Delegate The Outcome: The System For Building Autonomous Teams | Jess Whatman

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Great leaders delegate the outcome, but don't stop it there. Why? Why are you posting? What are you posting? Have the outcome in mind, and that will help you communicate. >> What are the pieces of delegation I might need to check to make sure I'm doing it correctly. >> I could talk about this all day. >> You built an offshore talent agency and you hit 400% growth in your second year. You really do need to look at your hourly rate and go, what is the $100 an hour task? What are the $10 an hour

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tasks? Because you as the founder need to be doing the things that are growing your business. >> Is that the founders's [music] issue or is it then on the on the team or is it a combination of the two? >> You need someone on your team that is going to [music] be the office champion of AI. It's not one replacing the other. Speed is a huge part of it. I don't want to be the problem. And if you want to use AI to get 80% there, my team members using the other 20% don't care. Like I

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really don't. And I think that's maybe where some leaders go wrong. >> Let's say you have 90 days. How would you roll out a map and encourage the founder to then go on that journey? Where should they focus? How much energy [music] and how aggressive should they be about their approach? >> Ooh. Okay. So, >> this episode is brought to you by Wix Studio. Jess Watman, welcome to the Agency podcast. >> Thank you for having me. >> You have become the founder and CEO of

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Agent Sync, and you've built an offshore talent agency, uh, which in its second year hit 400% growth, which then meant you showed up on the AFR fast starters list, which is super impressive for, uh, a reasonably new company in the market. >> Yeah, thank you. >> Yeah. So I thought it would be really fun today to talk to our audience about the power of delegation. When we think about AI, we think about delegation, building teams, selling products and services. There's a lot of communication

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between founders, team members, team members, clients, and so forth. When you think about delegation as a concept or how we should start to think about this as founders, what are we getting wrong about our relationship with delegation? >> What a great question. I look this is something that I definitely had to learn. I didn't start my business going I'm going to start this agency because I'm so amazing at delegating >> as a founder and CEO that it's something that you learn along the way. But if I

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can give any piece of advice, you need to have a really clear system for delegation and explain what the outcome is that you're looking to achieve. Because people, whether it's actually someone onshore, offshore, AI, if you're delegating one or two sentences or just a really quick overview of the task that you want completed, there's so much context that needs to go into that to get the outcome that you want. So you've got to let everyone know what what are you actually trying to

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achieve. Yeah. You just have to have a really clear outcome in mind because I think with AI offshore team onshore team and especially the larger that you grow your company um delegating is a skill that has to be learned. So start having a system and process in place for that and communicate that outcome to everyone. [clears throat] >> You make an interesting point is that delegation is a skill. Mhm. >> Even in my mind, I'm like, is it a skill? Cuz I think perhaps many of us are treating delegation like this

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outwardly or outward thing or result or or an event that occurs. >> In my mind, it kind of seems or feels like an event, but you're saying it's a skill. >> What What are the parts of the skill that we need to learn to be to become better delegators? >> Definitely communication. And I think as a founder, the busier that you get, you you have a hundred things in your mind, you have 100 things on your plate. And building that team around you that can work with you every day, obviously that

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helped me build that skill. But it's really easy with AI at the moment to communicate what you want and you can work back and forth with that. So if you've got a team and you're using AI, I think just start with that outcome, guys. this is what we want to achieve this week. We want to do a post every day on LinkedIn. But don't stop it there because whoever you're giving that task to is going to go, "Oh, okay. You know, five posts a week. I'm just going to work with AI and get that done." But

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why? Why are you posting? What are you posting? Is it for leads? Is is it for connections? Is it to build your personal brand? Like have the outcome in mind and that will help you communicate, you know, what you want to achieve and then the tasks come from that outcome. And if you think about AI as a skill, like how exactly is it a skill if it's part communication, let's just look at it as an item on the shelf that I wish I could download. You know that scene in the Matrix where um Neo learns how to do

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kung fu >> by like plugging his brain into the tape. If if I was to learn not kung fu, but if I was to learn delegation, like what are the maneuvers? What are the what are the pieces of delegation? The boxes I might need to check to make sure I'm doing it correctly? >> Again, communication. You really have to and and I tell my team if I delegate something to them, I've told all of them they're allowed to push back, push back, push back. Like what are we trying to achieve with this particular task? So

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even I get my phone out and I speak to AI and I make it talk back to me so I can clearly communicate what I want because like I said, as founders, we have so much going on. It's so easy to go, can you just send that email? What what do you want in the email? Like is it a yes? Is it a no? you know, what sort of context you want in that. So, definitely communication and make sure you're letting your team know to push back on you. I I think that is I I know that's not like a skill skill, but in

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terms of delegation, it helps everyone in the business communicate more effectively. They know the outcomes that you want. Yeah. Push back on them and and learn Yeah. learn that skill. So, let's assume someone listening to this right now is listening and saying, "Yeah, I do that." But the team still don't do the outcome. >> So, uh, and even I've experienced this where you speak until you're blew in the face. >> You jot it down, you put it in an email, you text it, you email it, you may as

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well like write it on a letter and like stick it to their desk and you outline the minute detail of what needs to take place and then the outcome still doesn't reciprocate itself. >> In that event, is is that the founders's issue or is it then on the on the team or is it a combination of the two? I think if you've got your SOPs, you've got your systems in place, you've documented everything, I would have to say that's a a skill issue with the team member. Yeah. And and maybe a fit issue.

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Maybe they're not the right fit for your business. >> So, if someone's listening to this right now and they're putting SOPs together, they're articulating themselves eloquently and they're they're doing all the TE's and the eyes and it's still not happening, you're saying that's the team's fault. >> Yeah, I would definitely. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> And then perhaps then that's also the founders's fault for then having chosen that team member.

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>> Absolutely. [laughter] It always comes back to the founder. >> Always comes back to the founder. You can't get out of it. Yeah. If you're listening to this right now, everything's your fault. Always. All the time. Okay. So then let's maybe break this down a little further. So in my mind I think about the power of delegation is say let's say in my mind I have all this code and material like floating around in my head >> and then I have to decode that and put

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that into words and then I send the words through the air. You listen to those words but then you have to decode it. Mhm. >> So then how do I make sure I'm decoding myself better >> and then making sure that I'm adapting the message to be uncoded by the individual in front of me better? How much of my uh communication effort is being conscious of the person who's trying to take on the task? >> I think it's everything. I think the way that you communicate and the way that

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you can articulate what you want to achieve is everything because you could delegate something to one person and delegate it to another person the exact same way but if you're communicating more effectively with that second person that if you've got your SOPs you've got your systems in place you you've got your AI set up that person will understand what you're trying to achieve better than the one that you You know, you've just given one sentence to >> May I complicate the issue even more?

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>> Do it. Let's do it. >> Jess, I've brought with me some props. Now, on one side, it says AI and on the other side it has a H for human. We're going to play a game about delegation and a sequence of events of which would be the best case scenario. Let's imagine you're the telegrapher. I'm the receiver or representative of an audience or an individual >> of what series events you you would go through to delegate a task. Okay. So, I'll leave these blank

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>> to begin with. Okay? >> And then I'll read out the first scenario. >> And if you need more than three, just let me know. >> Okay? >> But I'm running out of props. Okay? Uh number one, you have to send 500 different personalized cold emails. I would start with AI. So, I'm going to change this to AI. >> Yes. >> I'm going to give it so much context around who these people are, what business they're in. I would talk to it. I would give it examples.

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>> You wouldn't just be like, "Hey, write me an email for 500 personal people in this industry." You would you would train it. Yes. >> How much time would you spend on that? >> I I don't think it has to be a huge amount of time. I think talking to it or typing for a few minutes, but give it examples. So, the more links you can put in PDFs, if you've got examples of emails you like, uh, examples of the sorts of businesses there in, you know, there's so much you can do with AI and

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giving it that context. So, I would start with that. I would then go back to human. A human always needs to make sure AI is doing the right thing. And then I would go to AI >> again. >> I would to refine it. I'm not personally well or this human whether they're on shore or offshore shouldn't be then going through 500 emails to personally change it. So give it back to AI to fix it up and then it goes to you. >> Amazing. Okay. Scenario number two. You have to fire someone you're really close

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with in the business. >> I would actually go AI first. I would probably cry into Claude. [laughter] Um, I would spill all the beans on what's happened, why I think I've got to let them go, give examples of poor performance or whatever it might be. And I would actually have them, let's just say Claude, come back to me with uh questions and, you know, work back and forth. So you would give it context and then you would ask it to ask you to give it >> what additional context it might need or

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questions it would like to ask you. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> 5 years ago this would this would have been me writing an email and sleeping on it for the night because how you feel that night when you write that email to how you might feel in the morning are different. So write the email but leave it in drafts. You don't have to do that anymore. You can shorten the amount of time that you're spending on something. So go back and forth with AI and then it's human and I don't need the third

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one. >> So when you say back to human that would be >> oh the the friend the whoever I'm firing. So actually it's it's just AI and then it's me and you having the conversation and letting you go. >> Yeah. See your name. [laughter] >> I didn't make the cut. >> All right. Uh next is you have to choose your next CEO. >> Human to human. Me to human. Yes. So this would be the other leaders in my team, the other managers, AI, human, and then you're hired. [laughter] So

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human to human. So I would have a meeting with, you know, the most important people in the business, the the board members, whoever it might be, to talk about why we needed a new CEO. Then I would put everything into AI and have it craft the job description, the uh the ad that might go on seek or the emails to the recruiters, all of that. Then it's going back to human to potentially if we've already started interviewing that might be you know second interviews or things like that and then it it goes to me hiring you. So

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the AI piece is just to research, help craft the job description. Yeah. Everything personal is it needs to be human. >> Okay. >> You have to negotiate a million dollar deal. >> AI human AI human. So this is me talking to AI around the deal, what's involved, the whatever it might be, all the context, I would give it to Claude. Human is maybe a lawyer or another like a coach, a mentor, probably a few different humans. Then I'm giving all of that back to AI to draft up >> contract.

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I'd probably actually then have a fourth and human again back to the lawyer and then >> Right. So when there's additional stakes, you're going to go find someone who's a bit of a specialist at solving that problem, who's lived it before. >> Y >> why would you not completely trust that process with AI and why would you still want to add a specialist human into the mix? >> A million dollar deal, that's that's a big deal. And AI can hallucinate. It can make things

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up. It's it's not a true source of information. Um, so I think it's great to do research, but then to have a lawyer involved that can actually put together the document that everyone's going to sign on the dotted line. Like I I know people that have they've hired people with a contract through AI and there's been mistakes. They've been taken to court. It's you need a specialist that is going to that that's their livelihood. That's their job. You know that's on the line

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if this falls through or if there's a mistake on the contract. That's what you pay these people a lot of money to do. Don't put that in the hands of AI. What I think is really interesting about your responses, Jess, is pretty much every delegated scenario we went through includes a screening process >> with AI. >> Yeah. >> Okay. If you're thinking about and thank you so much. This was really fun. >> It was fun. >> Um, [laughter] we can leave them there

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If if we're thinking about how AI in essence has converged with companies at light speed and we're talking constantly with founders around how they can better improve their company, their culture, their systems uh around AI. So if we're thinking about AI, should we think about it as a software or more as a labor resource? >> That's a great question. It it's a software. It can do part of the labor, but essentially I believe that it's a software to be used with your team. I don't think it should be

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replacing team at at least any time in the future. >> Why not? >> What I truly believe will make businesses win in the next 5 years is team using AI to get ahead. It's not one replacing the other because you as the founder need to be doing the things that are growing your business and I guarantee that is networking. It's building your personal brand. It's these things that get you out there and your business out there. But if you want to be stuck in a cave in your office being

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the AI orchestra, you know, moving the pieces around with bits of software, is that really going to grow your business? >> You'll just become the bottleneck again. Is this one of those pipe dreams like uh where you see people saying, "Hey, like live the life of your dreams from a beach somewhere on a laptop >> and make millions of dollars of residual income >> and you don't have to work at all." Is is it do you feel like it's this notion around leverage everything with AI is

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becoming one of those um get-rich but be lazy mechanics? >> I think there's a very small percentage of business owners that could do it. because they're, you know, very smart or they're very tech focused. They're they're into they just live and breathe AI and they're that's the business that they want. That's great. But for the majority of business owners, they're they're barely using Claude. They're barely using Chat GBT. And when they are, it's it's pretty poor. Like

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they're not giving it enough information. So I think for those business owners, everyone's really overwhelmed at the moment by the thought of my competitors are, you know, going to overtake me because they've replaced everyone with AI and their margins are better and all. It's, you know, everyone's got this, I don't know, this feeling. Well, I from the people that I speak to, they're feeling very overwhelmed with how quickly it's changing. They're feeling like they're getting left behind.

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>> Okay. So, let me play a scenario here. So, so some of AI is to me reminiscent of the internet or the convergence of Silicon Valley launching the internet and then how the internet pretty aggressively disrupted retail shopping malls uh in particular across America. And if you're looking at one particular case, let's say Toys R Us, >> they had, I think from understanding, they had 1,600 stores across the world and they were running really tight margins and making a ton of profit. Then

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they do a deal with the devil. They do a deal with Amazon. They put their toys on Amazon. Amazon learn all the marketing uh tactics to toy sales and then start replacing >> online toys, which then closed down Toys R Us, which was this mega tyrant. It's safe to say that no matter how big a business is, it's never so big that it's safe. Right. >> Correct. >> Would you say that AI is reminiscent to the internet and how that disrupted retail or is this something else entirely?

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>> When you think of the the Toys R Us example and all of the toys going on Amazon, who set that up? It was humans. So I think as we move more and more into this era of AI, absolutely get on board with it, but start small. Start just playing with it. Have your team play with it. You need someone on your team that is going to be the office champion of AI. Roll it out. Do the training. That's where businesses will win. And if they, as they grow, they can refine some processes. they can streamline some

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things. Maybe it's instead of five extra hires in the year, maybe they only make four for the majority of businesses. I just don't think they'll get wiped out completely if they're playing the game of team and AI together. >> So, everyone says that AI won't replace jobs. It's just going to take over the boring parts. Or at least that's what the original conversation was. Uh, but if those boring tasks were the reason an entry-level role existed in the first place, does AI not then destroy the need

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for entry-level jobs? >> It definitely does. And this is something that I had to really think about about 6 months ago and I made a huge change in my business. We were we were supplying business owners with a lot of like entry level virtual assistants and a lot of the tasks that those VAS were doing were getting wiped out with AI. And so to make sure my business continues to grow and succeed and doesn't get wiped out and also the amazing people in the Philippines, I don't want them to lose their jobs

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either. So we made a pivot into training everyone and monthly upskilling all of that in AI. Businesses here aren't really doing that. Like you think of you as the founder or the CEO. You are on the forefront. You you want to learn about it. You're seeing the reals. You're seeing what other business owners are doing. You're listening to the podcast. You want to roll it out. People in the office love that it's going to take some of those mundane, boring things away, but they still need to be

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the ones that are running that bit of software every day. >> Okay. Now, if every business has access to the same AI tools uh and can move at lightning speed, does speed stop becoming competitive uh as an advantage or a competitive advantage? Is it then just becoming another chore, another thing that we have to do? growing a business, speed is a huge part of it. If if you think about meta ads, the creative fatigue at the moment happens so quickly. So if you can use AI to help you script, create, design a hundred

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pieces of content in a day and you're putting that into meta and your competitors only doing three, you're going to get that data a lot quicker to make decisions, see what piece of creative is working, put more ad spend on that, get more leads. whereas the competitor that's only doing three, it's a lot slower. So, I I definitely think if we've all got the same tools, definitely speed comes into it. the founders that want to be that solopreneur that are, you know, trying to build a multi-million dollar

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business with just using AI, they're still going to be the bottleneck because how are you going to do all of the behind the scenes running all of your agents and all of your your tools and software and still have that human to human connection? Well, even if the argument were true that you plus all these AI tools makes you a soloreneur that can do everything, well, why would you then not be able to have a team of 10 people that were all doing the same thing as you were? >> Correct. >> Right.

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>> Have have someone under you that can manage everything. >> Yeah. >> And then you have the life that you want. Put me on a beach in Thailand or Bali and you know I can delegate to my team or delegate to Claude via my phone. And that's the sort of business that I want. I don't want to be the bottleneck. >> Yeah. I have a picture in my mind of, let's say, a human who is trying to do everything human in their business is like someone with a horse and cart. >> Yeah.

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>> And they're trying to win a race and everyone else has Ferraris and souped-up V10s. >> Uh, and that's AI. AI just allows the human to do a heck of a lot more and have a lot more power under the hood of their business. I know this is oversimplifying the the the minutia of what it means to implement this stuff into a business, but you're saying that if people are >> reluctant in their adoption of bringing AI into their processes, they're they're drastically falling behind by just sheer

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speed. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. And and they need someone on their team that will do that for them. >> All right. Let's assume they don't have the resources or the capital or the means to put someone on their team >> to do it. What are some things that people can do themselves to start becoming more AI literate in improving the speed of what they can accomplish in their business? >> Really simply, grab a Claude account. If you can put Claude code in the

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terminal or have someone set that up for you, that can then take control of your computer and actually do things for you. You can speak to it on your phone. It can then go and do things for you. So you're you're essentially instead of delegating to a team member, you're delegating to Claude to do the work. If they're starting out with AI, you you just need an account and start talking to it. Start giving it uh as much information. Put all your SOPs in there. Put your website copy. Connect your

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social media to it. anything that you can put into it about you and your business and then use it as a tool to talk back to you to give you examples to you know you can even talk to it on you know 7:00 on a Wednesday morning and say hey I'm I'm having an off day I don't know where to start with my tasks you know I've got this this and this look at my calendar look at my emails just start using it as the only tool that you use in your business and have it talk back to you give examples It will really

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quickly learn so much about you, so much about your business. And it might not mean that your business is growing any faster or any quicker, but you're going to have something there that you're slowly building. And that's the great thing about AI. Just like having a team member that has been with you for 10 years, it's really easy to talk to them about what's happening in the business or what you need them to do because they've got that years of experience. they've got all that context of, you

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know, been through everything with you. Use AI like that. And even if you've got a team, have them do that as well. >> Claude Claude um teams, set up a team account. Have um projects or folders, sorry, for each department and have them start putting sales calls in there for the sales department. Marketing has their own folder for all the marketing. Then it all talks to each other. How many companies are actually actively doing this? Because I, you know, this is something we need to implement here by

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the sounds of it. Um, is is having this uh companywide, you know, department-led context constantly feeding into the same system. >> Yeah. So to give you an example, something that we implemented in the business only about two months ago, we were having a a real bottleneck issue with team members going to a certain manager or two and asking a lot of questions and then if that manager is on a meeting, the questions aren't getting answered. So then that's the bottleneck of, you know, clients not getting

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replies. What we did is we made sure all of our SOPs were up to scratch and completed. And of course they're always changing, but at least on that day we made sure that they're all, you know, complete. We put them into a program called uh superhuman docs, which is kind of like a a notion. Um it's just less expensive when you've got a big team. We then connected Claude to Superhuman Docs and now we've given it skills and context in the background of you can only pull from these SOPs to answer a

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question. If you can't if the answer doesn't exist in these SOPs, >> do not answer the question. Refer the person back to a manager. So then now all of our team asks Claude the questions. Claude pulls from zero. It pulls from superhuman docs. It pulls from our Google Drive to give the answer for the whatever question. And if they can't get the question answered, then it's like, please refer to Sheila or Christie. >> I I imagine that alone would be able to speed up, you know, how fast and how

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responsive the team are. >> Yeah, absolutely. >> Cuz I know what it's like at the end of the day to come out of meetings and to sit down with the emails and just go, >> team, you couldn't solve these problems without me. Are you kidding me? Yeah. Uh so so creating this internet is in essence a way to plug in all the different corners of a business >> so that the team can access it and ask specific nuance questions. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> And it

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>> if this was 12 months ago, we probably would have hired someone for the position to do that. >> Okay. >> Like that that's just when a business is growing and getting busy and everyone's at capacity, you keep hiring. M >> so it is especially in my industry and my business to think about not hiring someone is a shame but it means I can put that money towards the bigger hire in the business like a head of marketing or content or um you know a CEO if I want to scale out of the business even

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more and and just focus on the marketing we've got a CEO or a COO there we've got the funds there we don't have to keep hiring these smaller junior roles roles just to literally answer questions. >> Yeah. [laughter] >> Yeah. >> Okay. Then when we come back to then the founders's time and how valuable founders time is. Um how do you better understand your value of your time and where should founders consider spending less of it and then moving to where they should spend more of it?

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>> I could talk about this all day. I love and and this is something that I thought I was good at when I started my business because I was managing a really big corporate office. It was six offices and 60 staff and and then I started my own business and all of a sudden I had these thoughts of but people want to talk to me. The rep the email reply has to come from me. If it's a sales call I have to do it because they want to talk to me. So then I became the bottleneck and then I went to Bali on a business retreat and

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my phone was absolutely blowing up and I thought I'm here to grow my business to learn the skills to take it to the next level and my phone is constantly team messages, emails, calls, people unhappy because they haven't received, you know, an an invoice or whatever it might be. And I made the decision I need to make a hire. and I onboarded her really poorly and we talk about it all the time because I do not recommend but I she came to me really trusted from my old business coach so I could trust her and

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I said Sheila here's the login to every single thing in the business work it out what are we using what are we not using what are we double handling what can we automate what can we you know all of the things and she came back a week later with a full-on mapped out plan of the business what we can cut where we need to hire who we need to let go of like all of these things. And I just felt this relief of, oh my god, this is what it feels like to be a proper business owner where you've got either the team

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or a team member to take that pressure off you. And then there was the the steps of okay, clients can't have my email anymore. It's a support email or it's Sheila's email. It's someone other than me. And you start slowly removing the things that honestly give you a headache that you don't want to do. We've actually created a time audit that people can do and it goes through every half an hour of the day for a week and it is so eyeopening. If you sit down and actually put in there what you've done,

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you'll see how much you scroll on social or how much time you've spent in your WhatsApp chat with the team or how you know whatever it might be. And if you're looking at your week and you're like, "Oh my god, I only spent one hour on productive needlem moving work or the half an hour on a Friday night you got to do the networking drinks, but you got a client out of it." You're like, "Maybe I should do more of those cuz we're getting a client out of it."

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Or maybe I should turn that half an hour strategic work that I did on Tuesday afternoon into a half a day. What would happen in the business if I spent half a day on those things, delegated to a team to actually um execute on those things? How far would the business grow? >> And that's what I did. >> And that's why in the second year of business, we grew 400%. >> Because I was able to do that. >> We're going through that again now because I've kind of been the bottleneck

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in in a couple of things. Um but it's you know I've I've grown the team to 25 in the last year and some of the roles we are having to move because some of it can be done by AI now but I can tell you it's not me setting up the AI it's not me doing the research I know what I want and need in the business but I'm not the one setting up >> the AI tools. Yeah. How can you know if you're the bottleneck in the business or not? >> I think it becomes a level of frustration

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if things aren't moving ahead. If you have an hour call with someone or you're on a Zoom or you're sitting in a podcast and when you leave this podcast, you've got questions and questions and people waiting on you for things and none of that has moved forward because you've been sitting in the podcast room for 3 hours, you're the bottleneck. >> Okay. And then for those who aren't podcasting, [laughter] assuming they're not. Yeah. Yeah. >> [clears throat]

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>> If you go away for a week, what happens to your business? Are there people in it that can make decisions? Are you constantly checking your phone to make sure emails like what emails are in there? Do you have a WhatsApp group with everyone in the team or Slack? Is it constantly going off? If you're constantly being asked questions, there's a problem. M >> now what's the first step when someone identifies that they're the bottleneck? Okay, I'm in the way of everything.

00:35:52

>> Yeah, >> I am the uh type of entrepreneur who can't go away for a week without having a panic attack of the idea of it. Um what's the first or first few steps that they should apply to their business to start to remedy the issue of being a bottleneck? >> I think this is probably a great use for using AI because it's there. It's available. You can download it on your phone or your computer right then and there. You don't have to go through that hiring process or sitting down with all

00:36:19

your thoughts around what you need. Speak to AI. Do the time audit. Put that into AI. What where what's the bottleneck? You will need to hire someone as a founder, as a CEO. Yes, you can use AI, but you will need to hire someone to help you because if you want to spend your time doing the things that are going to move the needle in your business and for me that has massively been networking, that has growing my personal brand, uh, you know, spending days filming ads for Meta, the things that are actually going

00:36:56

to get us leads and sales, and then I've put a whole team in place to execute all of that. So, I think it's definitely a hire that needs to be made, but speak to AI first around your frustrations. Show it screenshots, show it your calendar, your inbox, the Slack channels, connect it all. And and ask AI, ask Claude, >> if I want to get to $10 million a year, >> what would Dan Martell do? Like, literally, think of the people that are doing huge things in business. What would they do?

00:37:35

>> That's another good idea. And I often times, you know, in the comics or in Disney movies when you have the little devil and the little angel on the shoulder, it's like, what would they do if they were here right now? >> Can people replicate like truly replicate what that's like using AI? Because I've done this before where I've contextualized a scenario according to like a public figure. If said public figure were to solve this problem, how would they approach it? How is it that

00:38:01

AI even knows in the first place how that person would approach it? And also, how do you know if um if if you're giving it enough context to be able to actually truly think from that perspective? >> It's pretty smart. If you're telling it to go and look at, you know, Richard Branson and how he's built his businesses, it's only going to find what it can find on the internet. >> So then if it's not a massive no name, might be a bit difficult. But for someone like Dan Martell or Richard

00:38:30

Branson who has >> copious amounts of biographies and interviews and um journalistic material, at least the public image or whatever they've crafted is >> would give some instruction as to how they would approach the issue. Yeah, you you just need to let it run free for 10 minutes, 20 minutes and keep when it's giving you information, make sure you're talking back to it or typing back to it, find more or dig into this deeper. Make sure that so I look at Dan Martell quite a lot because his

00:39:05

whole buy back your time method is like everything that my business stands for and I love when I read his book I was like, "Oh, wow. Okay, I get it now. So, I could I've read his books. I've listened to his podcast. I can give Claude or Chat TV, whoever I'm speaking to, the the extra context. Um, but I think it it can only give you so much at the end of the day and then you need to take parts of that and apply it to >> the bits of the business that you want to change. >> What's been the most costworthy task

00:39:37

you've seen a founder still doing themselves that they should start to delegate? It's the email management, the calendar management, and the team chats. So, this is probably where I've been at the last 6 months is that I I need that person to be like a another me. be in like be in my inbox, be in my calendar, be in the team chat and just start learning everything that's happening in my world. So then you can be that extra layer to do those things for me and you just come to me and ask me a question if you

00:40:23

need it. But in time, like to give you an example, my EA books all of my flights. And that's only just been a recent thing because I thought, "Oh god, it's just easier if I just log on Quantis and like look where I want the seat, you know, do I want to eat? Do I not?" Like, you know, I'll just book it myself. But there was a day that I was running late for something. I thought, "Oh my god, I haven't booked those flights yet." So I messaged John, here's a login for Quantis. I like to sit near

00:40:47

the front so I can get on like quickly. I don't want to walk through everyone or if it's not business, it's like in the first few rows. I also want to get off really quickly. I don't want to wait. Like I'm busy, you know? >> Um >> I'm always like, I want to get on last. >> Yeah. >> And I want to get off first. >> Totally. [laughter] Yep. But don't put me near the toilet. Like there's a few things. And that's where I think a lot of business owners go, it's just easier

00:41:09

if I do it myself because he's going to come back to me and go, >> oh there's not a seat here, not a seat there. No, you just make sure the first time that you give those instructions, it's like Yeah. Yeah. And it might take you 10 minutes to go, what do I actually want and need? But now John has that. So when booking a flight, I just message him, hey, I've got to go to Brisbane on this day and leave around 8. >> And he'll come back and go, "Yep, all booked. Flight's at 8:10. You're sitting

00:41:36

in row 3 near the window like you like it. I've paid for the coffee and the whatever for you." >> So when a founder says something uh like, "Oh, I don't need an EA. I can easily do all that stuff myself. Why is it so beneficial to have an EA in the first place? And why would you want to as a founder have the ability to then start delegating? Cuz some people might feel it's a bit frivolous or a bit um a bit too posh or a bit up themselves if they're doing it. What What's your

00:42:04

argument as to the reason why they should consider it? >> And I didn't get an EA for a very long time because I thought, who am I to get an EA? >> I did the same thing for seven years. >> Yeah. Like >> and I don't know how I didn't have one. Yeah, it's wild, isn't it? When you get one and you get a good one and you realize, what was I doing before? Why was I sitting on my computer for 5 hours of the day? >> Writing back to emails, like that is crazy. You really do need to look at

00:42:31

your hourly rate and go, what is the $100 an hour task? What are the $10 an hour tasks? And if you look at your whole day and you're putting so much of those things in the $10 an hour task list versus the $100, like if you think of the $100 an hour, this right here for you and me, this is the $100. Obviously, our hourly rate is more than $100, but for the for this um example, >> we're putting this in the $100. >> For me, it's also logging into the bank account and transferring money. That's

00:43:02

something I will never hand over. Other than that, of course, someone can answer your emails. Of course, someone can be in the team chat getting back to people. And then at 4:30 every day, John will message me or we'll have a call. This is what's happened. This is how I action this. I'm waiting on you for this. Or he'll send me a message if I'm still in meetings. Jess, I've actioned this, this, this, and this. These three things. I'm still waiting on you. Can you please get back to me about those

00:43:29

things? I get back to him straight away. He either does it that night or the next morning. They're the first things he's actioned. So, you really do need to look at your hourly rate. And it sounds so easy, but when you look at what you're actually doing daytoday, week to week, you can get quarters or half a year into the year and go, "What did I actually achieve? >> I just sent 2,000 emails. Did the business grow?" >> Right? >> No. Well, what are the things that are

00:43:55

going to make the business grow? >> Is it making a hire to do? And it might not be an EA. It might be a management level. It might be the AI specialist. Whatever it is, it needs to free up your time to do the things that are going to grow your business. >> Yeah. How how do you make sure that the time you are investing is being invested in the right places is as simple as just opening up your calendar and looking at your schedule? >> For me, it was Yeah. >> Yeah. I really had to clear away so much

00:44:25

of the dayto-day, delegate that to managers in the business who then have a team under them. And now we're also getting our managers EAS and support to help them because when you look at their time, they're also on a higher hourly rate as well. So what task are they doing dayto-day that we can give to someone whether that's AI or whether that's offshore team, it doesn't matter, but that's how businesses grow and scale. you and the managers in your team need to be focusing on the dollar

00:44:58

productive things is that lead genen is that you know client calls so the client feels loved and they're supported and they're going to stay because if they're not doing those things and you're having a churn problem well then what's the point in trying to get leads if you've got a churn problem >> recently I saw somewhere someone said to me that the the sole purpose of a CEO of a company is to add value to the company >> meaning if you if you really want to call yourself a CEO or a founder and

00:45:25

you're spending your time, like you said, responding to emails, how much value are you really adding? And if you could win back the five hours a day on managerial stuff and delegate and then win back the five hours, where could you invest it in a way that would compound value? That's that's in in essence what you're saying that people should start to do. You so so you hit 400% growth in your second year. What's the most painful experience that broken your own delegation chain during that growth

00:45:53

sprint? >> When I look back at what has broken the chain, it's always been me. I've got such a great team now and it's when I stick my fingers back in there or I think something can be done better without really looking at the situation as a whole or speaking, you know, having a meeting and speaking about what happened. If I just start firing off, it's like that seagull analogy. You come in and you all over everyone and then you leave, everyone's just covered in it. And that's kind of what was

00:46:26

happening. People were getting a bit cranky that they've set up systems and processes and I've gone and changed it. Like yes, I am the CEO and founder and I absolutely have a say. Of course, if I said this is what's happening, everyone, you know, the changes are made. But normally, I've removed myself so far out of the business now in in terms of I have one or two meetings a week. The rest of the time I'm on podcast, I'm filming, I'm, you know, doing things that are growing the business.

00:46:57

If I stop doing those things and I just go and put my fingers in like I was doing 12 months ago, that's when things start to break. You found by creating a system and then removing yourself from it was the most productive thing for your business. >> Yeah, absolutely. A system and a person. Yeah. >> Now you're adding value by producing media and content. Yeah. Sending [laughter] attention back to your business. Should a founder ever deliberately let an employee fail? >> Yes.

00:47:23

>> When and why? >> That's where you learn the lessons. And I think when you're hiring team, everyone has their own lived experience. They've they've worked somewhere before. They've been to school. They've been to uni. They've created things on their own. Like they've got their own ideas. And if you're hiring people to go, this is the exact playbook. Like what what makes me the what makes me know everything in the world? Like I don't I don't know everything in the

00:47:57

world. I've hired people a lot smarter than me in certain roles because I don't know what they know. So to have people come in and I can have ideas and I can have suggestions or I have a meeting with my my coach and he'll say, "Oh, you need to do this." And I take it to the team. They've worked at a company before and had 20 years of sales experience. I've been trying to sell for a couple of years and I wasn't that good at it. I think I got by because I was the

00:48:26

founder. I was so passionate. But then when you actually, you know, just to stay on the the sales person for a minute, it's like if you get someone with that experience who lives and breathes sales, >> goes to the trainings, they're watching the YouTubes, they're listening to the sales podcast cuz they love it, and they're getting rewarded by their commission, they're hungry for it. People might come in and and change things up when they've, you know, they've got that

00:48:51

experience. >> Yeah. Do great leaders delegate tasks or outcomes? And can you explain the difference? >> Great leaders delegate the outcome first. And again, they might have a way that they'd like it done, but I think whoever you're delegating it to, if they know what the outcome is, >> like I don't really care how you get there. I really don't. And if you want to use AI to get 80% there and my team members using the other 20% to actually get the outcome that I want, I don't

00:49:28

care. Like I really [laughter] don't. And I think that's maybe where some leaders go wrong. They've got >> some leaders do care about the process. Like I remember I had a job, I'm not going to name the person, but I was working in the gym and uh the goal as a sales rep in a gym is to hit sales target. And I hit sales target, but like blew way past it. And um I remember being challenged around how I got to the target and I was like, "Oh, I spent a bit of money here and I did this and I

00:49:52

did that." And they're like, "Well, I never said you could do those things." >> I said, "Yeah, but I hit the outcome and like did way more than was expected and I was a little resourceful with how I did it." And then they were super annoyed for like two hours about had I not followed their instruction to do it. If let's say someone's in a situation where they're drowning in tasks and it's kind of difficult for them to know where to tackle first. Do you tend to have

00:50:16

sections in the business that you tend to have people prioritize over others? >> Yeah, I think anything that is moving the needle in the business, client retention, client satisfaction is number one always. Um that's your business as it currently stands. Like protect that and then comes the growth. I think so many founders and even managers get so caught up in like the tasks that they think are important and they're not. It's just wasting time or it's avoiding doing the work that might be a little

00:50:53

bit challenging or having the hard conversation and it's like just get that out of the way. So every day I set three priorities for the day and I know I don't I don't do anything else until those three are done. When do you set the priorities? First thing in the morning or the day before? >> I like to do it the day before, like the night before, because I I've spent that day. I might have ticked off some of it. I' It's in my head. It's clear. If I can look at those three things and delegate

00:51:22

to someone else on the team, even better. Cuz they're going to either think about it that night or first thing in the morning, they're like, they're coming in, everyone knows what they've got to do. If I've done that and in the morning they've gone, "Oh, yep. I've done that, done that. Okay, great. Well, then what are my next priorities?" Or, you know, where can I I've just freed up more time of my day to make content or spend with the marketing department on leads or

00:51:48

whatever it might be. But yeah, I always do it the night before, especially a Sunday night. So great to like finish the weekend off like I want to start Monday morning with the list for tomorrow. Okay, Jess, how do you delegate your standards without having to approve every decision? >> I think it really starts at the hiring process. You need to hire people that I I wouldn't say are similar to you, but have similar values. Like I hire people that are amazing at what they do in certain areas of the

00:52:23

business, but they are kind people. They're humble. there. And I'm not saying I'm all those things, but they're the sort of people that I want to work with every day. And if I if someone comes to me with a question, I want that person to have similar values to me to be able to go, this is what Jess would do. And so, you're empowering the people around you just from being yourself and being who you are and showing them what sort of leader and empowering them to make decisions on

00:52:53

your behalf. And something that Dan Martell mentions in his book, he's got, I think it's a $50, a $500, and a $5,000 limit. So certain people in the business can make decisions as long as it doesn't go over that amount. If it's over $500 and you're a, you know, a manager, then you might want to speak to the CEO about spending more than that. If it's under 500, like he doesn't want to know about it. $5,000, the CEO might make the decision. But I think if you've got

00:53:24

people on your team that are similar values, you're really clear on where the business is going and how you would deal with certain situations, they'll learn pretty quickly. Like there's not many decisions I have to make in the business anymore >> other than having the meeting with the accountant. What do we need to do here? I have one meeting a week with my managing director. She takes everything and she spreads it out to the team. Can you delegate judgment or does that only come with experience?

00:54:03

>> It comes with experience. I I think everyone can have their opinion. It really depends on how long they've been with the business >> and how much background information they've got. If they're if they're fairly new, they might be really smart and go like this is how I'd handle that this situation. But if they don't have the context of the business over the last 5 years, certain SOPs in place, what you know, maybe we've something's happened previously with a client, a similar

00:54:34

situation, we've dealt with it that way before and now we've got to deal with it a different way because of how that situation turned out. It Yeah, it comes with experience. If the business can't operate without good judgment, have you really built a scalable business? >> No. >> Because then it's back on you. You become the bottleneck to make the decisions. >> Do you think too many founders are addicted to being too needed or perhaps they get too much dopamine or serotonin

00:55:07

for being the decision maker or being the bottleneck and being needed? >> Absolutely. Yeah. I think I mean we see it with social media. We we crave that dopamine hit of what's next? What's next? What's next? And in business feeling needed and having people ask for your opinion, you really do need to empower those people to make that decision because if everyone's coming back to you, you will be the bottleneck. >> And people can sit in that for far too long because of that do dopamine hit, because

00:55:46

of feeling needed, wanted. you know, it's it's their business, their baby. And your team will also uh thrive off that because it's it's not putting the it's not putting the um the the answers or the solution on them. They can't be blamed for everything if you've given them the answer to it. So, really empowering people like I say to my team all the time, what would you do in this situation? How would you and they'd say, I'd probably do this and this. Great. do that

00:56:19

or come to me with the problem, three solutions, and your recommendation. >> What do you think is more dangerous, hiring the wrong person or keeping someone mediocre because you're too scared to rock the boat and change the team? >> Keeping the person that's not right. I think you can hire someone that's wrong and learn the lessons from that and what you would improve to hire again. But if you keep someone in your team that is bad for team culture, that is, you know, not

00:56:56

doing their job and other people in the team see them not doing their job and you are essentially supporting that. You you are the one that you know, you're keep you're paying them a wage. So you're showing everyone on the team that it's okay to do half the work, to slack off, to leave early, and you'll still pay them the wage. >> So I think it's it's really dangerous when you've got a bigger team. >> I once saw a a video by Cohen Ray >> and he said that if you go through your

00:57:27

org chart and you look at each employee >> and someone just asks you the question, would you hire that person again >> and you hesitate for more than half a second? and you're like, "Yeah." He said, "Then you've hired the wrong person." He said, "Unless 80% of your org chart is hell yeah to hire that person again. >> There's probably some work that needs to be done to improve your team." >> When you look at an org chart and let's

00:57:51

just say you're like, "Okay, there's a cluster of people that are just not performing and they're just not where the company needs them to be." Um, you know, how should someone approach that? Should they go, "Let's just play it by year. Let's wait it out. Let's not try to rock the boat." You know, because as soon as you start to performance manage people or start to put pressure on, it makes things worse. So then you actually end up with a temporarily worse

00:58:12

situation that you're trying to solve with the hopes of a better situation. But it's not always so easy, right? >> It's not. >> How do you encourage people to kind of approach these issues? >> Depending where the business is at, if you can afford to make another hire, I would do that. I would make another hire and start giving some of those tasks to the new person. and see how they perform because I think a lot of people a lot of business owners get really stuck in well

00:58:39

like that's that's that's just the role or that that's all we can get like that'll do but I think when you make that next hire if they're so much better at that job you need to start performing that performance managing that person out of the role >> why is why is this the best thing to do it sounds terrible why why does someone need >> it does sound terrible but it it's your business >> yeah And maybe we go back to the the AI, like talk to AI, show Claude what this

00:59:09

person's doing every day. Are they following the procedures? And have Claude come back with a a report on what should happen. But I I really think if that role is needed in your business, then you are doing a disservice to yourself, to the business, and to your team by keeping that person there. Let's say that uh the founder is the bottleneck and let me give you a scenario here where the founder they themselves realizes okay cool I'm the bottleneck I'm the judge the juror the executioner across my business if you

00:59:42

know I walk out of a podcast I got a ton of emails and questions and things I got to solve and let's say they're looking at the team and they're like a man I'd make some changes on the team >> let's say you have 90 days how would you roll out a map and encourage the founder to then go on that journey like how should they segment it where should they focus is how much energy and how aggressive should they be about their approach? >> I think very aggressive. Um only because

01:00:06

time goes so quickly and you can easily just fluff around making decisions for a month and then you go, "Oh my god, I've only got 60 days left." So I would again I would use AI to look at everything that you're doing and then I would start that hiring process. Most founders and CEOs need an EA 100%. You look at Richard Branson, he's got 17 companies and he's got one EA. He has a meeting with that EA first thing in the morning and she runs the companies for him. Every business owner, if they want

01:00:40

to grow and scale, need an EA. The next hire, it would be that management position to really manage the team. But be aggressive. Start the hiring process. Start putting together what you want this person to do every day. And it it's pretty simple at the start. Like start small. Here's my emails. Let's just get that under control for the next two weeks. Next is my calendar. Next is booking flights. Next is the team chat. Next is like don't go and dump everything on this person in the first

01:01:14

week. You've spent 5 years, 10 years running your business without one. That's a lot to take in. Make sure that they get make sure you get someone that handles that within the first week or two and then build on it >> and just literally remove yourself. Don't look at your emails and say to your EA or or say to someone in the team, we'll have a meeting at 9:00 and at 4:30 we'll go through the emails. I'll tell you what I would reply, what I wouldn't reply, where we're going to

01:01:45

flag it, what folder we're going to put it in. Build the process with them. I think that's where a lot of people go wrong with hiring. they think I don't have anything set up for this person. Like start small and let that person help you build it. If it's a role that is doesn't exist in your business, let them like hire for experience and let them help you build it. But give yourself a goal. By 90 days, you're going to be fully onboarded into this business. You're going to have

01:02:13

access to everything. I'm not going to have access to my emails, my calendar, you know, whatever. We'll meet a couple of times a day. You've got access to me in the chat. but we need to go on a lead genen spree and get some leads. So, I'm going to be doing this, this, and this. And that's what's happening in 90 days. >> I like this. What What do you see happen when founders bring in their first uh EA and they start to delegate their calendar, uh their emails? What's the

01:02:37

typical response? What have you seen happen on the back side of that? they're still in there every day [laughter] and they're micromanaging and they're not letting go and then they get frustrated because now they're paying for a salary and they're still doing the work and >> they think I'll just I'll just go back to doing it myself because this person can't get it >> if you don't know what's happening like nothing in your emails can be that urgent really that can't wait a couple

01:03:05

of hours. So you as the founder block out the couple of hours and go and film your meta ads or go and create content, go and network, whatever it is. After the two hours, pick up the phone, send a message, hey, what's happening in the inbox? Okay, cool. What did you reply? Yep. Like you do have to spend time with this person in the first couple of months. I think a lot of people where they go wrong is like at the end of week one or two, they're like, "Oh, I still had to do everything. They weren't

01:03:30

listening." It's like, "Well, how many times did you meet with them? How many messages did you send each other? Have you made it clear to them that these are the times that you can message or meet or I'll be in a meeting, but send me any questions. I'll get back to you after. They're only going to learn by asking questions. Let them ask the questions. And if you do that now, in 3 months time, 6 months time, the amount of time you talk to that person gets less and less and less and

01:03:57

everything's taken care of. things get booked, meetings, podcasts get scheduled. All of these things happen and you had a couple of chats back and forth, but you only get there in 3 months, 6 months time. >> It doesn't happen in the first week or two. >> If someone's toying with this idea in their head that they can barely afford an EA, what would your advice be to them as to how they could see the potential upside of doing it? >> I honestly think you can't afford not

01:04:28

to. Do you really believe that? >> I do. >> Yeah. >> Because if you look at your hourly rate, are you really going to go back and do the $10 an hour task or continue to do the $10 an hour task for the next 5 years? >> If you've got someone else doing those and your time is spent doing the me needle moving things, the lead genen, the networking, whatever it might be to move the business forward, you'll see that person as an asset, not an expense. Now, if you're thinking about resource

01:05:01

allocation and you're getting this time back, uh where do you tend to find that founders get the most ROI? Is it through social media? Is it through broadcasting and networking? Where have you seen the biggest potential upside for people when they win their time back to start putting it elsewhere in their business? >> Yeah, I think it it completely depends on the business and the owner. If the business owner is growing a personal brand or doing the marketing, being the face of the business, which as you and I

01:05:28

know that should be everyone, um, that's growing a business 100%. Putting the time and effort back into that or developing your people so they can run the business for you. That's where you'll have the best Yeah. the best results 100%. It's the business owners that get the EA and then they micromanage them. That's where it goes wrong. >> Yeah. No one wants to do that. No. But people have been there before as well where they're like, "Oh, I tried the whole EA thing and had to micromanage

01:05:58

them. It didn't work." You know, potentially to the wrong person or the wrong the wrong hire. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. It's either you or the wrong hire. Yeah. >> And so I always think of it as like I worked in real estate for 20 years. If we had one bad receptionist, would we just never open the door to the office again? And we'd go, "Every receptionist is no good. They don't work. They're lazy. they don't answer the phone properly. No, you go, "Oh my god, we got

01:06:20

to open the doors to the business. We need a receptionist." So, you hire again and then you hire again and then you hire again until you find the right one. Every time you do that, you learn something. So, it really annoys me when people go, "Oh, I tried offshuring once. Doesn't work. Doesn't work for me." >> Well, why? Cuz are you still doing the $10 an hour task? >> Yeah. Is there a difference between a business that can survive uh without you, keyword survival, and a business

01:06:43

that can grow >> without you? There's a huge difference. It depends who's on the team for sure because sales, marketing, leads, sales are what will grow the business. So if you've got a team that is in place to maintain the business that you've got, the business will maintain. If you've got part of that team that is focused on marketing, leads, and sales, your business should grow. You're saying the simple equation is if as so long as I have sales, marketing and maintenance,

01:07:18

um that doesn't involve me. Technically, your business can grow without you. >> It can. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> You just have to have the right people. If you want to be that far removed out of your business, you need a CEO, a CEO, whatever it might be, that is steering the ship. Because if you've got five people trying to steer the ship at a management level, people are going to go the wrong way. who are they reporting to, >> right? >> And if that's not you, it needs to be

01:07:44

someone. >> Did you feel like over your time running your business that if you could go back to stage one now, how would you approach things differently with an offshore team with AI? Uh what would you have implemented far earlier in your journey as a entrepreneur? >> I still worked full-time for a whole year while I started my business. I would not do that again. [laughter] We grew too quickly. But that was the situation that I was in um with my old boss. He was selling the business. I

01:08:15

didn't want to leave him. I was such a big part of that business. I was essentially his EA and general manager. So to have his EA leave just before the sale, I couldn't do that to him while he had been so good to me to let me start the business while still working for him. >> But if I had to go back and that situation wasn't there, I would have left earlier. Mhm. [clears throat] >> I also would have hired more of a specialist in the business. So when the business was growing, I was doing a lot of the

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marketing, a lot of the sales calls, and I had a few great general virtual assistants doing things, but they were very dependent on me for what are we doing today? Can you do this? Can they're waiting for me. I became the bottleneck. when I hired Sheila who came in and completely transformed everything. I wish I had done that earlier. Yeah. >> Should the founders role actually gets smaller as the company gets bigger? >> It depends what the goals are for you and the business because if you're on if you've got a

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5year plan to exit for a certain amount of money, the CEO or the founder should be in there. they should be driving the growth, you know, teaching the team because you've got the outcome in mind. But if you're a founder or CEO that wants more of a lifestyle business and is happy for slow growth or just to maintain and you're getting your salary and you want to spend, you know, 2 hours a day working three days a week, that's fine. That you can do that. It it really depends on what you want as the business

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owner, >> right? And is there a system around this as to how you tend to approach it? >> For me, I know what my goals are and my growth plan is. So, I very much mirror >> some really like high-profile people like we've mentioned before and what do they do dayto-day? We had that Dan Martell event in November last year. Yeah. >> And Dan was all it was all about content, right? And >> that's what you love doing. That's what Dan loves doing. That's what Taki loves

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doing. Um I had a a chat with Taki and he was like, "You're either a maker or a manager." And I was like, "Oh my god, I am a maker. Put me in front of a camera, creating content. I love that. I love learning about that." And that's what I want my role to be in the business. I want to be the CEO and I want to be the founder, but I also want to be the face of the business and grow the personal brand. I'm not a manager, >> but I can hire managers that are phenomenal and that love it and I can

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pay them well and they can have a team under them that are offshore. But that's what I want. That's the sort of business that I want. >> What's the difference between a maker and a manager? >> A maker is your creative. You love marketing. You want to You might be an online coach and you love being on Zoom and uh teaching people. you you've got that um creativity, you're teaching people, that sort of thing. I'm not a teacher, but you know, I can go on a podcast or I can, you know, film some

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content. A manager is a manager really. They they love the meetings. They love being busy. They love >> supporting the team and managing people. I hate having meetings. I do. I have one or two a week and even then I'm like, "Oh god, okay, let's do this." Like what do we what's the purpose of this meeting? Where's the agenda? Like let's get through it and let's >> Oh man, can we trade lives? >> Yeah. Like seriously, >> I'm so taxed out on meetings. Yeah,

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>> you've got to get rid of them. >> Yeah. >> Who can have the meetings for you? >> That's a great question. Yeah. I'm going to unpack that immediately after this. >> And you have one meeting with someone a week. At the start, it might be every day or it might be, you know, twice a week, whatever it might be. But in time, if you could get that to once a week or once a fortnite, like how much more time would you have in your day >> to focus on content? And for you, that's

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what will grow the business. You need to be teaching people. >> I agree. >> You're a maker. You're not a manager. >> Yeah. Yeah. My week is about ballpark between 40 to 60 hours of meetings every week. >> That's insane. [laughter] >> Yeah. It's pretty crazy. Um >> just staff meetings or clients? >> Just everything. Yeah. So it's a big mix of like prep, writing, like just like not every like meeting is like a like with people, but it's like there's

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something in the calendar where this has to get done. So >> um but yeah, I'm in this period of transition between >> the way the company was operating the way it's about to. >> Um [snorts] so yeah, I'm just going through this tough season right now, but on the other end of it, pretty excited to definitely have a meeting diet, if you will. And I think that's the point like you mentioned there, it's a it's a season >> and that's great that you know that's a

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season because you're going to make the changes to get through that season. >> It's when the season continues for a year or two years and the business isn't growing or it's going going backwards, you're like what needs to change here? Something needs to change. >> Yeah, 100%. Okay, we're talking a lot about delegating tasks and delegating to AI and all this infrastructure and everything else. Um, how do you delegate momentum and is that possible? Absolutely you can. I think that comes

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from the top in terms of the CEO or the founder and again coming back to what's that outcome. If everyone knows the outcome, you can create the momentum to get there. You can look at breaking down whatever you need to get to that outcome. So for us, the five-year goal is this. We had to break down year by year what do we need to do to get there? What team do we need to hire? How many sales? How many leads? How much do you need to spend on meta ads? You can break it down and you then you create that momentum to get there.

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But I think short stints, so 3 months, don't go this is the 5year plan and everyone's going, "Oh my god, that's there's so much to do." Go by the end of the quarter, we need to be here and this is what we need to do here. So Sally, this is yours. You know, Johnny, yours, whoever, whatever. Let's, you know, create that momentum, put incentives in place. I'm huge on incentives. If the business is growing and we've all got the momentum to get there, the team need to be incentivized.

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>> How do you how do you incentivize the team? Like how do you truly incentivize the team to you know in essence people are never going to care as much about the business as the founder >> but if you're trying to incentivize the team to to bring it how would you do that >> everyone works to make money and yes they might be in a job I hope everyone's in a job that they love but at the end of the day if your competitor offered that person 10 grand more they would think about it because

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they're working for money but if you can incentivize them on the growth of the business. So in our business, we incentivize on like leads and sales and signups and then on client retention and also Filipino retention. So our team, especially on the retention side, they're putting in extra hours to have the calls with the clients, to make sure the team's working well. you know, they're having one-on-one meetings with their offshore team member to make sure everything's working. If that client was

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a bit uncertain around that team member and we've realize that this person loves the job and the client actually loves the VA, but there's just a breakdown in communication, how can we help with that? Saving that relationship and saving that client to the business is worth more to us than trying to get a new one. And we have spent so much money trying to get clients. And it's like, hang on, what are we doing to nurture the clients we have. >> And if they love one team member, they're

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likely to want another one and another one and another one. So, we incentivize the client manager to grow their her clients team. >> Yeah. No, that makes sense to me. And if you think about how people are trying to then create offshore businesses, are there any uh perks or tips or or some advice you might give people to consider giving offshore uh teams a chance for the first time? >> So if anyone is listening and they want to set up a global team, do your research. Obviously in Australia, we tend to go to

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the Philippines because the time difference is quite good. with the Philippines, for example, make sure that there's an entity in the Philippines, like the agency you're going through. >> Um, make sure they've got an entity and you're employing that person through the entity. >> Why do I need an entity to make sure I'm successful with offshore teams? In June or July last year, there was a huge court case of a Brisbane law firm had hired a contractor. And this is just

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someone I don't know if they found them on Upwork. I'm not sure, but they just found them online. It might have been Filipino jobs online. They said, "Yep, come and work for us 9 to5 Monday to Friday." She was a a law assistant and so pretty important role in the business and she was with them for 5 years. It was going well. They then fired her and she went to the office of fair trading and the office of fair trading sued the Australian law firm. >> Whoa. And they had to back pay minimum

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wage, Australian wage to her, super benefits so much because a contractor is not full-time 9 to5. >> Mhm. >> That the office of fair trading said that is a full-time person. >> You you have employ like hired her as a contractor. a contractor is can you do this LinkedIn post for me in your own time middle of the night doesn't work doesn't matter as long as the work gets done >> so people are blurring the lines between contractor and treating offshore talent/contractor

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as as employees >> correct >> yeah whereas if you go through an entity uh you're technically >> we employ them so for an example um >> and they're technically more more of a certified contractor I guess >> absolutely yeah no not a contractor we only do employees now >> okay Yeah, because our model is full-time. >> Mhm. >> We used to do contractors. We used to I actually started my own little mini Upwork. I had um a website developer create um like Upwork. Um I had VAS on

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there. They were available. Clients would log in, give them a task. We had a contractor model that wasn't very may I maybe I didn't market it well I don't know but it didn't take off as quickly as I would have liked and it was a lot of handholding for both sides so we went no part-time full-time um setting up the entity all of that and then when that court case came out last year and there was a lot in the media around the office of fair trading cracking down on Australian businesses for this yeah

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>> yeah so if you're listening and here. And [laughter] >> yeah, uh you should definitely course correct that. Okay, cool. And then as far as like offshore, like what are the perks? Like uh what what are the upsides of of of actually building a global team? Because I think there is sometimes a bit of a stigma or a bit of a a notion that they're they're not at the same caliber as perhaps if you hire locally. >> Absolutely. You want to keep that person for as long as you can. And if you pay them well and

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you treat them well, you will have them for a very long time. They're very loyal people. their English is amazing. And this is something that you go through when you go through the hiring process is what's their experience? Where did they go to school? Did they go to university? Have a call with them or have them send a one minute intro video so you can see them. How do they present themselves? What's their background like? Do they have chickens in the background or they are, you know, are

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they in a nice office or a bedroom with a nice background? Like pres presentation is everything. But they're amazing people. They're so loyal and you can get the caliber of people that you want anywhere in the world. You just have to know where to look. >> Do you find that uh entrepreneurs tend to try to delegate everything through email versus getting a lot of facetime with their offshore team? >> Email, Slack, WhatsApp. We use Telegram. >> Yeah. And I think in time that's fine, but when

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you're starting out, you really do need to build that connection with them. Have the video calls, have a laugh with them. If you're having a team meeting, bring them up on the screen. Like, get them involved. If you want them in your business for a long time, include them. Go over and see them. Fly them out here for a few days. It's not that expensive. But how committed and loyal they would be after being treated like they are part of your team is incredible. Like it it's just it's a

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game changer. And I don't know why like I'm all for onshore and offshore and AI working together. >> I'm I'm not at all saying everyone needs an offshore team only offshore. There's certain roles that I truly believe need to stay here and I've done that and it's working well, but there's definitely so many roles that can go >> Yeah. >> offshore and then now even AI. Yeah. >> Yeah. We have a team in in the Philippines. We have a small team of uh

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developers over there. Um I believe six and yeah, we're always uh having them on team calls. We have Zoom meetings going all day and they're always floating around in the background cracking jokes and all the rest of it. So yeah, we really try to here at Rival try to keep everyone as a part of the team. And I think it's also like, you know, when we were working with the agency about this, they were like, "Oh, we're kind of surprised that you guys want to have them that involved." And we're like,

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"What do you mean?" Like they're human beings and they have jobs and they're contributing to the mission. Like why would we not want to have them involved? Um so yeah, it does seem like there's a bit of a um I don't know a different perspective perhaps from from some people with how they tend to treat their offshore team. It's definitely changing a lot. >> Um, when I started doing this 10 years ago, um, in the real estate agency, it was very much like almost don't talk to

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them. Like, >> you know, give them the SOPs, but don't spend too much time like they're in the background to do their work. >> And that that just Yeah. We we it is weird. Yeah. And I actually one of my greatest memories of when I first met you um and you told me how you've got an offshore team and you actually flew out one of your team members and he now lives here. >> Yeah, he lives here and that just like I'm like, "Oh my god, >> I just love that."

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>> So for those that are listening to this for the first time, don't know this, um Hans and our team, he manages our dev team. Um he has an American accent, uh lives in the Philippines, uh and then spent a lot of his life in Germany. So he's a really welltraveled guy. But yeah, he was one of the first hires on the team and basically helped us build out our entire web division and uh he was crushing it and he was always joking about moving to Australia. And then one day we said to him, "Well, why don't you

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move here?" And he goes, "Well, maybe I will." Uh, and then six months later, he moved across the pond and now he works here full-time, which is kind of fun because, you know, he manages our Filipino team, but he speaks that language. So, I'll walk past his office and I'll hear American accents, Filipino dialect, like I don't know what to expect. And he's also uh taught himself how to speak um you know different languages in Lord of the Rings as well. So but >> that's right. He loves The Hobbit. Hey.

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>> Yeah. He has an Airbnb. Shout out to Hans. Uh it's a Hobbit house and you can rent it in the Philippines. Um >> but yeah, I think I think for me it's, you know, it's been a great contribution to my team to have um people working offshore. But is there any other perks? anything else you would like to leave final thoughts around why people might want to consider expanding their team overseas and then implementing uh or integrating that together with AI? >> I think it's like anything in business,

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you have to start and try. And like we were saying before, >> if you get one and it doesn't work out, >> yeah, >> try again. There's 7,000 islands in the Philippines. You're you >> Wait, what? >> You picked one person off one tiny island. >> There's that many islands. >> Yeah. It's It's insane. And so you just need to try try again. You'll learn something higher again and you might get that one person that is that good that you would pay them an Australian wage

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and fly them out here and now they're running a huge part of your company. And that's like me. I've got a couple of amazing managers that run whole parts of the company for me. >> In your experience, is there a typical process or where you like to manage an offshore team? like could you walk me through a day uh of what it means and what it would look like to to run your offshore team? I >> if you can meet with them in the morning or have a manager meet with them or your EA, someone I think should get on a call

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with them at a certain time and make sure they're all there, switched on, ready to go, have a chat about what's happening and make it a really quick standup meeting and then go for it. But I think that communication and making everyone feel part of the team is what will keep the team together and keep everyone really motivated. And then it's it's of course depending on the business, but you've they've got their task, they've got, you know, what they need to do throughout the day. And at

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night, like I like to send a message. I don't do it every day now. Um, but at the start when I was growing and building and forming this offshore team, I would send a message at the end of the day. Thanks everyone. like, you know, I'll be on for another hour. If you've got any questions, flip me a message. It just shows that like you're thanking them for the day. And you don't have to do that, but I think when you're starting out, it shows that you really care and value them. And over time, yes,

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it might be someone else doing that on your behalf and then once a week you can jump on a meeting with everyone or once a month you have a big town hall depending on how big your business is. But in the early days when you're starting that offshore team, communication is everything. They're not here in the office with you. They're not hearing everything that's happening. They're not getting everyone's, you know, funniness. They're not, you know what I mean? They're not building on

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that. You have to create that for them. Send them a birthday cake. Send them a bonus if they've done a great job. Like, create that culture that you want in your business and make them a part of it. >> Yeah. Well, well said. One final question that we tend to ask everyone here on the show is the the whole notion around the agency. For me, it's being a guy who runs an agency, I'm all about people who take massive agency and what their their heart desires in business and and and so forth.

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>> For you, uh what does agency mean to you? >> Definitely taking control of not just your life, but your business. I >> got into business. I I saw an opportunity and I started to grow the business and then I quickly realized that I was the bottleneck and I really had to think about what sort of business did I want to grow, what sort of leader did I want to be, what sort of business owner and make those decisions. And now I've got I I'm a maker. I can spend time doing the things that I want

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to do in the business and it's making the business grow. So, I think that's what to me, taking agency over my life, my business, what do I want? >> Oh, well said, Jess. This has been a pleasure. Uh, I always love hanging out with you and this has been enlightening and there's a few things in here I want to implement around Yeah. delegation and how I'm going to win some more of my time back throughout the week and get rid of some more of my meetings. Um, I appreciate you. Thank you so much for

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making the time to be here and um, thank you for joining us. >> Thank you so much for having me. [music]