if not occasionally Gary V. Oh yeah. Yeah. It’s hilarious. But yeah, shout out to, into the Gary V show. Um, but anyway, one of the things that he was talking about that found was really interesting is um, having to be in that position where you’re constantly looking at the horizon.
13:39 You have to predict it before it happens. That’s your job is you’re not here just to do the day to day stuff and, and, and you’re, well, our company may be, again, making widgets or maybe, um, you know, designing shoes or, or, or what have you. It’s our job to be looking at the horizon and seeing what is going to be the new trend, what’s the next trend. Cause by the time we’ve set in motion to do or accomplish something that is selling today, we have to be looking at the horizon and figuring out what’s gonna sell tomorrow and be geared up and ready to rock for tomorrow. And that’s when we see the businesses go under or they, they just, I, I was, it made me think of merging onto a freeway and the, you know, the traffic is going really fast and you merging and so you’re speeding up to get in onto the freeway and you catch up to speed, but then do you maintain that speed? Are you, are you there? And able to continually, um, stay on the edge of your industry. And that’s kind of falls into the second thing I think, um, a lot of CEOs should be really focused on is being innovative within your own industry.
14:52 So, you know, how, how do you say innovative in your own industry, right? What are you doing?
14:57 Well, so let me go back. Let me redirect here. So I love what you put down here. The CEO’s responsible for division and direction of the company. I loved that. And, um, you know how often founders forget that I think you get caught up in your very Alden. Yeah. You get, you miss the forest for the trees, you know, you hear that. And so I was telling you during the, during the break that when I engaged, you know, I’m a strategist, I’m a CFO and I helped scale businesses. And that one of the first questions I ask in one of the first questions you should be asking yourself if you’re listening to this show is this, why am I doing this? Right? Why do you get up in the morning? What gets you up in the morning about your business? And that changes?
15:50 Well, and if you’re not in love with the process, um, you may want to consider closing the doors.
15:56 Yeah. But the, but if you’re not making money, you definitely should consider stop the losses, so,
16:00 right, right, right. But the process, the process of the day to day. So, um, I don’t even think I told you this. I was preparing for a seminar. I’m giving a seminar on nondisclosure agreements, which I know most people conference that you’re going to, no, no, it’s just, um, it’s an hour and a half seminar that will be, um, online through national business Institute. Oh, excuse us. Well, excuse me, I don’t know about that. But anyway, I spent most of last weekend preparing for the, for the seminar and getting my material ready and they requested that I put together 25 pages of material than I initially thought, 25 pages on a nondisclosure agreement. So that might be a bit much, a bit of a challenge. And I came home, yes, last Saturday afternoon. Um, pretty much had it had it down and accomplished, but I was so excited because I really love what I do.
16:54 I loved researching it. I love knowing all the cases. I love knowing exactly, you know, where they are implemented, how they’re implemented, when you can implement them better. We know how they can be a tool in your business. And at the end of the day, even though I spend a Saturday working, I came, came home, very excited and fired up and had a great day. And I’m thinking, if you’re a business owner or you’re a CEO and you don’t love the process, consider closing the doors. If you don’t love what you do. And we don’t love it every day, that’s ridiculous. We all know that. We don’t love it every single day. There’s days that you just, you know, want to commit Harry Kerry and just be done with it. Um, but if you don’t love the process, um, you know, and that’s where you get good at the process. And that’s
17:43 cause he looks good, but you know what? Bye. Okay. So this is what I have to go on a little M and a merger and acquisitions that right. And a multiple, several of my clients, I have exit strategies. So not to what I asked you. So when I engaged, um, when I, when I, my company aligns and partners up with, with a business, um, you know, whether it is a half a million dollar business or a $15 million business or a $20 million business, I need to understand from the ownership, from the shareholders, from the members, from the senior management team where, where, where you are going. Now if you’re telling me, Leo, we want to maximize the value of the company in a three year, in the next three years and dress up for sale, the strategy, the X, the this strategies to support that vision is different than you’re telling me.
18:32 You know, all I want is a multigenerational business, right? We have no intention of selling, right? We just want to stabilize the company, produce enough cash flow for us to get paid and retire and become absentee owners. Right? Okay. The time horizon is a little different than if you want to exit, right? As in selling. And uh, so the whole thing that you’ve talking about, about systems and processes plays into that. We know, I’ve said it. If you, if you have listened to any length of time, the show, I always have some key analogies that I use and the, and the franchise model right in the front and why McDonald’s says McDonald’s and, and the Starbucks model, uh, of, of business in which, what is strategic buyer? A buyer who has a pile of cash and wants to give it to you in exchange for your business what they want.
19:23 It’s not you, right? What do they want? Right? They won the, the, she’s huge binder that has 400 pages of systems and operate standard operating procedures. We call it the SOP Bible. Write about your business. It could be this Sharon law firm, it could be Greenland, but what they want is I want to take, remove the absentee owner and I want to take it on and I’m going to consider this an annuity, right? It produces X amount of dollars and I need to know how to do everything that is in the book. How do you ask from as simple as how to answer the phone, uh, answering the phone. I still how to take messages and as complex as how do we know when to adjust the gross margin and how do you price your services and how we’re not much insurance do we need and how often do we do, do we lead the, you know, if you’re, if you’re, if dealing with lawyers is you know, what is the metrics that you need to manage?
20:12 If I, if I’m a non-lawyer running a law firm, right? All of those things are in the standard operating procedure manual in this strategy becomes different. So say so say you want to sell in three years, firstly, and I want to know is like, okay, let’s work backwards. What does it look like? What does it look like through the eyes of the buyer? What is your, what, what revenue you need to have? What is your gross profit? What is your net profit? Uh, what systems do you need to have in place? Where are you trending? Like what do you trend with your peers? Like if you’re growing a 45% year over year, your industry is growing at 25%. There’s something about you that makes you even more valuable to a buyer because you’re growing faster. So I want to digress. I’d die. I would just want to just, I’m getting too much into the detail, but division,
21:02 well it’s the vision, but the process. So if, if what your goal is is to sell your business in three years, you have to love that process of getting that business up, getting, you know, getting the clients in the door, getting the SLPs together, w which you’re absolutely correct. Is that the absolute completely different process than starting a multigenerational business and that you’re going to, you know, you’re grooming the next generation to come in and take over the business. Totally different process. Whatever it is, you have to love, not just the goal, right? You have to, you don’t get into business thinking, I want to be a millionaire that hopefully comes along with it, but that if that’s the only goal that you have, you’re going to probably be swimming around in
21:47 most for awhile. So I, you know, I, this is a great conversation and I think you should be having this conversation with somebody whom you trust. If you don’t trust anybody within your business or your own company, you don’t have employees I think is good to join some type of mastermind. Somebody who is actually at your level who can challenge your assumptions because we are our worst enemies sometimes. Right? And you become who you surround yourself with. Right? It’s true as a business owner, it’s true. One of the reasons why we highly, highly, highly recommend for our clients too
22:22 meet with us in group settings is just for this reason it have your account in there. Have your, your CPA, you know, whoever you’re working with, um, have your attorney there and have these conversations at a higher level where you have some trusted advisors who absolutely see things differently. Mm, absolutely. See things differently.
22:43 So point number one, what does it take to be a successful CEO? Sue? Run yourself with a great informal board of advisors. Yes. Comprised of people who are gonna. You know, think of this, and I always think of this myself, if you are the smartest person in a room full of people, you may be in the wrong group. I absolutely agree. Think about it, right? If you are in surrounded by people who are brilliant, brilliant, smart, progressive thinkers, visionaries, you will become like them by proxy. So if you want to be great, hang out with, great. If you want to be an Eagle hanger with Eagles, right? And this whole this surround yourself and come up with people that you got that there may be paid, um, advisers, they may not be paid advisors. I have, uh, surrounded myself with a great group of people and you’re one of them. We bounce each other as ideas because I want to make sure that legally I’m not going to fall off a cliff, right?
23:42 And, and we’ll just, we’re, we’re the classic, um, see things different. You know, we just, we, um, you know, we just have a different, an initial initial approach to things. Um, just because we come from a different world,
23:54 time for ourself, fish plugin, what does it the, so what do we do? I mean, you know, we have people that tune into our show that come and go and uh, it, it w we are, I got a phone call from somebody who said, Hey, you know, I was just going to the store and I was getting out and about 10 minutes, I listened to the show and we said, one nugget, right? So, but if you weren’t there for who we are, and you get that one nugget and that turns into $1 million worth of sales, God bless you. And that man, it’s a good thing. So with that, we are a Greenland HQ, www dot Greenland as in the country of Greenland, G R. E E N. L. a N D HQ for headquarters.com. Or you can go to where? sharon-law.com. S. H. E. R. R. O. N. okay. I hope, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m having a great time and we’ll be right back. You’re listening to business and legal talk with literally
25:17 is so much in my head today, man, you’d start something up in me, Claudine. Gosh darn it. Leave it to me. Wow. I mean just be in a CEO and uh, um, you know, just, just the evolution of what it takes from, you know, starting out and what a CEO is the CEO at the beginning of the janitor and is also the receptionist and is also the CFO. And it’s also the CEO to a point where you’re actually truly a CEO and the only thing you have to worry about, you become Larry Ellison from Oracle. And that’s the only thing you do is the cast division of the company. And every, you have both lots of people working for you
25:58 and wave the magic wand. Don’t forget the magic one with pixie and all of that that comes along with it. The magic show. So what do you want to talk about? I mean, we have, well one of the, okay, so, so I know this happens to me and I’m sure it happened to you. My husband’s a general contractor and this happens to him. Um, w how do you handle it when a client comes on board and insists that they want to work with you and only you?
26:26 That’s the million dollar question, right? I, I, when you asked me that earlier, I was like, wow, you know, let’s just talk about it because I don’t, I think it’s good exercise for us to even discuss it ourselves. It happens to me. In fact, I telling you that, um, you know, although I have multiple people that are very qualified at my firm, um, somebody called and went through the process of discovery, love the brand, love what we do and this is, but I absolutely want to work with you Leo, because you are the one who, you know, the face of the company, the, the founder and uh, you know, what it was that was that or nothing. Right. Now, how do you overcome that? I’m still trying to figure it out,
27:15 right? In our case, um, I work with clients and I, I try to, um, kind of preempt them and set expectations in the very beginning. I typically will meet with the client. Um, and I do have the final word in our, in our firm, uh, as to whether or not we’re going to take on a case, um, or take on a client. And, um, well I will back my associate’s decision. Um, I will always support them if they say, you know what, this is the case I don’t want, we don’t want to deal with, it’s just not, not, not aligned with our, our values here. I will absolutely support them. Um, uh, consequently if they say this is a case that I think that we should really take on, I’ll support them in that. Um, however, I do have the last final decision. So when I’m working with a new client, um, if I’m the one who is going through the new client, um, consultation and, and talking with them or, or I happen to meet them somewhere, um, I have made a very, very particular effort when I hired to hire associates, um, that have very particular skills different than mine and in many respects better than mine.
28:26 Complimentary. Absolutely. And so, um, I have associates that when an assignment goes to them, they’re the best in the house for that assignment. And I really have, I’ve, I’ve learned from being in various other businesses and in particularly the construction industry where my husband is his, you know, he’s a very, very experienced, finished contractor. He can do finish work and it takes a lot of skill and learning and, and so forth. And too often people w w, w they hired him and then if he had a crew member go in to do the work, immediately there was this anticipation that the crew member was less skilled, less than, and wasn’t going to do as good of a job. Um, and so I’ve always kind of in my mind, been trying to mitigate that and how do I mitigate that? And, and our way in our firm was to hire people who are better than me in their respective areas.
29:24 Um, areas of practice. And I think that one of the mistakes a lot of business owners make is you’re trying to find somebody who has your skill or your same level of skill or you know, that is somehow equal to you. And that’s just the kind of the, the knee jerk reaction, the GoTo on that. But when you hire that has a particularly different set of skills and those skills happen to be better than your skills in that area, then you have an ability to diversify the work and you can say, Hey, I’ve got this guy, he’s a tile set or he’s the best tile setter. I am terrible at setting tile, but my guy here, on the other hand, he’s the best tile setter, you know, ever. And then the anticipation from the client is you’re now sending the best person for that job in the door to do the job. Right. Well, so I don’t know, in your, in your world, and it’s a little different.
30:17 Well, you know what, yes and no. Um, every company that became somebody that became a brand, whether the brand was regional or national, goes through that process. I think whether you provide a service, um, or you manufacture widgets product right, you are going to go through that. It’s easier to get away, um, on the product side of things than on the service side because services personal, however it’s happens all the time. You know, hydro staffing companies become the Adecco, you know, Robert half was rubber half, right. Heidi B B, how did he become something other than Robert half? Right, right. I mean it, it I think is what you said is very important. You hire the best people that can carry on the legacy. It’s about reputation, but more than anything is the process of delivery of that service. Right? So what I’m trying to do in my firm is standarize the service delivery model, right?
31:20 So it’s done. Remember the whole franchise model. So how do you perform the services? How do you do the bookkeeping? How do you do the bill pay? How do you do the accounts receivable? The way we do it is gotta be certified, do it is going to be exactly as 10 other people in my company that do it. And that be, that to me is ensuring that this does not the same that is in and out burgers out past the same here in Modesto then I would do in Fresno, they will do a Sacramento is the same way is the process, right? So if you standardize your process and then delivery model, there’s no other Claudine, you are as good as they come. You’re the founder of the firm. But if you’re able to translate your knowledge into standard operating procedures that can be replicated.
32:09 See, and this is where your world completely divergent from ours in your world you do have procedures and you, you, you have um, an ability to at least to a greater extent to standardize. Not everything can be standardized but, but to a much greater extent. Whereas in our world, every case is different. Every case is going to require, you know, a, a particular and different skillset and a different background of knowledge. If a, if a client comes in and they have a class action lawsuit for wage hour disputes, you have to have a certain particular background and knowledge in that area of law. Now there could be a case that comes in the door that is really, we’ve got, we have some really complicated, um, land issues going on right now, um, within the firm where people have purchased land deeds weren’t not transferred when they were supposed to be in and now certain people have died and now we have to figure out how do we get title to the property transferred.
33:11 And we’re now on the third generation of people and we don’t have living trusts and we don’t have probates and, and, and we don’t know who’s got proof of payment and who’s paid the taxes. So a case like that comes down and that is set for somebody who really has a, um, the ability to do some in depth research, to really stick with it, to dig deep, figure out, you know, where the case law is and where the statutes meet the case law. And what are your alternatives procedurally as opposed to something where, you know, the background of the law, you know, wage hour law, you know how to get through and you know, how to, you know, the procedure in a courtroom. Okay. So for us, we, and, and I suspect for listeners out there who have different types of businesses, you and I are kind of presenting two things that are on opposite ends of the spectrum.
34:00 And they folks out there listening can say, where do I fall in that spectrum? Is, is my business such that, um, I have to find people and employ various people who are good in different areas and all of us together make, say for example, the general contractor example. Um, you know, I’ve got the great guy who’s great at dry wall, I’ve got the guy who’s great at, you know, painting and laying, you know, laying tile or yeah, laying mud on the wall. And then here’s the guy who’s great at tile and all of us combined together. We make this great, you know, you know, whole, whereas a newer world, you can come up with procedures and processes and then you bring everybody’s skilled up level up,
34:39 except for the advisory except for it, which we are very much the same. Yeah. So I ha, you know, in this is fluid sometimes. I, you’re listening to this, we’re going to, we’re not going to come with the solutions. We’re going to just Duke it out here because it helps you understand our thought process. You know, we’re, we’re here to build a talk show that really resonates with the community. So we, we may not have all the answers figured out. So, um, I’m sure that you can relate to us. Um, but if you’re, aside from the CFO advisory and our size, there must be something in your business that if you are okay, how about this? There may be areas, let’s just forget about accounting and law. Just business in general. Okay. Now, if you’re a founder, CEO and you’re good at that one thing and you’re tied to the business that way, and it produces revenue that pays bills, what all their revenue streams, passive income, recurring revenue,
35:38 whether it is monthly or annual, can you bring into your company that does not depend on you? That’s a challenge, right? That’s a, that’s a real challenge. Um, and for a lot of the service businesses, it’s looking for a product to sell. Okay. You’re a landscaper and do you have a product that you can sell? Maybe you have, uh, you know, tools or you know, that you can buy it wholesale and you can sell to sell to your clients or um, you know, maybe it’s, um, maintenance parts for, you know, whatever yard tools or you know, whatever. Or maybe it’s, it’s, you know, yard decorations and you’re working in somebody’s yard and you come out and you have this set of, you know, outdoor candles that you can sell to them. Those are the things you’re working in people’s yards. Amazon store, online on the side and, well, I don’t know if it’s online, but you can, you know, come and, you know, bring products.
36:31 Is there a product you can add to your service? I know we’ve looked at it in our business, is there some sort of a product and we have taken some of our services and packaged them as more as a product. Um, and so then we are dealing with selling a product versus selling billable hours. You’re saying productize yourself if you’re in a particular service model, right. Particularly if you’re a service. If you are a service. So check that out. And you know, if you’re listening to the show, if you provide us some type of service, what part of your service can you productize, right? Or not even? Or is there a product that you could have access to that would compliment the service that you’re providing? So again, back to the landscaping idea, you know, maybe you have this great variety of candles that you sell and they’re all for your yard and they sit on your patio tables and you know there’s something special and you can sell them to clients and clients love, you know, the fact that you come and do the yards and the yards look gorgeous. And then at the end of the service, you know, you also have some, you know, yard, um, or patio decorations that you use. I mean, look how much money is spent on just patio decorations, tents, and if you’re a landscape or maybe you have some patio decorations that you sell, well more to come. We’re having a great time here. You’re listening to business, illegal talk with Leah and Claudine. We’re having a ball talking about, Hey, being up to several CEO, we’d be right back. Don’t pack a phone around in Java. Drop down.
38:26 yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We’re back man. I’m having too much fun that with the Mike. I know we love in doing the show, you know, I didn’t before I started doing this show that I actually enjoy doing the show and just took a risk and uh,
38:40 and you yeah, yeah. You would, I would have thought that, um, you would have had to have, you know, drugged me behind to you. I know. We actually have, can’t stop talking. I think literally every meeting you and I have ever had, it has gone along the three hour. You’ll be started trying to do an hour meeting and then it was like, we might as well be here for this just Mark off the whole entire day.
39:05 You know what you are, it goes back to you are who you hang out with. No, no question. You know, and, um, and, and I think the reason why you’ve been D we decided to do this show together is because there is this yearning Yan, there’s that we sharpening each other to be better CEOs of our own companies. And that comes with just hanging out with the people that I can, they can make you better.
39:25 Right. And I, I like the idea that peop giving people access to things that they would not otherwise have and giving people access to just thoughts about business and, and what you think about or what it versus what I think about it and how the two, two concepts in the two completely different strategies play out, gives people an opportunity to kind of, to, to contemplate it while they’re out doing their thing. You know, maybe they’re at work and they’ve got the radio on or they’re driving down the highway. Um, but giving people access to the, the thought processes that go into, how do we advise people? We’re working with CEOs all the time. We’re working with, usually it’s not the employee of a company calling me to engage services, right? It’s usually the owner. It’s usually the owner, the CEO, and with me. And so we’re dealing with things at the top of the pinnacle.
40:13 And, um, and I, I have often thought I’ve got a couple, three or four clients who all have a really solid key internal employee. Okay. Um, and I do work with those, keep key employees. So once the engagement is established and, and now we begin the business of taking care of whatever the matter is that we’re working on with them, I oftentimes end up working with that key key person within the business. Um, and I have, I have often thought that I need to set up like a coffee group, like a once a month because these key four key five key people all experience similar things. They’re in different industries. Couple of them are in construction, so they’re in a similar industry. Um, but how did they deal with, um, you know, these different issues. And if they had that comradery amongst each other where they, they knew that they could call, you know, so and so over at ABC, you know, business and they could talk to that gal and say, Oh man, you know, I know you’ve been doing this for 30 years and you’ve been a key employee here at your business and this is what I’m up against.
41:25 But being able to generate and create a comradery of people who can bounce ideas off of each other is so incredibly important.
41:34 I like where you’re going with that and I think is so critical. There is not such thing as a sale if may CEO without influence from other people. Oh no. You know, um, it goes back to being able to be coachable. You know, Michael Jordan, you know, in basketball called, you know, Kobe Bryant and all the greats, they all had not just one coach, multiple coaches, uh, and multiple areas of the game. We are no different. We, you know, we come, I compare CEOs to top athletes. Absolutely. And they did. They had coaches until the very last day they played. Correct. They didn’t get to a point where they were done with coaching and they went and played, I got this, I got it. Don’t worry. I am a still, I still got it, you know, second before the end of the game. I, I know I can, I’ve done this shot a thousand times.
42:21 Uh, no. They need somebody, if anything, to push them to be the best that they can be. Hey, so there’s one thing I want to talk about. It’s knowledge drain. Okay. You know, um, uh, I believe that if you have a small business, you should be us as small business owner who wants to be building a brand as a CEO, that you should be able to do every aspect of your business, right? No question. You’re foolish if you can’t. Many calls I get where there is knowledge trained. So it was either at a partnership or to a friends started a business together. One has the technical knowledge and the other one had the sales knowledge and they started doing business together and it was great until it wasn’t great and any fell apart. Yeah. The technical guy leaves and the salesperson has no knowledge of what to do and the business implodes and worse yet, you don’t know what they did or didn’t do while they were there.
43:17 I got a call, you know, just the, I just thought about this. I get calls all the time, people Hey, you know, um, and, and not everybody has to turn into, it’s not like I’m seeking to engage everybody, but I, I do, you know, because of uh, speaking engagements, people come to me and have questions about business. So I got a specific call about somebody who wanted to get into healthcare. Right? Oh, that’s interesting. Yes. Who has no knowledge in healthcare? Oh, you just wake up and decided to get into health. What? I heard that the grass is green and on the other side I think there is a pile of money to be made by gay becoming Medicare a by an a Medicare, um, home health agency. And somebody has the license. I the, that you can make millions. And I started asking questions and I said, so what nursing background do you have for that to be able to take this on?
44:05 None. I want to be the finance here. I want to be the owner. And um, I want to just collect checks. I mean, I’m paraphrasing, but essentially I just want to have an absentee business. I said, well, this is not the kind of business, this is not like a, um, coin operated washing machine, you know, um, a laundry mat. This is oversight and government regulation too, every week to the extreme, right? And you want to get yourself into that, which means that you’re going to have to have had to depend on, does the keyword depend on specific people with nursing degrees who can run it? Who need to have in your staff that you have to pay him huge salaries so they can just be there. So the licenses attached to them and, and everything is going great until one of them decides to leave you and start another agency. What do you do then?
45:04 You’re, you’re really in a pickle. You’ve left yourself so exposed. Gee whiz, don’t do that. Right.
45:11 So the seat, so just be shrewd. If you haven’t started a business and you’re thinking about starting a business, you probably be better. You are the expert on knowing how to do this. You know, you may not know the accounting, you may not know the legal side. You may not know the quality control, but you knew how to do something that you’re gonna put on a marketplace that you know how to do manufactured at a service and provide well. Right? And then you build a team around it. You’d be better off to try to buy something else that you have no expertise on. Don’t you think?
45:43 You know where we’re seeing a lot of this a lot of this, the, the burgeoning cannabis industry right now, we are seeing absolute clashes of, of atmospheres. Just we have people
45:56 that’s the final frontier right now. This is the wild West, right? Yeah, we
45:59 are. Absolutely. We are absolutely, you know, heading West to find gold apparently. But what, what we’re seeing is that people who have been in the cannabis industry, you know, because it was illegal up until a few years ago, um, they, we had people who were good at cultivating and they knew how to cultivate and you know, for whatever reason they had a green thumb and they could, you know, not kill the plants, whatever. And then now with it becoming legal and everybody thinking that this is the golden goose, we have business people who are now jumping into the industry because there’s a dollar to be made because there’s a dollar to be made, but they have no idea how to cultivate and quote cultural business. It is the agricultural business and farming is a very VE and it’s a very particular product to farm. It doesn’t, um, it, it can be killed easily.
46:45 We’ll just say it that so you can easily make mistakes and, and you know, have terrible product. And now with the regulations and the testing that’s happening, everything if, if it’s, if they’re doing it according to the law, everything is tested and is, um, there is a definitive um, yes or no. Is your product any good or is your product terrible or you, you know, so we’re back in the day people they had their plants in the backyard and you know, Oh yeah, that’s great. You know, there were, there was no, there was no metric to what great was. Um, and so we’re definitely seeing this in business business. People are getting in and approaching cultivators, um, wanting to get into the business. And the, the interesting part is very, very, very few people understand either world they don’t, they either don’t understand how to farm for a business or they don’t how know how to, you know, take that business knowledge that they have and operate in an incredibly regulated world.
47:49 So, so that if you, if we were to just distill this last hour and just a few bullet points, what will you want our listeners to take away? I think that the end of the day, you know, the end is the end of the day. It’s always the conundrum and don’t beat yourself up because you’re in a conundrum because that’s what it is. Then that’s what it is supposed to be. On one hand, you’re supposed to know every facet of your business. You’re supposed to be able to function and successfully complete every phase of your business, whether it’s being in my world, able to fill out the judicial council forms and get them filed, drafted, pleading, do discovery, you know, understand procedures in a courtroom or counsel clients, um, and understand the law and the area of law that we practice in. Right? But at the same time, I need to be able to understand how the files work and do all the jobs that all the support staff does as well.
48:44 But at the same time, I’m supposed to be out here looking down the horizon, seeing what trends are coming in business, seeing, um, you know, how can we make ourselves better networking, building those key relationships in the community. Um, and so you’re caught in this, am I supposed to be here working all the time or am I supposed to be out there, you know, watching the horizon as it comes and it, it is, it is a conflict and, and be profitable and at the same time. And what’s, because you won’t be an end watch the cash we didn’t even talk about, but I think we’ve talked in nauseum of, of the last few weeks. So Hey, uh, listener, we’d love to have you tune in. Don’t forget we’re on every Saturday at 10:00 AM and um, you know, if you have any questions on the accounting side and on, on, on the finance side, on the scalability side, even if it’s just a question feel free to call our office.
49:34 Um, (559) 207-3148 or look us [email protected]. You know, just love to help the community. Um, or if we don’t know the answer, we’ll point you to the right person and you need to go to Claudine’s website to Claudine. Yep. We are located in Sherlock right now. In the process of, um, opening an office in Modesto. We’re really, Oh, really excited growing, growing like everybody. Speaking of scaling the skis, scaling. Absolutely. So we are currently@twoohninefourtwoseventwentytwohundredoryoucancatchusatwwwsharon-lot.com. And that’s S H E R R O n-law.com. Great. Well, it was just another great show. Um, thank you so much for tuning in. Have a great weekend everybody, and we’ll talk about Saturday. Happy mother’s day.