Latest / From Stuck to Scaled: Growth Strategies for SMBs / Why Everything Still Depends on You (Even Though You Have Good People)
Transcript
- Julio Gonzalez: Welcome to From Stuck to Scaled Growth Strategies for Small and Midsized Businesses. Your guide to navigating growth, transformation, and success in today's ever-changing business landscape. Each week, we'll dive into proven strategies, real world case studies, and actionable insights designed to help small and mid sized business owners scale smart, lead stronger, and grow faster. Let's get you unstuck and on the path to sustainable, scalable success. Now your host, Julio Gonzalez. Welcome back to From Stuck to Scale. Today we're diving into the topic of people and culture, exploring why many business owners still feel everything depends on them, even with a skilled team in place. We'll discuss how clarity or the lack thereof can impact ownership within your team and provide practical strategies to foster a more autonomous and effective workplace. Today we welcome Greg Harrod to the podcast. With over 30 years of experience in manufacturing, Greg specializes in helping leaders identify Where clarity is breaking down within their teams. As a certified working genius facilitator, he offers practical strategies for fostering ownership and confidence among team members. Outside of his coaching work, Greg and his wife Kristen enjoy raising a small flock of sheep in Southeast Kansas. And let's welcome Greg to the show. Greg, it is so nice to have you on from Stuck to Scaled. Well, thank you for having me, Julio. It's good to be here. Tell our listeners a little bit about yourself and your business. Yeah. So I'm a I'm a business coach and I focus on helping leaders who who still feel like everything depends on them stop doing work their team is ready to own. And I've spent over 30 plus years in manufacturing, worked for large Fortune 100 companies, ⁓ as well as small other smaller companies. But I've I've had various leadership roles there, but I grew up in a welding shop in Southeast Kansas. And my wife and I, ⁓ we raise a small flock of wool sheep now. And that's a lot of fun. That's a business we have also, but tiny little hometown is where I live. So I interviewed a business coach early on in the podcast, ⁓ Maggie Isaac, and and she made a comment in a networking group that stuck with me that, you know, when you're using a race car analogy, she wants that driver to be the absolute best driver where I want to have the absolute best race car. So it was a great, you know, counterweight or counterpoint there. ⁓ talk to me about how you help those business leaders really excel in their businesses. Well it's interesting. If we just want to carry that that analogy forward a little bit. I've never used this one before, but I think it's a good opportunity, I think, about building the best team. So you can have the best driver. And you can have the best car, but that pit team is just as important. So it's all about having understanding yourself and what you're really built to do, and understanding your team, what they're built to do, and then putting getting the right people to do the right work. And often I feel like that's an area where the factors that people use to decide who the right people are for the right roles isn't quite as It's a more nuanced and people don't quite think through that as much as sometimes they can and they get a little better results when they think about it at a different level. And and you bring up a good point. This is a conversation I have very often. You know, when it's when the world revolves around that leader, you don't have really a business, right? As as as that founder, you've created a job for yourself. And when it comes to, you know, selling your business, getting any kind of partnership investment. There's not a business there. ⁓ so when you run into those leaders, how do you help them break through from, you know, everything has to come down to me? Mm-hmm. Yeah, we're in a process of doing that right now. As I said, my wife and I are building up two businesses. We're founders of two businesses at the same time. And and I watched my folks ⁓ as they grew their business over time. It started in nineteen seventy. As a small welding shop. My dad bought a blacksmith and welding shop the year I was born. ⁓ long story behind that. But over time, really, he and my brother became the ends. My my dad passed away last fall, but my brother still is. The business fully depends upon them. And that happens with so many founders. And it's so easy to do because you, at some point, you have to do everything yourself. But the next step that I helped. folks take is to step back and think, okay, let's take a list of make a list of all the things you're actually doing and then seeing what is actually the best fit. What's the best use of your time? And what I find is even the step of writing down everything that a leader is doing is completely eye opening. The smile on your face, I think Julio, that ⁓ brings to mind that you've been through that yourself. I I've got a good friend Paul. This is you if you're listening. ⁓ so I I I I don't do coaching. I coach him because of the relationship that we have. And we had a conversation ⁓ late last year. We're planning for for 2026. And he's, you know, his one of his you know big initiatives was, you know, I'm gonna document all of our accounting processes, you know, to hand those down and say, why? Why you? Why are you documenting? Why isn't accounting documenting it? And then you can edit, you can influence, you can whatever. ⁓ no, because I want it done my way. So we had this whole conversation about, you know, is when when is good enough good enough? Right. Versus having to to impart of yourself. And accounting is not one of those areas that's like, you know, we need we have a special sauce and I need to to, you know, add my influence. ⁓ and that goes to highest best use, which which you mentioned. ⁓ you know, how do you get them, you know, other than the dollars, right? How else do you get them to understand, you know, highest best use and really to let go? Cause that that turns into a hiring conversation. It it does. And one of one of the things that people often miss, and I've got a story behind this, is thinking through what actually brings them fulfillment, what energizes them. And at first glance, you would think, well, that doesn't really matter that much. But if you want employees who are going stay and be good for the long haul, not just in the short term, that's critical. And from my own experience, so I I grew up in my career doing a lot of detail work. And I ended up in a project manager, program management type of role. And all the way down into the weeds of making sure all the details were done, everything was finished, pushed the push the project all the way across the finish line, get it done, done. And, you know, I could do that and I'm pretty good at it, earned a living doing that. But what I found over time was that's not what brought me the most joy, energy, and fulfillment. And I started to lean toward getting burned out. But when I was able to do things which I'm the things that I'm wired for, more coaching, enabling others and helping them do their very best and then applying discernment. That is what I would do. I always ask the question when I interview folks, it's like, well, what would you do if we didn't pay you? You know, what makes you pound the table? What do you love to do? What are you built to do? And that's the sort of thing for me that I could do for a long time without being drained. But those details, they tend to drain me over time. And when you've got a good leader on your team, the the danger you fall into, Julio, is if you if someone's doing something really well, you You tend to give them that work. And if you don't have the conversation about whether they're actually enjoying it, often you find out when they submit their resignation letter that they weren't enjoying it at all and they're burnt out. And do you find it's true on that resignation that that founders, leaders really need to focus on the quiet ones? Because I've seen so much of that. You know, the ones that, are aren't complainers heads down, you know, get the work done, you know, and then all of a sudden you've got a resignation on your hands. That's exactly right, because those dependable folks, they tend to be loyal and they keep doing it because they can until they can't. And things build up and whether it's the pressure that they feel at home or physical results of that stress, they you don't have that open conversation quickly enough. And if you're not paying attention, as you said, to those quiet folks, that they they tend to burn out and put you at a risk for losing your best person. And especially with a small company with a you know, a founder starting up, if you lose one person, that's a high percentage of your workforce. And what do you see as the biggest challenge with leaders and founders delegating? Well, there are a lot of challenges. I think you alluded to one already, and that is may not be something we all want to hear, but we all have some amount of pride. And it takes a lot of humility to say, this person who works for me, I'm gonna trust them. And Take a chance that maybe it won't be done my way. And maybe even a bigger risk is that it's done better than I could do it. Because that hits our ego. And what do you tell that leader? You know, I hired Bob, you know, I'm delegating to Bob and Bob is failing. Well, the first conversation is to ask about what conversation they've already had. What do you mean by their failing? Have you set clear expectations for Bob? Does Bob know what success looks like? Do you understand what's in in the way that's keeping Bob from being successful and flourishing? Which it's so easy, especially when we're busy, that we don't take the time to have a conversation. that you you actually get to know what a person's struggling with, why they're struggling, and know them at that deeper level. And and what I find is those more engineering types, you know, the more ⁓ I'll see even go intellectual, right? You know, they expect that people understand. You know, they they they throw a task at them and expect them to catch it and execute it as they would. ⁓ and and that's a huge gap. It it is and I find it fascinating. So when I think about how work flows, any kind of work, it flows from someone recognizes there's there's a problem, you know, super high altitude. They're thinking about what the market's going on or what's going on in our business. Someone has an idea in response to that. So you're still at a pretty high level. But what tend that's in your ideation phase, but people tend to jump to the implementation phase, which is helping other people and then getting all the details done, you know, finishing the job. But in the middle, there's a phase that you really need people to have discernment, to think about whether it's a good idea, and then make a decision and and state that you've made a decision and then galvanize the team to actually go do the work. So I I worked with a CIO at one point and the he found through our work together that his natural how he was wired Is he had an idea and he wanted it done. So he went from a high level idea to are we done yet? And he he recognized that he wasn't engaging his team and inviting that input for people to criticize his idea. So you've you've been in that role before. And I I'll just ask you that. What kind of weight did you have when you were CIO, when you said something? I learned a long, long time ago that I needed a lot more information. So I made it a point to make sure that I gave my staff as much information as possible and asked them to come and ask any questions for anything that they needed. You know, I was always very much involved with my teams. So, you know, I and I asked them, I told them, I said, you know, I will never ask you to do something that I'm not willing to do myself. You know, so I had the information that that I needed, but I've always looked at at management and I'm separating that from leadership, right? Because they're very different. I always looked at management where I can multiply my impact and my reach through the staff. Right. So, you know, I and and you know, I was in roles where, you know, like you said, I was CIO, but at the same time they were small companies, so I had to be, you know, rather tactical. ⁓ So I I empowered my staff with as much information as possible so that they can get the job done and not have to come back to me. But I was always available, you know, for them to to come back and and ask any questions. And that proved to be very ⁓ successful for me and my staff. I like how you use the term empower, and maybe that's overused a little bit these days, but when you think about the idea of knowing what your people are good at. And what they enjoy doing. And then when you can give them the opportunity to go do their thing and run, that takes that pressure off of you because a lot of times, even though you feel like you have to do it because of your role, you you don't you don't really enjoy doing it. And it gets you get trapped in that. And that's it, that's to answer your question from before. That can keep leaders trapped with doing work that really their team's ready to own. They want to do it. It's just empowering them to go take that step. And how do you differentiate delegation from decision making? Right? Because I see leaders who, you know, I delegate great, but they will not delegate the decision making. And and obviously there's some decisions that they belong to the leader. ⁓ but you know, they're they're unwilling to delegate even some of the smallest decisions. Mm-hmm. It's interesting you say that because I've been doing some word study and I just started, so I'm not super equipped for this conversation, but we'll go down this path anyway. But if you think about the term delegate, that it's actually entrusting and authorizing someone. So a delegate to a ⁓ committee or whatever. carries that, but I tend to think that when we hear the word delegate, we mean more of what you said. It's like I'm giving them task. That's not really what the word means, is my understanding. It is about what you were saying that it it includes that authorization for decision making on behalf of the person who sent you. And it's an it's an easy trap to fall into to just start giving work away to get it off your plate. But that's not That's not a strategic intentional reassignment of work, which is what I help clients do. I'm I'm gonna take you even further astray, and I can't imagine how this popped into my brain right now. But I I was it's I was in Maine in the car with some friends on a phone interview several years ago, and I was asked what my leadership style was. And I said, I am a benevolent dictator. And one of the individuals in the car, very seasoned leader, he turns around and he's saying, You can't say that. But in fact, that is the best description of my leadership style. I give you lanes. You know, as long as it's within those lanes, you know, you go and you do whatever you need to do. If you're gonna go outside of those lanes, we need to have a conversation. You know, come to me with, you know, your recommendations and everything else, but we need to have a conversation. ⁓ have you used maybe not the term, but the concept of ⁓ benevolent leadership in your coaching practice? I I love that concept. May I ask you another question though? Sure. How did you go about deciding who should be in which lane? based on their experience, you know, so if if you were a technician and you had you know you proved to me that your experience is sufficient. For these things, that that was your lane. If you're going, you know, beyond just being a you know server technician, and all of a sudden you're in networking, we need to have a conversation before you meddle there. If you're a a manager or leader, then you know your lane is specific to that. And those lanes expand based on you know your experience, our experience together, your success. So, you know, that that's not necessarily a fixed lane. You know, it's a lane that evolves. as you prove yourself as I become more confident with your abilities and your skills. Yeah. So when I think about assigning those lanes, there's a temptation, probably the simplest way is just look at job descriptions. And well that's in your job description, so you should do it. Doesn't really matter whether you like it or not or whether you're good at it, just go do it. That's a not a great way to do it. A a step up would be, as you said, with competency. Can you can you do it well? Can we trust you in the sense that you'll do the job well? But I think to truly get to that benevolent, and when I think of that's a term that I might use is someone who truly cares for their employees. And they they have their best interest in mind and they do everything they can to help them thrive and flourish is the way I've described it. When you when you take that step to be that true benevolent dictator, then you must know what what those people want to do and not only what they're good at, but what they really get energy from doing. And I used an exercise with my team over the years, and we use the the six types of work in genius assessment. And I use that as a tool in my in my coaching, but it helps people understand what they what they're designed to do and what brings them energy and what drains them. So we would just have a conversation in our one-on-ones and I completely ⁓ recommend that Folks should do one on ones with their with their folks. But we would have the conversations like, okay, this week, did you tell me about what energized you and what drained you on a scale of one to one to five? How energized were you in your work? And we would have a discussion around that. How what drained you? So then I could readjust and reassign work together with them to for their good, which I think brings out that benevolent side of things. So you're listening to from Stuck to Scale, then we're speaking with Greg Harrod about everything leadership evolution and team growth, right? ⁓ so as a leader, when do you delegate? How do you delegate and and learning those skills? ⁓ Greg, one of the things that came to mind is as you were mentioning that is there's a lot of ⁓ tool sets, let's call them, out there. You've got EOS that talks about putting the right person in the right seat and 90s, you know, kind of An evolutionary or version of that. ⁓ how do you guide your customers, your leaders, ⁓ on finding those right roles for the individuals? So when you think about I'm I'm not an EOS expert, but as you said, there's this concept of putting the right people in the in the right seats, and that's so important. But understanding, and as I said, I use ⁓ I'm a big fan of the six types of work in Genius. It's it's it's not a it's not a a personality test. It's more of a productivity tool because it talks about how work gets done. So the assessment itself, which I work through with with my clients and then have their team do it, that starts these rich conversations that we can get below the surface and really talk about what folks are wired to do and how they're built. But in the context of the work that they need to do. So for a particular project, as we talk through those six stages of work, when you can have a conversation, and probably the a really good story to illustrate this is Pat Lanshone, who wrote he create he came up with the six types of work at genius. That is his latest book, and he did the five dysfunctions of of a team. I'm sure your readers have heard of that. I'm sure you have as well. But when he developed this, the story that he tells in his book is Amy came to him and said, What's wrong with you? Because his over time, his behavior, he was not behaving well and people didn't like to be around him, even though they'd worked together for 20 years or whatever. And what what he found was he believed that because he was the CEO, his job title, he needed to be the cheerleader. He needed to be the galvanizer in working genius language. And he did not like it. But he felt like he had to. And when he admitted that to his team, Cody Thompson said, I love doing that. And Pat said, You're the chief galvanizing officer right now. And they were able to, again, relatively small business. They didn't feel constrained by their job descriptions or their titles. They adjusted their work based on a conversation they had around what they're built to do and what they're good at, those sort of things. So now you've got a a I don't want to say more theoretical, but more ethereal, ⁓ non-job description related job assignment. That that's the ⁓ terminology I was looking for. how do you make sure that there's not over dependence on those ⁓ assignments? And when you think about tell me a little bit more about what comes to mind when you say overdependence. So, you know, I thought, you know, as the CEO, I thought I had to be the cheerleader. Now, now we have a galvanizer. You know, it could be a lot of pressure to be a galvanizer. So, you know, are you putting too much emphasis on that one person? or do you maybe need a couple of galvanizers, you know, per area or per project? Mm-hmm. I To it comes back to communication. So when you're consistently having conversations as a team and having that vulnerability and that trust to say, for example, I'm overloaded here. And just because we we aren't built to do something doesn't mean we don't have to do those things at times. But having that awareness and the ability to have the conversation to say, for example, this is really overwhelming me. And I know, I know, Julio, you love doing all the detail work and you're great at it, but it is draining me. So I'm doing my best. But if you just bear with me, this is where I am. And if there is another dependence on a person who's struggling, that vulnerability to say, you might step up and go, ⁓ I'd love to help you. I mean, it's it's not a burden to me to do those sort of things. I actually like doing the kind of work that's draining you. Then you have that, just like we back to that analogy, the pit crew and the driver and the car, you've got the pit crew stepping up and saying, I'll fill that role. I can do that well. And bringing that back to the one-on-ones, how do let me rephrase that? A lot of business owners, a lot of managers don't know how to have a one-on-one. So do you teach your, do you coach? your customers on how to give or how to engage in a successful one on one. Because, you know, I've been in one on ones where it's, you know, it's was it was my boss doing nothing but talking down to me and and others where he just sat there and say, I don't know when to stop because I'm getting no reaction from you. Yes. So so this idea of having a one on one meeting is an art and a science and a skill all in itself. But some of the simple places to start, and you've already named a couple of them, but one that I find the easiest thing to do is actually schedule them. It's amazing. I I had an experience with a coworker who told me that he hadn't met his new, he had a new boss come in and he hadn't met his new boss in person or on a Teams call directly for months after he started. And he he described the way that that made him feel. And it wasn't good. But simply having the the one on one meeting scheduled, whether that's weekly or every other week, even monthly, although I think that's a little too long to go, that shows your employee that that you are important to me. I will put on my calendar time. And you know, when you're reporting to a high level leader, things happen. But instead of canceling that meeting, you reschedule a meeting. Again, it's communicating that this meeting isn't about me. This is meeting is about you, my employee, and how I can help you be successful. Because that's one of the most important jobs of any supervisor, manager, leader in a in a ⁓ reporting structure type of way is to help their people be successful. Because businesses grow when people are developed. So if you can develop your people, businesses will grow, and you do that by spending time with. So just to reiterate that, get a one-on-one on the calendar and then make sure that if you have to move it, if if you have a conflict, move it, don't cancel it. And the other, the other part of that too, goes back to what you were saying. And that is focus on the other person and what's going on outside of work. That's just as important to performance at work than a tactical update on the project. Sure, you have to cover those sometimes, and that's necessary. But knowing that when people know that you care about them as a human being, that makes all the difference in terms of retention, engagement, ownership, all the buzzwords that we hear, that's what where where you really show it if you believe it, is whether you're spending time listening to the other person and caring and not just talking and directing. Greg, you're a certified working genius facilitator. Tell us about that and how that drives your practice. Yeah, it's a great tool, as I've said. I've been certified for years now. And I think at last count, I believe it's 1.1 million people have gone through the assessment. It takes about 10 minutes. ⁓ it's very affordable. And and that's came up that came from the table group, Patrick, Patrick Linchoni and his team ⁓ developed that. But it's such an easy conversation starter. So if you're you're familiar, I think, from the nods that of the five dysfunctions of a team. So the foundation of that is trust. So there's a direct connection between knowing how people are wired and what they're built to do and what they're gifted to do. And then trusting one another. Because part of what comes out in that I've learned through the training is This idea of guilt and judgment. And it's just fascinating that people, when you you really get into a conversation about what people are feeling, that for example, if if I'm not the idea person and I look at a blank whiteboard and I just think, I feel paralyzed. If I go into an ideation session and I'm expected to give ideas, I feel dumb, I feel inadequate. I feel like I don't belong there. I have imposter syndrome. But in reality, that's just not what I'm good at. But if someone else, so I feel guilt, someone else might look at me and think, this is easy to come up with ideas. What's wrong with Greg? Why can't he come up with good ideas? But once those ideas are out there, in terms of working in language of working genius, discernment, that's where I shine. I can think through the ideas and see if they're good ones and have a conversation, but I need to have that idea to bounce off of. And so once once folks can understand that. It isn't something wrong with you. It's not actually really a weakness. It's something it's how you're how you're built. And everyone's everyone's contribution is necessary to have a good team. And that's where knowing your staff really comes in, right? Because if you know that, you know, Mary is a great idea person and Sue is a great execution person, you know. You can pair them together for a very successful project as long as you properly define those roles. ⁓ have you ever done the the marshmallow challenge where you you build the tallest ⁓ structure with spaghetti and you you have to hold a marshmallow up top? It sounds familiar. One of the one somewhere along the way, I believe I did that. Yeah. It it's it's one of my favorite team building exercises and and you know, statistically the best. groups, the ones that come up with the the tallest structures are the most diverse. Because you put a bunch of executives together, they can't do anything. You put a bunch of engineers together, it's like, come on. ⁓ so the the the most successful is you know the shared group, the diverse group. Yeah. And then after that it's ⁓ executive assistants because they have to be very innovative in what they do to solve all the problems for the people that that they're supporting. ⁓ that that's what came to mind on that brainstorming exercise because you you if you understand what everyone is good at, you are preventing the competition, right? Because now I'm gonna shine, you know, because this is an I you know an ideation exercise, ⁓ and you're gonna look like a fool. ⁓ and and that's where I think the the egos start, you know, causing the distrust. I agree with that. And when we can break down those conversations. And what I what I like to do with a group workshop is to have the leader start. So we'll go through their work and genius assessment. And for example, a leader might say, Wow, I really don't like the way that sounds that I'm not I my the tenacity is a working frustration for me. But in reality, yeah, I don't like the details and I'm not very good at it. And I don't really like to admit that. But yeah, that's true. Nailed me. When a leader can step into a conversation with his team and say that, and everyone is like, Uh-huh, we all know this. You're not hiding anything. And we can talk about, well, that's one of the rough edges of of having ⁓ a certain type of working genius is for example, the person I talked about with invention and tenacity. Their rough edge is that they have an idea and they expect it to be done immediately. So we think how that shows up is a lot of rework or a lot of It's not a very good idea. May I share another story that's just Absolutely Yeah, it's impactful. It impacted me very ⁓ deeply. And it's a lot a lot of the reason why I keep doing what I'm doing. My wife and I, ⁓ we were having a coaching session with a couple who we'd known forever, good friends, young couple who had their own business. And we did the work in Genius team map, and we we were at our kitchen table. And we talked about exactly that for her. She had an idea, she had invention and tenacity. She had an idea and she wanted to go run and get it done immediately. The husband, he had discernment and tenacity. So as we talked about what discernment meant, and a lot of times that shows up as asking questions, but the the perception can be you're shooting holes in. The ideas, or I'm throwing a wet blanket on it. She had this light bulb moment, and my wife Kirsten was watching her. And it was as if it was an epiphany moment almost. She said, That's why you always ask all those questions about these ideas that I have. And then you want to get them done. But I felt like you were, you didn't like them, you're shooting holes in them. And the level of respect that they had for one another was just a step. function improvement. So it not only impacted how they did business, but their marriage. And and it really does change lives when people understand why they're doing what they're doing in terms of working together. So, Greg, when you first walk into a customer, ⁓ there's always something really obvious, right? So, you know, based on your experience, you know, what are some of those things that you could tell any, you know, business leader that they need to stop, start, continue? What do some of those things look like? Yeah, the first step is to get your hands around what problem do you really want to go solve? So One of the thing, one of the tools that I use, ⁓ I it's called the the Leadership Clarity Scorecard and it's free, takes about 10 minutes. ⁓ Leadership Clarity Scorecard dot com is where you can go find it, but it helps people ask some self-diagnostic questions that reveals where they're they feel like they're really strong in their personal leadership or their leadership of their team or their ⁓ the the flow of work through their business and communication. There's six different sections. But that exercise alone will cause people to say, you know, I really do need to work on this area. Then taking that next step is pretty simple. And that is just take an inventory of what you're doing. Because almost always the folks I work with talk about having too much on their plate. They're carrying too heavy of a load. And they want, they want to reclaim their time because they didn't start a business to have another job and to be overwhelmed. They want to get out of that. Phase where they can work on the business, not in the business. But taking that inventory to just write down here are the things that I'm doing. And what I find is it's most useful when people can be specific. So we talk about using specific verbs. So someone might say, for example, Well, I own the sales process. Okay, well, what what are you doing? What what are your actual tasks that you're doing? So they might talk about updating their Their customer relationship management tool, their CRM. Or they might talk about developing a new, an entirely new ⁓ sales plan. Well, if we go back to the working genius concept, those are two very different types of work. So when we can dive into the details of what tasks within this idea of owning it are really bringing you energy and you want to keep doing, and what are those things that if you if at all possible you should stop doing? And assign to someone else. Again, strategically and intentionally, not just, well, I don't want to do it anymore. So have Bob do it. When you can design that work, that that's the way that productive, effective teams really get built. Did I answer your question, Julio? You you did, you did. Yeah. And and you know, on that stop work, one of the things that came to mind is, you know, especially for for smaller businesses, ⁓ solopreneurs or very small teams. There is so much opportunity to get help offshore, right? Be it somebody answering the phone, virtual assistant, you know, what are those things that can be easily passed off to to a virtual assistant that you should. You know, it's it's an easy lower cost ⁓ type of thing that that you can do. ⁓ not highly impactful in the sense of cost, but it could be highly impactful in the sense of your time. So I think as you know, as our listeners look through the things that they do on a repetitive basis, you know, some of those things they should look at lower cost offshore. I agree with that. And I think it's it's interesting to think about how that actually goes. So sometimes it reveals that we can feel good because we're doing things, even though they it isn't progress, it's just activity. So if we give away those activity things, then it causes us to To do the harder work or the more challenging work sometimes that we can sometimes, maybe I'm talking about myself here, we we can feel good because we're doing that stuff that's just turning the crank. But it's not the best use of of our skill set and our time. And then that gets to identity. To we think, well, we have to be busy. And if I don't, if I don't answer my own emails, well, that's not okay. If I don't schedule my own calendar. That's not what a hard worker does. There's all these identity things that come into play that, at least for me as a as a founder, stepping out of a W-2 job into owning my own business, it pries at those deeper issues that you really have to think about. Why am I doing what I'm doing? And why am I resisting things that should on paper seem like a no-brainer decision? Yet I'm still kind of hesitant. Have you experienced that? I absolutely. ⁓ you know, besides my Fractional COO work, I'm also a health tech startup. ⁓ I'm building a platform to help care for seniors aging in place and and talk about having to change your perspective. Now I'm not just moving into the entrepreneurial space, but I'm moving into the startup space. ⁓ wow. So that that has driven a lot of reassessment ⁓ in myself. And you mentioned the imposter syndrome earlier. It's like, you know. Me, little old me, who am I to start, you know, a health tech company? And you know, so yeah, absolutely that that's something that resonates completely with. Yeah. And how how has that ⁓ impacted your business, how you're running your business? How's that played out? So, you know, when I look at the mindset on the startup side versus my operational business, it has driven me to really change. you know, some of the ways that that I approach my business. I'm having to automate in different ways. You know, where in the past it was, you know, automate a response or or an assessment, things like that. Now I'm looking at it from a startup perspective. And that's also influencing how I imp how I approach my customers and the work that they're doing. Because, you know, in especially in a startup, you know, you have your minimum viable product, right? So You know, if we focus on what that that base level, that one nugget that has to happen, ⁓ you know, everything else is kind of ancillary. ⁓ so if you look at it from that base-based level perspective, it it does change your your viewpoint on you know, that specific item. So I'm I'm looking at a lot more granularity to a certain extent while at the same time looking at that much longer term picture. Mm-hmm. And it's to me at least, and again, my wife and I have built our own working genius team map to understand what are we really where do we add the most value? Where do we contribute the most? And as you said, when you're doing this yourself, you're t you describe there these high altitude things and these very low altitude things. So yeah, I would be really curious to see how you landed and what you're what you're best equipped to do and what would be the first things that you might want to outsource or find someone else that can contribute. Yeah. And in the case of the of the startup, ⁓ the very first thing I had to outsource was development. Because even though my background is technology, I'm not a developer and and there's only enough vibe coding and you know clawed coding and stuff that you can do before it's just not workable from a commercial perspective. ⁓ so I recognized early on that if I'm gonna have a solid saleable product, I needed a real development team. ⁓ you know, and and that's been, you know, a significant investment. But that's what that specific business requires. Where on my operation side, I am a solopreneur. So I am very selective with who I engage with because that's how I measure, not measure, but limit my my overuse of myself. ⁓ so it different businesses require different assessments and perspectives. I think that's right. And the thing that I like about if you come down to the core the core thing we can all build on, it's people. So as much AI as there is, there are st business are businesses are still built around relationships between people. Even if you're a solopreneur, you're working with customers. If you're going to hire a VA, you're working with another person and having that understanding, we said it several times during this conversation, you've got to know your people. And whether that's who they are as a person and their family and the things they're going with. Well you brought this up, and and I think it it probably a lot of ⁓ your listeners may relate with this. If you have an aging parent and you're working. That's a difficult task. It's a difficult task to have young kids at home. But especially having gone through that recently, having a a parent who is aging puts an entirely different demand on you, especially if you're a founder and you're so many things depend on you. That's a big load. So that's that's an important aspect in our in our workforce today that I think is not talked about enough. Yeah. And as part of that startup. ⁓ I'm working with the Florida Neurodiversity Chamber of Commerce. ⁓ it is a Chamber of Commerce specific to neurodiverse adults, getting them jobs and helping them grow in in their careers. And one of the things that we're talking about is helping organizations be more responsive ⁓ and maybe have a little bit more compassion and empathy towards, you know, those specifically and you know, specific employees. But you're you're right, you know, there's sixty-three million Americans that are caring for a loved one in the US. 78% of those are experiencing burnout. And 27% are wishing for it all to end. You know, and and I keep telling people, take that as you may, right? Because it may be for you know somebody to come and take over or for, you know, mom to pass away, whatever that is, that that's a pretty sad number. But that burnout numb number of 78% is huge. And and I think That as leaders, if we can have a little bit more empathy, a little bit more flexibility with those employees, the employees will really excel. You know, they will step up to the challenge and not just take advantage of the situation. And that is built on a trust relationship. And I've seen it time and time again, Julio, that I've been the recipient of that grace that ⁓ I've had situations where my boss said, Take as much time as you need, knowing that that I was gonna be there for the long haul and do my very best. And of course there are times where we work more and times where we work less and they would ebb and flow. And that's not always the case. There are situations where you have to fill a production line and it shuts down if you don't have your people. But as much as possible, being able to empathize, extend grace, and be flexible is a great decision that a leader can make because it's funny, those especially maybe those of us who hadn't been through as many life experiences, don't recognize how difficult it really is. And then lay and are a little more rigid, a little more strict. And then when the tables turn and we go through something difficult, we realize, ⁓ wow, that's much harder than I thought it was. The why don't you just you realize like why didn't they just do something? Because there was more to it. than you first realized. And and I'll toss not it's not a metric, but it is the women who are overwhelmingly providing that care. So, you know, you already have a glass ceiling in in the workforce, you know, you have ⁓ you know, women stepping out to have children and that's being held against them. You know, so now they've got the additional additional burden of caring for a parent. So they're they are just slammed and we give, you know, these caregivers very little grace in many cases. And in my my background growing up in manufacturing, it the the the obstacles that are already in place in the trades, manufacturing, services based businesses for females is already s a hurdle they have to overcome. So to add that on top of it makes it even more challenging. And that trickles through to every area of life. And as we talked about with that burnout, it just it just compounds. And the more opportunities employers can have that flexibility, or it's really empathy and seeing other people as human beings, not as machines. That's what it all comes down to. Absolutely. So, Greg, where can our listeners find you? Yeah, the the best place to start really, because it's a practical way to start, would be to to take the leadership clarity scorecard. Leadership Clarity Scorecard dot com words, leadership clarity scorecard.com. And that will help them self-diagnose areas where they can take that first step of making an improvement. Or maybe things are great in their business and they they'll get an encouragement from it. Either way, and that'll put us in contact via email, and that's the best way to start. And you'll send us photos of your sheep when we ⁓ when we do that. If you would like those, we certainly have plenty of photos of our sheep. It's a it's a fun business. They're all ⁓ it's related to Jane Austen characters. Are you familiar with the author Jane Austen? Absolutely. Yeah, so our Rams are Mr. Darcy the sheep. We have Mr. Bingley, Mr. Knightley, we have Emma, we have Lizzie. So it's not ⁓ it's not your typical just raising some sheep to produce wool, although we do that. We my wife hand spins a yarn, but it's also a business around ⁓ helping people reconnect with the real world. And we try to share that experience we have at Pimberley Farm. That's what we call it. That's awesome. Well, that is our episode of From Stuck to Scaled. Today we explored the important topic of leadership and team ownership with Greg. And as we've learned, many leaders often find themselves feeling overwhelmed, even when they have capable team members ready to continue. Greg shared practical steps to better clarify roles and responsibilities with your team. Remember to list your recurring responsibilities and assess whether they energize you or drain your energy. Consider reassigning work not just to lighten your load, but to enhance value for the entire team. We hope you found the discussion useful and that you feel empowered to make thoughtful adjustments in your leadership approach. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and share with other business leaders who might benefit. Until next time, keep working towards clarity and ownership with your teams. Thank you so much, Greg. We'll see you all next time. Thank you, Julio. You've been listening to From Stuck to Scaled, Growth Strategies for Small and Mid-sized Businesses, produced by Opticution LLC. For more information tools and resources, check out our website, www.opticution.com slash podcast.