Delegate so You Can Strategize | Erich Baum & Jordan Notenbaum

I think you need two things. You need to have somebody that complements you naturally, which I think Eric and I already had. He was an internal, I was an external. We had a good working relationship. But I think the most important thing is just the communication. Getting on the same page, talking about the issues and aligning with the vision up front. That's the foundation for a successful relationship and it's worked really well for us.

Hey everybody. Today I have the pleasure of speaking with Jordan Notenbaum and Eric Baum from Mobile Defenders, a global provider and distributor of mobile technology repair products and accessories. They gauge their success by being invested, adaptive, thoughtful, ambitious and acting with integrity. Thanks for your time today, guys, and welcome to the show.

Thanks for having us. Mark, hello.

Yeah, it's great to meet both of you and appreciate you taking a little time out of your day to spend to share some of your learnings along your, your rocket fuel journey, if you will. And to get started. Jordan, I'm curious, kind of take us back to the beginning of Mobile Defenders and kind of how did this business get started?

Yeah, sure. Well, there's a 45 minute version and there's a five minute version. So I'll try to do the latter.

Give me the five or less.

So when I was going to university here in Grand Rapids, Michigan, I needed some tuition money and I needed some beer money, some food money. So I started doing phone repairs and ipod repairs, posting listings on Craigslist and then meeting people on campus or at McDonald's or Panera, whatever really just to get.

How did you learn to do that in the first place?

Sure. Well, back then, you know, YouTube existed, but there was no YouTube channel for how to do a ipod repair. So really I taught myself and it was through a lot of error, a little bit of trial and a lot of error. So you learn to get really good at repairing technology when you rip somebody's phone apart in front of their face, you know, so, you know, I started with a, like a putty knife, like a spackle knife. And I would use that to kind of pry in between the seams of an ipod and you know, that'll damage and scratch and bend. And so that I learned very quickly that I needed to get a little bit more delicate tools to manage the tech. But it was really self taught, a lot of trial and error and really the graciousness of people letting me use their devices to learn the skill, to.

Give it a shot. So they had something that was busted and if it got busted worse, it was like, you know, Whatever. I'm not any worse off. Was that kind of the deal?

Yeah, because this is before phone repair stores and tech repair stores existed, so they didn't know any better. They didn't even know you could get an ipod repaired. So that was the genesis of the repair side. And we opened before we sold the company. We had about 18 repair stores throughout the Midwest, Michigan and Indiana. Wow. And then a few years after starting that repair chain, we spun off a phone parts distribution company called Mobile Defenders, and that's where Eric and I are now.

Okay, so what year was that?

We started this company in 2013. Okay.

And so out of the gate, how big was the company when you started it? How many folks did you have?

Yeah, we started from zero. So I was the first employee. My partners on the phone repair business, they started with me in the beginning, and then I kind of took things over for a number of years. We grew from nothing to within the first four or five years, we were doing around 10, 15 million in revenue. And then in 2016, we sold part of that company to a family office, and that immediately doubled our revenue. We went from about 16 to 35 million overnight. And we've grown ever since.

Wow, very interesting. So, Eric, when did you kind of come into the fold here?

Came in about four years ago, so they were pretty well established at that point.

How many employees at that point?

I think there were about 45, 46 employees.

And what was your first role when you came to the company?

Operations. Vice president of operations.

What were you doing prior to that?

I was in an operations role prior to that as well.

For a big company, Small company?

Yeah.

I started off in automotive, which was a multibillion dollar company, and then was really more intrigued with some of the aspects of a smaller company being able to really make a difference every day and seeing it every day, the difference that you make. So.

Right. So you guys, pretty steep growth curve you're rolling along. Okay, so Eric's on the team, you know, and then at some point you run into something or somebody that tells you about this EOS stuff. I'm guessing. Did you learn about EOS first or did you learn about the visionary integrator stuff first?

Yeah. My partner, Gary, co founder of Mobile defenders, he instituted EOs. A little bit before us is actually a little less than a year. So he was very new, but he runs a company, similar name, it's called Tech Defenders. Completely separate company culture, employees. And he thought he needed something that added a lot more structure and also gave a better vision down to the employee level, what we've found over the years is that we're pretty good at creating ideas and selling stuff. But the internal culture that, you know, the org chart changes and accountability is really, really critical to the long term, sustained growth and success of the company. So Gary found out about eos. He brought it on at Tech Defenders and, you know, within a few months he was raving, said we needed to do it here. That's when we called up our implementer and got the ball rolling.

Jim Coyle, you work with, right?

That's right. Yep. He's great.

One of the best. He's a great guy. All right, so you get started on that, you know, your, your partner kind of tells you about it and then you're, you hook up with Jim and you're off and running. And so, you know, one of the first times you're together, you do that focus day, I'm guessing. And that's probably the first time that you really put together an accountability chart. And that's where the visionary and integrator seats popped up. And is that when you first really kind of took a run at all? Right, this is the seat that I'm going to sit in. This is the seat that you're going to sit in, and this is how we're going to do this. What was that like?

Yeah, I mean, it was kind of natural for us. I think we were already in those roles. Eric was doing a lot of the personnel internal management and I was doing a lot of the external big customers, big supplier, relationship management. So there's definitely a natural fit. But there was also some like, heartache for me, you know, like taking some of the direct responsibility from other of my current reports and pushing those under Eric was like, ah, you know, like, I don't want to give up that kind of level of control. But besides that, I think it was a pretty smooth transition.

What was the key to your being able to give that up?

Well, I'm not sure that I've fully given it up yet.

Okay.

Speak to that. But I'm trying. So, you know, just, I think the visibility of the AC chart, walking through that process with the team and explaining to them this is who to go to for this, this and that. Even though of course I still speak with a lot of the leadership team regularly. Sure. Because we clearly defined who the person is that's accountable above them on the AC chart, they know to go to Eric first unless it's a big issue or he's not available. So I think just seeing it physically Walking through the process, you know, during our leadership team build out has been the key.

Good. Eric, for you, what was kind of the biggest difference before that day and after that day of kind of really making it visible on an accountability chart?

I think that it was the speed at which we could operate. I mean, that's what I felt personally. I mean, I was always like, how do we go faster? How do we get things to stick rather than, you know, fix it once rather than fix it forever. And to me, it felt like a switch kind of flipped when we were to be able to find those roles and who was going after what.

So it sounds like you probably had some growing pains in the process, too, though. So Jordan's kind of trying to maybe hang on to some stuff just because that's the way it's always been, I'm guessing. Did you have some people that were resistant to. Right. Where they're kind of like, well, hang on, I've always reported to Jordan. Why am I going to report to you now?

I don't think there was anybody that was really, truly resistant. I think where we ran into some problems where we were filling multiple seats.

The two of you were.

Yeah. And so then you start having some others involved too, that it's like, yeah, I work for Jordan, but I also, you know, who's filling that seat. But then, you know, here's how it fits within the AC chart that, you know, it's. There's some challenges even, you know, to this day about, you know, who's doing what. But I think bringing the clarity helps to, you know, drive that conversation and just makes an easier conversation from the team as well. So they can say, hey, I'm not sure how this should work, so I'm starting with you. You know, where do I go with us?

Gotcha. So you got some of the, you know, wearing multiple hats and trying to keep the hat straight and all that stuff. Right. How many seats do you sit in today, Eric?

2.

Jordan?

2.

What's your other one, Jordan?

Finance.

Finance. Eric, what's your other one?

Operations.

Ops. Okay. Yeah. Okay, so we've got somebody else at least running sales. How many direct reports do you have to the integrator?

Six.

Wow. Okay, so that's quite a few.

But one of those is the seats that Jordan's sitting in.

Right.

Is the finance seat, but.

Right. And one's you. Right. Where you report to yourself. That. Right.

Yes.

That's really tough. It is. Sometimes that's the most difficult. Right. And like you said, it's, you know, at Least it opens up the communication. If there's not quite clarity there yet or we haven't kind of built the, you know, the muscle memory of who to go to for what. At least are going, hey, I'm not sure if this is right, but I'm going to start here and then you can kind of talk it out and communicate around it. How's Jordan about resisting the urge to kind of go around you and go down into the organization and you know, I call it tampering, but you know, kind of do that thing visionaries sometimes do. Yeah, Jordan would never do that.

Would you?

Yeah, tampering is a good word. I mean, just being, you know, completely honest and transparent. He actually does pretty good with that. It can be a little frustrating because he's pretty self aware. So there's times when he's gone and he's done something and I've said, hey, you know, you can't do this. And he said, oh yeah, I screwed up all right, sorry. He's like, no, I want to kind of fight about it a little bit. But hey, you know, he's pretty quick to, you know, kind of acknowledge that and move on. So.

So talk to me about how you guys go about staying on the same page. So, you know, what do you do in terms of like the same page meeting, discipline, how often, where do you do it? How has that changed over the year or so that you've been doing this?

We meet every week, so it's, you know, same time. For the most part we just close the door, shut ourselves in and get rid of the distractions that way. I would say since we started EOS and you know, on the rocket fuel model, it's been more consistent. Prior to that, it might be where we'd miss a week, maybe even two weeks, start feeling it. So we've been a lot more consistent with that. But I think with just our industry and how quickly things are moving and we talked about having it be at a little bit different cadence, but weekly is for me personally, I feel like that's worked. Keep things moving.

And how long are they?

Half an hour. Typically we bring the issues and we go through them during that time.

Who keeps the issues?

Listen, I do.

Jordan, you ever add to it?

Yeah, occasionally. I mean, usually Eric knows the issues and we also meet, you know, ad hoc in the middle of the week outside of the same page meetings too, to go over big urgent issues. But yeah, I let Eric kind of list out the items that are most important to him. Usually those are also most important to the business.

So very good. And so, you know, what's been kind of since you kind of got into this model and into this relationship, what's been something that's been kind of a, I don't know, unexpected discovery that you've made, something that's really, maybe you didn't see coming, that you're kind of like, okay, this is different. And it could be a good way, could be a frustrating way. Whatever you think, what's something that was a surprise for you?

For me, I think it's just giving up the roles and responsibility of. Even though I think as an example, procurement is the most important or one of the most important pieces of the business. You may say they're all the most important, but if products don't come in properly, they don't go out properly. If they don't go out properly, then you lose all service level and, you know, your goodwill. So when I gave up procurement and then when Eric, as the integrator now is in charge of procurement, that really gave me heartburn, you know, making that move. And what I found is I can actually work on the actual high level structural strategic issues in procurement as the visionary and I don't need to spend time on the day to day, you know, small issues and problems that come up. And that was really a surprise to me that, you know, six months in I'm like, oh, I actually feel like I'm still making good progress in procurement even though I'm not working directly with the procurement head and making the day to day decisions anymore.

Great, I love that. Eric, what about for you? What was the surprise?

It's funny, right away, before Jordan started talking, my mind went to the opposite side of things where I was surprised how quickly the team picked up the responsibilities, where it felt like prior to that there was a lot of churning, if that makes sense, that we're kind of stuck in some of the same things. And so I was surprised by how quickly the entire downstream team just picked up the ball and really started taking some responsibility and ownership for some things that they wanted to, you know, pass their problems to myself or to Jordan. And I mean, they've stepped up and flourished. And so that's been really fun to see too and didn't really realize. And so the reason I was surprised didn't realize that wasn't happening until it started happening. And you could see people really start to get excited about what they were doing too.

Yeah, that's great. You make it visible, you know, people have clear accountabilities and they Engage like that, that's what you want. So what from the integrator seat, what's been tough, you know, what's been maybe a bigger challenge than you anticipated or less fun?

That's a great question. I think just things not moving as quickly as I'd like or a challenge for me too is that my background is in engineering, so can tend to be a bit of a perfectionist with some things. So it's giving up some of that, letting go of the vine, giving some of that up and then it being like, ah, that's not the way that I would have done it. But I think this is going to work. So it's kind of the counter to, you know, other things are happening and it's good. And in many, many cases, probably more cases than that actually ended up being better than what I would have come up with because they made something that will work within what they're doing.

Like that. Like that. So Jordan, one of the things that, you know, I see with visionaries is when they start to, you know, have time to spend, you know, you, you kind of talked about in procurement on kind of more, the more higher level things, right? You start to kind of be able to spend more time and energy in that vision, visionary seat, that visionary place. It feels less like work. And some visionaries struggle with that. You know, it's kind of, they, they feel put out to passion. They don't feel like they're doing as much because it's not as hard for them. Again, it doesn't feel like quote unquote work. I know you're still sitting in that finance seat, so you may not be experiencing that yet, but have you, I mean, have you noticed that, has that question, that feeling kind of popped in your head yet?

Certainly, yeah. I mean, shortly after kind of the initiation of our AC chart and bringing the leadership team on to EOs, there was a, you know, a few month period where we were onboarding and there was transition and it was kind of hectic. And then I felt, at least for six to 12 months I felt like I did have that additional flexibility and freedom. It wasn't needed in every meeting and you know, to talk to every person every second. And so my calendar started having a little bit more flexibility. That changed a little bit as the, you know, I've come back to sit in the finance seat more recently. So there's definitely day to day work there. But I think more than anything, when you're able to make the decisions from a strategic level and when you're aligned with the role that you should be in. And in my opinion, I think, you know, I should be the visionary and I should be working on the high level strategy, relationships, et cetera. That naturally is going to bring a better sense of enjoyment and also just makes me feel like I'm doing the right thing for the business or I'm spending my time on the most valuable thing for the business.

Abby, has that affected your life outside of work?

I mean, I think I do a pretty good job balancing at home and friendships and everything with work. It's always a tough thing, especially for. I'm sure you hear a lot of visionaries to turn off and to shut down, but I'm very regimented about that. When I'm home, I shut my phone off, I don't check my email while my kids are awake and that kind of thing.

That's great.

Weekends are a little bit of a struggle, but it definitely helps to have those ground rules.

Yeah, that's right. How many kids you have?

I've got two daughters living. I have twins as well in my wife's stomach, so we're expecting early January.

Oh my goodness. And the two, not the twins, but the two others are what age?

My six year old daughter, her birthday was yesterday, Madison. And then I've got a three year old, Kennedy as well.

Wow, so you're, you know, visionary young kids. I got to tell you, way too many visionaries don't have the discipline that you've got to turn that phone off and make that time. And so I'm really glad to hear that you're doing that and you're making some structure for yourself to be able to take full advantage of that time with those kids. That's a big deal. So congrats on that. Let's keep making it even better for you. Yeah, I appreciate that, Eric, on your side. So talk to me about conflict. So I mean, you gave the example of Jordan, does a end run, maybe does a little bit of visionary tampering and you pointed out and he goes, yeah, yeah, I confess, I did it. Sorry, I won't ever do it again. Hopefully. But I'm guessing some other times in your same page or whatever, you're coming at something from some really different angles. And so talk to me about that. When there's conflict, when you're just not seeing things the same way, how do you work that out? How do you work through that?

Yeah, I think it's really just a matter of open communication, being honest and direct. I think with us with the AC chart defining the roles, it makes that a lot easier to do that. There have been some situations within the team, you know, even this week I told Jordan, yeah, I told this person, if you went and talked to him, that I told him to come talk to me. So, you know, there's some, some stop gaps too, that we're kind of chucking each other and checking ourselves. But, you know, I think the level of respect say, you know, we both want the same things at the end, which is the success of the company. So it takes some of the heat out of, you know, those situations where it's like, okay, what's, how can we work through this with the best result, the end in mind? And I think we've been pretty good at that for the most part.

Jordan, does that match with your experience of conflict when you're, you know, when, you know, maybe you're really pushing for something and Eric's pushing back, you know, no, we can't do that, or we can't do that right now or whatever, you know, how does that feel for you? What's your experience of kind of working through those kinds of conflict?

Yeah, my wife tells me that I'm not very emotional and that I'm kind of too even keeled all the time. And so if there's a conflict and try to just listen to Eric, his perspective, his point, or the, you know, the people that he's supporting that have a difference in opinion, I don't know if I would say that I will relent on my opinion, but I definitely make my stature known to Eric. And if he still decides that that's not the route he wants to go or he wants to make the opposite decision, I'll fully support him. Usually we're on the, you know, even without the same page meetings, usually we're on the same page. And because the vision and the strategy and the rocks are so clearly defined up front, in our 1 year, 5 year, 10 year, we're always rowing in the same direction. So generally it's small issues and we're able to get past those pretty easily.

Did you, when you, you know, you went through the beginning parts of your EOS implementation and accountability chart, just kind of all the stuff sometimes that causes turnover in the team and some people don't make the transition. Some people, you know, you start to turn the lights on and hold people accountable for things, and some people don't like that. And so did you have that, did you have any turnover? Do you feel that was at least triggered or initiated by the fact that you brought EOS in and really kind of made accountability a big deal.

Yeah, we've certainly had turnover on the leadership team. There were some people that were on originally, I guess of the original leadership team besides Eric and I, there's still two people, I think only two people that were there and the rest have turned over or we've also promoted some people to join the leadership team as well. So I don't know if it's as much about the accountability and the flashlight in the dark as it is just us realizing that this person's not a good fit for this leadership seat or they're not capable of handling all the pressures that come along with that management role.

So who has those hard conversations usually, Eric?

Well, yeah, I'll have those. I don't know that they've necessarily been hard conversations. They've been, you know, again, it's direct. And I think even coming into it, there was some acknowledgement that this is going to drive some change. And even when we decided, you know, is this the right tool for us, we had some other things that we tried that really didn't, you know, give us the traction not to, you know, pull out that word. But we struggle a little bit with traction. And so there's an acknowledgment early on that this is going to drive change. Are we ready for it and is it appropriate? And we said, you know, ultimately it was said those conversations weren't hard because we just, you know, they were just honest two way, you know, conversations with specific individuals.

Yeah, that's the best kind. When it's not a surprise, you know, it's just kind of everybody knows and it's just kind of making it visible and talking it through whatever the reality is.

Yeah, I think some of those situations too, it ended up being kind of a relief to that person. They almost self selected out or it's like, hey, this is really what my passion is. It's not within this role. So we were able to create some better alignment, get people where they fit better.

Love that. So company's still growing fast. You guys are still moving and changing, doing your thing. So look into the future with me a little bit and talk to me about how you see that your visionary and integrator relationship changing over time. So, you know, Jordan, I'll start with you, you know, five years from now, how does it look different, your relationship as a visionary and integrator from what it is today?

Well, I think you have to go shorter than five years. Five years is a long time.

Okay, pick your time Frame.

If we go shorter than that time period, for me, I think it's just continuing to prepare the company to give more of my responsibilities to the leadership team to Eric and allow me to work on the business versus in the business. I think as time goes on, I've been, you know, trying to pull this thing, that thing away from my day to day and I've done a pretty good job of getting some of those things kind of delegated out, but I really need to continue that delegate and elevate process. And you know, Eric is picking up a lot of those things and if he's not, he's then delegating them down to the rest of the leadership team. I think that over the next handful of months will, will continue in such a way that I'll be able to have even more flexibility and free up my schedule to do other things as well.

So how long do we get you out of that finance seat?

Wow, that's a recent change, you know, so I'm looking at probably outsourcing the, the controller finance seat. Right now. We've got a third party in here. So if they can do it, hopefully three to six months, I can transition back out of there.

Okay, so it's not that you're grabbing onto it because you want to, it's just necessity and the transition and so you're focused on that Sounds like.

Yeah, exactly.

That's good. Okay, Eric, same question to you. So, you know, pick your time horizon in the future. How do you see things changing in your visionary and integrated relationship from the way they are today?

I mean, really my mind automatically goes to the team and the development of the team. And I think this is something that it's not, this isn't stagnant. You know, it's not like you arrived and it's like, hey, we're there and let's just kind of ride this out. So I think when you start doing that, that's when problems creep in. So they just the development of, you know, Jordan and my relationship in terms of how we best move the organization forward. But then also we can't do it by ourselves. And there's a strong team that's being built and so just investing more in them, empowering them and making sure that they have the right tools to grow and develop within themselves too. It's going from a huge 30,000 plus global company to a company that has 60 people and then providing some of the same development opportunities can be a little bit of a challenge. It's like, what's my career path. So I think that making that clear to people and having the AC chart, that kind of helps that, hey, you know, maybe I don't make these 10 steps to get to the, you know, where I want to be in my career. But sure, we can provide some development and room for growth, even with what we've got here. So continually changing and growing.

Good. So I want to kind of back your perspective up a little bit. So you've got lots of visionaries and integrators that are listening, that, you know, maybe they're way down the road, maybe they're kind of about the same place you are, or maybe they're just now kind of finding out about this whole structure and thinking, wow, I wonder if this is something good for me, if this is something that I could help with. So you're talking to them. And I want you to think about your visionary integrator journey as it's been so far and kind of the one big lesson or big aha or big discovery that you've had along that path that you could share with one of them. That's going to be really helpful. So whoever comes up with it first, I'll let you start.

Yeah. My perspective is just. Oh, I was first, Eric. My perspective is I think you need two things. You need to have somebody that complements you naturally, which I think Eric and I already had. He was an internal, I was an external. We had a good working relationship. But I think the most important thing is just the communication, getting on the same page, talking about the issues and aligning with the vision up front. That's the foundation for successful relationship. And it's worked really well for us.

Love that. Thanks for that, Eric.

Yeah, I think if something isn't working, making a change, it's not working. Make a change. If that doesn't work, make a change and keep trying to find that missing piece.

So if it's not working, you don't wait.

Don't wait, don't wait. Try something different. Keep going.

So does that apply to people and other things? Think that applies to everything?

Yeah, I mean, within reason. I mean, I think you get into, you know, the right people, right feet. And so I think that, you know, don't wait for that either. And when it's not working, there's probably a better spot and a better way of approaching things. I think that, you know, from a visionary integrator standpoint too, it's. I don't feel like there's a set of rules that work in every situation. I think the guidelines are There. And Jim might not let you be, you know, saying this, you know, on the the call, but it's like, you know, don't let the tail wag the dog. You know, I've heard him say that a couple times, and it's kind of been a little bit of a relief to me because it's like, hey, what are the rules? What are the structure? How does this work? And it's like, you know, what's the best for the relationship? What's the best for the business? And make a change. And make it right.

Good. I like it. If it's not working, make a change. All right, so I really appreciate you guys taking the time to hang out with me for a little bit today and share some of your story. I know that your experiences are going to be helpful again to those folks that are wherever they are in their own journey, kind of. They'll learn something from your experience. It'll help them move along and get a little closer to where they're trying to go. So if somebody wants to get a hold of you, find out more about the business, what's the best way for them to get in touch?

Probably for me. LinkedIn email.

Yep, LinkedIn email, social media. Find mobile defenders online.

Okay.

Or look me up on LinkedIn. Jordan Notenbaum.

Perfect. We'll get to all that stuff in the show notes. So, again, I appreciate your time and to our listeners, I appreciate your time to stop by and enjoy and take in this episode of the Rocket Fuel podcast. Hopefully you've liked it. If you did like it, you know, please leave us a review on whatever platform it is that you happen to be listening on. That helps us get the message to more people that may benefit from hearing what these great visionaries and integrators have to share. So until next time, go Rocket.

Thanks so much for joining me today. I really hope you were inspired by our guests. If you're interested to discover how your current visionary integrator relationship compares to the relationship you'd like, I invite you to go visit rocketfueluniversity.com and take our free crystallizer assessment. You'll get both your visionary and integrator indicators scores, and that's going to help you figure out your next step. You cannot build a great business on multiple operating systems. You must choose one EOS. EOS1 is the simple to use software exclusively from the makers of EOS. By bringing everything EOS into one place, EOS1 allows you to run better meetings, access the foundational tools faster, and build a more accountable. Team One Vision One System One Team. Start your 30 day free trial of EOS One today at eos1.com.