Episode 150: The Bottom Line - Out Of Bounds

So the big question is this: how do small business owners like us grow our leadership, develop our teams, and scale our business in a way that allows us to get our products and services out to the world yet still remain profitable?

That is the question, and this podcast will give you the answers.

I'm Bradley Hamner, and this is the Club Capital Leadership Podcast.

Welcome to The Bottom Line, a new weekly podcast series that we drop every Thursday to complement our weekly Monday podcast interviews with the industry leaders. These podcasts are going to be designed to give you short, impactful, and value-driven information that you can start using right away in your business. I value your time and attention and will do my very best not to waste it. Just get what you need and go. So with that, let's get into today's episode.

Are you an agency owner looking to grow your revenue, increase your bottom line, and better manage your taxes? Club Capital is here to help. Club Capital is the largest accounting and advisory firm for insurance agents in the country, providing monthly accounting, tax strategy, and CFO services. Way more than bookkeeping and your everyday run-of-the-mill tax prep, Club Capital is focused on providing financial and tax advisory services that help you plan and forecast your agency's performance. Their financial dashboards and agency forecasting tools help you better understand your agency's historical performance, create, measure future targets, and see how your agency compares to your peers around the country. Imagine what it would be like to understand the impact to your bottom line when deciding to hire a new employee, or forecast the impact rate changes or commission rates will have on your business. With over $200 million in tracked annual revenue and $140 million in tracked annual expenses, Club Capital has the data and the team to help you make better informed decisions for your agency. They will help you turn that back office stress into the backbone of your agency's success by giving you the tools to take your agency and your leadership to the next level. Visit club.capital today to book a solution overview with one of our business consultants. Club Capital, way more than a CPA firm. Are you an agency owner looking to grow your revenue, increase your bottom line, and better manage your taxes? Club Capital is here to help. Club Capital is the largest accounting and advisory firm for insurance agents in the country, providing monthly accounting, tax strategy, and CFO services. Way more than bookkeeping and your everyday run-of-the-mill tax prep, Club Capital is focused on providing financial and tax advisory services that help you plan and forecast your agency's performance. Their financial dashboards and agency forecasting tools help you better understand your agency's historical performance, create and measure future targets, and see how your agency compares to your peers around the country. Imagine what it would be like to understand the impact to your bottom line when deciding to hire a new employee. Or forecast the impact rate changes or commission rates will have on your business. With over $200 million in tracked annual revenue and $140 million in tracked annual expenses, Club Capital has the data and the team to help you make better-informed decisions for your agency. They will help you turn that back-office stress into the backbone of your agency's success by giving you the tools to take your agency and your leadership to the next level. Visit club.capital today to book a solution overview with one of our business consultants. Club capital way more than a CPA firm.

So many of you know how much I love to play golf, and I don't get to play nearly as much as I once did. If I'm lucky, if I get to play once a week at this point. But I want to share with you one of the biggest lessons that my— one of my early instructors told me. And I was having a conversation with a fellow business owner the other day And as he was talking, it made me—

we were—

he was using golf as an analogy. And I said, you've given me inspiration. His name's Dave. He'll listen to this episode. And so he'll remember. He gave me inspiration, made me think about a really early lesson that helped me so much when I was playing golf in college. And it was around course management. And so when I was growing up, there was just a small country club, Florence Country Club. It's unfortunately closed now, and, uh, in Florence, Alabama, where I grew up, and there was just a tremendous junior program there. And the head pro at the time is— was Chris Burns. Chris Burns had taught so many junior golfers, it really was incredible. I think there was at one time like a 3 or 4 year span where there was maybe, you know, I, I believe it was somewhere around 30 junior golfers played college golf that came through as members there. Several of them went on to play Division I golf at LSU, Mississippi State. A lot of people, people stayed home, played golf at UNA, University of North Alabama, and then several played, uh, JUCO and several other places. Anyway, the junior golf club championship was really more competitive than the men's club championship at the time. Well, Chris Burns was the head pro, and he taught Stewart Cink. So many of you know, if you're a golfer, Stewart won, uh, the British Open, famously, um, competing against Tom Watson, and has had a long career on the PGA Tour. Just a great guy from Florence, Alabama. I've been around him a few times, just, just incredibly nice, and has obviously done fairly well playing in the game of golf. Well, Chris really tutored him, especially until he got to college, and Chris just had a tremendous impact on a lot of people. And one of the things that Chris would do is we would be on the first tee about to go play, and he would come up there and grab our bags and take all of our clubs out except for sometimes He'd leave 2 in there, sometimes he'd leave 4, sometimes he'd leave, you know, just a putter and a wedge and make us go play 9 holes with that. And he was just teaching us so many lessons in doing that. And so if some of you have, you know, aspiring junior golfers or even yourself, that's a great way to just get creative. And he was not big on all the technology. He was really much more on learning how to play the game. And find your way around the course. And that leads me to kind of really what the message for today is. One of the best lessons that I got from Chris is he would walk with us occasionally, or he'd ride a cart. Of course, we were walking. And he would come up and he would ask us, Bradley, what do you see? And I would say something to the effect— number 3 was a par 5 at Florence Country Club. There was water, um, on one side and then trees on the other, or then there are another hole there would be out of bounds. And he would say, what do you say? And I'd say, well, I don't want to hit it there, and I don't want to hit it there. And so he would say, where do you want to hit it? And I would say, I want to hit it in the fairway. What kind of shot shape are you going to hit? Are you going to hit the ball left to right? You're going to hit it right to left? And at that time, I was not thinking in that way at all. I just wanted to hit the ball in the fairway, but I was so focused on where I did not want the ball to go. Well, fast forward, there is the club that I'm a member at now, The Ledges. The second hole is the hardest hole in the golf course, and there's out-of-bounds left and there's out-of-bounds right. And it's just a— and it's a difficult green complex. And I know some of you are not golfers, but just hang with me for a second. And it's a difficult hole and it's always given me trouble. And every time I would step up on that, uh, for that tee shot, I would think about all the times that I've hit, you know, hit the ball right or, you know, not trying to hit it left and all just, just some really tough, um, times. And it got to me. It became my nemesis hole, especially in tournament golf. I just wouldn't play well. And so fast forward and there's a Pro at The Ledges now, Craig Bocking, uh, great head professional. Um, I have had my other swing instructors help me before. Mark Blackburn, PGA Teacher of the Year, has been on this podcast about a year ago. If you haven't listened to that, if you're a golfer, go back and listen to Mark. So we talk about golf on there, but also leadership and coaching quite a bit in that episode. But Craig reminded me about where do I want to hit the ball. Because every time I would step on that hole, I would think, I don't want to hit it there, and I don't want to hit it in the bunker, and I don't want to do this. And I was just so focused on what I don't want to happen, as opposed to getting very laser-focused on where I want the ball to go and how I want to get it there. And when I began to really internalize, not just have the knowledge but actual understanding of what I wanted the ball to do and where I wanted it to go, I started playing that hole so much better. And that hopefully is the application for you in your business. So often it's not about sticking our head or, you know, in the sand and being a flamingo and thinking, oh, I don't have any problems and I'm going to try to tell myself a story. Although a lot of times as humans we can be pretty good at self-deception, right? I think that it's It's so important. It's been helpful for me to think about, be very honest with where I am today. And that comes from a place of humility, not from a place of guilt or shame, but just a place of humility to take an honest assessment about where the business is, both good and bad. But a lot of times it's so easy for me to get focused on all the things that are not where I want them to be. I don't want to go down this path. What happens if revenue does this? What happens if sales do that? What happens if this doesn't work? And I can get so fixated on all the things I don't want to have happen compared to, oh, what do I want to have happen? Where do I want the ball to end up and how am I going to get it there? Am I going to hit a cut or am I going to hit a draw in the business? Where do I want to go? There's an episode that I mentioned, um, or I did last week, a solo episode where I talked about 350 pounds. And I said at the very end, I said, where, where are you today? Where have you been? And where do you want to go? And all three of those are very critical. And so today's a little bit of continuation of that is where do you want to take your business? And can I focus on where I want the business to go? Not— there's an acknowledgement of there's out of bounds, right?

Sure.

Okay. I can acknowledge them and I'm not being delusional to say that, uh, to not see it, but that's not what I'm focused on. And I think hopefully that has been helpful to me to stay focused on what I want to have happen, not wallowing in where the business is today. I hope that serves you. I know that was a golf-heavy podcast, probably, um, you know, hopefully some of you related to that, and some of you who are not golfers or sports people can still get the idea. Am I staying focused on where I want the business to go? And have you been able to take the time to really articulate that? So if I had the opportunity to speak to every one of you and I were to ask you that question and say Where do you want to be a year from today? Can't— what would your answer be? So when you stop this podcast and think about what would my answer be, how would I be able to articulate this is exactly where I want things to be, these are my financial results, these are my sales results, because generalizations will kill clarity. Generalizations will kill clarity. It's important to be able to be specific about where you want the ball to go and where you want your business to go. Hope this served you. Hope you've got a good return on your investment and your time and your attention. So grateful for all of you. Till next episode, lead well. Podcast. I know you're someone who has a growth mindset and you probably want to be able to grow your book of business as well. What DirectClick specializes in helping insurance agencies leverage Google Ads and SEO to drive inbound phone calls. Leads, online visibility, and even organic traffic. You can be confident in knowing exactly how well your ads are working and getting support in what really matters in your business. Get exclusive online marketing support today when you visit directclicksinc.com. You know how important it is to develop yourself and to develop your team. Well, if you're going to do that, you want to do it with the best. Work with Coach P Consulting to learn and implement the same strategies that he used to sell over 700 life policies in 2021 alone. You'll get personalized coaching 2 times a week and an in-depth look at how his office is run, and Coach Peen will train your team alongside his own. Get your first month free when you mention the Club Capital Leadership Podcast during signup. Visit coachpeenconsulting.com to get started. If you've listened to this podcast for any amount of time, you've heard me say many times the best use of money is to be able to buy back your time, and one of the best ways to to do that is by hiring a virtual assistant. Whether it's an executive assistant or creative marketing assistant, Rock Solid has a unique hiring process to net the very best talent, and they intentionally match you with a great fit for you and your team. They value your success as if it were their own, because it is. If you're looking to build a rock solid team for your business, reach out to Tracy and her team at rocksolidassistants.com.