Welcome to the Make Others Successful podcast💡 We explore how to make work easier with the tools you already have. From M365 tips to creating a modern workplace, our goal is to help you create a workplace you love and make you successful.
Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Make of the Successful, a podcast where we share insights, stories, and strategies to help you build a better workplace. Guys, I'm I've already talked to these guys for, like, hours today. We've had back to back to back meetings. So if things seem charged or, like, we've talked about this and been into it before, we have.
Mitch:But we wanted to sit down and record some of the topics we've been talking about and focused on over the past couple weeks. Let's do intros really quick. This is Mike. He's a hobby beekeeper. What's the update on the bees?
Mitch:Yeah.
Mike:That's I we're not gonna talk about the bees.
Mitch:The bees. One is surviving out of how many?
Mike:It doesn't even matter.
Mitch:So when he says hobby, it's real. It's really like, it's just a hobby. He's I spent his bees die so fast.
Matt D.:Care if they die.
Mike:I I spend more money on them every year.
Mitch:Yeah. Yeah.
Mike:I've already started that ball rolling again.
Mitch:This is Matt. He hasn't had a pina colada.
Matt D.:I've never had one ever in my life.
Mitch:And my name's Mitch. My little boy just turned two years old this weekend, and we got to go to the museum. It was lots of fun.
Mike:I saw the cake. Yeah.
Mitch:Yeah. Wife did a good job with that. Props to her. I would have a way less exciting birthday party if it weren't up to her. So
Mike:It's a good thing you let everyone know that we had a little bit of charge under us today given the way that this intro has gone. Yeah.
Mitch:Let's let's get rolling, please, Mike. What are we talking about today?
Mike:So today, the topic is there is no perfect tool. And so we're gonna kinda come at this probably from a few different angles, but I think, there's often people that that seek our help or are trying to make a better workplace, and they're always looking for a perfect tool. So the idea or the concept is there's some tool out there that's gonna solve my project management problem, or there's some tool out there that's gonna solve my invoicing problem or my time tracking problem. Right? There's all of those plethora of problems, and I just need a perfect tool.
Mike:I need to find that perfect tool to solve that problem. But we're here to tell you that that doesn't exist. There is no such thing as a perfect tool.
Mitch:Especially in the Microsoft world. Is this just our way to give Microsoft an out and because their tools aren't good enough and we're saying it's just an excuse? Is Is that what this is?
Mike:No. I actually think there's no perfect tool.
Matt D.:Yeah. I agree that there's it's not an out thing. It's a focus thing. People are focused too much on getting a tool that is perfect rather than just doing what they can and having the right mindset and all of these other things that we're gonna talk about.
Mike:And this is one of those things that, you know, when you focus on something being perfect, it often slows progress. Right? Because you've probably heard people say a thousand times before, don't let perfect be the enemy of good. If if you're focused on finding that perfect tool and the truth is you that there isn't one, well, then you're not gonna make any progress because you're not gonna find it or you're gonna try a tool, and it's not gonna meet the needs or your expectations, and you're gonna move on to another one. And you're not really actually making progress or growing.
Mike:And so that's just one of the ways that that you'll get stuck in a loop. And then some of the other things that we're gonna reference or talk about in this podcast is how there are some foundational things or some essential things that are far more important than finding a perfect tool or the specific tools or what the tools do. And then we actually have some news. We have a bit of a product launch that we're working on that's related kind of to this specific topic, and we'll talk about that toward the end. And I think the thing that we can lead into this conversation with is is gonna be something like especially on the Microsoft three sixty five side is Microsoft three sixty five may feel like just a bunch of tools.
Mitch:Mhmm.
Mike:Right? And so you're probably trying to figure out, like, is one of those tools the perfect tool? How do I make those tools into the perfect tool? Right? Mhmm.
Mike:And so we wanna really kind of set the mindset and give people some kind of wisdom and and think about how to approach those tools in that world, in order to make a better workplace.
Mitch:Yeah. A lot of people have looked at me and said, I feel like a lot of these tools can do sort of the same things, and there's overlap. Which one do I choose? Please steer me in the right direction. And some of the guidance that I've actually kind of piggybacked on Microsoft from is think about it less as there's one tool to do a singular job.
Mitch:Think of it more as if you're showing up with a toolbox of tools. There might be more than one thing that can solve the same problem, but some might be more specialized or you might be more comfortable with one over the other. So we're gonna kinda talk about that analogy throughout this podcast. Cool. So let's get right into it.
Mike:Let's talk about the obsession with perfect tools and why some people focus on tools specifically.
Matt D.:Yeah. I mean, so for me, it all starts with a focus on what I need in my role for my purpose. And when you come to those things, that's that's a very natural approach that everybody has. And so when that happens, I'm thinking about what's perfect for me. Right?
Matt D.:But the reality is what's perfect for me isn't necessarily what's perfect for the entire organization. And chances are you're going to struggle to find something that is perfect for everyone in the organization. Right? You're gonna have to pick winners and losers. You're gonna have to pick between them.
Matt D.:Right? The options that you have in front of you. There is no, as you said, Mike, there is no perfect tool, but that only that that statement only really works when you think about it comprehensively. Right? It could be the perfect tool for the person that's trying to accomplish a particular job to do a particular thing, and it could absolutely blow up somebody else's workflow, effort, what how they're doing their work and their job.
Matt D.:And the question is, is that okay?
Mitch:Would that make it an imperfect tool, though?
Matt D.:It may make it an okay tool to use, if that's what you mean by imperfect.
Mitch:By definition then, that couldn't be a perfect tool if it Yeah. Hurt someone else.
Matt D.:Correct. Yeah. Yeah. A %. But the reality is in life, there are winners and losers.
Matt D.:There are people who have to work a little bit more for the benefit of the overall goal that you're trying to accomplish. It's just it's the way it works. And in in that case, I presented it very much as work. Could just be a cost thing. Right?
Matt D.:This thing costs three times as much as doing it the other way from a, like, a dollars and cents perspective. Right? But it this the the people using it are way happier with the way they'd you know, that's still a choice that you're making. Mhmm. So it isn't always just about effort or work or you know, it's looking at all of these things comprehensively, and that's the context in which there is no perfect tool.
Mike:There's so much I feel like there's a ton of analogies here. We could draw one that just came to my mind. You talked about tool being perfect for one person, but not for maybe other people in the organization. When we think of tools, I go right to, like, carpentry and building houses and, you know, hammers. A hammer may be a perfect tool for somebody who's just getting started in framing houses.
Mike:Maybe not so much the air nailer. Right? Because you could do a lot of damage with an air nailer if you don't know what you're doing. But the air nailer is a much better tool in the hands of an experienced professional carpenter, right, home builder. And so taking a step back and, like, often we care about efficiency.
Mike:Right? What's the most efficient tool in that scenario? Well, the air hammer.
Matt D.:Well, maybe if I only have two nails to put in
Mike:Right.
Matt D.:Right, the cost and the effort of taking out there the the the air compressor and getting the and nailer buying the nailer, setting it up, configuring it, getting all set to go. But to put two nails in, this is a waste of time. It's a waste of time and money. Yep. But for somebody whose job it is to frame houses, you bet that that is that's an essential pool.
Matt D.:That is absolutely something you have to have.
Mike:Right. And so taking a step back and looking at the big picture, what you're trying to accomplish as either a team or an individual or as an organization is important Yep. In any of those scenarios, right, when you're trying to select the right tool.
Matt D.:In the same context, when we talk about this obsession with perfect tools, you often get a couple different two main perspectives when you're talking the IT space. Right? You get end users who are like, I have this cool new tool that I found that does everything perfectly, exactly what I want. Right? But it requires us to put our data and and share our data with everyone in the world because it gets pushed up into the cloud and into a knowledge base that they're leveraging for some other purpose.
Matt D.:Right? That's perfect for me. Maybe there's no other tool that works this way anywhere in existence on the planet, and it's perfect for my job and what I'm doing. But it doesn't cross the baseline when you talk about from a compliance, security, like, all of these other things that are important maybe to the business. Right?
Matt D.:Maybe those aren't important, and it is a good tool for like, you don't care about the data that you're putting into it, and it really doesn't matter. Right? There is it's so complicated, and it there is two different ways. And so that one side is the end user side, and then there's compliance, IT, security, finance, all of these other business areas which compete against that. And choosing the right thing, there's no real right answer because there is no perfect solution.
Matt D.:We have recommended people use other third party tools. Like, that is a thing that you should do if it's the right thing for your business and for what you're doing, but you shouldn't start from the assumption that just because this is the perfect solution, that it's a perfect solution for someone doesn't necessarily make it the perfect solution for you.
Mitch:I feel like a lot of this translates to if you're looking at our YouTube channel, you've probably noticed over the past couple years, we've done less of the click the specific button to do this thing because it gets someone to an outcome because we realize, yes, while that might be helpful in that moment, it doesn't help them understand all the concepts. Or if we do do something instructional, we we might take a couple extra minutes and explain some of the concepts. We have people complain all the time. I feel like this could have been three minutes. Yeah?
Mitch:But you wouldn't understand these other things. If you're just looking for a a nail for your hammer, go elsewhere, please. But there are these these core things that are are so essential for people to understand so that they can approach this problem and actually see success on the other side of it and not just treat it like a nail.
Matt D.:So you're you're moving into a related but separate topic a little bit, which is, like, tools and understanding the tool and choosing the right tool and knowing how to use the tool is only one part of the process. Right? When somebody decides, this is the tool I need, this is the approach I need, go teach everyone how to use the tool, that is one piece of the puzzle. There's another piece that is if people don't have the baseline understanding of how to work in a modern environment in in this modern way, you're gonna struggle regardless of the tool that you choose. Right?
Matt D.:Again, me as a person who's super tech technical, maybe I'm leading an organization and I'm this is I think this is the perfect this is the perfect tool because I can see how it all works, and I can see the approach that we can take to make that work. Taking that into a workforce that doesn't understand the the thinking behind it, the thought process, it will be very difficult to get that to work out how you want, not because the tool is bad, but because you're not effectively getting everyone on board with the baseline, the base way that you should work as an organization, as a as an employee, as a as a team. And what we have found, which is what you're getting to over the last couple years, for sure, is that that is a way more transformational process than implementing a particular tool.
Mitch:Mhmm.
Matt D.:When you can get an organization in alignment on how to work with these tools and in this modern way, regardless of what tool you're using, whether or not it be a third party tool, whether or not it be a Microsoft tool, whether or not it be a Google tool, whether or not it be any tool at all, if they can up their game in regards to how they think about work in this world, you'll see a huge transformation that may change your opinion of this tool, this perfect tool that you're looking for, right, because you may not have some of the pains you have today. You may have different pains once they once the team once the organization kind of ups their game, across the board.
Mike:So, Mitch, you had framed those things as core, essential. We started to talk about them in terms of being foundational. Mhmm. I just wanna restate, Matt, I think what you just said in in a different way, and that is that foundation. Once that foundation is applied well, your people can move from being nailers to home builders, Giving them the ability, giving them that foundation so that they can move out of their simple, I need to build this widget every day into, I see where the organization is going.
Mike:I see where my team is going. I have that vision, and I can make the right decisions without leadership intervening all of the time. I think that's the vision that which we're trying to, like, help people get to Mhmm. Right, where they're equipping all of their people to be visionary in that way. Right?
Mike:And then they just need to worry about getting everybody aligned.
Matt D.:Yeah. And another way to think about it is that a lot of people people are familiar very familiar with my local computer and my local desktop situation. Right? That is, like, almost ubiquitous at this point. People understand the concept of that, and they understand how that works.
Matt D.:They also understand text messaging. Right? What they don't quite understand is when you branch that out into all of these other systems that are interconnected. And by teaching people about how to make those work better or how they work together, you're giving them that foundation. You're giving them that ability to go start thinking for themselves again because what's really goes on when you start to leverage some of these other tools is they lose their ability to think by for themselves somewhat, right, because they don't have a a common language, a common thought process about how that works.
Matt D.:Right? When that you we took away the, oh, I just emailed this person and they'd figure it out. We took away the, I go to their desk and tell them a thing, and they they they just do it. Right? The things that that are not come naturally to people, you're those things are gonna go away, and you're gonna be replacing with something else that's a little bit foreign to people, and they need to have that change in knowledge, that change in understanding so that they can start to, like you said, become builders of houses, become able to be effective at those things at a much higher level.
Mike:I like that the term you use ubiquitous. I think in many ways, we're trying to make the this new modern way of work ubiquitous. It it
Matt D.:the interesting thing is it is ubiquitous. Like, everybody has these things. Whether or not you're a Google shop, a Microsoft shop, you've got tools
Mike:that work this way. Using them the right way.
Matt D.:Them and understanding how that yeah. It's not it's not common. People don't start from the mentality that you need to make that happen.
Mike:And I think people assume that they're using them the right way.
Matt D.:A %. Right. Yeah. %.
Mike:Okay. So now that we started to talk about some of the the foundations, right, these things that that we're trying to piece together, what are they?
Matt D.:When we think about the foundations of this modern work, it kind of spreads across a couple different areas. Some of them we've heard us talk about in the past. So these would be things like topic based communication and organizational knowledge. Those are really core principles that people need to understand. You know, it's it goes aligned with what I was talking about before about the difference between my local drive and my local machine versus stuff that is organization focused.
Matt D.:Right? So that's that's some of it. Another one is effective meetings, so smart meetings. Right? Supercharged meetings using technology is the way I would describe it.
Matt D.:Right? We're not really gonna be teaching you from a foundation's perspective about how to actually run the meeting necessarily, but there are definitely some tools and some tricks and some approaches that you can take to scheduling, managing, and running meetings that will make them much more effective. And then also understanding the different types of of work that happens in organizations that are very common. You know, we call them the three p's, projects, people, and process. Right?
Matt D.:So it's it's those types of things are the foundations. And once you understand those things and you can kind of put into into focus what tools and what approaches you can use that are common to solve those problems, a lot of things just unlock in the day to day work that people do.
Mike:So maybe something like making sure that my people understand the outcome that we're shooting for and why that's important and letting them piece together how to use the tools to get that done.
Matt D.:So that is the end goal. The goal is to inform people enough that they are able to go take what they know of what their job entails and what they're trying to do and be able to improve that Mhmm. And leverage these tools in an effective way for their their job. Okay. So that's once you're done with with understanding the foundations, you should be able to do that.
Matt D.:Okay. You should be able to look at what you have to do, know the tools, and make your job better.
Mike:Okay. So in that scenario where we communicate what needs to be done and we assign responsibility and let them figure it out, there's a concern there that it's a little bit like the wild, wild west. They're gonna go do whatever they want with whatever they want, however they want, whenever they want. Wallet. Right?
Mike:Right.
Matt D.:Yeah. Yeah. So it's interesting. My first reaction is most organizations don't realize that they are currently in the most extreme form of the wild, wild west there can be, where everyone is doing stuff on their individual based tools, which is the most wild west you could ever be.
Mike:Tools like?
Matt D.:Outlook, OneDrive, like, these types of things that are very individual focused or personal focused. So that's my first response. But then I I think one of the weird things you're getting at is, like, organizations can be can have a separate problem when that they start doing this, and then because Microsoft has made it super open, they get 50 teams for the same purpose, for example. Right? Or they get four SharePoint sites and four people competing for the same thing.
Matt D.:And so probably when when I think about their ways and there's tools and and approaches that you can take that basically saying, you know, we're gonna start down this journey, but we're not just gonna let everyone create these new places. These new places are gonna be have a little bit of structure, a little bit of of organization. You know, we've talked about it in the past from an an approval process for SharePoint sites or an approval process for Teams so that you just don't get seven, eight, 10 of the same thing over and over again. But I think the most interesting thing about what you asked is that I would contend that most organizations are in the worst, most extreme form of the wild, wild west. The real risk about making the switch in an uncontrolled manner is that they get into a situation where everybody's doing the same thing, which doesn't isn't as much wild, wild west as it is sprawl.
Matt D.:Right? It's a uncontrolled sprawl of content, which is a little bit different than wild. It can seem very similar. It can look very similar. But because
Mitch:I think what happens on the flip side is if you don't give people their domain to to play a little bit, then they only have the things that they have personally. And so then they live in those spaces instead of and so IT's basis is lock everything down and control, and those things just create all that the shadow IT scenarios where people need to go around the system in order to make something work.
Matt D.:The ideal world, you have both. Right? Like, you have you've given them direction, and then you've given them the tools so that they can handle that in a in a an appropriate way, a a controlled way, which is interesting. It's all that's a very interesting, problem for sure.
Mike:Alright. So the next question I have is how do we develop the right mindset to get from button pushers, hammerers of nails
Matt D.:to visionaries? Yeah. When I think about what people need is they need to be explained how this stuff works and how should they should be thinking about this data. It's very similar to what we talked about before about the categories of mindset. If you can get people to understand even one of those components, right, even even one of the pieces to start with, you're gonna see them change the way they work, change the way they think, change how they're working day to day, and change their world, if you will, right, their work world.
Matt D.:It's going to be transformational for them in in how they work and how they function as a team and as a person.
Mike:You said one of these modules or components. Can you give an example?
Matt D.:Yeah. I mean, topic based communication would be probably one of the core foundation like, one of the core core core foundational ones. You know, understanding that it's much better for me to set up a space where I can work on shared work based on a particular topic rather than my OneDrive, my email, my whatever that is. Like, that's just gonna be so much better to have have that space that you can do that work. There's there's so many benefits to it.
Matt D.:It's really hard to categorize and quantify the transformation it can have.
Mike:And where do you think that that transformation starts? Is that something that has to be top down, bottom up?
Matt D.:I'm gonna say two different two to two different answers to that question. You need IT to have a little bit of an open mindset and allow you to have some things. And if you have that, you can start at almost any level. Per individual doesn't make a lot of sense, but, like, definitely a team. A team of five people, they can transform transform how they work.
Matt D.:Right? Yeah. Say, hey. This is how we're gonna communicate. This is how we're gonna do stuff, and it just snowballs from there.
Matt D.:People go, oh, cool. I love this. I'm gonna start working with other people this way. Right?
Mike:Mhmm.
Matt D.:So it it can be really small, but you do have to have a little bit of latitude from IT, from management, etcetera, which usually isn't the biggest problem. Right? Usually, most organizations have some way to create a team or to create a a SharePoint site or to create a shared space that they can work. It's just people don't know about it. Don't know how to use it.
Matt D.:Don't understand how the purpose of it. Don't understand how to make that a a key part of their day to day activities.
Mike:It does sound like, though, it's more effective if you can get a group of people who are working somewhat closely together all on the same page.
Matt D.:Yeah. I mean, the the smallest group is a team, a small a group of people who work together. It could be a project team. It could be a organizational team. You know?
Matt D.:But, yes, it it needs to have at least a small group of people that all kinda wanna work this new way.
Mitch:This section in particular reminds me of our example from I think it was last episode around McDonald's and how they have their systems, and they can effectively run a business with, quote, unquote, button pushers. Is this what we're talking about universal? Like, is it wrong to do that, or what what's sort of, like, the the why behind why this matters? Like, is McDonald's wrong for that?
Matt D.:This is a great this is a great question. So, this is why all of these things that we're talking about are foundational. At the people level, when you talk about the types of work, project, process people, and the people end of work and the project end of work, this is super critical. Like, it's it's it's absolutely the difference between successful and not successful work with people and with projects. Right?
Matt D.:Having open communication is what facilitates people's growth, people's interaction, change in organizations that is gonna be instrumental in growth and in in large part benefits to organizations. And for projects, it's how projects are gonna be able to function together and be, efficient in delivering on time and raising issues and all of that kind of stuff. Process is the one in the middle. Right? Process is, you know, at the extreme level, it is button pushing.
Matt D.:It is the epitome of button pushing. It is I don't have a physical machine that I'm pulling a lever on to produce a widget, but it's pretty dang close. Right? I'm executing a task to accomplish a thing that's gonna happen over and over and over and over again. Right?
Matt D.:On the other end of process, which is way lighter, way like, I just I have this thing that happens all the time, and I just wanna manage it a little bit, light light management of it. These things are still pretty important because it's on me. Because on the other end where it's like, I'm trying to develop this big system, you're probably paying somebody a lot of money or you have a third party software that's pretty specific or you're you know, some somebody else is doing that work for you. Right? On the other end of it, I, as the leader of a small group or of a, area within a business, I'm taking on all of that work.
Matt D.:And so then at least I need to know how that works and understand what I'm doing. But then most likely, the rest of your team probably does too because it's not gonna be as automated as push button and etcetera. Right? But it is a spectrum of things. And it's as we've talked before, you and I, Mitch, especially, it's a combination of all these things.
Matt D.:Right? Like, there is no one size fits all. You need to find the right thing that works for you.
Mike:I think that analogy is very interesting to me because you asked the question, is McDonald's wrong?
Matt D.:No. No. I'm wrong.
Mike:And they're not wrong. And I think the the right way to look at this is something like and we started to uncover this in our last podcast where we talked about project versus process and what does it mean to have a process, right, and and build a process or whatever that means. So in the McDonald's scenario, they figured out a process, and they built a button for it. And that's part of what we do. That's part of what we help other organizations do.
Mike:It's like we built many buttons Yeah. Right, in our time. And so it's not necessarily all about everything being a tool that solves a problem or something like that. There is a process aspect of it, and you should identify what parts are processed that you can turn into buttons, where that makes sense and turn them into buttons. Mhmm.
Mike:And then focus on the visionary stuff.
Mitch:Yeah. And figuring out, is that worth it? Right. Every business is a little bit different, so there's maybe not a universal right or wrong in that sense. Right.
Mike:And I think the thing that there's a distinction that we're also drawing in this conversation, which is use just because buttons can be righteous and have a purpose and need to be pushed does not mean that you should think of any of your people as just button pushers.
Matt D.:Mhmm. Well, I mean, you think about the way we're we're way down in the McDonald's thing right now. The way the home building. The way the fillet fillet of fish came about is because a franchisee said, hey. This is what works better for me, and there was a way to promote that and expand that out.
Matt D.:I'm not saying that's ideal. That was actual franchisee, not someone that was necessarily right on the line doing stuff. But just like I was saying, the people end of it, you still need a way for people to to be people.
Mitch:That reminds me of the guy who invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos.
Matt D.:Yeah. Same it's the same kinda story.
Mitch:Same thing. For that guy.
Matt D.:Saved your life?
Mitch:Yeah.
Matt D.:But, yeah, I mean, it is it is not wrong to automate things, to simplify things. But in our case, what we try to do is the intent of doing that is to enable an organization to do more. Yeah. Right? Free up free up resources.
Matt D.:Free up resources to gain efficiencies so that you can do more with the people you have so that you can really build an organization that has because the other thing that happens especially in the mindset of the we deal with is that a lot of the communication that we have can be very demoralizing. Like, when you think about having to deal with your email and having to do with the way that things get communicated, it can be very, very, very Right. Detrimental to your psyche, to how you're working. If you can change that to have a better relationship with those tools and the technology and how you're working, it can transform the people. It can transform the process, and it can transform the business.
Mike:You just walked right into the why. Why does this matter? Right? And, ultimately, it's about it is about people. It's how, as an organization, you you assemble your people, how, as a leader, you think about your people, how as a individual you want to be thought of as a person, right, how you want to be treated.
Matt D.:It is the we are trying to give tools to organizations and to the people in those organizations to change that, to change the way we communicate and how we get work done in a way that promotes those things. Yeah. But at the same time, is the foundation for the next level. Understanding that tools are not the the the end all be all and the perfect tool, not only won't you find it, but it's not not the best thing you can be doing, is all about setting you up to say, well, now I've got that sorted out. Like, my team I feel like we're we are communicating so much better.
Matt D.:We are so much more on the same page. We are just rolling together. Now let's take it to that next level. Let's figure out the next piece of this puzzle to go solve the next thing and really make a change in the organization. That's what the intent is.
Matt D.:Yeah. And a lot of organizations come to us with, I have a project management problem. I have a process problem. I have a, you know, whatever problem, and they really have this modern workplace core problem underlying that unless you solve that, you can't really get the gains you get out of those other those other efforts.
Mitch:Yeah. When I think about the two alternatives that we're we're talking about here, one is people are closed off. They keep to themselves. They're in their job just to make a paycheck and punch hours and be in it for themselves versus we're open. We're honest.
Mitch:We communicate. We're all on a mission together, and we're all able to work in a way that we we feel like we're working together versus something more closed off. I think that is just like a clear articulation of why this might make sense for people to pursue because I cannot imagine myself working in a world where everyone is just heads down, blinders on, not wanting to collaborate with people and push buttons.
Mike:Mitch, I'm gonna go build a button for you and make you push it.
Mitch:Yeah. Good luck.
Matt D.:I mean, it's it's really hard to to really describe what's going on here because, like, a lot of people who may be listening to this, they might be like, I use Teams already. I don't know. You know, we're doing this stuff. And what you were talking about really reminded me that even when people think that they're doing it the right way, a a bellwether to me is the number of direct messages that are going on or direct emails, internal emails. Right?
Matt D.:You should really have very should be a small percentage of your messaging and communication and and discussions that are going on that are direct meetings, direct messages, or internal email. Those first two, people can be like, we're doing great. We we we use Teams, and we're still frustrated. So we're ready to go go on to the next thing. It's like, no.
Matt D.:No. You're not. Because you're still having these direct message chats, because you're still having these regular meetings to actually do regular discussion. Right? One of the things that I I don't think we give ourselves enough credit for is largely when we come to meetings, we don't spend the first part of a meeting doing significant updates about what's been going on in the week.
Matt D.:Mhmm. Nobody comes and says, I did this and I did this and this, and I need you to do this and I need you to do that. But I you know, my experience with people is that there that is a lot of the meetings that they they have, and a lot of that has to do with how they communicate.
Mike:Mhmm. So now you're starting to get into some of the weeds of the next thing we wanna talk about and tease a little bit. And that's the new product that we're trying to assemble. It's intended to lay some of this foundational stuff down for people and help teams and organizations get on the same page, right, and figure out how to do this together. Mitch, do you wanna talk about what that
Mitch:looks like? There's a couple things that come to mind in that, obviously, Emma's recent video about project management is helpful, and everyone wants us to go deeper. And the more we thought about putting something together like that, the more we sort of felt bad in a way where exactly what we're talking about. This is not just here. Go click this tool.
Mitch:Here's how the tools work together. Go do your thing. There is a core mindset thing that we feel like we need to get everyone in alignment, especially on the person's team who is taking this course or this thing. Everyone needs to kinda be on the same page. And so when we thought about it, we said, what if we just build this first module of what we imagine this project management course to be and spin it off as its own thing and say, whatever we build in the future, this is always going to be the first module because it's so foundational to what we need people to understand.
Mitch:So that's a little bit about our our premise behind it. But the the concept is what if you could enroll someone in a video course? This this is what we're we're aiming for it to be, where they could upskill on these areas that we're talking about so that they stop working against the tools and getting frustrated by the tools that they are continually frustrated by. We're we're in Microsoft tools, so we're familiar a little bit. But they start working with the tools.
Mitch:And with this new mindset and approach, they start to see things in a different light and become less button pushers, more visionary, more, you know, being able to build a home instead of just frame a wall.
Mike:And able to assemble the more complex concepts as they start to become available. Right?
Mitch:Right.
Matt D.:Or at least be able to use concepts that other people have said and understand the why behind it. Right?
Mitch:Mhmm.
Matt D.:Another way that I like to think about it would be, if you watch our video con content, you consume our video content, and you're like, their perspective on this is exactly what I want all of my team to have, but you don't wanna have tell all of them to read all of our stuff because it's a lot of content that you probably have to consume to be able to get that. We're trying to distill all of that down into this foundations course so that someone can go take this course that's gonna be, you know, relatively short in duration. And at the end of it, they're gonna come away with starting from this mindset that that we have that that we're trying to share so that that you can build the next piece, that you can start talking about project management and process management and communications and collaboration and all these things, and they they you're on the same terminology and you're on the same, you know, thought process
Mitch:and Foundation. Right?
Mike:Foundation. Foundation.
Matt D.:So that's another way I would think about it. Right? Like, if you're if you're like, hey. What bulb is doing is what I need my team to know, This is the product for you. Like, this will get them that foundation ready to go and ready for the next thing that we're able to do, which could be the product thing, could be like, we're working towards all these things.
Mitch:Yeah. Yeah. So this is something we're working on actively. Where can people learn more about this? We're calling it three sixty five foundations.
Mitch:You can learn more at bulb.digital/360five. That's the numbers three six five not spelled out. We were joking about what if we ask people to actually spell out all the numbers? That would be silly. But
Matt D.:t h r no.
Mitch:That's where you can go depending on, you know, when we release this and how the product's going. You might be joining a wait list, or we might have it available. We're
Matt D.:Alrighty.
Mitch:We're excited to push this thing forward, and we're hoping you're excited about it as well.
Mike:Okay. I think that just about does it. To sum things up, what we talked about today is the fact that the perfect tool doesn't exist, so stop searching for it. What you really need to understand is that there's a foundational level of knowledge that your people need when it comes to doing things in the modern workplace. And, we talked about a little bit about why that's important and how it upskills your team or it lifts all boats.
Mike:Right?
Matt D.:Yep.
Mike:And then we teased a little bit about a new product that we're working on that's intended to kind of teach that to a team and get everybody on the same page so that they can build on that knowledge and ultimately make make their workplace better. Yeah. Another good episode. It it is exciting. It's it'll be fun to see where this new product goes.
Mike:And we thank you guys for tuning in, and we look forward to seeing you next time on another episode of Make Others Successful podcast. Thanks, Mitch. Thanks, Matt.
Mitch:Thank you. See you. Bye, everybody. Hey. Thanks for tuning in to Make Others Successful.
Mitch:If you enjoyed this episode, we'd love to hear from you. There's a couple ways you can do that. One, we'd love for you to rate our show on your favorite podcasting app. And then if you have feedback or topic ideas or suggestions for future episodes, head over to bulb.digital/feedback and let us know. Your input is super valuable, and we'd love to hear from you.
Mitch:Don't forget to subscribe and share this podcast with others who care about building a better workplace. Until next time, keep making others successful. I'll see you.