When EOS® Leaves the Leadership Team feat. Jared Stein

Christine Watts

[0:00:01]

Hey, welcome to Impact moments powered by 90. Today we're talking with Jared Stein. Jared is the COO and integrator at Strategy Financial Group, a wealth management firm helping retirees protect their families and their legacy. But before that, he had an incredible and diverse career. He ran five CrossFit gyms in New York. He worked at the NBA, taught spin class at Flywheel, and ran operations at a wellness resort. So he's seen businesses from every different angle. Jared shares how he rolled EOs out beyond the leadership team. So he went to every department and every person in the company. And what happened the first time that a team that was nervous about this new system gave the meeting a 10 out of 10 and how it really made it all worth it. He gets really vulnerable about core values and how he went from thinking they were psychobabble and BS into seeing how they really completely changed how teams operate and how they make decisions. And he tells a story about his biggest mistake. A million dollar gym deal with a friend that went sideways because he skipped the things on the paperwork. So tough one. Lessons worth hearing. Let's get into it.

Christine Watts

[0:01:11]

Hey, welcome to Impact Moments. I'm Christine.

Kris Snyder

[0:01:14]

I'm Kris.

Christine Watts

[0:01:14]

And we are joined by Jared. Thank you so much for coming today.

Jared Stein

[0:01:17]

My absolute pleasure. Yeah, thanks for having me. 

Christine Watts

[0:01:18]

So give us a little intro. Tell us about yourself. A little intro. 

Jared Stein

[0:01:22]

Well, I'm from New Jersey. The oldest of five kids. Came out of high school, right to college. They told me, like, hey, you're from New Jersey. You're gonna go be a banker. And so I was like, cool, I'll go do that. So I went into an investment bank, and I was on an institutional trading floor for the first five, six years of my career. Learned some really cool stuff. Learned that I didn't want to do that for the rest of my life. So went over to the National Basketball association, where I had a friend who was already there. Really easy intro. So I got to work in sports for a year, and that was really cool. Realized that the big bureaucracy wasn't for me. Went to business school while I was in business school. Leaned into fitness. I had to pay my bills, so I was teaching a spin class with a company called Flywheel. Rowing with City Row. Yeah, it was. I absolutely loved it. It was the best job I ever had.

Kris Snyder

[0:02:20]

Like, for me, it was like pre peloton. Like, we started doing Flywheel.

Jared Stein

[0:02:23]

Yeah. So some of my friends from Flywheel were the founding instructors there. Okay, so we're still buds today, but they're rolling.

Christine Watts

[0:02:28]

It was the first competitive One that I went to, too, where I was like, oh, I want to win. I want to be at the top.

Jared Stein

[0:02:34]

Yeah, it was. It was a great product. And it's. It's sad that they. When the founder sold, it kind of collapsed on itself.

Kris Snyder

[0:02:43]

I did it in Dubai one time, like. Like, because you were. I was traveling a lot, and, like, you could just pull up the app and just go, yeah, do it. And I thought that was super cool.

Jared Stein

[0:02:51]

Yeah, it was. It was before its time, and it was. It was a great experience. And while I was in business school teaching all these fitness classes, I was doing CrossFit for my own workouts, and one of the guys I was working out with disappeared. One day, I get a Facebook message from him. Two, three months later. He's like, hey, you want to grab a coffee? I moved to Brooklyn. Tell me the story. And I'm like, sure. And he pitches me the idea of opening a gym in the neighborhood that he's living in. I told him no. I was like, I don't have any money. I don't have any time. I'm gonna go back to the workforce. Like, he's like, no, no, it'll be fun. Like, you'll run the gym. I'll. You don't have to put any money in. I'll finance it. I'm like, all right, let's see what we got. So we started looking at some spaces. We saw one warehouse. We were like, okay, I see the vision. We can. Yeah, we can do it. So we built one, and it was a lot of fun, right? The term blood, sweat, and tears. This. This is. There was all three. And building a gym in the middle of Brooklyn, no air conditioning in the summer was, like, hard, but felt enriched. And customers showed up. No marketing, no nothing. We opened our doors, and next thing we knew, we were full, and we knew we had to expand. So in New York City, if you move five blocks north, you're in a different neighborhood. So found a space there. One turned to two in the first eight months, two turned to three in the first year. And then we were like, I don't want to build these gyms anymore. They're. It's exhausting. Let's go buy them. So we started some M and A activity and realized that, like, gyms don't make a lot of money. Well, CrossFit gyms didn't make a lot of money. So we were like, we have a proven practice. We know how to operate these things. We know how to market these things. Let's just go buy Gyms that are failing, flip them around, and we'll build our network. And we did. We had five CrossFit gyms, and then we bought a big box gym that was printing cash, but it was in bankruptcy, and so we bought it out of bankruptcy. That was going really well until 2020 hit and collapsed the whole business model and moved out to Arizona. Shortstop in Texas was in hospitality at a beautiful resort called Savannah. It's a wellness resort. And so I was the VP of operations there for three and a half years before I moved into my current role with Strategy Financial Group as their coo.

Christine Watts

[0:05:09]

And you, you were owning and operating these gyms, but you weren't leveraging eos, is that right?

Jared Stein

[0:05:16]

Correct. So my first introduction at EOS was someone who was a vendor of the gym. He was teaching CrossFit gymnastics seminar. So through CrossFit HQ, come in and teach you how to coach gymnastics properly. And he would him and I became friends. He taught like, six or seven seminars for us. And he's like, hey, do you want to help other gyms around the country? And I was like, sure. And so he'd get me on these calls with them, and they had a scorecard. They had a tab for ids, they had metrics, they had a vto, and they had an issues list. And I just sat down the first couple meetings, and I understood the cadence, and it was really cool. But he didn't call it eos.

Christine Watts

[0:05:58]

Oh, okay.

Jared Stein

[0:05:58]

He didn't tell me anything. He was like, this is how you run the meeting. And it's important that they are on the same time every week. We don't miss weeks. We don't reschedule. The scorecard has to be filled out, and you have to hold the owner that you're helping accountable. And I was like, this is a really interesting rubric for meetings. And, you know, while that was going, I was starting to transition out from owning gyms and into the hospitality business. And my first day at the hotel was their quarterly session. And at that point, only leadership was doing it. And, you know, I walk in and there's a big stack of books on my. On my desk. And I was like, I've read these already. What is this? And he's like, oh, we do eos. I'm like, oh. Oh, that's what it's called. Cool. I understand.

Christine Watts

[0:06:48]

Okay.

Jared Stein

[0:06:49]

And I jumped right into my first quarterly session. At the time, it was really raw at that organization. Team Health wasn't huge at the moment. There was a lot of conflict coming out of COVID And the business wasn't losing money, but it wasn't really making any either. And some things had to change, like, operationally, it was just a big venture to keep the wheels spinning. But we, you know, my tenure there, we went from, okay, five people are doing EOS and holding these meetings. My job as the ops director was how do I roll this out downstream? And it was a really interesting crash course. Stuff they don't teach in business school about organizational psychology. And how do you implement something when you have all these people who are in hospitality, and that's a very niche sector. And if you grow up in hospitality, you only work in hospitality. Well, there's only one way to do it, because Marriott has a proven process, Hilton has a proven process, the Four Seasons has a proven process. And all these people are coming from these embedded organizations and shifting the thinking to, hey, maybe we're going to do it a little differently here. And let me show you some value. And in six months, if you're not finding any value, let's have another conversation. And that's kind of how I got into the implementer role. And as I was transitioning out of hospitality into, you know, retirement services and wealth management, part of the job description was EOS implementer. And I straight up wrote the CEO an email saying, Calvin, your next COO, here's why, here's what I can do with EOs. Where are you guys in the process? And they were already on 90, which I was like, okay, great first step. Who else in the organization. Organization is doing it? And he was like, nobody. And I'm like, okay, I've done this before. Let me show you how. And that kind of brings me to today.

Christine Watts

[0:08:46]

That's awesome.

Jared Stein

[0:08:47]

Yeah.

Christine Watts

[0:08:47]

So when you were in hospitality, it sounds like you went into that and you had to drive revenue and you also had to fix culture problems. Were there certain tools you were leaning into as you were rolling it out that, like, helped you do that quickly?

Jared Stein

[0:09:00]

Yes. In short, we. I leaned heavily on EOS because of the, the backbone and core values that, you know, EOS makes sure you understand your core values kind of at every step. Right. When we look at the vto, when we run our meetings, when we talk about the lens in which we view the business, it's always through the core values of the business. And so Savannah's core values were super strong. And there's some that I still hold to today. I believe in it. Not only do I believe in the product, but their values are like my values. And I, you know, I really Leaned into them. And, you know, if you were to ask me 10 years ago, what do you think about core values? I was like, that is psychobabble bullshit. I don't want to. Don't talk to me about that. Just do your job. And then I saw how impactful they were, kind of on the broad scale, and I. You know, one of the core values at Savannah was teaming guest member experience, experience first. And so we would put all of our conversations through that lens and. And reiterate our core values and like, okay, well, does this. One, does it impact the guest experience or team member experience? And two, does it elevate it? And if it doesn't, check either of those boxes, like, we don't. We're not talking about it today. And so those were the tools in which I really had a pull from, because hospitality folks really do care about the guest experience. So I was like, okay, well, let's put it through that lens, and we'll have a conversation, and I'll just do the EOS template until you get comfortable with it.

Kris Snyder

[0:10:29]

One of my favorite stories is around core values. Core values are to be aligned to, not necessarily yours. Right? So maybe the founder started the company. Right. But we're aligning to those core values in those moments. And we. I have two daughters. They're 21 and 18 now, but we do core values as a family exercise, which is pretty cool. Like, and we believe that you activate, you know, culture through two things. It's the rituals, the things that you do, and the artifacts you create. So if you actually are at our house, you will see our core values are in the workout room.

Jared Stein

[0:11:00]

Right.

Kris Snyder

[0:11:01]

Like, next to the treadmill. Right. And what was cool, though, was we were, you know, be bold, be brave, love, give, and have fun. And then my daughter was probably 13, and she, like, at. At the table at night, I would say, tell me how you, like, live these core values today. This is terrible to be.

Christine Watts

[0:11:19]

I always say, man, your four kids,there's therapy coming for a mom.

Kris Snyder

[0:11:21]

But. But they would. They would give it back to us. And so. But my daughter Tess was like, dad, I don't think have fun is a core value. I'm like, oh, let's talk about it, right? She's like, I want to, like, say, find joy in the day every day. I was like, oh, so good.

Jared Stein

[0:11:37]

That's a good one.

Kris Snyder

[0:11:38]

Yeah, it's a good one, right? So we changed the core value based upon her reflection into the family, and it's like, oh, that's. That works, right?

Jared Stein

[0:11:44]

Yeah.

Kris Snyder

[0:11:45]

So I Don't. My whole point in bringing up that story is I. I do think businesses hesitate to bring them forward because I think sometimes they're like, well, what happens if people don't align to them? It's like, I think they do align. Like, just put them out there and let's go figure it out together. And if you need to modify something to get everyone on board, then figure that out.

Jared Stein

[0:12:02]

Yeah. And to further that point, now that we've rolled them out, at my current organization at Strategy, we're doing quarterly conversations and scoring people through the people Analyzer and seeing how they match up. And it turns out, like, you know, I'm at. I'm blessed to be at an organization that has really strong team health. I mean, like, 10 out of 10 alignment on core values. It's just really strong. And so when people are, you know, going through the exercise, you know, they're all pluses, and then they have reasons to back them up. And I'm like, yes, this is working. And, you know, it's. It's really fulfilling as someone who's newer to the firm, but also as someone who's responsible for upholding those every day. It was really enriching versus coming from another organization where, like, team health really wasn't strong at all. And you have to check your teammates being like, hey, is this aligned with what we're thinking? And if not, like, what's going on?

Christine Watts

[0:12:59]

We'll give a quick recap for anybody that doesn't know what the people analyzer is, what that is.

Kris Snyder

[0:13:04]

Yeah. So we're going to have core values. Right. I don't know if you have five, you have some number. Right. And then you pick a bar for each one of those. Right. And so the bar hopefully is, you know, probably if there's five, you probably three of them. It's almost always you behave this way. Most of the time is the next level down, and almost never is the other one. Like, we don't want that.

Jared Stein

[0:13:23]

Right.

Kris Snyder

[0:13:24]

Like, so. But you pick that and then you give the reframe to the person based upon the behavior of that product last quarter. And so you'll do that on core values. And then it's get it, want it and capacity to do it. And the one thing that I've seen over time, I think, Christine, you've. Maybe you've seen this too, is, is people inherently get most of the time like. Like the job that we're asking them to do. The want it part is tough.

Jared Stein

[0:13:46]

Yeah, it's a. It's a fun toggle yeah, it's.

Kris Snyder

[0:13:48]

It is because sometimes, as you know, you're building a company, you don't really want the seat that you're in. Right. And you look at them and you're like, do you want it? And they're like, I'll do it for you. Oh, no.

Christine Watts

[0:13:59]

Or for this amount of time.

Kris Snyder

[0:14:00]

That amount of time.

Christine Watts

[0:14:01]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kris Snyder

[0:14:01]

Which is fine for, for a little bit of time, but you can't do it for a long period of time because you got to want it. Like, you have to be passionate about it. You got to show up for it. Right. And if you don't want it, then it's going to come through.

Jared Stein

[0:14:12]

Yeah.

Kris Snyder

[0:14:13]

And the, The c. Part of that capacity is we can coach to that, we can help you with skills, but you just really need to have the. Want it.

Jared Stein

[0:14:20]

Yeah.

Christine Watts

[0:14:22]

So tell us a little bit about your current or current organization strategy.

Jared Stein

[0:14:25]

So Strategy Financial Group is a wealth management services, retirement services. We really pride ourselves on being a home office for those who don't actually qualify for a home office. So typically a home office will give you retirement services, tax planning, income strategy, legacy planning, and some, you know, charity work. So when I say legacy, I mean, you know, your, your trust. So a lot of people have a will, and that's not really great because every state has a different court and it goes to probate. And now your loved ones, in their worst moment, have to wait nine to eight months to settle your estate. And that kind of sucks. And so a trust is a really clean, easy way of avoiding that. And then, you know, the charitable donations, there's a lot of people who want to leave the legacy. You know, whether it's building a wing on the end of a school or giving a PETA or name the charity, you know, people have feelings about that. And so typically a home office, you need 10 to $50 million to get in the door. And that's not our clientele. My clientele are retirees nationwide who just need help. And what I've learned and what evangelicalized me into this space was that, you know, one, I saw it happen with my grandmother, I'm watching it with my parents, that, you know, these are things that aren't taught in school. You know, they're not talked about on a regular basis. You know, we hear a lot of chatter about Social Security this, Medicaid that. But there are other ways to protect yourself and your family or your spouse or your legacy without one, breaking the bank, two, paying egregious fees, and three, not having to go to Multiple different places. And so we all brought, we brought it in house. Our founder has been doing it for 24 years. He was evangelicalized when it happened to his dad. And everyone's got a really personal story and a personal why to it. And one, we want to help families. And it feels good to do that, right? Yeah, obviously we do it for a fee, but when you're watching Bob and Mrs. Smith leave the office with a smile on their face, feeling good, feeling protected, feeling safe, it's really enriching. And we've been doing it in the Valley. We're just starting to expand nationally. I'm happy to say that my parents are the first out of staters that are coming over. And um, just before this recording, I called her and she was like, I just had the meeting. It went so great. I feel so good. I, you know all the, all the words that told me that she feels safe in case anything happens to my dad. And I was like, yeah, this is why we're in the business.

Christine Watts

[0:17:01]

And so you joined today. We asked you to bring an impact moment. And so what was the story that you were hoping to tell?

Jared Stein

[0:17:07]

Uh, well, it comes with our, my current organization. We have a leader who, I don't know if she wants to do the lma, the lead, manage and hold accountable portion of her role. She's in the seat because of her tenure and she's the best at the job. Now, typically that's not how you pick a leader for a position, but there are some, you know, some instances of institutional knowledge where you're like, well, she really is the most qualified. Whether she wants to do the LMA portion of her job or not is yet to be seen. And it's an ongoing coaching conversation. But you know, when I told her, hey, we're rolling this out to your department, you, I set up your 90 page. All your team members have access and have signed in. Yeah, I've populated your, I ported your, your issues list over from the notepad we were using and you know, your scorecards are uploaded so you know, go with it. And she's like, I don't know how this is going to go. And I'm like, I think they're going to love it. She's like, why would you say that? I'm like, because now they have a voice. Now they have an opportunity to talk about issues in a really interesting way, dive deep into the discussion portion and actually solve their own problem without having to go to you, to you. Come to the leadership team and you can solve your own stuff down the stack before it bubbles up. And it's just apprehensive. And I'm like, I'll tell you what, I'll sit on the first however many meetings you want. And I'm happy to be the scribe and run the meeting for you. And she's like, okay, that made her feel a little better. We go to the first meeting and one, the teammates are pumped. They're like, oh, this is cool. Like, I got, I got FaceTime with my boss and my boss's boss. I was like, yeah, cool. Like we all sit in the same office, but like, you guys can come whenever you want. Yeah. And two, they were like, they really dug into the forum. One, they love the personal and professional best, right? That moment of personal connection, it's, it really is great because you, you, you get to interact with your teammates on a more personal level. It just brings tighter connection throughout the organization. And then the second part, we were going through the scorecard and it was clear who was performing and how much production they were doing. And A players are going to report out. And so like, our A players are top, top. We're so proud to see their numbers up there, like finally getting some recognition. And our organization's really blessed that we don't have a lot of C players. But the B players were like, oh, you know, not to make excuses, but they're like, we have more coming and they wanted to be up on that leaderboard. I'm like, okay, this is working. This is healthy competition. And then the meeting went, you know, we went through our issues list. They don't, they don't have rocks yet, but we go through the issues list and the conversation was riveting. I was learning things about their like day to day blocking and tackling that I didn't know about that maybe the manager did, but she wasn't sharing. And the meeting concludes. Everyone gives it a 10 and you know, just smiles across the board. And you know, I hung back with, with this leader and I said, well, how'd it go? She goes, I can't believe that went so well. And I was like, I can.

Kris Snyder

[0:20:07]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:20:08]

I was like, I've been doing this a long time. Like people really want to be seen heard, they want to report out. You have a great team. Like, give them a platform to like really shout it out. This is what the scorecards for. And you know, she felt much better. It looked like, you know, weight had been lifted off her shoulders. And now I don't have to sit in that meeting anymore. I still do Because I want to hear what's going on. But, you know, I pop in as a guest. I don't. I don't feel like I need to hold her hand and, you know, while she is still developing other aspects of the lma. But that meeting is going so great. She's so much more in tune. And when she comes to the leadership meeting, she has the answers already. Because they already talked about it today before for. And so for me, that was super impactful to see, like, one of the more important departments in our org really clicking, loving it, wanting it. And then they. They get it.

Kris Snyder

[0:20:55]

And I'll just. I'm going to plug 90 here for a minute. Right. You can have the system email you after every department meeting.

Jared Stein

[0:21:02]

Oh, I do.

Christine Watts

[0:21:03]

Yeah.

Kris Snyder

[0:21:03]

And it's great. Like. Like, you can see because it's. You're not reading the meeting, they're rating the meeting.

Jared Stein

[0:21:09]

Correct.

Kris Snyder

[0:21:09]

And if they're, like, averaging a nine, and all of a sudden they have a bad week and it's a seven, you can decide and how to engage in that. Right. Like, just dip in.

Jared Stein

[0:21:17]

Yeah.

Kris Snyder

[0:21:17]

You don't have to be at every meeting.

Jared Stein

[0:21:18]

Correct.

Kris Snyder

[0:21:19]

Because we can't. Like, it's just. Life is hard that way. Right. But. But you. You can see it. And I. I still do this. I'll. I'll pick up the phone, I'll call, and I'll be like, hey, that looks like that was a hard meeting. Let's talk about it. Like. Like, how do we get to a seven?

Jared Stein

[0:21:31]

Right?

Kris Snyder

[0:21:31]

That sounds like we're not, you know, we weren't winning today. And then they share and they start to unpack it. You're like, okay, I'll come next week and let's figure out how we can be better at this, because that's not. We're not a team that does a seven.

Jared Stein

[0:21:43]

Yeah, it's one of my favorite features, and it's one of my boss's favorite features. So as the visionary, he doesn't want to be in the weeds at all. He is very much like, textbook visionary. He comes into my office on Monday morning, he's got a thousand ideas. He throws them on my whiteboard. He's like, okay, you go figure it out now. And, you know, goes and does whatever he's got to do. But I set him up to receive those emails because he's been in the business for 24 years. There's nothing this man doesn't know about the world we live in. He is truly an expert. And he'll see something on some meeting and he'll pick up the phone. He's like, you need to dig in on this. And I was like, you got it.

Kris Snyder

[0:22:23]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:22:24]

And now I'm learning because he gets to. He has the visibility when he wants it. He doesn't have to micromanage. And I'm learning because he's picking things up and being like, hey, this is. This is a real thing. You have to go. Go dig in a little bit.

Christine Watts

[0:22:37]

Well, the visibility and giving everyone a voice is such a huge aspect. I think a lot of stop with the leadership team and they don't think to go down. So your expertise in seeing the value of how when every department leader is engaged with their department and what can happen through that.

Jared Stein

[0:22:53]

Yeah.

Christine Watts

[0:22:53]

Is really exciting.

Kris Snyder

[0:22:55]

That's where the power comes from. It's not the leadership team. Yes, we should all do that. But once you get everyone working in the system together, that's when it really starts to have momentum.

Jared Stein

[0:23:05]

And we share. I don't know if a lot of firms do this, but, you know, our. We have a production goal. Right. And the whole firm needs to be marching to the beat of that drum. And we share that metric throughout the organizations on everyone's scorecard. There's no hiding from it because I. I know by Friday if we are winning or losing in the week, and I know how that affects our year, how that's going to affect, you know, our future months. And I want them to know, too. And we've just changed our incentive plan to align with that because before it really wasn't. It was tangentially aligned and it was a really good plan when the firm was six people, and now it's not. And so we've had to reframe that. But the visibility downstream, everyone's looking and there's no place to hide. And, you know, at Strategy Financial Group, we believe that everyone's got to be an A player and that we don't have room on our roster for seas. And we really don't want Bs. We want. We want A players. We want people who want to report out. We want people who get excited about reporting out. We want people who come ready to win, who are asking questions, managing up. And the Scorecard 90 is just such an easy tool to use where they can see it. They know if it's right or wrong or trending in the right direction, green or red. And what they specifically need to do to impact the business to get us to where we need to be.

Christine Watts

[0:24:28]

It's interesting because actually, a lot of clients that I'M working with right now are hesitant to have everybody's numbers up there. Like, they're worried for their people, but it's not letting them step up or take accountability or do those things. So it's. It's refreshing to hear the perspective, because I feel like I share this. A lot of people want to do better, and they want to grow in what they're doing. And so this is like a very clear way where they can drive accountability and ownership for themselves and a little bit of competition. Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:24:57]

Not to say that, you know, particular groups have the ability to drive revenue, and some are operations and support, but when I look at, through the lens of the company as a whole, well, if the support function's not working, it's gonna be really hard to drive the revenue, you know, and so I want. And this may be some of my hospitality background coming in, but, like, this thing needs to run as beautifully and seamlessly for our guests and clients as possible. And everyone's got a part in that magic, whether it's our marketing department setting up seminars, whether it's our operations team picking up the phone to call a retiree about a cash withdrawal, whether it's our sales team treating every meeting as if it was the last one they were ever going to do. And at strategy, we have a big, wide range of clients. We have clients who come with US $150,000 in retirement savings at 65 years old. They need help. And then we have people who come in with $10 million who are going to be okay, but they don't. They don't know the tax implication. And they need. They need help, too. And we, we strive to treat all of them anywhere in between the same and have given that same gold or white glove experience. And everyone on the organization has got to be aligned with that. And that's why we want to go full kimono with our numbers, because they have to see it so they understand their impact to the business.

Kris Snyder

[0:26:19]

It's one of those moments where when I've been coaching clients, and I'm like, you have to win the week to win the month, to win the quarter, to win the year. And they'll have that moment. They're like, oh, you're saying we have to win the week to win the month? I'm like, yes. And how do you know if you're winning or not? Right to your point of, like, it's on the scorecard team. Just look at that. And if it's not winning, then fix it. And what's great about EOs and scorecards in 90 is. It's not a reporting function, it's a leading indicator of the function. And I think that often, like when we start to talk to teams and they're like, oh no, we, we have data and you look at it, you're like, yeah, but that's all lagging. It's like you're driving your car and I'm looking through the rear view mirror versus looking through the windshield.

Jared Stein

[0:27:02]

Correct.

Kris Snyder

[0:27:03]

That's not how we drive cars. We gotta look through and that's the leading indicators that we're chasing. And as soon as they can see that, then it just changes.

Jared Stein

[0:27:11]

Yeah. It's been super powerful for our team and we do look at both backward looking data and forward looking data, but much more so on the forward looking stuff because, well, what's done's done. Right. And we can learn from either we won the week or we lost last week, we can learn from that. But what are we doing now to impact this week, next week, next month, next quarter? And well, we know what the result is. We know where we gotta go. So what are we doing, you know, to, to drive that?

Kris Snyder

[0:27:42]

Yeah. On average there's probably five to 15 numbers on a scorecard and two to three of those are lagging indicators. Like cash is always on there for some reason. Like people. And I get it right. There's like, that's not a leading indicator, it's lagging. But, but the CEO, founder will probably feel better if they understand where their cash is at. So it's like, all right, keep there.

Jared Stein

[0:28:01]

Yeah, we don't, we don't keep cash on the scorecard, but we do report cash.

Christine Watts

[0:28:06]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:28:06]

On a weekly basis. Yeah, but we're in a. Look, I won't shy away from it. We're a successful practice. We are not. We're in an expansion phase. So, you know, our cash troubles are, well, are we going to expand the business or are we going to write a check to the irs? And my visionary is Hyper Growth Mode. He's got a BHAG out there where we do. I know where it is. I know how to get there.

Kris Snyder

[0:28:33]

But can you share what it is your tenure is, your 10 year target.

Jared Stein

[0:28:37]

Yeah, 10 year target to have a billion dollars under management.

Kris Snyder

[0:28:39]

There you go.

Jared Stein

[0:28:41]

And we are, we're marching that way. And we're growing quick, 26% the last four years of growth. So we are, you know, every couple years doubling the business from where it was. And it's really exciting to be a part of that. And we're. Because we're good at what we do. I would say we are the best of what we do. We're able to say, okay, well if we service X amount of families, we can expect X amount result and we want to get there. And the, our product offering doesn't necessarily lean to the bhag, it gives us a portion of it. But because we're in financial services, not every product is going to get, get us to the bhag, but we have to service everybody in their unique situation because some products aren't suitable for everybody. And so we just need to expand our market reach. And so that's, you know, when it comes back to cash, it's like, well, all right, how are we going to deploy that to help more families? And those are the conversations, you know, they're fun conversations to have.

Christine Watts

[0:29:36]

Yeah, yeah. Well, and earlier we were talking about the wealth transfer that's happening right now and how everything is going on. And so you guys are almost trying to keep up with that demand with people really thinking about exit planning right now.

Jared Stein

[0:29:46]

We are. And I saw an article from CNBC the other week, you know, was it $14 trillion in asset transfer? And you know, it's, it's anywhere from People's 401ks and IRAs and you know, qualified money, non qualified money that are safe in the bank to physical businesses that, you know, you own a dry cleaner and your kid doesn't want it, what do you do? And well, we can help you with that because quite frankly, that's a scary situation. Right? If you, if you ran a dry cleaner for 50 years, you're probably the guy you need to talk to to get the stain out of my shirt. But you're probably not the guy who's like poised to, you know, sell his business. And unfortunately there are predatory people out there, brokers, you know, you have private equity funds trying to roll every business we see, see it big in accounting services. You know, I've seen it in H vac services. You know, they're, they're finding industries where you have this transfer coming and these owners, you know, someone's offering them a big bag of money, but they don't actually know if that bag of money is appropriate for them. And that's something that we can help with. But what our firm specializes in specifically is that should something happen to someone you love and care about that, well, it's all in one spot. And you know, traditionally we've seen this bifurcation in the, you know, retirement wealth management space where, well, your tax return's over here. Your investments are over here. Your estate planning's over here. And, you know, your will is sitting somewhere in a drawer. Well, we want to bring that all in house, make sure that when the worst day of your family's life comes and you've left, that we can pull it off the shelf and say, hey, you're going to be okay. This is what we have. This is what's going on. Here's what your father or mother planned. How would you like to move forward? And you know that those are conversations that are starting to rapidly approach.

Kris Snyder

[0:31:38]

So I coached an IT managed service company, and they just recently sold to private equity. And when they came in, the private equity was just blown away. Every process was documented. It's in 90. All the scorecard data was there. Right. And this guy's name is Josh. Josh called me up. He's like, Kris,  like. Because we did this for years together, right? It's like they just couldn't believe we had all this figured out. It's like, yeah, it works. You did the work. You actually did the work. And so now when you go to sell to private equity and they look at it and they're like, we can value this. Right. Otherwise, it's really hard to put a number on that.

Jared Stein

[0:32:11]

Super hard.

Kris Snyder

[0:32:12]

You're trying to, like, sell the business, and you can't see it, they can't buy it. But if you've done that work with EOS and 90, then they can. They can see it.

Jared Stein

[0:32:19]

Yeah, there's tremendous value in that. Because if you were on the. I've been on the buy side of a transaction when I was buying gyms, and we'd go to, you know, we're talking CrossFit gyms. There's, you know, we used to joke there's two types of gym owners. There's business guys who think they can own a gym, and gym guys who think they can run a business and never works.

Christine Watts

[0:32:41]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:32:41]

So, you know, we'd go in and I'll never forget this transaction. It was in Tribeca, So it was CrossFit Tribeca or CrossFit 212 for forever. And they had been around for a long time. And I just dropped in, you know, not. I was looking to buy the gym, but the owner didn't know and the members didn't know. So I just dropped in for workout, see what was going on. I'm like, this is a cool space, like, physically cool, in a basement in Tribeca across from the FBI building. And I was like, man, this is a cool place. To work out. I would want to work out here. And so I pull the owner aside, and he looks terrible. He looks haggard, tired. He's doing everything he can to keep this thing afloat. And I tell him who I am. He had recognized me when I walked in, and the New York City cross site community was kind of tight at the time. And I was like, you ready to make a decision? Like, you want to make a move? And he's like, well, let me tell you about, like, you know, my life. You know, he's getting a divorce. He needs to liquidate the asset to satisfy the settlement. And I was like, all right, what's it worth to you? And he says, a number. And I was like, okay, show me. He can't. He's got no data. He's got no books. You know, he shows me a tax return that's got, you know, losses on it. I'm like, like calling Bob. I was like, bob, you're showing me, you know, five years of losses. How about you just give it to me and leave the security deposit and I'll run it for you? Like, you just walk away. You don't have to keep retina check. Every year he says, no, no, no, we make money. I'm like, okay, well, show me. Show me something, right? And he had no data. And I was like, bob, we can tidy this up real quick. You leave the security deposit, I'll give you a couple pennies on the dollar for the equipment, and then you just kind of walk away. And he's like, you know, I've been working so hard, you know, so long. And I'm like, I know that's. It's heartbreaking, but it's not worth anything. And in a year, this lease is going to be up and you're not going to be able to resign. So do you want this to be your, like, a legacy for you? Like, we're not gonna. We don't have to change the name, right? Your picture can still be on the wall. I'm a pragmatist. He can. Whatever we wanted. I was like, let me make it easy, right? We value this thing at zero. You owe nothing to the wife, you walk away. You take the $70,000 loss on the deposit. Your taxes are easier now, and, like, let me solve this problem for you. And felt a little gross because, well, the gym was losing money, so it wasn't really worth anything. But I'm a CrossFit evangelicalist, and I wanted these members to keep having a place to go. And I knew that with the right process. You know, all of our stuff documented the way we ran the business. This thing was going to make money, and it did, but he didn't have anything to show for it. You know, he didn't document anything. He didn't even know the guy who fixed the toilet. And I was like, all right. Like, all right, we'll plug and play our process in and see how it goes. But, yeah, it was. It was really. It was. It was kind of sad that, you know, he worked so long, but nothing. He had no numbers. He didn't. He barely had a tax return. It's really such a shame.

Kris Snyder

[0:35:42]

So don't do that.

Jared Stein

[0:35:43]

Yeah, don't. Don't do that.

Kris Snyder

[0:35:44]

Yeah. The takeaway is like, yeah, just don't do that.

Christine Watts

[0:35:47]

No, I'm sure it's hard to, like, think to get ahead because you're just, like, scrambling and trying to keep up, and then all of a sudden it's like, you're. You're too late. And so you coming in at that moment, it's like he didn't have time to even pull his head up and look at things.

Jared Stein

[0:36:01]

He didn't. And I would always say, because my. I was very blessed to live with my great grandmother when I was. Well, she lived with us when I was a kid. We had her until I was 12 or 13. And she used to always tell me, like, don't put off to tomorrow what you can do today. And, you know, she grew up on a farm in North Jersey. Like, she. She was a tough woman, right? Nothing got by this lady. And, like, she was like, if there's work to do, just do it now. Don't put it off. You'll feel better. And that's kind of how I approach business. It's kind of how I approach my life. And, you know, things like that, you know, having the business intelligence lined up, the processes built, because eventually you're going to need it and, you know, tie it back to 90. But, like, it's kind of the. Like, it's a really easy solution that just houses all of it, right? It makes it real easy to, you know, you have all the data for all the time in the world, and everything's super organized. And once you build it, it's pretty easy to maintain. It's why we love the software. It's why I. It's super important to the organization. But for me, as the, you know, the integrator, my title coo, but my job, my seat is the integrator is like, okay, well, one day, Calvin my. Our Visionary is going to want to exit. Well, it's my job to bulletproof him, to make sure he has the best possible valuation. And, you know, I take that role very seriously. And I was like, okay, well, all of our stuff's going in here, so by the time he's ready in 10, 15 years, we can open up, you know, flip the hood and he's gonna, you know, take his bag.

Christine Watts

[0:37:39]

It's awesome.

Jared Stein

[0:37:40]

Yeah.

Christine Watts

[0:37:41]

So I'm, I'm curious to hear. You've shared a lot about what you've built, the pain that you've gone through, Blood, sweat and tears. I want to hear about your biggest fuck up. What happened?

Jared Stein

[0:37:51]

Oh, well, I got a long list, but the biggest one, the biggest one was the, the, the Big Box Gym we bought out of bankruptcy. So my business partner and I have been running five CrossFit gyms. We are doing well, we're making money. We see this gym is up for sale in bankruptcy of a buddy of mine who I knew in the fitness space was like this gym broker, banker. So like sometimes finance a deal, he'd sometimes put the sellers together. Calls me up, he's like, yo, this is in your backyard. This is a slam dunk. Put your brand on it, put your touch on it, put your process. In big box gyms, like the, the sector is called low price, high value. So your crunch fitness is Retro Fitness, Planet Fitness, eos is. They're exploding because, you know, it's 25 bucks a month. You can fit, you know, a million people in there. Half those members don't show up and the overhead's low. So I looked at the model. I was like, yeah, it's in the best part of Brooklyn, like the nicest part of Williamsburg. I was like, yeah. And it was a million bucks to get it out of bankruptcy. I didn't have a million dollars. My business partner didn't have a million dollars. We had to go out and find a million dollars. So I called a guy that I'd done a couple deals with before and he was like, yeah, great. He lived like two blocks away. And we were friends, like actual friends. I worked with his wife at Flywheel. That's how we became friends. And I generally, like, love this guy. Like, I watched his kid a few times while they were like, on a date night. And so we were real friends. So he puts together the million bucks, comes time to close deal. We don't have like a really firm operating agreement in place. My best friend happens to be a transactional attorney. He's like, you better get that signed. Like, I can't do that for you. I'm on the transaction. I'm conflicted out. So you're going to have to go pay someone, you know, 10 grand to get this written, but you need to have this done. Didn't listen to him. Fast forward a couple months. This is like, right before COVID we had done the. My business, my other business partner, we redo the build out, we relaunched the sale process. It's going well. Like, we oversold our memberships. We kept the current members that were there. They're super happy. New equipment, new paint facility. Like, toilets work, the locker room's not dirty. Like, the smoothie bar is up and functioning. Life is good. This guy who helped me raise a million bucks sends us a letter. You're out of the business. And I was like, wait, what?

Kris Snyder

[0:40:15]

No, that's not.

Jared Stein

[0:40:16]

Yeah, I was completely blindsided because him and I are friends. What I later learned was he didn't like my business partner. My business partner didn't like him. But they didn't have to talk. They didn't. I was, I was, I was operating it. They were getting clean financials every month, and he just booted this out. And we had to go to arbitration. And I was like, hey, look, this is the money we have in the deal. You need to repay it. Right? But, like, if you want to operate and own a gym, go with God. You know nothing about this. Like, you'll. I was like. I told him, like, as a buddy, this is gonna be more of a headache than you want as an adversary. Just give me my money back. You can have it. Right? I, I, I knew what he was walking into. I don't know if he did, but, yeah, it was, it was really heartbreaking because it fractured the relationship I had with my business partner, who, you know, is still a dear friend, and I would never do that again without him. Right. You know, we were, we had perfect, like, symmetry. All the things he want, didn't want to do, I did. All the things I didn't want to do, he did. And we loved it. We went on vacations together, we ran the business together, we worked out together. We were two peas in a podcast. And then what I realized was we brought, we brought in a toxic pee and really, really messed things up. It was, it was expensive, it was messy. So the lessons learned here is one. If your buddy's a lawyer and he tells you to do something, just listen. You know, going into business with friends is a bad idea. And straying from your core business Focus. Big mistake.

Kris Snyder

[0:41:54]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:41:54]

And things, you know, long list of things I would never do again. That's. That's probably top. Top of the list.

Christine Watts

[0:42:00]

With hindsight being 20 20, is there something you feel like you would go back and do differently rather than just not doing it all? Like, is there things.

Jared Stein

[0:42:09]

Yeah, I would have leveraged the business. I wouldn't have taken equity out on the. On the million dollars. I would have go. I'd gone to a bank and. And just borrowed it and been like, hey, the model works. Like, we have other assets that we can collateralize. I wasn't as sophisticated on deal making at the time. I was kind of, like, in a rush to do it because it was in bankruptcy court. There was a time ticker on it. I didn't want to get outbid. I was so nervous about getting outbid, and I realized there was no other. I show up to bankruptcy court and, like, nobody's there. No one's there. It's just. Yeah, it's just me. And, you know, we had, you know, we had this massive fight with the landlord. It's, you know, 35,000 square feet in Brooklyn, and it's not. It's not a small space.

Christine Watts

[0:42:47]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:42:48]

And so I'm getting, you know, all this pressure to. To close this deal, and I took the easiest route, and 99% of the time, the easiest route is not the righteous. And, yeah, lesson learned. So, yeah, I would have to. To redo that. I would have kept our. Me and my business partner. That would have been it. I would have gone to the bank. I would have gotten creative with the financing terms. I would have done the deal because I believe in the business, the model works, and I would not have engaged a friend, you know, now. Now we're not friends. And that. That sucks. Like, I could. The gym. Those come and go. Like, yeah, money. You can always make more, you know, that I can leave aside. But I lost a friend, and that sucked like that. That was the trauma for me. It wasn't like, oh, now I don't get a piece of this. Cool gym, whatever. I got five others. Like, I. I lost a pal.

Kris Snyder

[0:43:43]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:43:43]

Yeah, yeah.

Christine Watts

[0:43:45]

I'm curious. My last question. So if you were doing something other than what you were doing right now, what would you want to be doing?

Jared Stein

[0:43:54]

Well, the Mets need a first baseman so that if. If I could. No, I. I love my job.

Christine Watts

[0:44:01]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:44:03]

I really do love it. I would. If I wasn't doing this current role. I mean, I'm still trying to be a published author. I have two Manuscripts in the pipe, trying to get those sold. But if someone would pay me to do that, that'd be cool, but that's not realistic. I think it's good enough. But I really love the business where I'm in. I love the families that we serve. I'm meant to do this. That's awesome. Yeah. It really speaks to my why. And if I wasn't doing it with this firm, I'd certainly be doing it with another.

Christine Watts

[0:44:34]

Yeah, it's cool you brought up core values earlier, too, because even a few weeks ago, we had a webinar that was talking about, like, that overlap of personal and business core values, and I can feel that coming from you, too.

Jared Stein

[0:44:44]

Yeah, it's important that it aligns with me. You know, I've. I've worked in places like the bank or the NBA where, like, values, like, just not aligned. Like, you know, they want to do something, and I. You know, do I get it? Yeah. Do I want it? I don't know. Do you have the capacity? Sure. Do I have the skill set? Yeah. But, like, the W was really tough for me, and then that's why the gyms were such a natural fit, because I. I loved it. I. I have a. You know, the reason I got into fitness was, one, it's passionate for me, but two, like, the, you know, the health and wellness space has been evergreen in my life since I'm 12. Now, I don't have to do that as a job. I get to do this for fun. But now I get to, you know, scratch that itch, helping people in a different way. So, yeah, the core values, if it's not aligned, you know, for me personally, I'm at a stage of my career where, like, I can make that choice. You know, some of us aren't that lucky when you're starting out, and I wasn't. But you. You get older, you get smarter, and you can choose what you want to do.

Kris Snyder

[0:45:42]

Two years ago, we were in Nashville as a. As a team at 90, and I taught Simon Sinek's Finding your why, and I am still, like, we had a team member talked about, like, what that did for her and how she's now living her life differently.

Christine Watts

[0:45:58]

Like, this week, she brought it up from something that happened two years ago.

Jared Stein

[0:46:01]

That's incredible.

Kris Snyder

[0:46:02]

She's like. That's, like. That changed it for me.

Christine Watts

[0:46:04]

Yeah.

Kris Snyder

[0:46:05]

And that's the kind of moments where you're like, oh, that's impact.

Jared Stein

[0:46:08]

Yeah, That's.

Kris Snyder

[0:46:09]

That's real stuff, which is why. Why we should do what we do.

Christine Watts

[0:46:12]

Yeah. And people don't take the second to slow down and really think about it, but when you go through those exercises and, like, can connect it to the bigger picture, it makes a big difference. So you land in the right place.

Kris Snyder

[0:46:21]

Yeah.

Jared Stein

[0:46:21]

There's a lot of value there.

Christine Watts

[0:46:22]

Yeah. Well, thank you so much for joining us. This was really fun. I enjoyed hearing your story, so it's my pleasure.

Jared Stein

[0:46:28]

Thanks for having me.

Christine Watts

[0:46:29]

If people want to connect with you, is there any place they should go?

Jared Stein

[0:46:32]

Strategyfinancialgroup.com Great. We offer the best strategy and financial retirement guidance one can get. You can find me on Instagram, Jared S. Underscore Stein, but that's mostly me lifting weights. I love it.

Christine Watts

[0:46:49]

All right, well, thanks for joining Impact Moments. Hope everyone enjoyed and Go win the week.

Christine Watts

[0:46:58]

And that was Jared Stein. What a great conversation. And taking the turn into exit planning and what that really means was fascinating. What really stuck with me was how he thinks about his role as an integrator through that lens and how his job isn't just running the business today, but it's making it bulletproof so that when the visionary is ready to exit in 10 or 15 years, everything is there and ready. If you want to connect with Jared, you can find his firm@strategyfinancialgroup.com and if you got something out of this episode, make sure you like and subscribe so you don't miss the next one. And of course, as always, share it with someone on your team that needs to hear it. Go win the week and we'll see you next time.