How I conquered BUSINESS OVERWHELM and scaled my business to $100,000,000..
In this solo talk, Shanli Liu explains the inverse relationship between entrepreneur overwhelm and accountability, arguing that excessive overwhelm prevents leaders from holding their teams to clear expectations, which stalls growth from seven to eight figures. He defines accountability as setting and enforcing KPIs with consequences, illustrates the symptoms of both lacking and effective accountability, and identifies three self‑defeating beliefs that block leaders from enforcing standards: blaming oneself, fearing employee departure, and thinking accountability is outside the founder’s role. Liu then shows how to replace each belief with a more constructive mindset and outlines practical steps—clear KPI communication, consistent consequences, coaching, and avoiding doing others’ work—to build a high‑performance team, attract top talent, and boost confidence as a leader. The video concludes with a call to action to subscribe.
Chapters
What is up? Today what I want to talk about is the inverse correlation between overwhelm and accountability and how that is probably what is preventing you from getting from 7 to 8 figures. This was top of mind for me because the other day, you know, Alex and I live in a building and we meet people all the time. And every time we meet people, we try and like, if they seem like they're cool and like, you know, interesting in the first couple of minutes, we're like, let's exchange numbers and maybe go grab dinner sometime. And so we were in the elevator and we you know, asked somebody for their number and said, you know, do you and your wife want to go grab dinner sometime? And that person immediately, when we texted them, shot us down. And the reason was, you know, they're like, I'm just too busy. You know, I have my business and I just got a ton going on. And I immediately was like, this guy's got to be doing like $2 to $5 million per year, because only someone whose business is still that small would say something like that. And I know that because In the first couple of years that we started Gym Launch, because I did not know how to truly hold people accountable and I didn't know how to run a business well, I had a lot of overwhelm, which resulted in no social life because felt like had no time. What it was is I actually had no attention. I see that a lot in other people who are around the, I want to say, like 2 to 8 million. It's really typical. If you go to the root of this, it typically comes down to one thing, which is there's an inverse correlation between overwhelm and accountability. Okay? So the more overwhelmed the entrepreneur is, the less they are holding people accountable, and the less overwhelmed the entrepreneur is, the more they are typically holding people accountable. Now, obviously, there's other factors that play into this, but every time I have a conversation with somebody and they're doing, you know, multiple 7 figures, trying to get to 8, or maybe just about to break 8, they're usually around this spot, which is they're super overwhelmed. They say no to everything. They have no time outside of work. And they're scatterbrained, right? Like they're so engulfed in their business and I have been there 100%. And this is the switch that I had to make to get out of that. Okay? Because I used to think that I was holding people accountable, but I was actually not. And the reason for that was I was so busy overcompensating for their undercompensation that I wasn't focused on fixing the problem through the person. I was focused on fixing it myself. And also having fake arguments in my head of, "I shouldn't have to do this. They suck. I just have to do it for them. I guess they're not good enough. Nobody can ever do it as good as me." Like, having all these self-defeating thoughts, and those were what went through my head many years ago at that point in time. And so if you've ever had those thoughts or you feel right now like you're overwhelmed, then listen, because I want to break down the mindset shifts and the tactical shifts that helped me get out of that. The first piece I want to explain is that accountability is just setting and holding someone to an expectation. The act in itself is not complicated. It is just like, you know, when you present someone with KPIs, you're like, here's the sales metrics you need to hit. Here's what happens if you don't hit them. That's pretty much all it is. And then what it means is that you follow through with that. And a lot of people, whether they miss, is they set the expectation in the forefront and they never follow through with it so that when someone isn't hitting their KPI, there's no consequence. Humans respond really well to consequences, negative and positive reinforcement. And so you want to use that when you're holding people accountable The question is, why don't we? Because everyone knows that you need to hold people accountable, yet most people, especially in the multiple 7 figures, are stuck there in the space, you know, looping through their head of why, why am I so overwhelmed? Why does everything feel terrible? Why is everything— I always have to come back to me. Why do I have to work 14 hours a day? Right? Well, why is because of you. It's because you're allowing yourself to overcompensate for other people and you're not letting them rise up and you're not letting yourself see the gap that is actually needed to fill the business. And so what accountability looks like versus doesn't look like. Okay. What accountability doesn't look like, right, when you're not holding people accountable, they typically show up and leave work on whenever they feel like it, right? And so I've actually audited a lot of people's companies through acquisition.com, and I've looked at the schedules and the time studies of people that are working, and it's crazy to me sometimes. I mean, there's someone who's a customer service rep and they're not— they're taking 2 to 3 hour breaks multiple times a day because of other commitments that they have and other jobs. You know, it's like your customer needs you at that point in time. And so that's a common behavior is they just let people work when they please. They have no set hours, no expectations, etc. The second thing is that delivery and KPIs are not met. A lot of times there's not KPIs set, but actually more often than not, there are vague KPIs set, but the leader is not holding anyone accountable to them. So nobody on the team, they're like, yeah, if you would ask them how many sales they need to make per month and how many sets they need to make per month and how many people they need to send per month, they could maybe tell you, but they know that there's no reinforcement behind it. So what the fuck does the number even matter? It doesn't matter. If you're not backing it up. The third and the most telling is that you or someone else in leadership is doing part of their job. Okay? So you hired them for a role. There's an entire job description of what they're supposed to do for their role, and they are doing half to maybe at like best two-thirds of it. And then you're filling in the gap by doing the rest of that. And instead of coaching that person, telling that person that they're not meeting expectations, you are just going in and doing it without saying anything. You're just like letting it happen. And then, uh, the last two are that you don't have uncomfortable conversations with them. So your one-on-ones, you probably probably don't look forward to, they probably drain you, you don't talk about anything substantial, and you are actually stressed about their problems. And so that is a telltale sign, which is you are, you know, say you have an incompetent sales director, you are lying awake at night thinking about sales numbers, right? Because you don't have trust in their ability to solve the problem, and therefore you are trying to work on solving it yourself, or your brain is. So that is what it looks like when you don't hold people accountable. Now, what does it look like on the latter half, right? Well, probably the opposite of all that. Which would be that people do do their jobs in a timely manner and they have expectations of when they're supposed to be working versus not. And there's transparency if they need to take time off or take breaks. KPIs are met or exceeded and they are discussed frequently. They are something that are looked at on a weekly, daily, monthly basis. They are something that is discussed and they are something that if you do not meet them, there are consequences and there's a plan that is always going to be put in place. And then lastly is that you don't do any part of their job. Like everything on their job description is what they are doing. You are not doing any of that. You are supporting and you are coaching them and you are holding them accountable. And then lastly is that you're not stressed over their problems. So if sales drop for a week, you're not stressed about sales because you have trust in their ability to figure the problem out. And you also trust yourself to help support and coach them well to help them come to that conclusion. Okay? That is what accountability looks like. Now, you might be thinking, "Yes, I understand what accountability looks like," and most people do. It's not that fucking hard. But the problem is that nobody actually does it. And so that's what I want to break down is here are the beliefs that I had when I was— honestly, I was incompetent. Like, I wasn't good at holding people accountable. And I'll explain what I swapped those to because a belief is just a thought repeated over and over in your head. And so if you can catch those thoughts and you can kind of pick them out of the pond, like you see a big pond full of fish If you can grab the fish that you see as poisonous, which is the self-defeating belief that you have about holding people accountable, and then you can swap it, put a new fish in the pond. And so that is what I want to give you today are the 3 beliefs that I used to have and what I changed them to. The first one is that I constantly thought, I can't hold this person accountable because I think I am the main source of the problem. Okay? So I would think to myself, well, I didn't do X well enough. I didn't train them well enough. I didn't set enough expectations. I didn't blah blah blah blah. Okay. What is the reality of most of those situations? The reality is that we are most likely both part of the problem, but blaming myself does not help them improve. That I know is true. That belief is self-defeating because it says, oh, Layla can improve and learn from this problem, but they don't have to. I'm going to treat them like a child. Okay. And so that is the first one. And I swap that belief instead of saying, now I can acknowledge, I can say, yes, I am obviously part of the problem. I may not have set these expectations correctly, That'll take me an hour to reset, right? And then from that point forward, how am I going to put that problem onto them? I'm not going to take that problem from them. I'm going to push it back on them and allow them the chance to improve by recognizing that they need to be part of the solution. That's the first belief. The second is that I used to think if I really hold this person accountable, they're going to leave the company. They're going to quit. And that is absolutely an irrational belief because, one, it just stems from like fear of rejection. We don't like people leaving us, but we're okay leaving them. So you'd be fine if you fired this person, but you wouldn't be fine if they quit. And that's how a lot of people feel. But the second piece going to this and the belief that I swapped this to was, if I don't hold this person accountable, they will unknowingly harm the company and the culture. Okay? So I used to think, oh my God, crap, if I really hold this person accountable, they're just going to quit, which I'll get to that later. But you know, it's not necessarily a bad thing. The second piece of that is if you don't hold them accountable, you are actually going to harm the company more. Than you would if you did, right? So if you really think about it, if you hold someone accountable and they leave, that's probably a good thing. Just because it's uncomfortable and you have to deal with the short-term pain of trying to compensate for where they were and replace them, which probably won't be much if they weren't really doing their job. Instead, you're exchanging it for long-term dysfunction by setting a culture of incompetence, right? You show everyone that you have a high tolerance for bullshit. And so then everyone else says, well, if I'm an A-player, why the fuck do I want to work here? Because you don't care what anyone's actually doing and nobody else is producing. And so that's the second belief that you have to break, which is you cannot fear that person leaving. You have to embrace and accept it. And you have to understand that most of the time if they do, it's a good thing, but that you have to step up and make sure that you're holding them accountable so that you show the rest of the company what the culture really is. And then the third belief is that many people say this, and I think actually the smarter that the entrepreneur is, the more I hear this, which is, I shouldn't have to babysit people. I shouldn't have to micromanage people. These people are experienced. I'm paying us all this money. I shouldn't have to do this, right? And I used to think this way too. And so I switched that to, I would prefer if I would not have to do this and repeat myself so many times and hold people accountable to this extent. But it is part of my job. And so I will do it because I prefer to be the founder of the company and not another position. And this is just part of the job. And so I think a lot of times like we try and our brain tries to get us out of doing this accountability thing by saying like, we shouldn't have to, they should know better, I'm paying them all this money, they're so experienced. But like that's not the reality of it. Holding someone accountable is part of your job and it's uncomfortable so your brain wants to stop you from doing it. And so you have to be able to see your own bullshit and get yourself out of that pattern of thinking and into this new one which is, yes, I would prefer not to do this but I will do it because it's part of my job and I prefer to I like to be in this role. And I like the upside that comes with it. That's really it. Those are the 3 beliefs that tend to cripple someone from holding others accountable. Now, if you can alter these beliefs, and you can constantly argue against them, because you've been repeating them so many times in your head, then you are most likely going to be able to go from 7 to 8 figures. Because in order to go from 7 to 8 figures, it's all about team. And if you're not able to hold people accountable, then one, you're probably gonna have about 35% more like more volume of workforce than needed, so you're going to have that much more overhead and your business is going to be that much less profitable. And then secondly, you're not going to be able to attract good talent because good talent doesn't want to come to a company that doesn't hold people accountable because winners want to be held accountable because they like the pressure, they like the challenge, they know it is good for them. And then lastly is you're not going to have confidence in yourself as a leader because when you know you should be doing something and you don't do it, you lose integrity with yourself. And that is why you must hold people accountable. So I hope that was useful to you. Like I said, this is the mindset shift that I had to make in order to get to a point where I could actually drive a high-performance team and high-performance people would actually want to work in our company. Okay? So to the contrary, many think that if I hold people accountable, if I hold these higher standards, and if I am doing less and feeling less overwhelmed, I'm doing something wrong. But it is, in fact, the opposite. If you continue to feel overwhelmed and not hold people accountable, your business will never grow. So that is all I have for you today. I hope you enjoyed the video. If you did, go ahead, hit subscribe, and I will see you on the next one.
