Skip to Main Content
Ninety logoNinety Presents

 

Jan 24, 2025

Bringing Your Vision to Life

Explore the challenges of aligning vision, leadership, and organizational growth in a scalable way. Mark and Cole discuss the importance of building an agreements-based culture, fostering the right kind of communication, and strategically timing key leadership hires to ensure your shared vision is executed effectively.

Audio Only

 

 

Cole Abbott

[0:00:00]

I think there's a lot of visionaries out there that struggle to execute on that vision and struggle to work on the day to day side of things.

Mark Abbott

[0:00:09]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:00:09]

Which is even more topical because that's just what we were talking about before this a little bit.

Mark Abbott

[0:00:14]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:00:14]

In terms of like me spending way too much time on the, the long term things and really working on implementing things. And there's a time to focus on the vision stuff, but then if you don't execute on it, then it's just.

Speaker C

[0:00:24]

Vision without traction is hallucination.

Cole Abbott

[0:00:29]

Sure. I think if you didn't read the book, the word traction there makes no sense. True. Right. All right. But I think it's interesting specifically coming from your perspective, since we don't really have an integrator.

Speaker C

[0:00:47]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:00:47]

Or a COO or a second in command person.

Speaker D

[0:00:52]

We're.

Cole Abbott

[0:00:52]

Right. So you, you know, more than most, especially if we're talking within the coaching or eos world.

Speaker D

[0:01:00]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:01:00]

What the challenges are of executing on vision.

Speaker C

[0:01:03]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:01:04]

So I guess to start, what would you say are the biggest challenges that you've faced in terms of not having an integrator?

Speaker C

[0:01:13]

Well, you know, I have frameworks that help me understand things and so which have been sort of things that I've been using since before we ever started. 90. So I think part of it is I understand the game we're playing and I understand the moment we're in better than if I said the average founder. That would be insufficient in terms of describing.

Cole Abbott

[0:01:54]

That would undermine the point.

Speaker C

[0:01:55]

Yeah. Because the vast, vast majority of founders don't understand the moment they're in because no one's taught them how to understand where they are, the game that's in front of them. And that there are the unavoidable stages of development associated with that game.

Speaker D

[0:02:10]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:02:10]

And it's unchartered territory.

Speaker D

[0:02:12]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:02:12]

You're an explorer mode for a lot of that as a. Yeah. As a visionary.

Mark Abbott

[0:02:15]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:02:15]

And yeah. You're in uncharted territory. You have no map.

Cole Abbott

[0:02:22]

And.

Speaker C

[0:02:25]

You know, for most they don't even really know what's important for them to really nail in the beginning versus what needs to be nailed. Call it stage three or stage four or stage five and not worth allocating any energy toward. And so there's a lot of frantic activity in the brain and within the organization and damn near every sort of startup. So I guess to some extent I was fortunate to be in a place where I understood the nature of the game before we ever started the company. And I understood it because I had coached People I understood it because I built businesses before. So going into it, I knew that there's certain things that we need to worry about and there's certain things that we're not going to worry about. And we've talked about this before. My classic example is really nailing process in the way that it's taught by a lot of coaches and organizations that try to help leaders master the art and science of building a great company. So I think in the beginning I knew we needed to nail certain things on the vision front. We needed to nail the core value stuff, we needed to have a strong point of view on where we were going to be in 10 years and the guideposts or guiding principles that were associated with all that. And so I think in terms of understanding and also I understood that I was going to be grinding, I was going to be doing some stratum one work, I was going to be doing some sort of day to day work and I was going to be doing some work that typically is done by an early leader and et cetera. So I wore lots and lots of hats and I recognized that I was wearing lots and lots of hats and I had a decent sense for which hats I needed to give to someone else and what the skills and experiences and sort of psychological DNA was required for that person to be comfortably wearing that hat. Does that make some sense? Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:05:07]

Are there specific frameworks you use for that or at least appreciate or like. Yeah, Dan Martel has a bunch of them, for example.

Speaker C

[0:05:15]

Yeah, well, obviously, you know, the whole time span of capacity framework is super important. You know, I have always liked the Colby because I think it helps us make not put square pegs into round holes around psychological DNA. You know, I, you know, the whole notion that I talk about all the time is it takes thinkers, feelers, doers and critics. You know, and I let leverage the Myers brings the type coach, you know, sort of Jung model. And there are other things that, you know, that I use. And obviously early on we also just leaned into the classic six key components methodology that, you know, Gino Wickman talks about in the book Traction. And so I think from the very beginning I had a decent sense for what I needed to focus on, what I needed to own, what I could delegate. I knew what I liked doing and what I didn't like doing because I was eight years ago, I was in my 50s. So I think generally speaking, even though I didn't want to be sitting as an integrator, I also knew that it wasn't forever and I knew that because what we were trying to do has never been done before. You know, I knew that my time should be dedicated to getting things moving as opposed to trying to go out and find, you know, an integrator. Especially because I did not have a lot of confidence in my. And I tried it once, right. In my ability to get someone who was going to come up to speed, swift enough, swiftly enough to really give me leverage, as opposed to just be one more human that I needed to invest a lot of energy in. And where, you know, especially if they sort of bought into the EOS framework on integrators, where they expected me to just give them, you know, authority for running things on a day to day basis, I, There was no bloody way, right. I was going to give up authority on how things were being done on a day to day basis. So early on, Right. I just, I got to own all this stuff and it is what it is.

Cole Abbott

[0:07:55]

That's a little bit founder mode, but from the start, yeah, you're just really taking ownership over all that which is in your domain.

Mark Abbott

[0:08:02]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:08:03]

So when it comes to, you spoke about sort of the individual side of things, know, knowing your strengths and all that and then also knowing the system and the, what the nature of the game.

Mark Abbott

[0:08:15]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:08:16]

Which of those do you think is more important or more foundational? Understanding yourself or understanding the nature of the specific game or arena that you're entering?

Speaker C

[0:08:27]

I, I think it's a, it's a, it's a great question and I can hit it from, I can talk out of both sides of my mouth.

Speaker D

[0:08:35]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:08:36]

So using the game metaphor, if you don't have a decent sense for the nature of the game.

Speaker D

[0:08:45]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:08:46]

That you're going to be playing.

Speaker D

[0:08:49]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:08:49]

If you don't understand that, you know, let's just say soccer versus rugby or, you know, you know, that's a team sport. We could even go. If you don't understand the nature of the game, tennis versus rugby versus soccer versus football, et cetera, et cetera.

Speaker D

[0:09:01]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:09:01]

If you have no sense for the nature of the game you're about to enter into.

Speaker D

[0:09:05]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:09:05]

You don't even know whether or not you're, you have what it takes to play the game well.

Cole Abbott

[0:09:09]

But if you don't understand yourself and what your strengths are, how do you know that you're going to be able to succeed?

Speaker C

[0:09:15]

Exactly.

Cole Abbott

[0:09:16]

Games.

Speaker C

[0:09:16]

Exactly.

Speaker D

[0:09:17]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:09:17]

And so that's why I said I can talk out of both sides of my mouth on this one.

Speaker D

[0:09:21]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:09:22]

So I do think that, you know, if I've seen Way too many people in my, you know, 40 plus years think that they could be a successful founder when, you know, within an hour of being with them. I'm like, no bloody way.

Speaker D

[0:09:43]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:09:45]

And so, you know, now, so one could argue. And I would argue that, you know, part of the reason I really want to do the five entrepreneurial archetypes is to help people decide whether or not they really have what it takes to play the game.

Speaker D

[0:10:07]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:10:09]

That.

Cole Abbott

[0:10:10]

And.

Speaker C

[0:10:10]

And, you know, you're not going to know until you get out on the field.

Speaker D

[0:10:15]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:10:15]

Because one, you know, it's one thing, you know, like Mike Tyson says. Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:10:18]

I was literally thinking about that quote.

Speaker D

[0:10:20]

Yeah. Right.

Speaker C

[0:10:20]

Everybody has a. What a strategy until they get punched in the mouth.

Cole Abbott

[0:10:24]

Right. I was talking about that yesterday, literally. And my literal experience with that sort of thing was like, you know, how you're doing? You know, like, you can think about all these things, but you have to face the certain tests.

Mark Abbott

[0:10:36]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:10:37]

And it's like, you know, be literally getting punched in the mouth. It was like, I didn't know how I would react to that, and that happened. And I reacted in a good way.

Mark Abbott

[0:10:46]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:10:46]

And that's good. But it's like, you don't know that until that thing happens.

Speaker C

[0:10:50]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:10:50]

I see. That's interesting, having that conversation with somebody yesterday about that exact thing.

Mark Abbott

[0:10:55]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:10:56]

And I mean, to some extent, if you were really curious about that, you could obviously go take boxing lessons and experience what it's like to get punched in the face.

Speaker D

[0:11:02]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:11:03]

But most people don't know.

Cole Abbott

[0:11:05]

And that doesn't have to be literal. We're not advocating everyone goes and gets their teeth knocked out.

Speaker C

[0:11:10]

That's not.

Cole Abbott

[0:11:11]

That's not the message here.

Mark Abbott

[0:11:12]

No.

Cole Abbott

[0:11:13]

But I think there's a part of it where you need to pick your sacrifice.

Speaker C

[0:11:17]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:11:17]

And you need to face that challenge voluntarily as. As a. If you want to figure that out. So you go into that arena, and worst case, you're going to learn a lot about yourself.

Speaker C

[0:11:29]

But it's even more complicated than that.

Speaker D

[0:11:31]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:11:32]

Because a lot of times you have. My experience was because I did angel investing and I also coached a lot of people for decades, and I'd have these people sitting in front of me, and it's like, is your spouse going to support this? Are you ready for this? Are you financially ready for this? Are you emotionally ready for this? Are your relationships ready for this?

Speaker D

[0:11:57]

Because it is hard. Right.

Speaker C

[0:12:00]

And it costs money.

Speaker D

[0:12:02]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:12:03]

And when I say it costs money, I mean you could either be making money.

Speaker D

[0:12:07]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:12:07]

On the one hand, because you got a regular job or you could be getting no income. And worse, you're taking money out of the bank, right, to fund this thing. Because you need to can't do this by yourself. Right, back to thinkers, feelers, doers and critics. You need to figure out whether or not you can get through each of these gates, right? Whether you have what it takes, you know, not just resiliency, but anti fragility, right? Do you have the mindset that, you know, we're exactly where we're supposed to be learning the lessons we need to learn?

Cole Abbott

[0:12:39]

Do you respond positively to stress or negatively? Just like. Right, that kind of stress, right? Are there smaller arenas or ways to see whether or not you would be successful or would be able to handle or even like becoming a founder? Well, you know, one of the things.

Speaker C

[0:13:00]

I wrote about in Founders Mode series is, you know, sort of intrapreneurs, right? People who have sort of played the entrepreneurial role within a company. People who have, you know, started a division or pushed the company to do something, you know, and led some effort. And so you know that you can do that, right? You know, you can lead, you know, you can take something that's just an idea and turn it into reality. I mean, it's even, you know, even as simple as, you know, I, you know, I think most people would be wise to come out of school, whether it's undergrad or even high school, right. And get a job and understand the nature of work, right? And the disciplines associated with showing up and learning and working with diverse groups of people, all sorts of personalities and quirks and aspirations and ambitions and all that good stuff, right? And then, you know, then take on more responsibility, take on responsibility that, you know, it's not part of your job. Go and grab, you know, additional responsibilities, put yourself out there and, you know, and take on rocks. Or say I want to do, you know, I want to take on these challenges which are not associated with the work I'm doing. I see this opportunity to help you with this or help you with that or help you something else. And so I think there are ways for you to sort of test that early on and you know, and test it and push it, right? And you know, rocks are a good example in most companies. They're hopefully they're doing 90 day cycles and there's opportunities for you to say, hey, can I help with something? And then, you know, just push for leadership, push for responsibility, push for taking on risk, push for taking on challenges that, you know that ultimately you're going to have if you step into an entrepreneurial activity other than if you're just going to be a solopreneur and, you know, go write your own, you know, a blog as an example, that even then, though, right. You're taking on risk, you're taking on, you know, the stress associated with getting rid of your. Getting rid of your. Your income. And of course, there are other things you can do, which is sort of burn, you know, burn the midnight oil and have a day job and then start working on an idea where you're basically putting your toe into the arena, but you're playing entrepreneur at night. And do you have the ability to do that? Can you burn sort of a little bit of the proverbial candle? Can you do the 14 hours, the 15, the 16 hours? Will your family, will your circumstances allow for it to happen? You'll learn a lot doing those things.

Cole Abbott

[0:16:14]

So we talk about the entrepreneur archetypes.

Mark Abbott

[0:16:16]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:16:16]

So I think you said there's basically three things. One is entrepreneur.

Speaker D

[0:16:21]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:16:23]

Solopreneur.

Speaker D

[0:16:24]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:16:25]

And then midnight oil.

Speaker C

[0:16:27]

Yep.

Cole Abbott

[0:16:28]

So which of the archetypes would be best suited to each?

Speaker C

[0:16:36]

Well, the accident. We're going to say accidental. We're going to push that aside because that's. That's on accident. This we're talking about.

Cole Abbott

[0:16:43]

Because all of these things are intentional.

Speaker C

[0:16:45]

Yeah, these are intentional. So accidental goes out the window right. Now, the opportunists, you can be opportunistic within your company, you can be opportunistic at night, you can be opportunistic as a solo. So you can be an opportunistic entrepreneur there. As far as lifestyle goes, it's an interesting conversation because we're talking about specifically, the midnight oil is not necessarily going to be a lifestyle unless you've said, hey, I'm going to trade lifestyle for a while.

Cole Abbott

[0:17:21]

You're sacrificing present for the future.

Mark Abbott

[0:17:23]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:17:23]

But when I. And I think most. A lot of lifestyle entre. I mean, I think the least likely for lifestyle would be intrapreneur. That just doesn't.

Speaker D

[0:17:32]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:17:33]

You don't see that a lot. No, but you see a lot of the solopreneur thing and you also see a lot of the midnight oil thing because it's like they're like, oh, I want to do this, and then they start doing that and then usually just creating passive income.

Speaker D

[0:17:45]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:17:46]

With the sole purpose of quitting the day job.

Mark Abbott

[0:17:49]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:17:50]

Right. I. That's very. That seems really popular right now.

Mark Abbott

[0:17:53]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:17:54]

Which is interesting because you're sacrificing lifestyle for Lifestyle. Yeah, But.

Speaker C

[0:17:59]

But that's a good thing, actually.

Cole Abbott

[0:18:01]

It is a good thing.

Speaker D

[0:18:02]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:18:02]

Because, you know. Because you're willing to do the hard work in order to get what you want.

Cole Abbott

[0:18:10]

Yeah, yeah. Let's say the. I forget who said it, but finding a love. Finding your labor of love is preceded by finding a love for labor. And so in doing that, you're kind of like, oh, yeah, I actually enjoy doing this. And. Right. It kind of evens out any imbalance there or any. Right. If you want to just like, oh, I don't want to work. I just want to do this thing. But I can really hang by my fingernails for six months. Right, right. And that will turn into a year. And you're like, oh. And then you end up unlocking the door that allows you to do something that you love, which isn't just passive income kind of thing, which I always think is interesting.

Mark Abbott

[0:18:45]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:18:45]

And what's interesting too is, you know, I have a theory, and it. Once again, we talk about research.

Speaker D

[0:18:52]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:18:52]

I have a theory that a lot of lifestyle entrepreneurs are capable of being legacy and visionary entrepreneurs.

Speaker D

[0:19:04]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:19:05]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:19:06]

So it's not like you just are one forever, but you go in sort of with the lifestyle approach, and then all of a sudden it's like, no.

Speaker D

[0:19:13]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:19:14]

And then you become more invested and you're like, no, I don't want to just have my own little team and my own nine to five. There's a real opportunity here. And all of a sudden you become invested in this grander, longer vision and you start to find yourself moving away from being a lifestyle entrepreneur to being, you know, either a legacy or a visionary entrepreneur.

Cole Abbott

[0:19:37]

Yeah. And I think the lifestyle thing is we do a whole episode on lifestyle. So.

Mark Abbott

[0:19:43]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:19:45]

Do we cover all of them? All right. So bringing it back in, I feel like most of these things are you figuring out you developing your character, in a sense, and then while also, in a more observational way, learning the nature of the game. But I feel like the more crucial thing is developing your care, because I feel like it's harder to do is make yourself into the person that will succeed across games.

Speaker D

[0:20:13]

Yeah. Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:20:13]

And as the hierarchy thing, like the person at the top of any given hierarchy can succeed across hierarchies. Right, right. I think that's underappreciated as a principle. And it's a little bit chicken in the egg thing, which I have my. It's not even an opinion. It's just the egg came before the chicken.

Speaker C

[0:20:33]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:20:34]

But I always think that's interesting.

Mark Abbott

[0:20:36]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:20:38]

Because usually it's like one or the other. You can't say, oh, so I want to both. Like if you dig down deep enough.

Mark Abbott

[0:20:42]

Yes.

Cole Abbott

[0:20:43]

Like one of the things is more foundational.

Mark Abbott

[0:20:45]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:20:46]

Because you're never going to stop growing as a person if you're pushing yourself.

Speaker D

[0:20:52]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:20:53]

So when, develop yourself as an individual and then you enter that game and you learn to understand the nature of it in that arena, you're still gonna be learning a lot about yourself in that process.

Mark Abbott

[0:21:04]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:21:05]

And, and, and, and, you know, it's like one of these things which we, we've never shared with. I don't know if you've talked about it. We talked about the matrix, the matrices of competencies. I don't think we have.

Cole Abbott

[0:21:16]

I think we have.

Speaker C

[0:21:16]

Yeah. So it's, it's one of those things where, and well, someday, you know, I'll put that out into the world. But, you know, as you're, as you're, as you're moving, you know, through the stages and you're moving from sort of, you know, product market fit where you're wearing all, all sorts of hats.

Speaker D

[0:21:34]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:21:35]

And you're just super narrow and super focused on getting product market fit and, and you, you know, control it all and then you, like, you're getting some good signals, like I've said before, whether it's revenue or someone's willing to invest in what you're doing because they can see the longer game. And then you start to take off hats and you start helping. You're hiring people and giving them the hats that make sense for stratum ones. And you're now predominantly wearing Stratum 2 hat in terms of how you spend your time. And then stratum three and stratum four and then stratum five, etc.

Speaker D

[0:22:08]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:22:09]

What you're going to do is you're going to be developing, you know, not just, you know, skills and experiences in terms of one thing, but you're going to. There's a whole host of competencies. There's leadership competencies, there's ego.

Speaker D

[0:22:23]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:22:23]

Competencies. There's time span of capacity competencies. There's delegating and letting go. There's all these competencies. There's becoming more confident in terms of your ability to solve more complex problems. There's all these competencies that you start to, you start to amass, speaking of, you know, hierarchies of competencies and, you know, sort of rising and having, you know, competencies across 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 different dimensions.

Speaker D

[0:22:56]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:22:57]

And so you Know, back to the beginning, conversation around integrator versus visionary. You know, you, you are, you know, you are basically playing mostly integrator and mostly, you know, manager endoer.

Speaker D

[0:23:13]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:23:13]

In those earlier stages, you're wearing tons of hats and it just is what it is.

Speaker D

[0:23:19]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:23:19]

Unless somehow or another you have co founders. That makes it easier. It really does. But then what percentage of the co founders work out? That's a whole nother thing to be to do some good research on. My sense is that a lot of good potential businesses and good potential founders, you know, get, for lack of, better get stuck and implode because of co founder issues.

Speaker D

[0:24:04]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:24:04]

Would you say that's a issue of prioritizing the relationship over the success or taking action on the purpose?

Speaker C

[0:24:13]

Well, it's my bias here, and we don't have the research to support this particular bias.

Speaker D

[0:24:19]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:24:20]

But I believe. Back to agreements versus relationships.

Speaker D

[0:24:24]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:24:24]

I believe that. I look back on some of the efforts that I worked on with co founders. There was no agreement.

Speaker D

[0:24:33]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:24:33]

On who's doing what. And you've experienced that.

Cole Abbott

[0:24:37]

When I was talking to somebody who is a co founder and they're struggling with this. So what are the things? And he's like, oh, we have good lawyers. Like, you're not understanding the question at all here. He's like, well, why? And he said, okay, we really got to step it back here. Look at the big picture. Understand why the agreements are so important. And even if you're trying to exit in two years, it's like, well, two.

Speaker C

[0:24:59]

Years, a long time.

Cole Abbott

[0:25:00]

That's a long time.

Mark Abbott

[0:25:01]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:25:02]

And it's probably gonna be longer than that.

Mark Abbott

[0:25:04]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:25:04]

And do you want that to be an effective two years both for the company and everyone involved and yourself as you learn all of these things, you're young.

Mark Abbott

[0:25:12]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:25:12]

Figuring all these things out.

Mark Abbott

[0:25:13]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:25:14]

And if you can do this now, you're gonna be. Have such a huge advantage at the next thing you do.

Mark Abbott

[0:25:19]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:25:19]

Regardless of what that is.

Mark Abbott

[0:25:20]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:25:21]

And, and, and, you know, without these agreements and very explicit.

Speaker D

[0:25:25]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:25:26]

Very explicit agreements. And you know, I had one guy who I worked with years ago, and he just refused to have explicit agreements. And it's like, you know, he's like, we don't need that. I'm like, 100. We do.

Speaker D

[0:25:38]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:25:38]

And it's like, okay, who's, who's gonna do which, who owns which hats and how many hours and how much money.

Speaker D

[0:25:47]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:25:48]

And how do we make decisions? There's all these things that need to be talked about and agreed to and when it's not.

Speaker D

[0:25:56]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:25:56]

My experience has been you have especially certain personality types.

Speaker D

[0:26:01]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:26:02]

They don't want to do that. I think it's a combination, you know, it's my agreements based mentality versus one of the people I can think of. Both the people I can think of actually a number of people. I can think of my own experiences. And then if I think about some of the other groups that I've helped over the years, there are a lot of relationship based versus agreements based tensions within those groups of humans.

Cole Abbott

[0:26:25]

I think it's a part element of that is avoiding accountability.

Speaker C

[0:26:29]

Cake and eat it too.

Cole Abbott

[0:26:31]

Option preservation.

Speaker C

[0:26:33]

Option preservation. Discomfort. Yeah. With having hard conversations, especially if you've.

Cole Abbott

[0:26:38]

Known someone for a long time.

Mark Abbott

[0:26:40]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:26:40]

And it's like, oh, now we gotta act like a little bit strangers here.

Speaker C

[0:26:44]

Or it's. Even if it's a new relationship and you like, you really want that relationship to work and so you're not gonna stress test it.

Cole Abbott

[0:26:51]

Yeah. If it's either really new or really old, then that conversation is kind of weird.

Mark Abbott

[0:26:55]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:26:55]

You got it. There's a sweet spot where it's not uncomfortable to have that conversation. But it's like if I have any of my friends from high school, like, that'd be a really awkward conversation.

Mark Abbott

[0:27:05]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:27:05]

To have with them.

Mark Abbott

[0:27:06]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:27:07]

And then if you just go up to somebody and you're like, hey, this is what I want and this is what we should agree to, it's like, whoa, you're moving too fast here.

Mark Abbott

[0:27:14]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:27:14]

Right. You got to sort out the dynamic first.

Mark Abbott

[0:27:17]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:27:19]

I wonder if there probably is a framework around that that I just don't know about.

Speaker C

[0:27:23]

Well, I mean, there's. Slicing pie is a framework around allocating the equity as an example.

Cole Abbott

[0:27:30]

I mean, those sorts of. But in terms of what's interesting about slicing social side of the frame, like a social framework around that.

Speaker C

[0:27:35]

But what's interesting about the social side of slicing pie as an example?

Speaker D

[0:27:39]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:27:39]

It's like, you know, because it. The Venn diagram, lap overlap here is really interesting.

Speaker D

[0:27:46]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:27:46]

So I see people where, you know, they don't agree on. Okay, so you're gonna do this and I'm gonna do this and I'm gonna put in, you know, 80 hours a week, and you're gonna put in 80 hours a week. And by the way, you know, right now I make, I'm just gonna make this up. I make $600 an hour and you make $200 an hour.

Speaker D

[0:28:08]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:28:09]

So if I put in 80 and you put in 80 and I'm putting it at my market rate and you put it your market rate and they're well, wait a second, I thought we were equals.

Speaker D

[0:28:18]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:28:20]

And so it gets weird really fast.

Speaker D

[0:28:23]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:28:24]

And because a lot of people, you know, especially the people that, that really don't want to work 80 and they look at this as an opportunity for them to step up. And like there's in part of it a lot what I've seen a number of times is the, the person who has less experience and frankly wants to work a little bit less hard.

Speaker D

[0:28:48]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:28:49]

They're, they're playing an arbitrage game and they don't even know it.

Cole Abbott

[0:28:53]

Do you think there's an ego development function to that?

Speaker C

[0:28:56]

100%. 100%.

Speaker D

[0:28:58]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:28:58]

And, and, and so these, so what ends up happening is the slicing the pie really forces the real conversations to take place really early and status comes into play. All this stuff comes into play. And I think if two people come in and they're relatively equal in terms of competency, competency, their market value, how much they're going to work, how much trust they have in each other from a competency, character and connections perspective, how aligned they are up here.

Speaker D

[0:29:37]

Right.

Mark Abbott

[0:29:37]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:29:38]

Then you got a really powerful co founder set. But I'll bet you the vast majority of co founders do not have that going on. And there's an arbitrage thing that the more junior co founders are looking for and think this is awesome.

Speaker D

[0:29:55]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:29:56]

They don't even, probably even know how to articulate. They don't even probably see it in their own heads.

Cole Abbott

[0:30:02]

I'm blanking on what it's Dunning Kruger effect a little bit there.

Speaker C

[0:30:06]

Yeah, yeah, a lot of things.

Cole Abbott

[0:30:09]

It'd be interesting to see the correlation between Dunning Kruger and stage of ego development.

Mark Abbott

[0:30:15]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:30:16]

And then, and then you get into the whole thing about like back to visionary versus integrator.

Speaker D

[0:30:21]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:30:21]

If the co founders are, you know, I've seen this two vision, two co founders who think they're visionaries.

Speaker D

[0:30:28]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:30:28]

There's a lot of that.

Mark Abbott

[0:30:29]

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker C

[0:30:31]

I have not look at a lot.

Cole Abbott

[0:30:32]

Of co founders that are integrators.

Speaker C

[0:30:34]

I have not seen it work. Period.

Speaker D

[0:30:36]

No, period.

Cole Abbott

[0:30:38]

No, it doesn't, it doesn't work in businesses, it doesn't work in bands, it doesn't work anywhere. Yeah, yeah. Because you can't have two visions.

Speaker D

[0:30:47]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:30:48]

You know, and there's a whole, you know, duality and yin yang thing that needs to work out. And you know, years ago I wrote a, a guide called Dynamic Duos and It was on my old site and it needs to be converted and updated. I've looked at it recently, but I get into a lot of this stuff because the co founder thing is it's. You know, it's. Especially if you're. I think it'd be interesting to see how many co founders are extroverts versus introverts. Successful co founders versus an I and an E as an example.

Cole Abbott

[0:31:22]

Oh, okay. I was like, yeah, yeah. I don't know. I feel like you typically have. If it's a founder or if it's a visionary. Integrator. Pair visionary would lean more. E integrator would lean more. I.

Speaker D

[0:31:36]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:31:37]

And I'm an I average.

Speaker D

[0:31:38]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:31:39]

And so you're a middle eye.

Mark Abbott

[0:31:42]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:31:42]

You're like a. If we're doing it one to ten. Right. So you're a four.

Mark Abbott

[0:31:47]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:31:48]

Probably right. Which is why you work at a software company. You just wanted to get out of coaching. I don't want to deal with people. Well, I'm joking.

Speaker C

[0:31:59]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:31:59]

But yeah, because you do enjoy it. But you're not as.

Speaker C

[0:32:04]

I don't.

Cole Abbott

[0:32:05]

I. As some people.

Speaker C

[0:32:06]

Right. And I'm not. And I don't need people all day long.

Cole Abbott

[0:32:08]

No. Yeah. Which is funny to see you get into that mood. But I love, I love. I enjoy being around people. I need probably an hour every day and I'm. Yeah, I'm happy.

Speaker C

[0:32:17]

And I need four or five hours every day of me time. Yeah.

Mark Abbott

[0:32:20]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:32:21]

It's a. I just think the interesting one is Foley. Yeah, he's really strong eye.

Mark Abbott

[0:32:28]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:32:28]

It's like, oh, yeah. No. No reason to do anything. I don't want to go see people. Right. Okay.

Speaker C

[0:32:32]

Yeah. And then we have, you know, you and Tim, who you know, an hour a day of alone times. Perfectly fine.

Cole Abbott

[0:32:39]

Yeah. It was fun. I don't know. I enjoy it. It gives me energy and I can see that my stress rises if I'm.

Speaker C

[0:32:46]

And isolated and Chris Snyder is the same way.

Cole Abbott

[0:32:49]

Yeah. So you put all of us in a room and it's fun. Yeah, yeah. So with the co founder thing.

Mark Abbott

[0:32:57]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:32:58]

I think we've just. We've covered what makes a better co founder set in terms of likelihood of success.

Speaker D

[0:33:05]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:33:07]

So if you have a good co founder set.

Mark Abbott

[0:33:09]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:33:10]

Do you think the vision to execution issue is in a good place or a great. A good starting point?

Speaker C

[0:33:17]

Oh, yeah. I mean, yeah. If you. I think if you're fortunate enough to be able to really align early on, you know, have a dynamic duo really early on that meets all the criteria for success.

Speaker D

[0:33:33]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:33:33]

I think that's very powerful. I just, I, I, But I don't, I think it's harder, I think it's rarer than people think it is for that pair to come together. And I think, you know, you can have, as an example, going back to my career, you can have these dynamic duos or even trios.

Speaker D

[0:33:52]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:33:53]

Who come out of a company and start their own business.

Cole Abbott

[0:33:56]

But they've got a lot of experience working together. They know how it works.

Speaker C

[0:33:59]

Yeah. And they're all aligned and they have frameworks that they've all agreed to. Right. And those are very, you know, I think the probabilities of those things succeeding are pretty damn good.

Speaker D

[0:34:11]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:34:11]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:34:12]

I wouldn't want to co found something with someone I haven't worked with that would be, I just, I wouldn't feel confident.

Mark Abbott

[0:34:20]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:34:22]

So then, right, on the flip side, if it's not a healthy pairing, and.

Speaker C

[0:34:26]

By the way, that's a legacy, most likely a legacy group of entrepreneurs.

Speaker D

[0:34:31]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:34:31]

Because they're sitting in a company.

Mark Abbott

[0:34:32]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:34:33]

They see an opportunity to do something stronger within their industry. And so that's a classic group of legacy entrepreneurs.

Cole Abbott

[0:34:41]

And what, how so I guess if you're taking it outside of that industry.

Speaker C

[0:34:48]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:34:48]

Then what does that look like?

Speaker C

[0:34:50]

Then someone's got a vision for taking this and applying it to it.

Cole Abbott

[0:34:56]

Entirely different industry.

Speaker C

[0:34:58]

Yeah. Entirely new industry for that.

Mark Abbott

[0:34:59]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:35:00]

Opportunity or just a need for it.

Speaker D

[0:35:02]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:35:02]

Yeah, yeah. Maybe because they're sitting in a company and that company is using a product.

Speaker D

[0:35:08]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:35:08]

And they're like this, you know, this product sucks.

Cole Abbott

[0:35:11]

Yeah.

Speaker D

[0:35:12]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:35:13]

And we've looked, we've interviewed, you know, a bunch of different people to see if we can get a vendor to give us this product. And no one's done it.

Speaker D

[0:35:21]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:35:21]

But there's just no one who's got a decent product. That's an opportunity for us.

Speaker D

[0:35:25]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:35:25]

And that could be. Now you're talking about a sort of a visionary collection. Collection of entrepreneurs.

Cole Abbott

[0:35:33]

So now moving outside of the co founder set.

Speaker C

[0:35:37]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:35:39]

Let's say you're a visionary founder. What are the, I guess, building blocks or ingredients of, let's say stage one, stage one, stage two of creating a solid and effective system for executing on the vision.

Speaker C

[0:35:57]

Well, I mean, product market fit, you don't need a system.

Mark Abbott

[0:36:03]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:36:03]

Right. I'm going to assume you should have a little checkbox here. Like we have product market fit.

Speaker C

[0:36:09]

We got product market fit now. And so now you got product market fit. So hopefully at this point in time, you know, you're really starting to lean into. Okay, so this is my icp. This is our unique value proposition, right. And now we're going to go start hiring people. So let's make darn sure that we hire the kind of people that we generally want to be around from a cultural perspective, core values perspective, right. So you're getting into a relatively decent, relatively well defined set of forever agreements, right? Your core values, your icp, your compelling value proposition and core values icp, compelling value proposition. And why am I having a. And compelling why?

Speaker D

[0:36:56]

Right?

Speaker C

[0:36:56]

What, you know, what you all think you're doing in order to make the world a better place. So we've got that stuff going on, right. And now we're talking about just a visionary or we're. Or, or now I'm starting to go out and hire people.

Cole Abbott

[0:37:09]

You're going out to hire people, Right.

Speaker C

[0:37:10]

So I'm in real building out the system, right? Yeah, I'm at stage two now. So I've got my forever agreements in place. And now hopefully.

Speaker D

[0:37:18]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:37:20]

You know, systems wise, one of the systems you need to start working on sooner rather than later is hiring, you know, how to hire and onboard people. And you need to start working on structure. So that's a really important component of the system, right? You need to understand, you know, which particular areas of expertise are really important. Is it, you know, do you need salespeople, do you need a marketing organization?

Speaker D

[0:37:43]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:37:43]

Do you need a product organization? Are you, which hats are you comfortable wearing through stage two? Which hats are you comfortable wearing through stage three? Et cetera.

Speaker D

[0:37:51]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:37:52]

And so, yeah, the system, I believe you should start working on implementing the system, but understand what's important at that stage of development in terms of the system. So I teach this, the unavoidable stages of development. These are the stages. These are the parts of the nine core competencies that you need to hit earlier. These are the parts that you can work on a little bit later. It's like, you know, once you, once you start to find yourself moving away more and more from understanding everything that's going on in the organization, data becomes more and more important. So you can see what's working and what's not working. Because early on the data is just, it's flowing through your brain everywhere, right? You're involved in everything you see what's working. It's all, it's all not just intuitive. It's intuitive and it's real, right.

Cole Abbott

[0:38:45]

You have the purview over the thing.

Speaker C

[0:38:47]

Everything you see, everything.

Speaker D

[0:38:48]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:38:49]

And the only way to do that at scale is.

Speaker C

[0:38:53]

Data.

Mark Abbott

[0:38:54]

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker C

[0:38:54]

That's the only way to do it at scale is data. And so, and so structure first, people second. So you need to start working on the structure stuff, right? You need to start working on the KPI stuff. You need to not worry about, you know, the KPIs in terms of the things that you're closest to, but where you starting to move further and further away. Where you're giving up the hats, right? That's where you like. Okay, so I'm giving up these hats. I want to make sure that they have the skills and the experiences. I want to make sure we're on the same page in terms of the KPIs and the targets, right? And so as you move through the stages, you need to decide from a systems perspective, what are the systems in place that enable you to let go and wear less hats. And hopefully the hats that you continue to wear are the hats where you're, you know, pretty uniquely qualified and you enjoy doing it. Because after a while, right, if you're wearing a bunch of hats that you hate, you know you're going to burn out, you're going to grind away, right? So the system helps you sort of figure that out and see that and delegate and elevate and stay in touch with that, that you need to at least have a decent sense for in terms of how it's performing, even though you're no longer involved.

Cole Abbott

[0:40:33]

From a structure perspective. And I guess hiring. Do you think that there are certain, we've talked about Colby and Myers Briggs and all that. Do you think there are certain trait frameworks that are more important at the earlier stages versus the latter stages? Because I think we've, as we grow, we're finding that like your, your Colby and your Myers Briggs, we use type coach isn't fully sufficient, right. At making sure that all these things work and we're exploring other things and. Yeah, yeah. So going back to it, it's like, do you think that a, like, ego development test is a crucial thing at a stage two? As crucial as it is at stage five and beyond?

Speaker C

[0:41:21]

Not, it's not at stage two, because for the most part, right, all the people you're hiring are entry level or, right. Stratum one, sitting in stratum one seats. And so, you know, but, you know, and, and you know, but you do want to, you know, Colby, I think you can start using day one, right? So certain seats, you need fact finders, you need high follow through other seats. Let's just say it's in. In sales, right. You need someone who's comfortable with, you know, depends on the product.

Speaker D

[0:41:49]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:41:49]

But someone who's comfortable with rejection. And maybe it's important that they're good to follow through because they're involved in, you know, completely bringing the customer on. Maybe it's important that they're really high, in fact, finding, because they need to go out and find clients that meet a certain type of, you know, sort of criteria.

Speaker D

[0:42:09]

All right?

Speaker C

[0:42:10]

And so it. So it all depends. But, you know, it's interesting if we look back through our journey now and we're going on eight years, you know, one of the characteristics that I believe I didn't do as good a job of understanding as I would have liked to have, as I advise others, is if you're truly a startup company and you're going to be under hyper growth for years and years and years, right. We can define hypergrowth as 20, 30, 40% or more.

Speaker D

[0:42:51]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:42:54]

You're going to go through all these stages of development. Leadership is going to change, structure is going to change. Change is like, it's. It's there, period, into discussion. So if you go and hire a bunch of people who just want stability, like, that's a really important thing for them.

Speaker D

[0:43:13]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:43:14]

It's going to be hard. You know, they may. Because they come in at one stage and they like what that stage feels like, and then all of a sudden you're at another stage and you restructure things and you change things and like, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Speaker D

[0:43:27]

Right?

Speaker C

[0:43:27]

This is not what we. What I was doing a year ago.

Speaker D

[0:43:31]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:43:32]

So we've seen that. I think we, you know, we've seen people who really loved getting hired into stage two or stage three or stage four, and they wanted to kind of stay there. Well, no, it can't.

Speaker D

[0:43:46]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:43:47]

So I do think that there are other tools besides Colby and Type coach. Predictive index and cultural index help you identify whether or not someone's really stability is really super important to someone. So there are a bunch of different tools out there. You have lots of tools that I think have really interesting value, but you can't be running around with 7, 8, 9, 10 tools. So this is a whole nother thing that we've gotta, you know, I'd like to work on.

Cole Abbott

[0:44:21]

It'd be cool if there was a thing that could do a lot of that.

Mark Abbott

[0:44:25]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:44:26]

Make it simple and make it simple.

Mark Abbott

[0:44:28]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:44:30]

So I like to look at things like the quadrant kind of perspective. Yeah. What as. As the visionary. If you're worried about time it's an issue. We have 15 minutes. Yeah. What behaviors? Right. That could be accountability, all those things, but on the part of the visionary lend to good execution on those ideas.

Speaker D

[0:45:10]

What behaviors?

Cole Abbott

[0:45:11]

What behaviors? Accountability, openness, honesty, conviction.

Speaker C

[0:45:22]

Well, you know, is conviction a behavior?

Speaker D

[0:45:25]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:45:26]

Acting, being assertive is.

Mark Abbott

[0:45:28]

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker C

[0:45:29]

Okay, fair enough then. And to some extent, you could say disagreeability is associated with all.

Cole Abbott

[0:45:34]

I would say conviction stems from disagreeability.

Mark Abbott

[0:45:37]

Yeah. Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:45:38]

And probably low neuroticism.

Speaker D

[0:45:40]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:45:40]

And then that creates assertiveness.

Mark Abbott

[0:45:43]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:45:44]

Or conviction, which leads to assertive behaviors.

Mark Abbott

[0:45:47]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:45:48]

If we really break it down here.

Mark Abbott

[0:45:49]

Yeah, yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:45:51]

But even if you're not, you don't. You're not super or highly indexed on those traits. Still being assertive.

Speaker D

[0:46:00]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:46:01]

It's like we're going with this. I don't. We don't. In certain situations, we don't need to. This isn't a decision by committee kind of a thing.

Mark Abbott

[0:46:06]

Right, yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:46:07]

For example, for. Just focus on that.

Speaker C

[0:46:09]

Yeah, yeah. I think this is something that we probably should write about. Right. Under the Founders Mode series. Not the series per se. Right. But we're going to transition from the series parts, you know, part 13 series to continuing sort of articles on, you know, that related to Founder Mode. But, you know, if you're the founder and you know, everybody else, you know. Yeah. You know, everybody in our company has equity, but, you know, there's one thing to have a little bit of equity and there's another thing to have a lot of equity.

Speaker D

[0:46:51]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:46:52]

And so the probability of me going away.

Speaker D

[0:46:56]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:46:57]

Is really, really super low.

Speaker D

[0:47:00]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:47:00]

But, you know, as we've experienced from the very beginning of the company, a lot of the senior people have left.

Speaker D

[0:47:06]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:47:08]

So, you know, if you're, you know, if you're giving up control and you're giving up your vision in order to placate a member of your team who may or may not be there in a year or two years.

Speaker D

[0:47:20]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:47:21]

Is that really a wise thing to do?

Speaker D

[0:47:23]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:47:23]

And so this ends up to. You put on your point on assertiveness and conviction. I was like, this is where we're going. I deeply believe this. I'm going to be here in two years. I'm going to be here in five years. I'm going to be here in seven years.

Speaker D

[0:47:36]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:47:37]

And so I'm grinding on it. This is all my time. This is my money. Right. I've got tons of conviction on this whole thing.

Speaker D

[0:47:47]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:47:48]

So, yeah, I think that, you know, and you could have, you could have two founders who, you know, early on, you know, appear to be working really, really well. And I've seen this a bunch of times. Whereas, you know, one founder is like, well, you know, I just want to work 40 hours a week. And another founder's like, I'm working 80 hours a week. And one founder's like, you know, if we're going to grow, we can't grow more than 10%.

Speaker D

[0:48:10]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:48:11]

Because otherwise I'm going to get tapped out and I'm going to get stressed out because I can't continue to do my 40 hours a week if we're growing this thing at 60 hours or. Yeah, growing this thing at 40%.

Speaker D

[0:48:25]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:48:25]

And so you see a lot of times where founders have very different levels of ambition and there's a lot of conflict in there and it's not even talked about.

Speaker D

[0:48:36]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:48:36]

And it's an honesty and openness that leads to consistency. Right? Because you're trying to placate people, they're not going to be consistent. That erodes trust.

Speaker C

[0:48:44]

Average players want to be left alone. Good players want to coach. Great players want to know the truth. They want to talk about this stuff, Right? Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:48:49]

But if you put up a facade, trying to placate a P's not offend, right? All of those things, sooner or later you're gonna blow. You're gonna blow. Or some other side of you is gonna. You're gonna snap or you're gonna reveal what's underneath. And then it's like, whoa, what's going on there?

Speaker D

[0:49:05]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:49:06]

And also, I think we've run into this as a. I'll say an issue, okay. Where it's like, oh, everything's shifting around. Like, what we're doing is it's moving around a lot. And it's like, well, no, it's like the core things always remain pretty much the same. It's only gotten clearer over time, but it hasn't changed. But then if we look at it like an iceberg, the bottom of its pretty steady, but the top is shifting with the winds and the weather and all that.

Speaker D

[0:49:39]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:49:40]

And so if you don't want to dig deeply into it on the surface, like, wow, it's really different. And I think there's gonna be a lot of people that a year from now are like, well, 90s really changed. It's like, no, we're. We're just doing a better job than we did before.

Mark Abbott

[0:49:53]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:49:53]

Well, but. But, you know, because we're going through that, right? This is. You know, we've talked about this before, right? Leadership changes on the ones and threes. And we're now doing the $30 million to $100 million march. And structure's changing.

Speaker D

[0:50:06]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:50:07]

The ICP is not changing. The compelling why is not changing. Our core values are not changing.

Speaker D

[0:50:13]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:50:16]

Our compelling value proposition isn't changing. We're getting better and better at articulating it. But to your point, the core has not changed. Structure absolutely changes.

Speaker D

[0:50:28]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:50:29]

And, and then not only that, but I keep taking off hats and giving them to people.

Speaker D

[0:50:35]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:50:37]

And I'm, but I'm still wearing, you know, too many hats. And as, as you give up the hats and you bring someone else in, they're going to have their way of doing things that's going to be different than my way of doing things. But as long as it's aligned with our vision and it's aligned with all core, you know, our forever agreements, and it's all aligned with, you know, the other core agreements and guiding principles that we have right there, we're all, we all solve problems and take on challenges in different ways because we're all extraordinarily unique. And so that gets back to if you think you're going to be in a hyper growth company and there's not going to consistently be change, then, you know, you know, and we could argue, one could argue that I haven't done as good enough a job explaining this to the company, but I would submit to you that I did explain this darn well to every single person who I interviewed right now. I can't, I don't interview everybody anymore.

Speaker D

[0:51:43]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:51:43]

And that started a year.

Speaker D

[0:51:44]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:51:45]

And you know, at a certain salary I get involved in the interviewing process, but you know, below that, I have not been involved in those interviews for, you know, what, at least a year now, maybe two years.

Speaker D

[0:51:56]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:51:57]

And so you got that dynamic as well. It's like, well, you know, I, I, and we have about 90. And I think maybe we could do a better job of explaining that, you know.

Cole Abbott

[0:52:06]

Oh, we're gonna put our whole guide on that out in short and long form. Yeah, I think that will help. But I also, I think we, and we're learning. Yeah, this is all development and you gotta, yeah. Appreciate that. Yeah, I think a lot of people do appreciate the change and the growth and they see that as opportunity, not threat. Yeah, but we need to get, we're learning all the heuristics associated with making sure that people do have the right mentality, right perspective going into the thing.

Speaker C

[0:52:42]

And that as leaders, we do a good job of helping them understand the game. They're, you know, playing.

Cole Abbott

[0:52:48]

Yeah. As far as communicating it really well to the leaders and making sure that they understand it at a deep enough level to be able to communicate it to their teams. And we haven't done as great of a job as we should historically there.

Speaker D

[0:53:02]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:53:03]

I feel like that's one of those things where it's like the. I, I believe that will be mostly resolved in next couple quarters.

Mark Abbott

[0:53:13]

Yeah.

Speaker C

[0:53:14]

And I think, you know, obviously I, you know, there's a part of you that wants. Part of me that feels a little defensive on this because we talk about, you know, our core values and why they're important every single quarter, every single state of the company. We talk about how we're performing.

Speaker D

[0:53:28]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:53:28]

We talk about what's working, what's not working. We talk about where we're going. We talk about our levels of ambition.

Speaker D

[0:53:33]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:53:36]

And so as the visionary leader of the company, I feel like I've done this reasonably well. I feel like there are certain parts of the organization that we could have done it right. The next level down could have maybe done a better job of explaining things.

Speaker D

[0:53:56]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:53:57]

Or asking questions or, you know, answering questions. And you know, and so, you know, some of that's why you have some turnover in your leadership.

Speaker D

[0:54:08]

Right.

Speaker C

[0:54:08]

Is because of, of that dynamic. But there's no question. I feel like I need to make it is clear. I feel like I need to be the one who takes responsibility for it in a deeper, more organizational and holistic manner perhaps than I thought I needed to. And that may be a cop out on my part, but obviously I do feel like I have to own this.

Cole Abbott

[0:54:46]

And I think to give you credit, the way that you want to do it is much is different than everyone else does it because you want it to be fully explicit, coherent and resonant. And I think that that has proved to be a much. It sounds great.

Mark Abbott

[0:55:09]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:55:09]

But to have that level of explicit understanding is very difficult.

Mark Abbott

[0:55:14]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:55:15]

But also forces you to make sure that there are, there aren't any air bubbles in there. There are any gaps in the system. Yeah. And so I think we're really close to nailing that.

Mark Abbott

[0:55:25]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:55:25]

Or getting to a point where that actually works.

Mark Abbott

[0:55:28]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:55:28]

But it, I think you've done explicit but not resonant. I think that's probably where we've been least. That's been our weakness in terms of those three as being, I mean, explicit. It'll be more explicit once it is resident, you know, here. But it's an interesting thing. It'll be cool probably in Six months time.

Mark Abbott

[0:55:57]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:55:58]

To revisit the explicit, coherent, resonant thing.

Mark Abbott

[0:56:01]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:56:01]

Once we actually see how that plays out.

Speaker D

[0:56:03]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:56:05]

So yeah, I guess to wrap up. Yeah, we'll do. I give you 90 seconds. I'm not. Yeah, I'm fucking screwed. I'm gonna bring out the timer. So we're gonna do 90 seconds, three questions.

Speaker D

[0:56:21]

Okay.

Cole Abbott

[0:56:23]

All right, I'll start after I ask the question. I feel like that's fair. Regarding learning how to execute on vision.

Speaker D

[0:56:34]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:56:35]

How much of that is learning from experience and sorting out those things, seeing what's going on, addressing those things and building out that, expanding that area of competency. How much that's learning from experience versus just applying knowledge, basically.

Speaker C

[0:57:03]

In terms of the vision itself, I think you have to be honest with yourself and everybody in the organization with where you're like, I'm really confident about this. And these are the areas where I think, you know, on a scale of 1 to 10, this is a 10, this is a 9, this is a 6, this is a 7. Right. Where. Where you're being honest with everybody around you in terms of how locked in the vision is and what the implications are and how to use the vision to help guide day to day decisions. And then the other thing I would say is really helping people understand where you are stage of development wise, so they can appreciate why you're involved in the things that you're involved in and they can appreciate you're going to be giving up the hats as the company evolves. Does that make sense?

Cole Abbott

[0:58:04]

I think that makes sense. I saw you looking at the timer a lot there. Keep you nervous. All right. Why is an agreements based culture so crucial?

Speaker C

[0:58:14]

Because agreements are everywhere.

Speaker D

[0:58:15]

Right?

Speaker C

[0:58:16]

I mean, and agreements based culture scale. Relationship based cultures don't scale particularly well. And you need to just figure out which agreements are your core values. Agreements are your unique value proposition. You're compelling. Why all of your forever agreements are forever. Agreements are agreements and then structures and agreements. Hats are agreements. KPIs are agreements. Agreements rocks are agreements. To dos are agreements. The only way an organization can scale is having the things that really matter be agreements.

Cole Abbott

[0:58:54]

I think we should have forever agreements are agreements. As a quote in the next newsletter or that could be a social media post. Just that. And then have a stupid.

Speaker C

[0:59:06]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Cole Abbott

[0:59:07]

Just freeze that, put that on there. It's gonna be a new headshot for everything. All right. Finally, when. If your plan. No co founder.

Speaker D

[0:59:19]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:59:20]

And your plan is to hire an integrator.

Speaker C

[0:59:22]

Right.

Cole Abbott

[0:59:23]

CEO, second in command.

Mark Abbott

[0:59:25]

Yes.

Cole Abbott

[0:59:25]

Day to Day person?

Mark Abbott

[0:59:26]

Yeah.

Cole Abbott

[0:59:27]

At what stage or when should you hire that person?

Speaker C

[0:59:32]

Well, it would be awesome if that was a co founder.

Cole Abbott

[0:59:36]

That's why I specified no co founder here. That ruins the question a little bit.

Speaker C

[0:59:42]

That would be awesome. You know, we should do research on this. My instincts are it depends on how fast you're growing, right? That's a big thing, right? Because if I would have when people were starting to say, mark, we want you to get an integrator, right? I knew within one to two years, I was highly confident within one to two years I would be filling out the C suite. And all of a sudden then the integrator, right. If that integrator came in at a Stratum 4 level and I hired Stratum 4 C suite people, then what's the integrator do?

Speaker D

[1:00:15]

Right?

Speaker C

[1:00:16]

Do we get rid of the integrator? Do you go hire an integrator saying, oh, hey, and by the way, within two years you're going to lose your job, Right? So I mean, I really think it depends on, you know, on the nature of your business, on the nature of your growth. If you're slower, slower growing organization and you've got everything in decent shape, you just want to let go of stuff like the day to day, right? And you want someone just to make sure that the trains are running on time. I think integrators are great, you know, but I think you want to get things reasonably well set up suit, you know, so that when that happens, you are like, this is who we are, this is how we do things. This is the structure, right. When they come on in, you need to be on the same page with regard to them and you and how you divide and conquer.

Cole Abbott

[1:01:10]

I really want to just be like BA at the end of that. Just a button. All right. That's executing on vision.

Speaker C

[1:01:19]

Cool.

Cole Abbott

[1:01:21]

Thank you, thank you.