Episode 154: The Three Steps to Profitability with Donna Krech

So I got some exciting stuff for you guys. Yeah, I remember how every time they say, oh, did you load a sound effect mic? I'm like, oh, no, I didn't. Yeah, I did.

What do you do?

I'm not gonna tell you. You gotta figure it out.

Okay.

You gotta figure it out. All right, we had a guess who's popping. All right, let's get ready to rock and roll. Are you ready to kick us off here?

I am ready. You are listening to the Profit first podcast.

This is the big one, episode 154.

Yeah, it is. Oh, I did.

By myself. By myself. I listen to our recordings of these shows. Yeah, I'm the only grunter. Except we had the group grunt, like two or three.

I missed that. I wasn't here for that.

It was underwhelming.

It was really.

That was pretty good. I mean, it was out of. It was not synchronized or organized. It was underwhelming. In regards to when they did it or did you listen to the recording yet?

I listened when they did it. It was underwhelming. Yeah, on the recording it was a.

Lot better because Ryan worked it over like magic.

Well, that's good. Welcome, everyone, to the Profit first podcast. I'm your co host, Christina Bolduck.

And I'm Mike Michalowicz, the author of Profit First. You do have that book, right? For God's sake, get a copy. That was your mom. I was trying to imitate your mom's voice. That was your mom yelling at you. Get a copy. I'm joined in studio by Christina with Christina Bulldog, of course, but also Kelsey Ayers.

Hey, everybody.

And you, my friends, you're listening to the Profirst podcast, the show where we talk about every element of profitability. Today we're gonna be digging into kind of health and how associates directly to profitability. You're gonna hear, I think, a pretty miraculous story of when you master the key elements of health. Managing your time, managing your energy, how it translates to a bigger bottom line.

That's right. You can find us on itunes, Stitcher, Tunein Radio, Google Play, and of course, profitfirstpodcast.com and if you know of any other locations where you can find us, please let us know, because I'm aware that it's everywhere.

Yeah, it's everywhere. On the web, the interweb. Yeah, it's just say that in the notes there that we're anywhere. You listen to podcasts, we should be there. Yeah. If we're missing somewhere, do tell us. All right, before we get into things, I Do a new sound effect and all that stuff. I want to know, cabby, what have you been up to?

Alex and I have to go to a wedding next month because it's wedding season.

Why do you have to.

Well, it's like his best friend, but there's no bridal parties or anything, which I guess is good. But I'm like, I don't know. I know it's kind of old school that you pay for your plate, but is that still the deal? Or do you just kind of give what you can afford? Like, what's the etiquette with that nowadays?

And you ain't got no money? I wouldn't. I don't know.

Well, I think it's sort of pay what you can afford, but make it reasonable, because the thing is, some places, venues.

Well, this is in a backyard.

Okay.

Thank God.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. No. So it's good. But I'm just like, well, we don't have a lot of money, but I don't want to not give anything, so.

I don't want a best friend.

Yeah.

What about a nice gift in lieu of. That's what sometimes I'll do if I'm tight with money. So then it's not like a. You can't easily compare it to what everybody else gave.

Yeah, that's a good idea.

Yeah. I wonder if you make a custom gift.

Yeah.

And then it's much more personable.

Yeah, that's a good idea. Thanks, guys.

Yeah.

What have you been up to, Mike?

I got a foot problem.

Oh.

So I was running. I don't know. I wish people could watch. I'm, like, doing the Bionic man running right now. I'm running, and I wear compression socks, supposedly for performance and for other health benefits. But it squeezes my foot, which never bothered me for years until in the last, like, two years, when I run, it hits a nerve and it starts getting irritated, and it can become excruciating painful. Excruciatingly painful. So this happened about two, three months ago where I started getting this pain. So now I'm like, I can't wear compression socks. But today I went for a run, started getting again, and then I'm feeling it. As a Dr. Moyes, today, I wish you were.

You wish he was there.

This is even a funnier story. I'll update you next week. Tell me to remind you about my Dr. Moyes. It was funny. What have you been up to, Kels?

So, you know I make jewelry, and I heard I got a tumbler to polish with rather than hand Polish.

Oh, nice.

And it is a game changer. I just tried it out for the first time last night and I let it run all night, actually. So this morning I tested to make sure they all came out great, and it was awesome. So it's hours worth of work.

Yeah. Time saver, right?

That's great.

Yeah, it's like set it and forget it.

Good.

Like, what is reality?

You're tumbling.

Yeah.

I always thought you were a tumbler.

I wish I was a tumbler.

Oh, man. So we do have a community shout out. I think we have a recording today, which is awesome. So this comes out from Sarah Jones. Can you take it away there for me, Mike?

Sure, Sarah, what do you have to say?

Hi, everyone, I'm Sarah Jones in San Francisco, and I'm the founder of Introverted Alpha. After reading profit 1st of February, I've been saving 1% profit, and I have extra money in my operating expenses account, which has never happened. Also, I paid off a $3,000 credit card, and I only have one final debt of 4,500, which is quickly going down. Two, I am profitable permanently.

Nice.

That's awesome. Congrats, Sarah.

She called our new hotline, and I want you calling, too. Here's what you do. Write this down like I know maybe you're driving right now. It's okay. Pull over, side of the road, put the hazards on. Maybe you're out for a jog. Just stop jogging and Write this down. 8, 4, 4. And I hope when you jog, you carry a pen with you. 8, 4, 4, 8, 7 6. 7,000, 221. That's our new little hotline. 844-876-7221. Give us a call. Tell us how you've implemented profit first or other ways you've achieved profitability. We want to make sure you're permanently profitable and shout it out like I'm permanently profitable.

I want you yelling on the rooftop. On the rooftop.

All right, so that's our new hotline. Also, before we bring in our guest, Donna Krech, I want to thank our sponsors who make the show a reality, of course. So a big shout out to Fundera, Fundbox, Nextiva, Receipt bank, and Xero. And also a special special thank you to American Express. We. I did a show with them called Turning Points. We produced it and put it out there maybe about three, four weeks ago. It is really cool. I've gotten some nice accolades from critics of mine, my best friends. I was talking with some of these guys last night. I went to the forum meeting, the EO4 meeting. I'm sitting down these guys and just we have to give updates of what's going on with business and stuff. I said, oh, I did this thing with American Express. One guy, Joe Spano, he's like in his 50s, but he looks like he's in the 70s. Horrible skin condition. Dr. Moy would have me go to town, who's a dermatologist by the way. And Joe's like your other podcast. Really? I don't like them. But Turning Points, he goes, I loved it. I love it because you finally, you've become a little more mature in your life. Mike. That was his response.

You grow up.

Thanks, Joe. Thanks for the backhanded compliment. You son of a bitch. Okay, so American Express Turning Points, you can download it on any podcatcher today.

Yay. Also, just I want to take a minute to shout out one of our mastery members. This shout out goes out to Leanne Reed, her firm. Instead of reacting to prospective clients and to customers to their historical financials, Leanne and her team came proactively design not only profit, but revenue increases, expense reduction. They evaluate your overall health of your business and the mental health of the business owner. And they are killing it out there. So shout out to you, Leanne. I'm so proud of you.

No, he's professionally dressed like she. She dresses to a tee.

Yeah, it's snazzy.

It is important.

Yeah.

You know, I actually do judge people. You know, don't judge a book by the COVID I judge people by their cover. And when someone presents themselves professionally, I just automatically assume that their work is going to be that much more professional, that much more diligent. Yeah. Dressed like this, no shoes on stuff. I'm like, well, maybe I'm pointing. I'm pointing myself. By the way, her name is Donna Kretch. Do you know that name?

Yeah, I know it.

You know. Do you know that name?

Of course I know it.

She is an entrepreneur extraordinaire, the best selling author. And I always say the best. She is a best selling author, probably the best of the best. And she's an international speaker. Donna kretch has a 30 plus year track record of building multi million dollar companies in the wellness space, the weight loss space and the fitness space. I ran into her at the Robin Robbins run around. I'm thinking of more Rs roundup and it was just blown away by her. These are people who grow different types of membership organizations. I've been blessed to be invited down to learn from these folks. Donna stands Up. It's kind of like, Remember the old E.F. hutton commercials?

No.

No.

Okay, so both of you. Too young. Both of you. Clearly we were not born in the 70s. There were these commercials. They would say, when E.F. hutton speaks, everyone listens. And so there would be these people in this room, like at a dining hall or something. And everyone's talking, it's very noisy, and someone's like, oh, E.F. hutton told me it was a brokerage. And then everyone just go quiet and go, yes. What did E.F. hutton have to say? Well, that's how Donna Kretch is. And she's about to teach us how to become wealthy by mastering our healthy side.

Awesome.

Donna, welcome to the show.

Welcome, Donna.

Now I feel as old as E.F. hutton. So that's good. Good.

Did you remember the E.F. hutton commercials?

You know, here's the deal. I do. I actually remember the E.F. hutton commercials. I do. So that's actually quite a compliment. Mike, thank you so much.

Oh, you're very welcome. Well, it's some powerful stuff you had to say. Now you say health met wealth. When we were doing the kind of pre call and you explained this, this was more than just three words. There was an acronym embedded in there. Can you get kind of lay the scenario out for us?

Okay, so healthy wealth. The breakdown of it is how to have the time, energy and money for the stuff you want time, energy, and money for. Well, here's the deal. Time, energy, and money matters in life. There's no doubt about it. But when it comes to business, it's money, energy, and time. And that acronym is met. So the way we teach this is where health met wealth, where wealth met health. It comes together with the health of your body, the health of your mind, but it is that the money making strategies you use in business to save time to make more money easier. So I mean, truthfully, it's like a big spaghetti and mixture of health and wealth and wealth and health. And it doesn't matter which one's first. It all works because there are specific systems in place that give you more money, more energy, more time.

You know, it's interesting, you just, you, you, you triggered something with me that I've just been hearing recently. Like the only asset we have that's not replenishable is time.

Yeah.

And I just heard from you, Donna, that if we avail more time, that in turn that will bring about more money. Did I hear that correctly?

It's how you use your time. Right? Because we all know there's 24 hours in a day. It doesn't matter if you're rich, poor, sick, healthy. Right? Man, woman, we've got 24 hours. It's how you use that time and what it comes down to. Well, okay. So you talked to E.F. hutton. Mike, let me ask you this question. Do you remember the cliche children don't care about the quantity of time you spend with them? They just care about the quality of time? Do you remember that?

I do.

Yeah. Okay.

And then my mom was spanking.

Poor quality. Listen, pure bs. Bs. Bs. That is bull. Bs.

That was my favorite ever. That was good.

The people we love in our lives want our time. So what I teach is quality at work equals quantity for whatever the heaven you want to do. So your time needs to be productive. The time vampires, you got to keep them away. And one of the biggest time vampires is you can't think. You got foggy brain. You can't find a person's name. You can't remember where the heck you left your keys. You're wasting time in a meeting. You're showing up late for times that need you to be profitable. So it's real time. Yes, but it comes back to even the stuff in your health. So again, we've got systems for the business, systems for the health. They all work together and they make everybody more money. I mean, let me just give you an exact example so there's no wondering what this means. My own story went from about 300 to a half a million a year in production and then soared up through a series of stories to about 4 million a year. Very exciting. Then became unhealthy, dropped back down to 3 million, 2 million, 1 million. Going in the wrong direction. Implemented the healthy wealth systems, Began to teach the healthy wealth systems. And listen, we're. We're. It's $30 million a year now with what our network is doing. $30 million a year.

And what about your time? You still have time to do what you want to do.

Here comes the punchline. I have more time for the stuff in life that matters. I have more time. And the people who work with me and study with me, that's the coolest thing. We're all talking about our life experiences because we have quality at work so we can have quantity for the stuff we want to do.

It's funny, there does seem to be this relationship that when we have less money flowing in and we have some conversations recently around the office around that, that there's less time. Because even the time you do have, quote, unquote, Available. It's all stress, right?

Exactly.

Things aren't working. Things aren't working. What does I do? So tell us the healthy wealthy system, Donna. I want to know it all.

Okay, so look, let's start first with money, right? Where health, met wealth. Let's go with the acronym met. So. So let's talk about money first now. All right, look, I'm. Y' all are going to think I'm kissing up. I'm not kissing up to Mike Michalowicz. What I'm about to say is totally true. Okay, maybe I'm kissing up just a little bit. But anyway, no, Mike shared that we got to know each other through a mastermind group we're a part of. And listen, I studied the profit first system and fell in love with it. So I did an interview with Mike. We do a business meeting each week with the people around the nation that we get to serve. And I told them I was bring on an expert that would teach them how to pay themselves first. So one of the key systems that we teach really is the pay yourself first system, which leads then folks into profit first. I don't think people really get their head around the whole Parkinson's law, right, the behavioral law, that if you have a whole bunch in front of you, you're gonna consume a whole bunch. And if you think you have a whole bunch of time in front of you, you're gonna assume a whole bunch and waste a bunch of time. But if you're really zilling in on being specific and what you have in front of you, then you'll use the specific and you'll achieve your goals more. So we really do teach as one of the systems go get involved in the profit first behavior. But one of the key things that turned everything for us, Mike, was a stand up meeting literally in the morning and literally every morning. And if one of our larger organizations, I mean some of the businesses we serve are like 500 square foot businesses, but some of the businesses we serve are 70,000 square foot businesses and they have 250 employees. So they can't do it just in the morning. They have to do it a couple times a day. But you literally stand, stand up. It's for 15 minutes. And what you do is you hone in on your day or your shift. You start that meeting with your achievements from yesterday. So your personal and or personal achievements. Because everybody's got to be knowing they're performing, they're excelling, they're using their time wisely, they're being quality at work. People. So they share an achievement from yesterday. Everybody in the room, again, you're standing up. Then they go into their number one for the day. And the number one for the day, very simply, is, if you could only do one thing today that's going to produce for you for the business. And don't tell me you have six number ones. You only have one number one. If you could only do one thing today that's going to be the most productive for the business, what would it be? Everybody shares their number one. Now, in our organization, we also share where we are at in production for the month. So everybody, that's. It's the quick check in. Everybody knows the goal. So everybody's checking in. They know their own numbers, and then the team knows the numbers as well. So they start with an achievement. They go to their number one and their production for the month, and then the whole team ends with whatever is positive for your team. I mean, for one team, you may end in prayer. For another team, you might end in the company credo. You might have a cheer. Just something that sends everybody off. Well, yeah, it's a neat way to start the day with super high energy, good use of the morning time, but it gets everybody honed in on what am I going to produce today. It helps the leaders know what to go back and check on if somebody isn't coming through on their production for the day and the next day. Here's what's so cool. Everybody's number goes up and everybody's number goes up every single day. Because you're just building this confidence, this belief that we can do it. And I mean, it's changed everything. I have people come to me, who we get to work with and say, you know, I used to go into my day overwhelmed by my list, and now I overwhelm my list because I hit it so hard. It's just. Yeah, it's cool.

I like that. I like that ending of ending something positive. You said a prayer or cheer. Ironically, we do, too. Most people are praying. We don't cheer. That was horrible. So let me ask you this, Donna. Why stand?

Oh, listen. Well, that's a perfect lead in. Thank you so much. Because you don't want to waste any time. I mean, I mean, listen, here's the deal. If you stand, your energy is higher, you talk faster, you're more enthusiastic, but you're going to. It's a way to hone in on the goal. I mean, I just told you guys, right? There are three steps. We start with achievements. We go to number Ones in production we end with. In our case, it's prayer and a cheer. It's the credo. Right? But there are three steps, and that's how every single goal should be. If you want to make money, you can't be vague about your goal. I mean, look, what you teach, you say, hey, if you can only start with 1%, right? It's specific. So it's very specific. 15 minutes, that's all the longer we've got. And we have teams. So sometimes in the morning of 35 people and 15 minutes, we're in, we're out, we're done. It's specific. Don't sit on your butt. Start your day standing on your feet. You know, you're gonna go take on the world and get something done.

Is everyone giving an update? And There's a whole 35 people. Wow.

Yeah, Every single. But, but now listen, this is something that we teach. So they know. They know when you come into tomorrow morning, come in with a Lycran achievement, come in knowing you're number one in your production. And then, I mean, the whole team is going to get together for the end piece. So they have to come just knowing two things. Now, the person who's the leader in the group has to know the cumulative production. So when it comes to he or she, their number one is their number one. But they are going to give the cumulative production. So the whole team knows where the team is at with comparison to the goal for the month.

That makes sense.

Yeah. And then, I mean, is the whole point of this to keep it positive, keep things going? Everyone's on the same page. But what do you do? I mean, is there an accountability aspect where if someone doesn't reach their goal for that day, I mean, does that kind of bring a negative thing? Or like, I know for here we do like push ups. If you didn't do your goal, like. Or is this just simply, you know, keep it positive. This is what we have going on.

So. Brilliant question, brilliant question. This particular meeting is only to keep things high, okay? However, there's always a leader in the room. So that leader is the one who is going to check on stats. Or we call it what's the score? Right? So the leader is checking on stats throughout the day and checking on the performance of the person that made that promise. And then at the end of the day, or whatever time they have determined, there is a report given, maybe it's electronic, maybe it's face to face, voice to voice, whatever. But there's a report given from the Person that made the commitment to themself. That's another thing. We've got a whole system for how you check the score with a scan throughout the day, that should be systematic and then how you take the final score of the day. And again, that should be systematic as well. But one of the key factors, guys, is that we tell folks, and I say this all the time to my teams, you are not making a commitment to me. You are making a commitment to yourself, which is the most important commitment you can make. So don't you pie in the sky. This because I'm gonna come around later and say, what the heck, you know, you said you're gonna do eight, you've done one, but don't you play small? Don't you say you can do one if you know that if you stretch, you can do three? No pie in the sky, no playing small. But yeah, brilliant question. You go around later, after the standup meeting, you do periodic scans checking the score of each person that made the promise. And then there is a key point where you're checking the score of the whole business to see where they ended up for the day.

Now, I think the answer may be obvious, but not connecting it exactly yet to profit. So I want to know, how does this, Donna, the standup meeting link to profitability for a company?

Okay, so you, the leader is going to report on production for the month, right? So everybody knows where that revenue point should be. And the leader knows the expenses and the categories of expenses. So the leaders shooting for a profit goal. And if you have department heads, they're shooting for a profit goal as well. So when we sit down with every team member to determine what their goals are, their individual goals, I mean, listen, some people have a conference room in our company, we have a solution room. And in our solution room, we have all over the walls these huge, the great big, huge post it notes from every one of our team members. And they've got their dreams and their goals up on these huge post it notes. So now the leader is going to sit down with you if you're a team member, but and go over your goals and then do what I call backwards math to come up with what kind of performance, what kind of production you need to have to end up with the time, energy and money that you want. So now me as the leader, I put all my team's production goals together. It always blows away my goal. Always. Now my goal is tied to profitability. So now when I come back and I check what you said you were going to Do a stand up against what your score is, how you're actually performing for the day. I'm going to be able to talk to you about achieving your goals. But I know that my profitability is totally tied to this. Does that make sense?

It does. Did you disclose the revenue and profitability like open book management or do you.

Suggest with our leaders? Absolutely. Yeah. So if you are a leader overall, we disclose profit for the whole business. If you are a leader of a department, we disclose profit for the whole department. But I do have to tell you that the department head's profit share or profit bonus is relative to the whole business profiting. So if that whole business doesn't hit its numbers just because that particular department did, it's not a big win. I mean, we have to keep the team effort going. Everybody has to know that the team has to win. Now let me not only focus on the business systems that tie to profit, because there's something really important people don't talk about a lot.

What's that?

And that is just where you are personally and the things that could get in the way of profit that you don't realize. And this is where the word energy comes in. Okay. Too often we've got, we don't have any mental clarity. We've got foggy brain. Right. We don't know what the heck's the matter with us. Like we're going into a meeting and we can't remember for sure what we were gonna say. Or we're in the middle of a meeting and we're wondering if we said this or, or that already. If we're sitting down. Go ahead.

Oh, no, no, I was just saying bazinga, you're spot on. Keep going. Yeah, okay, I was emphasizing your point and I ruined it. Keep going.

So no, actually I like bazinga. I'm gonna jump right off of the word bazinga. Okay, so you don't know what you're thinking. Like I said, you walk into a room, can't remember why the heck you walked into the room. You know, you shouldn't be wasting time, but you find yourself being busy with a bunch of stupid stuff. Stuff. And you're not even sure why. It's usually because you're vague in the world of tactics, but in the world of health and energy, bottom line, if a person's over 35, and it's not that it's not true, under 35, but if a person is over 35, there are three trends that we have now seen that are going to completely nail your Productivity, which means your profit's going to be nailed. Okay? Over 35 a person used to be able to be clear, be on their game. High production, high performance. And with regard to weight, they could just drop weight effortlessly, right? Okay. Now all of a sudden this first trend we see is they can't, they can't think, they can't sleep, they don't feel good. Sometimes they can't lose any weight no matter what they do, right? They just can't fix it. Right? Second trend we see is, well, you know, they go take a production course or a memory course or something or learn how to have a meeting course, like a stand up meeting. And they get the tactics of it, but they can't zone in, they don't have the energy, they're not able to stay consistent with it. And again with, regarding, with regard to weight, they might be able to lose a little, but they might be working out like crazy, eating all the things they know they're supposed to eat, but they can't, they just get stuck. The last trend is people who never had any of these problems like, like they just, they were super performers. This is where healthy wealth came from because this was me. Like I just, I just, by the grace of God, man, I just, I was just successful and it came from nothing. So I, my heart was full of gratitude for everything I was achieving, but it's like I couldn't wrong. I just kept adding businesses and building multimillion dollar companies. I had amazing people around me and I was like quote unquote, no pun intended on my game. And then all of a sudden, I don't feel good. Actually it got worse. I couldn't walk.

Geez.

Actually got worse. My whole body was writhing with pain. Couldn't think. Talk about foggy brain. I couldn't remember literally from one minute to the next what I had just been thinking about. I'd pick up my phone to text somebody. Couldn't remember what I was gonna text them. Couldn't remember what I was gonna do at a meeting. I couldn't walk. My skin, it's so bad. Scratch it till it bled. My hair's falling out and shocks. I'm stressed all the time. Sorry. My ex girlfriend, I'm stressed out of my mind all the time. Can't sleep. It's all bad. It's unhealthy. It's unhealthy, right? What I found out guys, and this is the third trend, I never had any weight to lose. I mean I look down, I've got weight around my belly we do a little testing, find out what the heck's wrong with me. There's no. Nobody knows. Do more testing. Nobody can figure it out. Then I got together with a stress hormone expert because of a product that we were creating with our wellness company. And I found out through my own cortisol testing my adrenals were burnout. I mean, burn out.

That's the. What does that mean exactly? I'm just so not okay.

So some people are in adrenal fatigue. You don't even know that. Like if you're a go getter and you're out there and you're an entrepreneur and you're in business, I, I can almost guarantee you, I mean, we have a self ass people can take and if you want to go all the way to a cortisol test, you can. But pretty much everybody's in adrenal fatigue because you're going after your goals, right? And it's not a big deal, it's not really going to harm you. But if you move into adrenal exhaustion, that's where you're starting to go. Wait a minute. Why am I not clear headed? Why can't I remember things? Why is my energy not high? Why am I not on my game like I used to be? If you go all the way to adrenal burnout, that's where you start having symptoms show up. I mean, I'm not kidding that I would look at my phone knowing I was gonna text somebody and I couldn't remember what I was gonna text. And that's just the small stuff, right? If you got all the way to the end of adrenal burnout, here's what they said to me. Look, Donna, if you don't do something, the next phase is death.

Jeez.

Adrenal failure is you're done. You can't function without your adrenals. So now, I don't know, kids. It's a little hard to profit if you're dead.

Supposedly. Supposedly. Bazinga. Bazinga. Bazinga. For that.

Mike, I think we should co author a book that says it's hard to profit if you're dead. Our next book. And the bottom line is you can treat this adrenal thing. Everything came back. Energy was back. I mean, I felt like a new person again. I was innovative. I was leading my team. I felt. Felt incredible. Life was exciting. More and more money and I mean, when, when I was going through that unhealthy wealth piece, standups, I gotta tell you, they were kind of a joke. They were Kind of a joke. People would show up and, you know, somebody talk about an achievement and somebody say, well, I didn't run out of gas last weekend and it was ridiculous. But I mean, when you are passionate about what you're doing, you're passionate about making profit so that you can make a difference in the world, right? Then you're going to hold your team to a set of standards. And if you don't feel good or if your brain is foggy, or you don't know how to organize your time, then you're not going to hold your team yourself or anybody else around you to those set of standards. Profit's going to be in the toilet and the money's just not going to be there. I mean, it's amazing how the right systems, healthy systems at work and then healthy systems for your body all tie together and you feel incredible. But you also have again, the structure, right? The stand up meeting, the check in the pulse, the taking the score and everything ties back to making more money easier.

So, okay, let's get back to the health. Specifically, I gotta finish out your story. How did you turn things around? Because I've seen you present, you got more energy. I think you were karate kicking people as you were speaking like you had full energy. You look extraordinarily healthy. What was the turnaround?

Well, really, I'm not. I mean, it. Okay, it was because I started getting sick. I didn't feel good and couldn't figure out what it was. And I have amazing people around me, Mike. So it wasn't like if Donna went away, everything stopped. But the leaders needed, you know, to keep that innovation going, to keep the vision going. And I wasn't able to participate. I mean, again, my adrenals were fried, completely fried. So my experts were saying, look, you just got to stay away from everything for a while so that you can begin to rebuild your body. And they gave me some, some natural products to take, which we now offer. And I felt amazing. But the thing is, when I wasn't around, it wasn't just my energy that was missing, the systems weren't being used. And so when I came back and said, look, I'm not back to, quote, unquote, save the day, I'm back to say these systems always work, but you guys have to continue to use the systems. And I think the real turning point, quite frankly, is that I realized as long as myself or a couple other leaders were making sure the systems were being used, everything was fine. But I then realized I had to make sure every team Member really understood these systems and money would just continue to grow even if a key leader had to be away for a while. It was a turning point. I mean it. Money skyrocketed in that next year. One year.

Yeah.

Money skyrocketed like it hadn't in a.

25 year career because of the implementation. And you saw the importance of systems.

Yeah, because of again the stand up meeting. But again, I mean, and I've shared the pieces guys, and there's, there's not no secret veil here. I'm sharing. Start with an achievement, but the achievement is a personal achievement. Then go to your number one and where your production is for the day relative to your goal. And then you end with something positive. But remember that after everybody in the room talks about their number one for the day in their production, that leader goes over where we are relative to the whole goal for the month. And then throughout the day that leader is scanning to check the score. To go back to what we talked about earlier. Are you fulfilling the commitment you made to yourself? And then at the end of the day the overall score. Did you fulfill the commitment you made to yourself? Revenue just increases. And with the department heads being rewarded for their profitability, expenses are kept in line and profit goes up. Well, you know what, here's probably a bazinga for us. Here we go. We worked with one team. I'm not going to say this is everybody, but this, this was the record holder. We worked with one team that went up 700% in profit in the first year. We worked with them with implementation.

That one system of the standup.

One system.

Wow.

Yeah.

Let's see if that's a bazinga. Let's see if you got it.

The stand up.

One second. Oh, you got it. You got it. Unbelievable.

So now let me stand up. And keeping score. Let's not forget keeping score and keeping score through the day because that's, that's what makes everything increase on an ongoing basis.

And that's the. So we do the stand up, we don't do the keeping score during the day.

Right. So what if you don't have like a quantifiable production number?

So there's, if you are a person that is in just service, we always have something that still can be sold. But if you are a person, an administrative person, let's say, or an amazing assistant. Right. Then your production is relative to a couple of things. Your deadline, getting something done by deadline, getting it done correctly by deadline, it may be your measurable because there's gotta be a Measurable. Now, my amazing assistant, she watches we count lives. Now, a lot of businesses call them leads, we call them lives, and we count the lives that we touch each day. So when she comes to the stand up meeting, she is reporting the number of lives we increased from yesterday. And everybody's pumped because everybody knows that our goal is 10 million lives. So as she comes and she shares, we're at 1 million, 1.2 million, 1.350. And as she's sharing that, everybody's getting more and more pumped. Now, she's not quote, unquote, quote production because she's, you know, at my hip. She's my literal right arm, left arm, right leg, left leg. But. But she's completely tied to it because she's reporting to them a number that matters to everybody.

You know, the world supply of ink just dropped. As you said, it's not leads, it's live. We all start scrolling down like that is absolute genius because just that little shift in, in the words you use has a massive impact on what you perceive, how you're serving others. But. All right, so I understand this system, Donna. We have pay yourself first stand up meetings. And number three, was it the health? You also mentioned time, I thought. Did I misunderstand that?

Yeah. So it comes back to what I was saying earlier, guys. That, that whole quality time, quantity thing that we were told when we were raising kids or when I was raising my kids, it's bs. Everybody that you love in your life wants your time. It's not just your kids, it's your significant other, your parents, if they're still here, siblings, friends, you want time. You know, I mean, I mean, I love what Jim Rohn used to say. He'd say, man, seek to have a Manhattan in Manhattan, seek to eat a Idaho potato in Idaho, Seek to enjoy a baked Alaska in Alaska. I mean, I love that. So we all need to realize nobody's promised tomorrow. And there are things that you want to do that you want to experience. Now, maybe it's go scale the Grand Canyon, but maybe it's not. Maybe you want to make a recording of your memoirs for your kids, but there are things you want to do that if you don't avail yourself of quantity time for you, you're not going to get them done. They're not going to be important. So the quality at work, time. It's another system that we teach, making time work for you instead of you work for time. And in that system, there are three steps. One, you need to do a time study. So inside of the time study, you're going to take three days out of your life and each time you change an activity, you're going to write down the time and the activity. And I mean like activity, like not, not 6:00am Got ready for work. 7:00am Left for work. No, no, no, no. 6:00am I went to pee. 6:01, I got in the shower.

I thought I said 6, 20, finish peeing.

So, and then when you get to work, obviously you really start breaking down each time you change an activity. Not 11 to 12, I checked email. 11 to 1102, email from Jay. 1102 to 1107 email from Alicia. And response. Every time you change an activity, when you do this for three days, you're going to be able to look and see where the time is being invested and where it's being spent. Where's the time being invested in production? Where's the time being spent on something a time vampire sucked the life out of you in? So step one is do the time study. Step two is look at the time study and see where your top three areas of best production are. Where do the top three areas of your highest production lie? Because again, you're gonna have a lot of time wasters. You're gonna have a lot of busy talk. It used to be called what water cooler talk. I don't know what the heck it's called now. It's probably called social media talk. I don't know. Where, where is your. Where did the top three areas of your production show up when you look at that three Daytime study. And then step number three, start booking appointments with yourself. We call it time chunking. Taking your top three areas of responsibility, your top three what, are always going to end up being your number ones for the day and putting them into your calendar throughout the week. And then, quite frankly, what I call being healthy, selfish with those meeting times. Because if you have quality at work, quality time at work equals higher production and profitability, and quality time at work equals more quantity, time for living life. I went, you know, I went to the. I went to game three of the playoffs, the Cavs game in Columbus or in Cleveland. And I don't know if you guys remember it. It's the one where LeBron forgot how to play basketball. That was the.

Yeah, I didn't watch it. I heard about it.

Yeah, I was yelling at him. I'm sure he was listening.

I'm sure that helped. Your adrenals are failing, LeBron. Your adrenals.

Listen, we stayed overnight in Cleveland and I was checking out the Next morning, and this absolutely gorgeous woman was at the counter at the front desk, and I'm checking out. Her name was Kenya. She was beautiful. And I go, kenya, wow. I said, is your family from there, or did your mama just give you this gorgeous name? She goes, no, my mama just gave me this gorgeous name. I said, it is a beautiful name. She said, but you know what? I'm planning to go there someday. I go, why someday? She goes, well, you know, I'm busy and I'm saving my money. I said, whoa, whoa, whoa. Why someday? She goes, well, I do take little trips, and I do get away, and I put some money back, and I go take these tiny little, like, weekend trips. I said, whoa, Kenya, why someday? When is someday? And she just kind of looked at me, and I said, look, I need you to get your head around something. You do realize none of us is promised tomorrow, right? You know that, right? You guys, she looked at me and she goes, you know what? Kenya is my next trip.

There you go.

Nice.

Donna, why don't you rename yourself Boonton and come. Come visit us here? We got. Believe it or not, time flew by. We got it going. Donna, before I let you go, though, I know so much more to share. I know a lot of it's available through your websites and all that stuff. Can you share all the ways our listeners can contact you and learn more about you?

Okay, so listen, if somebody is interested in learning more about our systems and healthy wealth, the. Probably the. The wisest place to go to help your business make money is going to be Adamillion.com so it's a D D a million Adamillion.com you can certainly find me at Donna Kretch.com or on Facebook. I'm hanging out there a lot, and you can kind of get to know me a little bit more. If you're really interested in figuring out, hey, are my adrenals an issue? Is this foggy brain thing? Because I got something going on, but I like to lose £20 in 30 days. Go to 2030 fast track. When it's 2030 f a s t R A C K fast track. And it just depends. Do you want to start with your money? Do you want more energy? Do you want more time? All the products that I talk about, they're, you know, they're all out there somewhere. You connect to us. You'll be able to find making time work for you or whatever. Thing sounded great to you.

Great. Do it. It'll all be in the show notes. I'm telling you, my dear listener, even if you don't know, if you want something that Donna has to offer, for God's sake, go there and spend the time to see how she's doing it, because she is the definition of what she just taught you. So. And the stuff is pretty cool because I've checked that myself. So, Donna, thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I love being here. Bazinga.

Bazinga. There you go. I love it. All right, Christina, give me a punch.

Boom.

You gave me. You perfectly timed that with the music.

I did.

I'm good. All right, so here's the deal, Leo.

Christina, what's the deal?

In a second, we're going to recap what we learned. We're going to. Let's see what else we're going to do.

Let's pretty much share corporate partners.

Partners. Yep. And, oh, I put the American Express promo here, so I'll just say it again. Well, I. I thought I. I'm just all messed up, but it says dear Mike. Say American Express. Why did I write dear Mike?

Dear Mike.

So the. Oh, dear Mike, Talk to yourself. Yeah, do listen to American Express. Go to turning points. You can go on itunes. Stitcher River. Just type in Turning Points. It's up there with S Town. Have either of you heard of S Town?

No.

Are you kidding me?

No.

You got to download this podcast.

Okay.

Write it down. Estown. It is a careening story about a murder that ends up not being a murder and ends up being something else. It's in Alabama. And the opener is this guy that lives down in Alabama. I'm about to swear he lives in Alabama. He sends his letter into a crime investigator podcast, guy named Brian Reed, and he says, there is a murder that happened here in shit's town, Alabama.

Oh, yes, I do vaguely remember.

He goes to shit's town or town Alabama, and he keeps, like, disparaging this town where he lives.

Yeah, really.

Brian Reed goes down there, ends up the main character is not the person that purportedly to the murder. It's the guy who's calling in, and it's his bizarre path. 6 hours binge. Listen to it.

Yeah, Yeah, I do remember hearing about that great show.

But then the turning points after you hear about this murder, then really turn up the heat and listen to me talk about business. All right, let's talk about our corporate partners. But here's the dealio, and then we're gonna do our recap.

Okay.

I'm gonna embed during the corporate partners the sound effect.

I promise oh, nice.

Okay, I'm not gonna tell you when. Okay, so first, corporate partners. Who?

Fundera.

Oh, my God. I haven't talked. I haven't seen them actually in a little bit. They weren't at the last trade show I was at.

What are you doing, Meredith?

No, they're. Because they're kicking butt. They don't need to go out there. Fundera is a one stop shop for loans. So if you need a loan for your business, our own podcast production company, Podfly, got, I think it's a $50,000 loans from Fundera within 24 hours. So one stop shop. You go, you fill out the form, they come back to you with 5, 6, 10 loan options, but they also advise you on which one's the best choice.

That's awesome.

Give me another one.

Receipt.

Oh, my God. I didn't expect that. I was wearing the Receipt Bank T shirt at the. Yeah, I saw that Banana went to Savannah Bananas. I threw out the first pitch, and I'm kind of shaking my hands here because it really wasn't the first pitch. I threw out a toilet paper roll.

It was awesome.

It was awesome.

Yeah.

And I was wearing the Receipt bank shirt in the stands. I'm getting pictures and I'm about to go out there, and Jesse's like, where's your Savannah Banana shirt? I'm like, I don't know. Stripped in the stands and everyone looked away. You just see. You just see people go like, what's wrong? What's wrong? They didn't want to see my moobs. And then I threw on the Savannah mini shirt throughout the picture. But Receipt bank people came up to me and said, what's that shirt you ripped off? They were more interested in the shirt than the boobs. And I told them about Receipt Bank. What Receipt bank is.

Yeah.

Is it allows you to scan in all your receipts and actually other documents and ties it into your accounting platform. It's the best way to track receipts. No more shoebox.

Cool. Can you tell me about nextiva?

I can right after this. Oh, what is this sound effect? I'll play it again.

Oh, that sounds familiar.

One more time. Now you two think about it. I'll. I'll keep cruising through and then you just think about that.

Can you give us a hint? Is it like, oh, all right.

So next. Next. That was a hint too. Nextiva is a voiceover IP phone system. Is a phone system we use. I love them. Ron's upgraded to the highest end phone system, and I'm a little bit jealous. But the one I use which is now four years old. I think the actual phone. Freaking awesome. It's voice over ip. Get the highest end quality phone system at a low price point. Check them out. Nextiva.com. do you guys guess yet?

Fun.

Is it Jason?

I was just gonna say yes.

Nailed it. No, not from Halloween.

Freddy versus Jason.

Yes, it is Jason from Freddy versus Jason, But Jason's not from Halloween. You were about to say it.

Friday the 13th.

Yes.

Cha Ching. You nailed it. All right, next company is Receipt Fund. We didn't do Fund Box. It's a cash flow accelerator.

Yeah.

So anyone listening? If you have, just listen to me. If you have an invoice that's due to you and you're like, God, I cannot stand. I can't get this money. And you're panicked, call Fundbox. Don't call a client and do that old. Could you please send me half the money? I'm down for it. Call. It doesn't work. Call Fundbox. They give you all the money up front. Then you go through your normal collections process. When you get the money from the client, you return to Fundbox. It's a great way.

It's awesome.

And then anyone else? 0. 0 is a cloud accounting platform. And it's official. We're wrapping up with Zero. This is their last. There is one more sponsorship thing and then done. No, Yeah, I know, I know.

It's a bummer.

I know. I'm a little bit disappointed. But I'll tell you one thing I'm not disappointed about how good their software is.

That's true.

It is awesome. So as they depart ways with us, at least for the near future, I hope they come back to ProfitCon. I'm trying to talk with them. It doesn't look like they're going to this show, but until they come back, check out Zero software. I definitely recommend you download it. Try it out. It is the most advanced cloud accounting platform out there.

Super easy to use too.

Yeah, exactly. Recap what we learned.

Oh, yes.

So Europe, what are you. What do you got? Kelsey, what are you.

I love the whole thing in general. I like being more intentional about your time and prioritizing the big things that really matter, which are the people in your world. So I like that she has a method, a program that focuses on that. But I love the time study. So I've seen that before and I've thought about doing that, but I'm like, that takes so much time.

The irony.

It takes time to map out my time.

Your whole time study. What did you do? I was tracking my time. Tracking my time. You repeat over and over. You're in a loop.

Yeah, it's like.

Exactly. Still tracking my time.

I'm writing down how much time.

I started writing this down.

Now I'm thinking about what I wrote that.

But I do think it's an effective way to see how you're spending your time and how you can be more effective about it.

Would you be willing to do a time study here?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I would be, too. Can we do. Can we do that? Like, hold each other accountable to that? Okay. When are you back in the office? Tomorrow. Oh, you're off tomorrow and then you're off Friday.

Yeah.

I mean, you're absolutely working from home tomorrow.

Right.

Okay. Because why were you here today?

Because Ashley here for the podcast, son. Oh, my God.

Did you call my son? I love son. Did Ashley work today?

She did, so I had to come in today instead of talking.

You are good. Good. Okay, so let's do the time study. If you're up to.

Yeah, let's do it.

What'd you learn today?

Oh, man. You know, 24 hours is 24 hours, no matter what economic status you are, to use it wisely. And, you know, quantity at work is. I'm sorry?

No.

Quality at work is quantity at home, which I think is. Or, you know, in general, whatever you want to do, which I think is overlooked quite often.

Yeah. What I heard very clearly is that time and money run hand in hand.

Yeah.

And the money you have can avail more time, but more time avails you to think in a new way, to make more money.

Yeah.

There's this really interesting relationship. So I encourage everyone that's listening in really investigate your time. And she gave you some great hacks. I mean, the stand up meeting is a great communication method. You know what this replaces is the sit down meeting. Whereas around the table, one person pontificates, you know, the owner, me, for an hour. Oh, we should be doing this. And this, everyone just sits there like, drooling. This is a really. We use this tool here. It's a very effective way to get everyone to think what's going on. So there you go. You can drive your profitability if you manage your time. And if you manage your time, you'll drive more profitability. All right, kiddos, I think that's it, right?

I think so.

Leave us a comment. Tell us what you think. Tell us what your biggest takeaways are. Leave us a rating on itunes or stitcher, any podcaster, and of course, profitfirstpodcast. Dot com. We want to chat with you.

Oh, my God, do we? And don't forget that hotline number.

Oh, yes.

I mean, you just learned a tip. Maybe you figure out. Maybe you do the time study and. Oh, my gosh, if I stop doing this, I got more time and I can make more money. You can call our Hotline, tell us, dial 844-876-7221. And that, by the way, by the way, spells out I'm very profitable. I think if you dial I'm very profitable. On your phone, I'm not even close.

Don't listen to him. Please don't listen to him.

He'll die. Like some, like, porn line or something.

Oh, goodness. You know where else they have to go?

Where?

Proffessional.com.

How did I forget? It's on my show. Notes right in front of me. For God's sake. Promote the company. Company you own. Go to profitfirstprofessionals.com. here's why you should go there.

Right?

We have Leanne Reed.

Yeah.

We have 146.

Seven something.

Yeah. And I shouldn't even say the specific number because, like, every day goes up a little bit or sometimes someone leaves. Sadly, most times more people join us. And it's good and it's beautiful. But here's the deal. We have 140 plus profit first professionals, people who've been trained in profit first and then maintain certification. If you don't maintain it, that's when you got to leave. So maintain the certification with us. And now are delivering profit advising strategies to companies just like yours. And some of these folks specialize in your niche. If you own a lawn mowing business, we have Lori. If you own an Amazon reselling business, we have Cindy. If you are a plumber, we have the other Cindy. It just keeps going on and on. Go to profitfirstprofessionals.com. that's step one. Step two, fill out the form. Step three, I like when I do it that way.

It's funny.

Step three, we will have a phone call and we'll discuss it. I'm sorry. Actually, we'll make an introduction. You'll have a phone call with our Profit First Professional. Now, these are independent organizations. They're not part of the Profit First Professionals. They've been certified in our methodology. So you can. You're not obligated to use one of our members. You got. You're obligated to find out if it's a fit, though. So go to private first professionals.com, fill out the form. We'll make the introduction. You're obligated to see if there's a fit. This person can help you drop drive your business to the highest levels of profit ever. And if they do, well, golly be Joe G. Williger, I'd hire him.

I like that.

What was that?

Jolly, jolly dolly. All right, let's get out of here. One final word from Jason. There we go. All right. Yeah. Jason caused that. All right, let's come back out of this.

If we come back out, do we live?

Yeah, we did. We did. I'm whipping it out. Okay, here we go. We're back. All right, we'll see you guys later.

Bye.

Bye.