David Jenyns : SYSTEMology | The Tyler Wagner Show #1084

All right, everyone. Welcome back to another episode. Today, I have David Jennins with us. So, welcome to the show, man.

Hey, thanks for having me.

Of course. Grateful to have you here. And before I hit record, I was just telling you, I had just downloaded your book and now I'm having you on the podcast and we didn't even plan that. So, I think that's just kind of cool. The universe wanted you on this podcast. Correct. Glad to have you. So yeah, either way, just to start, can you tell us a little bit more about you and what you do?

I help business owners get out of the day-to-day operations of their business and I have developed a system I call Systemology, 7-step process. And really it's about helping business owners go from I don't have any systems to I've got at least the minimum viable systems required to run the business. So it's really about going from 0 to 1. And kind of building that first bit of momentum.

Gotcha. And just out of curiosity, this selfish question, if somebody already is there and they wanted to even go further into the systems, do you help with that too? Like—

Yeah. So it's really a methodology and a framework for how to think about building a systems culture. The more that we've done this, I've started to realize there are a few key players that you need to develop inside your organization, one of which being a systems champion. So a lot of the work that we we actually do is about training up the systems champion and empowering them to, one, have a roadmap for what they do, and two, think about, well, how can they get the team on board and get them coming along for the journey?

Got it. So, and I want to go into the details then, but I'll start with this. I'm always curious. So before you were doing this, like what were you doing professionally? Professionally and how did it kind of like lead to this?

I've been, as soon as I left school, like an entrepreneur, business owner my whole life, tried tons of different things. We had a rock and roll clothing music store, kind of like Hot Topic because I think you're based in the States, but we were doing that here in Australia and we involved in some franchising stuff, we're importing products. And then the last business before Systemology I got stuck in was a digital agency. And I was in that business for about 13 years and I got to that point where for some reason, even though in the back of my head I knew systems and processes is what I needed in that digital agency, I thought, ah, this business is different because Google's always changing its algorithms. How can I write systems? And hey, we're a creative digital agency and we can't systemize creativity. And what's the point of putting systems in place because my team won't follow them anyway. So I had all of this baggage that really trapped me in that business for probably 10 years too long. And then when we found out we were pregnant, that really was the turning point because this thing went off in my brain. My dad was always a bit of a workaholic and I thought, I don't want to be that dad who's always too busy. And then I thought, right, I need to do something about this. And I intuitively knew systems was a way out. It was just about figuring out, well, how do I do it? Where do I start? What systems go first and then I systemized that business, stepped out of the day-to-day, hired a CEO. She ran that. I took about a year off and then I kept that business for a good number of years. I won't spoil the ending of the Systemology book. Something happened in that business that meant we ended up selling that business. But that whole journey of building, scaling, systemizing, stepping out and selling was kind of now what I'm trying to bottle and then go, That's really what I'm passionate about. I've realized this is such a challenge for many business owners and I'm quite good at distilling down the essential components.

Yeah, I just thought of it as you were talking actually, because we just had, he's kind of like a mentor of mine, you could say. His name's Dan Martell. He wrote a book called Buy Back Your Time. You guys might already know each other, but if you don't, you guys should connect.

Yeah, he's got a fantastic story. Great book as well. I have gone through, it's only recently out. He's super sharp.

Yeah. And I feel like you guys in different ways, but kind of help business owners in that way of like, it's like you're making a bunch of money and things are successful, but you're working like a dog and it's like it's time to step out of the business in a sense. So my first question for you actually would be in the detail side of this is what would be the first hire? How do you start the process of systems?

A big part of it depends on where you're at. Like if you are a solopreneur and you're getting your business off the ground, it's a different starting point to if you've already got a small team around you. I think like the first thing that you should do in either scenario though is identify what are the essential systems and start recording yourself doing those. Like that's a pretty common thread that you're hearing bubbling up all around this idea of people who create systems, then you want to, oftentimes it's a VA, getting a virtual assistant who can step in, then take those recordings, turn them into documented process, or at least pull out the key points to get a checklist. And then as you go through that process, the VA oftentimes can then say, 'Hey, I can do that one,' or 'Leave that one to me,' or 'I can do that chunk.' And that's part of that process where you can start to let go and we start to create some space for the business owner. And then the aim of the game in business is to always work on your highest value tasks. And it's the same for your team members as well. You always want your team members to work on the highest value tasks and you're delegating down to lower cost or less skilled labor. And systems are really the best way to transfer that knowledge. So it's kind of you need to develop the skill, but then you also need to teach your team how to do the same.

And it's like, I think a lot of times what is just like becoming aware of what are you doing repetitively? Because I think a lot of times business owners, once it starts to grow, they just wake up, they see all this stuff on their calendar and they're kind of just going at it. But if you were to ask them like, hey, what'd you do today? They're like, I don't know, man, I was just busy. You know, like, that's a lot of times the answer. Like, they really don't know. Um, so just either way, just taking like inventory of what's even happening, um, is a great starting. Um, do you recommend, uh, and maybe this is actually part of what Systemology is, but as far as like softwares and stuff go, do you recommend any in particular that you've seen You work a lot.

I'm not a huge fan of recommending software because every situation can often be a little bit different. I think as long as you understand what pieces of software you need, then you can, you know, there are plenty of different software that you can get to fulfill that. So for example, as you grow, you'll need some form of project management software. So that could be Asana, Trello, Teamwork PM, Basecamp, ClickUp, like there's a truckload of them and it really doesn't matter which one you choose. It's not so much the software as it is that you need something that you can assign who is doing what by when. That's, if you can find something that fulfills that role that you feel comfortable with, then you've got your first step. The other piece that I often talk about is where you store the knowledge. Because the knowledge needs to be located centrally and easily accessible by all. So some people start out with just like a folder in Google Drive, and that's a good starting point. But then over time, you might evolve to like some sort of SOP management software. And I think that's really where you want to go to something. And again, there's a truckload out there. We do have one called System Hub, but there are plenty of other ones out there as well. The key is just to have a place where you can store it that is simple and you can control access and that you can embed videos on. So you've got, here's the video that explains how to do the task and here's the checklist on how it's done. Because then when you pair the two together, your project management platform with a system, that's when you are in a magical place because you're very clear this task needs to be done by this person and here is the link to how I want it done. So you've set the expectation, like you link to the process that outlines the task that you've just assigned. Once you do that, you, it makes it infinitely easier to manage team members and get them to deliver to the right standard.

So what, for, that's, I was actually just taking a note of that because it's interesting. Like, I, again, I think we're kind of peeling back the COVID of like what, as you scale, what are the biggest issues? And as you scale, you have more SOPs and a Google Doc is great, but at the end of the day, let's say you're a 9-figure company, you have like 300 SOPs or more. A Google Doc, it's going to be a 500-page Harry Potter. So, Systems Hub, how does that, I guess, how does that organize it in a better fashion? Like, I know you kind of touched on it there, but Just how is it different?

I guess it's just purpose-built. As you grow your business and your problems become more obvious, there are software solutions that have optimized to solve that one problem. So something like System Hub is optimized to solve for the problem of how do you store and organize SOPs? How do you make it easy for everybody to use and with as little onboarding or training required to understand the software. Because oftentimes systems and processes, they have friction at the best of times. So we don't wanna introduce new friction by we gotta use this software and it's clunky and I don't know how it works and I've gotta train someone up how to use it. So it's gotta be very simple software that enables you to organize and assign like access for those that should have access. Like some people, you might not want to have them see your HR system or your finance systems. So you need to have control over who can see what, and that's really a big part of it. But again, when you're just getting started, Google Docs, great place to start. It's not until you start to, you know, maybe you get 5 or 10 team members on board and then you start to go, you know what, maybe I do need to organize these a little better.

And what was, and we can obviously come back, but I'm just for our audience, I'm curious on your experience with the writing books, publishing books and the marketing of your books because that'll really, just hit home with our audience. So for your first book, what was the— yeah, this actually— you have 2 books in total, right?

Yes. Yep.

Yeah, yeah. Let's see real quick.

Well, these 2.

Okay. Perfect. So I'm curious of like, what was the experience like on your first book? Like things that went well, things that could have gone better, and then what did you change to make the second book an even better experience?

Yeah. So when I think about writing a book, I write a book with the intention of using it to help to promote the business. So my first book, Authority Content, was used to promote the digital agency and the Systemology book promotes the systems consulting work that we do these days. So firstly, thinking about why you're writing a book because the book isn't gonna make you a truckload of money unless you write a Harry Potter, which probably for nonfiction, like the chance of that happening is very, very slim. So you need to think about what your backend is and what the intention is, and it's the gateway to your world. And for the reader, they can learn your frameworks and how you can help them. So then you come with the right intention of writing a book that's extremely useful and helpful and complete and almost explains, well, here's what I do. And then that helps for the reader to then go, oh wow, I can really see the value in the work that they do now as they read through the book. And for me, the way that I actually write the book, I did the same thing with authority content as Systemology. I love to typically run an event. So I've got my audience and I'll go to them and I say, right, I'm gonna run this particular event and we sell tickets, we make it live and we actually get a film crew in to record it. And when I run the event, I think of it in terms of me writing a book. So each of the different sessions are actually chapters in the book. And then I present and I love doing it this way because I know I'm gonna have a room full of people. And I bet if I had to write a book and I didn't do it this way, I'd be staring at a blank page and it'd take me many, many years. But if I run the live event and then we take the recordings from that, we get it transcribed and then it goes to a ghostwriter. The ghostwriter has first go, then it comes back to me, and then I start editing my book. So I use that same approach for both books. It just works for me because I enjoy the presentation part of it, and it creates this positive constraint. Like, I know I'm gonna have a room full of people on this particular day. I'd better be ready to go. Whereas sometimes if I'm writing a book, and I'm supposed to be doing an hour each morning or something like that. Oh, it's easy to go, oh, I've got this email I've got to attend to. I'll get back to it later.

Yeah. Oh, that's so— dude, I have never— and I mean, I'm a guy who's talked to a lot of authors. I've never heard that before. That's so cool. The event thing, obviously ghostwriter and stuff, I've heard that we literally offer that. But as far as the event thing, it makes so much sense. I mean, it's literally the structure And you actually, do you kind of use it as a way to get live feedback too? Like, do you like ask?

Ah, yeah. So we get a little bit of engagement. Like oftentimes I've already, before I run the event, I've tested the material a little. So I'll put something on a YouTube video, I might run a little webinar and I'll try and already gauge if I'm on the right track because by the time you come to write a book, you really wanna lead with your best material. Book, books, it's a noisy world and it's hard to capture the attention of your audience. And especially, I mean, I write for business owners and they're some of the most time-poor people known to man. So I have to be very particular about front-end loading the book and leading with something that just really grabs someone and pulls them in. So I kind of need to test that. And by the time we get to the live event, I've already got a little bit of an idea on which bits I feel like are going to hit and land. But then it's another chance I get to kind of gauge feedback. And I mean, if I struggle to fill a room to attend the event, then, well, maybe I haven't got the hook right, the angle's not quite right, the message to market match is not there. And I get to kind of play around with some of that before I start writing a book and then realizing I've written a book that no one wants to read.

Well, yeah, at least for me, and I can't, I wish I could remember exactly how I came. I think I just had some Audible credits or something like that. And then I saw it was the title that really got me because I think one thing I think any business owner, even if they have a bunch of systems running and everything's great, any business owner can agree we can always be more productive, right? So that's what I thought of. I was like, I'm curious what systems this guy is going to teach me, like in this book that I could implement in the immediate, right? So that was another thing. Yeah, it's like we're going through scaling right now in our company. So that book stuck out and it was just something I knew I could use immediately. So either way, I don't know if that's helpful for you or not, but I think the title is definitely hitting home. That's what hit for me at least. And it makes sense. I mean, it's literally the company's name, right? So why not use that? Perfect. Now, on the side of getting the books out there, did you have any strategy for that? And if so, what worked, what didn't work? You know, that type of stuff.

Look, I went in with eyes wide open that writing the book is only half the battle. Most authors are rubbish at the marketing side, but really that's where the rubber hits the road. So we were quite particular. We did a range of things like building up a private Facebook group and engaging my community in the journey. You know, I'm sharing with them the COVID and helping to figure out the tagline and getting people to pre-read it and getting case studies and feedback and building up like we would any launch to a particular date. So that way I had a handful of people who were ready to go who were gonna start posting Amazon reviews. We outreach to a bunch of podcasts and pre-booked a lot of those so that way they were ready to drop at the right time. We did everything that we could to kind of build up some JV partners who also mailed their audience so that way we could hit with, a little bit of a bang. And with Amazon, you kind of want to reach this escape velocity. There's this period once you kind of get enough reviews and traction and sales in a short enough period of time that Amazon then goes, oh, this is interesting. And then they'll start to say, they'll email segments of their database and they'll say, yes. Yeah.

Sorry, go ahead. I'm just getting excited.

They'll basically say, hey, you should read this book. And once you get through that little blip, then things really start to take off. And then now, like, we're in the maintenance phase now where really it's all about reviews. I just do what I can to continually work on and grow the reviews to kind of build this undeniable proof. Like, I already know the book is great. It's got traction. Great feedback, it's doing its job. So now I just have to think about how do we do it more? And then we start to layer in things like Amazon Ads to try and push it a little bit more, kind of playtesting around running some sort of book funnel strategy through Facebook. Costs us, we've got an upsell and stuff in it, costs us about $25 or thereabouts to get a book in someone's hands. So it's not a perfect loss leader, or like a, you know, it's not like it's a break even. So we need to keep working that because really for me it's just how do I get this book in the hands of as many business owners as possible? Because that one, I can serve them and two, a percentage of them goes, ah, well, how else can you help me?

Well, okay, so this is crazy because, well, it's not crazy, but it's just literally the exact strategy that I literally run through a lot of our clients, meaning like So, you do a big release, you have all that stuff lined up. Hopefully, it hits like a major bestseller list. If it doesn't, it's actually not a big deal. But if it does, you can leverage that. It helps with PR. There's benefits to becoming New York Times or Wall Street Journal, but it's honestly, it's not like required, but it's why not if you can. But then reviews, that is what ups— like once you have over 1,000 Amazon reviews, we've seen— I have a guy, his name's Alex, that I refer all my clients to after we do that. And then we get, help them get reviews. Like the Amazon ad conversion rate is insane. So all I would just say is like, I don't know how many reviews your book has right now, but once it has over 1,000, I would imagine that that $25 is gonna go way down.

And yeah, I mean, that's for the book funnel. It's a lot cheaper on Amazon. On Amazon, we actually run close to break even, if not sometimes profitable on books. So Amazon is fantastic for selling books. It's the Facebook funnel that is the one that we lose money on the front end. And it makes me wonder because is it Alex Strathy? Yes. Yeah, that's it. He does our Amazon ads.

Dude, that's awesome.

Small world. This is a small world.

It's incredible. Yeah. So he is like, he refers to us, we refer to him and we're very centered good synergy between us. But so that's why I was curious, because like I describe Amazon Ads to people like Facebook Ads 10 years ago, right? Because cost per click on Amazon is like, like $0.10 depending on the targeting, whereas Facebook's like $3, $4 or whatever it is. So that makes sense that it's a loss leader on Facebook, but you're in the green. Well, yeah, you're already in the ecosystem then. But either way, those reviews keep boosting, dude. I'm excited to see it's going to get a lot more hands. So question for you, next question I have is like from now, so the book came out, the business is on the back end, what's kind of the next like step? Like, are you focused solely on Systemology or do you have kind of another thing in mind after that?

Look, Systemology, I kind of go where I feel like I've got a passion and I feel like there's a big enough problem that I can solve and get the team behind and feel good about the work that we do. So at the moment, I still don't feel that our work is done with Systemology. I feel like the more that we've done this, I've started to realize, as I said, first we needed to go to work with the business owner, and that's really what Systemology was written for. The next piece that I'm working on is really going to work with the systems champion. I want the business owner to buy in and say, yes, we're doing this, we're all in, I'm gonna support this, and I'm gonna you know, give the resources and the team what they need to make this happen. That's the first thing that needs to happen. And then the second bit needs to be there's someone inside the organization who has capacity, whose role it is to really drive this forward and keep it front and center because the business owner very quickly can lose steam and they've got a million and one things on the go and another great idea falls in their lap and it's easy for them to lose their way and we need someone laser focused. So that's really the next piece. I'm working on my next book at the moment, so I'm just kind of starting to think about the outline and what that's going to look like. Because yeah, I think around that idea of systems champion, I think there's still some work that we can contribute that'll be helpful for small businesses.

Dude, it's huge. I really do. Like, I think if you're able to go into a business, train somebody that literally, like right now I have 2 full-time people that their sole focus is on figuring out AIs. So I just told them, I'm like, Full-time, both of you. And all I want you to do is research AI. And I told them what the goals are, obviously. So I gave some direction, but I was like, just find AIs that can get us to this goal. And we're testing, trying them all out. And now that we have them in place, they've kind of naturally now become part of the systems in the company, right? Because you kind of got to manage the AI. It runs on its own, but you kind of have to overlook it, I guess.

The merging of those worlds is a huge opportunity for small business with the idea of virtual assistants, AI, and systems. Because the way that I'm starting to see it is systems, as you document those, ultimately the AI is just gonna get smarter and smarter and it's gonna be able to execute on some of what it, the prompts that you feed it. At the moment we ask ChatGPT and it goes off and it comes back with text. At some point they're gonna figure out how to plug APIs into things and you're gonna be able to talk to ChatGPT and then it's gonna go off and run your email campaign or whatever over in ActiveCampaign. So the way I think about it is the system and the process that we're capturing and creating, really that's going to be the training for the AI at some point in time. And a system and a process is effectively like a mega prompt that you are feeding into the AI. So I kind of feel like the work that we're doing is getting even more important because it's about what is it that you do that's essential for your business? How do you capture that into a system or a process? At the moment, it's kind of human automation because the human executes on it. At some point, the machine might execute on it or it could be a mishmash of both. So I feel like AI and VAs can, you can kind of get a superpower out of the VA now, they can operate to a much higher level because they can leverage off the AI. And then we layer in the systems, which then keeps them focused on the essential tasks and getting the output. And I feel like there's a sweet spot right in the middle.

Dude, it's so big. It's so crazy too. And one of the things I love about it is like, I feel like starting a business is just becoming less and less risky, meaning like, you know, you'd start a business and it's like, oh, I gotta hire an executive assistant, like $50,000 a year. And it's like, well, the business just started. I don't even have $50 grand a year, let's just say, right? So, this is like, now there are tools and programs or whatever you want to call them in place where, you know, you could have like a VA, the AI, and the system in place for, you know, pretty cheap, I guess you could say on the upfront. And then once it starts to scale, then you can build out the team more and more, but you don't have to like throw $100K at, you know, building this software anymore. Like I read this article on Twitter the other day, And I don't— again, I have 2 people doing this. I'm not doing it. So, my understanding of this stuff is way off. But apparently, you can almost now talk to the AIs and have them build softwares for you. Like, I don't think it's the most complicated ones yet, but you know, you could be like, hey, I want you to, I don't know, collect all the email addresses of all the book publishers or something like that, just an example. And the AI will then basically go out and find all the book publishing websites and then get the emails for you and then distribute it. And it's like, okay, well, that's awesome. And that would've taken a human who knows how, like $10,000, $20,000 you'd have to pay to get all that data entry. It's unbelievable. So we're in a good time is all I can say. Yeah. It's awesome.

There's a first mover advantage as well. Like there's some people that will push back. And then there are people like you that hire 2 team members to say, we're doing this, let's go all in, let's figure it out. And it's those business owners that lean into this that will have the biggest opportunity because I mean, there's a land grab and there's a difference between those who know what the AI can do versus those who don't. So that gap, there's an arbitrage opportunity there for you to quickly leverage that. So I think it's quite astute.

So one of the last questions I wanna ask and then I'll leave the floor to you is for your next book, have you thought about or been messing around with having AI help you write it or are you like you have your method and you're not really changing it?

Look, I'm experimenting with, because we do quite a bit on YouTube and I've got a YouTube channel and I, that's historically how I've tested material. I'll put in a little video and then see what sort of response we get from it. And that gives me an idea, ah, I'm really onto something here and I'm getting good engagement. So I've got a truckload of info there that I'm thinking I'm gonna test taking the video, transcribing it, and then I've been working on some pre-prompts to try and prime ChatGPT to understand my voice. So I gave it some of my writing from the Systemology book and I said, hey, can you analyze my writing and tell me what type of writing style this is? And then it's come back and it said, 'Well, you're this, this conversational tone and you use examples.' And so I've now got the feedback from the AI on what it thinks my voice is. So now the thought is I'll go back to the AI and I'll say, like a pre-prompt, I'll say, 'Hey, here is my writing style that I want you to write in. Can you now take this transcript and turn it into a chapter of a book?' and then I'm gonna play around with it like that. So I'm definitely thinking about it. I'm, I'm very particular because books take a lot of time, effort, and hard work to write a good book. Everybody can, you know, probably write an average book, but if you wanna write one that has impact that lasts, it really does take quite a lot of work. So I don't wanna, even when I went my old route, which is getting it transcribed and then it goes to a ghostwriter, I end up rewriting it anyway, but I just find it's easier for me to work with what the ghostwriter gives me than a blank page. So effectively, I think what'll end up happening is the ghostwriter will probably be replaced by the ChatGPT output or the AI's output, and then I'll just edit it like I would normally, but it would be based off my original thinking.

Yeah, man, it's interesting how everything now is coming down to asking the right questions, right? And I guess that's how life's always been, but now it's like more immediate in the response. I mean, Meaning like you were like, okay, here's my other book. Let me see what it's like, what's my tone like? And now for the next book, you can now tell the AI to write in that tone. That was just such a genius method or system, whatever you want to call it. And it was all about kind of asking the right question, right? Like what's the tone, right? You didn't say like, write me a book similar. Like you asked, what is the style of this? And that was a Really good way to do it. So yeah, either way, obviously maybe we'll do a part 2 for when you come out with your third book. I'll leave the floor to you. Is there anything we didn't cover? Feel free to talk about it. And then where can people stay in touch? Like websites, socials, all that stuff and the book, obviously.

Look, I think if you are interested in systemizing your business and you're that type of business owner that maybe you've got a little bit of traction, you've got a team around you, or even if you're just getting started, head over to Amazon. That's where you'll get Systemology. And if you're an audio person because you're listening to the podcast, you can head over to Audible because there's the Audible version and I voiced that. And I happen to get Michael Gerber, who wrote the E-Myth. He actually does the foreword to the book. So a bit of a hat tip from one of the godfathers of business systems. So that's, yeah, if you're kind of heading down that route, the biggest thing for me whenever I do these sorts of things is to try and just light the fire inside the business owner around business systems. I think we all intuitively know that they're important. Some business owners, for some reason, they reach the conclusion and think, ah, I'm not a systems person. I tried that once before and it's not gonna work for me. And the reality is most business owners are like that. I don't even like writing systems and processes. I mean, that's the dirty secret of Systemology. I don't write the systems and the processes as a business owner. What you need to do is fall in love with what systems can bring and then find the right team to help you do it and develop your methodology for how do you go from idea to implementation? How do you go from idea to creating a system and reduce the friction and make it as easy as possible for you? And we need to retest some of those old assumptions like systems and processes, they don't have to be boring. This is not some big thick manual that sits on a desk that nobody reads. Like, a lot has changed. And especially, I think, you know, it's the right time at the right place with everything that's happening with AI right now, that if you focus on systems, you're thinking about what will ultimately be the input to this AI revolution that we know is happening. So get in front of the curve and start to put this stuff into place. So hopefully that's of interest. And if it is, someone can go a little bit further down the rabbit hole, which, yeah, Amazon, and then the other one is our website, systemology.com.

Perfect, man. Thank you again for coming on, man. Really appreciate it.

Pleasure. Thanks for having us, Tyler.