https://www.listennotes.com/e/29096f90b6574be2b5a5efbf8bfe9af0

Foreign.

Welcome to Executing the Vision podcast. I'm your host Brad Hunter, president of Emerge Labs. On the podcast we'll get to know the person behind the vision, their successes, their challenges and their plans for the future. If you're interested in becoming a guest or know someone who might be a good fit, stick around to the end and we'll discuss how to apply. Now enjoy the show. We have another episode of Execute the Vision. I am your host Brad Hunter and today I've got can Cam Martinez with Kensho Craft. Yeah and yeah I guess just you start off, tell me a little bit about yourself and what you do.

Yeah, so I, my, my wife and I co own and operate a fractional services and executive advisory firm called Kensho Craft. Which is essentially a fancy way of saying that we help businesses create fun, happy, healthy, high performance cultures that focuses on the overall experience of their business, so to speak. I for the last going on eight years have practiced as a fractional coo, fractional cmo, fractional chief of staff. All these labels didn't exist back when I was doing it in the early days. So I'm, I'm still working on describing what it is that I do done in the past. So I use all that knowledge and experience and expertise to actually go into businesses and kind of look under the hood and the way I would describe it is throw everything up on the wall and see where there's inefficiencies or things that could be adjusted or made more effective and then put it all back together so that the business runs on its on its own with the priority being profitability, peace and ease in their business.

Then you and your wife do this together. What's her role?

Yeah, she at the moment is more in the background of our business and the operation of, of what we do for our clients. So the way I would describe it is she's like Donna from Suits. She, she fills all the holes where I might either overlook them, miss them. She's kind of just my, my right hand so to speak. But eventually she'll move into more of a client facing role when she feels more comfortable and feels like she can provide the same type of service that, that I have been doing for a.

While in many ask how's, how's the dynamic with working with your wife so closely on stuff like that. Magical days days were at each other's throat. I would assume a little mix of.

All her and I work really well together. I hear it often where, where people who've either had experience working with their partner or Imagine what it would be like. See it as sort of how you described it, something that would be a little bit overlapping in the private or the personal and business arena, where it can be kind of where communication can fall through or bring our personal stuff into the business or vice versa. It doesn't happen. We're pretty good about keeping them separated and we spend all day together. So it kind of our business is a, a compliment to our life in, in a certain way. And we both have fun doing it. I imagine if it wasn't fun and we didn't enjoy what we were doing together, it might be more like how I think a lot of people see it.

How would you say was that something that thankfully, it just all naturally came to be that way? Does it take an effort to kind of in that direction as far as just offering any advice? Because I think there's a lot of entrepreneurs and different things out there, right. That have that intermixing relationship situation where, yeah, you know, it did. It just thankfully, the way you guys get along in your personalities, it just works and it doesn't take a lot or was there more purpose behind everything to make sure that it went the.

Way that it's going naturally? When we first met, it was kind of like we had picked up from a past life or something where we'd already known each other. We'd already kind of gotten a handle on how each other works and operates. And we take a lot of time to get to know each other. We spend a lot of time intentionally paying attention to what works for the other. She's more relaxed and, and she allows life and projects and work related things to kind of flow and come in and out as they go. Whereas I'm a little bit more rigid and a little bit set in the way that I like to do things because it works for me to, to stay centered and stable while I'm working on things. So we complement each other really well. And she is wonderful at, she's wonderful at all the things that I do and all the things that she does. So she's a perfect addition to everything that I've been working on. She kind of adds an extra flair to everything we do for businesses.

So where did you gain the experience to be able to do this and to be able to help clients and things?

Where did all that knowledge come from by doing this? Kind of goes back to, I guess, the origin of how this all came to be for me. In 2017, I decided to embark on the entrepreneurship journey and figure out how to create a business that sustained my lifestyle and supported my lifestyle at the time, which has changed a lot since then. But so I got started in the entrepreneurship world trying to grow a marketing agency. So that kind of sent me into networking with people and focusing on local businesses. I was creating relationships in the real estate industry. So real estate agents and mortgage lenders and title reps and people in that world was where I got started. That eventually led me to meeting my first business partner. We created a community and a membership together where we resold software. So we would go to companies like Zoom and Zapier and ActiveCampaign and Grammarly and Typeform, go high level. And we would essentially negotiate a specific price for their software to introduce to our community. So we'd have a membership, people would be behind a paywall, and they'd get exclusive access to a lower cost on what they were already paying for. So it was really easy to go to those companies and be like, hey, we have 1500 potential customers. Do you want to have a conversation? So that business was really where I kind of got thrown into the world of operations. How do we keep our business scaling but also not wanting to pull our hair out at the same time. How do we maintain expectations with our customers as well as our partners, as well as our. Our community? How do we keep all that functioning and have a good time doing it and not, you know, end up in a place where our business feels like a burden? And that was kind of. I fell in love with it. I fell in love with the idea of hiring people, managing them, leading them, training them. I fell in love with creating systems to make things more effective and efficient. I fell in love with the psychology and principles and strategy that goes behind a business. And so after that partnership ended, I just started doing it for other people's businesses. I was like, cool, I think other people might want this. I'm not really sure what I want to do. So I just, ever since then have been supporting other people's businesses and kind of acting as their. Their right hand behind the scenes, so to speak, and keep everything running smoothly while they go out and, you know, sell themselves or sell their product or go create relationships, whatever they enjoy doing. They. Being the owner of the business, I would fulfill on the. Usually the thing that people don't like doing, which is, you know, creating the organization behind the business. That's kind of my forte.

You talked to me about the name of the business Ken show, and then I also see you have a samurai star in the background.

Since I was a little boy, I'VE loved Japanese culture. I love Bruce Lee when I was younger, for I. I don't know why, I don't know what about him was.

Who didn't. Who didn't. Jeez.

Amazing guy, right? He seemed to have his. A handle on himself in life, and I didn't realize that when I was younger, but it's carried with me ever since then. So kensho, it's traditional, authentic Japanese meaning is seeing one's true nature. The way I interpret that and the way that I kind of infuse that into all the things that I do and the way that I speak in the way that I am in the world is I have a foundational understanding that we. We are all in control of our experience. We all have agency over our own lives. And when we fully see the nature of how powerful and how amazing we are at creating, that's when we fully get to step into the leadership roles that business owners and entrepreneurs and anybody who's trying to make something more out of their life will end up confronting or facing in their life. And I found that it's that foundational perspective or belief that our true nature is that we are. We are all connected. We're all the creators of our. Our. That's where that comes from. Does that make sense? It's my first time finding it that way, so.

Yeah. Yeah. You did a great job. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that makes a lot of sense. My. My wife is in the personal development space and performance coaching and things like that. So I feel like a lot of the terms I hear you say are different things that I feel very familiar with her in that space and everything. So I think it's great. And so talk to me then about the process itself of what you do. You know, you're. A company's interested. They. They're not sure. They need some help. They need some. They stumble across you, right? And they. They have an initial call and talk to you. Like, walk me through, what does your process look like?

Yeah. Depends. Everything is customized and individual to the business. But usually how it goes is people come to us for one of two things. It's usually, hey, I have this business that isn't what I wanted it to be when I first started it, and I want somebody to help me turn it into what I want it to be. Or they're on the other side of the spectrum where they have this really cool thing that's had success and they've made a bunch of money and they want to scale it and grow it, and they want it to become a legit, functional business. Usually somewhere in between there is who we typically tend to work with. Outside of that, they're easy to communicate with, they care about what they're building and they're open to change. I would say is the, the type of person or business we like to work with. But when we have that first call, what I'm really looking for is to, to gain an understanding of what they want and what they need and what they're looking to accomplish, which can look like a vast array of different things. Right. Some people just want, like I don't have. My systems aren't working, my team's not using them, my calendar's full, my inbox is a mess. I need somebody to come help me clean it up. Or it's. I've got all that sorted out now. I want to maximize on what I've created now. I want to optimize on all these things. So I, I want my team to communicate more effectively. I want more people in my executive positions or leadership teams to make better decisions or more sound decisions. I want somebody to come in that can help train them on how to do that and how to do it effectively within their respective roles. Other people might come and say, I want somebody to come take over this entire business and I want to step out of it because this isn't my thing. And I feel like I'm not, I'm not meant to be in the leadership position or COO position. I kind of started this company because I was good at the thing that I did, but the business thing isn't my thing. So it's kind of all over the spectrum.

And now industry wise, does it matter?

When I get asked this question, the way I usually respond is, no, it's usually the people behind the business is what I really care about. And the way I would respond is Tim Cook at Apple isn't going to care about some guy on LinkedIn who's kind of a niche boutique firm or agency. And I could be wrong though. What I care about most and what we care about most is having impact. And the last thing that I want is something that I put my name on or something that I'm a part of or participating in to not actually go into effect or not actually affect change or not actually mean anything to what I participated in. So industry, not really. Size, scope, scale, not really. I, I think that we can help any, any business with any problem that they're having as far as, you know, operations or leadership or communication or systems and processes, things like that go though I do have my preferences on. On who I prefer to work with, but that's separate from the industry.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay, cool. Yeah, so I've dabbled. I do a little bit of business consulting. I usually have, like, a business consulting client that I'm working with. And then most of my efforts are focused towards, like, custom software development. Right. To me, it's almost like the consulting side's almost like the hobby side of the business. Right. It just keeps it interesting. Having too much of that is. Things can get a little overwhelming. Having one at a time and also just always kind of having like one. And then you work with them for six months, year, year and a half, and then like the transition and maybe I got nobody. And then, you know, another situation falls. And yeah, to me, I find it just one of the most for my own personal growth. Right. It's funny, you know, the idea is you come in and look at somebody else's business and it can be so obvious of going through the things and like, okay, well, obviously you can be doing much better there. But they don't see it. Right. So they see you a lot of times as this amazing genius, which, from my perspective anyway, it's like, I guess to me it feels common sense, but what I also find it does is it makes me think so much about my own business, the way I do my own things. Right. I dole out this advice as to like, hey, you know, and then I stop and like, look at what I'm doing and like, huh, it's really good advice. You should probably take that advice and you should probably. And so I love that aspect. I feel like it challenges me. You know, it's like the advice I give kind of bounces back and like, okay, you know, that's really good advice for that person. Now, what about for you? And yeah, what. What part about the whole thing do you really like love? Is it the just all the fun, unique challenges, the problem solving? Like, what is it about it?

It changes. And it has changed from when I first got started. I would say at the moment, my favorite part about what it is that I do is you were saying I. Helping people or leading people to discovering what it is that they actually want on their own. Of course, you were saying, I can go into a business and understanding the principles the way that I do, I can go, cool. You don't have these things in place. If you did that, all these problems would go away. But I think that. And tell me if you have the same experience, people don't Want to be told what to do. If I just went into a business like, oh, you got to do that. It might work for a little while. Right. The way I tend to describe it is if I were to come in and do that, or like many of us do, taking advice and opinion from other people about how we should live our own life, it's sort of like buying a sweater that fits well around the torso, but when we extend our arms, the sleeves are too short. It's not quite right. It doesn't quite fit. So what I think that my. The benefit that I bring to client relationships and what my favorite part at the moment is, is helping people buy a sweater or make a sweater that fits perfectly, that their business, the way that they want it to be, the way that they want it to operate. I. I'm the last person to go into any relationship or into any working agreement and go, this is what you got to do. Because that's my perspective, that's my opinion. It might not work for them. Not everybody's me. So I do my best to keep a. Keep my bias out of it and my emotion out of it, my. My judgment out of it, and really meet them where they're at so that they can discover what they want for themselves. Does that make sense?

A thousand percent. I completely agree with that. And I also think that a big part of that, to me is like coming in a situation is like getting to know everybody, at least the management and everything, and just really spending the time listening to understand everybody's perspective. And then to me, it's always then working with the owner, whatever, where whatever sort of potential changes might be made. I'm really big on. You got to involve the team. You can't just be this. You and me got on a call and we decided that we're going to make all these changes and we need to just get them on a call and tell them what the changes are. We have a theory, we have an idea of a new direction, but I think the best way to really pull out is involving them. You know, involve your people involved. And then once they feel like they're part of that decision, then, you know, it's. Everybody's in it together and on the same team. Yeah, I feel like that's something too. Too frequently I see where the. The owner or whatever, like, just changes their mind about something and then tells their people, all right, we're going to do this and we're gonna do that, instead of, hey, you know what? I had this idea. What do you think? Had this thought. What do you, you know, kind of that approach of enrolling them because. Yeah. Then like you said, you don't have to, you know, feel you're not telling anybody do anything. It's like, you know, I'm offering up some ideas, but this is your business. What do you think? I don't. There's a lot I don't know. You've been doing this for years. Here's something that I kind of noticed and I think that maybe. Yeah. And I think that that approach the great. And I just think from enrolling everybody else in the company too. Right. Is just such a game changing approach. And what do you think it is overall? If you had to pick one thing, what do most businesses do wrong?

I think it's a perfect segue from what I was just saying. It's building based off of what somebody else has done or what's worked for somebody else instead of discovering what they want and how they want their business to operate. To two of my favorite, I guess entrepreneurs or one of my favorite businesses that is really, I think just a holdings company is 37 signals. So the two guys, David and Chris, anyway, the way that they run their business is totally different from how the vast majority of businesses that build software or build the type of companies that they're running usually operate. They go about things so differently and it's the way that they want it to be. It's their business. They, they operate it from how they want to show up and participate in an India and participate in it every day. So I'd say that's the thing that a lot of businesses get wrong is trying to build it based on somebody else's opinion or perspective or what's worked. There's foundational principles to how business operates that I think everyone ought to know and become familiar with. But past that, it's really a choose your own adventure. How do you want to do this?

And do you have any sort of like authors or just mentors or anything like that that you tend to point clients towards when you start working with them? You recommend books to them, anything like that to kind of like get them on the same page as you're thinking on topics or how do you go about that?

It depends. I, I have some, I have some people that I believe are kind of the, the gold standard or the upper echelon of the strategy and business design and, and business models. 37 signals is a great reference for that though. Their, their culture bible that they built for their company Basecamp as well as their. They have on their website publicly, all their principles for communication and decision making, I think is a fantastic resource for everyone. Outside of that, there's a guy named Lex Sisney who wrote a book called Organizational Physics and he has a couple others that he's detailed. And his perspective on how companies operate is something that I relate to a lot. So again, going back to what I was saying earlier, that's all just me. I enjoy those things. I enjoy the way that those people talk about it. I enjoy the way that they have gone about creating their own intellectual property and curriculum for things. Strategizer, I think is like, like best way to get an MBA without actually going to get an MBA for business owners. They have their, their series of books is like if you only just read those and got to know them really well and how they create their system for building a business model and value propositions and how they test new business ideas. That foundational understanding of what they talk about, I think is something that every entrepreneur ought to consider or at least add into their long list of things to consume.

And that was Strategizer.

You say Strategizer? Yeah.

Okay, great. Yeah, I'll check that out. I love all kind of checking out new little tidbits of things and seeing what, what really sticks and what feels good. Yeah, yeah. And then pro marketing. Well, okay, talk to me about AI. I feel like you got to talk to everybody about AI and just see kind of what they think. I have my own thoughts on it. I don't know, my thoughts are a little. I, I think that, you know, there's definitely, you know, it has a use. I think there's some stuff. I think obviously it's going to grow a lot. Blah, blah. I personally don't think at this stage of the game, outside of those couple niche things, that it's really doing anything that amazing in the marketplace. And I think that focusing on that idea of. What I don't like is how it kind of takes people out of so many parts of the. Right. Like the whole thing, oh well, AI can take this over so you never have to talk to a customer again. You know, like that kind of a thing. Where to me, when I'm working with clients now, going against that strategy, right. How can we be more client facing? How can we be interacting? How can we have more people truly engaging? But what are your thoughts on AI and what's happening in that space?

I, I tend to disagree with any strategy or tactic that that is based around the idea that people don't get to have human interaction. I think the more digital we get and the more automated business becomes, we'll eventually go back to a life where people crave and want a human's touch and feel. Like we're all going to go back to wanting to sense things, right? Smell, taste, hear, see. Any technology that takes that away from people I think is a less than beneficial way forward in humanity. As far as its impact on business though, it's cool. I have a unique perspective because my wife is actually, she is working on a project right now behind the scenes of a artificial intelligence company that's partly responsible for one of the bigger AI companies out there that I won't mention just because it's proprietary. At the moment she's not even allowed to talk about it, but she's behind the scenes of a well known artificial intelligence business that's kind of on the forefront of the innovation of it. And there are pros and cons, of course, pros being just speaking from my experience, I love ChatGPT's ability to take my brain or what I want to talk about, a concept or an idea or perspective I want to share with the world and turn it into like add more context and nuance and detail that I might not have thought about before. It's helping me or it's assisting me with getting my thoughts on paper, so to speak. I also think it's amazing what's happening with video and images and our ability, besides the copyright potential issues that will come from that. I think it's incredibly fascinating how how fast it's changed just from a year or two ago and how we can create literal movies from just typing in a prompt now, I think it's cool. As far as its impact on business. Like you were saying in the beginning, if it's going to take away from what a human can do and what a human can imprint on somebody's well being or imprint on somebody's life like a customer, customer service role or a client facing role or even internally with keeping the culture of a team alive or instilling new beliefs and new perspectives and instilling communication and decision making practice. And AI can't do that, right? We're still in control of the thing. AI, at least for now, can't do anything without our input. So it's still human built, it's still human run, human led. The more human we can keep it, the more human we can keep our technology, the better off I think we'll be. If that makes sense.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it's going to open up some potential actually for smaller businesses. Because I think what happens is the trend seems to be these large corporations leverage it to reduce costs when it comes to customer communication, engagement. And then for me personally, I mean, you know, when it comes to just whatever the bank I work with, I mean, I can't even stand the idea of working with these huge banks that you can't even get in touch with a human being, things like that.

Right?

Where I think to me, those smaller companies, that for them, leveraging it isn't really going to help that much anyway. And I just feel like there's that real potential of a shift of just people like wanting to get away from that, just anything but that. If I'm calling your 800 number and it's an AI thing, like just to hang up and find somebody else to do business is kind of, you know, the mentality where I'm at with a lot of that stuff. Right. Is it's just getting to be too much and too overwhelming already, I think.

Or unfortunately, depending how one on. Depending on how one looks at it. In order to, I think, thrive in life, we're gonna have to learn how to play with AI. I think it's going to be such an integral part of. Of how we do things that having a foundational understanding of it, understanding the principles of how it works, being mindful with it, thinking for yourself, not using it as a source of truth. If all of that is handled and people have the ability to use it in a beneficial way, I think it has some good. Good to come from it. Otherwise, I think that I tend to see it more like how you do. Though I do use it in my business and I will continue to, and I will likely suggest or recommend, depending on the context, that businesses use it as well. Even on zoom calls. Right. We can have this conversation. And there are. There are programs out there that record it and transcribe it and create data from it. I think that decision making will. Will be a lot easier from things like that. So, like a lot of conversations that happen around things that aren't fully understood yet and could potentially have a more significant impact than I think we might be ready for or prepared for. There's nuance to it. It's not this or that black and white. I don't think there it is, good or bad. I think it's just what we're going to make it and however we want it to be, if that makes sense.

Yeah. And what do you see then? So what's the future of your company? Look like?

Ooh, good question. What I want it to be is a place that a business can go and kind of have all aspects of what a business needs at their disposal. So if they need help with project management, cool, our team can do that. If they need help financially, cool, our team can do that. If they need a more right hand COO or operations manager or cto, I eventually want our team to be able to handle that. Where we kind of are a one stop shop all in one like you come to us and our fractional team that I've built, that I've nurtured, that I've trained, that I trust and go in and sort out whatever aspect of your business you either don't want to hire for full time or you don't have the means to make it what you want it to be. Yet we can be that kind of substitute while we help grow your business and get you to a point where you can eventually insert your own full time employee or end up doing it yourself or automating it or whatever it looks like for that business. Does that make sense?

Yeah, 100%. And then what's the typical like engagement length look like? You know, someone's interested, they start working with you. Is it their hey, we usually typically with what you're coming, it's going to be usually somewhere between six months and a year and a half is we're going to come in, we're going to get our thing in place and do our thing and then after that we should have you where you need to be. Is there such a thing or does that so dramatically? There isn't such a thing even.

Well it's not a super dramatic variation. Dramatic variation. How we usually start with business owners is we will do 30 to 45 days of due diligence where we're, we're just third party sitting on the outside where we're interviewing the team, we're looking at their systems, we're looking at whatever they give us access to and kind of making our. It's a test to see if we like working together for one. And it's also we then get to see where the business is at at this current point in time so we can create a game plan moving forward. So we'll spend the first 30, 45 days with a business usually doing that and then after that that's when it really depends. Okay. Is this a larger project because it's so disorganized that we actually need to spend more time to sort all these things out? Well, that might be a 6 month, 12 month project. If they just want us to come in and build some systems or hire somebody and train them and onboard them and create the assets that employees need to thrive, that might not take as long. We could also spend six months or a year just doing due diligence. It really just depends. We typically like longer term engagements, though.

And, you know, what would you say that somebody's listening to this and they own a company? Some of the things you're saying are kind of interesting. What do you find? What is it that kind of tends to tip people from, oh, I've been thinking about this for a while, to taking action?

Usually they're either at a point where they're super excited to expand on what they've already built, or they're in so much pain and distress and fret that they are at a place where they either want to shut the business down or hand it off to somebody else or sell it. And they're at the point where they just want to know that they did everything that they could before they make a drastic decision like that. And we're kind of that last ditch effort, so to speak, for a lot of people.

And then how do you acquire, where do you find clients?

Oh, man. Conversations like this. I imagine some will come from podcasts that I do. LinkedIn's become a really fun, practical place for me to share my thoughts and meet people and have conversations. But it's usually, yeah, through conversations like this or referrals from past working relationships or somebody who just saw me post some pictures that I took while I was out on a walk and they're like, I like this guy. It's usually how it happens.

And what's the initial situation look like? You know, your first call with somebody is like a 30 minute free thing. How does the initial engagement work?

It's as many calls as it needs to. Needs to be for us to. For me to really have an understanding of what they want, what they're looking for. Usually it's an hour call. I usually have everything that I need from one conversation. Sometimes it takes two or three because they might not know how to convey to me what they're looking for. I might not have a full understanding. It might need to be several calls. Just depends.

Yeah, okay. Okay. All right. So either way, if somebody's either, you know, they have a business that's doing well, but they really want to try to take things in the next level, but obviously they just have not done that before. Right. Great time to just reach out, get on. You For a call, just chat with you, you know, as long as it takes for you to understand and throw back some thoughts and see. See if that makes sense. Right? What you make sense. And then on the other side of the fence, those people. Yeah, they're just overwhelmed. It's just too much B. Same thing. Just jump on a call, talk a little bit, see what you have to say. Sweet. Seems good. Anything else you would like to, you know, kind of get out there to the audience?

I don't think so. This is great.

How do people. What's the best way to get in touch with you?

Go to kenshocraft.com cam. Kenshocraft.com is my email. Follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook. I don't have you. I'm not active on YouTube yet. I do have a channel, but I'm not there yet. But yeah, yeah, say hello, reach out in the dms. I. I answer all of them, so great.

Well, yeah, it's been an awesome conversation with you, but highly encourage everybody to reach out. If it's at all something that seems like a possibility would seem like a great thing to get on. I just jump on a call and see what you have to say. I appreciate your time here, Cam.

Likewise, man. Thanks for having me.

And yeah, thank you for being on the show. Thank you for listening to Executing the vision. If you'd like to be a guest, go to EmergeLabs US and click on the podcast page. If you like what you heard, please share the episode and subscribe. Ratings and reviews go a long way to help promote the show. You can find find us on instagram @brad emergelabs as well as x Facebook and LinkedIn where we strive to provide valuable information on business and life. We'd love to hear your thoughts on the show and what you'd like to see in future episodes. Thank you again and have a great day.