Dan Martell - The “Who, Not How” Strategy of Growth

00:00:00.080 Hey there, Dan Martell here,

00:00:01.080 serial entrepreneur, investor, and creator of SaaS Academy.

00:00:02.960 In this episode, I'm gonna share with you

00:00:04.760 the who, not how, strategy for growth.

00:00:09.480 And be sure to stay at the end,

00:00:10.400 we're gonna tell you how to get access

00:00:12.040 to my Silicon Valley secrets training.

00:00:14.440 Literally five years, immense,

00:00:17.840 immersed in Silicon Valley,

00:00:19.760 learning the best growth strategies

00:00:21.160 from the top marketers and entrepreneurs.

00:00:23.520 I'm gonna share with you how to get access to that at the end,

00:00:25.840 but let's get into it.

00:00:30.000 So the idea of the who, not how

00:00:42.080 is essentially asking you the question,

00:00:43.860 if you have something you wanna accomplish,

00:00:45.620 not how do I do it,

00:00:47.180 but who do I need to bring into my life

00:00:49.360 to help me do that sooner, better, or faster, okay?

00:00:52.740 So I'm gonna tell you a quick story.

00:00:53.720 When I moved to San Francisco back in 2008,

00:00:58.920 I wanted to build a software company,

00:01:01.100 but I knew that I wanted to also take some time off.

00:01:04.000 At that point, I'd been building companies

00:01:05.680 for literally 14 years, nonstop, 100-hour weeks,

00:01:10.380 really felt like, okay, I just exited my company.

00:01:13.720 Financially, I was incredibly in a good spot

00:01:16.280 and I'm not gonna rush to do anything else.

00:01:19.400 But I had aspirations and motivation

00:01:22.240 to do a startup company, to build a software company.

00:01:25.500 And it wasn't until I met Ethan

00:01:27.060 that I realized that this is the who

00:01:30.160 that might unlock the potential to do this.

00:01:33.120 So instead of me rushing to build this company,

00:01:36.000 I actually gave all the idea,

00:01:38.100 the code I'd built up to that point

00:01:39.860 because I had a full-time dedicated CTO working for me, Scott.

00:01:43.300 And I gave the code and said,

00:01:44.580 Ethan, this is your idea, run with it

00:01:46.920 and let me be a business partner with you.

00:01:48.940 And it was through that process of him CEOing the company.

00:01:52.420 I didn't wanna be CEO.

00:01:53.660 I wanted to be building something,

00:01:56.020 but I didn't want the responsibility.

00:01:58.200 I found Ethan, we partnered on 50-50 partners.

00:02:01.540 I brought the capital and the experience.

00:02:03.540 He brought the tenacity, the obsession and the focus

00:02:05.940 and the team management and all things operations and CEO.

00:02:08.660 And we ended up building this incredible company,

00:02:11.060 raised venture capital and eventually exiting

00:02:12.960 for a lot of money about two and a half years later.

00:02:17.080 And I share that because even today,

00:02:19.360 I've always known that I learned this back in the day

00:02:22.100 that building teams and finding the right bench strength,

00:02:25.320 You know, that's the real unlock.

00:02:27.300 For a lot of us, we think we need to know and do everything.

00:02:30.680 And the truth is, is that if you can find the right person,

00:02:33.520 that will allow you to unlock strategies

00:02:35.880 that you might've thought were three, four,

00:02:37.360 five years into the future and bring them forward.

00:02:39.600 So great book.

00:02:40.760 If you wanna read a book on the topic by Dan Sullivan,

00:02:43.200 it's actually titled Who Not How.

00:02:44.680 He may even have the copyright on this,

00:02:46.660 but Dan, I just read this a few months ago.

00:02:49.080 It inspired me to shoot this video

00:02:50.620 because I've always thought through this.

00:02:52.500 I mean, another quick story.

00:02:53.760 I'm on the board of a company called Peel a Case.

00:02:56.220 I invested with Jay-Z, the hip hop guy.

00:02:59.220 And I sit on the board with this incredible team,

00:03:01.620 Matt and Brad are the founders.

00:03:03.060 And one day I remember asking Brad

00:03:04.440 because they had so many different initiatives going on.

00:03:07.020 And I said, aren't you worried

00:03:08.640 that we're doing too many things?

00:03:10.060 You know, death by a thousand paper cuts

00:03:11.540 are not being focused.

00:03:12.400 And he says, I understand why you're saying that,

00:03:14.620 but the truth is, is we keep asking ourselves

00:03:16.520 the who question, not the how question.

00:03:19.000 So every new strategy that they were sharing,

00:03:21.540 they could literally point to the driver, the GM,

00:03:24.640 the entrepreneur that they partnered with

00:03:26.300 to execute that into the market.

00:03:28.600 And because of that, they had somebody

00:03:30.140 that could spearhead it so that they didn't get bogged down

00:03:33.500 by those new initiatives and it allowed them

00:03:35.200 to create bench strength and management bandwidth.

00:03:38.760 That's the power.

00:03:40.020 Here's what I got for you and how to do that for yourself.

00:03:42.480 Number one, big project.

00:03:44.060 So the truth is, is you gotta have a big project.

00:03:46.640 Why?

00:03:47.280 Because if you're gonna find somebody that's the who, 0.88

00:03:49.680 it needs to be big and interesting enough

00:03:51.940 to be exciting for them to want to be part of it.

00:03:55.400 Most people try to have who questions on small little tasks.

00:04:00.340 That's not gonna get the juices flowing.

00:04:02.820 That's not gonna get you excited.

00:04:04.340 That's not gonna get you thinking about a bigger vision.

00:04:07.200 I want you to think about what is possible for you

00:04:10.020 over the next three years and what are projects

00:04:12.500 that if you had the right person to drive that,

00:04:14.780 to spearhead that forward that you would start today

00:04:17.900 if you had that person.

00:04:19.260 and I want you to just start imagining, collaborating,

00:04:21.740 envisioning that project kicking off now,

00:04:24.520 not three years in the future,

00:04:26.380 because it may take you a year to find that person.

00:04:28.180 But that who question, not the how question,

00:04:31.220 a lot of people go down the path

00:04:32.580 of getting the trainings and the books,

00:04:34.420 and I'm a big fan of that.

00:04:35.640 But at a certain scale, if you have the resources,

00:04:38.920 the brand stature and potentially the finances,

00:04:42.220 finding the who is gonna be way more strategic for you

00:04:45.680 than learning the how and trying to manage another thing

00:04:48.740 amongst your busy workload.

00:04:50.220 Number two, bench strength.

00:04:51.560 I've mentioned this earlier,

00:04:52.560 but like one of the most powerful things

00:04:54.740 that you can start to develop today

00:04:57.580 are the people, the talent.

00:05:00.020 Where do you find that talent?

00:05:01.200 How do you get good at recruiting?

00:05:02.240 Well, the reality is as a CEO,

00:05:04.020 there's three things you need to be good at.

00:05:05.760 Number one, setting the vision.

00:05:07.380 Number two, managing the money.

00:05:09.340 And number three, finding the right people.

00:05:12.180 And to me, it's something you need to put in your calendar,

00:05:14.880 invest in it.

00:05:15.940 If you wanna find the easiest way,

00:05:17.340 just go up on Upwork.

00:05:18.760 You know, one of my favorite ways to find the right who

00:05:22.020 is to go up and find freelancers.

00:05:24.760 Upwork.com, incredible resource.

00:05:26.580 It's got a ton of different freelancers

00:05:28.800 that you can reach out to

00:05:30.660 because they have the expertise.

00:05:32.420 They have the experience.

00:05:33.760 So finding people, freelancers that you know, referrals,

00:05:38.380 just find folks that are talented that you jive with

00:05:42.900 and build that list and say,

00:05:44.440 man, wouldn't it be amazing to work with these people one day?

00:05:46.580 and just write their names down, okay?

00:05:48.840 These incredible talent.

00:05:50.100 I have a handful of friends

00:05:51.140 that I'm just waiting for the opportunity

00:05:53.460 for us to collaborate.

00:05:54.980 And when we do, I know it's gonna create magic.

00:05:56.840 I don't even have the specific project yet

00:05:59.200 for us to work on, but I know their talents.

00:06:01.280 I know their skillsets.

00:06:02.240 We jive on a value basis.

00:06:04.440 And once those two things come in

00:06:06.560 and I'm just gonna keep envisioning it,

00:06:08.420 I'm telling you magic will be created.

00:06:10.820 But the key is to build that bench strength

00:06:12.580 to start sourcing and recruiting candidates

00:06:15.700 for the who position, not the how.

00:06:18.460 Number three, partner with experience.

00:06:20.580 This is going to be the most important thing.

00:06:23.520 Do not find somebody that's doing nothing

00:06:26.320 and give them something to do,

00:06:28.000 to take especially a big project off your plate.

00:06:30.660 Find the people that are already doing the thing successfully.

00:06:33.480 That's why I recommended freelancers,

00:06:35.520 people that have the skillset, that have the experience.

00:06:38.180 Real world example, a few months ago,

00:06:40.740 I was thinking of potentially starting to look

00:06:43.460 at buying other software companies

00:06:45.660 outside of the portfolio that I'd already invested in.

00:06:48.080 And I didn't have the bandwidth in my calendar

00:06:50.540 based on the commitments that I made

00:06:52.140 and my family and my business partners.

00:06:54.180 So I just kept thinking about that problem.

00:06:56.080 Who could I partner with?

00:06:57.200 Who, because I had this asset, I had this audience,

00:06:59.480 I had this community.

00:07:00.320 A lot of people reaching out to me saying,

00:07:01.500 hey, I'm looking to sell.

00:07:02.300 Do you, can you recommend somebody for me to talk to?

00:07:04.080 And I'm like, man, if I had somebody that could support me

00:07:07.460 on evaluating deals and presenting to me the best ones,

00:07:10.480 that would be amazing.

00:07:11.340 Well, turns out creativity started going.

00:07:14.200 I actually work with one of my coaching clients

00:07:16.500 is a guy named Kevin from SureSwift Capital.

00:07:19.280 Kevin actually has a whole team dedicated

00:07:21.500 to sourcing deals, evaluating them, negotiating them

00:07:24.700 and doing all the due diligence, et cetera.

00:07:26.620 And I just called him up one day and said,

00:07:28.020 hey man, I got this crazy idea.

00:07:30.020 What if we partner together?

00:07:31.880 I will bring you a bunch of opportunities.

00:07:34.880 You let me choose the get first rider refusals

00:07:37.660 for the ones that I want.

00:07:39.120 I'll pay you a finder's fee for doing all that heavy lifting

00:07:42.200 and distracting your team a little bit.

00:07:44.040 But if I don't buy them and you buy them,

00:07:46.900 you pay me that same fee.

00:07:48.600 So it's win-win.

00:07:49.700 They get more pipeline.

00:07:51.060 I get resources to do all the work.

00:07:53.240 Everybody wins.

00:07:54.180 It doesn't cost us anything until we find something amazing.

00:07:57.040 And it just allowed us to take something for me

00:07:59.200 that was maybe next year and bring it forward now

00:08:02.300 because I've seen an opportunity in the market.

00:08:04.920 So partner with experience.

00:08:06.480 And number four, make it win-win.

00:08:08.500 I think one of the biggest challenges for entrepreneurs

00:08:11.560 to get their mind wrapped around

00:08:13.360 is creating scenarios where both people feel like owners.

00:08:17.460 See, the problem is that if you create a scenario

00:08:19.100 where somebody is the owner and the other person's a renter,

00:08:21.600 so that's what employees kind of typically can feel like.

00:08:24.220 They don't feel like they have any ownership of the business.

00:08:27.040 If you're starting a new project,

00:08:28.980 you wanna make it so that it's win-win, right?

00:08:31.220 So for example, I'll give you a real world scenario.

00:08:33.380 One of my sales guys, Chris,

00:08:35.240 is an incredible salesperson, okay?

00:08:37.900 but he's also just as good, if not better, a marketer.

00:08:42.520 He understands our customers' pain

00:08:44.020 because he's talking to them, he's chatting with them,

00:08:45.760 but he's also an incredible copywriter

00:08:48.040 and Facebook ads person.

00:08:49.700 So the way I see it, it's like, hey man,

00:08:52.000 like, yes, I need somebody taking sales calls,

00:08:54.840 but at the same time, you've got a unique skill

00:08:57.340 that could allow me to create new campaigns and new offers

00:09:00.300 that allow me to scale that up

00:09:01.900 that could be done independently

00:09:03.200 because he's got this unique skillset,

00:09:04.860 which is the full stack, which is kind of like a unicorn,

00:09:07.280 but yet I've got them focused on doing this one thing.

00:09:09.860 So I said, hey dude, what we're gonna do

00:09:11.500 is we're gonna bring somebody on,

00:09:13.280 take care of 80% of your workload today

00:09:15.660 so that you still stay doing the part

00:09:17.240 that you love to do the most

00:09:18.240 that generates the most economic upside

00:09:20.040 which is closing in the sales process

00:09:22.440 and with that free time,

00:09:23.960 I'm gonna get you to focus on coming up

00:09:25.520 with creative ideas to design offers

00:09:27.860 that will serve our customers,

00:09:29.600 stuff we already have that we just haven't put together

00:09:31.700 and put out there to the world

00:09:32.780 and you're gonna manage all of it

00:09:34.720 and we're gonna do a rev share

00:09:36.140 on all of that revenue.

00:09:37.600 So that way, the more successful this is,

00:09:39.900 the more you make

00:09:40.680 and the more we obviously collect

00:09:42.300 as a business in revenue.

00:09:43.480 And that to me is about making it win-win.

00:09:46.120 It's trying to be creative in the incentive process

00:09:48.660 so that you're not taking capital and just spending it.

00:09:51.820 Like the way I structured it,

00:09:53.000 essentially I went over here and well,

00:09:55.620 we both went over here and we both went over there.

00:09:57.960 And if you can figure out creative ways to do that

00:10:00.020 in your business with freelancers, partners,

00:10:02.420 like I did with Kevin, people on Upwork,

00:10:06.940 maybe your friends, people in your world,

00:10:09.440 that is how we will get to the who questions

00:10:12.140 and the solutions faster

00:10:13.860 than continuously going down this path of the how.

00:10:17.100 Because if you do this,

00:10:18.920 and in the book, Dan Sullivan wrote the who not how,

00:10:21.300 he actually hired and works with a writer

00:10:23.700 that wrote the book.

00:10:25.340 So he didn't even write the book.

00:10:27.200 It was his strategy, it was his IP, it was his outline,

00:10:29.640 and it was his clients that were,

00:10:31.100 the stories were told in the book,

00:10:32.860 but he wasn't even the writer.

00:10:34.540 Imagine that, that the book itself was a perfect example

00:10:38.720 of the who, not how.

00:10:39.560 I hope this inspired you today

00:10:41.800 to start asking that question a lot more often.

00:10:44.660 So quick recap, four key strategies

00:10:46.920 to using who, not how to grow strategically.

00:10:49.480 Number one, identifying big projects.

00:10:51.540 Number two, bench strength.

00:10:53.500 Number three, partner with experience.

00:10:55.240 And number four, make it win-win.

00:10:58.400 As I mentioned at the beginning of this episode,

00:10:59.660 I wanna share with you

00:11:00.520 one of the most powerful trainings I ever did

00:11:02.420 called the Silicon Valley Secrets.

00:11:03.960 Literally the top lessons I learned about company growth

00:11:07.540 that has never been written about in business books

00:11:10.320 that is 100% pulled from and copied

00:11:13.400 from the world of technology and innovation

00:11:15.700 in Silicon Valley.

00:11:17.060 The smartest minds, the mentors that I've had

00:11:19.440 extracted into this masterclass, the link is below.

00:11:24.180 You can click that to get access to this exclusive training.

00:11:27.120 And if you like this video,

00:11:27.960 be sure to leave a comment, subscribe to the channel

00:11:30.920 and like and share it with a friend

00:11:32.780 that you think it might serve.

00:11:33.780 And as per usual, I wanna challenge you

00:11:35.180 to live a bigger life and a bigger business

00:11:36.880 and I'll see you next Monday.

00:11:41.600 Is that good right here?

Dan Martell - March 08, 2021

The “Who, Not How” Strategy of Growth

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