Scale from Here | Business Growth & Scaling Strategies for Small Business Owners

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Nearly half of all one-on-one meetings are considered suboptimal by the employees sitting in them, even when management thinks they went great. The meeting you keep canceling might be the one holding your team together.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Dr. Steven Rogelberg, Chancellor's Professor of Organizational Science, Management, and Psychology at UNC Charlotte and the world's leading scholar on meetings, to talk about why the one-on-one is the most overlooked and most powerful tool in a leader's arsenal.

Steve is the author of Glad We Met: The Art and Science of One-on-One Meetings, a research-backed guide that reframes the one-on-one from a calendar item into a driver of engagement, retention, and performance. And as he explains, it matters even more for small businesses. When you have 20 people and one quits, 5% of your staff just walked out the door. The turnover a 100,000-person company can absorb is genuinely disruptive to a team of 20.

Early in the conversation, Corey and Steve define what a one-on-one actually is, and just as importantly, what it is not. It is not a status update meeting that serves the manager. It is not the place to discipline someone or drop them onto a performance plan. A true one-on-one is orchestrated by the manager but built for the employee, a designated space where the employee sets the agenda and feels genuinely seen. Steve shares research showing that employees who experience meaningful one-on-ones are more engaged, provide better customer service, help their peers more, stay longer, and even work more safely on the job.

One of the most counterintuitive ideas in this episode is that doing one-on-ones well actually gives leaders time back. A regular cadence means employees save their issues for the scheduled meeting instead of interrupting all day, fewer mistakes need expensive fixing, and your top talent stops leaving. Steve also tackles the fear many owners and newer managers feel: if I am not talking, am I showing my value? His answer, backed by data, is blunt. The more the manager talks, the lower the ratings of effectiveness. Competence is displayed through actions, and the one-on-one is where leaders flex a different muscle entirely: listening, curiosity, and interpersonal trust. He even explains the neuroscience of why talking is so hard to stop, since talking a lot activates the same parts of the brain as good food and sex.

Corey and Steve dig into the traps small business owners fall into, from replacing an employee's idea with their own to disempowering the very people who could become ambassadors for the business. Corey lays out the math on turnover that should scare every owner: a DIY hire succeeds only 25 to 33% of the time, and replacing a top performer who knows your business is closer to a one in ten shot. Steve draws a memorable parallel to parenting and to Michael Jordan's career, showing how lifting others up is what made him truly great. He also walks through his six research-backed strategies: regularity, never canceling, talking less, letting employees drive the agenda, following up with backward calls to past conversations, and understanding the signals leaders send. Because when a manager chooses to skip the one-on-one, they are signaling that their people don't really matter.

This episode is essential listening for small business owners, entrepreneurs, and new managers who want to improve employee engagement, boost retention, reduce turnover, and build a stronger leadership team. Whether you dread one-on-ones or simply have never had a system for them, Steve offers a practical, human, and surprisingly efficient approach.

Listen in, then grab Glad We Met on Steve's website, where all proceeds are donated to the American Cancer Society. Stop grinding, start growing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

A one-on-one is for the employee, not the manager: it is not a status update, not a discipline session, and not a performance plan; it is a designated time where the employee's agenda drives the conversation and they feel genuinely seen.

Turnover hits small businesses harder: when you have 20 people and one quits, 5% of your staff just walked out, and Corey's math is worse than most owners think, with DIY hires succeeding only 25 to 33% of the time and top performers closer to one in ten to replace.

Talking less makes you more effective: the research shows a direct relationship between how much a manager talks and how poorly the meeting is rated, and the three most powerful things out of your mouth are "help me understand," "tell me more," and "how can I support you."

One-on-ones give you time back: a regular cadence means fewer daily interruptions because employees save issues for the meeting, fewer costly mistakes to fix, and less time lost to replacing talent you should have kept.

Quality beats quantity, but regularity is non-negotiable: 15 or 20 fully dialed-in minutes every week or every other week gets you the benefits, and if you must move one, move it up rather than back, because canceling signals that your people don't matter.

Don't replace your employee's idea with your own: unless you know for sure it's wrong and the consequences are serious, let it run; people grow through mistakes, and employees whose ideas gain traction become ambassadors and your best recruiters.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Steven Rogelberg's website and free resource library: https://stevenrogelberg.com

Get Steve's book, Glad We Met: The Art and Science of One-on-One Meetings (all proceeds donated to the American Cancer Society): https://stevenrogelberg.com

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 - Introduction: half of all one-on-ones are failing and nobody says so

1:10 - Housekeeping: the BD sales funnel roundtable and today's guest

3:28 - Why owners avoid one-on-ones, and why small businesses can least afford to

4:37 - What a one-on-one actually is, and what it is not

6:48 - The counterintuitive part: good one-on-ones give you time back

8:27 - Not a discipline session: why invited feedback lands differently

9:43 - Talk less, listen more, and why your brain fights you on it

11:15 - Twenty focused minutes is enough

12:27 - Does listening make a new manager look weak?

16:14 - The turnover math: your odds of replacing a top performer

18:18 - One-on-ones at home: the parenting parallel

20:04 - Stop replacing your employees' ideas with your own

24:11 - Don't clone yourself: building ambassadors instead of bottlenecks

26:23 - The Michael Jordan switch

27:26 - The six strategies: regularity, never cancel, talk less, and signals

31:02 - Will the first meetings run long? The first-date rule

32:17 - No retribution: protecting the one-on-one as a safe space

33:45 - Where to find Steve, and why his book proceeds fight cancer

35:23 - Corey's closing thoughts on one-on-ones and your best people

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If tax season taught you anything, it's that doing more isn't the same as doing it right. The same is true for marketing in the age of AI.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Sara Nay, CEO of Duct Tape Marketing and author of Unchained: Breaking Free from Broken Marketing Models, to talk about why so many business owners are jumping straight to AI tools without a strategy to guide them.

The numbers set the stage: 88% of marketers now use AI in their day-to-day roles, but most are leading with tools instead of a plan. Sara explains why that approach is exactly backwards. AI can be incredible for repurposing, drafting, and finalizing content, but only after you've done the harder work first: defining where your business is trying to go, understanding your ideal clients, and building the messaging that sets you apart. Skip that, and you end up with generic, over-polished “slop” that anyone could produce and that no one actually connects with.

One of the most valuable threads in this conversation is authenticity. Sara shares how her most polished, perfectly structured LinkedIn posts consistently underperform, while her off-the-cuff rants take off. The lesson for small business owners is clear: in a noisy, AI-saturated market, being human, messy, and real is a competitive advantage. She also breaks down how to train AI properly using ideal client interviews, leadership input, and competitive research, so the content it creates genuinely sounds like you.

The discussion moves naturally into hiring, where Corey and Sara find striking common ground. Sara explains why bringing in a single junior marketer and expecting them to be strategic, run every channel, and understand metrics is one of the most common and costly mistakes she sees. Corey connects it to a familiar hiring trap: hiring for today's revenue instead of tomorrow's, and hiring on potential without the systems to support it. As Sara puts it, “Don't throw good people at bad systems.” They also unpack why defining the role clearly and setting honest expectations matters just as much in marketing as it does in hiring.

For business owners feeling overwhelmed, Sara offers a practical roadmap. She walks through the Duct Tape Marketing strategy process: auditing what's actually working, mapping the customer journey, building pillar and hub pages that rank in both Google and AI platforms, and running 90-day marketing sprints with real tracking in place. One client saved $40,000 in wasted spend in just three months simply by learning what was working and what wasn't. Her top advice: set up metrics you understand, know your ideal clients on a deep level, and don't overlook the back half of the funnel, including retention, repeat business, and referrals.

This episode is especially valuable for small business owners, entrepreneurs, and fractional CMOs who want to use AI without losing their voice, stop wasting money on scattered marketing, and make smarter hiring decisions. If you're ready to put strategy before tactics and stop grinding to start growing, this conversation is a must-listen.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Strategy comes before tools: 88% of marketers use AI, but leading with tools instead of a plan produces generic content anyone could make; define where the business is going, understand your ideal clients, and build differentiated messaging first.

Authenticity outperforms polish: Sara's most perfectly structured LinkedIn posts consistently underperform, while her off-the-cuff rants take off, because in an AI-saturated market people connect with content that feels human and real.

Train AI on you before you let it write: feed it ideal client interviews, leadership input, and competitive research, then hand it your own recorded thinking so the output actually sounds like you instead of generic slop.

One junior marketer can't be the whole department: expecting a single early-career hire to set strategy, run every channel, and own the metrics is one of the most common and costly mistakes; a fractional lead plus specialists in each lane works far better.

Don't throw good people at bad systems: undefined roles and hiring for today's revenue instead of tomorrow's set marketers up to fail, so define the role clearly and set honest expectations before anyone starts.

Know what's actually working: one client saved $40,000 in wasted spend in three months just by tracking channels properly; set up metrics you understand, know your ideal clients deeply, and don't neglect retention, repeat business, and referrals.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Sara Nay on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saranay/

Get Sara's book, Unchained: https://unchainedmodel.com

Learn more about Duct Tape Marketing: https://ducttapemarketing.com

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 - Introduction: 88% of marketers use AI, but most skip the strategy

1:02 - Housekeeping: a listener comment on AI polish and hiring

3:19 - Meet Sara Nay and Duct Tape Marketing

4:33 - Is AI replacing marketers? Why strategy still comes first

6:15 - Why polished posts flop and off-the-cuff rants take off

7:58 - Training AI properly so the content sounds like you

11:49 - What “strategy before tactics” actually looks like

14:49 - The real cost of doing marketing without knowing what works

17:56 - Zone of genius: starting small with fractional help

20:22 - The junior-marketer mistake: one hire can't do it all

23:52 - The two biggest hiring mistakes owners make

26:46 - Hiring for your stage: builders vs. process-followers

30:25 - Tactical mistakes: doing everything, tracking nothing

32:34 - Content that ranks: hub pages and pillar topics

35:15 - Top advice: metrics, ideal clients, and the back half of the funnel

37:31 - Where to find Sara, plus Corey's closing thoughts on hiring

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If your to-do list never gets shorter, this episode is for you.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Kelly Lorenzen, CEO of KLM Consulting, Marketing, and Management, a firm with 24 years of experience helping family owned businesses start, grow, and scale. Kelly introduces her CODA method, a practical framework for helping business owners identify what they should keep, outsource, delegate, and automate so they can finally step into the role of true CEO.

The conversation opens with a striking statistic: 75% of entrepreneur business owners have limited to low levels of delegator talent, according to Gallup, and 42% of small business owners experienced burnout last year. These numbers set the stage for a discussion about why so many owners end up trapped doing work they should have handed off long ago, and what it costs them.

Kelly walks through the CODA method step by step. K is for the tasks only the owner can truly do: hiring decisions, culture, key partnerships. O is for tasks that should be outsourced to fractional experts, a fractional CFO or a fractional CMO, people who can do the work faster and better at a fraction of the cost of a full time hire. D is for tasks that can be delegated to the existing team, often to people who have been quietly waiting for the chance to step up. And A is for tasks that can be automated entirely, using the AI and operations tools now available to even the smallest businesses.

One of the most practical ideas in the episode is how to build the delegation infrastructure. Kelly recommends creating video SOPs by recording yourself doing the task, on Zoom, on a phone, wherever it happens. That library becomes the training foundation for every future hire, so the work gets done the right way even when the owner is not in the room.

Corey and Kelly also dig into the mindset challenges that make delegation so hard. The type A personality that builds a business is often the same personality that refuses to let go of it. The 80-20 rule applies here: someone else doing something 80% as well as the owner is still getting it done, and with time, coaching, and the right system, that person may get to 100%.

The episode closes with Kelly's practical advice for getting started: pick one major thing that would relieve real pressure, find the right person or partner to take it, and then keep going, one item at a time, one week at a time. The goal is not to hand everything off overnight, it is to build enough momentum that the owner wants to keep clearing the list.

If you are a small business owner who is doing too much, wearing too many hats, and wondering why you started this thing in the first place, this episode gives you a clear path forward.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Most owners aren't wired to delegate: 75% of entrepreneurs have limited to low delegator talent and 42% of small business owners burned out last year, and the CODA method (Keep, Outsource, Delegate, Automate) gives owners a structured way to figure out what to keep and what to hand off.
• Do what you love and outsource everything else: pick the tasks you dislike, are slow at, or that drain your energy, and give those away first rather than trying to hand off everything at once.
• Record yourself doing the job before you hire someone to do it: video SOPs, recorded on Zoom or a phone, become a training library so new hires can do the work the same way even when the owner isn't in the room.
• Mismatched delegation breaks good employees: handing someone two roles that use opposite sides of their brain, like accounting and social media, sets them up to fail at both; the fix is aligning tasks with what each person is actually good at, even if that means shifting duties across several people.
• The 80-20 rule makes letting go easier: someone else doing a task 80% as well as the owner still counts as done, and with coaching and time they can get to 100%; expecting perfection on day one is what causes owners to snatch tasks back.
• Start with one thing, not everything: pick the single task that would relieve the most pressure, find the right person or partner for it, and keep working through the list one item at a time instead of trying to overhaul everything at once.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Kelly Lorenzen: https://www.duplicatemyself.com

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

• 0:00 – Introduction: the stats on delegation and burnout
• 2:29 – What the CODA method stands for and how it works
• 4:54 – Why business owners get addicted to chaos instead of their product
• 7:26 – Overcoming the mindset that makes delegation so hard
• 10:05 – How to run the CODA method with your own team, step by step
• 11:47 – Building video SOPs so the work gets done without you
• 14:48 – The delegation mistake that breaks people: mismatched duties
• 21:24 – Deciding what to truly keep, and taking the elevator to the C-suite
• 23:26 – The 80-20 rule and giving people time to get to 100%
• 28:05 – Kelly's advice for getting started with delegation

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If your best salesperson is still you, this episode will change how you think about your next hire.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with James Hayden, managing partner at Hayden Marketing Inc. and fractional CRO with 30 years of experience fixing broken B2B sales engines. James has worked with more than 140 companies and helped generate over $1 billion in revenue, and his focus is on helping founders and emerging leaders build sales teams that do not depend on one person to function.

James and Corey break down how a founder can tell when they have become the bottleneck in their own sales engine, why the same passion that built the business also creates blind spots, and what actually needs to happen in the first 30, 60, and 90 days after bringing in a first sales leader. They cover the difference between a sales leader and a salesperson, how the type of sale determines the type of hire, why category-creating products face a harder sales cycle, and the risk of hiring someone whose only experience is inside a big company. If you are still the primary driver of revenue in your business, or your last attempt to change that did not work, this conversation will give you a clear framework for how to do it right.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Every founder eventually becomes the bottleneck: the passion and drive that built the business also create blind spots, and the very thing that made a founder a great salesperson can make it harder to build a team that sells without them.
• A sales leader is not a salesperson: the first 90 days should focus on building repeatable process, an ideal customer profile, and a shared sales lexicon, not booking meetings, and owners who expect calls in week one are setting the hire up to fail.
• The type of sale determines the type of hire: someone who filled inbound orders for an off the shelf product has a completely different skill set than someone who can run a 12 to 18 month relationship sale, and founders who hire based on impressive numbers alone often end up with someone who cannot do the actual job.
• Selling something the market does not know it needs is the hardest sale there is: founders with category creating products have to build demand before they can even compete on why their company is the right choice, a challenge most off the shelf sales hires have never had to face.
• Big company experience can be a red flag, not a green light: sales leaders who have only sold inside a recognized brand often have not built the muscle to create demand from scratch, and owners can get won over by polish instead of the tactical work the role actually requires.
• Do not hire for the business you have today: hire someone capable of running the business you want to have in five years, not just the one on your P&L right now.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with James Hayden: https://jamesbhayden.com

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

• 0:00 – Introduction: why every founder eventually becomes the bottleneck
• 2:49 – How to know if you are the ceiling on your own growth
• 6:32 – Why the founder's biggest strength creates blind spots
• 14:06 – The first 30, 60, and 90 days after hiring your first sales leader
• 19:17 – Building an ideal customer profile and a shared sales lexicon
• 22:29 – Sales leader vs salesperson, and the impatience that sinks new hires
• 29:17 – Category demand: selling something the market does not know it needs
• 33:50 – The product adoption lifecycle and finding your early adopters
• 35:04 – James' top advice before you hire your first sales leader
• 39:44 – Why hiring from a big company is usually a mistake

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

If your referral pipeline has slowed to a trickle and you are not sure whether the problem is sales, marketing, messaging, or all of the above, this episode is for you. On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock brings together an expert panel to tackle one of the most pressing challenges facing small business owners right now: how to build pipeline and drive revenue when the economy is uncertain, tariffs are biting, and the old ways of generating leads are no longer working. To ground the conversation, Corey introduces a fictional $8 million industrial manufacturer called Precision Works. The company has grown almost entirely through referrals, has a CRM that nobody consistently uses, a LinkedIn page that gets updated whenever someone remembers, and a sales team that has never had to answer the question of why a buyer should choose them over anyone else. Stop us if you have heard that before. Joining Corey are three guests who each bring a distinct lens to the problem. Tara Wagner of Breakthrough Boss works exclusively with small businesses and immediately asks the question most owners are not ready to hear: where is the leadership team and why is the CEO the one stressing about this? Nader Safinya of Black Ribbit brings a culture and brand strategy perspective, pushing the conversation toward the foundational question of what experience a business actually delivers and whether the people inside it can even articulate that consistently. Neil Benedict of Silverbrick Sales Solutions, a Sandler-trained sales coach making his first appearance on the podcast, argues that this is not necessarily a sales problem at all. It is a clarity and consistency problem, built up over years of never needing to answer the hard questions because referrals did the work instead. What makes this roundtable especially valuable is the way three professionals with very different disciplines arrive at the same diagnosis. Before you change your messaging, run paid ads, restructure your sales team, or launch a new LinkedIn strategy, you need to look inside. Talk to your top customers and find out why they actually buy from you. Talk to the deals you lost and find out why they said no. Talk to your managers separately and listen for the discrepancies. And then use what you learn to build messaging, targeting, and a sales process that reflects reality rather than assumption. If you are a small business owner trying to get out of a referral-dependent growth model, a sales or marketing leader trying to build a more predictable pipeline, or an entrepreneur wondering whether you have a sales problem or a foundation problem, this episode will give you a clear framework and a lot to think about.

KEY TAKEAWAYS
This is not necessarily a sales problem — when a business has lived off referrals for years, it has never been forced to answer why a buyer should choose them, and that gap gets exposed the moment the referral engine slows down
The bottleneck is almost always at the top — at $8 million in revenue, the CEO should not be the one stressing about LinkedIn; someone needs to own sales and marketing and the org chart needs to reflect that
Talk to your best customers before you change anything — they will tell you why they actually buy from you, and that language should be driving your messaging, your targeting, and your sales conversations
Talk to the deals you lost too — understanding why people said no is just as valuable as understanding why they stayed, and most companies never do it
The greatest insights come from the discrepancies — when managers at the same level are telling three completely different stories about the business, you have a clarity problem, not a sales problem
Fix the wrong things first and you will burn time, money, and energy — get the diagnostic right and the repair becomes obvious
Do this work iteratively, not all at once — surveys instead of interviews, one conversation at a time; it does not have to be operationally straining to be effective

LINKS & RESOURCES
Learn more about Nader: https://blackribbit.com
Learn more about Tara: https://breakthroughboss.us
Learn more about Neil: https://www.linkedin.com/company/silver-brick-management-solutions/
Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/
Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

EPISODE CHAPTERS

• 0:00 – Introduction: BD and pipeline — why this roundtable topic won by a landslide
• 1:28 – Meet Precision Works: the $8M manufacturer whose referral engine is running dry
• 5:01 – What the panel is seeing in the market right now: winners, losers, and the overwhelm paradox
• 10:40 – Which industries are holding up and which are hurting, and why differentiation is the dividing line
• 13:56 – Where do you even start? Tara, Nader, and Neil each take their first crack at Precision Works
• 17:52 – Neil's call: this is not a sales problem, it is a clarity and consistency problem
• 22:12 – Tara on leadership: the bottleneck is always at the top and the CEO needs to get out of the weeds
• 25:41 – Talk to your best customers, then talk to the deals you lost
• 28:37 – Nader on the holistic picture: when people at the same level tell different stories, that is your diagnosis
• 30:48 – Getting tactical: using what you learn to build messaging, an ICP, and a real sales process
• 39:11 – Corey's synthesis: every discipline in the room came back to the same answer — look inside first
• 41:14 – The biggest objection: this does not have to be operationally heavy, do it iteratively
• 43:11 – Tara's mechanic analogy: get the diagnostic right before you start replacing parts
• 45:01 – Closing thoughts and where to reach Nader, Tara, and Neil

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

Most small business owners who hire on their own get it right just 25 to 33% of the time, and AI recruiting tools are making that number worse, not better. In this solo episode, Corey Harlock cuts through the noise on AI in hiring: what these tools can actually do, where they'll overwhelm you if you're not ready, and the three mistakes that guarantee you'll keep hiring the best of the worst.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

AI can recruit, but it cannot hire — tools that source and schedule candidates 24/7 are genuinely useful, but they can't read the room, assess culture fit, or replace the human judgment that separates a good hire from an expensive mistake
Whoever gets there first with the best offer wins every time — the best candidates move fast, and AI-generated floods of applicants give slow-moving owners the illusion of progress while their top prospects take jobs elsewhere
You can't delegate role definition to AI — before AI can write a useful job description, you need to clearly define the role yourself; skip that step and you'll get a generic description that attracts the wrong people and wastes everyone's time
AI is making your resume screening harder, not easier — candidates are now using AI to rewrite their resumes around your job description, flipping your qualified pool from a top 20% to a crowded, hard-to-screen top 80 to 90%
Never put your C players in an interview — underperformers will either scare off your best candidates or deliberately sabotage the hire to protect their own position; only your strongest people should ever be in that room

LINKS & RESOURCES
Download your free Small Business Hiring Playbook: https://connect.keyhire.solutions/small-busine…playbook Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/ Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-k…d1643962763 Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

• 0:00 – Introduction: "AI will take over recruiting 100%" and why it won't 
• 3:00 – What AI recruiting tools can actually do and who they're built for 
• 10:00 – The 3 challenges every small business owner faces in hiring: time, training, and prioritization 
• 18:00 – Where AI helps and where it cannot replace you 
• 28:00 – The 3 biggest mistakes owners make when using AI to hire 
• 38:00 – How to use AI correctly for job descriptions, interview questions, and building for scale 
• 45:00 – The resume arms race: when candidates use AI to game your screening process

Built for small and medium-sized business owners, the KeyHire Podcast has earned a loyal audience of leaders who act on what they hear. We limit our sponsors intentionally with one voice, one message, and full impact, so your brand never gets lost in the noise. If you want direct access to the owners making the hiring decisions, this is your seat at the table.

Learn More at Keyhire.Solutions

Hiring the wrong person is one of the most expensive mistakes a business owner can make, and the KeyHire Hiring Playbook was designed to make sure it never happens to you. Packed with proven strategies trusted by SMB owners across the country, this free guide gives you a repeatable process for getting every hire right. Grab your free copy at keyhire.solutions/playbook and take the guesswork out of growing your team.

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A single bad review can cost you 60% of your potential customers 
— and 94% of consumers say they've avoided a business because of 
what they found online. In this episode, Corey sits down with Dan Klein of Joseph Studios to unpack what online reputation actually means, how to protect it before something goes wrong, and what to do when it does. Including the wild true story of 880 fake one-star reviews posted in four hours by a Facebook group of witches.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Your reputation starts before the sale — online reputation isn't just about reviews, it's about setting clear expectations at every touchpoint so customers know exactly what they're getting into
• Fake review attacks are real, and they're organized — Dan shares how a client was hit with 880 coordinated one-star reviews overnight and exactly how they got every single one removed
• AI is resurfacing your oldest bad reviews — answer engine optimization (AEO) is pulling low ratings from years ago to the top of your business summary, and most owners have no idea it's happening
• Your Glassdoor strategy could be secretly recruiting your own employees away, and the hidden risk of asking your team for reviews that most business owners have never considered
• Train your customers, not just your staff — the businesses with the strongest reputations don't just deliver great service, they teach clients how to be great clients from day one

LINKS & RESOURCES

Learn more about Dan Klein: https://www.josephstudios.net
Download your free Small Business Hiring Playbook: https://connect.keyhire.solutions/small-business-hiring-playbook
Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/
Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions
Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763
Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00  – Introduction & the stats that define your online reputation
3:30  – What "online reputation" actually means for your business
17:00 – The witch attack: 880 fake one-star reviews posted in four hours
24:00 – How AI is surfacing your oldest bad reviews right now
37:00 – The Glassdoor warning every employer needs to hear
43:00 – 3 best practices to protect your reputation starting today

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44% of all managers have never received a single day of leadership training — yet they're responsible for up to 70% of the variance in employee engagement. In this episode, Corey sits down with Emma Rose Connolly of Conversant to unpack why promoting your top performer into management without support is one of the most expensive mistakes a small business can make, and what you can actually do about it. If you've ever lost a great employee and wondered why, this one's for you.

Key Takeaways

• The "best doer" trap is real — promoting your top performer without leadership training doesn't just hurt them, it puts every person they manage at risk of disengaging or leaving
• Middle managers are your biggest retention lever — research shows they account for up to 70% of the variance in employee engagement, more than compensation or culture initiatives
• Don't kick the can — the "Point Easy" framework shows why addressing a performance issue early takes a fraction of the time and cost of waiting until it becomes a crisis
• 44% of managers have never had leadership training — that stat isn't just shocking, it's an opportunity; the businesses that invest here gain a compounding advantage
• Curiosity is a leadership skill — the simplest thing a manager can do to re-engage a team member is ask a genuine question and actually listen to the answer

Links & Resources:

• Learn more about Emma: https://www.conversant.com/ 
• Learn more about Conversant's Emerging Leaders Program: https://www.conversant.com/emerging-leader-program-enrollment/ 
• Download your free version of the Key of the Small Business Hiring Playbook: https://connect.keyhire.solutions/small-business-hiring-playbook
• Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/ 
• Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions
• Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763
• Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

Episode Chapters/Timestamps:

• 0:00 – Introduction & why middle management is your biggest hidden risk
• 6:47 – The "best doer to manager" trap and what it costs your team
• 14:41 – Connected vs. superior leadership (and why the difference matters)
• 24:49 – The Point Easy framework: address issues before they become crises
• 32:49 – The stat that should shock every business owner: 44% of managers, zero training
• 39:22 – How to "rehire" your best employees before they decide to leave

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If AI is the answer to every hiring challenge, why are so many business owners still making expensive hiring mistakes? On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock breaks down the real role AI can and cannot play in your recruiting process, and why replacing human connection with automation could cost you the candidates you most want to hire. 

Corey opens with a candid look at the current landscape. AI-powered sourcing tools, automated outreach agents, and resume screening software are everywhere, and the promise is compelling. But as he explains, speed and volume are not the same as quality. Candidates are using AI to generate polished resumes loaded with the right keywords, and if your ATS is screening those resumes with its own AI, you may be running an automated process that filters out red flags on paper while missing the person behind it entirely. 

The sourcing problem runs even deeper. AI outreach agents can cast a wide net, but when candidates start receiving unsolicited messages to their personal emails and phone numbers, the response is not excitement. It is suspicion. Corey points out that the best candidates are already fielding multiple opportunities, and spam-style outreach does not cut through. It gets ignored, flagged, or filtered by the very AI tools candidates are starting to use on their own side of the process. 

That said, Corey is not anti-AI. He walks through several places where it genuinely helps. Using AI to build a thorough job profile, define the skills needed for future growth rather than current business levels, and structure a job description around what the candidate gets rather than what the company wants, these are real advantages. He even suggests a specific prompting approach that addresses two of the most common hiring mistakes at once: failing to define the role clearly, and hiring for where the business is today instead of where it needs to go. 

Where Corey draws a firm line is in the interview and offer stages. Assessments and AI-scored questionnaires feel like efficiency, but they function as exit ramps for the strongest candidates who have other options and no patience for unnecessary hurdles. Every step you add to your hiring process is a reason for the right person to walk away. The phone screen, the video interview, the on-site conversation, these are not places to automate. They are where trust is built and where the information that actually matters gets surfaced. 

The offer conversation gets the same treatment. Corey shares his own practice of calling candidates, walking through the offer live, and inviting follow-up questions before the overthinking starts. His point is clear: candidates are already using AI to evaluate your offer, pull apart your compensation package, and benchmark it against market data. If you have not had the human conversation first, you are leaving them alone with a tool that may push them in the wrong direction. 

If you are a small business owner trying to figure out where AI fits in your hiring process without losing the human element that actually closes great candidates, this episode is a 

practical and honest guide. Listen in to learn how to use AI as a tool that supports your hiring discipline rather than one that quietly replaces it.

Connect with the Experts

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/ 

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

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If managing people feels more complicated than running the actual business, this episode is for you. On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with keynote speaker and author Ryan Estis to talk through what human-centered leadership actually looks like in 2026, and why the old model of managing performance is no longer enough. 

Ryan brings twenty years of experience working with commercial and leadership teams, along with a newly published book co-authored with his brother Chad Estis, executive vice president of business operations for the Dallas Cowboys. Together, they developed a leadership philosophy built around a simple but powerful idea: companies grow when people do. That single principle anchors the entire conversation and reframes how small business owners should think about their teams, their culture, and their own role as leaders. 

One of the biggest themes in this episode is the tension between doing and leading. Corey and Ryan both acknowledge that most small business owners start their companies because of a passion, a skill, or an idea, not because they love managing people. But as the business grows, the leadership demands grow with it. Ryan explains that the startup entrepreneur who wears every hat eventually has to evolve into a world-class leader, and that transition requires an entirely different set of competencies. Without intentional development, a capability gap opens up that no amount of hustle can close. 

Ryan introduces several ideas that will resonate with any business owner trying to get more from their team. He talks about the concept of talent velocity, the idea that the skills required to compete are outpacing what is being developed inside most organizations. He also shares Gallup research showing that a single coaching conversation per week with each direct report is the biggest lever available for improving performance. Not a formal review, not a structured meeting, just a consistent, informal check-in that builds trust, expands psychological safety, and makes people feel seen, heard, and valued. 

The go for coffee principle, contributed by Chad Estis, offers one of the most practical takeaways in the episode. The idea is simple: leaders should schedule informal micro-moments of meaningful connection with people at every level of the organization. No hierarchy, no politics, just access. Corey connects this to a hockey coaching analogy about moving quarters from one pocket to another to track personal interactions with players throughout practice. Ryan runs with it, pointing out that this kind of intentional connection is exactly what separates cultures of high performance from cultures of quiet disengagement. 

The conversation also digs into talent retention, transparency, and what Ryan calls the employment value proposition. His promise to every person on his team is to leave them better than he found them. Corey builds on that by sharing how openly developing people, even for roles outside your company, can paradoxically increase loyalty and tenure. 

If you lead a team, manage people, or are trying to figure out how to get more from your business without burning everyone out, this episode delivers real, actionable ideas on human-centered leadership, building trust, developing people, and growing a business that does not rely entirely on you.

Connect with the Experts

Learn more about Ryan: https://ryanestis.com/
Get Prepare for Impact: https://ryanestis.com/prepare-for-impact

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/ 

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions