21 Hats Podcast

This week, we learn that Gene Marks and Bernie Sanders agree on something, which is that there are better ways to handle health insurance than making business owners responsible for providing it to their employees. Isn’t running a business hard enough without this financial and bureaucratic burden? Does it really have to be this way? Plus: Why Gene thinks what he calls “the era of the worker” won’t last forever. And what business owners need to know and do before they lay off or fire employees.

It took a series of sad losses to turn banker Channon Kennedy into an entrepreneur. If a friend hadn’t lost his son and if Channon’s mother and sister hadn’t been diagnosed with cancer, she never would have designed, prototyped, manufactured, and started selling the Morgan Square, a tool that can save carpenters time while framing a project. CDhannon is just getting started, but we’ll keep in touch as her journey continues.

In this week’s bonus episode, Bill Fotsch, a business consultant, explains why he thinks much of the effort that he and many others have put into creating employee engagement over the past three decades has been wasted effort—well intentioned, but wasted. The fact is, Fotsch says, employees today are no more engaged than they were some 30 years ago when the concept of employee engagement first gained currency. So what’s the answer? Fotsch has come to the conclusion that it’s something he calls “economic engagement,” which happens to be the name of his consulting business. What exactly is economic engagement? He says it’s getting employees to focus on serving customers, and doing so profitably. He says it’s not so much about sharing financials with employees but about getting employees to understand the strategies and actions that really drive a business’s profitability. Fotsch is so convinced that he’s cracked the code that he’s gone beyond mere consulting and has been buying stakes in businesses so he can implement his ideas and prove his concept. So far, he says, it’s working.

Show Notes:

• See how you score on an economic-engagement benchmark survey.
• Here’s Gallup’s G12 employee-engagement survey.
• Bill Fotsch co-authored an article that argues economic engagement is a logical successor to open book management.

This week, in episode 170, Jay Goltz tells Shawn Busse about the latest stop on his journey to figuring out whether an employee stock ownership plan is right for his business. Jay’s latest adventure includes waking up at 4:30 in the morning in Minneapolis too anxious to sleep—“Oh my God, what am I getting myself into here?”—and deciding to leave the seminar and drive back to Chicago. But on that six-hour return trip, Jay says his anxiety turned into clarity. In fact, he thinks he’s pretty sure he knows now what he wants to do. Of course, he has said that before. And we continue to learn more about ESOPs, this week hitting upon an interesting issue: ESOP enthusiasts love to tout the benefits of turning employees into owners. But are they really owners? And is that the right message to send them? “If you bought 10 shares of General Motors stock,” Jay asks, “would you tell your neighbors that you're an owner of General Motors?” Plus: We also talk about when business owners should ignore their accountants and whether Shawn and Jay expect their employees to come forward and tell them if they see another employee doing something they shouldn’t be doing.

When Gene Marks and I recorded this episode of Dashboard on Friday, we were pretty sure the government was going to shut down. That, of course, didn’t happen so you can fast-forward through our brief remarks early in the show—or perhaps you would enjoy hearing Gene state confidently that he’s known all along that a shutdown was inevitable. We also discuss what Gene’s been hearing from business owners as he criss-crosses the country talking to various groups. And Gene talks about the IRS’s decision to suspend the ERC program and what you should do if you fear you may have been overly aggressive in your application. Plus, he explains why he hates LinkedIn but keeps using it anyway. -- Loren Feldman

This week, in episode 169, Sarah Segal tells Shawn Busse that the other shoe has dropped. A couple of months ago, as she’s shared here previously, Sarah lost two big clients in one week. Now she takes us through her decision to lay off three of her employees, including what it means for the business and what it means for Sarah’s own role in the business. Before the layoffs, she had gotten to the point where she was working on the business—but now that’s changed. “I'm not working on the business,” she says. “I am working for clients. I am getting the job done. I am making sure that we're successful with our clients, and that is my priority right now.” Plus: We also discuss how to choose a CRM, why Sarah and Shawn’s home cities of San Francisco and Portland have been getting such bad PR, and whether former business owners are employable. “I wouldn’t hire me,” says Sarah.

This week, Tracy Bech talks about why it’s important, from time to time, to review your margins, to compare them with those of others in your industry, and to look for ways they might be improved. You might even find ways to adjust your business model. The first step, of course, is to make sure you know what those margins are. Plus: when is it time to start thinking about next year?

This week, in episode 168, Shawn Busse, Paul Downs, and Liz Picarazzi talk about when it makes sense to walk away from a client. Liz, for example, is tired of dealing with bureaucracy and being at the bottom of the food chain. In one instance, she was so turned off that she actually recommended a competitor for a job she no longer wanted. Paul has a simple test: If it’s easy work for a bad client, okay, fine. But if it’s hard work for a bad client, “Just don’t do it.” Of course, there are times in the life cycle of most businesses when that’s easier said than done, when you have to accept almost any work offered. Those are the tough ones. Plus: Is it time for business owners to take artificial intelligence seriously? And should owners care that a well-known economics firm is predicting a depression in 2030?

John Arensmeyer explains what the end of pandemic-era childcare support will mean for businesses. He also talks about the Department of Labor’s proposed overtime rule and what’s at stake for business owners if the government shuts down. Plus: owners say banks are getting harder to deal with.

This week, in episode 167, Shawn Busse, Jennifer Kerhin, and William Vanderbloemen discuss private equity. Both William and Jennifer have been getting emails and calls from representatives of PE firms who come promising all kinds of gifts—connections, expertise, money to invest in the business, and money to take off the table—which is why the temptation can be great. “If anybody even just offered me a three-day vacation, I think I would jump at it,” Jennifer jokes. But of course PE firms do exact a price, possibly including control of what used to be your business, which is why Jennifer says she wonders whether she should even take the phone calls. Entering the conversation, she says, feels a little like entering the Garden of Eden. Do you take a bite of that apple? Plus, Shawn thinks he’s found a better way to manage his company’s credit cards, and Jennifer gives us an update on her new website.