Dan Sullivan [00:00:00]:
So what we want to do, these are four things that just stick out for me that if we really, really get these done, one, we're going to make a big hit in the first year and you're going to be a real hero to me. And however, there's quadrant four and this drives me crazy. And I don't ever want you to.
Mike Koenigs [00:00:18]:
Do this with a prompt. That said, I want you to create an updated incentive program based upon the conversation that I just shared with you, the transcript, and I want you to create positive, results driven, company focused summary and a way that I can negotiate an upgraded incentive program and AI pumped out an entire agenda and a framework.
Dan Sullivan [00:00:46]:
A lot of the lack of success that I notice among entrepreneurs. The vast majority of our entrepreneurs and Strategic coach are making more than a million a year. But I'm amazed that they can do it in terms of how much not specific they are about what they actually want.
Gord Vickman [00:01:03]:
So the fourth quadrant that drives me crazy is not something to be feared because a lot of this stuff is just self evident. I feel for me personally, I can't speak for other people, but I would have to try really hard to do those things to drive Dan crazy.
Mike Koenigs [00:01:32]:
All right, Dan, you've got a big idea for how to create incentives for teams and really have them, it appears self managing. So why don't you talk a little bit about the 4x4 casting tool structure that you put together and you've got a whole new program for creating and managing and maintaining a self managing organization.
Dan Sullivan [00:01:53]:
Yeah. First of all, I'd like to say that this is, this is an old tool in coach. This is about 10 years old and it's a tool where you put everything on the table with your team members. So that's bringing them into the company. If you bring them into the company, you bring them in with this tool. And Gord Vickman, who's our podcast manager on today's podcast, was a recipient of this when he first came in and it kind of blew his mind. I mean, he can make his own comments about this, but it blew his mind about what it does for someone coming on board for the first time. There's another version of it that you can do and we've already done it with all the team members in Strategic Coach.
Dan Sullivan [00:02:42]:
We're at about 120 team members, three countries, four cities. And it really strikes him as something very, very unusual. And the third reason for it is that Jeff Madoff and I are writing a book for Hay House. We have a Hay House contract for a Major book coming out in November of this year, it's called Casting, not hiring. That hiring people with a job description doesn't tell them anything about how they can be special in the company. And also it doesn't tell them anything about how they can get fired for their behavior or lack of behavior. So I've been playing with this and I, I think that this is the possibility. What I'm seeing here is that the strategic coach company itself can now start, start to be a coach to other coaching to other entrepreneurial companies.
Dan Sullivan [00:03:47]:
So we have our coaches, I'm a Coach, we have 18 other coaches, but we've always gone for the entrepreneur. But I think that this particular tool and the way we're going about it in our own company really is a model where one company can actually coach another company.
Mike Koenigs [00:04:06]:
What I'm going to do, Dan, is I'm going to show the tool and the outcome here first and then why don't we go through some of the blocks and what they represent, what the mindsets and the thought process was in putting these together and I'll zoom in after we look at the big picture. So we've got the best result, the worst result, the success criteria. And why don't you just explain the framework first and then we'll go through each one of the boxes.
Dan Sullivan [00:04:39]:
Okay. So basically one of our experiences is that when you want to introduce a new team program, you want to introduce something extra into your organization. And we've done this many times over the 35 years that we've been up is that it's something else on top of everything else they're doing. And some will do it, some won't do it. And then you have to create a whole management structure to get people to do it. And I said I don't want to do this this way. And so what it is is basically we're going to have everybody invited and it's voluntary, you don't have to do this, but your non participation will be noticed. Okay.
Mike Koenigs [00:05:35]:
Right.
Dan Sullivan [00:05:36]:
And so in January, actually we're doing this just after New Year's, you and I. And the, the 8th of 8th of January, we're, we're going to actually introduce this to the entire company worldwide. So we'll be having a big zoom meeting and here's the deal, the tool, the 4x4, which they've all done before, so it's not something new. We're going to invite them that in the first month of the year to January 31st to fill it out now for the next quarter. Okay, so this will be for January, February and March. And there's four. Four things. How they're going to perform, how they're going to show up, which we call performance.
Dan Sullivan [00:06:23]:
And we want them to show up alert, curious, responsive, and resourceful. And specifically to what they're doing, what the activity is, what their area of responsibility in the company. How are you going to be more alert? How are you going to be more curious? What are you going to be more responsive for? And this is Gord's. This is Gord's, the one he came in with. So alert. You're always looking for new ways to multiply the usefulness of our existing podcast. Okay. And then it goes down curious, responsive, and resourceful.
Dan Sullivan [00:07:00]:
Then results faster, easier, cheaper, and bigger. And you're always finding new tools, methods, strategies that enable us to produce podcasts more quickly. Okay. And then easier, cheaper, and bigger. Here's where it gets really interesting. Mike down at the bottom on the left hand, in the first six months now, he's just coming on board. This is November of 2017.
Mike Koenigs [00:07:25]:
I remember this. I remember when he. This is happening.
Dan Sullivan [00:07:29]:
And that's what he came on board to. He came on to this. He had gone through a whole series of interview steps before this. He hadn't met me yet. And so when he did meet me, about a day before he met me, he got this little page for me. Then I said, I've got four things where you can really be a hero. You know, we're hiring you because we know you have the technical experience to do this. You had great radio work.
Dan Sullivan [00:07:55]:
You've been front stage radio, you've been backstage radio. We know you. You're totally familiar with podcasts. So what we want to do, these are four things that just stick out for me that if we really, really get these done, one, we're going to make a big hit in the first year and you're going to be a real hero to me. And however, there's quadrant four, and this drives me crazy. And I don't ever want you to do this. One is fall, fall behind and never catch up with your work. You don't have a front stage priority.
Dan Sullivan [00:08:30]:
You're isolated in a disconnected silo and you're following orders, but you're not initiating. Okay? So anyway, that was. That's what we got from there. And why don't we just invite Gord on board? Because he's. He's managing this production and Gord can just come on and say what he thought when he got this. If he's there.
Mike Koenigs [00:08:54]:
All right, Gord, let's bring you on because you get to be featured and talk a little bit about what the experience was and then we'll, we'll move on over into the new program. And because this will be the first time you've seen this officially, the rest of the company hasn't as of this recording. This will be super interesting to get your real time feedback. So why don't you just talk a little bit about what your experience was with the 4x4 and then we'll move on into how this couples into the new program and what your experience is, seeing it for the first time.
Gord Vickman [00:09:29]:
Well, picture someone handing you an exam and then walking by your desk and just putting the answers down and kind of shuffling away. For me, it felt like cheating. So someone gives you the answers to something that's a bit of a, you know, a puzzle and a project. So for me, and we're going back a long time here, the role was not mine yet, but I had seen the 4x4. So I said to myself, I'm just going to pretend that it is and assume that it is, and I'm just going to do all of these things. I'm just going to satisfy all of the quadrants and then write it out. And then hopefully when I pass it back to, you know, whoever else I'm speaking with, it's going to make its way up and Dan's going to see it and then, you know, there'll be expectations about what is going to happen in the first few weeks and months. And that's how I treated it.
Gord Vickman [00:10:31]:
And it, it clearly worked. And, you know, just like Dan said, to reiterate, you have these job descriptions that you see for roles that are open. And it's just, you know, it could be some kind of middle manager, just like vomiting out a series of nonsense that may or may not be related to the role itself. But this was so specific and it gave me, you know, confidence going into it that this was something that I wanted to do, because at the time, I didn't need a job. I had one. But I knew who Dan was and I was interested in working with him, but I didn't obviously know exactly what was going to be expected of me. So this thing came and landed on my lap and I said, okay, well, now I have a very clear, crystal clear expectation of what I'm going to be doing in this role. So it gives you a lot of confidence coming in if you, you know, if you're, if you're moving from One opportunity to another, then gives you very clear expectations on what is going to happen next.
Gord Vickman [00:11:43]:
So it was, it was fun and I did the exercise, like Dan has said a few times, like I did the exercise and I thought to myself, even if I don't, even if this is not the right fit for me, I'm going to learn something and it'll be fun to go through this. So that's why I did it. And, and, you know, the rest is history, I guess.
Mike Koenigs [00:12:06]:
Well, I've got some thoughts and some feedback because I'm going to bring up a blank version of the 4x4 and I'll describe it for folks who are listening right now versus looking at this. But again, it's broken into performance results. Being a hero drives me crazy. And you'll see that being a hero, you know, in the performance, it's alert, curious, responsive, resourceful. Results are faster, easier, cheaper, bigger. But being a hero, those are open categories. And again, when we go over to Gord's and look at his, what you'll see is Dan drove this, which was great, and his categories for being a hero were compelling up to date landing page. So clearly this is designed for lead generation.
Mike Koenigs [00:12:57]:
Our podcast drives new customers great series descriptions. Obviously that means they're going to speak to an audience. So the messaging has to be correct. The immediate episode summaries, which essentially means get this thing out as soon as it's been recorded, and then also the record schedule. You know, we're, we typically do several podcasts at a time. This one is like a bonus one where I reached out to Dan, I said, hey, let's hit something first part of the year. Because people love predictions and they also are looking for, they're looking for results. How can I use this wisdom and this knowledge? So I wanted to have some good content.
Mike Koenigs [00:13:38]:
And then that drives me crazy, crazy. Never fall behind. No stud, front stage, priority, isolated, following orders. Those are specific. Now what I wanted to do is give you both a little an idea of how I've used AI recently for my own team, because I had realized that some of our incentive programs internally were driven by marking off checkboxes, not by results. So what I did is I looked through my 4x4, for example, with my EA, also with my sales team and our AI team. And I brainstormed into Otter and I went through the categories and I talked about really all my frustrations and challenges that I knew we were having. And then I fed in my 4x4 and the job description with a prompt that said I want you to create an updated incentive program based upon the conversation that I just shared with you, the transcript.
Mike Koenigs [00:14:45]:
And I want you to create a positive, results driven, company, focused summary and a way that I can negotiate an upgraded incentive program. And AI pumped out an entire agenda and a framework and I just had a dialogue with it on exactly what kind of a new incentive program we could have. Basically, it did what for me was days of grueling, painful work that I didn't like doing anyway. So I had a really positive meeting. I'd say some of the best meetings I've ever had with my teams just because I had a framework. So this is a way to, you know, really understand what you want, what you need. Draw from the incredible resource and knowledge base of AI. But without a framework like this to start with, the psychology wouldn't be accurate.
Mike Koenigs [00:15:46]:
So I'm curious what your, what your thoughts are on that, either of you or both of you.
Gord Vickman [00:15:52]:
I'll start off. I think that's wonderful. And again, that's like taking it to a whole new level because back when this tool was created, we didn't have those kinds of tech capabilities. Right. So you're weaving in what's new and taking it to a level, like you said, to remove things and to eliminate hours and hours of work that you don't want to do anyway. Because there were certain things that were not available to us when the tool was created. So I feel like all of the coach tools are alive, they are evolving. I mean, some of them were kind of like a hole in one right off the top.
Gord Vickman [00:16:31]:
But if there's new things that become available to you in the future, you clearly recognize that and you're taking the next step and bringing everybody into it. And I think that's wonderful.
Dan Sullivan [00:16:46]:
I think the. I really will answer your question or respond when we get into the program that I'm recommending for our company right now. Okay, so this is the 2025. So we start right here in January and we'll go through to the end of the year. And it's an incentive strategy and I'll get right to the point and it's called the best result. We establish an incentive of $250 per quarter for team members completing their online 4x4 casting tool by the end of the first month of each quarter. So we're starting in January. So by the 31st, if everybody has.
Dan Sullivan [00:17:30]:
Well, if each person has their 4x4 in. And it has to be typed out in a form like this and it has to be posted so there's going to be a general site where everybody can see everybody else's 4x4. So our total payout per person completing four quarterly 4x4s will be $1,000. So if each person does it four times, they get $1,000. In order to qualify for each quarter's payment, the completed 4x4 must be posted on a special 4x4 online site. Each quarter's payment will be made on the first payday in the second month of each quarter. This will be a major new growth capability for the company that keeps getting better, with surprising new possibilities. 2025 is a great year to start because our fourth Hay House book will be being written throughout the year for release in 2026.
Dan Sullivan [00:18:26]:
It'll actually be in November. Strategic Coach will be trailblazing role model company for tens of thousands of other companies. So that's the general picture and this is the worst result. We never put a major organizational focus on company wide use of the 4x4, leaving it up to occasional company meetings or up to the team leaders doing it with their members. In other words, it never takes hold, never has any traction. All the while, we aren't doing this on a company wide basis. We are writing a major market book with Hay House in which we are recommending that they implement the 4x4 throughout their companies. To the readers, a growing and glaring lack of integrity as the book becomes a huge hit in the marketplace.
Dan Sullivan [00:19:11]:
Okay, so, okay. And then we'll go to the top. Okay. Any thoughts about that, Mike? You got it so far?
Mike Koenigs [00:19:22]:
Yes, I get it. And again, what I've been doing internally is I found that I'm better at conversations than I am at filling out forms. So what I typically do, and I do this at Coach meetings, is as soon as you get a, you have a new form, I quick take a picture of it, drop it into ChatGPT with a whole bunch of thoughts and ideas, and I say fill out this form for me and I have a dialogue with the form. When I'm. When I'm working by myself, I actually just have a conversation. I look at it, I talk about it. And because I have a tendency to have an idea and then as I'm talking my way through it, I have another idea. And what chatgpt does a really good job of is sifting and sorting through all my stuff to create an easier to read, more concise form.
Mike Koenigs [00:20:16]:
And I've consistently found that what normally would take me hours to do, I can do in minutes. And you know, every, every task I do Right now, when I've got an idea, I make a quick list and then I perform my results. So performance mindedness is, to me the key to making these live and also conversational. I think the messaging lands better because I'm thinking about having a conversation with the customer or a team member while I'm doing it.
Dan Sullivan [00:20:51]:
Yeah, yeah, so. So the big thing, I mean, everybody wants more money and this is just not a big, big deal of money. But because we're putting money as an incentive for the project, we're telling them, and this is the first time anyone's experienced this, that we're telling them we're really serious about this.
Mike Koenigs [00:21:15]:
Yeah, well, you're giving them points. There's points. And also talk a little bit about the psychology of making this publicly visible and available, because I think that's it's fantastic psychology and it creates ownership. But also when people can see and compare other people's, it's going to make them better at filling out their 4x4 and seeing what will work. You know, you're really taking advantage of.
Dan Sullivan [00:21:40]:
Well and they get cute because they won't be equally in terms of their specific and what I find a lot of. And you know this from just working with entrepreneurs, Mike, a lot of the lack of success that I notice among entrepreneurs who are, you know, top entrepreneurs, you know, the vast majority of our entrepreneurs and Strategic Coach are making more than a million a year and. But I'm amazed that they can do it in terms of how not specific they are about what they actually want. And what I'm pushing for is you be very, very specific about everything you're doing in the company. Now, we don't say that as part of the four by four, but by them doing it every quarter and then watching what everybody else did every quarter, they'll see that the ones that they really are impressed with are very, very specific. And they get more and more measurable, they get more and more practical. And we don't have to have a class on that. It'll just be part of the experience of doing the four by four.
Mike Koenigs [00:22:49]:
I love it. So from your point of view, Gord, when you see this, you hear it, I'd like you to respond both as a participant, as a team member at Strategic Coach, but also what's your perspective upon first glance, thinking about it from a cultural point of view, how do you feel it'll land?
Gord Vickman [00:23:14]:
You know, I'm sort of the 4x4 OG like I came. I'm the original gangster 4x4. There was myself and I believe Melissa were the two that came into the company first with it. So I've been looking at this document a lot over the past many, many years. This is something that I would do normally and I have done normally, you know, without incentive. But I think it's something, it's very unique. No one knows about this like you said, but I think it will encourage people to really drill down on it. And you know, Dan, the whole concept, one of the whole concepts of Coach is like the self managing company.
Gord Vickman [00:23:55]:
Well, how can you have a self managing company if you don't have self managing people within the company? Because there's no magic soil. It's the people within the company who will make it self managing. So to have an entire team of people and you know, in 120 plus in the coach ecosystem doing this and making it a habit because you know, the first time you fill it out. I remember people came to me a lot early on with this tool because they knew that I had probably more experience than most within coach with the 4x4 and everyone knew that I had come into the company with it. And I'll just, I'll just say one quick thing about the fourth quadrant where it's, you know, the drives me crazy quadrant. I've been asked like why, why would that be on there? Wouldn't that freak people out? Like you're scaring, like wouldn't that be scary to people? So my answer was always, if you go to the zoo, I call it the tiger cage. Okay, the fourth quadrant. If you go to the zoo, can you fall into a tiger cage? The answer is probably not.
Gord Vickman [00:25:06]:
Like you have to actively do a few ridiculous things to get in there. If you're going to get mauled by a tiger, like you're climbing a fence, you're cutting a fence, you're putting effort into it.
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Gord Vickman [00:26:25]:
So the fourth quadrant that drives me crazy is not something to be feared because a lot of this stuff is just self evident. I feel for me personally, I can't speak for other people, but I would have to try really hard to do those things to drive Dan crazy. Like that would have to, I'd have to put effort into it. It would be a concerted effort. So it's well, well, it's a great, you know, it's a great reminder and it gives insight into what is not to be done. At the same time, it's not something that I feel if you're, if you're just doing, if you're doing a good job and you're again like smart, skilled, talented, you know what's going on, it's pretty tough to land in that tiger cage. So that would that sort of like put, put the fears to rest about, you know, like don't stare at it and focus on the fourth quadrant thinking like I better not do any of that today. It's like let's focus on the outer rim of that to be smart, curious, responsive, resourceful and focus on the positive and especially the blue.
Gord Vickman [00:27:30]:
Be a hero and try not to spend too much time being preoccupied with screwing up, if that makes sense. Let's focus, let's move to the left and let's focus on the hero stuff. And the fourth quadrant is there again just for specificity of your role and what you're going to be doing. I hope that makes sense.
Mike Koenigs [00:27:52]:
Yeah, it really does. And I think this is a good transition then into the success criteria because you begin, Dan, with first of all the easy, small investment. You talked about that and get the whole team engaged. When you look at the outcome and the results that you anticipate getting compared to the cost. But it's a good incentive. It's not a lot of time for a reasonable payout and the psychological benefits. So any comments about that? I think like I said, you know.
Dan Sullivan [00:28:30]:
It might be, you know, I mean people can talk about it, they can, you know, have discussions about it, but if they were just to measure the time that it's going to take them to fill in the form and post it, it's probably about an hour a.
Mike Koenigs [00:28:44]:
Quarter and then voluntary. But noticed again, I think the psychology behind it is brilliant because it ultimately Everyone. You're everyone who doesn't participate. It'll be obvious if they don't. And the benefits to, to participating, especially just the, you know, who wouldn't want to retain their job and be better at what they do? You know, we're all human beings. Want to be useful.
Dan Sullivan [00:29:15]:
Well, that's a good, that's a good question.
Gord Vickman [00:29:18]:
Yeah.
Mike Koenigs [00:29:18]:
Well, at least the ones that you want. And so it's a good self selection, self filtering process.
Dan Sullivan [00:29:23]:
Who would want to get into the cage with a tiger? You know, I mean, who would want to do. Well, there are people who want to get in the, you know, I mean, in the past, have you had people who've wanted to get in the tiger's cage, Mike? I have, yeah.
Mike Koenigs [00:29:38]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That, that's. But they're, they're probably not going to be long term.
Dan Sullivan [00:29:43]:
I'm for, I'm for, I'm for inclusion here, Mike.
Mike Koenigs [00:29:51]:
That's good. It's good. So I love that.
Dan Sullivan [00:29:56]:
And Kathy Davis, who's one of our major team leaders, that anybody in coach knows who Kathy is. She's going to do a live zoom call where she's going to fill in hers and anybody can join her on the zoom call with her and do it at the same time, that is, then they'll have breakout sessions and then they can have general discussion about it.
Mike Koenigs [00:30:20]:
That is the genius of Strategic Coach. I've talked about this on episodes before, but the number, the non. To me, it was non obvious until I had been in coach for a long time, at least for the people who are in coach. And I don't know what the breakdown is. This is a worthy question, but when you look at the vast majority of members of Strategic Coach, the business owner, founders, what percentage are quick starts versus high fact finders have you found?
Dan Sullivan [00:30:59]:
Well, right from the beginning, we were very top heavy with quick starts. Very top heavy, I think. And I remember because we didn't have Colby right off the bat. So it was about two years in that we did Colby and we did it and we had about maybe we may have eight or nine people in the company at that time. And I think it was eight. Eight, eight to one. Nine people. We had eight to one.
Dan Sullivan [00:31:27]:
It was quick start to fact finder follow through.
Mike Koenigs [00:31:30]:
Okay. And that you're talking about team members or customers.
Dan Sullivan [00:31:34]:
Oh, the customer. Customer is way off the. At the beginning it was way off the chart as far as quick starts, because quick starts are the first people to try anything. Okay. And then what we've noticed now, it's still dominant. The if we do a every year. Julia Waller, who's our unique ability specialist in the company, she, she. So last year we came in at around 2800 active for the year active clients and she did their Colbys and then did an average Colby and it was, it was ninth.
Dan Sullivan [00:32:11]:
It was 639-466-394. So it's a, it's a heavy quick start population. The community is heavy quick quick start.
Mike Koenigs [00:32:24]:
Okay. And that, that I think correlates with why I asked the question because back to the incentive and I'm again I'm looking at this through the lens of.
Dan Sullivan [00:32:33]:
Both customers and that's not, that's not the team members. The team members would be if you did, if you did an entire team member average of the thing. It would be, it would be fact finder follow through. It would be because the roles that people play require quite a bit of fact finding and follow through. So I would have to check that out. But my guess would be but there is a significant amount of quick start. The sales team for example is very, very quick start. The program advisors have a lot of quick start, you know and so anyway but, but we're, we're designing a program that you know will accommodate everybody.
Mike Koenigs [00:33:24]:
Yes. Well I think again getting back to the reason I brought that up in the first place, the genius of the strategic coach system. When we're at a meeting and we get a new tool, we always go through it's demonstrate by leader first. So when we're working with Dan, Dan rolls out a new tool, he shows us the tool, he's filled it out and he explains why. So you get to see the use case and the application and it's a future focus and then we do it together and it's timed so it demands participation and because we get broken down into groups, we get to see and compare it to other people who've done it. And I think getting back to having Kathy do this, I think having a participation and breaking into groups is genius and it requires a lot less management. That to me is it, it's not up to me as a founder to do other people's work for them and then have them guessing how achieve success in their role. The same with a founder who is, who really must be a visionary if you're going to create value and innovation inside a business.
Mike Koenigs [00:34:42]:
Unless you have a non innovation first business. And I don't know how they're going to survive in the future frankly. And then we've got the online posted PDFs the fact that you're posting them, you get to see, you get to compare, you get to see who's participating. And then the byproducts, which is the. I think this is all driving towards the mindset of how can I be a hero to the customer? And how can I be a hero to the company? But again, any comments, thoughts from either one of you on those? And I didn't, I didn't mean to zip through them too fast.
Dan Sullivan [00:35:15]:
No, no, no, it's great. The thing is that I have a personal strategy that I try not to react to an experience before I've had it. Okay. And so, I don't know. I mean, we're just announcing it on. It'll be next week, next Wednesday. And, you know, and Kathy will have the date in the calendar for people to, you know, to do her, her coaching session on it where she does her own and invites other people, but that'll be recorded. So the recording can be sent out to send out to everybody.
Dan Sullivan [00:35:53]:
And then they have the 31st of, 31st of the month. And if it's on February 1st, they don't get paid, you know, if they put it on fifth. So one of the things I said, the deadline is the deadline. There's no, there's no grace period. And the other thing is, if you didn't do it, nobody's going to go after you that you didn't do it. Okay. And then we'll go through another quarter and we'll, we'll do it, you know, and so at the end of March, then that's the next month, and you do a new. You do an update.
Dan Sullivan [00:36:24]:
Kathy will do her coaching session again. But my sense is that the process will develop new dimensions to it as we go through, you know, and you know, and you'll have all sorts of ideas for what we're doing here. I mean, you, you'll go crazy with this. And that's one reason why I'm showing it to you, because I know you're going to do all sorts of things with this.
Mike Koenigs [00:36:47]:
Yeah. The first thing that comes to mind is what I've been doing with my teams when we're doing meetings now is we record all of our zooms. I've been using Otter and Fathom is my current tool. And then I feed that into. I've got a series of prompts that create SOPs. So, and that way there's a written document that someone can glance at and if they are a quick start who loves to go through data. And of course, you don't have to do this in real time. You can digest an hour's worth of content in a matter of two or three or four minutes.
Mike Koenigs [00:37:32]:
And you can also modify the prompt to get feedback. So if there's participation from other team members, you can see what they say. So we've been taking and creating, we use a tool called notion that we put all of our SOPs into. And one of the things I'll do for folks who are listening and watching this right now is I've documented how to create SOPs with AI and I'll put those in the show notes. So that'll be a good takeaway and a giveaway. And another incentive of course, to subscribe to this channel and share it with your team members right now because they'd get a lot out of this program. But for you, Gord, any other feedback now that you've seen this?
Dan Sullivan [00:38:16]:
I mean he's just. Gord is just learning this for the first time. So what do you think, Gord?
Gord Vickman [00:38:23]:
I think it's great and I think.
Dan Sullivan [00:38:25]:
We just, just throw in another thing. We have six team members and we get together regularly. Just we go out to dinner, we talk, talk about we're doing. But last, this was about a month ago, we went out and everybody did their, their 4x4 for the first first quarter, first half of 2025. And I, I thought it was a tremendous dinner. I thought everybody was so pumped, high, so excited. These are all people who have done the 4x4 before, but we've been sort of like a dinner discussion group for five or six years and I thought it turned out really well. Gord, yourself on that.
Gord Vickman [00:39:13]:
Yeah, me too. Didn't hurt that the meal was fantastic, the wine was delicious, the company was great. But Mike, you were talking about SOPs s being standard. None of this is standard for, you know, individuals and other organizations. So you know, like I just to sort of rewind to what I was saying before. It's. You don't have a self managing company without self managing people. So I think the, you know, as, as people get into this and as it becomes a habit and a quarterly habit, there's going to be questions.
Gord Vickman [00:39:50]:
Fantastic that Kathy is doing the zoom session to sort of guide those who might not be as confident to fill this. I filled out probably close to, I don't know, maybe 15, 20 of these. So for those who need a little bit of guidance to, to kind of get the hang of it, it's a wonderful way to get yourself into that. And then I think by the Second or third one even, it'll all be second nature and self managing. People create self managing companies. So, you know, in the evolution of continuing and elevating the self managing ness, if that's a word. It is now because I just said it, you know, here's where we are and I think it's interesting. I think people will be jazzed, they'll be positively chuffed about the incentive.
Gord Vickman [00:40:40]:
But it's just great to know what you're doing next and what you need to focus on because we all want to, you know, do a great job, succeed, learn, elevate ourselves not only for our role in particular companies, but just, you know, constant independent education, learning more and getting better. I would assume that most people want to get better. I can only speak for myself, but most people want to get smarter every day and learn more every day and improve.
Dan Sullivan [00:41:10]:
See, we'll see what comes out of it.
Mike Koenigs [00:41:15]:
Yes.
Gord Vickman [00:41:15]:
And that's guesses and bets, right?
Dan Sullivan [00:41:18]:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, I've had responses in the company from people who are no longer in the company that you're asking me to think. I, I didn't take this job to think I want to come at nine, do what you tell me to do till five and leave. And I said I, I'm totally, I, I'm clear and you're clear about this. And now you're going to do that someplace else. You're not going to do that here. And so my feeling is that the players will show up to play, you know, and, and, but I think it gives some people who we've never heard from a real chance to develop themselves in a way that wouldn't happen in an ordinarily, I mean we're 120 people. But every company, if it's more than about 20 people after a while it has a bureaucratic quality about it.
Dan Sullivan [00:42:13]:
You got the, you got the boss and then you got the jobs and you got the deadlines. But that's, there's no leadership in that at all. It's just management. The difference between management and leadership is management is maximizing what already exists. Leadership is creating something that's going to be far bigger in the future than what already exists. And I believe that everybody who is really interested in their work and they're really good at teamwork with other people, can see new things to be done that will increase their enjoyment, will increase the creativity and productivity of the team and this gives them a chance to work on it every quarter.
Mike Koenigs [00:42:56]:
I'm super excited. I did we do the last One.
Dan Sullivan [00:43:00]:
I didn't see if we did the last box.
Mike Koenigs [00:43:02]:
Surprising byproducts. So I'll bring that up and we'll talk about the byproducts. Because ultimately, I think the byproducts, what you were really just talking about the benefits to the culture in the thinking and the mindsets that carry over as a result of going through this. And I can see this methodology being used. If you had an innovation department, I'd get department specific with this as well and teach department heads how to do a similar thing.
Dan Sullivan [00:43:35]:
Yeah, well, my sense is that we have the team leaders. Okay. And you know, they're not managing this. The team leaders are not managing this. They have to do their four by four, just like I have to do my four by four, just like everybody. Babs is going to do her four by four. So from the standpoint of the posted site, it's a complete democracy. It's a complete democracy.
Dan Sullivan [00:44:03]:
Everybody can look at everybody else's 4x4. So there's no hierarchy in this at all. And we'll see how it develops. Quarter after quarter. You'll see that there's a real inequality over, like, I would say probably 3/4. There's a real inequality of people who've just got their teeth in this. And it wouldn't necessarily be. It wouldn't necessarily be according to what their job description is in the company.
Dan Sullivan [00:44:37]:
And that'd be interesting information. That'd be interesting information. So throughout 2025, we will be surprised by the breadth and scope of Being a Hero initiatives. I think we'll be surprised every. And they'll learn more how to name them. They'll learn more how to create collaboration with their initiatives. There'll be a lot of who not how. If I'm going to do this, I'm going to need to work with so.
Dan Sullivan [00:45:06]:
And so I'm going to need to work and I can kind of tell what the other person's up to by their four by four.
Mike Koenigs [00:45:12]:
Right. And have you thought yet, I guess this is so new, but this to me would be a remarkable segment or chapter in your casting. Not hiring.
Dan Sullivan [00:45:25]:
It's four chapters.
Mike Koenigs [00:45:26]:
Okay.
Dan Sullivan [00:45:27]:
Yeah. This is three parts to the book. We have what it means to look at your entrepreneurial company as a theater. Theater. Theater enterprise. Okay. And then there's four chapters for that and Jeff is really working with that. And then we got a middle section that we're going more and more into a theatrical world.
Dan Sullivan [00:45:48]:
The more technology you have, the greater theater you have to have. So that's one of our thesis, of the book that people want live, you know, live and in person more and more as technology becomes pervasive, people want more and more live and in person. Okay, so there's a middle section and then at the end we say, now if you're really interested, here's how you can actually do it. Here's the tool to do it with, how you do it as the leader of the company. That's one chapter. How you get your whole team cast, that's the second chapter. How ownership of roles grows. And number three is as this happens, your company becomes a theater.
Dan Sullivan [00:46:31]:
Yeah. So.
Mike Koenigs [00:46:34]:
Yeah, I, I can see how this mindset can be adapted towards all sorts of different developments. I can see it, for example, in kind of a mastermind group or a business group you belong to. It'd be a great way to create incentives for innovating and participating and providing more value, you know, no matter what your role is. So I have to digest this. I gotta sleep on it for a day or two. But I think this is definitely one of, one of our most interesting and useful episodes we've done that are, that's tactically usable right now. So as we wrap this up, are there any major comments or thoughts or breakthroughs that either one of you had just as we pass through this?
Dan Sullivan [00:47:28]:
Yeah, my sense is that. And we'll talk about this later in a podcast. What I've noticed is that AI coming into the workplace certainly in the United States isn't proceeding in the way that people thought it was going to proceed. Okay. And I think the reason is because they're bringing a powerful tool. I mean, it's as powerful as you want to make it as a tool into sort of passive bureaucratic type of settings. And there's a push from the top. Don't get too creative.
Dan Sullivan [00:48:13]:
Don't get too creative. You know, okay, you guys, you know, why don't you just do this with your gaming when you're outside of work? Well, my gaming is my work. I just come here for a pause because it's so boring, you know, and everything else. And my feeling is there has to be a very utterly simple structure for allowing the. We call them team members, but the employees of these bureau organization is that first of all, if they get the book and they get the tool, they can do this on their own and we'll see where it proceeds. I mean, what we want to be is the first totally self managing company of a significant size. Significant size that runs its entire company. In other words, all the creativity, all the Productivity, the profitability is based on that.
Dan Sullivan [00:49:08]:
But the culture itself is this one tool. It's this one tool every quarter that takes an hour to do and you get paid for doing it.
Mike Koenigs [00:49:19]:
I love it. I love it. And my full disclosure, when I told you I worked on my incentive program for the company, I was, I got way, way too granular in terms of little incentives that were behavioral, behaviorally driven instead of, you know, it's behavior instead of mindset. And what I think this really does is encourages and changes a mindset and the granularity of what you do in your job doesn't have to, you know, again, how do you, you can't have a self managing organization if everything is too granular. Yeah, and I, I really, my experience of, of watching this was, I saw the flaw in my thinking and how, how much I put the onus on me as a founder to think through this versus give people the freedom to solve these problems on their own.
Dan Sullivan [00:50:22]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I'm not a manager and Babs, you know, I think that comes naturally to Babs and me that were simply not managers. I mean, for example, I, I gave this input to Gord, I guess a week before he actually came on board. And I haven't talked to him about it at all for the last seven years. But I can see the results that he's producing and I can see the new initiatives and I can see the new innovations and he hasn't done anything to drive me crazy. So that's all I needed to know. I didn't need to know anything else, you know. Yeah, good job, Gord.
Mike Koenigs [00:51:03]:
How about any, any other closing comments.
Gord Vickman [00:51:05]:
Breakthroughs or thoughts that you had nothing new to add. All I'll say is, you know, the guesses and bets, as Dan says, and this is, this is interesting, but the word interesting doesn't do it justice. This is something that is so different in terms of the way people think about their role in any organization because most people are not really asked to think about it in this way. And it's going to be a lot of fun to see how it progresses and how it evolves, how it, you know, moves and shakes and twists and turns as we move forward with this. I keep mine pegged up. I got a cork board in my office. I look at it every morning. You know, I don't stare at it like a weirdo for four hours, but you know, a little glance here and there when you're sipping your coffee and I think if it's, if it's used in that way where people just kind of go, okay, like, you know, I'm on track here.
Gord Vickman [00:52:10]:
This is what has to happen. And it's fun. The hero objectives are fun because it allows you to kind of think about things in a different way, and it allows you to, you know, make your own guesses and bets about things that may work, they may not work, but at least it allows you to expand your mind a little bit. There's going to be no punishment for the bets that don't necessarily work out as well as you may have thought, because how would you know that if you didn't try it anyway? But that's how. That's how you keep yourself from being stagnant and not growing, both individually and as part of an organization. So with that, I'll just say it's going to be fun to see how it evolves. I'm excited to see how other people use it, and we can gather again one year from today and do a recap if you'd like.
Mike Koenigs [00:53:05]:
I love that. Well, let's officially wrap up the session. So some of the big takeaways we have for you is check out the show notes for my SOP AI creation tool. That's a gift. And again, this would be a great time to share this with your team members. I know I'm going to do it as soon as we're done here and say, I think this is breakthrough. I'd like to adapt what we've been doing and use this. And it's another great reason for you.
Mike Koenigs [00:53:35]:
If you're not part of Strategic Coach already, get inside, start the signature program, and also digest the rest of Dan's books, because they're all available at Strategic, and I think we can. We can end this episode. Great job.
Dan Sullivan [00:53:52]:
Yeah. Thank you very much, Mike, for diving into this.
Mike Koenigs [00:53:59]:
Thanks for showing up too, Gord. This has been awesome having you on.
Gord Vickman [00:54:03]:
Thanks, gents. My pleasure.
