Hiring and Building Great Teams with Dr. Sabrina Starling

There is an event that you need to come to if you're struggling with profit. It's called Profit first Live. It's held right here at our offices, and we make sure that you're doing profit first. Right. Maybe you've read the book, but are you really doing it right? Well, in short, I teach it with my colleagues here at our offices in Boonton, New Jersey. All you need to do is sign up. There's, I think, two more events this year, so go to profit first live dot com. All right, my friends, it's time for you to strap on your sprinkly hanger. That makes no sense.

No.

God, you guys are horrible. That was a terrible one. Your sprinkly hanger. But because we're about to discuss hiring for contractors the right way. All right, there we go. Oh, it's loud again. That's so loud. You know, before it was quiet. Oh, my God. The audio sounds. I hope it didn't blow out our system.

Oh, my God.

Hey, everyone, I'm Mike Michalowicz. I'm on a very specific mission is to eradicate entrepreneurial poverty. There's so many versions of this. There's financial poverty. There's time poverty, there's happiness poverty. You know, the entrepreneurial journey can be much easier if it's simply simplified, and that's what we do in the show. So I want to welcome you to Entrepreneurship Elevated. And I'm joined in the studio by the whole crew this morning. So welcome Kelsey.

Hi, friends. Find us on itunes, Stitcher, tunein, radio, Spotify, iheartradio.com, any podcast or anywhere.

And you're dressed very professionally today. Yeah, it's nice. It's fire, and I like. I love that color necklace, so it's my favorite. Is that turquoise?

It is indeed.

I nailed it. Finally. Aim, how about you? How you doing?

I'm good. I'm good.

What necklace is that?

I really love that.

It's. I'm faux silver. It's silver.

Yeah. But what's the. What's. The ornamentation is like flowers.

It's actually the second half of these earrings, which were way too large, so I took it off and made it into a necklace.

That's how you do it. Am.

Thanks.

I don't know if you guys know Amy has half an earlobe. Did you guys know that?

Yeah.

Did you know that, J.

No. You know?

Yeah, yeah. Don't you remember that story?

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Now I do.

Cursed you out with that before high school.

Ripped it right out of here.

Oh, God, yeah. That's awful.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And talking about it.

Jason Cologne, how are you doing?

I'm good.

Yeah, Good. Good to have you back. You wiped out on your motorcycle. That's good to see you.

Yeah, I'm alive and kicking still, dude.

So I'm on the phone with J. Blown. And I'm like, how you doing? He's like, I'm good, I'm good. Which what you were doing yesterday, Kelsey, with your neck out. I said, how you doing? I'm fine, I'm fine. And then Amy blurts out. She threw out her back.

No.

You could barely move. She was doing that, like that old person spin where you don't turn your neck or your shoulders. You just kind of turn your waistline and your eyes try to look around corners, you know?

It's a testament to her youth that she is like this today already, though.

I know she's fine.

Or would be three weeks.

Three weeks in the hospital.

Today.

I go, how you doing? She's like, I'm good, I'm good. And Jay Shablon, I'm on the phone. I'm like, hey, man, how you doing? He's like, I'm good, I'm good. Like, what happened? And you wiped out on your motorcycle?

Yeah, it was. It was intense. It was. It was a learning experience, I guess.

And so I go, well, you said it was. Rite of passage was the exact words you used. Because. Because I go, dude, so I guess you're done riding motorcycles. And you're like, no, that's a rite of passage. And you went back on the bike the next day.

You have to. Because in other words, you're scared.

You gotta get back on the horse.

The nice thing is I got scared before I ever rode a motorcycle.

Yeah, exactly. Me too.

Yeah. Kelsey, what have you been up to?

I went to Lake Ontario this weekend.

Oh, yeah?

Yeah. It was so great. I mean, I actually. I went to Niagara Falls, so technically it's second time, but it's the first time I was just on the lake and it is so beautiful and massive and awesome. It was great.

That's awesome. Yeah, that's in the Adirondacks.

No, it's further. Yeah.

Than that. Yeah, that's up there.

It's between Canada and New York State.

Okay.

All right, I was gonna answer. Did you camp or did you?

No, we got a house right on the water.

Yeah.

So I want to. One thing. Our core sponsors make this show a reality. Our sponsor, it's next. Eva.

Wait, why am I the only person who talked about themselves. Is that not weird to anybody else?

No, no, I know.

He just knows about us.

It is kind of weird, right? So anyone else want to share any updates? How you doing, Amy?

Crickets.

I knew it was crickets. I knew crickets. No. I'll tell you what's going on with Amy. I didn't want to bring this up, but now I have to. Thank you, Kelsey. She's going to abandon her son. His first day of high school. Right. His first day of high school is coming up, which is probably was the most important day of most young adults lives.

He's probably terrified. He's probably absolutely terrified and excited. Skinny, scrawny little guy going into high school. And then his mom and dad are gonna go take a vacation on that day. And he's so funny.

To an empty house, if I recall. Because Chris gave me a call, your husband, and said, oh. So I was talking with Amy and Amy asked John Henry, your son, when's your first day of school? And he's. What was it, September 5th or something? She goes, September 5th. And he's like, okay. And then booked right there in that moment, said, we're leaving.

Clicked.

Yeah. Good luck, kid. That's the youngest. That's how you treat him. How you been doing?

Good. I went camping over the weekend.

Where'd you go?

Nice.

Yeah. So it was western Penn, near. It's Ricketts Glenn State park.

Oh, yeah.

Like 27 waterfalls or something.

Wow, that's so great.

Yeah. But this is just another waterfall.

Oh, that's amazing.

Some of them are big, like 60ft.

Wow. We gotta go.

Serious water. It's beautiful. But then I booked a campsite that was on private land on a horse farm.

Whoa. Romantic.

And I didn't realize how far back in the woods it was.

Yeah.

And there were coyotes at night and it was picking up black.

That's scary.

It was freaking.

Were you with a friend or.

Yeah, but it was still completely, like it's completely dark and you hear. And then it gets closer and then they get. They're barking.

Oh, man. Like, surrounding.

No, no.

So like I got out of the tent and I was like, yeah, yeah. I was like yelling like, get away, get away.

So the person you were with, if you gone to a sprint, can you outrun them?

I think so.

Okay. You're safe. They're. You're safe. They say all you have to do is be faster than the slowest person.

But they're cool. Coyotes are cool. It's just they're. The noises they make are freaky. So if you don't know it's a coyote, because they. The range of their noises is insane. It's like they make 30 different noises.

Do they do screeching and stuff like that?

Barking, yipping and. But then it's, like, weird, like, kind of like grunting and how. And stuff. Like, all kinds of stuff.

There was a news release about a coyote, I think it was rabid, that was chasing a person out of the woods in a park. This is maybe a month or two ago. And is a guy or something running away. And there's a woman with her baby walking in a, you know, stroller. Stroller, like, pushing. And they're running toward him, and she keeps on walking the. And he runs by, and then the. The coyote attack them. So slower person gets attacked her. She's fine. Baby's a. Okay. Hurt. She said, oh, I thought the coyote would just keep chasing him.

That's not bad logic, because when you train a dog, like, if you run, they chase after you.

Yeah, but. Yeah, that's true. But rabid. Well, you wouldn't know it's rabid, but here comes an aggressive animal. Like, everyone should start running. Like, you don't just sit here. Oh, you know, I'll just run by me. No.

Yeah, I don't know.

So I did have a big news announcement that I was going to share, but now I don't want to because Kelsey ruined it.

I only ruined it for us. I didn't ruin it for everybody.

We're going to wait till next episode. I got to rebuild the excitement. I'm no longer excited. You know, my wife doesn't know about it, so I'm going to reveal it to her.

Okay, okay.

When she comes in for next week's episode. But the thing is, you better keep your pie hole.

Shut your trap.

Pie holes.

But don't ask me directly, because they won't lie.

I know, I know. All right. I do want to thank our corporate partner, Nextiva, that makes the show a reality. We'll share more about them in a little bit. Did I tell you I'm on their board? Guys, I'm on their board.

No, never mention it.

All right. Oh, we have a fun game today. It's a riddle, which sounds like it's gonna be horrible. Her name is Dr. Sabrina Starling. She's the business psychologist and author of how to Hire the Best. It's a series of books. Now, there's a contractor's edition, and she is the founder of Tap the Potential. Tap the Potential specializes in transforming small businesses into Highly profitable, great places to work. Then sending business owners on a four week vacation to celebrate that accomplishment. She's also the founder of Breakthroughs on the Bayou, an annual retreat of elite entrepreneurs who are looking to become elite. Her. Does that make sense?

No.

Okay. With no further ado, welcome Dr. Sabrina Starling.

Thank you, Mike. Good to be here with everybody.

It's good to have you here. So I want to first talk about Breakthroughs in the Bayou because I think that's going to translate into what we're doing with hiring practices. What you're doing. Oh, yeah, you've been doing this event at the Bayou for four years now. Just tell me the people that are coming there and I'm curious, what are you learning from them when they come to your event?

Oh, my goodness. I learn. I learned so much. So this is our. Because you and I co host this, Mike. And this is. I'm a pumpkin planner. And so I am always paying attention to what do my clients need the most? What is next on the horizon for them? What problems are they going to encounter and how can I help them solve those problems? And that's really how the whole focus that I have around hiring and building great teams came into play. Because originally I just wanted to help these business owners have a life. I saw them working 90, 100 hour weeks, crazy, insane hours, health, suffering, you know, spouses being neglected, kids being neglected. We won't talk about the one who's going off to high school by himself, but that's.

I know, right? The neglect.

Right, right.

And I just, as a psychologist, that hurts my heart because I know what that's doing, the ripple effects that that is having. And you and I, Mike, have really come together over the years around helping business owners have more life. And your mission to eradicate entrepreneurial poverty goes a long way towards making sure they have more. And I also want them to have the teams that they need and the support. But the other thing that I think is so important, I have worked in some crappy places before, you know, bad places to work and had terrible bosses. And I've been in situations where people gossip, you know, team members and employees are gossiping about each other and it's just, it feels awful to go to work. And I have always wanted to do everything in my power to create great work experiences for people because we, when we work, that takes over the majority of our days. And if work is emptying us and draining us and we go home. My expression that I had when I worked in the. The last bad place that I worked was I have nothing left to give. And I would go home and I would just be like, leave me alone. I'm going to curl up on the couch and suck my thumb because I'm done.

First of all, I think you need to say, see a psychologist if you're sucking.

I know it was. It was bad. I've healed from that, Mike.

So one of the things that at breakthroughs, the bayou that happened the last time was a couple people, one person in particular talked about a very toxic work environment. And sometimes even your own employees start working against you. You know, they had their own. This vendetta of some sorts. So let's talk about nipping that in the bud. Specifically, when it comes to hiring, you can hire the right way. Why don't you give us a couple tips on how to recruit a players?

Okay. Yeah. So this, this is the thing. When it comes to creating a great place to work and recruiting a players, they go hand in hand. If we want great team members in our business who can run the business while we business owners can take a vacation and be away and things keep going, we need to have a players. But in order to have a players in our business, we have to have a great place to. So when we have team members that we are holding on to because it feels so hard to find good people, we don't want to let the bad ones go. We are really setting the stage for that toxic work environment. We're kind of just letting that fester. We can't do that. So the number one tip for being able to hire a players is to be very mindful of who is toxic on your team and what is the real impact impact of keeping that person around. Because when you have warm bodies on your team, you might as well be spraying a player repellent all over your business.

Yeah, I've experienced that too. Actually. I'm a big college football fan. There was a story that broke out about my alma mater of this toxicity that's happening inside the team to the point where the last game they played, some team, some players were talking actively about trying to lose the game. And so they had our overhaul of the entire team. But businesses, you never hear the PR about that, but there's businesses where employees are working against it. If you identify someone that's toxic like that, like Amy's kind of that way, when you identify someone like that, what do you do with that person?

Damn it, Michael.

Amy, you're negative Nancy all the time.

Right? Like, listen, let me just lay out some of the facts, Dr. Psychologist Sabrina. And tell me what you analyze. I come in yesterday, I go to Kelsey. I go, are you okay? Amy jumps up and says she's injured herself. She's throwing her back.

This is the mother in me, which.

Was a lie, I swear. It's just the mother in me. Second thing is, this morning, I come in and we go updates. And like, Kelsey's like, I love children in general. I'm like, I love my kids. Everyone talking about their kids. And Amy's like, oh, my son's going to have his first day of high school and I'm abandoning him.

I'm going to cry. Is that what you want?

No. A little bit.

So, Mike, in my analysis, I think it's the boss.

Yeah.

All right. Toxic employees. Like, what do we do? Seriously, though, someone's really toxic.

Yeah. So first you have to get rid of them. I mean, there is no. There's no coaching this. There's no fixing it. If they are actively undermining the rest of the team and the goals and the initiatives you're trying to lay out, let them go.

But what about repercussions? Like, they could be. They could have a vendetta. They could try to delete all the passwords, blow up the accounts.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay. So do it quickly so that you minimize those repercussions. The repercussions that you don't see are always going to be much greater than the ones that you're. You're afraid of and what they're doing to your team and morale. After you let them go, I promise you, your other team, team members are going to come to you and they're going to say, what took you so long? Thank you so much. But why did this take so long? And it's always hard the first time this happens because it does take a long time to build up the courage to let them go. Because we let fear get in there and we start thinking about what about, you know, they have all the passwords and. And what if they. They do something that's fear speaking. And we can't make good decisions for our business when we're making decisions out of fear.

You talked about. You want to say something, Jlon?

Yeah, I was just going to ask on that point. Do you feel. Because in my experience with managing people who are toxic, I always felt like there was a way to communicate with them. And then you kind of get down to the grassroots of why they're upset, and then you can kind of work on and fix it, and usually that helps. Do you find that that's possible or.

Well, I think we might be talking about two different levels of toxicity there. So when we intervene quick when a situation arises and try to understand, you know, what's going on with the team member, why are they upset or why did they make the choice that they made and to act the way that they did and have a one on one discussion about that and to see if you can turn that around. Absolutely, that could be turned around. And you're really preventing something from becoming very toxic. When I say let them go, I'm talking about somebody who repeatedly is doing things to undermine the team. And you've already tried the one on one conversation and it's not improving.

Let's talk about contractors specifically because your new book is how to Hire the Best Contractors edition. It's coming out shortly. That that's a tough market now. And yet, I mean, when I say tough market, there is so much demand, there's an under supply of capable workers. How can you recruit in an environment like that?

Okay, so, so they're actually, and I know we have a lot of people listening and many of them may not be contractors. I think you can learn a lot though from the situation. If we take the perspective that we're always going to be recruiting in a tight labor market and how do we design our business to grow and be profitable and have the team that we need in place within a tight labor market, let's just assume it's always going to be like that. So there's a few key strategies and I want to point those out first because it makes recruiting a lot easier. One of the things that business owners really struggle with is I can't pay enough in this labor market to attract the people that I need. These larger corporations, they pay so much better and they have all these benefits and no one wants to come to work here. They all, everybody we interview, they, they turn us down. So what do, what do we do? So first off, one of the things that you can do if you're a contractor but in any business is really niche down. Mike, you've said it before, the riches are in the niches and what this allows you to do. When you have a niche that you serve, you are the expert. You are the one in your area that gets called for this particular work. When you're the expert, you can charge more. That is key because you are going to have to charge more for your services and that's going to allow you to pay more to attract the a players that you need to bring into your business time and time again. I'm a profit first professional going way back, and we see people struggling to hit their profit first percentages, and we stop and we say, well, are you charging enough? No, I haven't raised my fees in a couple of years. I don't want to do that because it's so competitive and, you know, contractors. I've got a bid and. Exactly. You have a lot of competition. But when you're the niche expert, it's not about price anymore.

Okay. So. But with contractors, I'm just thinking, we had a plumber at our house recently. I mean, isn't residential plumbing residential plumbing? Can you really niche down beyond just that?

Yeah. Okay. There's a lot of things a plumber can do to stand out. So first off, when your sewer is backing up in your basement, do you want that plumber coming, you know, three days from now, or do you want them right now?

That's a good question.

Right now, please.

Okay. Right now. We're gonna go with right now.

Okay. All right. And. And so. And there's. And I'm not a plumber, so I do not declare expertise around here. But I happen. I do happen to know there are certain ways of fixing things in the plumbing. And you want this done right. So you can have somebody who's an expert who can fix it and who may not have to do foundation repairs as part of fixing it. There you can absolutely specialize. And there's certain aspects of plumbing that you can specialize in and that is much more valuable to the end user. So it's always a question of, you know, from the pumpkin plan, who are my top clients, who are the best people that we can work with, and what are their needs, how can I serve them, and what is the real value to the person purchasing the service? And take that into consideration as you're setting prices. And also don't hesitate to communicate to your customer that you want to take care of them and you want to hire a players. That requires a certain being able to charge at a certain level.

You know, there's a new friend of mine named Tersch. He owns a contracting company in Savannah. It's called Icebound. They do H VAC services specifically though, for residential. And he's in the last six months, have really started to niche down to your point. And they're just doing residential, but for professionals who. How Tersh puts it is that they put more significance in their time than managing the project. You know, some people want to be there and watch every step. These are Professionals that just want the job done and done right. And he says they put way more value on that and are willing to pay a significant premium, do it right, but don't need me to be kind of overseeing it. And he's been able to recruit more sophisticated contractors. They don't just do the work. They're able to oversee and manage the stuff in the absence of the owner and communicate with them remotely. So that supports your point there, Sabrina.

Yeah. Well, and the other thing is, it's kind of a running joke, but have you ever called a contractor and gotten a call back within an hour ever?

No.

No.

Imagine a dream come true.

So how many of us homeowners would love to call a contractor and get a call back and have. Have them start on a project, like, right away?

Yeah.

Like, that's amazing.

Yeah.

So if you it, I would pay for it. I hope none of my contractors are listening, but I would pay for that, for that. That level of service. And. And that's a timeliness issue. That has value.

Yeah. I mean, I have. I don't know. Amy Cows. Jake Blone, if you've experienced this, I've had contractors actually come to my house, like, three or four weeks later, do a proposal, and then never hear from them again.

Like, yeah, what's up with that?

They're. Are they that mismanaged? Is the problem niched? Is it a hiring problem? What's going on?

They are. They are spread so thin. Mike, that contractor who wrote that proposal for you probably was writing it at midnight and does not have the team or the systems in place to follow up with you on that. And he's running from one job to the next. And so this is where we spread ourselves way too thin. And it goes right back to, okay, we have to start with the basics. We've got to design, design this business to be sustainably profitable. And sometimes that means going down and making the business smaller to get to that core that's profitable. While we're niching down, we're using the pumpkin plan and we're really identifying what is that sweet spot that we can provide the most value around. And then the other piece is once you have that clear niche sweet spot, then you have the opportunity to innovate and innovate around with technology, with team, with systems, and really take the perspective of how do we build this business as lean as possible with as few team members as possible? Because we're always going to operate on the assumption that this is going to be a tight labor market.

I guess if you have fewer people. You can pay them better too, if they're more productive, right?

Yes. Yeah. So a players typically are 900 to 1200% more productive than warm bodies.

Holy smokes.

So if we have a niched down business and we're able to charge more because we have a highly focused niche, we have designed the business to not require as much labor as our competitors. Now we are making a lot more profit.

Yeah, that totally makes sense.

And we have a players so they are more efficient. And now if we're more profitable and we have a players and they're more efficient, we can do things like profit sharing. And one of my favorite things to look at as an incentive when you're a small business and you can't pay a lot up front is to have a profit sharing incentive in place. And what that could look like is when you're hitting your target allocation percentages from profit first and you're where you should be, you have the opportunity to share in the profit and create a profit share account for each team member who's been with you, say three years. And you give them, when you take a distribution, you also give them a distribution into their account.

And.

And they have to wait three years to access it. And then after that, every year they can take a third out. So this creates loyalty because that account will build up over time. And if a competitor comes along and offers that team member, you know, $10 more an hour, now they're not just comparing hourly wages. They're also looking at all that money that's built up in their loyalty accounts from that profit share. And it becomes harder to walk away from that because that's the deal. They'd have to walk away. And it stays with the company. They leave.

I'm trying to put golden handcuffs on Kelsey, but they're more like plastic, you know, they're really cheap. You come out of a gumball machine. I'm trying.

Kelsey's ain't like she requires more than some plastic.

Oh my God. I know every person here. I feel so blessed. Like, Amy, I absolutely love you. J. Colone. Dude, how have we known each other? We've known each other forever. And like, I just keep. It's like I can't let you go. I just keep pulling you back in.

It's because you just love my face.

I do love your face. I do love your face. And I think we have a culture here, but I don't know how much has been defined or it's just come about. Is there something, doc, that we could do? As a contractor, as any kind of business, to create a culture that attracts A players, you know, deliberate.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. There's. There's two things that work really well. So one of the things is I like to interview the A players that already are existing in the business and ask them questions around. What is it that you enjoy most about this business? What. What keeps you here? Why do you like it? Why do you stay? I mean, there's all these terrible things. Like, you have to go on this podcast with Mike and he's going to run into the crowd. You know, all these terrible things you put up with. Why do you stay? And. And that starts to get the language of your A players around. What is attractive about this as a place to work in the culture? Those are things to start amplifying and intentionally systemizing.

That is good. That's good stuff. Why are you guys here? Why are you here? Because you like. You like it here?

I love it here.

Yeah.

I love it here. And I'm here.

Get a little closer to Mike, just.

So I'm here because you guys. It's the people, really?

And what is it about the people?

It is a warmth. It's a genuineness. It's truly has a lot to do with happy personalities. I mean, there's a really good energy when you walk in here every day. It's a fun energy.

Lack of toxicity.

A lack of toxicity. A lack of that. That small, backbiting type of. There's none of that.

None of that. Right?

There's none of that here.

Yeah.

Now, I wonder if part of that's because we're so tiny. There's, I think, 14 of us total, including our remote with Papa first in this. In this building and our remote people. I want. When you get bigger, Doc, like, when you have, I don't know, 40, 50 employees, that may happen. Like, people break into their little cliques, kind of like high school. Like, Amy wouldn't even talk to me in high school.

Oh, shush.

That's what you would say. I'd be like, hey, Amy. Oh, shush. That was exactly it.

Feel that pain, says the jock.

So. So these are the seeds of your culture. Warmth, genuineness, I hear. When I hear lack of toxicity, I hear open, positive communication, direct communication happening. That's what's underneath that. So those are things that need to be documented as part of general operating principles. This is how we do it around here. And I believe you just recently had Josh Fonger on your podcast from Work the System.

Yes.

This is something they talk about in the work the system book is having general operating principles so that the way you do business, you start documenting that, talking about it openly, noticing when the business owner, when you notice those good things happen, don't just take them for granted. Call them out in team meetings and do the shout outs around. Hey, you guys had an issue come up. I heard you work through it it. I love how you were respectful and handled it with each other. That's awesome. Those are the little things that start building the culture. The other piece though is the business owner's core values need to be translated into immutable laws for the business. We don't ever want to rely on the team to come up with immutable laws. This has to come from the core values of the business owner. The nice thing is that but when you're a small team and you have a players and everyone is happy and healthy, which you guys sound like you are, chances are there's good alignment with the team members and the business owners immutable laws to begin with. So it works together. But you want to make sure that the people that you're bringing on board going forward embody those immutable laws. So if you're going to have an atmosphere of open direct communication that needs to be part of the screening process and making sure that the people that you bring on value open direct communication. And you know, you can get at that in an interview by just asking them, tell me about the last time you had a blow up at work, what, what went on? And they're going to tell you a lot of times that'll bring out finger pointing of, you know, so and so did this and so and so did that. And then you can ask, well, and what was your role in it and how did you communicate? Talk to me about what you did and what you're really looking at is are they giving lip service to open direct communication or are they able to give you concrete examples of how they utilized open direct communication in that situation.

Interesting. I don't think we asked those questions.

No, but I feel like if somebody asks, I don't think I've ever had a blow up at work.

Yeah, you never have in like life.

Except for your sister when you dug.

Into Delaney's eyes with you, your fingers. I know.

Here's another one where you'll get to the core is tell me about the last time you had a blow up in your family.

Oh yeah, like last night I, I put a cigarette out on John Henry's chest and said, oh my God, I Bought you a pack of smokes for your birthday. Now enjoy your first day at high school, kid.

Well, what accent was that?

Any of his accent.

Like, I mean, any of my accents I'm pretty good at.

They're all bad.

They are pretty bad. We're going to do an accent contest in a minute.

I. I like to think of Kelsey. I don't think I've ever told you this, but this, in my mind, this makes me laugh. You're so like. She's so sweet and like nice, but I picture her having like the worst road rage on the way home and just like flipping.

Oh, that's a funny.

I need some kind of outlet.

That's a funny vision.

That's it. That's the like just giving fingers to.

Truckers, cutting them off with their little Subaru. Get out of my way.

No, I like the opposite. I'm just dancing really hard.

So, Doc, you do breakthroughs in the bios? You've been hosting it. I've been co hosting it with you. But it's at your facility. You actually have a retreat center. You invite business owners down there. Why don't we wrap up by just sharing a little bit of details of what that's event like, because I think some of our listeners want to attend.

Oh my gosh. It's totally different. I don't think anybody else does something like this, Mike. You know, most of the time I haven't been. You hear about retreats on the beach in Bali and whatever, we do it on the bayou. And so you and I, you used to come to Wyoming and I would do a mastermind retreat every year for my clients and you would come and you would take part in that. And, and that was great. But after I moved to Louisiana, I had the opportunity to buy a really nice place. And I bought it because I saw retreat facilities all over it. And it's got a big open living room, great room, we have a pool, we have a big open space outside. And so what we do is we bring in and we limit it to no more than 25. So this is a small, intimate group and we spend three, four days together. And this is. There's learning going on. You. You roll out your. Your latest research. At each of these RET retreat participants have had the privilege of being the first to hear about profit. First, way back when, you experimented with clockwork on us.

Yes.

In this past year, you experimented with us with your latest book. And I've done the same. I rolled out things that I offer at Tap the potential to our Clients, our retreat participants are the very first to have insight into it, to get to try it out in their business and give us feedback so we can improve it from there. But really what's going on for our retreat participants is they are coming together with high level entrepreneurs. And when I say high level, I'm talking about high level mindset entrepreneurs, not necessarily multi hundred million dollar businesses. That's not what I'm getting at here. But quality people who want to learn and grow and share and give. And this is an alumni community. Our alum alumni come back year over year and stay in touch. We have retreat reunion calls throughout the year and we have a very active private Facebook group for our retreat alumni that you and I continue to participate in. Mike and people when they're having a challenge. So we, we recently had a retreat participant who had a significant challenge around taking a five week vacation that was planned for 18 months. It almost didn't happen and he put out a request for help and we had 5 or 6 of our retreat alumni get on a call with him and take him through not problem solving and brainstorming solutions. We do a method called cue storming which is way more effective and powerful. And our retreat participants constantly comment on this, that we are. When we go into mastermind sessions and they have a challenge in their business, we support them in brainstorming all the powerful questions that could be asked around that challenge. Those questions open up possibilities that would never be considered in a brainstorming session.

Over my 12 years of being an author devoted to the small business entrepreneur, I've discovered the biggest challenge. And you know what it is? It's profitability. That's why I wrote Profit first and that's why I'm now hosting a two day workshop here at my offices in Boonton, New Jersey where I will teach you and my team will teach you how to become permanently profitable. Go to profitfirstlive.com right now to get details again, profitfirstlive.com, find the dates that work for you and I'll see you here at my office. Yeah, the breakthroughs is totally different than any other event I've been to. It's not a mastermind. It's a collaborative effort with a petri dish of new concepts and ideas. We're running super tight on time here, so I want to invite, I know that to keep it fresh, you and I have talked about this about five to seven people every year invited to introduce new people. And then there's established alumni too. So there's this continuity. If someone's listening in right now, wants to get more information or sign up, how they go about it. And I know we discussed a little coupon.

Yeah, we have a little special deal for Mike's people. So we only have seven openings left. There's a limit of 25. There's just seven openings left because we want new people coming in and bringing in an infusion of ideas. And you can get more information about the 2020 retreat at 4weekvacation.com so it's for the number 4 week vacation dot com. There is a deposit that we ask you to put down to have an interview with us, and we will take you through that process. And if we decide together you're not a good fit or this isn't the right time for you in your business, we happily refund that deposit to you. We want the right people there. And here's the deal. When you get on the call with a member of our team to talk about the retreat, use the words Mike sent me. That is going to get you a $3,000 savings off of the full ticket price. The full ticket price is $10,000. That when you say Mike sent me, you're gonna get in for 69.97.

So just everyone go to 4weekvacation.com we'll have that in the show. Notes when you speak. If you decide to pursue this, say Mike sent me, get 3,000 off. You can say, Kelsey sent me, and you get criticized. So that's another option you can do. Dr. Sabrina, thank you so much for joining us today.

Thank you, Mike.

Thank you so much. Nice little sound change. All right, so let's transition in. Oh, that's a long one. We gotta recap what we learned. You guys all have notes you took. Okay. And I got a little mini game for us today. Is there something else we have to do, Kels?

Well, we have to thank our corporate sponsor.

Oh, yeah. And do we have mail and stuff? Did I skip all that stuff today?

Yes, you did.

Okay. All right. It's my fault. All right. So thanks, nextiva, for making the show a reality. I'm on their board. Just for full disclosure.

That's amazing.

It's amazing.

Awesome. What a career choice.

You missed, Amy. I told Kelsey I'm sitting on the board. And she goes, what do you mean? I'm like, I sit on a board. They actually put me in a room and sit on a plane.

They're just sitting on a plank.

Next step is the VoiceOver IP phone system. It is truly exceptional. And now that I'm on the board. It'll even be better. All right, what was the mail we got, Kal? Okay, do you wanna do a recap first? Is that throwing you off?

No, let's do the mail. We're on that track now. So this comes from Matt Piccarillo. He writes, I am through a few chapters of profit first and just completed the instant assessment. I love everything. So fun. There was one mathematical part of the instant assessment that I think is wrong or. Hoping you can clarify what I'm missing. The tax row is based on 15% of real revenue, but shouldn't it be off of profit or some calculation which takes out business expenses? I completely understand shifting the mindset, but my calculation shows a huge number for taxes that I believe would be majorly inflated. I can't imagine I'm the first to ask this, so hopefully I'm missing something. Easy year, Picarillo.

You nailed it. You're right. Right? I mean, ultimately, taxes are based upon the money that gets distributed to the owner in your pay or in your profit. The reason we do off the top line is just for simplicity's sake. If you did have profit, you could say, well, it's 30% or 40% of profit. But we found that 15% of real revenue consistently covers all your tax liabilities, regardless of how you divide it up into owner's pay or profit. So technically, Max, you nailed it. You're right. But it adds a little bit complexity. So 15% off the top real revenue, not top line, but the real revenue consistently covers your tax liabilities. There's your answer. All right, why don't we talk about what we discovered or learned? I don't know where I would be in life without you, Kelsey.

I don't either.

I still. I'll never forget when I was so proud to reveal the TV show this morning. And Kelsey. But last reveal, I'm sitting here, and everyone's like, what's your big wish? If you have one physical item, like, reward yourself with something concrete, what would it be? And Amy's like, oh, I'd like a hammock or something for the house. And I like this. I'm like, I would like him. Before I could say, Kelsey's like, he wants a utv. And then so I'm like, deflated. And then Amy looks me in the eyes and says, mike, what's a utv? And Kelsey goes, it's like an atv. It's just a side by side, like the worst number. Stop myself the entire surprise. All right, what did you learn Amy. And if you don't have time to reveal it, Kelsey will tell you for you. What'd you learn?

I love the idea of, well, this is new to me. Niche down. Become the expert to get paid more so that you can afford to pay your A players. That's. That was really okay.

I like that.

New for me.

Okay. You're trying to get a higher salary right now. J. Sloan.

Yeah. So just on the question I asked, differentiating between toxic that's, you know, unable to be resurrected and toxic, that's not. And then, you know, getting rid of the bad one.

J. Babylon. All right. What'd you got there, Kels?

I feel like there was a lot of good nuggets, but I really loved that you have to get rid of the toxic person because you're never going to get good people if they have to work with that person.

Yeah.

It seems obvious, but I never thought about it that way. I thought about, like, well, they're. They're doing their job for now.

Right. You know, you want to say something about that aim. You did the thing.

I did not do any valid.

I heard the indicator that you wanted to say something.

No, sir.

Okay. Okay. So for me, it's. I like that you asked the existing A players, why are you here? Yes.

I love that.

Yeah. And get the story out. Why are you staying?

I feel like I make assumptions, but I don't actually know.

Yeah. So we need to do that internally.

Yeah.

Our next kind of company thing. Are we gonna do something in the winter gathering?

Yeah, I've been looking.

Oh, yeah. I was thinking Skytop. Have you ever been there? Have you been there? Right. Where's that one in Pennsylvania? The Poconos.

That's where you went last year with your fam, right?

Yeah, I think I was there a couple. I've been to a bunch of different ones in the Poconos.

It's cool because there's hiking, there's boating activities, there's games. There's a nice little bar there. So I thought maybe we do all like an over night or two.

Sounds good.

And then do a retreat. So I don't know why.

I think it's you.

Yeah, I know it was me. Was it me? Maybe it was me.

I think it was.

It's like the perfect chipmunk face. You can't see it, but when I play it. Yeah, it's amazing.

It's like a ventriloquist. I'm throwing it at Amy, throwing it.

At me and blaming me.

What else we have to do, Kelsey? Is that Everything. It's a little choppy today.

Well, you have riddle.

Oh, the riddle. Okay, you guys ready?

Ready.

Ready.

All right, first one to get it gets nothing. But it's a contest between you three. Dr. Sabrina, you still there?

I am here. Can I play through?

All four of you're in this, so listen to the riddle closely. These are all entrepreneurial riddles. We'll just do one, though. And whoever gets it first gets nothing for the first and only time in the 20th century. And make sure you pay attention to all the details. Right. Starting again. For the first and only time in the 20th century, an entrepreneur rode into work on Tuesday and left two days later. On Tuesday? How is that possible?

Tuesday's a horse.

Biggest ass I've ever met. Can you give a pregnant pause at least, for God's sake?

Well, you looked right at me like.

You were waiting for the answer.

How did you know that, Amy?

Because he thought he's the world's oldest, stupidest riddle.

I was about to compliment. I was about to compliment you. You know, Amy was our valedictorian, I was gonna say. But no, she was the biggest ass in this. All right, we're gonna do one more. Amy. Okay, I'm just pissed you ruined it. You.

Someone like, tell me you're expecting a baby.

You ever have someone blurt out an answer before you guys say it yourself like Kelsey does? All the time. It ruins it. All right, here we go. One more. Sorry, Dr. Sabrina, that you can get answer. Here we go. And Dr. Sabrina. Just yell out anything before Amy jumps all over. Here we go. I have branches yet. No leaves, no trunk and no fruit. What am I? I have. You can say it. Amy.

Family tree.

Okay, close. Not it. I have branches yet, no leaves, no trunk and no fruit. What am I? Think of an awful summit? Yes. Yes. It's a bank. Okay, we're done. That was stupid. Kelsey, we have anything else now? Do we have any? Okay, then let's get the heck out of here. Take us out. Do you take us out or do I take us out?

Please don't forget to subscribe. Subscribe wherever you're listening and leave us a review if you can.

Yeah, an honest review. We never got those T shirts. You know that We've been talking a big game like the saying T shirts us is never gonna happen. Do we ever get requests for them?

We did. I actually made some on custom Ink, the weekly order.

Oh, we did make some. Yeah, and we just sent them out to random people.

We didn't. I didn't order them. They're just sitting in queue.

So we had requests, we designed them, and we delivered nothing. That's A players right there, guys. And there's one more thing you can do as an A player yourself. Go to mike motorbike.com click on get the Tools. Cool stuff waiting for you. See you guys later. Was that you? That's awesome.