Jeff is Founder and CEO of Key Performance Integrators (KPI), a firm providing Fractional COO services. He partners with visionary business owners to develop efficient and scalable systems and processes. KPI helps to identify, document and improve the key processes that drive their client’s business, train their teams so they can measure and continuously improve. KPI helps business owners achieve their goals and grow their business.

We had a wonderful discussion about Jeff’s work with his clients and their teams to drive change. Here are a few key markers:

• Business Overview and team experience 1:09
• How to make a difference as Fractional COO 2:10
• Driving change and get buy-in from the client’s team 4:44
• Driving change in large versus small organizations 8:43
• Same type of problems surface across industries 10:24
• Getting people aligned in the face of change 12:25
• Top three skills that make a difference at the client 14:51
  •         Process – Data - Accountability
•  Example of a successful client transformation 20:01
•  Jeff’s contact information 22:03

  Contact information: 

https://www.kpintegrators.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreyprovost

Today’s guest is Brett Knopf with KnopfKnows Solutions. 

 He is a Performance Coach and Business Strategist with over two decades of experience in Leadership and Sales Management across multiple verticals.  

He has delivered nearly 1000 presentations over the course of his career for highly successful organizations such as United Healthcare, Equinox, and Hitachi, to name a few.  

 Brett's mission is to empower leaders and teams to create work environments that focus on collaboration, transparency, self-accountability and personal development in order to recruit, retain and develop elite performers at all levels of the organizations he works with.  

 He recently published his first book:  “Everyday People Extraordinary Sales Success: Sales Secrets From Those Who Won Financial Freedom and Their Life Back”  which hit #1 Bestseller in multiple categories.

 We had a wonderful discussion about Brett’s work with his clients and their teams. Here are a few key markers: 

• Background and inception of KnopfKnows Solutions 1:10
• Building a culture of team accountability 3:30
• Importance of clarity when building a culture 6:00
• Nuanced approach to team development 7:50
• Managing skill versus will issues 10:50
• The servant leader model 12:40
• A flexible and customized approach to working with clients 14:00
• Different needs in a new versus stabilized business 18:30
• Helping people to perform at the highest level 20:00
• The not so hidden cost of keeping the wrong players on the team 23:00
• Coaches as sounding boards to help clients work through challenges 25:10
• Contact information 28:17

 Contact information: 

 Brett Knopf

KnopfKnows Solutions, LLC

Cell phone: 551-404-4060

https://knopfknowssolutions.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/brettknopf/

Today’s guest is Australia-based Roslyn Ranse. She is a travel advisor and business strategist who’s been in the travel industry for over 15 years. She is the founder of Travel Agent Achievers, where she educates and mentors other travel consultants to grow their business and put in place systems and processes that will accelerate their business and ultimately enhance their client’s experience. Roslyn educates her community through live events, courses and masterminds. She is also the host of the Travel Agent Achievers podcast.

Here’s what we cover in our conversation:

• How Roslyn became an entrepreneur after a long corporate career 1:08
• Initial challenges after starting her travel business 3:30 
• Started her 2nd business focused on educating other travel agents 5:10
• Delegating the right things to continue to grow and enjoy the business 6: 00
• Challenges to find the right people and build a strong team 7:33 
• Mapping out processes and clearly defining roles help others to execute 10:00
• Avoiding the trap of thinking that every client is different 13:40
• The travel experience starts when clients book the trip 17:00
• Curating long-term client relationships to create personalized experiences 17:40
• Building a strong team to prepare for the next level of growth 20:40  

 Roslyn’s contact information:

 www.travelagentachievers.com

[email protected]

LinkedIn: 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/roslynranse/

Welcome to this episode of Power Up Your Team podcast. This is your free resource with tips and tricks to build a high performing team.

If your business is growing and you are an entrepreneur with just a few part time resources, you sooner or later have to delegate larger portions of work that you used to do yourself. That is if you want to keep on growing.

It’s easy to let go of administrative tasks such as:

• booking appointments 
• keeping your CRM system up-to-date 
• writing and posting social media content for you

Most likely,  you have an array of business partners who provide support services such as accounting, legal support or IT services.

But what if, despite  all outsourcing and delegation, you are at your capacity limits? 

Maybe it’s time to start building a full-time team!

You have covered all major parts of the business yourself: Business Development, Client acquisition, design and delivery, billing, correspondence. You name it.

And you realize that, while you are in the weeds focusing on execution, you don’t have time to think about strategic stuff anymore.  You are rushing from one task to the next and still feel constantly behind.

No time to design and build the next program because you are busy delivering the current one.

No time to focus on new clients because your long standing clients are keep in you so busy.

So, the key question is: 

Where do you start?

Who do you bring on board, first?

Here’s an approach I invite you to consider: Make your weakness your team’s strength.

Start with what you least enjoy doing, the stuff where you feel out of your zone of genius.

If you don’t like administrative tasks such as billing, bookkeeping, organizing things, creating process flows or work instruction, then maybe it’s time to put someone in charge of that. 

If you don’t like to connect with new people every day, maybe it’s time to hire someone who focuses on business development.

To build a successful team, you have to be clear on your strength and know what jobs you are hiring for.

And it's equally important to do some soul searching on yourself. 

• Are you willing to accept new ideas from that person? 
• Do you need a thinking partner or just a person who executes? 
• Does this person have decision authority or is he/she following instructions?

You have to be clear on “how much leash” you want to give your first team member. Maybe not from the get go but over time.

Over my career, I have built many teams and I realized that it is important to recognize when someone is more skilled or talented in an area than I am myself. It’s important to acknowledge that and create a trusted, respectful climate.

By nature, I am an operations person and like to make sure things run well and there is a clear line of sight between activities and results.  

On the contrary, I never liked to go out and have networking conversations or join industry groups to solicit new business. 

And guess what, there are people who loved just that! I put those people in positions to navigate our stakeholder landscape in and outside the company and let them run that show.

We aligned on purpose, intend and strategy. But that’s it. In our check-in meeting I viewed them as equal partner in pursuit of business success.

The first few hires are the most crucial ones because you are hiring 50 % of your team with the first hire and 33 % with the second and so forth.

Continue reading at www.powerupyourteam.com

Today’s guest is Anne Rush, Founder & CEO of Elasta Jobs. Elasta Jobs provides HR consulting services through skilled independent consultants.  Prior to jumping into entrepreneurship, Anne has also held Fortune 100 executive roles in Talent, Operations, and Technology. Anne holds her bachelor's degree from Boston College and master's degree from Harvard University.   

 Here’s what we covered in our discussion:

 Elasta Jobs introduction 1:00
The idea and market need that started Elasta Jobs 1:46

• Helping independent consultant get access to clients
• Providing skilled talent on demand for a particular need

Flexible HR talent fills a capacity gap in a growing business 3:42
Aligning client’s needs with expert consultants in her network 5:10
Growing the business by leveraging the gig economy 8:22
Building a trusted consultant network one conversation at a time 9:40
Benefits of a reliable close-nit network 12:10
 Onboarding independent consultants to become one team representing Elasta Jobs13:00
Leveraging corporate experience to build, lead and empower the project teams. 16:10 Anne’s contact information 18:04

 Anne’s contact information:

www.ElastaJobs.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/anne-rush/

Today I want to add my 2 cents to the subject of quiet quitting. It’s a new term for a problem that has been around quite some time.

What moved it so much into the focus is the pandemic. It caused many people to re-evaluate what’s important in life and how they currently spend it.

And also, over the decades, the work itself has changed. There are more businesses that put employees in touch with the customer as they co-create the services. The rate of change has increased. Technology is more complex.  

So every business needs the hearts and minds of all their employees to contribute with functional expertise and new ideas.

Here’s the truth: You simply can’t afford a quiet quitter on your team!

According to Gallup, “quiet quitters” make up 50 % of the US workforce. It’s those people who do the bare minimum and their mind is detached from the job. They are on autopilot so to speak.

They might smile, they show up on time, do what is asked of them but nothing more. No new ideas, no extra step when dealing with a customer, no improvement of their work. 

As CEO or Founder, you have the power to create an engaging work environment that keeps your peeps engaged. 

And frankly, if you want to scale your business to the next level of success you need people who are all in.  You need them to say “Hell Yes” and not “Maybe”.

In my mind there are several things you can do to create that environment:

1. Anchor your business in purpose

What is the bigger purpose above and beyond the annual results or the current products or services? 

That makes me think of the fable of the three bricklayers of which one is laying bricks to feed the family, the second one is building a wall and the third one is building the house of God.

2. Create clarity into where you are going

What’s your vision, what’s the strategy to get there?  What’s the most important work?

The more people understand about the organization, the more engaged they can be. 

3. Create context of how work gets done 

If everyone just understands their job without knowing where work is coming from and where it’s going, it is very hard to get the whole picture. Going back to the fable, all they are seeing is the brick.

During my career in continuous improvement, I have encountered a lot of situations where employees didn’t know how their individual work fits into the overall context.

4. Lead with a process mindset

And yes, I am talking about process here.

Employee engagement is sometimes viewed as a matter of leadership tasks such communication, recognition, personal development. The soft skills. And they are all important.

But I have helped enough teams to improve their processes to know that transparent processes are a key ingredient to an engaging work environment.

Seriously, it can be so frustrating when you get a customer inquiry and don’t know where to get the information to answer it. Or, if you wait for an approval and can’t follow up because you don’t know who the approver is. Your request was sent off with a swoosh into a black hole called computer.

Let's review: What did I list so far? Purpose, Clarity, Context and Process

By the way, If this resonates and you realize that this is holding you back from the results you want, let’s book a strategy session. It’s 90 minutes where we can brainstorm how you can start to create a more engaging environment.  

When it comes to leadership habits, there is one that stands out when it comes to quiet quitting:

Find out about tip # 5 at PowerUpYourTeam.com

Welcome to this episode of Power Up Your team podcast. 

These days, technology is a part of every business. Every successful venture depends on technology ranging from small best-in-class spot solutions to large end-to-end business automation systems.

And as you scale your business, your technology has to follow suit.

There is an overwhelming selection of software products out there. Most of them are solutions for specific tasks.  It is difficult to integrate them and avoid overlap or gaps between systems. There is so much choice.

Just think of CRM systems as example. There are so many out there. HubSpot, Salesforce, Oracle NetSuite, Monday and so many more.

And they all come with excellent features, offer integration opportunities and promise a better world. It’s so easy to get carried away by really cool functionality.

And of course, you want to make sure your business runs on state-of-the-art technology.

But what if your processes are still not running smoothly?

With every system you’re adding there seem to be more manual workarounds that your employees are coming up with.  That is so frustrating.

As Founder or CEO, you may not be the technology expert – unless that happens to be your product. But you are the expert in how your business runs and so is your team.

To guide your team in making a good selection, they have to recognize that technology is not the equivalent of process. It’s an enabler.  Technology needs to support the process and the people doing the work - not the other way around.

So when you implement new technology, it's good to make sure your team has a:

• crystal-clear understanding of the existing process
• record of gaps that need to be addressed with new technology
• list of things that are working well that can’t be thrown out
• mental image of the future process
• role in the selection and implementation process

All team members who are working with the technology all the time have to be involved. By the way, that also helps with buy-in from a change perspective.

What if you are not the expert in the process?

Throughout my career, I had to lead several large technology implementations.  Sometimes, I was in the role of President and P&L leader and other times I was a strategic initiative leader.

I was never the expert in the process.  I am also not a technology expert. So in each case, I had to lead my team in a way that guaranteed the highest likelihood of them making good decisions for the business.

And I did that by involving them in evaluating current state and designing future state down to the click and clacks on very screen. We even looked at everyone’s role and evaluated how much they were aligned to the process.

When it came to configuring the new system, I remember we had many discussions about the extent to which we should customize the new technology to match our processes or change our processes to pick up the latest and greatest technology trends.

See there is a huge element of change management in here. Sometimes our team was fearful to change to processes away from what they were used to. We needed to make sure that employees were bought into that change.  Otherwise, we would implement new technology and still have manual workarounds.

Think of technology as an enabler of the processes that are run by your team members.

Keeping a process mindset at the forefront will help to buy and configure technology that seamlessly integrates into the way you 

So, you became an entrepreneur to do you own thing. You are your own boss and ditched those rules and instructions your managers used to give you.  As founder, you want to be creative and take your ideas to market.

But as your team is growing you realize that it’s very tough to keep your fingers on the pulse or predict a month end result when everyone is flying by the seats of their pants.

You are not involved in every step anymore and you suddenly see that people have created their own way of doing things. 

That might be okay here and there but it quickly becomes a problem when there no clear view anymore on how products or services are created and delivered to the customer. 

Processes are often associated with cumbersome mapping exercises and documentation of detailed work instructions that might get ignored before the ink is dry. 

But without processes, you are wondering how things are going and what it is that people are actually working on. You are waiting and hoping that stuff will get done correctly and on time. By now, there are too many people around to follow-up with directly. 

It’s so unsettling when you don’t have visibility into anything until it’s done. You are constantly looking in the rear view mirror. 

Now there is the need for the team to step up and implement processes that align everyone around how work gets done.

And how do you show up as a leader to signal that processes are important? 

I think you do that by asking questions that can only be answered if the team follows consistent processes. And, of course, you have to be a role model and follow the processes yourself. 

So here are 3 types of questions you can ask: 

Questions pertaining to roles and responsibilities: 

Clear roles and responsibilities are important to get stuff done. So ask questions that start with “Who’s in charge”.  

Handoffs between teams are a place where things fall frequently through the cracks. So ask about them, too. 

Questions pertaining to processes.:

Have we improved the process for checking that payment has been received before we release the final product version to our customers? 

How much time are we spending on the annual review with customers? How far are we scheduled out?

How often do we check in with the client after we completed the project? Who is doing that? 

Questions pertaining to measurements:

Only what gets measured gets done. And those measurement give you the transparency you need to manage your business without being involved in every detail. 

And here’s my favorite one:

How do you know you have done a good job? 

This is very basic but the ability for people to assess the quality of their work is the foundation for making improvements and, believe it or not, a source of pride. People are more motivated when they know that their work hits the mark and makes a difference. 

How would it feel to know what’s going on in your shop

Here the truth: 

If you want a team that creates and follows processes you have to lead with an unshakeable process mindset.

That’s required to create an environment where processes drive consistency, transparency, and collaboration so you can keep your fingers on the pulse without being directly involved in every detail.

If this is an issue that is holding you back from the success you want, feel free to book a strategy session. We can brainstorm ideas for how you can show up with an unshakeable a process mindset and navigate your company to the next level of success.     

Hello and welcome to Power Up Your Team podcast. This is your free resource with tips for how to build a more resilient team. 

Without doubt it is challenging to keep a team motivated and on board. It may feel like an extra thing to do when your plate is already full.

You have a clear vision and are excited about it. You can visualize how things will be five years from now.  Maybe you envision a steady revenue line and a comfortable profit position. And, after many years with a bare bone salary for yourself, you can even give yourself a raise. 

In your mind, you can hear raving reviews from your customers and your competition curls under the table. Your employees are thrilled now that they are working in a nicer space. And you envision yourself having more time to think strategically because your team is running the day-to-day business independently. 

You carry this image of your future in your head and your heart. And this image is what gets you out of bed every morning. 

But you are wondering if your team shares this exciting vision with you!

You have shared where you want to take your business from a financial and marketing perspective.  And your team may just say “Ok more work coming our way”. 

 Maybe you talked about your personal vision. For instance, that you want to be on the top 40 under 40 list published by Forbes Magazine.  That’s a awesome goal but it’s hard for your team to buy into. Because is your personal goal.

 So how can you create a shared vision that your whole team will rally around?  

You have to invest the time to co-create that vision with your team.

Have you ever heard someone say paint me a picture? Or, a picture says more than thousand words?

I believe, creating a vision board is a great way to engage your team. Vision boards have become known as a means to manifest a personal vision but they work for a team as well.

Creating a vision board can be a fun team activity where you take a scrapbook approach to visualize the business future on a large white board. You can use magazine snippets, photos, drawings, paintings and other stuff to create a collage where everyone can see themselves represented.

This activity will also bond the team together. If you have a remote team, you can bring them together in person for this important event. 

Find out what opportunities they see for your business.  Maybe they have other ideas and expand the vision that you had in your head. You learn how your business vision translates into a shared purpose and an individual vision for each team member.

Where you see yourself as the top service provider listed in an industry magazine, they envision themselves talking to a friend and sharing that they now work for a very successful company (as opposed to a small startup with an uncertain future).

Where you see yourself having a steady stream of clients and a growing top line, they are excited about more career opportunities or flexible work hours. 

While you are seeing yourself as an established expert at an industry event, they can see themselves working in a bigger office or having better work-from-home equipment. 

While the vision is shared, the meaning is different for each and every team member. The key is that they all can see themselves in that future and are bought in with their hearts and minds. 

And the best way to get there is to co-create that vision. Having the dialogue so it becomes a colorful image that ignites yourself and your team every day. 

So don’t be the only visionary in your business. Get your team on board so they can support you as you lead your business to the next level of success. 

Kelly Wittman is the owner of Witt and Company, a brand strategy and design studio that specializes in rebranding. Prior to the unplanned start of her business in 2017, she spent six years in marketing, event management and fundraising, specifically in the nonprofit and startup space.  
 Now, she happily wears the title of ‘unemployable’ and is on a mission to help people-first businesses create strategic and intentional brands that support them in doing more good work.

Here’s what we covered in our conversation:

• How Kelly got started with her business 1:10
• Kelly’s first client who started the pivot towards branding 2:17
• Leveraging corporate skills and education to build a digital company 3:00
• How Kelly went about building her team after welcoming her first child 5:29
• Recognizing the need for an internal brand for her own business 7:00
• Creating clarity for her team on the Witt & Company brand values 10:29
• Team feedback to ensure customer interactions are aligned to brand 13:50
• Open dialogue to keep employees engaged in the business 15:00
• Finding team members who align with the company values 16:47
• How Kelly’s internal brand values create a great work environment 18:21
• One person with different values can get a small team out of alignment 21:50
• Kelly’s contact information 23:00

 Kelly’s contact information:

 www.WittandCompany.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellymwittman/