Why Founders Need a Number Two to Thrive with Jhana Li
In this episode, we sit down with operations expert Jhana Li to discuss the crucial role of effective operations in business growth and successful exits.
Jhana shares her insights on how founders can overcome common operational bottlenecks, the importance of hiring the right number two, and the transformational journey that CEOs must undertake to truly let go and thrive.
Tune in for valuable strategies to optimize your business and prepare for a successful exit!
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📌 Website: https://spyglassops.com
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Transcript
>> Lani Dickinson: Well, Jhana thank you so much for joining me. I'm so excited to have
Speaker:you on the podcast. And as you know, you're one of
Speaker:the first five, so this is super exciting.
Speaker:I think you bring just an
Speaker:incredible perspective to the audience because you work with
Speaker:so many people, you know, varied businesses across
Speaker:the United States. Well, I'm not even sure all where you
Speaker:work, but, you've really focused on making
Speaker:successful operators, which you and I both know
Speaker:means then the founder gets to go live life
Speaker:or sell for more, Right?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: And so, I just thought all the
Speaker:things you bring to the table, across all the
Speaker:themes you see with all the people you work with,
Speaker:of how they can't get out of their own way.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yeah.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: And, how they inhibit the number two
Speaker:from flourishing.
Speaker:But tell us who you are a
Speaker:little bit about what you do and,
Speaker:who that your favorite client to work with is.
Speaker:And then in terms of the exit
Speaker:conversationus, I'm sure people come to you and say, you
Speaker:know, I want toa sell this pretty soon. Like,
Speaker:how do you go about working with them and what are the common problems you see,
Speaker:like, they say they want an exit, they say they want
Speaker:a number two, and then, yeah, here's all the stuff
Speaker:that we got toa get through. So take it away.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Amazing. So, yeah, my name is Jhana Lee. I'm
Speaker:an operations expert, and my background is as
Speaker:a COO for various businesses. So I was
Speaker:in that number two role, and I still today really
Speaker:see business from that perspective. I've now started my
Speaker:own company. And what we do is we help
Speaker:founders understand the operational bottlenecks. We actually
Speaker:audit the business and tell them, this is why you're not growing as
Speaker:fast as you want to. This is why you've hit a revenue plateau. This is why you
Speaker:aren't as valuable as you want to be when it comes time to
Speaker:exit. Right. So we literally break that down for them, and then our
Speaker:unique methodology is to go find that number two.
Speaker:So either they have this person internally and they just need to be
Speaker:leveled up into the role, or they really don't have
Speaker:that person. Even if they think they do, they might have somebody in the
Speaker:role who's not actually the right fit. and we will go out, we will
Speaker:recruit that person, plug them in, set them up for success, and
Speaker:then support and execute through them to
Speaker:bring all of this change into the business.
Speaker:Because you asked, well, I'm going out of order
Speaker:here, but you asked, what are the common mistakes that
Speaker:entrepreneurs make as it relates to operations. I would say the biggest
Speaker:one is that they put all of the responsibility and pressure on
Speaker:themselves to somehow magically be great at
Speaker:operations and everything else. And everything
Speaker:else. Right. Even though they hate it. Right. Like no founder I know
Speaker:is like, oh yeah, SOPs love.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Oh, give me an SOP.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Give me an SOP. Right. Like no one is.
Speaker:It's a totally not just different like competency and
Speaker:skill set, it's a totally different lens.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: That an operator has in a business. And so the big
Speaker:permission slip we give to our clients is actually
Speaker:you will be of highest value towards your
Speaker:definition of success, whatever that is, if you can stay in
Speaker:the visionary role and you can drive massive levels of growth and
Speaker:leverage. The operator's job is
Speaker:to free up everything else that you may be
Speaker:doing so that you can just double down and do
Speaker:that. But you get to be and live in your zone
Speaker:of genius and the operator gets to be the person that
Speaker:supports you in making that transition.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Now how many of them love to just instantly stop doing the
Speaker:doing like none of them.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Which is so funny.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: See you.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: We see you. it's so funny, right? Because we
Speaker:tell ourselves that is all I want. If somebody could just
Speaker:come in and take the whole day to day off my plate and I had
Speaker:30 hours a week back to do whatever I wanted, that would be the
Speaker:dream. But what's so interesting, Lonnie, that we see because
Speaker:that's the transformation that happens, right? We bring in
Speaker:the operator. All of a sudden white space is appearing on the
Speaker:founders's calendar for the first time in years. And what
Speaker:happens?
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: They go mess things up. They freak out.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: They freak out because they l. It's like I don't know
Speaker:what to do with my hands, you know, Like I'm so used
Speaker:to. I'm so wired to be so busy.
Speaker:I'm so wired to know what all the problems are and to fix all
Speaker:the problems. In fact, I m tell myself that
Speaker:I'm needed.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: To fix all the problems. So when problems start to get taken
Speaker:care of without me, it's actually very confronting and it
Speaker:causes a bit of an existential crisis around. If my business really
Speaker:can run without me, then what does that mean about me?
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Who am I?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Who am I? What am I needed for? What does
Speaker:a CEO actually do?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Because I've never had this much time to just be CEO before,
Speaker:which is I love why clients work with you becausee you're able to manage
Speaker:them through that transition because otherwise
Speaker:unsupported, they get Back into the day to day we
Speaker:messes totally.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: They get new ideas. Y now the teams left over
Speaker:here and we haven'tep they're stepping on their team's
Speaker:toes.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: They're undercutting their managers. Not maliciously, not
Speaker:intentionally, but because they literally can't help themselves.
Speaker:But it prevents an operator from being able to do
Speaker:their best work if the CEO is constantly making
Speaker:chaos or undercutting their authority.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah. In terms of the exit conversation,
Speaker:it likely creates some turnover. So totally.
Speaker:Good luck selling a company when there's not
Speaker:somebody to stay with the company post transition. Have you
Speaker:had some experience with that?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: 100%. And you. It was one of my learnings
Speaker:in our early days where we were creating these
Speaker:incredibly powerful up leveled operators.
Speaker:They're so emboldened, they're so ambitious. They have all these skills
Speaker:they nown to bring into the business. And the
Speaker:CEOs we worked with didn't actually
Speaker:know how to let the number two
Speaker:be a true number two. They'd never worked with that role
Speaker:before. And so they would accidentally stifle,
Speaker:micromanage, take away autonomy, veto projects,
Speaker:undercut authority. All these things we just said. But the
Speaker:operator got so frustrated. Right. That sometimes
Speaker:they would just leave. And that's not success. Nobody wants
Speaker:that. So the responsibility on the CEO is
Speaker:as the day to day starts to come off of your plate, it's
Speaker:your responsibility to start growing and leveling up into a new
Speaker:version of yourself.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Exactly. Leader level of identity of who
Speaker:am I without the doing. Yeah.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: 100%.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah. And the clarity of what am I gonna be doing after this
Speaker:exit and what does that get for me? to me that's a big
Speaker:key to people's success. You got toa start on that early.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Is as you're giving, you know, first, at least from
Speaker:my perspective. I'd love for you to chime in on this. I have people get
Speaker:rid of stuff they don't like and they're not good enough.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: They usually don't have a problem doing that.
Speaker:When we get to the place where we're moving from generalist
Speaker:to specialist, we've got this up level number
Speaker:two. And now we're replacing
Speaker:my stuff.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: The excellence.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah. Like oh wait, now I really am being
Speaker:replaced. And yes, I said I wanted
Speaker:it, but who am I without that? And I have a client
Speaker:where I've said to her, you've
Speaker:got to start figuring out where you're gonna get your love.
Speaker:M Right. It can't be here if
Speaker:you're gonna exit. Right. Yeah. And
Speaker:so, to me, that
Speaker:is one of the most important journeys is the
Speaker:CEO figuring out I'm the issue.
Speaker:And I really need my number two to be go be
Speaker:awesome. And I need to move obstacles, provide
Speaker:resources. But my biggest job is
Speaker:developing myselfep and become
Speaker:externally focused and figure out who's a
Speaker:great person to acquire me. And then I gotta say,
Speaker:okay, what do I need to build in here so that they
Speaker:want to acquire me? And then hand the number
Speaker:two. Here's how are we going to build
Speaker:this? Yep.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: 100%. And I will. I will echo it back to
Speaker:you. I will double down on it. It's not only a nice
Speaker:to have, it's not something for the CEO to get to
Speaker:eventually. It's actually a root cause. Like,
Speaker:the business will not be able to move forward
Speaker:substantially until that CEO
Speaker:makes that level up. So when we come in, we do these operational
Speaker:audits guaranteed, like 100% of the time,
Speaker:we identify a root cause, and it's something to do with the
Speaker:founder. That's not because our Clients are bad CEOs,
Speaker:they're phenomenal entrepreneurs. But it just comes from the simple
Speaker:truth that what got you here will not get you there.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Exactly.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: And you're prepping for an exit that is a radically different
Speaker:reality. So that requires a radically different version of
Speaker:yourself.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah. So as you think about it, so I've
Speaker:been a CEO. I've been at the top. I've done all those
Speaker:roles. I've had to do the journey and
Speaker:have had the benefit of, like, if I just give these
Speaker:people resources, I can sleep
Speaker:in. I don't have to work Fridays. I can leave
Speaker:my noon on Thursdays. I never have to answer
Speaker:a call on the weekend again. My thing was
Speaker:only call me if the building's actually on fire. And since I
Speaker:currently work in a virtual business, there's never a building on fire.
Speaker:Right. So I've been through
Speaker:the journey. And it's like, once you've become
Speaker:what you need to be, let me say, I still have my
Speaker:own growth and development plan. We always do. But
Speaker:I've already become that person who doesn't get in the way of the
Speaker:operator and is like, I want you to be awesome. What do you
Speaker:need to thrive and achieve these goals?
Speaker:Not necessarily with me, but, like,
Speaker:go do it.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Right.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah. But you have a unique
Speaker:perspective, having been a chief operating officer, and
Speaker:then that's your passion, to grow these other operating
Speaker:officers to change the world, like, achieve these big goals that
Speaker:entrepreneurs, inv visionaries come up with.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: What do you see from your lens and
Speaker:your angle of what are the big things you
Speaker:see that the CEO has to do that nobody sold them
Speaker:yet and the ego won't let them
Speaker:see. Their wife probably knows or their husband
Speaker:probably knows. The operator certainly knows. But
Speaker:we haven't figured out how to tell the CEO you're
Speaker:the problem.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Oh, that's such a good question.
Speaker:Okay. These are the major root
Speaker:cause bottlenecks that we see as being the common patterns and
Speaker:reasons that CEOs get stuck. The first is,
Speaker:is the business owner clear on what it is that
Speaker:they want? Hm, that feels so basic. But you
Speaker:would be surprised how often that's the root cause.
Speaker:Because as entrepreneurs, we set out not knowing the version
Speaker:of the business that we're gonna end up building. We're just taking it one
Speaker:step, one day at a time, not really thinking that far in the
Speaker:future. And so even when it comes to something like an exit, like we
Speaker:know we want an exit, we may even have a number in mind for
Speaker:that exit. But do we know the exact
Speaker:version of the business that I want to build
Speaker:that will get me to that target valuation
Speaker:and will allow me to be happy, fulfilled
Speaker:and successful along the way? How
Speaker:many clients I've worked with that are building a version of their business that
Speaker:they secretly hate?
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: I did that, Right? Yeah, I did that.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: And it's such an easy mistake to fall into because we're
Speaker:chasing what we think is going to generate the most revenue,
Speaker:forgetting that if we're actually just optimizing for
Speaker:ourselves and what's gonna light us up energetically, we
Speaker:will work so much harder, we will be so much more
Speaker:leveraged in the business, we're going to create more revenue inevitably.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: And so I think that's the first part is the self awareness that
Speaker:says, what do I love doing as a
Speaker:CEO? How can I leverage my skill set as much
Speaker:as possible, build that version of the business
Speaker:and then just when we have it to your point,
Speaker:shift my identity again. That says what I
Speaker:loved was sales.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: And so I built a high ticket sales business.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Right.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: But now I have to shift my identity from being the world's best
Speaker:closer to a CEO. Right. And shifting
Speaker:that identity one more time, even though you just built this whole
Speaker:company around what you do uniquely well, it's
Speaker:this crazy catch 22. Right.
Speaker:that your business will be its most leveraged, effective version
Speaker:of itself when built towards you and around you. And then you have to
Speaker:figure out how to kick yourself out.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah. How not to be in it.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah.
Speaker:the thing I thought about when you were talking about, you
Speaker:know, they got toa get clear on what this thing is. I often
Speaker:think, and I'm interested in your perspective on this. I
Speaker:often think maybe they don't even
Speaker:know that what they want is actually possible.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Say more about that.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Well, think about like when you first
Speaker:built your baby business. Right.
Speaker:Even though you're an amazing operator and you're training people to do
Speaker:that and you worked with and for
Speaker:visionaries and you're like, if you would just focus
Speaker:on this thing. But I think about
Speaker:the people I work with and
Speaker:often they don't even know what a
Speaker:world would look like if they had
Speaker:all these. Right. People. So the, the beliefs
Speaker:stuff. Well, I can't afford them. Well we could if we were following
Speaker:up with the leads that were actually looking for us. No, we do
Speaker:follow up. No you don't. You know, I have 17 examples
Speaker:of how small business owners do not follow up with the leads
Speaker:that are already looking for them.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: can't even imagine that we could get to a
Speaker:place where we work half a day on Thursday
Speaker:and we don't work from Friday until Tuesday
Speaker:again because the way my
Speaker:world is constructed is I am the center
Speaker:of everything that. So I can't
Speaker:even see that vision.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep. There's this brilliant line from a book
Speaker:that says starting a business is do
Speaker:more to get more. Scaling a business
Speaker:is do less, to get m more. But the
Speaker:challenge is that we build our whole identity and belief
Speaker:system around do more to get more. Therefore if I want
Speaker:more, I have to do more. If I want to grow my business,
Speaker:I have to work harder, I have to work longer. If I need
Speaker:operations, I have to be the one to figure that out. Right.
Speaker:Countless examples across the business where the underlying
Speaker:belief is I'm the only person who can do this
Speaker:or I'll do it better than anybody else. So
Speaker:I might as well just. It, it's going to be faster, it's going to be
Speaker:easier. I tried delegating that once. It didn't work. So now
Speaker:I have to do it. Right. All of this self fulfilling
Speaker:prophecy that says you are necessary
Speaker:for your business to continue to grow and if you want more growth,
Speaker:we need more.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: You and the cultural paradigm, like you think about
Speaker:the boomers especially like achievement
Speaker:and they fought for everything they had as and their
Speaker:parents did. So they programmed them to achieve
Speaker:more, work hard, do more. So this cultural paradigm
Speaker:of we only
Speaker:get more or have more by doing more
Speaker:is also at play and you know, I'm
Speaker:an exer. There's half as many of us as there are boomers
Speaker:or millennials. And so I was like in the middle, in my corporate
Speaker:ears, I was the exer who kind of was like a boomer
Speaker:cusper. And so initially, I don't think
Speaker:it's so prevalent now, but initially the boomer's like, oh, the millennials
Speaker:are never gonna work and whatever. But it's like they have
Speaker:different belief and value system that's like,
Speaker:how can we work smarter, not harder,
Speaker:and enjoy life too? So they
Speaker:live and then work, whereas boomers lived
Speaker:to work. Right? Yeah. Extreme overneralization, sure.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: But I think it's true, like especially younger generations, we learn
Speaker:from an early age to leverage technology. So the concept
Speaker:of leverage is introduced from a very early age.
Speaker:The invitation even for young entrepreneurs that really struggle with
Speaker:this, because in the entrepreneurships there's all
Speaker:this glorification of hustle and grind and work
Speaker:harder and the 80 Hour Weeks are your badge of honor. And so
Speaker:to roll that back is at odds with the
Speaker:mainstream narrative. And so what we have to think about
Speaker:is the same way we leverage technology, it's our
Speaker:opportunity to leverage our team and the human potential as
Speaker:a resource that our team brings into the table.
Speaker:You used a word earlier in this event. Optimize.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Right. And how in general, founders are not
Speaker:wired or care much about optimization. Hm. I want to
Speaker:build, I want to launch, I want to do something new. I want the
Speaker:novelty. I don't want to take something that's existed for six
Speaker:months, six years and make it a little bit better
Speaker:every.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Dayeah 1% better, 1% better.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: But that is what's going to allow every single lead to get
Speaker:followed up with. That's what's going to allow you to go home on Thursday
Speaker:at noon. Right. So again, the
Speaker:ultimate workaround we have found is allow somebody else
Speaker:to optimize. Operators love
Speaker:optimizing, is what we do as a habit.
Speaker:O, give me that 1% gameain.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah, love it.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Right. So if you can, as a founder, know what
Speaker:you are uniquely skilled at and be
Speaker:willing to bring in the person that's going to take
Speaker:your incredible idea, the final 10%,
Speaker:that final 10% to excellent or efficient or
Speaker:optimized, you get to reap all of the
Speaker:efficiency gains and the benefits of that without having to
Speaker:rewire your brain towards something that you intrinsically don't
Speaker:care about.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: And I never are going to. No, I never
Speaker:advocate for people to make their weaknesses, their
Speaker:strengths, I say let's just work on it enough so it's
Speaker:not a stumbling block.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Love that.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: the reason I'm mostly in love with optimization
Speaker:is when I'm a data person. I love data, so it's weird.
Speaker:I'm a visionary, but I love data and a spread. We could put on
Speaker:a spreadsheet. Suddenly I understand and I'm
Speaker:with you.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yeah.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: But the reason I love optimization is,
Speaker:you know, if you can get this. And I always tell people, start closest
Speaker:to cash so you see the bigger thing right
Speaker:away. But if I can get this segment
Speaker:to perform this much more, I'm dropping more profit to
Speaker:the bottom line for the same amount of effort.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yes.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: So when we talk about exit,
Speaker:I have a T shirt'mnn to wear tomorrow called the EBITDA whiskeperer.
Speaker:Okay. When we find
Speaker:in each segment another percent or
Speaker:2M and we start
Speaker:getting that one or two in all these different places, not
Speaker:creating new things, but getting these 1 and 2
Speaker:and 0.5 percents all the way through. And
Speaker:then we start to realize it's the same
Speaker:amount of effort, it's the same number of team,
Speaker:but there's more pennies, nickels, and dollars
Speaker:dropping down on the other side of that
Speaker:one. Suddenly there's more money
Speaker:to go around and make new investments and all that. But on the exit
Speaker:side, we're increasing what we take
Speaker:away from this life's work. But I
Speaker:have not met an entrepreneur yet.
Speaker:Even if they believe they're optimizing, if they
Speaker:don't have a number two who
Speaker:is almost the exact opposite of them. And this is
Speaker:a challenge. We tend to hire people who are just like
Speaker:us. That's who we're comfortable with. But diversity cures
Speaker:all the problems. I'm not talking about diversity hires
Speaker:and all that stuff, but I don't
Speaker:love details. I gotta hire people who love
Speaker:details. Right. if I didn't love
Speaker:spreadsheets, I gotta hire somebody who makes
Speaker:spreadsheets and
Speaker:teaches me how to use them right or
Speaker:understand them. Yep. It does not
Speaker:make sense for us to make new things when the old things
Speaker:could probably create way more profit if we would
Speaker:just focus on them for a minute. But I
Speaker:cannot find an entrepreneur, small business
Speaker:owner who has spent the kind of time we spent
Speaker:in corporate. This is where I learned this.
Speaker:Optimizing each
Speaker:segment of the business and each quarter
Speaker:picking one thing we're going to focus
Speaker:everybody on. And if
Speaker:there's still more to get, guess what? Next quarter we're doing the
Speaker:same thing. but it's like, you know, in
Speaker:the corporate side, I grew up in a publicly traded company'like
Speaker:if we don't figure out how to make more profit, we're doing a layoff.
Speaker:So it was very real. M. We don't do that. And
Speaker:entrepreneurs, we keep people for way too long. Right?
Speaker:Yeah. So I love optimization
Speaker:because it's like what we already have
Speaker:can give us so much more. If I can get
Speaker:you to just let me focus on it.
Speaker:Not, you don't have to do it.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: But you have to set me up for success to do it.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Get your love and excitement somewhere else besides this
Speaker:business. Yeah. And then we're all happy,
Speaker:healthy, wealthy and whole. Right.
Speaker:So you have some experience
Speaker:with getting your CEOs to let your
Speaker:operator focus on optimization long enough.
Speaker:And what's the secret to getting them to do that?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yeah. So, okay, there's a hundred directions I could go with this.
Speaker:I'm so excited. I think it
Speaker:starts with understanding how operations links to
Speaker:the money pipeline. Because me as a CEO, I'm not. And I
Speaker:shouldn't do anything if I don't understand how it's going to increase my
Speaker:top line or my bottom line. Right. And so. Or decrease my
Speaker:bottom line. So the metaphor I give to help understand how
Speaker:operations connects is imagine your business is a
Speaker:bucket and sales and marketing are the pipe
Speaker:piping water money into that bucket. Right. And
Speaker:the goal is we want as much water in the bucket as possible.
Speaker:Cool. Well, as we get more and more water in,
Speaker:cracks and gaps begin to appear in the bucket. And
Speaker:when it's small, the cracks are small.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Right.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Barely noticeable. Frankly, not worth optimizing because you're not losing
Speaker:that much money. But as the pipe grows, the
Speaker:bucket grows, the cracks grow.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Right.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: And so what we find when it comes to a revenue plateau,
Speaker:the CEO is so frustrated because they
Speaker:are launching offer after offer. They are trying new
Speaker:marketing channels, new angles, new. Right. All of the
Speaker:things that used to work to pour more water
Speaker:into the bucket. And it is tons of water is flowing in and
Speaker:they're looking at the same revenue and profit every month and
Speaker:saying what the helleah? It's because the gaps
Speaker:and the cracks have grown so large that the exact
Speaker:amount of water being piped in is
Speaker:just draining out immediately in the form of lost
Speaker:money. Lost profit, lost time. Right. Like
Speaker:your time being spent on the wrong things. Your team's time being spent on the
Speaker:wrong things. Lost energy, lost human potential. These
Speaker:resources are just leaking out of the business.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Right.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: So the CEO's unique genius is to
Speaker:focus on the pipe and to bring more water in. Let
Speaker:your operator focus on closing the cracks and
Speaker:the gaps. But to your point, every
Speaker:optimization that they make drops straight to the bottom
Speaker:line because the water is already in the bucket.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: It's already, we've already paid to get that water.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: It's already there. We don't have to spend another dollar. We
Speaker:just keep the water in the bucket. And so all of
Speaker:that drops direct to your bottom line and becomes profitability.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: And what you said it, you know, it's like,
Speaker:what are they doing? Oh, we need to launch a new offer and
Speaker:get, you know, ideal client number
Speaker:three.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yes.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: You know, need to, I need more leadses. I
Speaker:gotta find a media buyer who can spend
Speaker:enough money every month. Like those are all the symptoms
Speaker:of
Speaker:there's not enough water coming out on the other side. And if they
Speaker:don't have a number two, it's even worse. But at least if they have somebody
Speaker:they respect who can argue with them and say, we
Speaker:could get this up to x percent if you would just stay
Speaker:out of my office.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yes, but that's where the operator has a responsibility.
Speaker:Right? Because. And I failed in
Speaker:this so beautifully, like catastrophically when I was
Speaker:a coo because I just assumed
Speaker:that they saw the business the way I did. Because
Speaker:it's so logical, it's so clear to be, obviously there's
Speaker:water leaking out of the bucket. you'd have to be an idiot to miss it. It's
Speaker:not that they're an idiot, it's that they're not focused on that part of the bucket.
Speaker:They're focused on bringing one.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: It's like the five love languages.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yeah. You know, we're just speaking different languages. And so
Speaker:what I had to learn as an operator is how do I
Speaker:translate my lens into a language
Speaker:that my CEO can understandeah? How do I translate
Speaker:something like culture? We talked about m mission, vision, core values, how
Speaker:do I put a dollar sign to culture? Because if I
Speaker:can, then my CEO is going toa give me the
Speaker:time, the energy, the budget to go fix the culture
Speaker:problem. Right. To go hire better people, to go kick out all of our toxic
Speaker:team members, whatever. Right? So it's our responsibility
Speaker:as operators not to just see the problem, not to
Speaker:just know how to fix it, but to actually be able to translate
Speaker:our lens into the lens that the rest of the
Speaker:team, starting with the CEO, can understand. Because without
Speaker:that, we'll never get the buy in. And so it's as good as
Speaker:useless to know what the Solution is if you can't actually roll
Speaker:it out and get people to buy into it, use it and make
Speaker:the company better.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Is that one of the things you do in your program is help
Speaker:the number two speak CEO a
Speaker:hundred percent, the
Speaker:COO whisper, turn them into the CEO
Speaker:whisperer.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Pretty much. Right. Because again, I
Speaker:think'it's our responsibility
Speaker:because what's our job? Our job isn't to build the best system.
Speaker:Our job is to build a more efficient company. And
Speaker:if our lack of ability to communicate or translate
Speaker:or get by in on an idea blocks it, then we're not doing
Speaker:our job. Right. So again, I didn't realize this at
Speaker:first. I just did what I thought my job was. I just built all these great
Speaker:systems and then got pissed when nobody used them.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yep, seen that before.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yeah. So how do we as operators go as step
Speaker:further, take on more than maybe our fair share of the communication
Speaker:load and recognize that our visionaries literally just don't
Speaker:see the cracks, they don't.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: See the leaks and have no interest in it.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Actually optimization is not where they thrive.
Speaker:And thank God because if operators ran the world,
Speaker:nothing would ever get done. There'd be no water coming into the
Speaker:bucket.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: They having big visions.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yeah, 100%. So we need the yin and yang.
Speaker:But something that you said earlier, spark this for me. The
Speaker:greatest challenge that people run into for hiring
Speaker:operators, this is ultimately why we ended up launching our
Speaker:recruitment service and actually finding operators for our clients
Speaker:is because when they go out to hire someone,
Speaker:the confirmation buys kicks in and they think, okay,
Speaker:I do a great job of running this business. If I want somebody else
Speaker:to run this business, I want them to do it just like
Speaker:me. I'm looking for a mini me.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: But then what do you get? You get two visionaries. Ye
Speaker:even more water, do even leakier bucket.
Speaker:And so it's really hard to be a yin
Speaker:and go out and find your yang. You're looking for your
Speaker:opposite. You're looking for a lens that you don't even understand and
Speaker:that you don't have. And so finding that person
Speaker:who's also going to be able to work with you and collaborate with
Speaker:you is really very difficult.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah, I remember when I was a gosh, this is way
Speaker:back in my corporate career and
Speaker:I'm an intj and an enneagram8 so
Speaker:we don't come off as warm and fuzzy and whatever.
Speaker:Right. Y so I got lots of feedback.
Speaker:You know, you're a buwlling a china shop and all that. Yeah, it was just what led
Speaker:me on my transformation journey, which every CEO has to
Speaker:have their transformation journey. And
Speaker:I remember thinking, okay, so
Speaker:people need hand holding.
Speaker:My instinct was not to learn. And I'm a nurse.
Speaker:Right. That was my first career. My instinct was
Speaker:not to go learn how to do hand holding. My
Speaker:instinct was I gott to hire people who hold hands.
Speaker:And I have done that.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: I love that.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: That was the first time I realized I don't
Speaker:have to become everything that people need.
Speaker:I gotta hire people who hold hands.
Speaker:This is amazing. I wish I thought of this
Speaker:sooner. So I don't want to paint myself as
Speaker:a cold fish who doesn't care. But you know, I'm more like,
Speaker:let's solve the. My first career was
Speaker:emergency room nursing. You know, there's not. It was like, we
Speaker:gotta solve the, the bleeding artery right
Speaker:now. Right?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Ye.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: So, if you had one piece of advice
Speaker:for the CEO and one piece of advice for the
Speaker:coo, like you want to exit,
Speaker:you want, you know, more than 3x, you want 4x5,
Speaker:8, 6. that's the thing that's gonna get them to hear us.
Speaker:Right. What's the one thing you
Speaker:would say to each of them so
Speaker:that they can like, see the other's
Speaker:perspective, hear the other's language and say, okay,
Speaker:like, I understand now why you need what you
Speaker:need. And I'm not going to be so
Speaker:judgy about. And it's not
Speaker:about I don't like you, it's I can't
Speaker:hear you. Right. So what would you say to
Speaker:them?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: That is the first time I've ever been asked that question. That's a genius
Speaker:question. to the visionary, I would say
Speaker:the CEO. I know it sounds like we've done a lot of
Speaker:visionary bashing on this episode. Quite the opposite.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: But we love the visionaryes. At least I do. I'm one of need
Speaker:them.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Right. I love them. They're incredible. I need
Speaker:them. The company needs them. In fact,
Speaker:it's a celebration of all that they
Speaker:are. And it's an invitation to not
Speaker:force themselves to step outside of that. Yeah,
Speaker:right. You don't have to be every solution
Speaker:for your business. This is the permission slip to
Speaker:leverage the hell out of yourself and do
Speaker:exactly what you do best, which is
Speaker:be a visionary, hold the vision
Speaker:for the business and see it over the finish line. Because you're
Speaker:so close, right.
Speaker:CEOs fail to recognize that they are the most
Speaker:valuable resource within their own company. And so they spend
Speaker:all their time and energy Doing low value work, trying to learn
Speaker:SOPs do all this stuff when in fact if their time
Speaker:and energy that valuable, spending it on the
Speaker:things that only they can do. And if you don't know what those things
Speaker:are, go work with Lonnie. Right. Like she will tell you. She'll
Speaker:just tell you, get over here.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: And your.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: This is what you need to do. This is how you get your business
Speaker:that final mile. Right?
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Right.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: So it's a celebration of all that you are. Keep going.
Speaker:Just utilize it and leverage it in the right direction.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Right.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: What I would tell the operator, I had a mentor of
Speaker:mine, Alex and Leyla Hermozi are a pretty iconic
Speaker:visionary operator couple. And Laila told me
Speaker:once that a visionary and operator pair are like
Speaker:the gas and the brake pedal of a car. There is an
Speaker:intrinsic tension between the gas and the
Speaker:brake.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Right.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: And the gas will always want to move faster
Speaker:and the brake will always want to slow things down.
Speaker:But you need both to drive the car safely.
Speaker:Right. So the intrinsic tension is not a sign that
Speaker:anything's wrong. If you're frustrated with your
Speaker:counterpart sometime, it's not a sign that anything's wrong. And for
Speaker:the operator, what I would say is that it's hard to be the brake
Speaker:pedal because we're always the person saying no
Speaker:or not yet or slow down or did you think about
Speaker:this or did you really think about this? Right. And so
Speaker:we often get painted as the bad guy, the
Speaker:pessimist. Right. All of these negative labels that
Speaker:nobody wants to be. Right. And so for
Speaker:the operator, I would say, number one, recognize that as
Speaker:not just your responsibility, but your
Speaker:unique genius and gift that you bring
Speaker:into the company. Because you're slowing that car down just
Speaker:enough that the wheels don't fly off and it all ends in
Speaker:catastrophic failure. So recognize the value
Speaker:of that and work with your visionary so they can
Speaker:see and understand and respect you for the value
Speaker:you bring.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: I 100% agree with you. And I would add
Speaker:the visionary, the CEO, the founder, the small business
Speaker:owner, whatever identity tag this person has on
Speaker:them, they have to
Speaker:be the one to say, I
Speaker:don't like holding hands. M other
Speaker:people are really good at holding hands.
Speaker:The person who likes to hold hands is probably gonna have
Speaker:personality characteristics that drive me
Speaker:crazy. But the people need hand
Speaker:holding. So I gotta do
Speaker:what I need to do to accommodate that, which is the
Speaker:same thing. It's like if I don't love details
Speaker:and I get a number two, they're detailed people.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yep.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: I have to say
Speaker:I'm hiring you for all these things. I
Speaker:want especially details and
Speaker:maybe operators probably aren't hand holders either.
Speaker:Right. it's an extreme overgenerization. But hiring
Speaker:you because I don't want to do the details and I don't want to do the
Speaker:doing. I want to achieve the vision y to
Speaker:get there. Somebody's got to love the
Speaker:details. So I've got to make space to hear
Speaker:you and do my own work and my own
Speaker:evolution. To be able to say
Speaker:John is going toa show up in my office and get me to focus
Speaker:on data and segments and
Speaker:she's going to need resources to do stuff I think is
Speaker:crazy. But if I don't do that,
Speaker:we're not going to get where we need to be. And I think that's
Speaker:I have to own that as the CEO, founder, small
Speaker:business owner, entrepreneur, whatever it is. So
Speaker:yes, number two has gott say I got to
Speaker:communicate in a way that they're hear me and I got
Speaker:to understand that I might be going. It might feel like I'm going
Speaker:uphill and it might feel like the brake and the gas pedal are
Speaker:in in friction and the
Speaker:car'know feeling little bit and I'm
Speaker:frustrated. I'm pretty soon goingn bang my head on the steering
Speaker:wheel. Yes.
Speaker:And if I'm gonna have a vision to reach
Speaker:the world and change them and transform them and do all those
Speaker:things, I have to understand I need you
Speaker:to be able to do that. So I got to create the space for you to
Speaker:feel safe to push me
Speaker:where I don't want to go.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yes.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: When I was, let's see,
Speaker:I'm gonna say somewhere in my 40s,
Speaker:I came to a new facility, I was the CEO
Speaker:and it was kind of a tumultuous reason.
Speaker:I often was hired as the turnaround person so like
Speaker:people were gone or people needed to leave and I was hired
Speaker:to make all that happen. So I was giving
Speaker:a counseling situation and I was ending
Speaker:with, you know, it's always easier to find a job when
Speaker:you have one. So now's a good time to go get that jobuse
Speaker:the next time we meet I'm probably going toa be handing you
Speaker:the final check. That is not usually a CEO conversation but in
Speaker:a turnaround situation, you're often the only person
Speaker:standing to do it. And so, you know,
Speaker:they went on their merry way. And if I remember correctly,
Speaker:that person did resign. But Anyway,
Speaker:afterwards, the 27 year old
Speaker:HR Director who had just been
Speaker:promoted to HR Director by me,
Speaker:she's like, okay, all that was good. I like this, I like this.
Speaker:But I need to give you some feedback. And in my head I've been hearing
Speaker:my entire life. I'm
Speaker:intimidating, I'm, a bul in a china shop. People can't get a word in
Speaker:edge wise. And I'm like, you know, I had to
Speaker:do a lot of development and I thought to
Speaker:myself, I had to keep her on my team
Speaker:for the rest of my life because she's not afraid
Speaker:of me. She's about to tell me
Speaker:stuff I don't really wa want to hear and probably don't agree
Speaker:with. Right. I promoted her when I
Speaker:left my corporate job. She came into
Speaker:my entrepreneurial space. We're still connected.
Speaker:She still does things for me. And I'm like, I can never let go
Speaker:of her because she's not afraid of
Speaker:me. And that is the work of the
Speaker:founder, CEO, whatever label they want to put on themselves.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: I agree.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Otherwise that, number two is never goingna be safe to say,
Speaker:I've got some feedback. You're totally screwing things up
Speaker:here. We're gonna drive over a cliff and
Speaker:I cannot launch one more idea.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: I completely.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Everybody else wants to quit and you're the problem, right?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Yes, 100%. And to the
Speaker:operators who don't know how to have that
Speaker:conversation, number one, it's a skill. You can learn it, you
Speaker:can practice it. And sometimes it's the
Speaker:funniest thing. When we come in and we do this ops inspection, we
Speaker:call it this audit. We're pretty much telling the
Speaker:CEO things that the operator and the team have
Speaker:known for months, if not years. We're literally,
Speaker:we're interviewing the operator, the team. That's where we're pulling so much
Speaker:of this data from. We're just presenting it to the CEO
Speaker:in a way where they can hear it, finally hear it,
Speaker:internalize it, take ownership for it, understand it, and
Speaker:action. Right. And so if you're feeling really, really
Speaker:stuck, it's the operators or the team's job to
Speaker:also get the help that they need to help the
Speaker:CEO understand what they need to hear.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Yeah, yeah. Amazing dynamic
Speaker:tension. So, love it if people want to get in touch with
Speaker:you, follow you, you know, get
Speaker:your, get your thingy that helps them do something
Speaker:faster. Where should they go?
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Well, if you want my thingy that can help you do something
Speaker:faster, you can find me on Instagram is the best way to
Speaker:connect @thejhanali And I am in my own
Speaker:inbox. DM me if you have any questions.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Aha.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Ah, moments. I would love to help. or just book a call with my
Speaker:team, which you can also do at our website,
Speaker:spyglassops.com.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Awesome. Thank you so much for being here today.
Speaker:I really feel like everybody out there in YouTube
Speaker:and podcast land will get so much value
Speaker:from everything that you shared. And it's interesting to be the
Speaker:CEO and the operator. Like, I'm
Speaker:thinking of all of my experiences, and even though I haven't worked with
Speaker:you like that, like, seeing you in that way, we would probably work well together.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Pretty fun.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Pretty fun.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Thank you for having me. This is blast.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: Thank you so much.
Speaker:>> Jhana Li: Y.
Speaker:>> Lani Dickinson: All right.
