Why Most Small Businesses Stay Stuck (And How to Fix It) | Rob Young

Most business owners are experts at their craft—but they've never been taught how to run a business.

In this episode of Small Business Pivots, Michael D. Morrison sits down with business coach and author Rob Young to discuss the foundations every small business needs to grow, scale, and avoid becoming stuck.

After spending years in executive leadership roles before leaving corporate America, Rob transitioned into real estate renovation and construction. Along the way, he noticed a common pattern: highly skilled tradespeople and business owners were losing their businesses—not because they lacked talent, but because they lacked systems, processes, financial understanding, and business structure.

Rob shares practical insights from his book and coaching work, covering business plans, financial statements, KPIs, hiring, networking, systems, playbooks, and how owners can stop being the bottleneck in their own companies.

Whether you're a startup founder, contractor, consultant, service provider, or established business owner, this conversation provides actionable frameworks for building a healthier, more scalable business.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why every business needs guardrails and a working business plan
• The biggest mistakes small business owners make when scaling
• How to identify your best and highest use (BeHU)
• Why business owners become bottlenecks
• The importance of systems, playbooks, and documented processes
• How to hire the right people and avoid costly mistakes
• Why financial statements tell the real story of your business
• How KPIs help business owners make better decisions
• The difference between working in your business and working on your business
• How to build a company that doesn't depend entirely on you

About Rob Young:

Rob Young is a business coach, author, and founder of Stage 3 Group. After a successful executive career, he shifted into entrepreneurship and business coaching, helping small business owners develop systems, leadership skills, financial awareness, and operational structure to create sustainable growth.

About Small Business Pivots:

Hosted by Michael D. Morrison, Small Business Pivots features entrepreneurs, experts, and business leaders sharing the pivots, lessons, and strategies that help business owners get unstuck and grow.

Ranked among the Top 10% of podcasts globally by Listen Notes.

Transcript

Welcome And What To Expect

SPEAKER_01 0:02

If you're a business owner feeling stuck, overwhelmed, and ready to grow, you're in the right place. Welcome to Small Business Pivots, where founders share insights, stories, and pivots that lead to sustainable growth. I'm your host, Michael D. Morrison, a business coach helping business owners get unstuck and grow. All right, welcome to another Small Business Pivots where we have special guests from around the world. And as I've said before, there's two coaches on, two business coaches on the episode today. So you might want to buckle up. And if you've listened to the show before, you also know that no one can introduce themselves and their business like the business owner. So, my friend, I'm going to let you share a little bit about you, your upbringing, maybe a little backstory so people that don't know you can get to know you before we get

From Philosophy To Business Coaching

SPEAKER_01 0:55

going.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

Okay, sure. Yeah, I'll tell you my story. First of all, I'll start off by saying I am the last person who should be doing business coaching or I've had a business career. It was not in my DNA by any means. I grew up in Cincinnati and my dad worked in construction, never went beyond the eighth grade, but a super smart guy. And then he was a school bus mechanic for probably the last 20 years of his career. And learned a lot by watching him, and I may touch on that a little bit later. Worked my way through college, worked full-time, and was a full-time student, and I got a degree in philosophy of all crazy things. Um at the time I was thinking I'd be a teacher, uh, like a college professor, loved small liberal arts school and all of that. And I remember laughing at my friends who were business majors. And my position at that point was hey, we're gonna change the world, living in the realm of ideas. This is just high-priced vocational school for you. You're just here to get a job. It's a little bit self-righteous. And so, you know, I think God has a sense of humor, like, oh, let me just show you what's in school. Always. Yeah. So I kind of stumbled into a business career, was very fortunate that I got involved with a company and they saw some potential with me and put me through a lot of training. So, yeah, that's how I got involved in this.

Burning Out And Switching Careers

SPEAKER_00 2:10

At one point, I got into the C level and was working in companies anywhere from a VC-backed startup, a venture capital-backed startup, to a large public company headquartered in Europe. And I just got burned out. Was working 80 hours a week as a lifestyle, a lot of travel, a lot of politics, and I just absolutely hated it. So, in spite of the closet full of button-downs, uh, I love construction and it's been a big DIYer. And so in 2013, I left that world and I started purchasing and renovating historic houses. And I worked side by side with a lot of great contractors and tradespeople. And as part of my agreement with them, they had to teach me how to do construction. So I traded my briefcase for a tool belt, worked side by side with a lot of great people. And in that process, I watched a lot of these people that I really liked, really admired, respected their work, great at their craft, but they had never been trained to run a business. And I watched several of them lose their businesses. And so, really going through that experience, I thought now I have my mission. And I started off focusing on residential remodeling companies and have expanded what I do. So I'm kind of industry agnostic, like any small business I will work with. But that's like you, I just have a passion for this. I love small businesses. I appreciate what business owners do. Very challenging. More to do than they can possibly get done, more pressure than most people can really understand.

SPEAKER_01 3:39

Absolutely. So I always admire people that are consulting or coaching other people that have actually walked in their shoes, right? So you're not teaching from a framework, you're you're coaching probably from experience, I would assume, and helping these others uh not do the things you learned not to do. And so let's start with uh when you started a business, because a lot of our listeners are kind of in the early stages. What are some of the things that you would advise or suggest or recommend that they be focused on? Because they there's so much noise out there on the internet. You need to do this and buy this course and read that book. And and it's just very confusing, right? But there are some essentials in business that I think we should be focused on. And can you help us? Sure.

The Three Things Owners Need

SPEAKER_00 4:29

So I I wrote a book that was published last year, and it's I accidentally wrote a book. I can tell you that story, but it says basically if you're a business owner, you're there are three things you you need. You need to know certain things, you need to monitor certain things, and you need to do certain things. So foundationally, I think there are things every business owner needs to know. They need to know their business plan. Business plan will tell you what to do. More important, I think it will tell you what not to do. It's going to be act like the guardrails for your business. Same thing with a budget. And I know if you're just starting out, it's going to be a little more than an estimated guess. And that's fine. Thinking through those things and then letting, again, your budget not only tell you what to spend money on, but what not to spend money on, because there's always a temptation to spend money. And if you have a team, they're always going to want to spend more money. So those are foundational things, the guardrails. And then unfortunately, I mean, business is a numbers game. And so I think business owners need to understand financial statements. They don't need to know debits and credits, they don't need to be experts in accounting, but to understand that their financial statements are the report card for their business. And I like to say that the data in your financials, they tell stories. And so one of the things I do is help interpret those stories and help companies to respond to those stories. So those are things that I think are super important. I've worked in companies that have been around for 15 years, $10 million in revenue on an annual basis, and still don't have a budget. And it's it's pretty amazing. You can you can get big, but it's it's really challenging if you don't have the foundation.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

Absolutely. I'm a little bit older, and back in the day, business plans were 50, 100 pages, right? And they all had different summaries and columns and you know sections. You mentioned business plan so that someone doesn't go on the internet, find a business plan template, and spend a hundred hours on it. Can you kind of expand on what a business plan just to start with would look like so they're not wasting their time?

SPEAKER_00 6:31

Sure.

A Business Plan That Stays Useful

SPEAKER_00 6:32

And in the book I tell the story, I did the same thing. So I'm actually probably older than you are, Michael. We're similar anyhow. But when I started doing this, I wanted my clients to put together a business plan and I would work with them. But yeah, I expected 40 to 50 page plans that anticipated every possibility. Like that, and they never got done. And they resented it, me asking for that. And I realized eventually they weren't the problem I was. You just don't need that much. So I think some basic things. Foundation, the big thing for me, you know, you can talk about exit strategy and all of that, but really what I want to know more than anything is what problem do you solve? Who's having that problem? What is the cost of that problem? And what is someone willing to pay to solve that problem? For me, that is the heart of it. And everything else, just details beyond that.

SPEAKER_01 7:26

You mentioned foundation. Is that included in the foundation, or is there more to build upon so that they have a clarity about their business?

SPEAKER_00 7:36

Well, they do. So we do a lot of market analysis who your customers. So, for instance, my wife is a residential architect. She has a very specific niche. And if she gets outside of that niche, it's outside of her specialty, her capabilities, and she can get in trouble. And I've seen that a lot with customers. They're on this pathway and they do X, whatever X may be, and they're experts at that, but then they see an opportunity just off the trail a little bit. And they may not have the expertise, may not have the money to support it, may not have the resources, and they can get in trouble. So yeah, I think it's incredibly important. What problem do you solve? What capital do you need? Who's your market? All of those things. So yeah, and and like you, I've seen that there are all kinds of tools out there online that can lead people in a rabbit trail that goes very deep for a business plan that they'll probably never use. My take on it is that a business plan is a working tool. You absolutely need it. It should guide decisions, but it shouldn't restrict you. I like to think that the business is going to change and evolve, and my business is going to tell me what it needs to become. My business plan today is a lot different than it was three years ago. So I think it should be a good guardrail, but it's not something that's going to lock you in on unnecessarily.

SPEAKER_01 8:56

I love your term guardrail because I think people love stories. So I'm going to share a quick story. And we were working with a client, still are, that I would say their bandwidth, their capabilities, they probably took on a job. They saw flashes of money, right? But it was literally 10 times more than their capacity. It was big and big numbers and everything. And they're like, well, you know, even if even if we fail, we're still going to make money. There's room. They lost money, even though they thought they were going to make it. So having those guardrails of understanding, can we keep handle this job? You know, don't don't keep us from expanding and growing. But if you can't handle the job, like you said, your wife gets in trouble if she goes outside of her niche. And that's what those guardrails do is if you go too far out, you're probably not going to make money, get a bad reputation, it's going to cost you more time, all those things. Is that kind of what you're talking about? You got any stories like that?

SPEAKER_00 9:56

I do. I've seen, especially residential construction companies, probably what you're doing. You know, they have a particular niche and it may be a mid-market niche, and they typically do remodels that are anywhere from $80,000 to $150,000. And suddenly they have an opportunity to do commercial work, which is completely different. But oh, the money is so great, and we're going to make great connections, or to do a million-dollar project, and they just don't have the ability to do it. And so I think people get blinded. I talk about upside goggles. Uh, people were presented opportunities, and all they see are the upside to it. They don't see the difficulties and how they could get in trouble. So, yeah, I've seen that in a number of cases. But to get back to your point, I'm not sure that I fully answered your question about the components of the business

Values Culture And CEO Identity

SPEAKER_00 10:44

plan. So we start off with guiding principles. So, what's your vision? What are your values? What's your mission? And then what do you do with those values? So I don't want just a list of values. How are those going to play out in the day-to-day activities of your business? How's it going to play out in your culture and your interaction with your team and your customers? So we do that. We clearly define the products and services, and that's where the guardrails come in because you're you're limiting yourself to what you're really able to do. We do a lot of research on viability. And so that's the financial viability. Again, what's the size of the market? What is the problem you're capable of solving? Who's having it? How do you get connected with them? What are they willing to pay for it? Have everyone do a SWOT analysis. I assume most people have heard of that, but it's an analysis of your strengths and weaknesses, which are internal to the company, and then opportunities and threats, which are external things impacting the company. So we do the SWOT analysis, and again, it's it's not an academic exercise. Like, how are you going to respond to those things? We look at the competition, and you know, I always say, why would people buy from you when they have these three or four other options? And so we really hammer that down, and that affects the messaging significantly. So we have an operating plan, a marketing plan, and then we look at the financials. And then the other piece of the foundation, of course, is the budget. So these things tie together.

SPEAKER_01 12:08

I love because before our podcast opportunity, we had never met, right? And your coaching background is very similar to ours. And so I want your clients and my clients to hear, these are two people that never met coaching on these same principles. This does matter. This stuff matters. But one of the questions I'm always asked on the guiding principles, because that's the part where people get stuck. What is my what is my why what is my per all this stuff? And they're like, now what is this gonna do for me? Like, how is this gonna move the needle in my business? Can you and that's one of the questions is now what do I do with it? So, how do you get it to be part of the DNA moving forward so you have a business that can work without you? You got any tips on that?

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Well, I think part of it comes down to the DNA of the owner. And so I have seen enough podcasts or listened to enough podcasts and read enough books that I may be contrary to what some people do. And so oftentimes I've heard people say, hey, if you own a business, you are the CEO. That part I agree with. The definition of a CEO's job description, I offer a little bit of latitude for that. So, for instance, I had a client in Cincinnati when I lived there, residential remodeler, super high-end projects, historic houses. Two owners, husband and wife team. He was an absolute master craftsman. He was an artist with construction, an expert in uh renovation techniques for historic houses, materials, all of that. She did the design work. Written up in magazines, they were fabulous. They were the secret sauce to the business, but they were struggling because people don't reach out to you and me when things are going well, right? Yeah, because there's a problem. And so I was meeting with him one time. We were just doing a coaching session at a coffee shop, and I talked about you need to change your identity. You are not a contractor, you are not a carpenter, you are the CEO of a construction company. And I watched his posture change. He slumped down in his chair and I said, What's wrong? He said, Well, I guess what that means is I need to go home and learn Excel and sit in the office every day. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. You are the secret sauce. There's probably no one in Cincinnati who's better at doing what you do. Like, keep doing that. That's your passion. That's what you're wired to do. You're good at it. You can find nerdy guys like me to do spreadsheets and look at financial statements. You need to guide that and set the culture and they report to you. But I so that's one of the things I believe in. And I think one of the guiding principles, you know, everyone's going to say integrity and quality and all of those things, but how are those going to play out? And how does that tie to the reasons the owner started the company? Because I guarantee it wasn't to sit in a in a kitchen typing out on a spreadsheet every night.

SPEAKER_01 15:06

Right, right. I know there's some popular business books out there, nothing against them. They're very well thought and usable and applicable for most businesses, but for the smaller businesses, like what you and I are talking about, something you uh put there was uh this business needs to be an identity of you, right? And some of the business frameworks and books out there, it's like gather your team together and come up with a mission and a vision. And I'm like, but you can't do that in a small business, right? Because if those people leave, uh now who carries on that torch, if you will. Can you kind of explain like what can we what do we need from the business owner? So the identity is theirs, and then what can we involve our team with to kind of move the company forward? Do you have a breakdown or ideas?

SPEAKER_00 15:56

Yeah, well, a lot of what we do is we talk about where do you want to go? Like, why did you start your business? So I think I just I'm kind of a curious person and I always want to know why did you start the business? How is it different than what you expected? Because you know, everyone I think thought it was going to be easy, and in two years everybody's gonna be making millions and millions of dollars and you know, phoning it in from the beach or whatever. But yeah, we we work through all of those things, and a lot of it is just curiosity. And so uh again, I think the DNA of the company has to be closely aligned with the business owner. A lot of my clients have reached the point where they have employees, but that that informs whom they bring into the organization. And I think culture is a huge issue in terms of what happens in your business and how you're gonna perform. And you have to protect that by making sure that you bring people in who are aligned with you. Not to say they're gonna agree with every decision. I want healthy disagreement because there's a very real possibility I'm gonna be wrong about something. I want to set up an environment where it's safe for someone to tell me that in a respectful manner, and I will do the same with them. But I I think that's a big part of it, just figuring out what how is the owner wired? What was their what was their dream? Because there are easier ways to make a living than to try to run a business. So we we hit that pretty hard, and we just make sure that that is included in the values of the business.

Quick Coaching Offer Break

SPEAKER_01 17:28

If you're ready to get your business unstuck and grow, let's chat. Schedule your free session at michael dmorison.com. Now back to the show.

BeHU And The Question To Ask

SPEAKER_01 17:40

There are many things that business owners do. For instance, stay busy, right? But being productive is very difficult. Time management. And when you're wearing a lot of different hats as a business owner, everything's a fire. Everybody's calling you. So do you have any suggestions on how they can kind of reel it back in so they can focus on those things you talked about that they need to be focusing on?

SPEAKER_00 18:09

Sure. So I talk about two things BeHU, which is an acronym for best and highest use. And so I said, look at your schedule. What are you doing that is the best and highest use of your time? So this particular client, he needed to be in the field. He needed to be talking to clients, he needed to be coaching his team on making sure the job was getting done. It wasn't sitting at home working on a spreadsheet. So we look at Behu, not only for the owner, but for everyone in the organization. What is the best and highest use of their time and talents? The other thing that I tell people is I'm gonna constantly pepper you with this question to the point where you start asking it of yourself. What does the business need? And that simple question, I think people step back and look at that, like, oh yeah, the business doesn't need me to be sitting, you know, at home in my home office working on a spreadsheet. It needs me to be doing X. So those are the things that that I bring into the conversation.

Simple Systems Using Swim Lanes

SPEAKER_01 19:07

Let's talk about systems because there's all kinds of well, first of all, I believe most business owners have probably heard you need systems. Now, there's a million books out there, there's a billion templates, and but uh we can get overcomplicated on the systems. Can you kind of share for maybe three to five year starting business what are systems that would work for them? How do we get them to people to use them, follow them so that they're not so complicated? Almost going back to our business plan, right? We can write that big 50-page business plan or we can keep it simple for the relevant information we need. And I know the systems is a big thing. Sure.

SPEAKER_00 19:48

Yeah, absolutely agree with that. Uh I don't know that I have a set playbook that says these are the top three things. There's usually consistency in the top things, but again, I go back to questions and I ask questions like, what one thing, if it's done well, will really help the company? Is it sales? Is it administration? Is it product making? What is it? What one thing, if it's done well, will really help the company move forward? Conversely, what one thing, if it's not done well, will really harm a customer, will harm the business or cause us to lose money. So we go through that and and the owners have the answer, but you know, our job is just to help draw the information out of them and put that put them in a position where they can think about things that maybe they haven't thought about. So that's how we prioritize. And they're often the same types of things. So sales is a big thing. You need to systematize sales, you need to systematize your project management and so forth. I'm just gonna grab a little bag here. This is how I simplify this. Sorry, I wasn't planning to do this, but I bought these little cards here. These are small erasable marker cards, and I have either you're free-formed or I've just put words on them, and we just map these out. So I'm a big believer in a swim lane diagram as opposed to coming up, coming up with processes and procedures that are narrative-based. And so we'll just go up to a whiteboard and we'll say, here's a task, boom, what comes after that? And we just map it out. The beauty of these things on little magnetized marker boards or is that we can move them around as we need to. But then we just draw out a pathway, who's involved in the pathway at what point, what are the decision points, what documents are needed. So I just walk the customer through that exercise at the end. I take a picture of what we laid out and I put it in a swim lane diagram software, and there you go.

SPEAKER_01 21:45

I love that. You've talked about people, and one of the big challenges I hear from not just contractors, but most small businesses how do I find good people?

SPEAKER_00 21:57

Yeah.

Hiring Without Regret

SPEAKER_00 21:58

Well, let me tell you how not to find Good people. So I like you said, we could probably get together and just share war stories about what we've encountered. Probably the biggest people mistake I have seen is owners. They don't have a lot of money out of the gate, but they have a lot of passion and a lot of vision. And that's infectious. And so if they're talking to friends or family, you know, my friend Steve, I'm talking to him about my vision. And Steve's like, you know, I hate my job. I hate my boss. How about if we work together? Like, yeah. Yeah. And the biggest thing in terms of people that I've seen, small business owners, the biggest mistake, they hire friends and family. I've never seen it work out well, maybe once, but it's a strain on the relationship. If that person doesn't work out, it's really difficult to fire. You're losing not just an employee, but probably a friend. It's going to make Thanksgiving dinner awkward if it's a family member. So that's the biggest thing. I'm a big believer in networking, but for me, it's about defining the role. It's kind of like a business plan for a particular position. What is the role? What are the things that I'm expecting of this role? What does success look like? What do I have to be aware of? And so, however you go about connecting with people, whether it's networking, whether it's posting on LinkedIn or Facebook or indeed wherever, I think the critical thing is the mundane, boring, tedious work you have to do up front to describe the role and describe what success is going to look like. And what characteristics do you expect for that person?

SPEAKER_01 23:33

You mentioned networking. So we're kind of all over the board, listeners, and that's my fault. But there are keywords that you continue to say, and I'm like, oh, that would be something else that I've heard that they want to know. You mentioned networking, which is sales related. How do these business owners, when they're wearing all the hats of admin and hiring and firing and doing the jobs, how do they sell? Where do they sell? What are some good advice for those people that don't have the time to invest in a robust CRM and a marketing team and all that? Can you help us? Sure.

Selling Through Niche And Networking

SPEAKER_00 24:09

I think there are different methods. I think there has to be some sort of marketing, and you can outsource that pretty cheaply, whether it's Facebook or what have you. But again, I go upstream and it's defined by the business plan. Who are your ideal clients? Am I going to be a remodeler for everyone or is it a particular niche? I bet you and I are in agreement that it should be for a particular niche where I can develop expertise and traction and all of that. Um, but then where are you going to find those people? So I could pay a couple of hundred dollars per month for someone to lead my marketing efforts. But in terms of networking, just get out there. Where are the people you want to connect with? Where are they? And how do you how do you find them? Uh, whether it's the end homeowner that you eventually want to meet or whether it's a networking group. So I was a little bit skeptical. I don't think it's quite national yet, but there's a group I'm part of called Am Spirit. And we meet every Thursday morning, and there are about 20 of us, and all business professionals, most of us are owners, and it's just a referral networking group. So I have a roofer, I have a sidewalk repair person, I have a home inspector, all of these people who are in similar or in industries that are, you know, kind of touching construction and the amount of referrals they give back and forth, they're pretty amazing. So I know there are a lot of networking groups out there, some virtual. So yeah, I would try a couple and just see what sticks.

SPEAKER_01 25:36

But what you're really saying is make sure your target market is there, right? Make sure your target market is there. Yeah, absolutely.

The Owner Bottleneck And Playbooks

SPEAKER_01 25:43

So we've all heard, or most of us have heard, that the owner is the bottleneck of the business. Can you explain what that is? And then also what working on the business versus working in the business? Because I'm asked that often. So what would I do if I'm not working in the business, if I'm not, you know, doing home remodeling? What would I do? Working on versus in, and then also where you see most business owners being the bottleneck in their business.

SPEAKER_00 26:10

Sure. I think where most business owners are the bottleneck is they're doing trying to do everything when it's just impossible. And so again, we go back to those questions of prioritizing how are we going to set up our operating procedures, what's going to give us the biggest impact, what's going to hurt us the most if we don't do it well, and we develop those things. And then we just go back to Behu as well. What's the best and highest use? And so, even if we determine, like my client in Cincinnati, the best and highest use of his time was being in the field, guiding the team, overseeing the projects, because he was this amazing craftsman and artist, the other things need to get done. So he just needs to find someone to be able to do those things. But again, I think it's it's process, putting processes to everything, especially the things that are going to come back to bite you if you don't do them well.

SPEAKER_01 27:03

Some people don't know the importance of processes as you're speaking. Can you kind of share what those do long term for a business?

SPEAKER_00 27:13

Sure. So I have a client here in Columbus, and he's an ultra-high-end custom home builder. And he cycled through a couple of project managers. He had a total of four project managers, no other employees. They bring in subs for everything. And he had a project manager who left for another opportunity recently. And so this guy stepped in and was wrapping up a project, and he ran into his electrician. And his electrician said, Hey, I have to tell you, you're the fourth project manager within your organization that I've worked with. And every single one of you does things differently. And it's hard on me. I don't know what to expect, you know, from planning to paying invoices to all of this stuff. He said, You need a playbook. So my client and I met the day after he had that casual conversation. And he said, Rob, you've been telling me that for the last 18 months. He said, My relationships with my subs would be so much better if I had a playbook. My relationship with my clients would be so much better if I had a playbook. I'm gonna put the playbook together. He said, I'm sorry that I didn't listen to you. It took my electrician telling me that in order for me to really step up and do that.

The Accidental Book And KPI Monitoring

SPEAKER_01 28:25

All right, let's talk about your book. Okay. Go deep diving into it, who it's for, how it can help people.

SPEAKER_00 28:32

Well, so I mentioned before that I accidentally wrote a book. It was not on my radar. And within a two-week period, I had six business owners, three who were clients, and three people just in my network who said these words to me. I don't know how to run my business. Usually it was preceded by a statement of, I know how to X, you know, my craft, develop software, build a new house. I know how to do my craft well, but I don't know how to run my business. And finally I asked, like, well, what do you mean by that? And so the things I heard were, I don't know what information I should be looking at. Where do I find it? What's it telling me? What do I do with it? Other than looking at my checking account, you know, logging in and looking at my bank, how do I know if I have money? How do I know if I'm gonna have money? What meetings should I have? How do I organize my time? So basic blocking and tackling stuff that I took for granted because I had spent 20 years in the corporate world. I'm like, oh yeah, of course they don't know these things. And so I sat down and I started writing what I thought was going to be a series of blog posts or white papers. And at the end of that first day, I had 30 pages. I was surprised I had that much. Next day I picked it up. I had 50 pages by the end of the second day, and I just kept going. So it is designed for business owners who've never been trained to run a business. And it's trying to make it simple. So again, you build the foundation. So there are things you need to know: business plan, budget, those are your guardrails, your financial statements, or your report card. So those are the things you need to know. And when I was in school, I was a pretty disciplined student. And I never waited until my report card came out to see where I was on with my grades. I was constantly monitoring them. And if my scores started to slip in a particular area, I could intervene. So the second thing that a business owner needs is to monitor things. They need to monitor things. So key performance indicators, pipelines, cash forecasts. And so we help them put together these systems that monitor different parts of their business. I don't want them to have to search through a bunch of data and spend hours doing that. We have monitoring systems. So they look at there, they can look at the dashboard and see what's going on. So no monitor. And the last thing is do. What do you need to do? So we've already talked about Behu, best and highest use of time and talent and wiring. The book is simple, like what meetings should you be having? What are suggested agenda for the different meetings? All kinds of things like that. So it's very practical stuff. Ideally, you're gonna have a playbook, and that's really what the book is. It's a framework and it's a playbook, and you put those two together. And I think any business owner should be able to use it and start running more effectively. So I do I want to go back to something you talked about earlier.

Time Management Meets Energy Management

SPEAKER_00 31:21

I think we talked about time management and so forth. I'm a big believer in that and organizing your time, but I couple that with energy. So I wake up about four o'clock every morning, just for whatever reason. I just wake up and that is my highest time of energy. So from like 4 a.m. to 10 a.m., I am full of energy. And then I start to slow down and usually lie down for about 15 minutes after lunch and then come back to medium energy over the rest of the afternoon. So I align my tasks that I need to do with my time and energy levels. And so anything I need to do that requires deep thinking or creativity, I do in the morning. I can respond to email anytime, you know, unless it's a really complex thing that I'm dealing with. I can just respond to emails about, I don't know, one o'clock right after lunch or something. So that's a big thing as well that I advocate, and that's talked about in the book.

SPEAKER_01 32:17

We've covered a lot of things. There are a lot of hats to wear as a business owner, and I'm sure you've piqued the ears of interest from many of our listeners.

Where To Follow And Get Help

SPEAKER_01 32:27

How can someone follow you for more tips, insights, any blogs, podcasts? You got the book.

SPEAKER_00 32:34

I have the book. Yeah. So if anyone is interested in a free assessment, they can go to bizheealthassessment.com. It's free. 50 questions takes about eight to ten minutes to fill out, and it will give you a score in 10 different areas of business. So biz BIZ, bizhealthassessment.com. They'll find that. My website is stage three group.com. So stage number three in group. And so the idea is that that's where I think business owners really get into the deepest trouble because the business has grown beyond infancy and early childhood. Uh, sometimes I tell people that I help business owners move their company from unruly teenager to mature adult. So I think that's what we're both doing here. So we're curious, that's how the name came about.

SPEAKER_01 33:21

I always kind of before the teenage years, I feel like they're sometimes running a daycare. Yeah. Right. So running a daycare to the teenage, terrible teens, and then a mature business. I love that. Yeah. So I end up with a question usually. And so our question of the day for you is if there was one thing that's applicable to every entrepreneur, what would that be?

Give Yourself Grace And Keep Going

SPEAKER_01 33:46

Could be an insight, a quote, a book other than yours that could help them no matter what business they own or what size of business they are.

SPEAKER_00 33:57

I'm gonna say insight. And this is just from my observation. I again, God has a sense of humor because I kind of mocked business majors, and now here I am doing what I am doing. But I think there's probably nothing better or nothing more, I don't know, heroic is probably overstating it. But running a business is hard, but it's important. I think it's a way to make the world a better place. And so I just want people to give themselves grace. I don't know if you've run into this, but again, people reach out to us because things aren't going very well. And the amount of shame I have found in working with clients and they feel like failures and they're full of shame. Like, no, you're an absolute world-class expert at what you do, the craft of your business. You've never been trained to run it as a business. Like, you're fine. Cut yourself some slack. So cut yourself some slack, get help where you need it, and I think that's a good pathway to success.

SPEAKER_01 34:52

I love that. You're absolutely right. I I forget from time to time. One of the questions I'm asked from a lot of business owners am I the worst business owner you've ever worked with? No, I'm the worst business owner. That's why I'm trying to help you.

SPEAKER_00 35:08

Yeah. Well, and it's funny, and I say this in the book like the lessons in this book, they're not because I'm a smart guy. It's because I've made mistakes. I've watched other people make mistakes, and then we figured out, all right, what's the solution and how do we avoid that? Yeah. And that's really the majority of it, just stumbling myself and learning from it. There are a couple of times when you know I saw people do things really well. We brought that into the book as well. But yeah, it's it's hard.

SPEAKER_01 35:35

It is. It is. Well, I appreciate you and your time and your insights. You've been a blessing to many, and I wish you continued success, Rob. Well, thanks. It was fun. Thanks for the opportunity, Michael. My pleasure.

Subscribe Share And Final Goodbye

SPEAKER_01 35:50

Thanks for listening to Small Business Pivots. If you're ready to get unstuck and grow, schedule your free coaching session at MichaeldMorrison.com. On social media, you can find and connect with me using the handle Michael D.Morrison OKC. And if today's episode helped you, subscribe and share it with other business owners. Until next week, keep pivoting.