Intro (00:00:00) - Welcome to the Creative Agency Success Show, the go to resource for agency owners looking to scale their business. Join us every week to stay ahead of the curve and position your agency for future success.
Jamie (00:00:14) - All right, Joe. So, we just had J. Scott from 120 VC on, and we talked a lot about leadership and how to do some change implementation, but also some project management. I thought it was a really good conversation and definitely turned some ideas that I'm both you and I probably have on their head a little bit.
Jody (00:00:29) - Oh for sure. And it kind of graduated from the thought leadership right away to marketing and talking a little bit about that and, and really how, how we should lead the way that we market. And I it was a great moment for me. Light bulb went on halfway through. It's like, wow, this is a this was brilliant. Why didn't I think about this like years ago, you know, type of thing. And you'll find that some people are naturals at it and other people aren't.
Jody (00:00:51) - And it just kind of gives you an idea of, hey, here's the way that we should be leading our team.
Jamie (00:00:56) - And not only the way we market, but also the way we talk about working with our clients. Right? Like we lead with our clients a lot, with asking questions and trying to get the answers out of them. And I think that's the same way you can work with your employees, too, because I like you said, oftentimes your employees maybe don't have the best answer, but they might get the ball rolling on a really good answer. They can get you going in the right direction. So again, I think this is a really good conversation that our listeners are really going to enjoy.
Jamie (00:01:20) - Hello, everybody. Welcome to today's show. I'm very excited about today's guest. I think it's something that a lot of us can learn from. We're going to talk about how to create high performing teams with Jay Scott from 120 VC. So, I'm very excited to have a J on the show.
Jamie (00:01:32) - But before we get to J, I want to let you know that Jody is here once again. So welcome to the show again, Jody.
Jody (00:01:37) - Yeah thanks, Jamie. Looking forward to this conversation as well.
Jamie (00:01:40) - Awesome. All right Jason, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself and a little bit about your company so we can get this started?
Jason (00:01:46) - Awesome. Thanks, guys. Really excited to be here. As you've already said, I'm J. Scott. I'm the founder of 120 VC. We've been around for 25 years, and our focus has always been taking groups of high potential individuals and turning them into a single, high functioning team that focuses on things that matter improving customer satisfaction, team member satisfaction or profitability. Because in business, those are the only things that matter. So traditionally we've worked with groups that are considered, Cigna or cost centers like it or marketing, or HR, etc. and instead of just letting them operate in the business of HR and the business of IT or marketing, we help them recognize that they shouldn't be working on anything that doesn't serve one of those three pillars.
Jason (00:02:32) - And so we transform them from cost centers to profit centers for their business. Right, right. Lockstep with like, sales.
Jody (00:02:43) - So kind of kind of, breaking into that. A typical client size would be you know. not clients, but group of individuals, maybe in a marketing team would be about 5 to 10, 10 to 20, 100. Give me an idea of what we're looking at.
Jason (00:02:58) - So the, like, 99% of our clients over the last 25 years have been the fortune 1000. We do work with mid-size companies, but generally speaking, we'll start with like taking a, like a global IT group that's like 4 or 500 people. And once we transform the IT group we then go to work with HR. We then go to work with marketing. Like essentially we're working with any team within that business once we have that initial success. to really get them to stop focusing on their quarter inch drill bit as the business that they're in. Right. Because that's what marketing is, is a tool.
Jason (00:03:30) - That's what it is, is a tool like. And so going about thinking that their job is to deploy it. How does that help the business thrive. How does that help the shareholders. Right. So, what what's typically accomplished in these situations is that it's considered this really expensive, necessary evil HR, this really expensive, necessary evil. and the board members and the CEOs, they don't they don't know what to do with them because they're a little like NASA. Like, what is what does it do? So, they kind of have to trust. But that but what happens then is it really is this business-critical organization to the business. But when there's a downturn, they're like, hey, lay off all your IT people. And that really sets the business back. And it all fundamentally comes from the fact that they're not thinking like businesspeople. They're thinking like it people. So, we go. One of the things that we've learned about transformation is if you want people to do differently, first, you have to help them think differently.
Jason (00:04:23) - So we go in and we we'll like make a list of, you know, they're hundreds of things that they're working on. And then we're rationalize them like, okay, so how does this thing improve customer satisfaction, team member satisfaction or profitability. And the first thing they say is we can't do that. It's not the business that that that we're in. And I'm like, okay, first challenge accepted. Second, it's the business that your CEO wants you to be in, right? It's business that your board members want you to be in. And trust me, this is this is what I get every time. Let me help you and we get working on it. And what happens is some we rationalize and now we know this is exactly how these things will improve customer satisfaction, team member satisfaction, profitability. and the others. This is my favorite point. We cancel. And so usually we get them to cancel about half. And the beauty here is every single one of them thinks before we start working with them, that to get more done, they need more people.
Jason (00:05:16) - This is the this is typical thinking. Hey, to get more done, you need more people. We believe that the more people you add, the more complexity you're adding. And so for us to get more done, you got to do less. So, we cancel these, and we then repurpose the existing team members because now suddenly they have a lot of people, right? And they're all now focused on initiatives or endeavors that are going to create growth for their business. So, if you want people to do differently, you have to teach them to think differently first.
Jamie (00:05:46) - So, interestingly enough, I think a lot of the people listening to this podcast are probably somewhere between, let's just say, 20 to 100 employees working for an agency. And they're sitting here listening to this saying, okay, so I have a two person HR team and I have a three person IT team. So again, they're not large teams. But can you expand a little bit on how these smaller teams can still help kind of the three areas you talked through and what they should be thinking about within their smaller business, to make sure that those people are still driving profit and helping the people out.
Jason (00:06:17) - Okay, so here's the good news. It's way easier with less people, right? So like it's less people that you have to help shift. And human beings being the efficient creatures that we are efficient at surviving and taking care of our personal needs. Right. Are wired to push back on anything that conflicts with the previously held belief. Right. So, when I'm going in and I've got to shift 300 people, first of all, I don't shift 300 people, right? Are you I, I probably can't get into the law of diffusion of innovation here, but the idea is you want to get a small group of people then and then make it visible that this small group of people is adopted. Then you get the next 15% of people, which are your early adopters, right? Which gets you to 18%. Once you get to that 18%, you've got the early majority, which is the next 35%, making it visible. You'll get them. So, your baby stepping this vision shift. Right.
Jason (00:07:11) - So if I've only got to get to two people if I can get one of them to see. And that's really easy because I mean, this is what I do all day long. I wasn't born being able to look at a situation and say, okay, you think you're deploying any system? But that's not the point. You're not just deploying an ERP system. Nobody invests a ton of money to deploy an ERP system. What we the question we have to answer is what business problem is your company investing in solving by deploying the CRP system, or the CRM system, or the HR process, or the HR policy, or hey, marketing. I love marketing, by the way. I fell in love with marketing probably five years ago because I hired a guy named Andrew McGuire. So, he's our chief marketing officer. And I very quickly realized that marketing and leadership, which is the game that I'm in, are similar. A lot of people think in your listeners, hopefully you're going to appreciate this, that marketing is tricking people into buying things that they don't need.
Jason (00:08:06) - This is that's I mean, do some marketers do that? Yeah. You know, you do. And it's terrible. Right? But marketing fundamentally is making people aware of the possibilities and inspiring them to action. This is exactly what leadership is, right? When I when I walk into a room and I say, hey, we've got to go to Mars and back in the next decade, the first thing every human in that room does is start coming up with all the reasons that's going to be hard, and it's going to be terrible, and we can't do it. And the technology's not there. And so, you know what I do? I walk up to a whiteboard, and I make a list. Things, the obstacles, obstacles. And I put a line under it, and I start writing them down. And then at some point they simmer down, and they've got it all out of their system. And I'm like, are we good? Are these all the reasons we can't do this thing? And they're like, yeah.
Jason (00:08:48) - And so I erase it and I just write things we need to solve for and we get started. Right. It's making people aware of the possibilities and inspiring them to action. Right. So now that we've got a list of all the things that we need to overcome, let's get to work. So, leadership marketing very similar. So back to your question. When it's two people, again it's really simple. You're the people that are leading you, your business executives, in marketing. They're going to come to you and they're going to say, hey, we need some branding, right? We need a pretty picture for this. We need a brand narrative. the and so right then and there, pause. Don't just take the order for their eggs. Right. Don't just be like, how do you like your eggs over medium. Would you like that with a side of bacon. Right. Pause and ask them, well, listen, you know what? You've never asked me for eggs before. What is it? What's it? What's with the eggs? Oh, well, you know, I've decided to.
Jason (00:09:45) - Oh, in the bacon. I've just, you know, I'm a little overweight. I'm talking about myself now. You know, I'm 51. I've got a kid that's ten and 12. They've destroyed my ability to get to the gym, and I'm feeling a little chubby, so, like, I'm thinking this keto thing, it's for me, right? And then I'm like, oh, so you want to lose weight? That's what you want to do. Yeah, well, I don't just want to lose weight, you know? I want to put in some more muscle. Right? So, I start asking these questions to figure out why they're asking me for eggs, and they're asking me for bacon. And ultimately, I'm like, okay, so what you're trying to do is improve your quality of life, right? So, you're struggling physically. You want to improve your quality of life, you know, what? Do you like eggs? Well, not really, I don't really like eggs, but I figured it's the easiest way to get this weight loss thing done.
Jason (00:10:28) - And so ultimately, what I figure out is it's not about the eggs. The eggs is their tool. They think it's this Atkins thing that's their tool. What they're really trying to do is I could say they're trying to lose weight, but is that really what they're trying to do? No, they're trying to improve the quality of their lives. And I mean, I'm sure that your all of your I'm speaking to the choir because I'm sure everybody listening is familiar with story brand. Yes. Right. But you but you, you apply this journey to business. They're going to come and they're going to ask you for a quarter inch drill bit marketer. Right. But you can't just make pretty things. There has to be attribution. Marketing has to provide a steady increase to top line revenue or you're failing. So when they come and they ask you for a pretty picture or a brand narrative, you've got to ask them, what problem are you trying to solve? And there's only three problems in business. Are we trying to improve customer satisfaction? Are we trying to improve team member satisfaction? Are we trying to improve profitability or all three? And if we have something that can do all three, that's going to be a higher priority than something that's going to do just one, right.
Jason (00:11:32) - And so first get obsessed with those pillars. Right. What how is this thing that you're asking me for? And I have customers say to me, well, like, it doesn't, it's just something that we have to do. And then what I point out to them is then it won't.
Jaime (00:11:47) - Right.
Jason (00:11:49) - Then it won't. So, let's figure out how to do this in a way that does one of these things, because otherwise we're wasting an opportunity. We're bringing a bunch of people together to accomplish something for the business. So, we've got this talent, we've got all these hours, we've got all this money, we've got all this humanity. Let's not waste it. On the implementation of the quarter inch drill bit. Let's implement the quarter inch drill bit and do it in a way that improves customer satisfaction, team member satisfaction or profitability. And nobody's ever been able to stop me. I can come up with a way to do it.
Jody (00:12:22) - It's pretty fascinating. Yeah. Because we when we when we think about that, I mean, you're talking change management for the most part, it sounds like.
Jody (00:12:29) - And,
Jason (00:12:31) - Except that's not really how the change management practitioners go about it.
Jody (00:12:35) - Right?
Jason (00:12:36) - They go about it like, you know, let's get buy in. Meaning let's advocate for this. Let's get people convinced to do it the way that we think we need to do it. Let's let them know it's coming so it doesn't scare them or piss them off. What I'm actually talking about is creating demand, okay. Which again is something that your audience can understand. These are all things that most business leaders don't think about. And what's crazy, even in marketing, they know their job is to create demand, but they're not applying their skill set on their business. Right. So, when you think about the typical project and you brought up change management or a project, what happens is an executive stands up in front of everybody and says, "We're going to do this, right?" And then they go away, and they plan in a little dark room somewhere with the project team. And now all the people that were at this town hall meeting, you've got the laggards over here.
Jason (00:13:27) - Again, if you're familiar with the law of diffusion innovation, right. And the late adopters, the skeptics, they're employing the law of diffusion innovation because every opportunity they get they're saying that's stupid. It's not going to work. I don't want to do I don't want to do it. And what they're doing is they're getting adoption. Right against this initiative. Right. And so, the work the worst way. The worst way to create demand is to go tell, announce what you're going to do to people. So what I advocate for is way before you even think about launching a project is you think, you think, hey, I think we should do this thing for the business. Cool. But let's pause. Let's figure out how it improves. Team member satisfaction, customer satisfaction, profitability. Okay. How we think it's gonna.
Jody (00:14:12) - Yeah.
Jason (00:14:13) - And then we call our different stakeholders together. So, we'll call the executives together. And usually, they're the ones that ask for it. So, they're pretty bought in.
Jason (00:14:19) - But we want to shift the way that they're thinking about it. And here's the thing. It's not going to come as a shock to them. They asked for the quarter inch drill bit, but because they think it's going to solve a business problem for them. So we go, we ask a bunch of questions, we go back to them and we say, hey, we think this is the problem you're trying to solve, and this is how it improves customer satisfaction, team member satisfaction, profitability. And you know what we do? We ask them for experience shares. Can you tell me about a time where doing something like this accomplish this goal instead of asking them for their requirements? Because they'll ask for everything and the kitchen sink and the backsplash and the and the warm floors. Right, whether they need them or not. And we don't ask for opinion because people will give you their opinion whether they have any experience on the matter or not. We say, tell us. We come up with questions in advance that are thoughtful.
Jason (00:15:06) - Tell us about a time and then we go to the next stakeholder group, which are the managers and the people that have to do the work. And we do the same thing, and we go to the next stakeholder group, the people that are going to have to adopt the majority, the people that are going to have to adopt a new ways of working. Because again, anything that is ever deployed to the organization is meant to enable people to do their jobs differently because the business needs to see a change. The only way the business is going to see a different outcome is if people go about doing their jobs differently, but all the way back to you, they need a different vision in order to go about doing their jobs differently. So I'll give you a good example of what I'm talking about at a CIO and a CIO that came to me and said, I need to replace ServiceNow with BMC. So, these are customer service tools. When you call into a call center and you say, I have a problem, they look you up, they look at your history of problems, right? And they're now trying to help you solve whatever problem you have, add service, add a feature at a tool, whatever.
Jason (00:15:59) - And so he was going to migrate one tool to another competitive competing tool. And in my mind I was like, that's not that's there's got to be a reason. Like why are you going to spend a year and a half and $1 million to deploy a tool globally? So I dug in and I started asking why, why, why? And he there was a couple of things he said. He said, you know, we've spent the last three years trying to improve the customer's perception of the work that we do. No matter how hard my call center people work, they can't get better than a two out of five-star review. And I said, oh, so you're trying to get your call center people. You're trying to give them a tool that will allow them to provide a concierge like customer service. And he said, yeah, I said, so we're no longer going to call it service now to BMC. We're going to we're just going to say we're implementing a tool that will allow your team to provide a concierge like customer service, and this is going to resonate with your customer that you're going to go have to ask for $1 million to do this, right, because they're unhappy.
Jason (00:16:52) - But what's the problem? And he said, well, we've been working on this for like nine months and we can't seem to get moving. And I said, why? He said, because, you know, I need the people in the call center that are struggling to help us figure out how they're the subject matter experts. So, we need them to help us figure out how then we need them to do the work to migrate to the new system. Then we need them to learn the new system. And every conversation is obstacle after object. This is why it can't be done. Obstacle after obstacles. Here's why. Guys, before I even go on, it's because in their minds. He was trying to improve customer satisfaction at their expense because I said, do they still have to do their day job? Like meaning, are they just working on the project or do they still have to answer phones? And he was like, well, they still have to answer phones. So essentially and by the way, this is how almost every single project works.
Jason (00:17:37) - You got these people with a day job, they get Volun told to now work on this project and they don't understand why. So, I, I said to him, and we had trust we'd worked together for a while. I said, can we go talk to them? He said, sure. So, we get like 100 or so people on a zoom call, and the very first thing I asked them to do was complain. And this is what I mean by experience shares. So here's an example of experience shares. I said, listen, I hear, and I know you guys are all working hard, right? Because human beings fundamentally want to be successful at home with their friends, their families and in their business. So, I hear you guys are working really hard, and no matter what you do, all you can get is a two out of five star review. How's that feel? Silence. I looked at my customer and I said, listen, they need they need some encouragement here. And he's like, guys, we really want to know, how's this feel? So, one guy opens up the floodgates and goes on for like 2 or 3 minutes about how it's terrible, the next guy.
Jason (00:18:25) - And I'll never forget this because I don't remember what the first guy said, but I'll never forget the second guy he raises. He was like, you know, they say they don't know how to get Ahold of us in. The phone number hasn't changed in 15 years. Can you imagine this? Like that's some angry. Like they. They are complaining. They can't get Ahold of us. But it's been the same phone number for 15 years, right? So I let this go on for, like, a good ten, 15 minutes. And then I said, okay guys, cool, I get it. It feels terrible. And everybody's nodding. So the next question was very simple. I said, if any of you ever worked somewhere else where you had a tool that helped you get like a 4 or 5 star review, and somebody was like, I did, and I was like, cool. But tell me more. What was the tool? What is what did it do specifically that helped you get these better reviews? And he starts giving me a list.
Jason (00:19:12) - So you know what I'm doing? I'm writing down the requirements. I'm I could have asked for requirements, and I would have got a whole list of stuff that they may need or may not need. But the other thing I'm doing is this guy's giving me solutions in front of all these other people. Again the law of diffusion of innovation, right? So I get a list of good stuff. I had seven people that shared, and I got them to all get really granular. Tell me about a time and then tell me what the features are. I wrote all those down and then I was like, thank you quieted down. And I said, guys, I only have two more questions. The next question is very simple. Have any of you guys encountered a problem where you didn't get a great review, where you think you could have done better if you had any of these features? Everybody had a story and I just started checking them off. Oh, this one again. Oh, this one again.
Jason (00:19:58) - Oh this one again. Oh this one again. I ended this conversation with a weighted list of things that we these that they want. That they would want that they think would help the business. These are the people that do the work, and yet we never crowdsource the things that we should do. The things come down from on high, right? There's whether there's demand for it or not. What am I doing? Am I crowdsourcing requirements or my crowdsourcing demand? I'm crowdsourcing demand. Okay. So, my very last question was this. Listen you guys. If your CIO can get funding to implement a system that does these things, who would want to volunteer to work on this project? We got everybody.
Jason (00:20:37) - Yeah.
Jamie (00:20:39) - So do you find the most effective way to do that is with everybody in the room and doing it that way, because I know we do a lot of and we've talked to our clients who do a lot of like surveys and try to get to the bottom of whatever the issues are out there.
Jamie (00:20:52) - And that's really sometimes where they get to, okay, this is what needs to be done. It sounds like what you're saying is like having the meeting, even if it's 100 people in the room and getting the excitement first for the problem. Okay, we know we have a problem now let's crowdsource it and let's figure out, okay, what do you guys think? We should fix it. And it's going to get us to the path we probably should go anyways. Is that way more effective than any of the some of the other tools out there?
Jason (00:21:13) - Here's the deal everybody. It doesn't it's not always conducive to what you're trying to achieve. So, it really depends on the situation. However you do want a group of people because there's two things, right? Because I'm there to create demand. So, if I can get people that are clearly voicing their interest, which I did in this scenario, they're clearly voicing their interest. The other people that are maybe even ambivalent at this point, like, are like, oh, okay, they seem interested.
Jason (00:21:42) - Why are they interested? Right. So, like social proof is what drives adoption. Again, I'm not preaching. I'm preaching to the choir. Right. and so, I do always want to do it in groups. But here's the other thing. This is beauty. The more people I can get in a room that when I pitch these things, when I get crickets, here's what I know. I am not pitching a solution that solves a problem that anybody thinks they have. So, I can try to launch this project and I can try to shove it down people's throats, but it is not going to go well. We're going to waste a lot of time. We're going to waste a lot of money, and adoption is always going to struggle. Okay. So, I'm a big believer in any change back to change initiative or project. We need to use marketing techniques. Marketing is the domain of leadership. Right. And so, your creative agencies, they're very likely serving up marketing. But are they using it as business leaders within their organizations to crowdsource the problems? Because here's the thing.
Jason (00:22:40) - We executives, I don't know what's going on the ground floor where all the people are doing the work. Unless I get down there with them in the trenches and check it out, I can't. They won't let me. I'm cool. My team loves me. I get like a 4.9 on Glassdoor, like all those things. And still, I know they know. That I could fire them. And so, are they going to be real with me? I can't even ask them to be real with me. That's not even fair. But you know what I can do? I can go to them and say, you guys. Instead of going to them and saying, hey, we have a problem, this is what I'm going to do to you. I go to them and I say, hey, I think we have a problem. What do you think? And so I pitch it. And then I asked them for experience shares, and I test, do they think we have a problem. Can I get some experience shares I can get them to open up and answer my questions.
Jason (00:23:31) - Can I get them to give me authentic feedback? No way. But if I come with very specific questions around things, around things that I think present a challenge for them, if I'm again, I if I can if I can come up with a solution that solves a problem that they think they have, they'll get on board. And I'm not going to be able to. The fastest way to do that is to go ask them to say, hey, I think we've got this problem, okay? This is what I'm thinking we might do about it. And then, in my experience, shares, I figure out. What their opinion of that is. But never ask anybody for their feedback because you'll get it. Never ask anybody for their opinion because you'll get it. Never ask anybody for their requirements because you'll get it. Ask them for experience shares. And that's really the magic piece, right? Figuring out how to transform the request for a quarter inch drill bit into how deploying that quarter inch drill bit improves customer satisfaction, team member satisfaction, and profitability.
Jason (00:24:29) - That's not that hard, right? Okay. Being. Inquisitive. Then when you present this not advocate gives like hey, this is what we're going to do. Going and saying, hey, this is what I'm thinking. Leaders are not taught to do this. We're taught to do the exact opposite. Back to the anti-thought leader, right?
Jody (00:24:46) - Yep.
Jason (00:24:46) - So we I present it and then again, the hardest part is coming up with the questions. Tell me about a time. Tell me about a time. So this requires thought and preparation. And by the way I never do that by myself. I come up with the questions and then I go to one of my team members and I get coaching, like, what do you think? Like, like what do you think? Are there any of the questions? I'll present it to a couple of other team members. So we really work hard to come up with these questions. So, we're not asking for opinion or feedback or requirements. Right.
Jason (00:25:14) - And then we go pitch. And sometimes I have you know I have it happened where everybody I see the demand the demand is clearly there. I've got everybody on board and they volunteer and other times and this is beautiful to crickets. And I know this is great feedback that I got no feedback. Nobody cares, right. Can you imagine if TiVo had done this right. Can you imagine if TiVo had done this? They'd have been like, we probably should not spend all the money trying to launch this project and struggle for 15, 20 years. I mean, I don't even know if they're even around, right? Like, yeah. So, I hope that answers your question.
Jamie (00:25:51) - No, no, it definitely does. And I think, you know, one of the things that we recently did, because we're going through some trying to figure out some of our issues, we've actually been bringing team members into our leadership meetings. So we had a leadership retreat in Florida where we brought some of our team members.
Jamie (00:26:04) - I think it goes back to you talking about those early adopters, and we brought some team members in while we discussed the topic and got their opinion on it, and then help have them help us solve it. So now that we're in that solution phase, we have those early adopters that are on the ground floor that are there and saying, hey, yeah, I know this is I'm part of the solution. And you kind of get those people that are that are passionate about it. So, I definitely think that what you're saying makes sense here. So we are we are at time for the fun question. So, I want I want to make sure I throw this over to both of you guys. So earlier in our discussion, you were talking about, bacon and eggs. And my mind keeps going back to that because I haven't had breakfast yet. It's it is 1230 here. And I'm like, I don't know. It's been a busy morning. So, I'm, I'm on the I'm on the West coast or I'm in the Midwest here.
Jamie (00:26:45) - So but it's 1230 here, so I've not had my breakfast yet, so I'm a little hungry. So, I'm curious what both of you guys' go to breakfast food choice is. So, so, Jody, I'm going to start with you on the on this one.
Jody (00:26:57) - Go to breakfast food choice, man. That's. Yeah, that's the traditional eggs and bacon and hash browns. that is, by far the, the go to. I've been doing it forever. Kids expect I'm actually pretty decent at it. I don't know how you can't be, but, pretty decent at it. And, seems like, it gets eaten all the time. So those are the those. That's the eggs, bacon and hash browns by far.
Jaime (00:27:18) - The eggs.
Jamie (00:27:18) - Bacon and hashbrown. All right, Jay, what about you? What's your what's your go to breakfast choice?
Jason (00:27:22) - Here's the thing. I gotta know that you're gonna answer before I go. I just got oh, yeah, I'm gonna answer.
Jason (00:27:26) - All right, all right, all right, all right, all right.
Jason (00:27:28) - So mine is. Mine is really simple. I have celiac, so I'm limited on what I can eat. And I found one bread choice that's actually kind of decent. And that's Trader Joe's white bread gluten free white bread. So I just I toast two pieces of white bread up, I throw a little butter on it, I layer it with salami, I cut it in half, and I basically have like a toasted buttered salami sandwich every day for breakfast every day.
Jamie (00:27:51) - So you're consistently eating that interesting.
Jason (00:27:53) - You know.
Jason (00:27:54) - I'll mix it up, you know, with some fruit and bananas. But it's
the sandwich in fruit.
Jody (00:27:58) - It's fairly similar. Yeah. That's cool.
Jamie (00:28:00) - Awesome. Yeah.
Jamie (00:28:02) - I tried the gluten free for, for a while and bread was the hardest and this was like ten years ago. Bread was like I was like, man, every bread out there is awful. So I it took me a while to and I jump it right back into, okay, I'm gonna eat gluten for the breads.
Jamie (00:28:16) - All that gross. So for me, I'm gonna, I'm gonna have two answers here. So one, I am a like, a cereal lover, but I'm not calling that my breakfast. I hardly ever eat cereal for breakfast. It's more of like, a snack or a dessert thing for me, so I'm not going to count that. So I'm going to I'm going to go breakfast burritos. I love a good breakfast burrito. I find a fine authentic, especially, especially, you know, food truck type thing. I just, I love breakfast burritos, and that's me. The way to go.
Jason (00:28:41) - Totally.
Jody (00:28:42) - Hey, final thoughts real quick, Jamie. kind of listening to what Jay said would give me a final thought on what you've heard so far. And, you know, how we could probably apply that going forward.
Jamie (00:28:54) - Yeah. It's great. Great question. I think from my standpoint, what I really like about what Jay said is, is that I think oftentimes as leaders, we do this the wrong way is we sit in our I talked to a lot of clients that do this, and I'm part of a lot of those conversations as a CFO where it's like, we have a problem, we need a solution.
Jamie (00:29:11) - Let's just the three of us figure it out, or the four of us figure it out, when oftentimes it's the people on the ground floors that really have those solutions. But the reason people don't do this is because if you just go to them and say, here's the problem, help us come up with a solution, they're going to be like, well, I can't do that. But I think the way Jay's approached this by just asking questions and asking the right questions and honestly, the first part where you're talking about getting people a little riled up, getting them, like getting them to bring the problem to you, I think we'll really bring that, bring that passion up where you're going to get some really strong solutions that you might not get if it was just the three of us in a room talking about how to solve a problem, that that is definitely my take away from this conversation.
Jody (00:29:48) - Yeah. Jay. Same thing. Final thoughts. And then how would somebody get Ahold of you if they wanted to reach out?
Jason (00:29:56) - Final thoughts.
Jason (00:29:57) - You know, we are taught to advocate for what we think should be done as leaders. Like you get your first management position. So, you think you're going to go and you're going to you're going to sell. And that's how most people think of getting buy in. I'm going to go sell. I'm going to convince him I'm going to get him on board. Except for we know from experience that that doesn't work. So, my I would say shifting from advocacy, and it still has its place to inquiry like inquiring crowd sourcing. And here's the thing. They might not be able to give you anything other than the problem. Okay, but if you can get clear on the problem that they feel like they need solved, they're going to be open to a solution, right? And then they can collaborate on the solution. And so, as Fred Kaufman said, balancing advocacy and inquiry is really important. And I think most leaders today are probably advocacy heavy because it's the model that we that that we see.
Jason (00:30:55) - Way to get Ahold of me. there's JasonScottleadership.com which is my speaking website. It's how I get booked for speaking podcasts, etc. The company that does all the work that I've been describing it's called 120 BC. So if you're interested in or if your listeners are interested in and digging in, to more about, like what we do and how we do it, it would be 120BC.Com and you know, anybody that reaches out and says, that they heard me on your podcast, just heard you on that podcast, I'll connect with you.
Jody (00:31:28) - Oh, sweet, sweet. Yeah. Final thought for me. You know, I, you know, this has been a great, informative, podcast for sure. And, you know, just kind of twisting around the normal or basically changing the way people think. And people lead, I think is the, the biggest thing, you know, listening, you know, it is key, you know, and not, not speaking too much.
Jody (00:31:47) - It sounds like from, from the normal that you're seeing people talk too much as leaders and people, you know, present as if this is the only solution. Push it down on their team. And you're saying it should go the opposite way, should go listening for the issue, drawing it out of them what the issue is, and then letting them be a big part of that solution and, and buy in. And with that, the results are, you know, ten times better. And that's what I like about it, because it's a very similar approach in marketing. You don't want to go out and sell beats on doors all the time. You want you want to get that demand. So, they're calling you and, you know, asking for your product and service. And I think it's a and I never, I guess I never connected the dots until, this conversation that, it should be done the same way with your team. and some people do it naturally and others don't. And that's, that's pretty interesting to hear your conversations today.
Jody (00:32:35) - Loved it.
Jason (00:32:37) - Right on. Yeah. Hiring a marketer made me a better leader.
Jody (00:32:42) - Yeah.
Jamie (00:32:44) - It makes a lot of sense. All right. Well definitely. Thank you everybody for listening to this. And thanks to both our guests. Like I said I think this is a really good conversation. And kind of kind of turned a bunch of ideas we had maybe on their heads. So hopefully that's people get that out of this. So, appreciate you guys.
Jody (00:32:56) - Yeah. Thanks, Jay.
Jason (00:32:57) - Right on, you guys. Zoom high five
Jaime (00:33:00) - Awesome.
Outro (00:33:03) - Enjoy this podcast? Visit our website SummitCPA.net to get more tips and strategy for achieving business success. We're here to be a resource in this ever-changing industry.
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