Dan Martell - How To Scale Your Team (The Right Way)

00:00:00.000 The biggest killer of momentum and success is not a bad decision or lack of funding or a key person

00:00:09.040 quitting on you. It's the CEO taking their foot off the gas pedal.

00:00:14.440 Kenneth how's it going man? Getting on good, Dan. How are you? I'm doing incredible. I'm looking

00:00:33.480 forward to this conversation. Give me some details. What's your story? What's the business?

00:00:39.320 So we have a valuation tool in the Irish market after spending over five years in the UK selling high-end real estate.

00:00:49.320 You can probably tell I'm Irish. I found a gap in the Irish market alongside my business partner,

00:00:55.320 whereby we collated and aggregated information from multiple portals.

00:00:59.320 So like your NLS in the US, we looked at how we could get information to the industry

00:01:06.320 to make it a more transparent environment for everyone.

00:01:09.320 uh and what's it called yeah uh ipi the independent property price index cool so essentially it's a

00:01:16.200 data aggregation uh product like what's the what problem do you solve like how does a customer

00:01:21.640 interface with it so i would say we solve giving people a platform to get uh accurate valuations

00:01:30.360 so give transparency with data driven insights so is it more for consumers or more for real

00:01:36.280 estate agents or realtors or or investors yeah great question um agents bank valuers finance

00:01:43.720 institutions media bodies we create can create you know dynamic reports for some of the media

00:01:49.640 groups in ireland so that if the product has evolved um immensely since we first launched in

00:01:55.160 2019 um and we're now kind of going on to a more i would say enterprise um offering whereby we're

00:02:03.320 offering the data as a service as well as the subscription model.

00:02:08.120 Yeah, I know this industry well. I've coached a few people in this space. So what are some

00:02:14.520 questions that you might have for me that might be able to help you with?

00:02:17.480 Yeah, I'm thinking some of the pain points. Obviously, I'm a huge fan of your content,

00:02:22.200 and thanks again for putting so much out. There's a lot of value there for startups. You've been

00:02:29.400 there you've you've you've wore the hat and so i mean yeah looking at how you some of the pain

00:02:36.840 points in the iris market is you know how do you hang on to staff especially you know some of your

00:02:42.120 maybe your your original uh coders or software developers or making sure that you have

00:02:50.760 i would say yeah people people are the fundamental in our business um they've been there with us

00:02:56.920 through the pandemic i think what what in your opinion would be the sort of three top points for

00:03:05.080 keeping them so um is your challenge right now attrition like people are quitting or leaving or

00:03:13.960 what's what what specific problem are you trying to solve uh so i would say making making sure that

00:03:20.920 like they stay with us. No, we don't have a huge turnover of staff, but creating a culture in a

00:03:28.920 startup can sometimes be, it can be a rollercoaster when we're busy and it's making sure that you've

00:03:36.580 kind of time-blocked team meetings, but what has worked for you in the past to keep and grow culture

00:03:42.000 within the business? Well, Steve, those are two different questions. So it's interesting,

00:03:46.680 like you went from like how do I keep people to how to create culture and that's why as a coach

00:03:51.400 I always I always try to really get to the root of like what is the problem you're trying to solve

00:03:56.480 because you know my answer will be specific to that is is your challenge the concern that people

00:04:04.840 are going to quit and you're not aware of it is it that you want to create the best place to work

00:04:09.960 like what specific problem are you trying to solve so yeah create create an environment that people

00:04:16.380 want to come in every day uh and also work remotely we've got people in six different

00:04:21.500 countries around the world we've grown a team to 15 since march last year yeah um so here's a few

00:04:29.260 thoughts um one like i'm gonna order them by priority because i think a lot of people get

00:04:35.260 this wrong you know most founders because they're in the in the zone of knowing what the future

00:04:42.860 looks like and what's happening day to day that they just assume that other people are going to

00:04:48.060 know right so one of the things i like to do is is hold some kind of meeting you can call it in all

00:04:54.380 hands you can call it a q a with the founder you can call it office hours but i think it's important

00:05:00.060 that you know at the frequency that you feel is appropriate maybe it's once a month i think that's

00:05:04.860 not often enough maybe every two weeks i do them weekly um the bigger the team more frequent you

00:05:10.620 and you wanna do it, but create a space

00:05:13.480 where you can share and reconnect the future

00:05:17.940 of where you're going with everybody on the team, right?

00:05:21.500 And speak boldly about that future.

00:05:25.980 Speak specifically about that future

00:05:29.840 because that will create the questions

00:05:32.140 that'll come up in your team today

00:05:34.080 that they will then ask you about.

00:05:35.620 So if I say I have a vision, so let's say I'm you,

00:05:38.800 It's like, you know, I have a vision where every company making a real estate decision is using our data in Europe, right?

00:05:49.120 Or whatever region, you know, in the future, I don't know when, but there's a future where every person making a property decision is going to use our data.

00:05:59.240 and it's going to require us to you know build infrastructure that allows us to do x amount of

00:06:05.740 calls and requests against our api and have the highest quality data just speak that future into

00:06:10.600 existence and then with that go now that i've shared that i just want to create the space for

00:06:16.240 everybody to ask me questions on on that future and what happens is that if you do that people

00:06:21.940 are going to connect their work to that and there's a lot of gaps that are going to come up

00:06:25.640 they're going to be like okay that sounds cool but how are we going to do this or that sounds

00:06:29.480 cool but what about this or hey that sounds cool but how is that my department going to change i

00:06:33.800 mean the reality of it is is most people are self-interested in how you're going to help them

00:06:39.400 realize their dreams like i just assume everybody's going to be selfish like and that's okay there's

00:06:45.480 nothing wrong with that i think it's very important that you just acknowledge it like

00:06:48.760 they show up every day because there's an agreement that may have never been said that

00:06:53.080 you're going to create an environment for them to be able to express their creativity in the best

00:06:57.400 possible way without the bureaucracy without the constraints because otherwise they'd go work some

00:07:02.200 other company and get paid more but they'd have to deal with all that does that make sense yeah

00:07:07.720 yeah great answer yeah so so to me it's important that i create the space for my team to talk with

00:07:15.320 me directly okay so all hands meeting really important so like you know talk about the future

00:07:21.800 let them do Q&A. That could be a format. The other things I do. Oh, go ahead.

00:07:27.640 And just on that, because you've obviously got tech and you've got business. And let's be honest,

00:07:34.600 there's always going to be a fine line between the two and how each of them talk. Would you

00:07:38.680 have a space for everyone and then do separate? Everybody. Yep. Because your leaders, you know,

00:07:45.800 you're still small that you may not have dedicated leaders to those departments. But

00:07:49.480 usually what will happen is everybody's on the call you speak that into the future spend five

00:07:53.560 minutes and you might have said thought to yourself i already explained this last time

00:07:57.720 say it again say it again say like i would argue that i spend 30 to 40 of my verbal communication

00:08:06.840 speaking vision impact mission meaning that's that's what i do i'm literally a professional

00:08:13.720 storyteller at this point my job is to tell them where the mountaintop is their job is to figure

00:08:19.160 how we get there i don't hire people and tell them what to do i hire people to tell me what to do

00:08:23.640 i just need to be clear of where we're going right how do you know it's very clear for everyone

00:08:29.880 yeah it's north star it's what does that look like when we get there like paint the picture

00:08:34.520 tell them i want you to i want you to visualize this okay we won an award for this and we're

00:08:39.640 seen as the best company to work for and we've got a data set that's in the multi terabytes or

00:08:45.080 or whatever, like, you know,

00:08:46.600 we've built a supercomputer infrastructure

00:08:49.320 with artificial intelligence,

00:08:50.880 be able to predict pricing changes

00:08:52.640 before customers even ask us for it.

00:08:54.300 Like, that's the future I wanna create.

00:08:56.840 If you're on board with that, then awesome.

00:08:59.380 What questions may you have for me?

00:09:01.000 Well, how are we gonna fund that?

00:09:02.560 Great question, here's my plan.

00:09:04.000 I don't have the long-term answer.

00:09:05.300 I can just tell you what the short-term

00:09:06.640 is gonna probably look like.

00:09:08.200 And then what'll happen is if everybody's on that call,

00:09:11.100 then individuals, they may not wanna ask publicly.

00:09:14.140 A lot of people are shy.

00:09:15.620 They may bring that up with your leadership.

00:09:19.440 And hopefully you do that with them

00:09:21.380 to the point where they can share.

00:09:23.720 The way I like to explain it is you want everybody singing

00:09:26.000 from the same song sheet, right?

00:09:29.420 And nothing's worse than misalignment.

00:09:32.620 Elon Musk says this often.

00:09:34.060 He says that leadership is nothing

00:09:35.860 but more than a vector problem.

00:09:38.580 So in a vector diagram, there's direction and force, okay?

00:09:44.140 little, little vectors are like little triangles. Okay. But there's two, there's two components to

00:09:49.180 a vector. There's a directional component to it and there's a force. Okay. So think of like one

00:09:54.260 to 10 being the force in the direction, Northwest, Southeast. If I have two people on my team and

00:10:01.280 one's vector is pointing that way at a five, and this one's pointing that way at a five,

00:10:06.340 do I have any forward motion? No, they cancel each other out. Okay. The two fives cancel each

00:10:12.800 other out. If I point them in the same direction, do I have forward motion? Yes. Then the question

00:10:17.980 is, okay, how do I get everybody on my team pointing in the same direction and get from

00:10:25.580 twos, threes, fours, fives, sevens, whatever, to tens? To the degree that you have the ability

00:10:30.700 to get everybody pointed in the same directions out of 10, that is called leadership. That is

00:10:36.860 skill can you learn the skill sets to be a better leader if you haven't read the 21 irrefutable laws

00:10:43.660 of leadership by john maxwell great start start yeah anything from um patrick lencioni amazing

00:10:52.460 books he's got a whole library of incredible books but leadership's one of those things as a ceo just

00:10:56.860 like sales you really can't over consume like great place to invest your time but so all hand

00:11:04.220 meetings and creating that space that's one okay the other one is one-on-ones okay so i have one-on-ones

00:11:09.820 with all my direct reports every week but i only believe you should ever have more than five

00:11:14.540 i call it the five by five rule so five direct reports five levels deep should get you to where

00:11:20.940 you want to go in any business okay you can go up to seven but i just like five by five it's a simple

00:11:26.300 methodology to think about and just build your teams underneath other folks so that people say

00:11:32.460 well i like flat hierarchies that's great doesn't work right i don't i've never made it work i think

00:11:38.460 people want a clear person who is leading vision and managing reporting and metrics and all that

00:11:45.500 stuff um but every every monday i have direct reports one-on-ones okay and we talk about

00:11:51.900 not the projects we talk about them we talk about their vision we talk about what's what's

00:11:56.300 challenging them because that's why somebody's going to leave your organization and and to me

00:12:00.940 it's mandatory so all my leaders have to have one-on-ones with anybody that reports to them

00:12:05.100 because i don't want to be surprised that somebody was having challenges and decides that they want

00:12:10.380 to leave to go pursue something else right so that's the second thing and then the third thing

00:12:15.340 is um once a quarter across all my team okay and i have you know close to 100 people that work for

00:12:21.500 me i do one-on-ones with everybody on the team 15 minutes okay so like today i might have three my

00:12:30.300 My assistant essentially fills them in

00:12:31.900 whenever I have cancellations or something comes up.

00:12:33.980 They just, you know, whoever's on the list

00:12:35.940 and then we recycle every quarter.

00:12:37.520 I just start at the bottom and I go back.

00:12:39.480 And my job is to just ask them questions like,

00:12:43.620 is there anything that you just see is so obvious

00:12:47.080 that we should be doing that we're not even thinking about?

00:12:50.660 Right, and just listen, don't make commitments.

00:12:54.300 Don't try to, you know, undermine any of the leaders.

00:12:59.300 just listen, right? Any questions for me, right? I like to create the space. Any questions for me?

00:13:06.760 Like they're talking to the CEO, they have questions. And then finally, like I just said

00:13:10.760 at the beginning, the end of the call is to connect their work to the bigger vision. That's my job. My

00:13:17.080 job is CEOs have three things they have to do really well. They have to be clear about where

00:13:22.540 we're going and communicate the vision. They need to manage the financial so that you don't run out

00:13:27.860 of capital, right? So money. And they have to make sure that the right people are on the team.

00:13:34.960 Those are the three things, vision, money, and people. And if you do those things, the business

00:13:40.340 should build that momentum and continue to grow even faster than it has been so far.

00:13:45.660 Based on what I just shared, Kenneth, I'm just curious, what resonated with you? What did you

00:13:49.940 need to hear most? What did you like? I liked, you know, it hit a nerve when you started talking

00:13:57.660 of you know getting everyone on the same page because that's been on my objective this year

00:14:02.220 it's really interesting the time that this conversation has come about because

00:14:06.080 I've literally been going ham I'm not gonna you know since March I've been going full force and

00:14:12.640 I'm taking it I'm taking a sort of a week's uh holiday um to sort of reflect on on on the past

00:14:19.940 you know year because it has been you know it's been uncertain for some we've lost our lead

00:14:24.300 developer, but we've also gained a CTO, software engineer, we've grown our sales team, we've got

00:14:30.880 analysts. So there's a lot of pros. And I think from what you were discussing, I like the one-on-one

00:14:37.280 reports, the really just kind of sticking to having those CEO mindsets of your vision, mission,

00:14:45.760 values, and making them solid in the business. All hands meet. I do like that. We usually do

00:14:52.320 like a stand-up meet which is like it just ends up this one person talking where it's not actually

00:14:59.200 it's you go out at the end of it and you've gone past 15 or 20 minutes you're like that

00:15:03.860 there was no agenda set so making sure you're setting agendas making sure the conversation

00:15:09.140 is led by team rather than up at the top of the triangle so lead from the bottom is one thing I've

00:15:15.920 really taken on from the last month. And making sure that, you

00:15:21.980 know, we're in what six different time zones. So aligning

00:15:26.960 transparency. So doing what we're doing for the industry, but

00:15:30.820 internally, I think will resonate more with our customers.

00:15:36.020 Awesome. Those are big takeaways. I mean, to me, again, if

00:15:40.640 you can get everybody aligned with the same amount of intensity,

00:15:43.180 focus and uh execution that's what's going to create momentum so yeah i know you're a big

00:15:49.580 advocate for outdoor sports and and and uh hats off to you for doing your your uh your iron man

00:15:55.740 and what would you say if you had down time uh in the space 28 think yourself 28 maybe 30 years of

00:16:03.900 age what would you be doing i mean i don't think age like i'm doing what i'm doing now which is

00:16:12.140 you know yesterday when i started off i did a big hike was fun then i went wake surfing all

00:16:16.940 day with the family and then i got back and i went for a mountain bike ride so i don't know

00:16:22.860 i think it's just being outside in nature i think is a really uh important component of

00:16:30.460 an integrated life like i believe i don't believe in i believe that most people that

00:16:35.820 say you need to sacrifice to be successful is because those people don't have control

00:16:39.980 of their calendar like they're you know they don't plan their mornings they don't schedule their

00:16:44.780 lives they don't have a vision for their their business they don't have a cadence and the way

00:16:50.780 i know that to be true is you know when i ask entrepreneurs that i coach you know privately

00:16:56.700 you know what's something that when you do it a hobby an activity that really lights you up and

00:17:01.500 it charges you up and it rejuvenates you and some people it's like kiteboarding or snowboarding or

00:17:06.940 or even hobbies, like one of my clients

00:17:10.420 is into model train sets, right?

00:17:13.620 And I go, so after you do that,

00:17:16.480 if you took half a day and went and did that activity,

00:17:19.380 after you did that activity,

00:17:21.300 are you better for your family

00:17:24.000 and for your coworkers and your team or worse?

00:17:27.180 And most of the time they're like, no, I'd be better.

00:17:29.120 Cause like most people need a separation from the work

00:17:34.120 work to go do something different with their mind and their body to almost reset them to come back

00:17:39.120 with another level of intensity. So I know I work out twice a day typically, but I work out at lunch

00:17:44.860 because it resets my energy for my meetings in the afternoon, right? And I just show up better.

00:17:50.400 Most people would think like, aren't you tired after a workout? Nope. I don't know about you,

00:17:54.940 but after I go to the gym, I feel better, right? I feel, you know, excited, energized, strong,

00:18:01.240 confidence um creative so i just think it's find the activity if it can bring you outside awesome

00:18:10.120 if you bring you in the water even better right surfing that kind of stuff is is is great and if

00:18:16.200 you can do with other people even even even better right um because there's nothing like you know

00:18:23.560 getting your sweat on having a great conversation enjoying some vitamin d um you know being in in

00:18:30.040 in nature to uh to make you feel like you're not sacrificing see business will suck every ounce of 0.69

00:18:37.320 you if you let it and the biggest uh killer of momentum and success is not a bad decision or

00:18:48.040 lack of funding or a key person quitting on you it's the ceo taking their foot off the gas pedal

00:18:56.200 it's the ceo getting to a point where they're burnt out and they got to take three months off

00:19:01.480 i have clients that get before they've worked with me you know they've shared with me they've gotten

00:19:06.680 um they've gotten adrenal fatigue okay where their body literally says i'm done and there it's like

00:19:14.200 you're hung over laying on the couch for three months like i have one of my clients right now

00:19:19.240 he's in one of my programs i don't coach him privately that was offered to he didn't want

00:19:23.240 to see anybody because his eyes were all inflamed okay but essentially what i'm saying is your body

00:19:29.160 will have a physical response to your work schedule and stress levels and if you don't have a release

00:19:36.680 valve eventually that tank gets to a high pressure and explodes and i just think you know if you don't

00:19:42.920 incorporate physical movement or what i call sweat every day at least just break a sweat every day

00:19:48.360 it doesn't matter if it's yoga hiking walking stretching just you know make sure your heart

00:19:53.560 rate gets you know increased um then it's just it's it doesn't allow you to execute at the

00:20:00.040 highest level possible does that make sense yeah yeah i'm i'm there on that cool bye

00:20:08.360 last question i would say um

00:20:10.680 launching, we're launching in the UK next. What would you say one key indicator of launching in

00:20:21.820 a new market would be? Usually what I tell people when they're expanding into new markets, new

00:20:29.980 segments, new use cases is try to go back to how you started and replicate that. So success leaves

00:20:38.160 clues people that are successful have done things inadvertently they may have forgotten that they did

00:20:44.800 right it might have been like a first partner like you launch because you had a partner that

00:20:48.880 brought you into the market and then you go and you start a new market and you don't have that

00:20:54.000 and then you struggle for six months and then you're like oh i forgot the thing that made me

00:20:59.280 successful is that we had a partner that kind of like launched us into it to create that momentum

00:21:04.720 So that's the big rule is like whatever worked in the past, so there's replicate that, so like pattern match.

00:21:12.000 And then the other one is like everything in life, find somebody who's successfully done it, ask them what they learned.

00:21:18.540 What I've discovered, because I coach a lot of clients that do international expansion, is if you are going to do it,

00:21:24.200 we're going to build like a separate team, you know, customer base, et cetera.

00:21:27.460 it's always best to have somebody from the main company move there and build the team with local

00:21:35.420 people than to hire somebody to lead it locally that didn't come from your team because there's

00:21:43.340 so much dna and culture and you know just like just so much knowledge that is required to take

00:21:50.880 this and be successful because if you don't do that typically what i see happen is you know

00:21:54.940 clients that have failed again before i work with them these are all stories they tell me because

00:21:58.860 i've seen the pattern replicate itself is they hire somebody in the uk or germany or in south

00:22:05.820 asia or whatever and then they hire somebody from that region that doesn't have any connection to

00:22:10.540 the business they have no visibility what that person's doing they're trying to give the person

00:22:14.940 space to kind of create demand and pipeline but six months nine months later they're like hey we

00:22:19.580 just spent 150 grand on this department and it isn't even producing any revenue we're gonna have

00:22:24.460 have to shut it down and maybe start again in a year or two years we have more time right so that's

00:22:30.460 that's the big missed opportunity um when expanding into new regions geographical regions

00:22:40.140 yeah that was very good so kenneth as we wrap up i'm just curious what based on everything you've

00:22:45.580 heard me say share even other videos you've seen what has been the most impactful thing on your life

00:22:51.740 the most impactful thing on my life in business yeah getting getting after it every day for for

00:23:01.100 for a big meaning um sort of making sure i'm floating my own boat and i'm looking after the

00:23:07.820 people around me i'm looking after my health well-being and i'm bringing people up within

00:23:13.500 the business from may that may have never got the opportunity um helping the leaders

00:23:18.700 yeah helping guys that you know uh i'm a firm believer that you've got to help people uh in

00:23:25.340 17 18 19 in schools and you know disadvantaged areas that may have never got the opportunity

00:23:31.980 because they might be the brightest minds in businesses um and that's a space i really want

00:23:37.100 to explore into going into my 30s and 40s is like getting into schools uh because i'm going to be

00:23:43.500 honest i wasn't a i wasn't i wasn't good in school uh but i've got a business mind and i was always

00:23:49.580 at trade shows with my with my dad and learned a lot from him but it's like how do you how do

00:23:55.260 you bring that to younger generations that if they don't get the points to go to college or

00:24:01.900 they don't have the finances to fund it that they can have the opportunity to and i think giving

00:24:07.660 you know programs towards that generation i think would have massive effect because

00:24:13.500 They end up getting into drugs, drink, et cetera, and that's just a slippery slope.

00:24:18.680 So how to bring my value and share my value to other people would be something I would like to do.

00:24:26.300 Probably biggest thing would be, yeah, keep your group close.

00:24:33.360 Look after your body.

00:24:35.900 Try and surround yourself with the best brass in the business.

00:24:38.560 People like yourselves, watch the content you produce.

00:24:41.100 Jay Papasan's another good mentor

00:24:44.360 I've followed for quite some time

00:24:46.220 my own business partner

00:24:48.040 and my team, listening to your team

00:24:50.560 my mother always tell me you've got two ears and one mouth 0.99

00:24:54.660 to do twice as much listening

00:24:56.640 as you do talking, I think that can be

00:24:58.680 brought across the board, and what was the other

00:25:00.680 one I heard there? An empty vessel

00:25:02.460 speaks loudest, so

00:25:03.780 learning from people who are coming

00:25:06.660 up as well as the guys at the top

00:25:08.100 I love that, awesome, Kenneth

00:25:10.360 it's been a pleasure man keep it up keep me boasted and uh hope you have a amazing rest of

00:25:14.040 the day bye-bye

Dan Martell - December 06, 2021

How To Scale Your Team (The Right Way)

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