Hiring too Slowly and the Concept of Levers

The Small business show episode 314 for February 10, 2021. Greetings folks and welcome to the Small Business Show. The show by, for and about small business owners. Where the action is small businessing sponsors for this episode include LinkedIn.com small business. So that's an easy one to remember. Here in Durham, New Hampshire, I'm Dave Hamilton.

And in Lafayette, California, I am Shannon Jean. How are you, man?

I'm doing good. I, you know, trucking along. I mean, it's. It's what we do.

Yeah, yeah, that's right. Is this episode 314? Huh? That's pretty cool.

That's what I said. So I'm gonna believe myself?

Yeah, I hope so. Go back.

Hope I'm not wrong. That's right. We are. Wait a minute though. Wait, wait, wait. Because February 10th is very close to our sixth year anniversary.

That's correct.

Of this show, I believe. When is our anniversary for this is it. I wanted to be right around here. Yeah. Yeah.

Because we started in January, recorded some stuff so I could get kind of my feet wet behind the mic since I had never recorded the podcast yet. You would. Maybe you can't tell that, but now, but. And then we started releasing them right around the 10th. Right?

Yeah.

Early February.

It was early February. You know, it's interesting. I have all kinds of these things on my calendar because I don't like to have to remember them, but. And I have. It's weird. I have Giggab, which is the show that I started the same year and the same month as Small Business Show. I have the anniversary for giggab as February 19th. So it's real close. I don't think we're at it quite here on 10th, but it's close.

It was six years ago. We have a name, DBA. Okay. So that isn't. That's up. I'm up on the site. Interesting.

Yeah, well, we'll figure it out. But we're close to an anniversary here, which is. Which is really exciting. Yeah. I need some business therapy today, so.

No, we need to come up with some business therapy music, you know, like that we can cue when we're ready to talk about business therapy. I'm going to look into that because that would be, you know, some sort of something uplifting to kind of help you through it and. But I'm excited about Small business Therapy. I always love talking about it, whether it's you or me or one of our guests. I think it's one of the most useful parts of the show.

I agree. I Agree. Actually, the first thing I want to do though is I want to read one of your comments that actually a review that Ashley that you left on Apple Podcasts five star review. We'd like that. Because, you know, the difference between. The difference between 4 and 5 is 5 means that we are at least barely adequate it and four means that you wouldn't even trust us with your first name. Right. That's. That's how the, the, the, the star system works. Right? Yeah.

Yeah.

Yep. So thank you for the five stars knowing. It's nice knowing that we are at least barely adequate. The title of the review, really insightful questions. This podcast has some of the best and most insightful questions from the hosts that I have ever, ever heard on a business podcast. So much great value from digging beneath the surface on business strategies. I love it. 100% recommend this show. Thank you, Ashley. That's.

That's awesome.

Yeah.

Good stuff.

Yeah. And you can review the show too. BusinessShow Co reviews gets you as close as we are able to being able to click that button to review. You've got to kind of dig one level deeper and then, boom, you're good to go. So please do. We'd love to have your reviews.

Yeah, for sure.

All right. Are we good to get into this, Shannon? Because I think so.

Let's do it. I've got my. Lay down on the couch and I'll lay down the chair.

We'll play the music. Well, I'm playing the music in my head, so maybe that's the first part we talk about. But I am hiring too slowly for a very key position that I know will make a huge difference to the business here. And the position is one that I've talked about on the show before. I want to bring on a podcast. I call it a producer, really a podcast PR person to help us not just with this show, but with. With a few of our shows to here. Here's the problem that I'm solving. Although this, this is not my problem. It's a different problem. But the problem is I know that this show and other shows that, that I do are super valuable and, and, and engender great loyalty in you, our listeners. The trick is in order to bring someone on as a listener, they have to invest time to listen to entire episodes and find the right episode to listen to with this show. Especially now that we're tweaking some things and shortening the length of the show. Fine. But like our Macgeekab show is a 90 minute show. That's a Big investment to make when you don't know whether or not you want to listen. And so I want to have somebody that can really help promote the show, but also chop it up into bite sized pieces for us and use that to help promote it and all that. So looking to hire somebody full time, I've talked with a few people, haven't clicked, haven't found the perfect person yet. But I know that perfect is the enemy of the good. I also know that you have to hire slowly and I know that I still haven't hired someone and that means that this job isn't being done. It's not like I'm doing this job and I need to get it off my plate. I am not doing this job. I'm doing parts of it, but not very well and not very consistently. So I am doing, literally leaving money on the table at this point in time. And that's bad.

Right. Well, let me ask you a question.

Yeah.

Where, where have you looked for this person? How have you, you know, gone out to try to find them?

Yep. I've, I've mentioned it on our shows. It would be great to get someone that already understands at least one of the shows that they are going to be working with. Right. So, so I mentioned it on our shows and I've, I've reached out, I would say I've reached out to about 30, I've done 30% of the outreach that I could do to just my personal network.

Okay, sure. Yeah, I, I know it's always difficult because you have probably a vision of the type of person and who it needs to be.

And usually when I hire somebody, I know who it is I want to hire and why I want to hire them.

Yeah.

And my problem is right now, I don't know, like I can't think of, oh, if I want that person. So I would just call them and then hire them. That's typically, you know, I keep the teams that I have, I keep them fairly small. And so I've been fortunate over the years that that's how I've been able to do this. I'm not able to do that this time. Maybe I am and I'm not seeing it. Right. But for whatever reason I'm not, I'm not doing it.

So I guess. Okay, so the question is the problem that you haven't had enough responses to kind of go through and have a varied talent pool to, to go through or is it that the type of people that are responding are not what you're looking for?

So I don't have enough responses. And the reason is I have not solicited for enough responses. And so, you know, putting on my self awareness hat here. Why am I not soliciting enough for this? Okay. I don't know what, I don't know what this position is. Right. This is not like that's a, that's a. Yeah, it's not like I'm saying I need to bring on a salesperson to do this. And I know not only what that job is, I know what this job is too, but I know what the market tends to pay for this, this kind of job. I have no idea what somebody, what would be a fair wage pay for this kind of job. And honestly, as we're, as we're talking this out, I think that right there is my biggest stumbling block. Or at least it's, it's my first one.

Right.

There's more, but I need to figure out what I should be paying for this. For somebody that does this.

Yeah, that would be good. And I always like to, as, as a. I wouldn't want to be asked this question, but I think it's a really powerful question to ask people when you're hiring them is, you know, what is your salary requirement?

Oh, I see. When I'm hiring. This is interesting. It's fascinating having this problem because when I bring someone on and interview them for any position, I talk about money first.

Yeah, that's fascinating. See, I. Yeah. And that's.

I don't want to waste time.

Well, that's why I asked the question. I actually asked that question before we interview, I send them a questionnaire. So the way I go about it is I post the ad and I, I link to the questionnaire. And surprisingly, well, maybe not surprisingly, quite a few people apply for the position and don't follow the instructions and answer the questionnaire.

Interesting.

Those people are immediately, you know, eliminated from consideration because I figure, well, they can't really follow my instructions. It's only a paragraph that says, this is the type of person we're looking for. Learn more about the position here.

Yeah.

And then when they go read that, it says the first stop is because I don't. Look, I don't care about your resume. I just don't care. I want to meet you, I want to hear about your experiences. And the questionnaire asks those kinds of questions. And one of the questions on the questionnaire is, what's your salary requirement? And I put in there, I have an idea, or we have an idea of what the range is. But let's Be sure we're even in the ballpark with you. You know, if we want to pay $75,000 a year and your salary requirement is 150. Well, let's not waste each other.

Let's not waste each other's time. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah.

And I mean, I can send you a copy of that questionnaire.

I would love to see that and I think our listeners would like to see it too.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We could post it up on the show because, you know, it saves so much time and that way you could do it like, you could post this on LinkedIn and have it as. They could go to a page, they could read about it, they could answer your questions and then you, you, I guarantee you would have a significant amount of responses. But you can weed out.

I'm also on and I'm going to learn in this process to. More about what I want from someone. I mean, to be perfectly honest. Right. Like, this is, this is a fishing expedition sort of. It's a, it's a. Yeah.

I mean. Yeah. Have you, have you taken the time to, I mean, have you written out.

Yes.

A detailed job description? Oh, yes. That's. Yeah, yeah. That's important.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I know what I want this, like, if I, if I had somebody coming to my office tomorrow morning to start work, I know what I would tell them to do. So like, that's, I feel like that's a huge leg up. I mean, creating a new position is always scary. It's not like I've had somebody doing this and I need to replace them. That I would, I think I would do a lot faster. I mean, like I said, I think there's, I mean, we're doing business therapy here. I think there's several things that are slowing me down. And, and that's. One of them is like, I, I think I know what I would have them do tomorrow. I mean, obviously a month in, we'd probably be doing different things and that's okay. Like, but that's a different, that's a.

You, that is a special specialized type of person. And I think it's important that when you frame what this position is, is. Look, if you're the type of person that wants to create a position, you know, this may be the role for you. If you're the type of person that wants to be told, you know, A to Z how to do it and what's going to happen, maybe this is not the, the right role. Right. And that's, I think, very important like this to Success. Not, not. It's not going to help you find the person. But I believe it would help you find the right person.

Correct.

Because as you're talking, like you and I as business owners and entrepreneurs that try all kinds of crazy new stuff. That sounds exciting. You're like, oh, I get to. We don't even know we're going to create it. We're going to do this.

I'm going to pay you to figure something out. Go. Right.

But I can tell you from my experience, and my wife Renee reminds me this all the time because I haven't been an employee for, you know, 30 years. She says, not everybody thinks like that. And so when you talk, they like, that's crazy talk. I don't want to hear that. And so you need to find the right person that has a little bit of that, that entrepreneurial spirit or whatever, however you want to, whatever you want to call it, that can embrace the unknown.

Yes.

And seize the opportunity in the unknown. And I think that's important.

I like this. This is, this is super helpful. I mean, as it. As business therapy should be. This is. Yeah, you're right. I, I need. That's the right. I think another part of this that I'm, I'm petrified of is the deluge of responses from the professional podcast promoters that we get, you know, spam emails from.

Yeah.

All the time. I know that if I post this out, and perhaps that's again, a part of why I say I've exposed it to maybe 30% of my circles, because it's like the last thing I want is just all of those people that are like, for $5 I can cheat itunes and get you banned for life. And it's like, yeah, cool. That's not exactly what I'm after, but thanks for your time.

Yeah, you could put that in the info. Hey, if you're an agency or whatever, do not contact us.

I mean, I wouldn't mind. I'm not against hiring a PR agency to do this. I think for my long term plans for what I've got in mind here, I think it would be better to have somebody internal. But if there's an agency out there that kind of already has enough of this in place, I'm not against that. But I would want like a legitimate agency and not one of these, you know, people that's gonna like, game the system and all.

No, no, no, no, no. You want to. But, you know, interestingly, you bring that. Maybe that's how you, if, if you go that route and it turns out there's something that makes sense with some sort of agency.

Yeah.

You know, your long term plan could be to try to hire that person that they put on your account.

Of course. Yeah. There's nothing wrong with that.

Yeah, no, not at all. And, but I have an interesting thought. What if, why don't you, if you, if you do any of these things and you, you get, start getting a bunch of responses, then you can kind of winnow it down and then we could talk about it on the show. You could bring some, you know, anonymize it or whatever.

Sure.

And talk about, well, this, this person has these pros and cons and this person has that and we could kind of break it down and, and it would be an interesting exercise to see if you're comfortable with that, to see the, you know, during the hiring process. Because hiring is, and we've done a number of shows. If you, if you go up to business show co and just search for hiring or employee, you know, we've done a bunch of shows about hiring and it is really a critically important aspect and it's, a lot of it is subjective voodoo in my opinion, because you don't, you're never gonna know how it's going to work until you just start.

Right, right.

You can be careful and you can ask lots of good questions and, and, but until you start working with someone, the personality, their reliability, you just don't know.

You just don't know. You don't know. All right, well, this is, this, this little, you know, 10 minute therapy session here has been super, super helpful for me. So thank you. I am, I have freed myself from at least one of the paralyzing factors here. And that's sort of the key. And I think as a business owner, identifying when you, when you are stuck in one of those paralyzing factors is hugely important because it's really like I could sit here all day and, and rationalize why it makes sense that I haven't reached out. Well, I don't want to have to deal with those, you know, those, those scammers out there. So that's, that's a good reason for reaching out. Well, no, it's a good reason for being cautious about how you reach out or, or conscientious about how you reach out. But it's not a good reason not to. So. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's good. I want to talk next about our sponsor here, Shannon, because LinkedIn Sales Navigator is the best version of LinkedIn for sales professionals. If you are doing any kind of Sales. Well, get ready to exceed your 2021 sales goals with the help of LinkedIn Sales Navigator. The best salespeople that I know, they know that closing deals is about understanding your customer's needs and building relationships. Selling is about relationships. It's not about just getting people to put money on the table. That's a byproduct of, of understanding a customer's needs and building a relationship with them. And you can tap into the power of LinkedIn 700 million plus member network because LinkedIn Sales Navigator gives you 20 monthly InMail messages, lead recommendations, unlimited searches, actionable insights and news. We love actions here. And access to free courses on LinkedIn Learning so you can target the right prospects and decision makers. Unlocking like 15% more pipeline from sourced opportunities, 17% lift when saving leads on sales navigator and 42% larger deal sizes. So as the world is adapting to new working habits, we as sellers must also shift tactics to stay ahead. We use LinkedIn Sales Navigator here at Backbeat Media for a variety of things and it's fantastic. It really does help do those narrowing and help us build relationships. So you can start your 60 day free trial of LinkedIn Sales Navigator today by going to LinkedIn.com small business, that's LinkedIn.com small business to start your 60 day free trial of LinkedIn Sales Navigator one more time, LinkedIn.com smallbusiness and our thanks of course to LinkedIn for sponsoring this episode. All right, Shannon, what's next on the list today?

Yeah, I want to talk about, I've been kind of developing this concept in my head about levers. The power of using a lever to help to kind of give you exponential power. You know, with, with the, with a big lever, you know, you can lift a lot more weight. You know, you kind of lean into it and.

Mechanical advantage.

Yeah, exactly. And, and I think because I've had some situations recently where I realized I was using these levers, whether it was a, a person, a relationship I had or something, a piece of software or something like that that helped me achieve way more than I could on, made me exponentially more successful. So I started to think about this concept and, and I realized we've been talking about levers and encouraging our listeners to find levers for years. You know, and so I, I, I have a few examples that I want to throw out there.

Okay.

And I want to see, it's, this is really rough. I just started writing it down this morning. But I, I, I'm going to continue to work this out because I think there's something here. Giving something a name and, and focusing on this concept is, on a concept itself is really powerful because it's easy to remember. And the reason why I bring this up is because when you have a problem or you need to solve a situ, you know, solve a problem or you're in some situation, I want you to think of what lever can you use in that situation to help you and your small business succeed. Right. And if you don't have a lever, well, that's a weakness. You need to find something or someone that makes you more powerful. And you know, a few examples that we've talked about on the show, some of them over and over, is your board of advisors. Right. It's a tremendously powerful lever for your personal success, your personal branding, your small business branding. And I don't care how small or big your business is, or if you're a solopreneur, that board of advisors, whether you meet these people at the local chamber of commerce, whether it's your banker, your accountant, asking him to introduce to somebody, your lawyer, those people are in your corner and they're very powerful. Even if it's a, a very loose association, you, I mean, I'm not talking that you have to bring all these people together in a room.

Sure.

All the time. They're just your, there's your circle of advisors. And, and leaning into them is, and leaning on them when you need help can dramatically change your life. You know, another one, a very kind of loose association of people is your connections on LinkedIn. You know, have you connected with David, Dave and I? I don't know, maybe you have, maybe you haven't. But you know, if you go up on LinkedIn and search for our names, you should be connected with us because we may be able to help you or introduce you to someone or offer you some small business therapy. If you don't want to hear it on the air, you could send us a message on LinkedIn and we would be glad to give you some feedback.

Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Another lever that I thought of is kind of a weird one, but we did a few episodes over, over the years about affinity credit cards and, and funding your business and pulling those points out to personally enrich your life and create the charmed life for travel and for, you know, wherever you want to go or converting them to other things that can, you know, non taxable benefits. And you know, at one time my FedEx and UPS bill was $250,000 a month and all of that went on my American Express. And all of those dollars built up millions of points that we used to travel all over the world, you know, and not have to pay for it. And it's just a huge lever to make your life better. Yeah, don't forget about those, you know.

Yeah.

And then overall, this, I think this show itself is a powerful leverage to help you over time and give you the opportunity to sit and listen to other people's problems. Like, we just talked about the, you know, the hiring issue, and I would just, I would encourage you to go back into the archives. You know, we've been doing this for six years. Our first show was on February 19, 2015, so we're getting close to that. Six years.

Was it the 19th? I know that's the first one on the website, but I.

First on the website. Yeah, it was. We did before that, you're right.

But I, I think we even released one of the ones before that, but maybe not.

I didn't see it.

Yeah, maybe not. You might be right. Yeah. Yeah. Could be the.

Go back and search. You know, it's a huge archive of data and, you know, that, that you can listen to and get some, some feedback. It's a. This show is different, I think, than very many or a lot of other shows is that we're not, you know, we're really focused on the day in, day out, small business issues that we've all faced over time. And the topics are, I think, unique and the, the way they're discussed are unique. And I'm not saying that just because it's our show. I get a lot out of it every week. And I think that you can too, by, by researching those, those archives and, and I think also I've got a few more here, but I think hiring the right people, you. You want to hire somebody that's going to be a lever for your business, Dave, that they're going to lean into that lever and really raise it up. And so focusing on that type of person, is this person going to. Going to be that, you know, strong enough to lean in and lever us up, or am I going to have to hold their hand the whole time? And, you know, that's not maybe the person that we're looking for.

Right, right. Yeah. No, you're absolutely right. I can't. I don't want to hire someone that, for this position that I need to, day in and day out, instruct them as to what I want them to do. I mean, yes, they will be, you know, zooming it way out. They will be a tool for the business But I don't want someone that's just a tool that's only being worked when someone is directing the tool. Right. Like, I need somebody that can think for themselves and make some mistakes, you know, like experiments a little bit. Let's learn what things are going to work if they happen to come in and, and can, you know, and have ideas. Great. I also have some ideas and I will share them. But you're going to need to experiment and you're going to need to fail in order to really get there. And if you're not comfortable with that, well, this ain't the right place for you. Yeah, I agree.

And you know, speaking of mistakes, our small business guide, you know, all about mistakes, is a great lever for you to read about other people's mistakes and how they overcame them. You know, it's. You can dip in and dip out of it. You know, it's, it's. I don't even know what price we have it at now. Is it 10 bucks? Is it 9.99, 2.99, something like that. But, you know, go to businessshow co mistakes and you know, put that thing on your bedside or put it on your phone or your Kindle. It's powerful stuff. And then finally, one of the most powerful levers I think we've, we've discussed on this show is related to customer service. And like Dave always says, you know, we're all in the customer service business no matter what you're doing. And this, the two tokens concept of customer service is a crazy powerful lever to build customer loyalty from upset customers.

Right, right.

And to convert them into champions for your business. And if you don't do anything else from what I'm talking about right now is go up to BusinessShow Co and search for two tokens. We've had a few episodes where we've talked about it and we'll try to put a link in the show notes for you as well. That concept from Jean Louis Guesse, you know, former head of Apple Europe is just so great. And I, I use it all the time, my kids.

It is one of. Yeah, go back and listen to one of those episodes to, to really understand what, what that two tokens concept is. It's well worth your time. And I've got, I've got a search in the show notes you can go to.

Perfect.

We've explained it a few times, so. Yeah, yeah.

And I'm gonna keep explaining it because it's just every. When I talk about it, a lot of people, but most People just don't even know, understand it. But when you talk about, oh, aha, you know, and, and so again, these levers, I'm going to be talking about it this year a little bit more. You know, last year we were really focused on action and how small business should be a verb because we just as small business owners, we have to embrace action to make things happen. Even if it's the wrong thing, you got to do something. But this lever concept of making yourself exponentially more powerful by using your resources, whether it's people or, or a place or a thing, you know, a piece of equipment, whatever it is. So, you know, what levers do you use in your small business? You know, we'd love to hear it and help us develop this concept out as we roll into 20, 21 and, you know, send us a message feedbackus show. Co tell us how you've used this lever concept and we'd love to hear from you. So one of the best parts about doing the show is getting your feedback.

It is, yeah, we really appreciate it. And, and it is, yeah, it allows us to tweak this show. That, that is also the feedback avenue is another lever for you, Right. Because you get to tweak what we are doing for you each week. And I, you know, I say that excited and it sounds like a sales pitch, but it's really true. Like this show is for you. Yeah, absolutely. So that's good stuff.

All right, enjoyed, enjoyed hanging out. I enjoyed the business therapy and I'm, I'm excited. We've got a great, you know, show coming up next week with some interesting topics. So we'll. We'll see you then.

Yeah, we'll see you then. Thanks so much for listening, folks. Keep, keep living that charmed life. Keep focusing. Lose those levers. Use us feedback@businessshow.com See you next week.