How to Grow from $3M to $100M+ (feat. Leila Hormozi)

Welcome back to the Mike Andes Podcast where we discuss the ins and outs of owning a small business. If you're new here, the Mike Andes Podcast is all about starting, maintaining and growing your small business. What does it take to scale a business? How do we take a company worth 3 million to over a hundred million? Today we get answers when Mike interviews Leila Hermozi, co founder of acquisition.com and is known for her experience in scaling businesses through flexible infrastructures and creating management systems that create wonderful places to work. This interview is a tour de force of the relationships it takes to effectively scale a business and more importantly, how to manage them. As always, you can find the video version of this interview over on the Mike Andy's YouTube channel. But without further ado, here's Mike and Layla with the breakdown.

All right, well thanks for coming on Layla. I really appreciate it. And for those of you who don't know, Layla is a co founder of acquisition.com they take three to $10 million businesses and scale them up. And I'll share more prior to this video. Leila, about kind of what you've done in terms of gym launch and Prestige Labs and Alan and all the rest of it. I was introduced to Alex and Layla a couple years back, couple years into growing my franchise Anytime Fitness and as a gym owner hearing about what's kind of new and going up in our industry of the gym gym lords as they called it back in the day. But now they've exited those, they have done multi eight figure acquisitions and really done so much in terms of the community adding to on YouTube and their content. But I really wanted to dig in today and really try to get some questions Layla that you have not maybe been presented because you've been interviewed quite often. So I didn't want to go through the whole like story of Jim launched and all that. I can cover that pre this interview. So I just wanted to jump right into a couple of things. I kind of wanted to pick the interview in two different directions. One is the relationship side that is very interesting between you and Alex in terms of business partners as well as spouse and partners in that regard. And then also obviously the business side and you taking so much of the operational and sort of the integrator role in the company. So first off I want to talk about actually something that happened with one of our franchisees recently I thought you'd have some great insight on. And that is for several years they had been married and the wife had a food truck and was really successful and then he joined Augusta Lawn Care really started to grow the company and felt actually some resentment from her in terms of him now making more money. The business really started to take off and they've actually now filed for divorce because there's so much contention over that. How do you, with, with Alex and everything that you guys are doing not be that sort of competition? Because when I look over the past six, six to 12 months, as both of you have now become more public, making more content, you know, he has these bestselling books and, you know, lots and lots of views and a much more of a wider audience. How do you kind of calibrate that not to allow the jealousy part to kind of get between of you?

Yes. I mean, how we do those things, I think it's just viewing it as, you know, I think that everyone in any sort of relationship, like you have to have autonomy for yourself before you get into a relationship. Right. So you have to know who you are as a person, what you want for yourself. Right. So like what I've wanted for myself has not been to be public facing until maybe 10 months ago. My want and desire has always been I want to be the CEO. I want to be the one running the company as we build it. Like, I want to take this to a billion and say I was still the CEO. Right. And so Alex is, has always been more like, I want to write books, I want to make content, I want to do videos. Like, he's always liked that stuff more. And so I think first off is that that's the ingredient for any healthy partnership, right. Which is two people have complimentary skill sets that they bring to the table. Um, so the reason that I do content is not because I want to be market. Like if you listen to like our conversations with our marketing team, Alex knows how to market himself. Layla asks the team, what do I do? I don't know. Right. And I'm, I don't spend nearly as much time as he.

On those things. And that's because that's his hat and that's what he likes. And so with that, if he spends more time on it, he's going to become more popular, wider than me, more public facing. And that's good. Like that's what we want and that's what he wants. And that's not what I want right now. Like in the future I could see that when I have more time, when we have more of a team built out, but that's just not where I'm at right now with like my career. Right. And so I think it's first, like, identifying. Like, I think when we look at other people, like, jealousy stems from thinking like, oh, like I should have that, or that's not fair that they have that. I'm like, well, if you haven't put in the work to have it, then why would you expect that outcome? Like, if I did a half of what Alex did for content, then I would think that I would be halfway there, right? But I don't. I do like a tenth of what he does. And so I think it'd be unreasonable to think that, like, we would be matched. And on the other side, it would be unreasonable for him to think that he'd be, you know, as good at running the company as I am when he's put a tenth of the time into it. Right? And that's just reality. And that's something that we talk about because he's like, you know, due to the nature of our roles, he's like, you're always going to be underestimated because one, he's like, I'm the public facing one. So people are going to assume that I do so much more than you, even though the reason that you don't do it is because you're running the stuff, right? And so that's just something that has to be accepted. And I think a lot of people tend to argue with reality in terms of what they're good at, what their role is, and then also what's required for the business. And so it's this desire for self importance, right? It's wanting to think and feel like we're more important than we are. And I think if you lack that within yourself and you lack a sense of like, healthy self esteem that you get from within yourself and you seek that from the outside, and then you tend to be more jealous when it comes to partnerships. I see it truly as like, we're a team. And so I think it's funny when people think, oh, like, well, Alex or Layla, who do I like more? And I'm like, we, we are so integrated in terms of like our partnership and our team dynamic that like, we look at those comments and we laugh or like, if people only knew, like we see all of those things. Like, we've talked through all this stuff and I think that because we want to win together, that's like the driving force behind everything. And I think that a lot of people just haven't had those conversations. In terms of your client, it sounds like their relationship started with one dynamic and then they transitioned into another dynamic. And when you transition you have to reset expectations. And it sounds like maybe they haven't reset expectations. And also, here's the thing. You can reset expectations and say, this is what I now want of my relationship and of you. They don't have to comply. Like, if a woman, for example, and this, I hear this a lot with women in business, right? She wants to then start doing her own thing. And then often the man is resentful. And I'm like, well, he never agreed to support you in this thing. And so as much as we could be, like, that's bad and wrong, that's also just reality. And so I think it's not arguing with reality. And then for us, you know, it just tends to work of, like, we have complementary skill sets. We're good at different things, and we do support each other, like, indefinitely. You know, people have said, like, oh, what if Layla beat you one day in content? Alex always says, yeah, and Alex always says, he goes, I hope she does so that I have to do this all the time. Right. Like, he's just joking. But it's just. That's not the. We come at it from like we're sitting at the same side of the table rather than across the table from each other.

Now I want to. I want to kind of dive into that a little bit more. Recently, Alex made a video about how there was a couple of interviews that he had done. I think it was with Bradley, and.

I forget. I'm forgetting the other name, Pineda, and, yeah, Ryan Pineda. And he was saying that he felt like he had kind of come across wrong and then you had given him some feedback, Caleb had given him some feedback. What does that conversation look like when you are really in a partnership, both maritally and in a business, and you're like, hey, look, you're kind of coming across weird or different or like, you know, how did that come across? And how do you present that to someone as they are starting to get more public facing attention in a way that isn't demoralizing and you're not breaking that relationship.

Well, I'll tell you this, which is, I wouldn't give Alex feedback on something if I didn't know what he wanted. So when Alex verbalizes his goals to me and says, I want to achieve these things, then I'm going to support him. And I'm also going to point out if I think that he's off track or if I see something and other people are telling me, hey, I think that this is off track or this, that. So I'm going To I consider that to be how I support him as a spouse, right? Not just encouraging him because I encourage him way more than I give him feedback like that. Like, I'm like, these things are amazing. I listen to all his content, I watch all his content, I'm his number one fan. But then also if I see that something's off track and I think that it's going to deter him from his goals that he has expressed to me, then I feel that I have the ability to tell him. And so it's a simple conversation. I just say, how do you think you came across in those videos? And he's like, I don't know, different than normal. Why? And I said, well, is your goal to come across like, you know, smart and like this or is your goal to come across like Alex, the authentic, like funny person that I know and who everyone loves? And he's like, like that. Why? And I said, I don't, I don't think. And based on the feedback I've gotten, it's come across like that on the last few. And I just wanted to tell you because maybe you didn't notice or you weren't aware and that's the tone I tell him in. And you know, like, I'm not hard on him. I'm not like, hey, you sounded like an asshole or something like that. Like, because he didn't. He just didn't sound as authentic as he normally does. And so I just want to make him aware of it. And he does that for me too. He's like, hey, you were kind of off on that meeting. You seemed like you were distracted. Is there something going on? Like, and that's what I said to him. I'm like, is there anything I could do to help? Right? It's not like I'm pointing it out and saying like, go figure it on your own and you suck. I'm like, hey, were you aware of this and is there anything I can do to help?

Knowing what your business goals are will help lead you to the right decisions down the line. But once you know your goals, how do you ensure your employees Goals line up? P4P enables a business to maximize efficiency and keep your employees motivated. Like no other system, you can pay your employees the smart way with our new P4P software automatically updating efficiency numbers, real time project tracking and individual employee metrics on a day to day basis. You can learn more today@p4psoftware.com.

For sure when I've mentioned your name and Alex's to several different individuals and Kind of shared your content. A couple of people, their first sort of response is almost that you seem out of touch and it's a matter of like there's no emotion when it comes to interacting with the business or with employees.

What's your response to that? Because my thought process, my kind I come back to it is like, well, they've seen everything so there's nothing new that they're going to react, be reactive to and taking emotion out of it, they're able to deal with the situation. But what's that balance for you to have the empathy of being a boss, being a manager, but then also not, you know, you've seen it all. Like, what else? Is there supposed to be some sort of reactivity when things happen?

Yeah, I mean, out of touch, I think. Yeah, I don't, I would say unfazed is probably a better word for it. Like there's nothing that I haven't seen. I don't think it's out of touch. I would say it's unfazed. It probably comes across as out of touch. I have a ton of empathy. I mean, I would say ask anyone who works for me, you know, if they like, like most people, this is the best job they've ever had. I care a lot. I send my employees gifts all the time. I call them, I text them, like, how's your girlfriend or boyfriend? I go to dinner with their families. Like, I'm extremely personable. That's not something that I think I overemphasize because. And maybe I should because that's actually good feedback. I haven't heard it.

Because I think a lot of people are too emotional about how they run their businesses and they think that being emotional is actually for the better of their business and that they are doing right. And that's how I was for the first two years. And then I realized that you're actually setting people up for failure. Because when you baby people, you coddle people, you basically are saying that you believe that they are unable to do a job themselves and therefore they need you as their boss. And when you don't give people autonomy and you're constantly telling them what to do because you're, it's almost like it's, it's further than empathy. It's like empathy gone too far. And I see that a lot of first time managers and bosses and CEOs do that. It's. I see it all the time because we bring in the companies that do it right. They have so much empathy. They're so giving and Generous that they realize it's actually debilitating their team. And then what happens is that within two to three years, they realize that, and then they have to fire those people because they've set the wrong expectations for them. So what I want to get across to people is that people and protecting them from the hard stuff, it's not doing them a service, it's doing them a disservice. And I had to learn that the hard way because I built a culture off of that. And then I realized it completely backfired because that's not how operation works. You can build a company. Can you be kind to people? Yes. Should you protect people from the hard things in life? I don't think so. I think that if you protect people from the hard things in life, like you would protect a child. Like, yes. Do you want to protect them from dying?

Of course.

But, like, protect them from getting their feelings hurt, Protect them from making mistakes. The more that you protect them as a child, the less equipped they are as an adult. It's the same thing in business. The more that you protect them when they first come in, the less equipped they are to progress in their career later on. And a lot of people just have so much empathy and so much emotion around it because they've never done it before. It's new, and they don't know what else to do. So they just, like, treat people so well. And almost. It's not treat people so well, it's they baby people. And then they end up having to pay for that later on. And I've just seen that so many times that I just feel like I want to get that message across. Um, and the way I also come off my content, you know, I think is probably different than how I am, like, with my company. Um, just because I'm newer at making content, I don't think that I'm, like, I'm probably not, like, a hundred percent authentically myself yet. I'm much lighthearted, like, much more lighthearted and much more humorous outside of that stuff. Um, but when I'm making content, I'm just thinking about those people I'm talking to. Probably talking to, like, my past self and thinking to myself, like, gosh, I don't want them to make the same mistakes I made because I thought that I was, like, gonna revolutionize the industry and be like, I'm the best boss ever, because I'm gonna give them all these per this stuff, and I'm going to treat them so well. And then I realized I was actually setting them up for failure. And so that's why I feel passionate about it. In terms of the unfazed or out of touch, I really just think it's. Once you've had a certain amount of experience, like the first time that you experience anything, it like typically you think it's not normal, it's weird, whatever. Like, you know, the first time someone gets a lawsuit, for example, in business, it's like it consumes their life. If I get a lawsuit now, I'm like, whatever, lawyers will take care of it, right? And so it will probably come off as like, I'm out of touch. It's not that I'm out of touch. It's like I have low reactivity because experienced a lot in a short period of time. And so now I know none of those experiences are new for sure.

I'm gonna take a bit of a turn because we have a little bit of a limited time. And that is about just the way that you all have built Gym launch in the past. And now, even with acquisition.com where a lot of your leads, you might say, or incoming clients that you're now working with, even with acquisition.com are fans to begin with. They come to the channel, they love Alex, they love Layla, they're really fans. And then they. It evolves into this business relationship where now you're a part, even though it's minority, there's a business relationship now and you start to see sort of the hinder parts as you were of the individual. And now it's like, oh, like Layla had this quirk or Alex is a little bit strange in the morning, whatever it might be. How do you deal with that? Because, like, you know, the selfless question in part because all of my franchisees come to us first and foremost from the content. But as time goes on, they start to realize like, oh, as a franchisor, they make mistakes. Like, Mike isn't going to make a perfect decision every single time. And it's a different lens when it's coming from partner versus fan. The same way that dating versus marriage is a very different lens as time goes on. How have you dealt with that, you and Alex, to set those expectations correctly as they become partners?

I think 100% one thing is like one, I never claim to be perfect or to think I know everything. I do not think that about myself at all. I do not think I won't make mistakes and I do not tell that to anybody. So when people come on, I always tell them the first thing. We have a very long onboarding process. It probably takes us a quarter to take on a company and we have a lot of phone calls, a ton of diligence. And one of the things I express to them, because we have an entire setting expectations presentation, is that you know your business better than anybody. And oftentimes what I want to help you do is figure out like, what is, what do you know that we don't know and how do we extract that out of you to get the answer of what we need to do with this business? Because I have expertise and I have experience, but I don't know your business like you do. And so I try to more empower them to understand that like, at the end of the day, if a decision doesn't feel right to them, even if I think it's right, I'm not going to ask them to move forward with it. Right. And so like everything at the end day is their decision. They have to maintain autonomy. I never want somebody who always defaults to me and Alex because I don't think that that's me doing them. Like, they're not going to become a better entrepreneur or CEO if we just tell them what to do and they do it right. They'll become better if we teach them how to think and how to listen to their own intuition. And so that's the kind of expectations that we set. We're like, we are guidance, we're advisors, we're not going to, I mean, we can tell you what we would do, but we also would say, but because of your business, your mission, your values and who you are, you might tweak it this way, right? And so we always try to figure out like the context of them, which is the most important part, and then also set the expectation. Like, we're not perfect. I don't set the expectations anybody. I mean, even when I hire people, I'm like, oh, they're like, how's this and that? I'm like, oh, that's fucked up over there. Like you're gonna kill it, right? Like, I would rather set the expectations low and then over deliver than the other way around. So I think it's, I mean, I think it's just being okay with like, if you're making content, especially for like the franchisees, like I think to myself, like, there's been so many podcasts or pieces of content I've record, I've been like, I hate that so much. Don't post it. And I'm like, no, I should post it because I want people to see that I'm not Perfect. And if that means that people don't like me too, that's totally fine. Like, there's pieces of content where I see them, and I'm like, dang, I seem harsh and aggressive, and I'm like, put it out there. Because like, sometimes I am that way, and then sometimes I'm really funny and kind, but, like, that's who I am and it's okay. So I would say for you, making sure that you. You don't, like, edit your content, let it all go out, and that's okay, because also, they should know that you're a human. Because if they see you as this robot who doesn't make mistakes and doesn't make flaws, they paint you as their savior. And then when they make a mistake, you are also the villain who caused the mistake. And that's what I never want people to see me as. And so the more that you can kind of even purposely make, like, showcase those mistakes, I think the better off you'll be.

Awesome. Another business question, and coming that same line of thought is as we have been growing. Something you talk a lot about in your channel is when to hire, how to hire. Obviously a big thing for us right now. We're in that transition period where you're getting 100 employees or so, and it's like, do I start to hire from outside of the business? Like, our Achilles heel, in all honesty, is we do with a call center. Like, we have a call center for our franchisees. All their calls come in, we manage their email, we do their payroll, all that stuff. That's my Achilles heel. And so when do I hire someone from the outside that's really good at that. But when is there. Like, there's gotta be a balance of losing the heart of the company where the managers have grown it with me from the beginning, know the culture, know we're trying to build or completely bought in, and yet I go hire some outsider and just to come run the command center, we call it command center, the call center for our franchisees. Where's that balance of hiring from outside versus inside, cultivating that talent?

Well, one thing I would say is, like, why do you think that hiring someone from the outside would lose the heart of the company? I think some of the best people that I've ever hired from the outside have grown the heart of the company. So that's the first thing I would say is, like, I don't think that serves you. And because I look at it like, if I'm hiring someone from the outside, which I like to have A healthy mix of both, then they are going to add to the culture. They should be additive. It's not that they should just have experience and all these things, then, hey, these other people make up for the culture. No, like first and foremost they should be a culture fit. They just also need to have the skill. That's why it takes longer to find those people. They have to have both. Right? And so you can't compromise.

Let me interrupt there for just one second and say, what would you deal though with someone that when they come in though, it's not so much a matter of them not understanding the culture as much as other mid level managers feeling threatened or feeling like, hey, why is this person just going to hop up to being like reporting to the CEO without our years of experience?

You are responsible for communicating why this is needed for the company, but you're not responsible for how people react to it.

I have learned in a lot of time, like I am as transparent as possible people. And I'll tell them, I'll be like, listen, you don't have the experience to run this department. I don't have the experience to train you. We need to bring somebody else in. And my goal is that you learn from them and that one day maybe you can run that department, they can move up and do something else. But right now we're stuck because neither of us know what the fuck to do do. And so I would put it out there like that. And if somebody gets defensive and they're, you know, upset, et cetera, I'd be like, I totally understand. I still have to do it because at the end of the day I'm the steward of the company. If I don't get someone who knows how to do this in this role, the company will not succeed. And so it's not mean, it's not you. I need to find somebody from the outside. And then after that point, if somebody's unable to manage their feelings, that's, that's self management. And I try to hire people who are good at managing themselves and don't take, aren't reactive in that sense. It's something that I think in gym launch I taught a lot more of because there was a lot more junior people. And so I had to teach them a lot more like emotional management.

But I think that you can't take that on Mike, in terms of like, you can't think that you're responsible for other people's feelings or even what they think about you. Here's the thing is that a lot of the times what it comes from is you're like, what are they going to think about me? If, like, they're mad at me for bringing this person in, I do it anyway. And then you're like, what are they going to think about me as a boss? It's like, jesus, that's going to be so time consuming. If you spent all that time in your head thinking, like, how do I try and control what they think about me? How do I try and control their judgment of me? Like, imagine, think about, like, I could never make content if I thought, like, how do I control people's judgment of me? It's like, I would be paralyzed because there's so many people that hate me.

If you made it this far, you probably can't get enough of Mike Andy's, which is why you should absolutely sign up for the text club. We promise it's not a ton of spam. We really like to make sure our audience gets exclusive, exclusive access to new products and services from Mike Andes before anyone else. You get notifications when Mike goes live, so you can jump in and be a part of the conversation. Join today by Texting Landscaping to 360-227-6362.

All right, switching gears real quickly before we wrap it up. And that is back to a little bit more about the relationship side of things. Again, I'm going to. I'm going to take it as almost you're giving me advice. So you and. You and Alex built this thing together, right? Basically from zero. Nothing all the way up.

That Alex likes to joke about sometimes. But it's also is a heartwarming story. When you said, hey, now, at the bottom of the barrel, you were like, hey, even if it's under a bridge, I want to be with you kind of. Now. How does that.

This has been the Mike Anders podcast. We really hope you enjoyed that conversation.

If you do.

Mike Andy's YouTube channel to.

From somebody that. But as we have.

Let's just.

That's all we have for each wealth.

And success for just a moment as its own parallel. The reason I bring this up is because I've talked to my attorney, my lawyers, and they have said all we have to do is. They've always said, hey, you're getting a relationship. I'm like, yeah, definitely. One day I want to get married and have kids, et cetera. And they said, you know, make sure you have a prenup. And personally, I don't want to have that. I feel like we're in it together. We're 5050 from day one. But I also realized there's a certain level of responsibility I have to like the franchisees, my employees, and especially at the early stages of the franchise, for that to be torn apart. 50. 50 would be like really, really bad. So what will you say to someone like myself, for example, because you're now my therapist for the next few minutes.

In terms of finding a relationship, how is that something that should be broached? And what would your feelings be? Us growing something with somebody, but not from the onset where there's almost an inequal balance of monetarily successful.

So do you mean like, if you'd get in a relationship that you would want to bring this person into the business or that they would just like inherit it because they'd be married to you?

The latter.

They'd inherited it.

Yep.

Okay.

I honestly think that there's. There's no right or wrong. There are trade offs. Right. Which is.

If you bring. I'm trying to like put myself in the shoes of somebody like this. Right. Like if you have existing wealth, like even like me as like a, like just thinking it through, like, I would never. If somebody had existing wealth and I got married to them, I would say, like, I wouldn't want half of that. Right. So it's like the first thing I think is like, you wouldn't want anyone who would desire half of your wealth. Right. Like, you don't want that to be the reason that you're getting married. I wouldn't think that would be something that you would desire. I mean, maybe would. In that case, then she would want her to be hot or something. I don't know. It's like, that is a thing. Right. Like some men are like, hey, you get part of my money and I get a hot wife. Like, it's an exchange and it works for people. Yeah. But I don't get the feeling like you're that kind of person. So we'll go with the other side, which is, you know, you find a girl who you really, really like and say you decide you want to marry her and you're basically like, do I want to present her with a prenup or not? And so then I would think through it with any other decision making filter, which is, what's the upside, what's the downside and what's the worst case scenario? Upside of having a prenup is that if you do get divorced, that you get to keep half your money, etc. Right. Or. And half the value of the business downside of having a prenup Is she may feel like you don't trust her. Right. Or that it's not an equal marriage or something? To that extent, I'm just imagining. Worst case scenario is what you have to figure out. What's the worst case scenario of if you were to have a prenup?

Probably that you wouldn't ever want to go forward the relationship.

And what's the worst case scenario of if you did have a prenup? Did not have a prenup.

I would lose the business. I'd have to be forced to sell it.

So the question that you have to figure out is of those two downsides, which one could you live with? That the girl that you love and want to marry doesn't want to be with you or that you lose half your business?

My question, though, is, do I get to the point where I think that person so deep in the relationship where I would even think that. Right. That it would even be a conversation between those two things? Because at that point, like, obviously I would choose that. The first, my wife, if I knew that was my. The person of my. I was gonna live my rest of my life with. I don't know, wanted to. Right. Right. Now I see you're saying, so what.

So what are you asking? Pre.

That.

Pre.

Even just trying to find. Find someone that would be in that position.

In the profession that.

What?

So, for example, I would love to get married one day. Right. I'm trying to find somebody I do not want money to be. Even in the factor of whether or not she does want to spend the rest of her life with me. I also don't want it to be something that could affect the businesses and all the partners, franchisees that I have now attracted to my business.

Yep. I think it probably will affect it. No. Unless you don't tell her you have any money. Here's why. Not because of the money, but because women, typical women, seek security. So if you don't want a woman who is going. Who it's going to. It's not about the money necessarily, but it's the fact that when she hears that you have that money in that business, she's probably gonna be like, oh, my gosh, that feels like good, secure, safe. Right. Which is not a bad thing. Like, that's like evolution. She's been socialized to feel that way. But if you want someone who doesn't, then you would want to find somebody who has her own security, safety, et cetera. Right? So I would imagine if you don't want someone to use that and use it in their decision making process to be in a relationship with you, then you need to find a woman who has a thing of her own.

Absolutely.

Well, I can go financially stable and set up and like can own her own stuff, right?

Absolutely. Well, I know you're busy, so I want to let you go. Last question I have. And that is in relation to the more business side, I guess. Sorry, I've been jumping around a little bit when it comes to the visionary versus the integrator. Obviously that's the two roles that are so often commonly talked about. And you refer to Alex as the visionary, you as more the integrator. Taking off the table, the marriage side of things, just business, those two roles. How do you prevent stepping on each other's roles and toes as the business is growing very quickly, especially from that like 30 employee to 100 employee level. So I have an integrator. She's actually my aunt, her name is Liz. And she is kind of, you know, what you do for Alex, she does for me. Operations, hiring, hr, et cetera. And so we find ourselves a lot of times step on each other's toes or trying to help the other person, but in doing so, we're really taking their role. We feel like, hey, like, why are you doing my job like that? I thought you wanted me to take. Well, I want to take that off your plate. Well, no. How do you prevent that without like, obviously defined roles is important, but as the company is growing so quickly, those are changing every single week. So what's something that you would say in that regard?

I would say there's a couple things which I think that a lot of the times there's a lot of camaraderie between the two. And so if they're both very generous people, they want the other person to be out of pain quickly. And so they'll jump in without asking and try to save that person, get them out of pain. And so the best thing I think Alex and I have ever done is we allow each other to be in that pain. Like, I'll be in pain. And he never jumps in and like tries to. He'll ask eventually, right. Sometimes, like, do you want help? I'm like, no, I don't want help.

Right.

It's the same for him, you know, I mean, what's the last thing he wants for me to jump in and try to help him. Right. So the first thing is like allowing each other to be in that pain. Because the thing is that if you constantly are trying to solve problems in the business by jumping in with each other's roles, what you're not doing is pushing it down, right? And so I always think if we're constantly trying to help each other, we're probably not pushing things down enough because the business doesn't grow. And you don't see the holes in the business. You'll see it between each other, but you don't see the holes in the business unless you push responsibility down to the teams that you can see where the gaps in the business are. So that's the first thing that I think I've observed a lot between in that dynamic.

The second thing, if I had to think in terms of like, if you're growing between 30 and 100.

It'S probably that the visionary and the a lot of the integrators role becomes more of being a leader and almost being like the internal setting of the vision. Like I would at that point, we were getting to that point. Like I ran all the big company meetings and I'd be like painting the vision. I'd take it from like what Alex has said at some point, like the monthly vision meetings. I'm like, I can run those, you know. And so it does turn into like, it's almost like it's so segmented in that. And then it starts to almost get like, there is a little bit of overlap. Because by the nature of business, in order to run the business effectively and get people to do what you need to do, you do have to be able to sell the vision. And so like I do a ton of what I would say is like selling of the vision, you know, talking about the vision, strategically setting the vision.

But I'm not necessarily the one that came up with it. Does that make sense? And so I continue to always try and think, like, what more can I take off Alex's plate? What more can I take off Alex's plate? And the thing that usually happens, the visionary is they start to feel a little isolated. It's like if they don't have other projects they're working on, like, Alex has his books and all those that like when we had Jim launched, like he had the book he was writing, he had content, he was making. All those things are things that aren't going to deter or distract the business, but they keep him. It's productive. It's very good for the brand and the business. It's how we make new business. Right? And so he just adds more of that versus if he didn't have that stuff. Like we used to always joke we'd be like, alex, we need to get your product. Because otherwise he'd jump in and be like, no, I can do this and this and this. And I think between 30 and 100, that was probably what we struggled with the most, was, like, him feeling like him trying to figure out, where can I add the most value without distracting other people in the business? And then me trying to figure out, is it okay that I'm also painting the vision to the employees. Right. Versus, like, oh, the visionary and the integrator. At some point when you're getting that big, the integrator role does turn into one where, like, you are painting and selling people on the vision frequently. So even.

Even you say, like, you're taking things off of his plate to try to enable him. Like, how do I, as a visionary, help my integrator also do, you know, be more effective in her role? When I see her being overwhelmed, for example, because that's literally where the moat. Like, we have some pretty intense discussions and heated debates and arguments over stuff. And almost always we're just trying to help each other. We're just like, hit up, hitting up against each other in the same thing. So how can I help?

You know, my integrator one is you listen and you don't try to fix anything for her. Like, it's offensive to an integrator for you to, like, jump in and try and help. Because it basically it says to her through your behavior that you don't trust that she can do the job. But if you encourage her and you empower her and you just speak belief into her and you're like, dude, you can do this. So every time that she comes to you and she's got a problem, instead of you jumping in, doing that, it's like, you've got this. You figured it out before. You don't need me to help you. You can do this on your own. Like, and then you just give her an argument. You're like, here's all the evidence. Here's the five other things that you've done in times like this before, you're just going to go and do that again. That's the best thing Alex has ever done for me. And I think with any dynamic like that, that's the best thing you can ever do. Because most of the times what people want is they want someone to listen to them and then to tell them that they're good.

Does that make sense?

Absolutely. No. I could talk longer, but I'm going to go ahead and let you go. I really appreciate your time, Layla. You have a great day.

I appreciate it too. Thanks, Mike. Have a good one.

This has been the Mike Andes Podcast. We really hope you enjoyed that conversation between Mike and Layla. If you did, we have tons of lectures, interviews, and more over on the Mike Andes YouTube channel. Anyways, that's all we have for you today. We'll see you next time.

Sa.