Mike Andes stopped telling managers what to do and started coaching them to reach the same conclusions themselves. When founders force systems on people, they get resistance. When they guide managers to ownership, the business scales past the low-million-dollar plateau where most stall.
Entrepreneurs want to do things their own way. They want to push boundaries. They want to try new things. And that's good. It's also dangerous. It's tough when you know it works and you see the systems and what they should be doing. You already have the systems that have been proven. How do you get someone to follow the system without forcing them? Because if you force them, they will resist. This is human nature. You're like, why isn't my manager doing this? I'm just gonna like completely tell them exactly what to do. If you tell them what to do, if you force them, to take action, they're gonna resist you. What we try to do instead is guide them. We try to coach them. We try to help them come to the same conclusion themselves. I'm not gonna try to prove them wrong or go against them. I'm going to guide them to the right conclusion. And sometimes that takes a little longer. It's a lot easier to just tell someone what to do. But many times, someone will stall at $1, $2, $3 million in annual revenue 'cause they never figure out how to lead managers and lead leaders instead of just leading technicians. Or people that are willing to take a bullet list and just work through them one by one and taking marching orders. The reason I'm trying to get them to come to that same conclusion themselves is because when they do that, they actually commit to it. They put discretionary effort into it. That's the difference between compliance and alignment.
