Hello, welcome back. I'm Zee. Hey, Zee. Hello,
Rowan. How are you? Good, thank you. That's good.
Hello, everyone. We have Ian again. Woohoo! Hello,
Ian. Hello. Welcome back to the Business Abundance
podcast. Jeez, thanks for having me. Today, we're
going to be talking about improving employee
morale before COVID -19. Working at home seemed
super innovative and few companies actually set
it up. And now... We're all experiencing it.
So that's just one example of how businesses
have changed and an example we can touch on when
we talk about employee morale, because how do
you keep people excited from their own homes?
I think the question is how do they stay excited
at their own home? Fun and games. So we're going
to chat using examples from Google and a few
of our own businesses. So looking forward to
talking about that. Well, that's an interesting
one because we all work at home too. We do at
home. Business abundance. We don't have offices.
We can use our examples. We work wherever we
want. And whether you employ people or not, employee
morale, I think everyone can understand because
you might not employ people, but you've been
employed by people. So, why is it important?
There's a lot of obvious reasons. Happy people,
good people. Happy workforce, generally good
workforce. Happy people, solve problems. Unhappy
people, probably make problems. Happy employees
happy clients There's a lot of things that you
know, you pretty much say like that and people
go. Yep. That's right You know, it's not always
the case but majority of the time good things
are gonna happen when people are happy and you
know and stimulated So if you have a business
where people don't want to be there people don't
want to work there people hate being there people
Dread the thought of going to work. They're not
gonna be doing a good job They're not going to
be when you you know if you expect little things
to be done They're not going to do them You know
if they can avoid doing it and no one's going
to know they're just not going to do it because
I don't want to be there Whereas if someone's
happy and they want to do a good job. They want
to look after the clients They want to have a
good day They like the people they work with
or they like what the business is about they're
going to do everything that needs to be done
To make everything go well so One it's about
having a good business, but two it's been being
a good employer, if you've got happy people then
generally you're doing some things right and
you're making some people's lives better. Whereas
if you've got unhappy people, well you're probably
doing the opposite, you're probably making some
lives miserable. Which, you know, some people
might like, but personally no. In 2013, I remember
watching the internship and... How old were you
then, Zee? I was 12. Anyway, so I what's the
um, what's the rating on this? Were you allowed
to watch that show? Interesting. I think it's
PG 13 plus. I had 13 plus. Oh, that's terrible.
Anyway, anyway, it draws light on the Google
workplace, which was probably my first exposure
to Google. um and the google the the google is
that on the interwebs um so you you saw that
there's this huge slide in this business and
um yeah that was pretty modern that's very cool
considering i was i grew up thinking that a business
just had to be four walls little office dividers
no windows no windows an old coffee machine and
lots of paper with a printer in the corner that
barely works. You had an interesting childhood
if you were thinking about that when you were
12. I'm an entrepreneur. So anyway, this movie
comes out and they've given us a snapshot of
what Google looks like and there's this huge
slide and people are going down this slide and
they have these little nooks and crannies where
they can work from. There's like bean bags and
tennis tables. Free food, I remember that. Bro,
food, yes. Yeah, you can't forget the food. Yeah.
How cool is that? And so now when you think about
it, those employees must be so happy and well,
you'd hope so. Well, you'd think that those things
would make them happier. Whether they're happy
or not, you don't know, but definitely going
to make them happier. Yeah. And I guess Google's
idea is that it's going to reduce turnover. Turnover
is I Mean if you have a high turnover, you're
gonna assume that something is wrong with your
employee morale. Would you know? Yeah, definitely.
Yeah, I think I'm on here but It's not just turnover.
It's about getting the right people were attracted
them to your business as well or making them
Productive or getting the right results or the
right headspace to do what they need to do. Yeah,
so there's a lot of exposure to the Google The
Google. The Google workplace, the Google culture.
We know the Google sounds ridiculous. I just
remember working with this man who will listen
to this, so he'll know what we're talking about.
But we kept telling him to Google things. If
you need to know, just Google it. And he called
it the Google. He's like, oh, I'll ask the Google.
So now I just can't help but call it the Google.
I'm going to jump on the line. It's from the
movie. It's great. On the line. It's online.
Yeah, I'm going to go on the line. Anyway, so
Google has created this workplace culture that
is built on data. So they have developed, they've
used all this data to work out, for example,
how long should you be waiting or how long do
people want to wait in their cafeteria line for?
And they've found that three to four minutes
is the maximum without wasting time. That's a
cool concept. I mean waiting in line for lunch
is probably not something that employees want
to do. So you know you're doing a few things
right when you're looking at problems like that
to fix your cafe lines for people's lunches.
I think that's fantastic. That's good. Yeah.
Their work environment like we talked about has
bean bags and hairdressers, chill out areas.
What do they do for people without hair? Head
shining. I don't know. Rowan's thinking about
a job at Google and needs to cover all their
bases. Oh, I thought about trying the test and
see what happens. He's not, yeah, he's not going
to be the only one because Google now has over
two million applications a year, which is highly
impressive. They do the six second test where
they review their resume, someone's resume, and
if it doesn't grapple, like get them in six seconds,
then it's thrown out. So you basically just lead
with the cover page of a puppy and that's going
to get someone's attention for six seconds. Just
stick my face on there and just be like, here's
me. That's it. One second, no. She hasn't got
enough life experience. So in terms of maternity
leave and all the women that they employ, they
have 18 months paid maternity leave if they choose
to use that. That's awesome. 18 weeks, not 18
months. I was about to say, I was working out
how you do that. Actually, 18 weeks is not good
enough, Google. 18 months I would prefer. You
would? Year and a half maternity leave, yeah.
Okay. Be great. Sorry Google. First chink in
the armour. Yeah, what's the standard? Especially
in the US, I'm not sure what it is in the US,
but it's probably not a lot. US is terrible.
Yeah. Anyway, someone could let me know. It doesn't
really matter. It's fantastic that they actually
offer that to the people who would like to use
it. And it means that women have the option to
stick at work instead of having to leave. And
then they also have the flat organisational structure.
And that is where an intern, for example, has
direct access to the CEO. They're able to communicate
freely without going through the levels of management
bureaucracy Yes, which has led to the downfall
of many businesses Except public servants they
seem to keep their business intact even though
that's levels upon levels of bureaucracy Controversy
yeah Their core values they literally have them
written out for everyone to see in the the things
we know we know to be true And people can move
within the company for their position. So if
they decide that They've had enough in this position.
I'm sick of talking to people. I'm gonna become
a code monkey Yeah, exactly and they will get
trained and they will move which is fantastic
considering that means that people move within
the business their experience and They're keeping
the people they think are talented. Yeah. So,
the same is for Facebook, actually, with the
flat organisational structure. Ooh, Facebook.
I know, but I think the idea behind it is very
good. They have the shared tables where an intern
can sit with a person of leadership. They have
the fishbowl where Mark Zuckerberg is... accessible
through class, but he's working there. He's sitting
there, not on the 74th floor, but he's sitting
there on the same. Yeah. And he's a real person.
They have the Friday Q and A's with Mark. And
so they have direct access to information and
leadership. All of these things, I think are
highly valuable for employee morale. Yeah. It's
interesting because obviously there's some different
views around Facebook at this recording, but
just because someone's good or someone's bad
doesn't mean we can't take good things or learn
things from a business. I think I said in a previous
podcast, if you want some advice or you're struggling
with something, go look at a business that does
it really well, not just a successful business
because they might be doing the same wrong things
or might having the same problems. But if you
can go look at a business or regardless of what
you think about and go, hey, this bit's good.
I can see how that's good, you know, it's a very
good school to have. So why would a business
put so much effort and so much money and time
to increase employee morale? Is that a question?
Yeah, for me. I think it started with why, so
yeah. It's got a question mark at the end of
it. Yeah, it just sort of faded away. Yeah, so
why are they going to do it? We've talked about
a couple of things I just touched on, but getting
good employees. If you want the best people,
where do the best people want to be? The best
people want to be in the place that they want
to be, so having a good setup. is definitely
important to recruit the best talent. If you
had a choice between a workplace where you could
sort of sit where you want, work how you want,
do a good job, it's up to you to make it happen.
They'll feed you lunch. There's 20 different
choices that you can choose from. You can get
a snack any time of the day, and all you've got
to do is do your job really well. I don't know
about you, but if I was gonna go work somewhere,
that sounds pretty good, you know? The prerequisite
there is that you've got to do your job. They
know what you're doing and what you're not doing.
If you're not doing that, the perks don't apply
because you're not going to work there. But for
the people that are doing a good job and dominating,
that's a place that they're going to want to
be. Looking at other workplaces, a lot of business
owners often say, they go, oh, I can't find good
people. They'll work somewhere else. They don't
want too much money. Blah, blah, blah. Why would
they work for you? And they'll say, oh I'm a
good boss. In reality, they do the minimum entitlements,
they make people do their, they don't give them
empowerment, there's no progression past whatever
the job is, they just want more people to work
so they can make more money. That's what it comes
down to, or take something off their plate, but
they're not trying to make a good environment.
So number one, good workplaces gonna help you
get better talent, get better people working
for you. And so you touched on turnover. People
leaving a business is a big cost. You've got
to find someone else. You've got to train someone
else. They might work out, they might not. They
might be as good, they might not. but just that
recruitment process, often it's tens of thousands
of dollars just to find someone. By the time
you, if you work out the time, you work out the,
if you've got a recruitment cost, it depends
what your role is, you know, advertising, downtime
of not having a person in place, you know, there's
a few costs you can think of, but then if you
add in training, how long does it take for them
to get to where they, you know, the other person
was? That's a cost to the business as well, so.
Depending on your organization, like even an
electrician, if you lose a qualified tech electrician
that's really, really good at their job and you've
got to replace them with someone, that can be
tens of thousands of dollars by the time you
train them on the system. You get them productive,
you get them figuring out how your business runs,
and that's pretty much someone that a qualified
electrician should be able to do what another
qualified electrician does. So then you've got
businesses like Google where you've got different
operating environments, you've got systems they
need to understand, processes and things that
people have to get used to to fit into the team
and thousands and thousands and thousands of
employees. The cost to get a new person when
someone leaves is massive. So you want to do
whatever you can if you've got good people that
fit in. And we talked about, I think in the first
episode, about treating business like a machine.
You build this machine to be a process that you
can expect a good result. A bit breaks, and then
you've got to make a new part from scratch. That's
the big downtime in your machine, whereas if
that part never breaks, it's still there. It's
doing a great job day in, day out. Well, that's
the best scenario. So you're going to find with
a good workplace, you're going to find you'll
get better people which in turn is going to help
your business and make all the other good people
happy. But you'll find that the ones you've got
hopefully won't leave as well or won't leave
because of your business. So Google is such an
exceptional standard. I am thinking about how
would a small business implement activities or
incentives for employees to come to work with
them and also how would they do that now that
some people are living from working from home
yeah and covid restrictions are happening pretty
serious straight into the the juicy details but
so much to cover i think there's another reason
too because there's a lot to cover in this podcast
i guess but um we're talking about turnover we're
talking about recruitment but you've got What's
businesses businesses are there to make happy
customers because happy customers are buying
something that you know makes the business money
and that gives everyone a job and whatnot so
the third reason mainly for happy employees is
Customer satisfaction if you've got great employee
morale people good people doing good things you
can have really happy customers and Whatever
your business does is going to be having a bit
of an impact on the world or you know its clients.
That's a What Richard Branson says, if you've
got happy employees, you've got great customers.
Richard Branson, I don't know him personally,
obviously, but he's got a lot of companies. Some
people in small business, they can't even manage
one. It's crazy, he's out of control. What's
he got going on? Hundreds. But he's about empowering
his employees and letting these people do what
they need to do and what can he do to help them.
So, you know, I haven't worked with him, but
it seemed to work pretty well for him. It's a
lot written about him and you can look it all
up. But yeah, it's a good example. There's a
fella here in Tasmania who died a couple years
ago, Brian Inder. Tasmasia. Created Tasmasia.
I got to work with him a few years ago and having
a coffee up at Tasmasia and he said his exact
words were, people think I'm really, really clever
with what I've done. You know what makes me clever
is I get the right people and then I let them
do their job. Yeah, yeah 100 % And you think
about your sports teams as a good example, too
If you've got a happy team and you're getting
out of the way you're giving them all the tools
they need Let them go about do the things you're
gonna get good results But if you're trying to
control every single aspect of what every single
person does and try to whip them into line You're
not gonna have a good team It's a no -brainer,
so business is pretty similar. But yeah, so for
small business, that's a pretty big question
you asked, but what are some things that small
businesses can do? It probably depends on what
products or services you're delivering. If you're
a retail, bricks and mortar store, it's probably
a bit hard to say. People can work from home.
people working from home is not necessarily a
perk. I remember, Zee, when you first came for
your interview with us, I said, look, working
from home can be lonely. I was like, what's the
friends and family situation like? Because if
you don't have that, you're going to hate life
working from home. So for some people, it's a
big problem because they don't get the interaction.
We talked previously about burnout. I said, we'll
spend some more time with your friends and family.
But for employees, sometimes going to work is
their downtime because the stress is elsewhere.
So you can't necessarily just carbon or copy
what another business doesn't say it's going
to work for you. But talking to your employees
is a good thing. Hey, what are your problems?
Like what's annoying you? What annoys you every
day? What pisses you off? you'll probably get
a whole bunch of things. Some might be ridiculous.
Yeah, that's fine. You don't have to implant
it all. So you can say, hey, what a noise. Or
you ask me, you won't do anything about it anyway.
So, you know, there's a few things we can change
and it makes sense. I'm happy to, you know, we
want to make this the best place we can. Within
reason, like we can't change the world overnight.
I hate how you expect me to do my job. Damn it.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, okay. Well, you don't have
to do your job anymore. See you later. That'd
be ruthless, wouldn't it? But yeah, I think the
people working for you might know a few things.
It might be as simple as, I just really hate
how three people in the office always show up
late and no one ever does anything about it.
Well, that's going to be a huge impact on employee
morale. So it's not about having ping pong tables
in your office necessarily. It's about what are
the problems people experience and trying to
solve those problems. And then there's the flip
side of, well, how can we make this the best
place to work? So sometimes people go, oh, our
wages are lower than everyone else, we can't
afford to pay people higher so they go work elsewhere.
Well, people don't always want the money. What
other things do you do? Well, we let people choose
their own work hours. That's a huge perk. Oh,
we make 150 bucks less a week, but I can look
after my kids two days a week and I can do this
and we can move this around and I go play golf
or whatever. I'm still doing my job because it
comes back to that. But we've got these different
things in place. The number one reason people
leave a job isn't money. Correct. It's feeling
like they're not valued. Yeah. 100%. And usually
there's a lot of warning signs before someone
leaves. They'll say... not happy. Yep. They'll
show they're not happy. Yeah. They'll probably
kick a few doors down and then eventually they'll
leave because either no one heard them or no
one cared or people thought, oh, they're too
afraid to leave. But at the end of the day, if
you've got employees working for you, they can
go work anywhere. You don't need too much money
to feed yourself, like it's a worst case scenario.
So you can get a government benefit if you want.
You can go work at McDonald's. The only reasonable
way you can go work at Woolworths and earn, you
know, above average wages. turn your brain off
for eight hours and... Yeah, it's your own stress.
Just rock up. I've just got to do this task,
which we can all appreciate sometimes. Doing
those basic tasks is actually kind of good. So
do they have to work for you and do they have
to do it? No, they never do. And that's where
a lot of employees, probably employers, sorry,
go wrong, is they think their employees have
to work for them. And that's not true. I like
the values. I think you... talked about the 10
things. Yeah. Core values. So therefore the business
has identified their core values. They know what
their core values are and as a small business
owner that starts with you. Yeah. And as a startup
especially you've got the chance to create your
culture. So you are your culture. Make sure anyone
you employ is on the same page and then your
turnover disappears. Yeah. Having that written
down, this is what we believe in, this is who
we are, this is how we act. That's gonna be a
whole lot more likely to continue with that culture
than not having it written down because like
you said, if you're starting out, it's just you,
you are the culture. You get another employee,
then between the two of you, that's the culture.
And if you have 20 employees, if you haven't
defined it, then it's gonna be whoever's the
loudest and makes the most noise, I reckon, is
gonna be the culture. for the older guys in the
room, that was the Branson model for me, the
Google for you, see, is Branson for me. Branson
started with a group of people in a room talking
about great ideas for business and then he's
in a phone box one weekend when he's supposed
to be at school selling advertising to a magazine
that didn't exist, all based on the passion of
this is going to be amazing. people liked it.
Yeah and then got lucky with the music side of
things with tubular bells and then turned that
into an absolute empire. Yeah. All because of
wanting to do good things and create value in
the world. Yeah. It's interesting because that's
passion. We're talking about passion for clients
and doing something change but then employing
morale, setting the core values, setting those
standards is also pretty similar. It's getting
people on a ride that they want to be on. Sometimes
you go, okay, well, maybe the best person isn't
the best person to be in the business. You might
be technically the best, you would get the best
results, but you might be, yeah, that's not quite
the fit for the other people in the business
or what you want the business to be. Apple at
the end of the 80s. We're going back to when
I was born now. They sacked Steve Jobs from his
own company and they brought someone else in.
The guy that Steve Jobs hired from Pepsi. And
that guy took over for a couple of years. Apple
plummeted. Meanwhile, Steve Jobs went off and
created Pixar and another computer company. I
can't remember the name of it. But Apple ended
up buying the technology off of Steve Jobs' new
company for their new computers. In a good way
to make some pocket change? After they sacked
him. Sacked from your own company because you
were trying to keep your company on the same
page that you started it. So the same culture,
the same idea. All stories I hear about Steve
Jobs as he is are right. But he knew what he
wanted. And he knew what Apple was supposed to
be. He's looking at it as his company. That's
what he wants. So he can set those rules. This
is what I want. There's some stage where you
lose control as he found out. People can kick
you out. But for small business owners, you're
not going to kick out your own business. So you
can choose what you want your values to be. I
know some businesses, they want their values
to be, we work hard and we don't care about each
other and we're just here to make money and we
clock in, we clock out, we don't waste any time
and that's their business culture and yeah, their
employees reflect that. Other businesses where
the core values, they want to do the right thing
by the world and they're trying to make a social
change and lots of the buzzwords and that sort
of stuff, the employees love it. There's I think
a friend, he talks about his business having
a scape. like a little half pipe in the office,
it's not usable. But they, I think - Good for
insurance. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure
they have a board up on the wall that shows how
much the business has donated to projects, like
charity projects in the year. So they don't see
how much the business bills out, they see how
much the business donates. So they can see when
they're working, they're making money, they're
not making money for the business. Well, they
are, but they're also making money for these
other things. So it's depending on how you want
to run your business, there's lots of things
you can do. Well, I guess I can speak from experience.
The employee, I am employee of Rowan and this
is a job that is... completely different from
what my friends are experiencing. They've got
the nine till five office job, Monday to Friday.
You sit in those cubicles and you go through
those papers. Once you're done, you leave. Also,
they're public servants. Yeah, some of them are.
But they look at me when I'm playing golf on
a Wednesday afternoon, for example, and say,
do you work? And I say, Yes. And it's like, well,
I can work from my phone. I can work from a cafe.
Those things you see in movies. That's me. And
I we touched on ways to avoid a burnout in our
last podcast episode. And one of them is to get
a hobby, that sort of thing that Wednesday afternoon,
although I'm there. Working to some degree it
is it is important for My health as I go through
the week. I work from home, so I don't get to
see people often Yeah, and so it's important
for me to get outside talk to people and I guarantee
you on Thursday morning my work is so much better
and It's just that that break that we need so
I get to play golf on Wednesday afternoons I
get to work from cafes or in a park I get to
enjoy the summer sun instead of sitting inside
and going Really wish I was outside I get to
travel to Davenport to work with the team. I
get to go visit my clients. It's a lot of freedom
and flexibility that is empowering I guess so
Those are just some examples of what I've experienced
that's different from the nine to five office
job Yeah, so I think it's probably worth discussing
what we do because you know, we're a good example
of some different Practices to the traditional
So business abundance or we all work remotely,
which means we work wherever we want But you
know, my idea is if Sahara wants to go go live
in Queensland for two months, she can go live
in Queensland for two months and the point is
that that should not affect anything a client
gets. That's the thing, if you're doing your
job, you're doing a good job and we've got it
set up to make sure that our clients are happy
and that's what we're trying to do. If we're
not doing our job, we want to know and we do
whatever we can do to fix it and fix it for the
future. But we should be able to, if Sahara wants
to go overseas, she can stay with our business.
There's no reason for us to leave. If she's happy,
she's happy doing what she's doing. She doesn't
have to be stuck in that spot, which for a lot
of businesses, the reason people leave is...
they want to go on an le or they want to live
somewhere else or you know it depends on the
type of the business you're running but so we're
a professional service business which we do accounting
with a business because I would do marketing
so traditionally oh especially for accountants
they're like oh you've got to have an office
it's gonna be face to face you're a profession
we've got to have a desk you've got to have a
suit and then you have a different title with
your name on the on your bench Because people
need to see you and you have to be in the office
and you've got to do a six minute time sheet
To make sure you're doing a good job, which aka
is so we can build to clients But in reality
none of those things correlate with a client
being happy or getting a good result You could
say well people doing time sheets means people
are accountable, but no it doesn't it just means
that they're building time to clients So does
that job take that long or should it take that
long? So if someone has the opportunity to go
knock off two hours early in a day, do a good
job, do it faster for someone, that's probably
better for the client. It's done sooner. It's
better for the worker because they get to do
something fun and it's a bit of reward and a
bit of motivation. But in the same respect, they're
not going to want to knock off two hours early
every day because they have nothing to do. So
you'll find that once, you know... people find
better ways of doing things, faster ways of doing
things, ways to get better results, ways to keep
clients happier outside of the normal because
they have this shared motivation, more gets done,
better things happen. And it's not just one employee
or if we can learn, okay, well, this person can
do this, this, this and this, what are they doing?
We can all learn from it. We're in an industry
where traditionally you need an office, you need
to be in every area and the last two months,
95 % of our new clients have been from outside
of where I live and that's always the intention.
We're not trying to serve as local people, we're
dealing with people throughout Australia and
that's what we do and very rarely do we have
someone say how we want to deal with someone
local because the local people aren't that good.
They can't get in to talk to them for two weeks.
People don't ring them back. They're too busy.
But every now and then there's a person that
says, I'd literally just like to deal with someone
I can see right in front of me. That's fine,
no worries. You're not our client, you know?
That's not who we're set up for. But the majority
of the time people are like, oh, so I can just
ring you in time? Yes. I can just email you and
we can do a screenshot straight away? Yep. Wow.
That's a level of service I cannot get from anyone.
And so sometimes these things have a pretty big
win -win. And that's where you want to look at
employee morale. I've been raised to think that
a nine to five job is exactly what I will get
for the rest of my 40 years of work. And so it's
yeah, it's not true. And there's other ways that
you can work and you can do a really good job
at it. And yeah, so I guess I'm very appreciative
and I would encourage other businesses to do
the same because It's There's ways that they
can get their employees to be highly motivated
with a really good work for work -life balance
On that Friday afternoon if they've done all
their jobs and it's four o 'clock Why why are
we sitting at a desk? Yeah, why Twitter thumbs
because our bosses busy so they walk past us
who've done a really good job today smashed or
we're stoked with our way We're like we nailed
it and your bosses walking past you gone I'm
still busy and you're not working. I'm so pissed
off because I just paid you 20 bucks. Yeah, and
then it's one hour of... That's the worst. ...time
for that employee to dwell on how much they hate
sitting at that desk for one hour. So, I mean,
there's so much opportunity. In other countries,
they're considering going to a four -day work
week. Yeah. Plenty do. Yeah. Well, Greece before
it shut down, you know, they only worked half
a day. Didn't work for them. A lot of the Mediterranean.
Countries will have that siesta time. Productivity,
Scandinavian countries, reduced work hours. Happiest
places in the world. I always joke about three
o 'clock nap time, but you know, if you're super
tired at three o 'clock and you're just like,
the last two hours of the day, just have a 20
-minute nap, you probably worked awesome for
the last hour, you know. Recharge. Like the flexibility
in job positions. For example, if they're stuck
in the office every single day, then why not
give them the opportunity to leave the office
and get outside, do something. It's, I'm curious
to see. I imagine that would work because then
that's just that little bit of flexibility that
that person might really look forward to. Yeah.
You're multi -skilling them as well. Yeah, exactly.
So the opportunity to grow. As soon as you stop
crying, you stagnate and as soon as you stagnate,
your morale goes down. Yeah, I think it's important
to remember that people are people and they want
to do something better in their lives and Zee
and I were talking about this earlier this morning
that maybe not everyone wants that to be work.
it might be they just want, you know, have a
million grandchildren. So they're at work. They're
not at work to work and they're not at work to
take over the world. They're at work so they
can get a bit of money and then they feed and
then they go play with the grandkids, you know.
But the people that want to work and want to,
you know, kick some goals, want to change the
world, want more freedom, more time, you know,
all these reasons why people go into business,
if they're working for you, well... You wanna
make sure they're as good as they can be, and
people are like, oh, but if they leave, and it's
like, well, if they leave, like, good on them,
like, you've done a good job as an employee,
you've taught them everything they need to know,
and they're onto something else. But most of
the time, people are gonna leave, because they're
like, oh, yeah, well, there's no more opportunities
for me here, I'm doing all this cool stuff, and...
It doesn't mean anything for me. If I'm gone,
I've lost it. There's no future proofing. There's
no security filming. I literally leave and my
wage stops. And that's something that I'm big
on too. If you want to be here and you want to
be doing things and you want to get better, then
you'll be a part of the business. There's a progression.
It's not just like you get to a certain point
and there's no one above you. Well, no worries.
Well, what do you need to do? What do you want
to do? you do it with us that's fine go nuts
and yeah you can get a piece of it so there's
always that opportunity for people to do more
so when you've got a good employee and they're
motivated it's about getting out of their way
or allowing them to be part of it so you're not
going yeah you're so good i really appreciate
what you do this year you do this and this you're
just fantastic and we're paying you good money
and rah rah rah and they're like oh can i be
the business no it's mine you work for me you're
mine You know that's essentially what people
are saying. So I know Ian talked before about
there's plenty to go around and you know we call
business business abundance because I believe
you know there's always opportunity there's always
stuff out there there's always things you can
do like look with COVID people thought the world
was going to end and yeah it's completely different
but there's a few fundamentals like the world's
not going to completely collapse there's going
to be issues you know it's things like food and
water that that we've really got to worry about
and make sure, but business -wise. Toilet paper.
Yeah, toilet paper in Australia. Don't run out
of toilet paper. But business -wise in Australia,
the government doesn't want the economy to collapse
because the economy really is just money flowing
around. The money didn't disappear. COVID came
along and people suddenly had no money. The flow
stops. big incinerators burning money, and when
we say, oh, I burned a bit of money this month,
it's like, someone else got your money. It didn't
disappear, it's gone somewhere else. So, you
know, business is not going to collapse. Things
keep going, so it's important to sort of understand
there's lots of opportunities. You can, if you
have people on board that want to get better
and do things and make it bigger and better,
well, if you stop limiting them by trying to
protect everything you've got, you'll probably
end up with something bigger and better and safer
with more people. you know, a small piece of
a bigger pie just by having the mindset of, you
know, there's plenty out there for everyone.
For our business owners that are listening, I'd
love to be able to throw out some ideas that
they could take home or be like, oh, I think
I can really implement that. There's an article
I read about millennials coming into the workforce.
So what's a millennial? They're like my age.
What's the date range on that? It's like $2 ,000.
I think it's 99. 99, yeah. I could be totally
wrong about that. Who's damn millennials? But
essentially... They're coming into the workforce
for work wanting work -life balance. They don't
want the don't work Basically they want work
-life balance so they don't want to be stuck
at work all day every day They're not living
to work. They're working to live. Correct. So
how considering they're gonna be the next lot
of employees how can Small business owners implement
change so that people want to work for them.
I remember a client and they had a really, really
good reception slash admin girl. Originally when
they recruited, I was sitting in on the interviews
and I was like, we haven't hired one of these,
can you help us out? They had 30 employees, so
they had a pretty good business, but just...
someone to sit in the office hadn't done for
a while and said, can you help us out? And we
said, well, we just need someone we can train.
They don't need to be skilled experience. It's
just process -orientated. We need someone with
great attitude. And they're like, yeah, that's
exactly what we want. So they got three people
in the interview, two that we sort of selected
together and they sounded right based on what
they submitted and one that their friend, the
recruitment agent said, oh, this should be fantastic.
sent her along so we we interviewed the three
and we're asking questions so I was asking questions
like ah so you know tell me when you've had a
problem like it could be a work it could be home
it could be it probably your parents or school
or whatever it doesn't matter where it is it
was a really big problem you didn't know what
to do you thought you couldn't deal with it but
you did like what was it what happened tell me
about it and one girl's gone oh well the other
way and she went into this story about something
that happened in the house So what it told me
was that, oh yeah, she can identify problems.
She went, okay, I'll try to fix it. She went
about, it didn't matter what she did or how,
whether it made sense, but just the process of
she was trying to fix it, she did. She's excited,
she was happy, she got there, cool. Okay, she
can think. And then the third one that their
friend had sent along, she's like, oh, I don't
really have problems. That's a dream. Yeah. Oh,
once I did something and it went really bad,
and yeah, that wasn't good, and you can tell
really quickly that that person's not going to
work out, but... This is completely off -topic,
but it's interesting, so I'm going to keep going
to me anyway. These two business owners at the
end with the three interviews, I said, which
one do you like? She goes, oh, that one that
our friend sent, she was really lovely. You joking,
right? That was the no problem person. Yeah,
she couldn't answer any questions. She didn't
actually know what the business does. She said,
do you know what the business does? She had not
even looked at the website. We're talking about
a building company, so it's pretty straightforward.
You build stuff. She didn't know. That was in
the interview like they were there sitting there
and they thought she was pretty lovely I think
she'd be okay. She's had past experience and
her friend recommends her. I said this other
girl She's like she knew about coming. She'd
looked it up. She'd been proactive She'd tell
all these things I asked her some hard questions,
you know, do do do do do she had some go She
had some wit, you know, she was fun. She had
energy and a lot. I actually she was awesome
What she was great? She was the best we should
get her Had you not come to that conclusion?
big business Anyway, this this girl that she
got the job and she did really well for two or
three years like dominated so she would be she
was replaced with a with another person and she
Basically the role became operations manager
for the business, but that's that person that
young girl was doing that role But she left because
she asked if she could go away for four months
to Europe bit of an OE She goes, oh, I don't
have that much leave because what employee has
that much leave? And they're like, oh, well,
we're going to need to get someone else. It's
going to be really annoying. And if you go for
four months, you don't have a job. And their
mindset was, we don't want her to go for four
months. We want her to come back because it's
going to be a big hassle for us. My advice was
just give her unpaid leave. She's not asking
you to pay her. Give her unpaid leave and get
a temp in or do a bit more work for a while.
It's not like it's going to kill you guys. And
you've got this person, when she comes back,
that's not gonna go for another four months that
way. And they're like, nah, we need someone else
to recruit and the next person, same sort of
thing, but she's still there. But that girl doesn't
work there anymore. And I think being flexible
and looking at people, well, millennials, they
are working to live, but... Work's a big part
of your life. So making it a good environment
or making it an environment they'd like to be
at to make money because they have to make money.
So they may as well do it in a place they like
to be. But if they want to go away, well, can
they do work when they're away? Because then
they've got money and they're on holiday and
they're still working. Or, you know, like Google
for that longer maternity leave. Well, you've
got that longer time, but then you're still in
touch with us. You've still got a job to come
back to. give them that, yeah, you can go do
those things and we're still here, if you're
a good employee. Obviously if someone's terrible
at their job and takes advantage of it and stuff,
you probably should be sacking them or managing
them or something before that point. Does that
make sense? Yeah, absolutely. Can I put you two
on the spot a little bit? Unscripted? Okay. I've
seen business abundance from startup to where
you are today and sort of how the insiders look
without being inside. The interview process for
Zee at the time, what drew you to apply and then
what was the process like? This was peak COVID
too. This was peak COVID. The world's ending.
What made Zee an attractive prospect to work
for Business Abundance just to try and embarrass
both of you at the same time? Fantastic, love
that. When I first applied I was just finishing
my degree so I was still at university full -time
for another six months after I was hopefully
starting with Rowan and the incentive of being
able to work from home because I'm high there
was a lot of things that I needed to be at home
for essentially so working from home was attractive
but the way that Rowan had worded The interview
or their job Provided it wasn't here's what you're
gonna do. It's gone. Here's the opportunities
that you're gonna have I want to work with you.
I want to see you grow. I want you to be part
of the business it wasn't you're going to, here's
a list of 10 tasks that you're going to do and
you're going to do that for the rest of your
life. It's, we're going to grow, you're going
to grow with us too. Commit to me now. I mean,
yes, working from home was cool and that was
important to me because I needed that at the
time. But someone who genuinely values you and
your brain and your experience and your ideas,
your opinions, I think that's more valuable than
anything else that you can get. I said it before,
it's empowering to know that you're going to
be taken seriously. So that when I applied was
highly attractive and it was not in any other
interview or job application process. I mean,
you knew what you were going to expect from literally
every other job they're going to go. you're going
to become this person. In about four or five
years, we're going to up you a little bit. And
then probably 10, if you're still with us, we
want you to become the manager. And it's like,
that's 15 years of my life doing the same task
over and over and over again. And in the interview
process, Roman said, what do you really want
to do? And I said, I love business. And he said,
yeah, I'm a business consultant. I said, that's
awesome. That's fascinating. And so from the
very start, although I was working in marketing,
he said, here's your growth opportunities. So
that for me was really important. Love that.
And that's a lot of what I've seen with the way
Rowan runs his business and his businesses in
the past is about empowerment and then having
an engaged client and an engaged workforce. It's
everything that we've talked about today, really,
isn't it? This is how you do it. Here's a template.
Here's a millennial. So the guys my age and above
who run businesses look at millennials and go,
ah, you can't employ them. And they say things
like, oh, you can't find good people and these
kids are rubbish and yada yada. And without blowing
smoke up your butt, like you're an above average
millennial with a good work ethic, but you've
found your niche as well. And you've found an
employer who I would imagine values your... contributions
and saw something at the interview process row?
Yeah, so there's a fair bit involved in my process.
I'm not sure if he's serious or not. At a three
page questionnaire. Yeah, there is a bit of stuff.
So I'm looking for people that can think that
they're intelligent. People are intelligent in
different ways, but for the particular role,
we need certain types of... this is how my brain
ticks on people with energy and are going to
do things because working from home or people
go, oh gee, working from home, I'm always wouldn't
do anything. Well, you've got to be okay with
that. Sometimes I won't do anything, but if that's
affecting clients and that's affecting the business,
it's going to be noticed pretty quick and it's
not going to be a long -term thing for anyone.
But if you've got a person that's like that,
you... You've got to find out and deal with it,
but you're not looking for people like that to
avoid them. You're looking for people that aren't
going to have that problem. And you're looking
for people that are motivated. So when they're
at home, you don't have to keep checking on them
because you're just going to drive yourselves
crazy. So you're going to go, okay, well, sometimes
I'm going to have a bad day and not do anything,
but that's okay. Of course, they're going to
sort it out and come back. When I started working
from home, there was challenges as well. Sometimes
you just don't feel like doing anything and it
was like you sit at the desk going, oh. desk
or I've got to keep working because it's still
work time. And then I quickly realized that turned
into, well, we just haven't done any work today
because we're just trying to struggle through
it. And then I figured out that if I just go
do something else, within 20 minutes I'm usually
like, right, work. You know, and then I smash
it, these are cool stuff, you know. So yeah,
my process was identifying, well, what does this
person need to be like? And I said before, I'm
a big believer in attitude, you've got to be.
a bit clever and you've got to have a good attitude
because we don't want people bringing us down,
which we talked about with Burnout. So then,
yeah, I was describing what the job is and the
opportunities there because... It's literally,
you want people, if you want good people, you've
got to say, well, why should you work for us?
If you don't want to be going, hey, come for
work for me, I'll give you the most money. Because
as soon as someone, let's say, one of our clients
goes, gee, that person's awesome. Here's a ton
of money. They'll go work for them. And if that's
what they want to do, that's fine. But we've
got to provide a better workplace. We've got
to provide a better opportunity. We've got to
provide a place where they're happy for it to
be part of their life. And that's what the thing
is. So yeah, well, what's the job and why is
it good for this person to come and apply for
the job? Why should they put their effort in?
Why should they work for us? Well, it's not just
we'll pay you and you can work here. Like employees
goes, yeah, I'll give someone a job like they
should worship me. Well, no, like they can go
work somewhere else. So yeah, just defining,
well, this is opportunity. This is what we want
to do. We want a person like this. If you think
like this way, this way, this way, we're gonna
treat you like this. And sometimes we do, sometimes
we don't, but that's what we're trying to do.
And then there's a questionnaire asking, you
know, like that question I mentioned before.
There's a question that says, can you write?
Give me an example which she said yes, I can
write and then didn't give an example I Googled
her and she brief she'd done a big blog post
for you know an organization she's part of and
I was like she can write And a lot of people
wrote some interesting things and and there's
a lot of questions It's just giving me an idea
of how they think what do they want to do? Like
what's going on? I thought this girl's alright.
She's a bit intelligent like sounds alright looks
motivated and pretty much got the gist that Yeah,
she wanted to work, she wanted to work hard,
like, cool, okay. So, I think I read it and then
I rang her. Literally, so quickly. Yeah, just
like on red ring, and just someone asked a couple
of questions. Just to clarify, what am I reading?
Is it a reflection of what this person actually
is? And then she's answered a couple of questions,
like, I'm going to cheat. Nah, it's fine. So
you've got an insight on how the person thinks,
which is far better than getting a one -page
resume, a two -page resume. Oh yeah, they've
got experience, they've done it for 10 years,
rah, rah, rah, rah, rah. And in reality, you
have no idea whether it was good or bad. You
have no idea how the person is. So yeah, that's
our process. And then in the interview, like
I'm pretty much already decided by the time I'm
doing the interview of like, yeah, if you want
to work for me, like if you're interviewing people
and you don't think they can work for you, you're
probably wasting a lot of time. So there was
100 applicants for that job. And there were two
people that I went, oh, that'd be right. And
yeah, so then talking, yeah, what do you want
to do? I want to be successful, I want to do
this, I want to do that, blah, blah, blah, boom,
boom, boom. Yep, cool, no worries. And then it
was literally, well, it's not, we're not trying
to sell the business, we're seeing for a good
fit. They'll say, okay, well, this is it. And
for the service that she was going to work in
is marketing done for you. So basically a marketing
person inside a small business, they can't afford
to. marketing person full -time but the admin
person does it or the owner does it so neither
has the time or the skills or the priorities
to do it so we thought okay we can teach someone
how to market we get the right plan in place
because we have that knowledge in our business
and then they are the contact they make it happen
it's a good place for people to learn how business
works as well like marketing is a big part of
business but you're also having conversations
with business owners I know Zahara did a marketing
course with someone recently, and she's like,
oh, we came up with this, and we thought, what
if we can get people back more often? How could
that be, by doing this, this, and this marketing?
I said, that's business. Sorry, that's not marketing.
It's probably marketing, but you've basically
just shown them how to get 40 % more turnover.
That's huge. And the person's like, oh, wow.
So it's a good place to learn these sort of things.
So yeah, it's just about asking the right questions,
and not just necessarily relying on past results,
and just looking for people with the right attitude.
It depends what your job is. If you've got someone
you want behind a desk churning out work, those
questions need to be about churning out work.
Because there's people that love it. They just
go, I just want to come to work. I don't want
to talk to anyone. I just want to turn my computer
on, turn my clock on, and go bomp, bomp, bomp.
Do the same thing all day, every day. Turn it
off at lunchtime. Come back after lunch. Turn
it back on. They love that. They love the security.
They love that they know they're going to have
work tomorrow. They love that it's always going
to be the same. But that's your questions. You've
just got to make sure you're looking for the
right people. But everyone that works with us,
I'm saying, there's opportunity for you. If you
want to make it happen, there's opportunity.
If you don't want to make it happen, well, you
probably won't be working for us. That's how
it is, depending on what the role is in the business.
But for most people, most roles in our business,
we want them talking to people. It's about relationships.
It's about people talking and... creating better
results. So if you're not motivated to do that
or learn or read books or do something interesting
or step outside of your comfort zone, us as a
business is not going to get better. So for someone
who's motivated by getting out of their way,
allowing them to do their job, allowing them
to set their own schedule, that's great for morale,
going back to employee morale, you know, just
getting the right people, letting them do what
they want to do and giving them a pathway. The
way I see it, like, Google has how many applications
per year? Two million. Two million applications
per year. You put one job advert out on the northwest
coast of Tasmania for a pretty niche role. And
you get 100 applications. And people work from
anywhere, so there were people from around Australia
who applied for that. You get 100 applications
for a job for a relatively small business. in
the northwest coast of Tasmania. I didn't mince
words either because our business sort of transitioned
from something else and it's grown extremely
quickly. But this was a new service. No one else
does it. No one else does it in the way that
we were going to do it. And it was going to be,
this is a role, don't know if it's going to work
or not, but you're going to have a big say on
whether it does or not. For some people, if I
interviewed the wrong person with the wrong attitude,
they'd be like, I can't take this job because
I might not have a job. You did actually make
that very clear. But in the same respect, that's
important to communicate because some people
wouldn't be like, oh, this person might scare
them off. But you want them to know because you
want to know that even if it's scary, they're
still going to have a crack. So that worked well.
But yeah, so I think that's another thing. People
go, you can't find good people. They're not out
there. Well, they are always out there. They're
just working for someone else or they're not
seeing your posts. People go, oh, I advertise
on Facebook all the time. I put it up there.
Well, Facebook's just one channel. Seek .com
.au, not sponsored. Is the number one place people
go to look. And they're like, oh, I don't want
to pay 300 bucks. Put an ad up on there. It's
like, you're an idiot. What's it worth to you
for $300? Oh, but last time I did, I can get
a degree in ambulance. I got no accolades. If
you've got no influence, leave it there. If the
job's still there, keep paying every month until
you get one. Because if you get a good person,
it's going to be more than worth that. But yeah,
we've got on Facebook, but we've got to share
it and we don't really get anyone. Well, because
the people on your page are sharing it, so you've
got a limited thing. But do you pay for more
ads? What are you doing to search for people?
Let's say Google, do they have to search for
people? No, people go to their website, go, I
want to work at Google, because of the word of
mouth. So what are you doing to do that? you
know, we got approached by a local college to
the Careers Expo to talk about what we do. And
it was probably more so than I was thinking,
we'll get some good people out of it. It was
more, we'll probably give back a little bit to
the community and just say, hey, people. Just
so you know, when you're going through school
and you're learning that you've got to work nine
to five and do the same job for the rest of your
life, be a good citizen, you don't have to do
that. You can do all this other stuff too. You
actually do whatever you want. As long as people
are happy to pay you for it. I was like, oh,
that's fine. Happy to do that. But then there's
word of mouth from that. We've got someone that
then approached us. Oh, can we do some work for
you? It's free. We've got funding from here,
so they'll pay Dean, but we'd like to learn about
it. And then various times people sort of sent
through, oh, we heard about this. So what places
do people hear about your organization? What
programs have you got? Is your business doing
anything for the community? Your reputation of
your business will attract good people. I see,
Google's a great example. Google didn't start
out as Google. Obviously they had the name Google,
but they didn't have the reputation. They didn't
have worldwide reach that they've got today.
I mean, they're 30 to 40 year old business. And
business abundance is in that early stages of
setting their culture, getting the right people
in the right place. I mean, it's ridiculous for
me to see you guys get a hundred applications
to a job. It's only a hundred. You're looking
at that as only get 100 and then Joe Bloggs around
the corner here who's been running a marketing
agency for 20 years is looking at that going,
I wish I could get 100. Good people at point.
In that we had people that have a social audience
themselves of over 200 ,000 people. So when you
put the right thing right, you'll get good people
but what's in it for them? That's a big thing.
WIIFM. WIIFM. What's in it for me? Yeah, so employment
are up. Yeah. Before we wrap up, I just want
to talk on one more thing and that's employee
-led. I've got another things too. Let's talk
about that. Let's talk. So we've covered topics
like work -life balance, investing in your employees,
changing your business or creating a really nice
business culture for... Your employees can I
just interrupt for a second investing in your
employees? It's just a nice little thing people
can take away Maybe you should train your employees
like pay send them on courses if they say I want
to learn this like show them how to learn it
Like there's nothing more frustrating than people
not knowing to do things So that's a really easy
one pretty much every business can implement.
Yep. Yep So like employee led initiatives is
another great example of how you can improve
your employee morale Do you want to speak to
that? Yeah. Do you want to explain to me what
you mean? It's a pretty fancy term. So employee
led initiative. An employee comes to you and
has an idea and says, this is cool. I think this
would be really good for your business. Can I
take this to where I think it could go? Yeah.
I've had experience with this with you. Yeah.
Okay. The podcast. Yeah. And from my experience,
it's really fantastic. And I really appreciated
having that happen. What does that mean for other
small businesses? Yeah, so it's much easier when
you've got multiple people helping, I think.
So if you think as a business owner, you're letting
other good ideas, you're kidding yourself. Yeah,
there might be some terrible ideas coming out
of your business too, but if no one's ever coming
to you with ideas, yeah. You're not going to
get any out. But yeah, the podcast is a good
example. We're talking about what can we do to
communicate with more people and get our name
out there more. We'll do a podcast and then put
this out because we've got interesting ideas
and we're talking about things people don't talk
about. When we talk to a client, they're like,
what is this? I forget, not many people talk
about the things I talk about. It's just like,
yeah, we just need to get out more. And I was
like, oh yeah, but then we've got to market ourselves
and we've got to market our podcasts. And then
in a podcast, we've got to sell ourselves. And
I'm like, oh, that's actually making more work.
And like, just being honest. And I said this
is hard when she told me, oh, but then we've
got this. And she's thinking about the name.
The name had to be a certain name. The people,
if they saw the podcast, they want to click on
it. I was like, well, does it? Or should we use
it for a different purpose? I know more about
the direction of where I want to go than what
she does. And I try to educate everyone as much
as possible on what I want to do and what we're
going to do. So, but you know, on me, so it's
in my head. So that's, you know, I know. And
it's like, well, we've got clients throughout
Australia using a variety of services. Like,
for example, someone might just ring up and want
some support with Xero. I don't know how to do
this. My accountant won't talk to me or they're
like, oh, it's not enough work. So go away or
they let me. talk to the receptionist who hasn't
used Xero before and charge me 200 bucks per
hour for eight hours of listening to that person
say I don't know how to use this. So they literally
use us for an hour to get some Xero support through
to they spend multiple tens of thousands with
us per year to do a variety of things and yes
we're making more money than that and helping
them but there's quite a big range. Like can
we use this podcast to communicate with them
every month and give them some value that's literally
for free Maybe it'll be useless when they listen
to it. Maybe they'll get something out of it.
But we get to talk to everyone because I can't
ring everyone every month. Like it's just impossible.
Plus it's not productive for our business. But
if we talk to everyone, that's definitely good
for us. It's definitely good for them. And if
we're giving out some free value and people get
some takeaways and makes their life better, makes
their business better, then that's a no brainer.
I was like, well, I think the podcast, so if
we literally just sending it to our clients and
the only people listening to it. I'm happy with
that. Like that's ideal. That's exactly what
we need because it's about happy clients and
good results for our clients. So then the name
was a bit easy because it's the Business Among
Us podcast. Like people know what it is because
it's coming from us to our clients. And then
if that expands and gets bigger because of that,
that's great. That's no problem. That's an added
benefit. But particularly it was to make sure
we had happy clients. So that's a staff -led
initiative. hey here's an idea and this was the
purpose and I've gone well yeah it's a great
idea but actually we'll use it for this purpose
so you don't have to say oh that's great idea
or that's terrible idea and you can also work
with them and let's brainstorm it and there's
there's ideas that people have come to me with
and said hey this is a good idea and I've said
or thought Oh, that's a terrible idea, but I've
gone, yeah, go nuts, put that together and see
how it goes. Because at least they're trying,
at least they're learning. They'll learn, and
I'll help them where I can too, but they'll learn
what works, what doesn't work, what they could
do better for future, and then there'll be better
ideas later on. Almost like they'll get some
life experience. Funny that. Buzzword. Yeah,
so in other businesses, it's the same sort of
thing. You know, people have incentives, there's
organisations where if a staff member comes up
with something, it gets implemented, they get
part of the profit improvement. You know, so
hey, if I can implement something in your business,
it's going to make us another $100 ,000 a year.
What do you reckon? Most business owners will
be like, oh, thanks for telling me and bank the
money. The employee gets nothing, maybe another
couple of bucks an hour. Like, who cares? Some
businesses... This was 15 years ago. We're saying,
yeah, we'll go 50 -50 in the first year. Whatever
we decide that impacted by, you'll get half of
it. Would you reckon they would come up with
some good ideas? Definitely, you know. And then
you've got employers that are part of the business
too. They don't own the business, but they know
if they do something to make the business better,
they get pretty well rewarded. How many places
have you worked at where part of the employment
contract is any ideas you come up with are 100
% the property? of the business, you get nothing
for it. Yeah, well that's true, but it is either
paying you for your time, so you're there, you're
working, your ideas are the property, but they
don't have to give you their ideas, do they?
So yeah, but if you've got happy employees, they're
gonna come up with things, they're gonna be motivated
to get good results, and I think it's about focusing
on the right things, going back to core values.
If I think everyone in our business understands,
I don't really care what you do as long as we've
got a happy client getting a good result. Now,
I don't want happy clients that aren't getting
a good result because that's sort of fraudulent
and sometimes things don't work out That's fine,
but you've got to be trying to work to fix it
You've got to be trying to get to that point
where they're going. Oh my gosh. That's not only
am I super happy with you like this results amazing
Someone rang me yesterday and just gave me a
20 -minute debrief on how awesome I was last
year and and give me that what's happened since
and you know, that was nice I was like but in
reality you got you did the work, but that's
what we want. We want them to be happy and get
good results. That's what we're in business for.
So you've got to do whatever you can, and all
of your team needs to be doing whatever they
can to make that happen. So you've got to have
an environment where people not only are happy
to come to you to give ideas, but you don't just
go, that's a dumb idea, because they're not going
to come to you with the next one. You've got
to be able to, if it's a dumb idea, say, oh yeah,
can you tell me more about that and get it explained?
Say, well, what about this and what about this,
you know? and they might eventually go, no, I
still think it's a good idea, we'll let them
run with it, you know, no worries, prove me wrong.
Every now and then they will. Yeah, or just go,
that's, to be honest, we're going in this direction
with, I think that's going in that one, so let's
just leave that to the side. Have a good enough
relationship with your staff to be able to say
that too. Like, if you've got a good friend,
you can tell them to shut up, you've been stupid.
If you haven't got a good relationship, you can't,
you know? Yeah. So we've talked about everything
from work -life balance to the recruitment process,
investing in your employees, employer -led initiatives.
And I've remembered now. Oh, welcome back. Yes,
we talk about Google and we talk about having
slides and food and I think it's something that
doesn't get discussed is there was, for every
Google, there were like a million tech companies.
Burst in the bubble, you know, it was a being
the great Being yeah Ask Jeeves Alta Vista. Oh,
yeah, lots of different things, but they were
tech company for everything It's like now you've
got you got a billion different crypto currencies
like in reality Are they worth anything? Like
yes, you can make money on them at the moment.
You can also lose a lot of money But they're
not a physical thing. You've got 20 ,000 different
currencies that essentially you're just transferring
something for something else and they won't exist
later on. And we had a tech company boom where
everyone's going, well, this internet, like,
you can make a business and then you can sell
it on the share market for millions and they
didn't actually have any revenue or there was
nothing there. So there's this huge inflation
of prices for these companies and then investors
going nuts for it. And then one day everyone
went, actually, none of this actually makes money.
and then it all dispersed and everyone, all the
investors lost their money. And so that's not
saying that's anything to do with Google's workplace
culture, but tech companies, especially Silicon
Valley, they were, we have a slide, we have a
beanbag, we have ping pong. Actually, you can
play ping pong all day. Come work for us. Their
business sucked. And they, Google knows what
their employees are doing, the output and the
results. You can't just say, let's make everyone's
life fantastic and let everyone go nuts and not
have some control in place to ensure the business
is doing what the business does. So if your business
is selling cars, you need to have happy employees
and sell cars. Well, you're selling cars. You
need to know what's going on. You need to have
rules. Chicken and egg kind of thing isn't it?
Yeah, you need to have rules in place saying
well you can have fun as long as we are selling
cars Yeah, so you go nuts you have the craziest
fun you've ever had in your life if we're selling
cars and I had a boss when I was much hungrier
I was in sales a JB Hi -Fi actually and he didn't
care what I did all day at all If my area was
clean and I was selling and I was selling more
than anyone else in the company and my area was
fantastic But did I have 20 breaks per day? Yes,
I did. Did I sell three times more than anyone
else on the shore? Yes, I did. So was he going,
come on Rowan, you need to get back in here because
you could sell six times more than everyone else
if you were in here all day. And I was like,
well, in reality, no, I'm going for breaks because
no one's in the shop. And if I see a customer
coming, I'm getting back in the shop. I'm the
first one back there. And I'm not standing around
doing nothing, waiting for a customer to come
in. I'm cleaning my area. I'm there somewhere
doing something because I know a customer is
going to come to me if I'm doing something. but
not if I'm standing there looking weird. You
know, so he knew I got all this stuff, and he
let me do what I want, which is definitely unheard
of in retail, but I was doing 100 % of everything
I needed to do to work in that business, and
I wasn't annoying other people there. I'd help
other people, so I wasn't going and taking a
break when my mate in my section was busy trying
to do something. I was helping them do it and
it was just, instead of standing there with my
fingers in the air going doo -doo -doo -doo -doo
-doo, I was going to do something else. So the
point is that we can talk about a Google or a
version or whatever, X, Y, Z. You still need
to have a business model. People still need to
know what's expected of them and they need to
be doing their job. You can't just have all fun.
That's good. We're gonna wrap up here. So I just
want to let you know that our next episode will
be on the concept of change and discussing the
quote, if you stand still on the train track,
the train will eventually hit you. So what's
it mean to be that business that doesn't change?
And it's a very relevant topic at the moment.
So I look forward to chatting to you guys about
that. If you have any questions about what we've
talked about today, make sure to visit our website
and book a catch up. You can visit our website
at www .businessabundance .online. We'll see
you next time. Thanks everyone. So long.