Latest / Unfinished Business / In the Middle of Mastery Best of Season 4 | Rory Sheppard
Transcript
- Rory Sheppard: so many of us we started a business With a dream with a set of goals that, you know, this business was gonna give us a lifestyle or a chance to live the way we wanted. And three years, five years, nine years in, it's not that way, right? there is so many opportunities to to regain those those hopes and dreams that we had when we started. Kimberly Griggs: When people hear the word operations, you know, like I do, I usually think of systems, SOPs and software, right? But you've you've led operations for big companies, H E B, Whataburger. how do you define operations, this great big pillar? Rory Sheppard: absolutely the components you you laid out, right? Systems, process, programs, Those kind of things have to be there. But what you want operationally is consistent, predictable, reliable results. So many people want to deliver a wow level of service, right? To, you know, knock the customer socks off. they do it one time, but they can't do it every time. I would much rather get, B minus service on a consistent level because then I know what I'm getting with the expectation that's going to improve from there. Kimberly Griggs: So as the businesses grow and there's many decisions that still flow through one person, even if they are growing and adding lots of team members, they're still, you know, the person with all the knowledge. why does that tend to happen? Rory Sheppard: So the first easy one is it's a control issue, I have trouble as the owner yielding control or I want to make sure that it's done my way or exactly the right way every time. another would be that I I've got the S on my chest, I can answer that question. And I can tell you that, superhero kind of syndrome you know, the control and then I've got the answers, right? Is the is the thing that's that hamstrings us. And when you ask somebody, why don't you delegate that work? You got a team, why don't you give it to them? an answer that always comes out is it would take me more time to explain how to do it to somebody else than to just do it myself. Kimberly Griggs: Yeah, tha that's exactly what I would have said. Rory Sheppard: Right, right, right. And and you're right. It will. The first time, the third time, the fifth time, right? I mean, but somewhere along the line, if they can do it at 70 or 80 percent as good or as efficient as you could, how much time did that just give you back? But the only way you'll know whether you can get to that spot is to explain it that first time. Andy Stanley, his line is as the business owner, as the leader, right, You should only do those things that only you can do. And so there are root decisions, if I make this decision and make it wrong, it will kill the whole business. it's at the root level. There's another level of decisions that's at the trunk level. Right. So it could be pretty devastating to make the wrong decision. then there's branch level decisions and leaf level decisions that we as the owner try to make all the time. a leaf level decision. So if you lost a leaf on your tree, is the tree gonna die? are you even gonna know that that decision was made and made wrong? No. so Just going through and classifying decisions and those things that I need to be in control of. As the owner, absolutely I need to be in control of root level decisions. I need to at least be in the conversation in every trunk level decision that's made. but branches and leaves. I mean, how much time do I really need to spend there? where you need to move is from the bottleneck to air traffic control. air traffic controllers, Their job is to make sure that airplanes take off and land and navigate between takeoff and landing efficiently and effectively without crashing, right? But I am not concerned about getting the plane loaded or backed away from the gate. My role is to make sure, that I keep the plane in the air safely, land safely, and then go on to the next one. So as the business owner, again, back to those things that are your responsibility, it's to make sure that operationally the plane can stay in the air, one of the things Kimberly Griggs: Thanks Rory Sheppard: that we always talk about was if you don't tell every dollar where it's supposed to go, it will go somewhere that you may not want it to go. that one probably sneaks up on a lot of people pretty quickly is that I was diligent when I was living hand to mouth, right? And now that it's a little bit better, I relax a little bit and I probably need to be more diligent or as diligent then as I was when I started. I worked for billion dollar companies and we were just as, maniacal about where every penny was going in those companies as that first year entrepreneur was. because that's how you make money, you tell every dollar where it needs to go. whether that's into the profit account or the savings account that account that I'm building up to pay my tax payment. Wherever that needs to be, I'm telling every dollar where it needs to go. financial clarity gives you confidence and reduces stress. if I am worried about, I don't know if I'm going to make payroll, but I don't want to go look, there's no way I'm as present for my team or for my customers or for my family when I get home. there's all the downside when I don't have financial clarity and only upside when I do. Kimberly Griggs: you've been a part of many leadership teams, so you've seen it done really well and you've seen it done not so well and maybe even poorly. But what are three words that describe, someone who is is a very influential leader? Rory Sheppard: I think about some of the the best leaders that I've had. and think about the things that are the most consistent across them. And not just to cop out and go back to some of the words that we've already used, but there's an extremely high level of competence, they know kidding know the business. that would be one. two, there's pretty consistently there is a deep, genuine interest in the people that work for them. one of my favorite stories is we had a leader very highly technically skilled, but got feedback that he did not engage with his team, didn't have conversations, didn't know his team. and one of the coaching things that he was given was you just need to pick a day where you walk around and talk to the team, engage with them, ask them about How their weekend was or what they got planned for the next weekend, but you need to engage with them in something other than work conversations. he took the advice, but he did not engage, right? so he'd walk around on Monday mornings, and he would go to everybody's office and say, Hey Kimberly, how was your weekend? And not pay attention at all to your response, there was no connection or relationship that was being built. He was going through a a rote practice that somebody had given him to say, This is what you need to do to get better. What do you think he did? He got worse, Significantly worse because the team was like, This is crazy. We we can tell him anything. And he Doesn't flinch, doesn't correct us, I'm overblowing the story a little bit, but I mean it was almost to that degree, so competence would be one or just kind of knowledge about the business, deep emotional caring about the team would be another. And then a third would be And it may be the most important is a a very high sense of humility. it's not all about me. It's not all about how I look, but it's how we perform as as a team. kind of back to some of the the competence thing of not saying I know everything or not acting like I know everything because I think I'm the boss and I have to fill that spot. being humble, owning my mistakes, being transparent. But very deep sense of humility. And so if I were gonna give you three words, it would be those. People support what they help create. if I come into a meeting and say, here's the problem. I think the solution should be this. What do you guys think? And then shoot down every one of your ideas. Well, we didn't do any good, right? and you as the team go, well, if we don't choose his idea, then we're not going to do it anyway. Right? so many times we get better solutions when everybody pitches in, adds onto it, has an and kind of mindset of love that idea and we should add this to it and we should add that to it. There's a four letter word, one's called vote and one's called veto, right? It's the same four letters. Everybody on the team gets a vote. The boss always has to have the veto, right? And so there will be times when not the right decision. That's not the direction we're going. even still, when I do that, if you got to vote and participate and contribute to the idea, more often than not, you're going to buy in if you got to build it. Now we can't have that kind of conversation if the house is on fire, right? I mean, we can't have a committee meeting out front to talk about what's the right approach to put the fire out. I need to be more directive. so many of the problems, and where conflict really happens, it's not about those immediate decisions. It's about slow turns of direction or a new idea that you didn't even consider what I was offering. And then I get resentful. I didn't feel like you listened to me last time. so, yeah, right. Or I come in, bowed up already, right? I'm already Kimberly Griggs: Right, so why should I apathy, know, kind of going over to that continuum. Rory Sheppard: mad and angry and, or I'm apathetic. And then we don't get the best solution. Kimberly Griggs: I'm going to pivot and ask a real hard question. different when we can have this conversation face to face. Because like you said, 90 % of all communication is nonverbal. So what changes in everything that we've talked about in a remote first environment? Rory Sheppard: a lot changes, right? But I think the core tenants are the same. I may need to move a little bit slower. especially if we're permanently remote, I've got clients that have, offices in three locations, they get together once a year, right? I mean, so they're in a permanent remote kind of environment. then it's I have got to have non-business business conversations, right? need to spend more time with you, understanding who you are, what's important to you, things about your family. Because all four of those trust domains get fractured if we're only doing transactional stuff remotely and there's no human interaction. And so I think you've got to go a little bit slower, invest more time in them. and have meetings that are about them, what's going on in their lives, those kinds of things. it's not a business topic. So one-on-ones have to change in that remote environment because. When we're all in the office, there's so many opportunities to interact I can get the personality and I can understand your humor and those kinds of things. That if we're all business via Zoom or email or Slack, I don't get any of that. Then the super sarcastic kind of zinger that you put in the slack message, I mean, comes off completely wrong if we don't have a relationship. the pace of change in the tool sets is far outrunning what we can do from strategy planning, analysis, any of that on our own. Kimberly Griggs: Just comprehension. Rory Sheppard: I mean, a year and a half ago, even a year ago, we were talking about how to get more intelligent in the way we wrote our prompts for AI. going back to what are those major releases from the big players, it's all around agentic AI. How do I start having agents do the work for me? How do I delegate full bodies of work and say, do this, then that, then this, then that, and so I think we also have to make a shift all of us, but especially in the service space, we need to get better at not doing the work, but leading, guiding, directing the work. and it's a little bit of the shift that we've talked about over the last couple of sessions on how do I move from being the doer to being the leader. But now I've got to do it with a set of chat bots or AI agents that I'm doing the delegation to. I'm gonna go back to Ken Blanchard's teaching on situational leadership. I'm gonna start with being very much a micromanager on what I'm delegating to that agent and I'm checking their work all the time. Right. it should be my unique knowledge and expertise, not The generic off the internet experience. Kimberly Griggs: Right. let's talk a little bit about what that transition looks like. if that's something that everyone should be practicing theoretically, but especially professional services, what skills do do these providers need to be developing now? And, you know, how do we move higher up the chain rather than, you know, just competing on the production? Rory Sheppard: Yeah. I think that ship has sailed, right? I mean AI can do the production. Kimberly Griggs: Yeah. Rory Sheppard: Right? It's the the knowledge, the skills, the experience of the leaders that are saying, I know they asked for this, but we need to deliver that, right? I mean, I'm reframing the problem. And the solution, because of my knowledge and experience. And so, I cannot tell you how important it is to check the work. So, we have to be way better at proofreading and checking the work of AI than ever before, how bad would it be, in especially from a professional services point of view, to provide a client with a proposal or a body of work that had something in it didn't make sense? Kimberly Griggs: Well, and you know, to to that point too, I think language and being able to communicate your expertise, part of the way that you showcase that is by being able to simplify. So, you Rory Sheppard: Mm-hmm. Kimberly Griggs: know, that that has happened to me with a couple of clients. And just as a provider working with small businesses and getting to know that business, you start to understand terminology and and verbiage that humans would really use to communicate that versus you know a machine Rory Sheppard: Yeah, and I It may just be me, but I mean, I can say fourth grade language, completely understandable, use my voice, don't use those words, right? I mean, that's crazy pretentious and I hate that. Don't do that and it's good and remembers, you know, for one or two or three tries, right? But then I'm back to twelfth grade language and stuff I wouldn't I mean, would never come out of my mouth. Right. I mean I'm like Kimberly Griggs: Yes. Rory Sheppard: I don't talk that way. Kimberly Griggs: kind of going back to the micromanagement piece. No matter how you're implementing this, I want you to remind us of that model. I think this is actually a critical skill for all of us in learning how to go from doer to to director. Rory Sheppard: So the the model is from Ken Blanchard. It's called Situational Leadership. the four kind of stages or phases of it are stage one is they don't have any knowledge, skills, experience in the space. And so I am micromanaging them So it's I'm giving you the how to do it. I'm giving you the outcomes I expect. I'm checking on you, looking over your shoulder all the time, because you don't know what to do. And so if I just gave you the work and said, go do this, you're gonna be super frustrated. so I'm gonna manage you through that process. The next step is I'm not managing anymore. I'm collaborating with you. And so then I'm sitting beside you as the leader, right? Shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip, we're working on this together, right? I'm still sharing wisdom, knowledge, experience, but maybe you've got hands-on keyboard, you're doing more of it, but it's in collaboration. Third step is coaching. then I'm on the sidelines watching, but giving you feedback, going, don't use those words, right? I mean, that's not my language, right? Back that off, change that, try again, right? And then finally it's into support, right? So you've got the skills, you've got the knowledge, you know how to do it. I'm here when you hit a a bump in the road or something that you did not expect to occur. that's the process. if I'm managing a an agent in AI, whether I'm using co-work with Claude or I'm using Codex with Chat GPT. I'm doing that process and it's probably taking me longer than if I had written it myself. so that's back to the I don't delegate because it's faster for me to do it myself. I think the same thing is true in this space for AI. The first few times that I'm doing pure management kind of delegation down to that agent in AI, it's gonna take me a little bit longer But if I teach the skill right and I I'm setting up projects or I'm creating skills in Claude where it's learning that and knowing what to do time after time after time. It gets better and faster as we go. but I still need to check,