Culture Eats Strategy

Today, Jonathan Keyser, the inspiring founder behind real estate brokerage firm Keyser, joins us today to talk about living out one’s true values. He gives us an insight into the cut-throat industry of real estate and what he has become to rise from the ranks. After an epiphany, he realizes one doesn’t have to be ruthless to succeed.

Selfless Service: The Key to Success

If you ask around among Arizona commercial real estate brokers, you’ll surely hear about Jonathan Keyser — a thought leader and the inspiring founder of Keyser. He designs and implements unique solutions to complex real estate challenges. 

In particular, Jonathan focused on promoting “selfless service,” which he believes is the key to growing his company. However, when he was still starting his career, he was very honest about being ruthless and cut-throat.

“The thing about me is, I try to be as authentic as possible. I used to be the most ruthless, cut-throat, commercial real estate prick in the world. I would lie, cheat and steal and would basically do whatever it took to be successful.” – Jonathan Keyser

You Don’t Have to Be Ruthless to Succeed

Jonathan vowed to himself that he will be successful. He came into the real estate world because it was a promising industry. Unfortunately, he was not prepared to face the hard truths the industry has in store for him.

“This is a ruthless industry. Everybody was scratching, clawing and backstabbing. I said okay if this is what it takes to be successful, I would do that. Because I was a little overachiever, I became ruthless the most. While I was successful at it, I hated it.” – Jonathan Keyser

Upon attending a seminar, he had an epiphany and realized that you can create success – financial, material success – through selfless service. Fast forward to the present day, he created the Keyser Institute which trains various corporations and individuals to succeed through selfless service.

Creating a Culture of Selfless Service 

Jonathan believes that at the end of the day, it’s our relationship with people that really matters. He warned that this philosophy of selfless service is not an instant gratification play. 

“You have to be thinking about long-term sustainable success. The only way you develop trust is by helping other people. Not trying to “sell” to them, but to serve them.” – Jonathan Keyser

Jonathan built his organization on 15 cooperating principles that define the company culture. New members of the team must be aligned “culturally” which means they truly want to help other people. 

Download and listen to Living Out Your True Values to learn more. Remember to let Jonathan know you heard about him next Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website: jonathankeyser.com

LinkedIn: jonathankeyser

Twitter: @Keyserway

Instagram: @keyserway

Miha Matlievski, popularly known as the “Fail Coach,” joins us today to share the highs and lows of his career and what culture has to do with it. At present, Miha coaches entrepreneurs towards success through his project, Framework4Freedom. 

The Fail Coach

Miha Matlievski is a business coach who experienced monumental personal failure in his life. He was bankrupt at the age of 30 and was close to committing suicide due to this.

After a year of slumping, Miha took charge of his life once again and built a startup. The business generated eight figures in less than a year.  Many publications in Slovenia approached him and his story went viral.

Regardless of these failures, Miha was able to forge an approach towards helping entrepreneurs and business executives find their personal success and fulfillment. 

Culture Enables You To Become “Premium”

For Miha, culture is about how the whole company vibes. Culture defines the values, the interactions and how the company functions as a whole. On the inside, culture is about how employees present themselves. On the outside, it is about understanding and knowing the “whys.”  

Miha underscores the importance of culture cultivation. He notes that, as with everything else, it should start from the top. If there is no clarity and guidance from the CEO, owner, entrepreneur — there will be more confusion and disconnect among the lower ranks of the company.

“If you cultivate the right culture, you’ll have much happier employees, more productive employees, happier clients, more brand awareness. You can position yourself into a more premium level because the whole company vibes with what the culture should represent.” – Miha Matlievski 

Framework4Freedom

Miha has a website named Framework4freedom and he considers this as his way of giving back to entrepreneurs. Although he has a number of high-end clients with his business FailCoach LLC, he still believes that it is more challenging and fulfilling to work with new entrepreneurs.

“I have the freedom of time. I have the freedom of money. I have the freedom of choice ⁠— which for me is the ultimate freedom ⁠— and I chose to work with new entrepreneurs.” – Miha Matlievski

Miha believes that new entrepreneurs have a lot of inner demons to conquer, such as their fear of both success and failure. Further, he believes that with proper guidance and the right foundation, any entrepreneur could reach their level of success and fulfillment.

Download and listen to Framework 4 Freedom: Helping Entrepreneurs Reach Success to learn more. Remember to let Miha know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website – Framework4Freedom

Facebook – FailCoach

LinkedIn – FailCoach

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Micah Rowland, COO of Fountain joins us today to share a lot of insights about onboarding, coaching and developing employees towards their personal success. Rowland believes that focusing on employee growth will lead to a great culture, which will then define the company’s success.

Building People, Teams and Processes

Micah Rowland is not the typical everyday builder. He used to be a software engineer but at the moment, he builds people, teams and processes as the Chief Operations Officer COO of Fountain.

Fountain is a service-oriented company that helps clients with their hiring and onboarding process. Fountain provides these companies tools such as automated communications for attracting talent, interviews, hiring, and onboarding. Micah has taken multiple companies from 50 to 250 people and $5 million to $30 million in revenue.

Culture is paramount to success

Micah believes that culture is of paramount importance to every organization ⁠—  in terms of achieving the company objectives. Although he believes that without a strategy, a company will not reach success, he also believes that a company with a bad culture will not stay for the long term.

He cites as an example of a company that is not set up to empower people and to help people bring their best to the organization. With this, he believes that the hiring and training process is beneficial in creating a great culture. 

“If you have somebody you hired in your company and they’re not meeting the bar for performance, whatever the bar, there are many things that need to be examined before you make a decision. You need to ask yourself if that person’s manager understands how to onboard, coach and develop that person in their role to help them be successful.” – Micah Rowland

Hire slow, fire fast is a myth

As a true believer of culture himself, Micah shares his opinion about the popular Silicon Valley mentality of “hire slow, fire fast.”

He says that this might hold true to entrepreneurs who believe that “lots of bad apples are scattered throughout the working world.” However, he believes that most of the people, especially those who wind up in the StartUp industry have determination and motivation to do an excellent job. 

“They want to bring to the world a unique set of talents. If someone is not succeeding in their role ⁠—  the hire slow, fire fast is very disruptive not only in cost associated with hiring and replacing people, but it terms of the way it impacts culture.” – Micah Rowland

He believes that managers are in a unique position to help an employee to become successful. Additionally, he cites the importance of the experience of the management, not only with the hiring process but in handling compensation, promotion, and incentives.

Download and listen to Onboarding, Coaching and Developing Employees Towards Success to learn more. Remember to let Micah know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website – Fountain

Twitter – Fountain_Inc

Facebook – F...

Jeff Gothelf, the co-author of the book Lean UX, shares today the true measure of success in any organization: customer and employee engagement. He believes that having a customer-centric organization is the key to developing products and services that last. Organizations cannot achieve this objective without creating a culture that values feedback.

From Building Softwares to Building Organizations

A musician by heart, Jeff found himself joining the bandwagon of the internet age 20 years ago. He was coding, designing and building websites for different organizations. Ten years in the software industry, he reached the crossroads of his career and realized he wanted to do more.

At present, Jeff helps organizations build better products and executives build the cultures that build better products. Jeff works as a coach, consultant and keynote speaker helping companies bridge the gaps between business agility, digital transformation, product management and human-centered design. 

“Today, the only way to build a business that delivers value in a way that people expect it is to leverage technology, that aids in the delivery and capture of the value that you provide to the customers” – Jeff Gothelf

Customer Engagement: True Measure of Success

In the past, Jeff’s work was to build a product and ship it into the market. That was the measure of success—disregarding its impact and usage to the people. He deems himself and his work as that of a production factory, only this time, its for software.

“I figured there had to be a better way how design worked, to be a more strategic partner in the product and service development process.” – Jeff Gothelf

Jeff’s learnings led to the publishing of the book Lean UX—UX stands for “user experience.” The book was well-received globally, as people of different industries are encountering the same problem. 

Creating a Customer-Centric Culture

Jeff points out the importance of creating a culture for employees, where feedback is equally important as product development. He received a lot of feedback from readers of his book stating that they find his teachings very efficient, but their bosses, company or culture does not encourage this kind of collaboration with customers. 

Moreover, he shares that the nature of product delivery of today is very different in the past. Technology plays a huge role in learning and developing products

“The power that comes from that technological distribution channel allows you to build a culture of continuous learning, a culture of continuous improvement and a culture of agility.” – Jeff Gothelf

Download and listen to Customer and Employee Engagement: True Measure of Success to learn more. Remember to let Jeff know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website: Jeff Gothelf

Twitter: @jboogie 

Book: Sense and Respond

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Brandon Vaughn shares to us in this episode how he grew his business from zero to over 70 employees, with revenues down from $8k/mo to over $450k/mo, in just 6 seasons. He believes this is achievable for any aspirating entrepreneur, through implementing systems and creating a positive company culture.

From Zero to Hero

Most entrepreneurs consider implementing systems and processes as the bane of their existence. Brandon Vaughn thinks otherwise. He runs his company Automate Grow Sell, which aims to assist small businesses to systemize and scale their businesses. Brandon helps SMEs by offering personalized mentorship and training programs.

He made the decision of purchasing the company from his ailing father, who previously ran the company by himself. However, when he started his business, he admits he does not know the importance of systems and culture.

“As I was growing my business from 0 to 60, I experienced all the pain and suffering and different breakthrough points. I didn’t realize how important systems were, and I really didn’t realize how important culture was” – Brandon Vaughn

Culture Makes Employees Stay

Brandon recounts how he started with his company, where he found himself losing half of his employees in a span of one month. This event made him realizes his failure to place emphasis on culture.

“One of our focus is we started switching up was, helping our employees fulfill their dreams. That sounds really cliche, but if you help enough other people to get what it is that they want in life, then you can have anything that you want in life.” – Brandon Vaughn

There’s a high turnover of employees involving the young generation. By addressing this fact, a company can then focus on creating a training system where the company serves as a stepping stone for an employee’s future goals. Moreover, company owners can invest more heavily into the culture and positive work environment and culture

Systematic Sourcing and Training 

Brandon’s company has a very systematic process of hiring and training. They bury their phone number in the job post to weed out applicants who cannot follow instructions. Moreover, they do ask the applicant to leave a voice message and receive further instructions via voicemail. 

The employers sit down, interview the applicant and explain the Dream Manager program. The applicant must be aligned with the core values of the company, before heading to a robust 2-week training. There is also a 30, 60 and 90-day evaluation where they get to evaluate themselves based on their work. 

“The happiest employees are ones whose boss really creates clear expectations and clearly defined goals.” – Brandon Vaughn

Download and listen to Growing Your Company Through Systems and Culture to learn more. Remember to let Brandon know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website: Automate Grow Sell (AGS Conquer) 

Linkedin: Brandon Vaughn

Facebook: Automate Grow Sell

Today, New York Times bestselling author and GuruMaker Inc. executive coach Harrison Monarth joins us to discuss the impact and influence executives can make in their environment by focusing on promoting a positive culture. 

The Guru of Top Level Executives

Harrison Monarth is the executive coach at GuruMaker Inc. He is a leader in the field of developing key leadership competencies, executive presence, effective communication, and leadership influence. In the past, he held senior leadership positions in manufacturing, marketing, and organizational development.

Harrison’s international bestselling book Executive Presence-The Art of Commanding Respect Like a CEO was included in the top 10 business book list in Canada, Austria, and China. Harrison helps managers and leaders better understand their style and impact on others and in the end reach their business goals. 

“I do this internationally and the beauty is, the topic executive presence is very relevant whether you are in the US, Latin America, Asia.” – Harrison Monarth

Organizations Hire The Guru

Harrison Monarth has speaking engagements and clients internationally. He has been exposed not only in multi-cultural environments but to varying company cultures as well. Surprisingly, almost all organizations who hired him, share the same objectives of bettering their leaders.

Organizations want to learn about helping their leaders show up with more confidence, building their personal brand, having an impact on people and having influence.” – Harrison Monarth

Aside from adapting to the company culture and the environment of his clients, Harrison points out the importance of asking a lot of questions on the needs, challenges, and goals of the client. 

The Gap Between Intention and Impact

Based on Harrison’s experience, most of the time, the CEOs and the employees have misaligned values. Some CEOs have the best intentions in implementing a certain culture, but not necessary weighed in on the impact it may have on him/herself or the employees in general.

“As the CEO, you set the culture⁠—how you behave, what you communicate and don’t communicate. People are getting their cues from you. The root of this is the gap between intention and impact.” – Harrison Monarth

To cite an example, a CEO espouses the importance of feedback and yet is intimidated by responses from subordinates or likewise gives sugar coated remarks to employees. He points out that to be able to influence people, one must have a good grasp of how the company culture functions.

Download and listen to How Your Leadership Style Impacts and Influences Others to learn more. Remember to let Harrison know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website: Guru Maker

Linkedin: Harrison Monarth 

Twitter: @HarrisonMonarth

Vincent Pugliese joins us today to discuss the culture within Total Life Freedom—an exclusive, intimate mastermind of generous entrepreneurs and freelancers building a life of money, time and location freedom.

Total Life Freedom

Vincent and his wife Elizabeth homeschool their three sons, often traveling for months at a time to explore, learn and connect. In fact, Vincent was in a California beachside when he envisioned Total Life Freedom.

Total Life Freedom is an application/invite-only community for entrepreneurs who wants to collaborate and connect with like-minded individuals. The members have weekly meetings and a live 1-Day Masterminds retreat. 

Vincent is also a keynote speaker and an upcoming podcast host of Total Life Freedom.

The Meeting of Minds

The term mastermind was first popularized in the book Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Mastermind was defined as “a community meeting of multiple minds who bring unbiased feedback, encouragement, and support along with a growth mindset to help elevate everyone in the entire group.” 

“Generosity is the key. We want people who are helping each other. When there are down times and you want to reach out, we will be there for you because it’s lonely being an entrepreneur.” – Vincent Pugliese

Vincent says there are a lot of mastermind groups, who are focused on achieving different goals, but it comes down to the culture. He prides himself as someone who loves change and is challenged by it. It is no different when he has to deal with people coming and leaving the group.

People Come and Go

The hardest part of handling a group who pays membership fees is seeing people go. Vincent tries his best to view it on a personal level instead of from a business perspective. He has invested time and energy in helping members and it is devastating to see them go.

“My job is to create a culture as good as possible so they don’t want to leave, not to make them feel bad for leaving.” – Vincent Pugliese

Vincent added that you cannot run the masterminds without being personal. Another challenge he faces when people leave is how to explain it to the other members. 

How to Cope with Exiting Members

A masterminds leader understands that people leave as the seasons change. Each time somebody leaves, it is an important opportunity to ask oneself what can we do to make the group better. He contemplates how to make the replacement for this person better, so the remaining members are not getting less value.

“I get their pulse with what they’re struggling or what they want to grow with. We do niche calls outside the individual groups.”  – Vincent Pugliese

Aside from coping, Vincent shares the value of keeping things fresh within the organization to keep the remaining members motivated.

Download and listen to How to Deal with People Leaving a Close-Knit Organization to learn more. Remember to let Vincent know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website – Total Life Freedom

LinkedIn @vincent-pugliese-3955321a

Certified tax coach and bestselling author, Diane Gardner, talks about how standing out contributes to overall business health. She developed an incredible company culture based on gratitude. Aside from her amazing management skills, entrepreneurs can greatly benefit from some of her tax strategies in this semi-coaching session.

What’s Beyond the Comfort Zone

Diane’s has considerably amazing management skills. Her clients greatly benefitted from her tax strategies. In fact, her clients have a total combined savings of over $3,151,006 to-date — hard-earned profits these clients would have given to the government by overpaying taxes.

In the past, Diane found herself pushing her limits during the recession. She hung on by fingernails as many of her clients were going out of business. As her monthly revenues dwindled, she contemplated how to get through with her five employees and a newly purchased commercial building.

“My business coach challenged me to start thinking outside the box—start looking at accounting from a different mindset and start being able to work outside our geographical area.” – Diane Gardner

Diane started to do things differently. She knew she had to stand out among the general accounting practitioners so she found her own niche. Her business coach encouraged her to write a book, too! Aside from the challenge of writing and promoting it, she knew she had to re-do her support team.

Turning the Business Around

Diane faced a lot of resistance the moment she decided she needed a better culture in the office. Most of her tax planners and bookkeepers thought that she was nuts for executing “non-sense” customs. However, Diane was on a mission to implement a company culture that will transgress to client satisfaction.  

“I went from being more of a traditional accounting office to an office where our culture is completely based on thankfulness and gratitude.”  – Diane Gardner

The Thank-you-gram and Extra Mile Token

Employee productivity and motivation are way up with Diane’s newly implemented customs. Two of these employee motivators is the “Thank-you-gram”⁠, where she personally writes thank you notes to employees, clients, and acquaintances⁠.

The second motivator is the “Extra Mile Token”, where an employee can give their exemplary peers a token. They can exchange it for a paid free hour of work. 

Download and listen to Turn a Business Around: Creating a Culture Based on Gratitude to learn more. Remember to let Diane know you heard about her on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website – TaxCoach4You

Facebook @taxcoach4you

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Would you believe that most entrepreneurs, including CEOs, are having a hard time simplifying big management decisions? Life-long entrepreneur Ed Eppley talks about it and more in this conversation. 

“So often in business, the choice is not between right and wrong. It’s between one choice that has a set of consequences and another choice with another set of consequences.” – Ed Eppley

From Terrible Employee to Terrific Consultant 

Ed is a leading global expert in professional management, sales strategy, and performance management. He started an advertising agency and a manufacturer’s rep firm selling to the industrial and construction markets before creating Tyson Eppley Management, ProspeX, and The Eppley Group. 

He spent the first 20 years of his life figuring out what he was good at. At 48 years old, he considered himself a “terrible employee”⁠—one who doesn’t like scaling businesses. He wanted to be an entrepreneur who masterminds a business instead. 

He has a passion for interacting with people at all levels and has a vision of trying to help them advance. Consulting has been intuitive to Ed. The only challenge was finding how to monetize his skills. 

Advancing Businesses Rather Than Oscillating

Ed defines “oscillating” in business as sitting in a rocking chair. It is moving, maybe further forward or may even go backward. But in reality, the business is still where it was. 

Ed vowed to help organizations advance. He devised several ways to assist decision makers. He says the most important thing a business owner should do is simplifying complex problems. 

“Simplifying things gives people permission to do what they should do or what they should have done anyway.” – Ed Eppley

The next would be identifying if the current talent pool is in line with company culture. The third one is helping the CEO, almost at any level, to have the courage to finally make the decision. 

Download and listen to Simplifying Big Management Decisions to learn more. Remember to let Ed know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website – The Eppley Group

Twitter @ed_eppley

LinkedIn @ed-eppley-a18a2a

Book – Let’s Be Clear

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What does your work culture look like? Does it make your employees happier and more productive? Today, Erik Bergman talks about the high price he took to succeed and the lessons he learned in the journey.

“All shortcuts come with a price.” – Erik Bergman

Hard Work and Well Being

Erik is the co-founder of Catena Media. Their company went from zero to over 300 employees within 5 years. He earned more than he ever needed in life at that time. However, success was not without the expense of burning himself out.

He learned from that journey of his life and started Great.com, focusing on the well being, transparency, trust and flexibility. 100 percent of their profits go to charity.

Radical Transparency with Employees

Erik zeroed in on the importance of radical transparency in the workplace. According to him, it is sometimes tempting to treat people unfairly because of the ability to hide behind secrecy. This unfair treatment includes how much an employee earns compared to how much s/he deserves.

He witnessed its negative impact on his company. Two people in a team, for example, had different salaries. The one with the lowest salary was the best performer but was the worst in negotiating his worth.

“If everyone knows what everyone makes, I cannot make that shortcut and neither can anyone else.” – Erik Bergman

Setting One’s Worth

Erik realized that if he wanted to thrive for more years—with the right people, he must change his perspective. At Great.com, they gave employees the privilege to set their own salaries and to be honest about what makes them happy.

“If we could build a culture where people get to decide what makes them happy, hopefully, we can attract people that have the same values that matter.” – Erik Bergman

The goal is to have a team that is completely responsible for their own salaries. This comes with the mindset that what they set for themselves is fair for everyone else.

Download and listen to How to Improve Culture in a Remote Workplace to learn more. Remember to let Erik know you heard about him on Culture Eats Strategy with Jaime Jay!

Connect through the links below:

Website – Great.com

Website – Erik’s Personal Website

LinkedIn @erik-bergman-0462112b

Facebook @livegivegreat

Twitter @bergmanel

Instagram @erik.bergman

Leave us a 5-star rating and review if you enjoyed the show! Thank you and meet you again next week.