The Systems Paradox: Mike Handa on Sales Impact Beyond the CRM

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I really think it's the mental health aspect of it in all fairness, like how much stress it is causing when you're disorganized and how much friction it causes between people. Right? Because all these micro stresses just build up. You're looking for information, people keep asking you questions they shouldn't really be asking because that data should be available to them and it damages the relationships and it's just build up stress. So that's what it translates into. But when you can take all this out, you actually can build better relationships. And not only with colleagues, but you also have better sales conversations, right? Because you don't bring that negative energy into your sales calls.

Step into the world of success with your brand Amplified. The ultimate podcast designed to unravel the intricacies of thriving businesses. I'm your host Anika Jackson and I'm on a mission to uncover the stories, strategies and secrets that have propelled entrepreneurs and business leaders to success. I am thrilled to have Mike Handa on the show today. Mike, you have quite the background. You have been a multiple time business owner yourself and then you made the transition into helping business owners fix operational chaos, which we know is such a big issue for so many businesses when they're starting out. We have great ideas, right? We start getting the business going and then we end up okay, what's going on? Where are we leaking money, time, resources? So can you talk about that pivotal moment where you decided that this is where you wanted to focus your attention?

First of all, thank you so much for inviting me. It's lovely to be here. Aneka and I appreciate the kind introduction. Yes, I owned A number of businesses. And of course I went through this journey myself and I think after building my third business I realized that it can be done better from the start. Like you don't have to wait until you adapt to broken processes and just develop a coping mechanism, but actually you can build on solid foundations from the start. So I mainly work with established businesses or sort of like mid sized companies now, just because that's where the demand is really. Early stage businesses often try to figure it out themselves and learn the hard way, which is fine. But life doesn't have to be that stressful. Just look at me, I mean, I could get this hair back.

Oh, so fun. So you found in your third business that you could operationalize your own company better and then that turned into helping. Did people come to you and say, I see that you really understand how to do this or did you just see the opportunity that opened up to help other companies?

Well, in all fairness, I consulted a company a couple of years ago where they really had the processes now done and I saw how well machine is just outperforming anything I have ever seen before. So once I saw that I was like, wow, this is amazing. I never seen anything like it. And I wanted to share that with the world. I believe how very different it was compared to what I've patched together in the past. And that's where it all came from.

Wow, Amazing. Was there something that you saw in your early businesses, a breaking point perhaps that made you also think, there's better ways to do this than the way I'm doing this?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, one of the first things that you would notice is that you work very long hours. So like when you do 14 hour days, seven days a week, it's just not sustainable, you know, so something's got to give. And usually you don't notice because you're energetic, you're excited about your business, you're passionate about it, you think that's just like the way startups work, you have to do this, but that's not the reality. And actually when you're tired, you're massively underperforming and you make bad decisions. And that's where usually the breaking point happens. People make some mistakes and they start to realize, oh my God, like my world is crumbling. But you know, when you build on good processes, then actually that shouldn't happen. Life is not like that. It doesn't have to be that way.

So let's start with the basics. Explain revops to listeners who might not be there in their Own businesses. Yet why should people care? Because it is, you know, it's a buzzword. We have so many acronyms and things that people throw out into the business world. So what exactly is Rev Ops and why should people be paying attention to this from the beginning of their business?

Right, so money is not the objective of a business really. It's just a vehicle for personal freedom that we all want. Right. But money is the blood flow of the business. So without like having money coming in, you don't have a business and eventually you'll end up having to go back to work for somebody else, which is kind of defined the purpose of having the freedom. Right. So RevOps is essentially setting up the business processes in a way that support generating revenue without friction.

Yeah, and I think that can be difficult for many beginning business owners. You know, people run their business on maybe Google Suite. So you have Google Sheets and you have Google Docs and you have different folders for people to go into. You might have a whole bunch of different apps. Maybe you have a central file that has all the different logins for every app that you use. Some might not be ones that you need. There might be others that you haven't identified as being more important in your business. So is this something that you are helping organizations look at?

Sure. So I tend to cut down the tech stack to the bare minimum in all fairness, or use as few tools as you possibly can because the cost of distraction is immense. So like just switching between tabs, fighting with two factor authentication. And you all know how it is, right? Trying to log into system that won't let you in with the password that you actually have and stuff like that, and it all creates micro stresses. Right. And these things compound. So it's when you have minimal setup or one system that kind of does everything for you, sort of like an operational system for your business, then all of these distractions are reduced. Plus all your data is just in one place. And you can really use that data to optimize your business and optimize your revenue flows as well.

And at what point do businesses need to start thinking about this? From the very beginning or after they've gotten to a certain established point?

So retrospectively, I would probably start with that. If you have the means or if you have the resources, maybe you have funding or, you know, you have some capital, then I would build with this from the start. Because the house is only as strong as the foundations. Right. So once you start building on broken processes, and then you have to go back and set the foundations that's going to mean that you'll have to pull the brakes and kind of rebuild while operation slows down. And that's a very difficult step for many businesses to say, okay, we need to pull the brakes on this because. Because otherwise we're gonna crash.

And I mean, I mentioned some of the things that can happen when you have a lot of different systems and you mentioned trying to streamline to one system. You're, you know, you have some different certifications, obviously HubSpot, you have McKinsey Forward certification, ICF accredited as a coach. So my first question is, what are some of the hidden costs that you've seen of disorganized systems in organizations? What are companies maybe losing that they're not even realizing?

That's interesting. But I really think it's the mental health aspect of it, in all fairness, like how much stress it is causing when you're disorganized and how much friction it causes between people. Right. Because all these micro stresses just build up. You're looking for information, people keep asking you questions they shouldn't really be asking because that data should be away available to them and it damages the relationships and it's just build up stress. So that's what it translates into. But when you can take all this out, you actually can build better relationships and not only with colleagues, but you also have better sales conversations. Right. Because you don't bring that negative energy into your sales calls.

Wow. So we're not just talking about tech, we're also talking about mindset, we're talking about leadership, you know, and we're talking about cohesion in a company where you, instead of being stressed out about these little things that you were talking about, you actually have the time to be present and to connect with your employees or with your clients in a much different way.

Absolutely.

Yeah. I think that's something that we sometimes forget. In the equation is that mindset piece and how having a disorganized business that is full of disruption, you know, that mental health piece is one of the first to go.

Exactly. And ultimately I feel like you can only build long lasting business if you enjoy the process. Right. The process has to be enjoyable, otherwise you'll come to resent it over time or you'll end up on medication just to cope. And that's not sustainable in the long run. Right, yeah.

And having disjointed systems can also lead to having a lot of data in different places that you don't know what to do with. So can you talk to us a little bit about the concept of data hygiene because I know there are people who are very analytical who come in, they love the data, they love the operations, but there is a whole segment of business owners that come in because they have a creative idea and this is going to be a way for them to execute what they want to do and put it out to the world. But these things, they might sound boring in our minds, but they're actually really critical components. So what do you do to help people think about good data hygiene? What does that mean and how do we get to implementing.

This is a rather large topic, but good data hygiene consists of a lot of things. First of all, when we talk about outbound sales, right? Data hygiene is essential for inbox placement, right? Because if you send to wrong email addresses, potentially spam traps, then your email addresses get flagged and you won't be able to deliver your emails. And if you can't, if people don't see your emails, then that can never turn into a sale, right? So that's data hygiene in terms of acquiring sales data or potentially using sales data acquired from different sources. Right? Now once you have that data, it's obviously about tagging and compartmentalizing the data that you have in a way that you know what is being communicated to who and why, right? So that you don't send irrelevant emails. Essentially you don't spam people or the when your team grows, they know who is doing what, who is dealing with this person, this lead being followed up with, does somebody else need to take care of it, perhaps, etc. So it cascades, right? Especially as the team grows. And obviously you need more people to grow a business at one point you can't build a company on your own, right? No Fortune 500 company was built on one single person. It just doesn't happen.

Not every sale happens at the register. Before AT&T business Wireless, checking out customers on our mobile POS systems took too long. Basically a staring contest where everyone loses. It's crazy what people will say during an awkward silence. Now transactions are done before the silence takes hold. That means I can focus on the task at hand and make an extra sail or two. Sometimes I do miss the bonding time sometimes.

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No. You've worked with so many different types of organizations. Franchise networks, international associations, global agencies. Are there some patterns across these different types and categories of businesses when it comes to operational challenges?

Patterns about the challenges? Yes. I think with big organizations obviously it's like the information flows that is typically the challenge because well, information gets compartmentalized and only different only. But different departments see different information. Right. So it becomes a challenge is the company is growing into a monster. Right. And you have so much information and so much data who to give access to what and always waiting for accesses and requesting information. So it's just like the internal communications. Obviously it's becoming more and more challenging and that's why decision making processes are typically much longer with enterprise level clients. Right. Because there are many layers of approval and it's usually about the accesses of the data and the information of how these things connect. So yeah, that's why I personally I prefer working with like mid sized businesses. It's just more interesting for me and there is still more of a human touch. People know where things are and people can make decisions, they are more empowered rather than focusing on a smaller segment of the operation.

Mm, yeah. That human touch I think is still so important in business. It's the one thing tech can't take away from us.

No, absolutely. And in fact I believe tech should support it. So rather than outsourcing the human connection to the tech, it's actually the repetitive manual work that should be outsourced to tech really such as generating reports and analyzing data and kind of back office things really like AI or automations can do this very well. But the human connection should be left to humans because that's what we thrive on and that's what, you know, energizes most of us at least.

Fantastic. You mentioned when we jumped on that you work east coast hours now. I'm on the west coast of the United States. You are in Prague. How do you choose which clients you want to work with?

Typically it's based on the mindset of the client. You know, I help ambitious companies that want to grow and want to move their business to the next level. Perhaps they hiring salespeople. They need to build a sales team of like five, ten people. Right. So they need sales enablement and that's the right intersection where I would come in. And those are the clients I'M most happy working with, really, because it's not something you can force upon people really or convince people that you need this. They have to be at the level where they understand themselves that this is something that is actually going to benefit them and we are ready to invest in it.

Yeah, and that's such a good point because we are talking about digital tools. You also talked about mindset and teams and alignment. So how do we as leaders in organizations lead digital transformation, but without losing the human side of our businesses? Right. Keeping people, how do we continue keeping people engaged? We're not overwhelming them and we're not losing them in the tech chaos. And this change management, I really love.

That question that actually cuts to the heart of it, what you just asked there. So, first of all, one thing that you need to acknowledge when you go through a digital transformation, there is a performance dip, right? So there is an, call it an adoption curve where people move from their old way of doing things to a new way of doing things. And that typically results in a performance drop because it takes time for people to learn and adopt to new systems. Get used to it is just an inevitable effect. So it's very important to know this because this can cause internal frustrations. People are afraid, oh, I'm not doing as good as before, what is my manager going to say, etc. So this kind of, it can cause internal friction. But once they're aware of it and everybody knows that this is going to happen, that kind of tension just evaporates. So it's not there anymore. We accepted that this is going to happen. It's fine, everybody's aware. So then the next stage is how can you cut the adoption curve? How can you shorten that? And I have three tips for this. One is to involve your team in the decisions and in the implementation process. So ask questions like, how do you do this? What would help you the most? What part of your work would you like to automate? What can we maybe put in a copilot for you that you still manage, but it can help you do it more efficiently, et cetera. And when people are involved in these decisions, they're far more likely to like working with the new system because they feel like, oh, my input has been taken on board, actually they are doing this to help me. So they're more invested in actually using the system if they feel like their feedback has been implemented. So that would be one. The other is obviously having training in place to make sure that they get the support in the beginning that they need. They Have a person they can ask questions from, and there is time and resources or allocated to the training and the support. And the third is really just monitoring the new system, keeping an eye on how things are going, and tweaks can always be made. So it's like, okay, this is not quite how we wanted it. So then you can still make improvements to make sure it's fully supporting how people actually work, rather than shoehorning them into a system so that people have to work around the system, not the other way around.

Yeah, and I do think that's where a lot of businesses fall flat, is they do try to pick something and shoehorn everybody into it, rather than take the time, like you're saying, to bring people along to make sure that they feel included, that they're part of the conversation, that these workflows will support what they're doing and help them achieve even better results for the company and for themselves.

Exactly. And ultimately, again, now we go back to the rev op side a little bit. It needs to support the revenue goals of the company. So we need to see how these processes tie in with the revenue generation. And that happens by looking at the customer journey end to end, to see how the customers go from the first touch point to conversion and beyond, even like customer support, retention, advocacy, etc. So you really need to look at the entire life cycle of the customer, if you will, and design the systems that support people to support the customers.

Fantastic. I'd love to hear if there is a large transformation that you played a role in a company that, you know, was in chaos, what it looked like on the other side, what kind of results they were able to garner after getting your assistance with everything from their tech to their mindset.

So I can't name the name because of NDAs, but we have one very, very large client who is generating over $3 billion in revenue. And they managed everything in Excel before. And it was incredible for me to go into a company of this and seeing that everything is just in like many Excel sheets. I couldn't comprehend, like, how can a company get to this size and this much revenue with using just Excel sheets? Somehow they managed. Did they enjoy the process? I can tell you they did not. So it wasn't fun. They did it. They, you know, toughed it out. But could it have been a better, less stressful process? Yeah, they. They admit it could have been. So that was a huge surprise for me.

That's incredible. And once they went through the process, even with the heartache of changing from the way we've always done things to the new system. Were they able to achieve, I mean, that's already a huge number, but were they even able to see even better results or Greater efficienc to 30% growth?

Wow. And on their numbers, that's no small deal. It's just like having all your data in one place and being able to manage the sales processes efficiently. Like you simply just, you can do more in less time and you have better sales conversations because you have access to all the data that you need that you don't have to search. Plus, you know, things don't get forgotten because you can automate task generations based on priority things like that. So it was really big differentiator and they're very, very grateful.

Oh my gosh. There may be some out there, but I don't know who would not want to see 30% growth from just streamlining and making your processes more efficient.

Not every sale happens at the register. Before AT&T business Wireless, checking out customers on our mobile POS systems took too long. Basically a staring contest where everyone loses. It's crazy what people say during an awkward silence. Now transactions are done before the silence takes hold. That means I can focus on the task at hand and make an extra sale or two. Sometimes I do miss the bonding time sometimes. Sometimes.

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I mean, it's just a no brainer. And honestly, like whether you like money or not, that honestly it doesn't matter to me. But I'm sure nobody likes stress and no person in their right mind want to go home like, you know, fried. At the end of the day you want to go home like, okay, this was actually a productive day. I got so much done, I, you know, I closed some deals. You want to go home with that energy, right? And to me personally, that's what it comes down to. I mean again, money is good and it's a vehicle to have in the personal freedom. But you got to enjoy the process.

Amazing. So for somebody who is thinking, I recognize myself in this, I'm experiencing operational chaos and they're overwhelmed. Where should they start? What's step one on their journey to controlling the chaos?

The best thing you can start with, look at what is your most profitable product and service and not the one that's bringing in the most revenue necessary, but what is your most profitable product and service that you can deliver well and look at how you have been selling it. Just look at the process of it and look at how can you make changes in your business to support doing More of that, if you can identify that it will already make a big difference in your business. Because I don't think I need to explain.

You work a lot with HubSpot. Do you think that no matter what size of business that they are a strong solution whether you're a micro business just starting out or a large organization?

Look, there are a lot of different CRM systems and some are good, some are not so good. Obviously there are enterprise level CRM Systems as well. HubSpot I find is the most scalable one. Really. You can start out with HubSpot for free. Obviously the free stack is pretty limited. And then you can upgrade to the starter, which is very, very affordable. It's still kind of limited, but when you go with a HubSpot Pro, honestly it might sound a bit expensive for some people because it's like I think $180 a month, something like that. With all the other, they have a stack of different tools, but it adds up to about $180 a month. But honestly it replaces all your scheduling tools, all your email marketing tools or your landing page builders and your CRM and, and the form builders. You don't need like 10, 20 different tools. You have one. And all the data that comes in through these different modules like the email marketing module in HubSpot or the forms, the pop ups, et cetera and your sales pipeline, everything is just in one place. Right. So it's way more manageable. So for that reason I would definitely not recommend like, you know, maybe choosing a cheaper CRM and many other tools on top of that that doesn't connect. It's better to just have one tool and one subscription and then you don't have the subscription nightmare either with the bills at different days and you know, many small payments and having to put all that into your accounting and whatever, it becomes a nightmare.

Yeah, and I'm just, my wheels are spinning about how many subscriptions I have, which ones I need or don't need. As we're having this conversation, if you could go back and offer yourself a piece of advice for when that very first business that you started when you were starting your entrepreneurship journey, what would that piece of advice be?

I think don't start alone. I tried to start a business by myself and it was a pretty ambitious venture back in 2006 actually. So it was a long time ago and it was an online business as well and I really tried to make it by myself. So I feel like if you starting to build something big like find a co founder, somebody whose skills ideally complement yours. So that maybe you're a technical person, you need somebody who's good at sales. Right. Or vice versa. You're more like a promoter type person. Then you need the technical person who can take care of things for you. So if you find a co founder who's aligned with your vision and your ideas and ambition, you can really go much further together than whatever you try to do by yourself. Because after a while it just becomes a lot, especially when you start seeing some success like managing sales, operations, delivery and personal life and everything else is just. It's a lot for one person. So I definitely wouldn't recommend that. But it's better to kind of share the load and it will take you further as well.

Is there anything that we haven't covered about Revops and the work that you love doing that so many of us might find a little more, you know, the thing that we keep putting off until it's too late? Is there something we haven't covered?

Maybe one thing that I'd like to add when you said things that we like to put off until it's too late. So most businesses, they really get caught up in just running the business and things are going. So you focus on being functional and when you have a problem, you put a band aid on it just to stay functional. Or you use a bit of duct tape here, a bit of duct tape there, just to keep the whole thing together. Sometimes and maybe during holidays, etc. It's good to take a step back and just go deeper. So you don't just duct tape these things together, but you look at what is the underlying issue, like what is the deeper problem that are causing the surface level issues that you can kind of duct tape just to go deeper into that and sit with that question. And when you uncover those, you can really address the root causes, the core issues, and that will help you to fix those and ultimately run things better on a day to day basis and have less surface level issues come up.

Yeah, fantastic. I really appreciate your advice because this is something that needs to be top of mind that so many people. I mean, I remember when I started a new business a few years ago and it was very organic and I didn't have any of this. And then I went back later and created SOPs and workflows and systems. Right. I had to learn, oh, this is not the way that you start the business. Because then you don't know. Are you overpaying your employees? Do you have too much staff? Are you charging clients right amount all of these things that can really destroy your business. And like you said, your own mental health, your own belief in yourself as a business strategist. So I really appreciate you Mike being here today. We will link your website, but I always ask one last question. Do you have a favorite quote, mantra, verse, poem, motto?

I have a controversial one for you, if I may. Yes, it's from Mike Tyson, but it applies to business. So everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face. And I like this quote because business is really like that, that people have a plan and then reality hits. So that's kind of like a punch in face and that's where plans meet reality and then you'll experience some friction. So I, I really like this quotes because I this quote because I experienced it. I know other people experiences it too. And it's just an interesting process how you go through that.

I love that. And I, I don't think I've heard truer words that apply to business. So thank you very much. And to everybody who's listening, we will of course have Mike's information in the show notes so that you can learn more about how you can solidify your revops. And again, as Mike said, it's not just to make the money. The money is the byproduct. Obviously you have to have revenue, positive net revenue, hopefully. But it is the way to help your whole team feel really good about the work that you're doing. It's to help you feel really strong about the way you're moving forward in the world and something that has to be part of the conversation from the beginning of your organizations, not something you leave behind until it's too late. So with that, I hope that you're inspired by this and don't look at it as, you know, doom and gloom. Let's all do better. Let's figure out how to operationalize our systems and processes, how to get out of the the having 10 different apps that do different things and how to fend better, better systems. Well, until our next episode, I will leave you with that again. We'll have Mike's information in the show notes and thank you for listening or watching this episode. Thanks for listening or watching to this episode of youf Brand Amplified. Don't forget to leave us a rating or review on your favorite favorite podcast listening platform. And if you want to learn more, check us out@yourbrandamplified.com.