Sketchy Ideas

By Sketchy Ideas Show

Sketchy Ideas is a video podcast where Michael and Brad illustrate and debate concepts surrounding leadership, business, and personal achievement in a way that'll make you think twice before you imple... more

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FAQs about Sketchy Ideas:

How many episodes does Sketchy Ideas have?

The podcast currently has 95 episodes available.

Sketchy Ideas episodes:

June 11, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 46: Planning to Fail
00:10 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Planning to Fail
1:45 Sponsors
SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
3:45 Recap of last two weeks
Mindsets and lingo

Speaking it into existence isn’t a real thing

You need to understand what you’re trying to achieve and build implementation around it
4:20 Planning for next quarter
Nearing the end of quarter 2, time to think about quarter 3

To plan ahead, you need to look ahead and anticipate what is going to happen

To get to your goal, you need a plan

“A plan in a theory. A plan is a guess” -M

“A plan is a map” -B
Like a map, you need to account for detours unless you plan ahead

Having processes in place allow you to be prepared and reach your final destination on time

“No matter how good the plan is...sometimes the unexpected does occur” -M

Great plans have failure built into them

“Failure is inevitable” -M
There is no way for things to go exactly to plan

Plan is a theory

There is no way to account for all things, good or bad, to happen along the way
10:30 Segmented Plans
A good plan is segmented into smaller things

A single plan can break the rest just falls off

A segmented plan has built in check points to keep you on track and allows for you to find the next step without affecting the rest of your plan

You can bridge it to the next step
12:24 How to segment your plan
Look for big milestones
A milestone is a significant deliverable that leads you to the next part of your plan

How to find the best milestones
If you’re measuring, you can use results as your milestones

Activity goals

Communication/checkpoints

Wherever there is a natural stopping point

Milestones came from the roman empire
Golden stones one mile from the center of the city

“Milestones are there to make sure you’re on the right track to your destination” -M

It’s important to take the time to plan

Planning gets you a minimum of 1:1 ROI, if not 2:1

“There’s a time to plan and a time to just do” -B
Hedgehog plan (Previous episode)

18:15 Steps of planning
Depends on the time you put into:
Formulating

Documenting

Training others to do it (if delegating)

Checklists help you become more efficient
Visible milestones for your day

“Planning is pre-deciding” -M

Know what you’re going to do before you get there

If you limit anxiety, your performance increases right away

“The plan is NOT the result” -M
It's the goal.

All of the effort, not the results

28:00 Why plan?
You need to plan so you understand the potential outcomes

So you can adjust your plan

Planning to fail works in your advantage most of the time
30:04 Closing remarks
The podcast is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, & Anchor

Check out SketchyIdeasshow.com
Full Show Notes
...more
35min
June 03, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 45: Applying Your Mindsets
0:54 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Applying your mindsets
2:05 Sponsors
SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
4:35 80/20 rule
Brad’s explanation of the 80/20 rule:
In sales, ~20% of your customers take care of ~80% of your revenue
Your 20 favorite customer might not be taking care of that 80% of the revenue

In work, 20% of what you do takes care of 80% of where you’re trying to get to

Michael’s explanation:
The Pareto Principle
80% of results flow from 20% of your efforts

Doesn’t mean you only need to do 20% of the work

Sometimes 80% of your efforts only produce 20% of your results

A client’s 100% is probably your 90%
The only person that will notice that last 10% is you

The last 10%
Extra revisions

Extra little details

Perfectionist meets procrastinator

Focus on the big picture instead of the last little bit

12:15 Turning 80/20 into action
Hotel example:
Rewards programs
20% of their guests produce 80% of their revenue

Identifying those frequent travelers and keeping their loyalty

Free upgrades, drinks, etc. are an investment to keep loyalty

Guest satisfaction surveys
Small set of problems that produce a large portion of dissatisfaction

Theoretically, fix 5 main problems and it’ll increase satisfaction score by half

Need to track the problems as well as fix them, or you’ll keep having to fix the same problems

17:45 Sales example
Figure out who is your most frequent buyer and what are they buying

Your 80/20 might be 60/40
It’s still a trend where a few make up the most

You need to find your main focus item, without forgetting about the rest
21:20 How to implement the 80/20 rule
Start somewhere
Figure out something small and start tracking it

Gets you in the habit of tracking something

Track your time (and activities)
Even if it’s just an estimate

Able to go back and see what was important

In sales and marketing, you need to focus on what you’re doing and why you’re doing it

“80/20 does work, if you apply it” -B
If you talk about it, it doesn’t work

25:55 What to do
1. Start counting

2. Look at the results

3. Find the pattern

4. Think, look, learn
26:45 Business Owner duties
There's a few things that you as an owner are doing that are making a big difference

Also a bunch of other things that don’t matter

Most of the big difference things are thin
Full Show Notes Here
...more
38min
May 27, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 44: Measuring Your Mindsets
1:08 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Measuring your mindsets
2:00 Sponsors
SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
3:25 Where we broadcast
Live each wednesday at 1:30 PM on:
Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/SketchyIdeas/

https://www.facebook.com/creamcitymarketing/

https://www.facebook.com/bjjamesco/

Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCires_knhAHxLpUGXjcheQQ

Twitch
https://www.twitch.tv/bjjames23

LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrampolla/

Audio podcast available each thursday on:
Anchor
https://anchor.fm/sketchy-ideas-show

Apple Podcasts
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sketchy-ideas/id1556484587

Breaker
https://www.breaker.audio/sketchy-ideas

Google Podcasts
https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy80MGM3NzRkOC9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw==

Radio Public
https://radiopublic.com/sketchy-ideas-6nA4mN

Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/show/3BeF36A3birITtUsELVVbi

5:31 Turning your mindset into actionable behavior
“The OG of mindset is think and grow rich” -M

The middle of mindset and results is behavior
What are you actively doing to achieve those results?

Mindsets produce results IF your behavior aims for it

Most theories don’t turn to application and produce results
All qualitative and not quantitative

“If you’re reading a book and haven’t gotten through half of it, you probably haven't gotten to the tangible stuff” -B
10:10 The Growth Mindset book
A book that explores growth mindset studies

Written poorly

Textbooks and handbooks are not meant to be read end-to-end
Full Show Notes Here
...more
34min
May 20, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 43: Where Are We Going?
0:29 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Where are we going? Return to the office
2:06 Sponsors
SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
4:00 The world opening back up
In the last week, Brad has had his first face-to-face meetings in quite some time

Close to a time where in person meetups are no longer frowned upon

Being in a room for a networking event
“It was weird for everybody” -B

6:33 How to handle the return to normalcy
Brad’s story
Planned to have a meeting with a developer who he hasn't seen in 2+ years

Meet halfway, go to dinner, talk about work, have a few drinks
Restaurant was full

1 hr meeting turned into 4 hr meeting

Awkward first connection (shake hand, elbow bump?)
It’s going to be awkward

Be Chill
Going into a meeting knowing you’ve done it before

You know how to talk to people

Just be chill

“I underthought the logistics, and I overthought the mental aspects” -B
10:50 Things forgotten
Logistically
Travel time
More people are starting to work in the office/travel more so commute times will continue to rise again

Need extra time for driving, parking, walking

Add extra time to your calendar
Buffer time on both ends of the event + more time

“This new normal will take 3-6 months” -B

“The new normal is neither new nor normal” -M

We will never be back to the old “normal”
Example is travel pre and post 9/11

Things have changed for the better and will continue to improve

We are still in a transition, and we are all in different parts of the transition
“Everyone is figuring out what they are comfortable doing” -M

17:40 Know what you’re gonna do
Decide if you’re going to shake hands, elbow bump, or just say hi

Eliminates the awkward moment you meet

Stick with it, people don’t want to make the first move

Call/make reservations at restaurants
More people are dining out and will relieve stress on your side and the restaurant side

Servers are on their game right now
Haven’t been busy in a long time

Looking to help as many people to get more/bigger tips

Don’t waste their time - ask for more time if you aren’t ready to order
Let them help others instead of waiting for you to decide

“The small-talk is going to take a long time right now” -B

The feeling of talking in person is way different than a Zoom meeting
24:22 The things you forgot
You are reestablishing relationships

Expectations and emotions are overlapped

Prepare mentally for the anxiety and awkwardness

Pro tip: don’t talk about politics right now (touchy subject for many)
Full Show Notes Here
...more
39min
May 13, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 42: A Real World Case with Katy Corey
1:27 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Nonprofit real-world example with Katy Corey
2:14 Sponsors
SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
4:09 Guest Introduction
Katy Corey

Director of Development for the United Performing Arts Fund (UPAF)

“I think a healthy dose of skepticism is a good thing” -M
5:15 Katy’s thoughts on nonprofits running like a business
Appreciated the focus on the 3 customers of a nonprofit (often overlooked)
Funder

Board/Leadership

Volunteer/Staff

UPAF is focusing on rebuilding their governance structure
Making sure to care for volunteers, board, committees

True partnership on all levels

Building a better relationship with donors
“It's not so much a transaction as it is a relationship” -KC

Looking for the reason WHY people donate to the arts
Which will eventually lead to long term donors + profit

7:00 Katy’s background
Served as a volunteer in the Peace Corps

Wanted to have a purpose

Worked with development initiatives along with volunteer support

Some volunteers become some of the biggest funders

Wasn't impressed with some organizations and lack of money transparency and what it was being used for
Nonprofits need to be transparent and not take advantage of donors

Her way into UPAF
Started in marketing but wasn’t a good marketer

Wanted to get back to working with people (nonprofit world for her)

Joined UPAF in May 2019 as their Director of Development and Leadership
Works with Leadership Donors, Foundations, and planned initiatives

11:09 What does UPAF do?
Been around for 5+ decades in south eastern WI

Work to power and fund 14 committees - including theater, ballet

Bringing in money to keep these organizations running

Allocate funds yearly
13:33 How are funds allocated?
Strong leadership board, financial committee, executive committee, and internal team studying the allocation process

Groups need to submit applications annually

Making sure groups are responsible with their funds each year

UPAF has a 4 star charity navigator
15:24 Importance of Charity Navigator Score
Recognises nonprofits for being responsible with how they allocate/use funds

Adds a level of credibility and validation

“The best nonprofits are mission driven, but they have process, methodology, and systems to back them up” -B

“I can fall in love with any mission, but I want to know those dollars are being funneled the right way” -KC
Full Show Notes Here
...more
34min
May 06, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 41: Make Your Nonprofit Profitable
1:40 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Make Your Nonprofit Profitable
2:56 Sponsors
SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
4:32 Why nonprofits?
B and M have both worked with nonprofits in the past

Many nonprofits aren’t able to reach all of their goals
They think there are constraints bc of the “nonprofit” status

There is a difference between nonprofit as a business model and nonprofit as a tax status
9:50 The debate about nonprofits and their business model
Typically have 3 customers/stakeholders:
Your board

Leadership staff/volunteers

Funders

Nonprofits never say “I don’t need more funding”

At the end of the day, your organization is a business
You have a mission to fulfill

Serve a community

People willing to give time, energy, funding, resources in exchange for results

Stakeholders/partners are aligned to the mission of the nonprofit

Can be heard about Nonprofits (not correct btw)
**Shouldn’t**

Make money (They need money to hit goals and create change)

Focus on revenue

Track results

Evaluate ROI

Many nonprofits collapse because they don’t make money a priority

“Money is the well of life -B

Nonprofit is a tax structure, NOT a business model
It does not affect the business model, mindset, or mission

Great marketing, not tied to results, will only pull on heartstrings

Your marketing needs to produce sales
Casting your line but not catching any fish

“Marketing alone does not produce revenue, therefore does not produce resources that you can use to invest to produce value for the people you are serving” -M

If I have no fish in the boat, I can’t feed one man, let alone a whole army

If I can’t feed a man for a day, let alone a lifetime, if all I can do is show him how to cast his line

24:22 Tracking your data
“why bad presentations happen to good causes” -mentioned by Michael

When good causes like nonprofit go to pitch their cause and miss the mark and don't get their funding

One key thing that is holding them back is their great story showing no numbers or results

“Great story, where’s the numbers?” -M

People want to see where the money they donate is going

If you can show the good you did this year with their money, they are more likely to give more for the next year

Show the value of their contribution
26:58 Simple breakdown of a nonprofit
Somebody gives money

Organization takes money

Organization executes on mission they marketed

Right now is harder than ever to find donors - think like a business
Look at where your nonprofit is and make a judgement call on priorities

Just like a business owner does

Look at your list of priorities
Under the mission (at the top) should be generating who the customers are to understand funding and data in the long run

Full Show Notes Here
...more
36min
April 29, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 40: Humanizing Your Social Media With Laura Kaiser
1:44 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Humanizing Your Social Media
2:27 Sponsors
SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
4:00 Guest Introduction
Laura Kaiser
Founder of Engage Social Media

Communications Director at Wisconsin Tech Council

People often use social media as “show and tell media” instead of social media
5:15 diving into social media
People don’t always differentiate paid and organic social media
You don’t always need to boost your posts, but instead put more time and effort into your posts

Tag the right people and companies with thought and not just for the sake of it

Organic posts are natural and come from the heart and intentional

For a podcast:
Tag the hosts

Tag the producer

Tag the company

Put the post on every platform the podcast is on + every platform you’re on with a link

Making sure you’re in the right space with the right people

“People can easily become fluent in social media if they want to” - Laura Kaiser
7:15 Give and Get on social media
“You have to be willing to fill other people’s buckets” -Laura Kaiser

Laura worked in banking for 20 years and her boss saw how her personal social channels were successful and asked her to take over the company social media

The more you work with your voice on social, the more you understand how you come and how you want to come across to other people
9:18 Using Social media in the corporate world
Companies that are hiring/recruiting need to focus on showing people what your mission, vision, company culture, member interaction with you looks like

Member/employee spotlights give a chance for people to see the people behind the people

Use more personal photos - not always using a corporate headshot
11:57 The steps to get more engagement
Understand what your personality is and what you want it to come across as on social media

People are on LinkedIn, but they don’t use it

It’s important to nurture any platform that you’re on
If you’re not motivated enough to nurture every platform, it’s better to not be on all of them

Mark it on your calendar to check notifications/requests on LinkedIn each week and eventually it will become habit to check more often and not get behind

Dig a little deeper
If you see other like people commenting on a post, maybe that’s a place you want to be in

Check out their profiles and do your research and maybe connect

3 step process:
Schedule time

Observe notifications

Dig deeper and connect with others

Helps prioritize where your time should be spent

Social media… the more you stay on top of it, the less you feel overwhelmed
16:05 Social media is like doing the dishes
If you wash as you go, you’re caught up

If you let the sink fill up, you spend a lot of time washing dishes

If the dishwasher is full and you run out of dish soap and the sink is full of dishes too, then you’ve run out of dishes

Just because you didn’t take the time to go to the store and buy dishwashing detergent
Full Show Notes Here
...more
35min
April 22, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 39: Your Employer Brand
2:10 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Your Employer Brand
3:00 Sponsors
Shoutout to a fundraiser Michael is working with: Girls On The Run
Team SPEARity is raising funds to help empower girls

Donate here: spearity.com/giveback/michael

SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
5:57 Last week recap
First impressions

Hiring practices

“Being comfortable is how you stagnant” -M

“Being uncomfortable is how you change and grow” -M
6:50 Day one as a new employee
Your first day will be one of three
Awesome

Awkward

Awful

“Shoutout to Brad from one Brad to another Brad” -B

What you say after a party in the car is really how you feel, even if you told everyone at the party something completely different

The ability to answer the question, “How was your first day” to a friend or family member is what employers are hinging on.

You used to have until the end of their first day to win an employee over
Now you have until their first bathroom break - bc of social media

75% of employees make the decision to stay/leave in the first 90 days

Of those who made the decision to quit, had their mind made up in the first 45 days

Your time to win them over is a critical time

Employees have choices
“It’s a relationship” -M

11:58 Winning the Firsts
Onboarding
Having a plan (clear documentation)

Clear expectations

Resources (people and stuff)

Orientation is day 1
Onboarding is a process that begins before day 1 and ends never

Before orientation → Indefinite end

Lower the bar
On day one people want to know where the bathroom is and where to get lunch

Don’t overwhelm people on their first day

Don’t overlook their basic questions
If you have a burning question that is not getting answered, it’s very hard to take in new information

Brain block

Answer those questions and “Get the barge out of the canal” -M (17:24)

17:30 Key Things
Ask
What does the employee want to know

What do they expect

2 week black box
The dark period between signing and offer letter and the start date

A lot can happen in that time (on both sides)

Brad’s idea:
Create an email campaign after an offer letter is signed

Access to accounts

Stories from former employees to learn about company

Remarket back to people

“Nothing is ever going to be perfect” -B

Personalized video from supervisor

Onboarding/hiring is just like sales

You want to market yourself to attract the best talent

Employees can still get buyer’s remorse, it’s just different

“Engagement has tangible, bottom line impact” -M

Employees are more valuable than any customer
Full Show Notes Here
...more
34min
April 15, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 38: First Impressions
0:53 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Hiring/Onboarding (onboarding will be next week)
2:00 Sponsors
Shoutout to a fundraiser Michael is working with: Girls On The Run
Team SPEARity is raising funds to help empower girls

Donate here: spearity.com/giveback/michael

SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
4:30 Throwdown begins
Michael’s point
Large scale hiring is a waste of time, energy, and money

Mass hiring events lead to overhiring and having to let people go

The point: hurting people and wasting money and time

Brad’s point
Hiring more people that all have talent can cause more competitiveness and ween out the lesser qualified people

Does it have negative effects? Yes, but so does hiring slowly

Michael’s rebuttal
You still need to use resources to hire and onboard the extra employees in addition to the salary

The cost to hire someone is 125% of their salary over a year

Brad’s rebuttal
The goal is to augment the speed of hiring to hit business goals in a specific time period to scale

You might need to churn and burn in the short term(Cattle call approach), but it’s better that than over the long run

Large companies have large pools of applicants and hire too much to help scale with the intent to not keep all of them
Examples: Google, Epic Systems

15:50 The biggest risk
Hiring and then evaluating (not having your own data and having to use industry standards)
Investing more time and money to evaluate the employee to see if they’re a good fit

Need to use own data to improve hiring process to hire the right people for the position

You need a long term hiring strategy
“Don’t continue to use bad hiring practices” -M

18:43 When to use these caveats
Hiring in bulk works in some instances for a business model

When looking at it as an opportunity rather than an expense

$4-5k a hire each year

Using results of a role rather than a job description

Sales is hard to hire for bc some sale people can sell in one arena but not in another
Same with recruiters

Some critical roles will take time to find the right person

Some candidates in your pool do not fit your exact standards and then you can hire more than what you need bc some will eventually fall out
You need to define hiring processes to limit the rate at which people fall out

No role in a company will have perfect efficacy

It takes 3-6 months to see if they are a good fit
3 months in, they should be 70% productive based on the goal of the hire

Need to make it clear to those you are hiring why you are hiring this way
24:40 Hiring for strategic added value
This is when mass hiring doesn’t work

For critical roles, you take your time and choose the best

For input and output role, you can hire more than needed

Don’t smash 2-3 roles together for one role
Hire several smaller roles

Full Show Notes Here
...more
34min
April 07, 2021Sketchy Ideas Episode 37: Upgrading Your Team Part 2
0:42 Intro
Intro/Opening remarks

The topic is: Upgrading Your Team Part 2
1:50 Sponsors
Shoutout to a fundraiser Michael is working with: Girls On The Run
Team SPEARity is raising funds to help empower girls

Donate here: spearity.com/giveback/michael

SPEARity (SPEARity.com)

Cream City Marketing (creamcitymarketing.com)
5:30 Diving into more ways to upgrade your team
Learning agility
Critical for any role that will operate with ambiguity

Ability to understand
what I don’t know

What I need to learn

How I’m going to go learn it to address the situation it’s currently under

Point back to a previous episode to learn about VUCA

“Unknown and ambiguous is kinda our thing” -M
9:45 Learnability
Breaking down your processes and finding the competencies

Get your processes down to the micro-level

When a valuable team player leaves…
Break down their role and see what you can delegate to others and what you can potentially outsource

What are you going to miss about them?
What is something you can’t just hire for?
Example: Deep Communication

Ability to not only understand what you’re saying but making sure you understand what you’re saying

Don’t just replace the role that is leaving
Look at the opportunity to upgrade your talent

Upgrade your talent by splitting up your functions

Don’t replace what you’re losing, upgrade with the open spot

Sometimes people move on when they feel they are now “overqualified” for the role

“Don’t look at what you need now, look at what you need next” -M

It’s not often that you get to replace a valuable role at your company

“We’re not saying the traditional approaches don’t work” -B

Different generations learn and teach differently
Traditional roles are going to shift

New sketchy ideas are going to come in

People learn in different ways
Example: youtube, other people, google

18:13 Solving problems
Just because you’ve learned something before, doesn’t mean you need to know the answer every time. You have a supercomputer in your pocket.
“If I have to solve something, the first thing I do is grab my supercomputer” -B

Search “how to do X”

Your talent now has to be agile

If your team doesn’t have the skills to operate in the current environment, you’re setting yourself up to struggle from the beginning

How-to videos are a good thing!

“We are now living in the application world of training, rather than the nuts and bolts” -B

Great talent takes their knowledge with them unless you have an ongoing system in place to capture that knowledge as it’s created

Make process documentation part of the company culture
24:50 Throwing people in the deep end
Full Show Notes Here
...more
32min

FAQs about Sketchy Ideas:

How many episodes does Sketchy Ideas have?

The podcast currently has 95 episodes available.