https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-is6Z2T2h8o

1 00:00:00.000 --\> 00:01:00.000 all right in this video what i want to
talk about is um i just finished our strategic meeting and it was so
apparent um some of the new talent that we brought in um how much they
were really driving growth in um in some of our companies and i want to
talk about this because i think it's the single hardest thing that
entrepreneurs face like every single entrepreneur has one problem they
think they have multiple problems but they have one problem and it's a
people problem they don't know where to find good people number one
number two they don't know how to hire and recruit those people number
three if they don't know how to manage those people number four they
know how to grow uh and cultivate the talent right and so that entire
process embodies what really growing a business becomes after you get to
probably about 10 10 to 30 million a year is when when ops really really
start taking over especially at 30 it's all about talent and i think
i've said this before this is probably the big it's been the biggest
bottleneck for me crossing 30 to 100 um is was really understanding that
it was understanding that it was all about the talent it's actually not
about you

2 00:01:00.000 --\> 00:02:00.000 and that can be really hard for your
ego because you love being needed and that's like an interpersonal need
that we you know have from childhood or whatever it is we didn't get
hugged enough but like that need is something that is outside of the
business the business doesn't require you the business should be able to
run on its own and this is something that has shifted over time um that
being said it doesn't mean that you can't have the strategic vision for
the business you know bezos just stepped down for the first time after
you know 30 years or whatever um but but you're the actual doing the
leading all that stuff over time the company becomes a company of
companies right it becomes a conglomerate as you grow and so what i want
to talk about specifically today is how to find and know the difference
between an a player and a b player or really an a player and everyone
else and i can't really stress how unbelievably important this is and
the thing is is that we've talked to entrepreneurs they're always like
my team's awesome and you talk the same entrepreneur a year later and
they're like that team was horrible this team's awesome and that's
because we're eternal optimists right that's that's just the reality of
it if you can't look at someone on your

3 00:02:00.000 --\> 00:03:00.000 team and be like i think this person's
kind of weak or i think this person could be better um then you really
have rose-colored glasses on right and that's the hard part and i
honestly this isn't this wasn't real for me until i actually saw
teammates of mine growing divisions of our companies without me doing it
in ways that i had never thought of once that happened it became real
for me i think there's these different steps in your entrepreneurial
journey i mean the first one was when i remember the first person who
did a sale for me i cried i remember i cried because i heard about on
the phone and they're like yeah i sold two people today and i i had done
every single sale for my business for like a year and a half it's just
it was just no one could bring it in right and and the answer is other
people can bring it in you're not special um but i it wasn't real for me
and as soon as this this girl did this i was like oh my god like i don't
have to i don't have to literally make the money someone else can do
this and i can actually start running the business and so it's a huge
breakthrough um and there's obviously levels to this

4 00:03:00.000 --\> 00:04:00.000 right and i think the the level that i
just recently had a breakthrough on was watching teammates actually grow
the business um without me right and it's really special it's really
awesome so you're like that's awesome for you alex why are you talking
to me great question a players and b players so what i want to do is
tell you a quick story because i think it's perfect for illustration so
we just recently promoted a brand manager one of our companies and she
was given uh the task of like hey why don't you think about other
revenue streams that we could possibly bring into the company and so she
said i thought we should start an apparel line because i'm getting lots
of messages on social media about how we should have apparel um and i
think that'd be a good opportunity and so her her supervisor said i
think that's a great idea go for it right and so what she did was she
emailed you know 20 different uh you know manufacturing companies uh for
for apparel um she got samples from all of them she tried them all on
she felt them and she showed up to the strategic meeting and she was
like

5 00:04:00.000 --\> 00:05:00.000 they were crap she was like i'm not
sending that to my customers she said those exact words and i can't tell
you what it felt like for me as an owner to hear that she said i'm not
sending that to my customers and it was because it showed so much
ownership and one of our core tenants is bureau and boss which i'm
switching to act like an owner but that's exactly what she did and to
push it even further she didn't just stop there and say all this stuff
sucks because that would just be presenting a problem instead she was
like but i did find some manufacturers that don't do manufacturing and
fulfillment because some centers do both which is much more convenient
for me as a business but she's like but their stuff is legit it's
awesome just like so i just need help figuring out how how many pieces
do you want to order as a baseline i'll figure out the logistics to get
to a third-party fulfillment center so that we can do this apparel
launch and so we ended up coming with a solution for it and she felt
great about it we looked at different you know designs and uh and with
with the great quality we were able to come up with a solution but
here's here's what i want to bring a break apart for you imagine a
normal person a b b level

6 00:05:00.000 --\> 00:06:00.000 employee nothing wrong with them
there's lots of them right but they show up they do their job they go
home right they don't take ownership because what what an alternative
story of what would have happened is the director says hey why don't you
look for new revenue opportunities and that person may or may not have
done at level one right level two they actually do it and they say i
think apparel she says okay go check out apparel now what that person
probably would have done was look at three companies from a google
search maybe or maybe not even sample the product just look at the
pricing and say hey i found an apparel company we can print our logo on
it we can ship it out that is what a b player would have done and
honestly unless you have an a supervisor the a supervisor probably would
have let it go and what and i'll tell you the difference the difference
is with the a scenario you have a high quality product that people buy
enjoy and buy again and that massively increases the ltv of the customer

7 00:06:00.000 --\> 00:07:00.000 and on top of that that brand manager
cares deeply about the customers and their experience and she's going to
be thinking top of mind how do i make this easier how do i make this
faster how can i improve their experience right whereas the b player you
already lost them like oh yeah they don't like the t-shirts i mean what
do they expect right i mean like they're 30 t-shirts i mean they're not
gonna be you know xyz and so that difference is the game and finding
people who think like that a player compared to people who think like
the b player is the difference between companies that grow and companies
that die companies that barely compete and make it and companies that
thrive and none of what i just described was earth shattering it was
just a willingness to do more work and raising the bar it was having a
level of intolerance for anything but excellence and it is my belief
that within a company hierarchy

8 00:07:00.000 --\> 00:08:00.000 every person the higher the person who
runs the division or the department or the company should always have
the lowest amount of tolerance for anything but excellence which means
you should be intolerant of anything that is not amazing right and that
trickles down it gets deluded right at every level it's diluted a little
bit more a little bit more a little bit more and if there comes a day
where you see two people and you see a supervisor and you see someone
underneath that supervisor and the person underneath has a has a lower
tolerance for anything but excellence than their supervisor those roles
should reverse the person who cares the most should be the one in charge
and so if there comes a day where someone cares more about my customers
and the experience and the business that we have than i do they should
rightfully run the company not me and sometimes entrepreneurs get to
that point they have a ceo and they elect them because they're like i
think that you're better equipped for this and i think that you care
more deeply and that's okay that happens right you know phil knight
doesn't run nike anymore but

9 00:08:00.000 --\> 00:09:00.000 um i mean shoot jeff bezos says and you
obviously step down for other reasons and what not but the big picture
here is having a level of intolerance for what an a versus a b looks
like starts with us and the thing is is whoever you hire most people
only hire people worse than them and so if you're if you're one level
removed or two levels removed dear god imagine what you're what's what's
being hired on the front line right and so you have to carry this torch
you have to raise this bar you have to set the standard so that a
players will be attracted to you and also so that you can have a team of
a players and then the entire culture rises right if you've ever been on
a winning team a championship team you know the difference between the
vibe how people come to practice how they play the expectations of one
another right the speed of response the teamwork all of that that's
culture and that's only created through having the right players on the
field the right people on the bus and kicking off the wrong people and
i'll end with this quote

10 00:09:00.000 --\> 00:10:00.000 from the head of people for
chick-fil-a which is a company i admire a lot she said a lot of
companies want to compete against us in the championship but the reality
is they lost in the draft and that one really resonated with me because
and i'm paraphrasing here that might not even be your title but that was
what she said in general and that that really struck me because so many
of us are always trying to develop or awesome develop talent i was
trying to do all these things management styles etc but some people just
come with batteries included there are some people who are just winners
right and you just need to get out of their way and i think that it's
worth the extra five interviews it's worth the extra 20 interviews to
find the a player because once that person is in place they will grow
right they will grow whatever they touch and this has been a deep lesson
for me which is what you know people are like it's all about people and
it is it's just boring and unsexy for most entrepreneurs because we love
the promotion we love the sales we love the marketing we love all that
stuff right we love the product but the people

11 00:10:00.000 --\> 00:11:00.000 is what runs it and i think that this
has been this has been a deep lesson for me um and i hope i hope if you
look at your team right now you don't think oh they're all amazing right
because the reality is they're probably not right um and every single
entrepreneur says that i can tell you right now some people that are
weak on our team right but you have to be honest about it and you have
to think not just what are they doing but what would i be doing in their
position what initiative would i be taking that they're not taking what
questions would i be asking that they are not asking and ideally you
want someone who's asking questions that you haven't thought of and
that's when you know you've got an a player so anyways this comes with
time it comes with experience it comes with once you've seen an a player
you can never unsee them and then you start to use that template to
apply to other people all right and so and then you repeat it over and
over again and i think that's why entrepreneurship takes time like you
grow you grow in levels you grow intolerance you grow an interpersonal
understanding you grow an awareness of other people and by as you grow
in that awareness

12 00:11:00.000 --\> 00:12:00.000 so too will your selection of talent
so too will your recruitment of talent um your management and growth of
those people so anyways hope that made sense hope that was valuable for
you if you're hiring people only look for eight players put in the extra
time to get the a player because it will pay you dividends beyond your
wildest dreams and there was a harvard study that showed that eight
players are worth five times more than b players and with that i'll
catch you soon bye
