The Art of Manliness - #175： Systemizing Your Work and Life

00:00:00.000 Brad McKay here, and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.

00:00:18.080 Do you own a business, or maybe you don't even own a business, maybe you're a manager

00:00:20.960 or an executive at a business at work, and you feel like every day at work, you're just

00:00:26.180 putting out fires.

00:00:27.300 Every day, it's just a crisis you're putting out, or even in your personal life, it could

00:00:30.660 be the same thing.

00:00:31.360 You go home, and it's just like a crisis after crisis after crisis, and you're just always

00:00:35.120 putting these fires out, and you get better.

00:00:37.780 You try to manage these fires by getting more efficient with your fire putting outing, right,

00:00:41.440 by using to-do lists and productivity tools.

00:00:44.680 But what if the answer, instead of getting more efficient with putting out fires, would

00:00:48.300 be to look at your business and your life as a series of systems and working on making

00:00:53.280 those systems more efficient?

00:00:54.560 Well, that's what my guest today argues.

00:00:57.360 His name's Sam Carpenter.

00:00:58.540 He's the author of the book, Work the System, and he's also a business owner himself.

00:01:03.060 And in Work the System, he talks about systemizing your business so things run on its own, and

00:01:08.100 you don't have to worry about putting out fires, and instead, you can work on tweaking your system

00:01:12.340 so things run more smoothly.

00:01:14.640 And what's interesting, you don't even have to be a business owner to get something out

00:01:17.260 of this book.

00:01:18.040 You can apply the big picture principles to your own life and find ways to systemize your life.

00:01:23.320 And so instead of putting out fires, you can just work on managing systems in your life.

00:01:27.680 Really practical book.

00:01:29.220 I read the book.

00:01:30.380 I've gotten a lot out of it and my own business and my own life.

00:01:33.560 So without further ado, Sam Carpenter and Work the System.

00:01:46.000 Sam Carpenter, welcome to the show.

00:01:48.480 Thanks, Brett.

00:01:49.060 I'm really glad to be here today.

00:01:50.800 Well, you are a business owner, you own several businesses, and you're also an author, and

00:01:56.960 you published this book that I read, and it's phenomenal.

00:01:59.880 It's really helped me in my own business.

00:02:01.060 It's called Work the System.

00:02:02.780 But before we talk about what Work the System is and what it means to approach business and

00:02:07.020 life with a systems mindset, let's talk about this.

00:02:11.400 How do most people approach their business or their life in trying to manage it?

00:02:17.380 Most people just plunge into the day.

00:02:20.060 They plunge into the day without, well, I could say without a plan.

00:02:23.760 But they plunge into the day into this mass of sights, sounds, and events and try to get

00:02:29.400 through it and accomplish some kind of a goal.

00:02:32.860 And they're fire killing all through the day.

00:02:35.320 That's how most people get through the day.

00:02:36.840 From the moment they start to get dressed to the end of the day, they're pretty much fire

00:02:41.760 killing.

00:02:42.740 And what that means is you're going in a lot of different directions.

00:02:46.860 And the problem with that is that people perceive the world as a confused mass of sights, sounds,

00:02:53.960 and events.

00:02:54.780 And they just jump into the middle of it.

00:02:56.580 And that's incorrect.

00:02:57.980 That's not how the world is.

00:02:59.640 It isn't that.

00:03:00.420 It's a collection of separate systems, processes.

00:03:04.420 And they all make sense.

00:03:06.060 But until you can see those separate processes, you can't wade through and straighten things

00:03:12.540 out.

00:03:13.300 And that's what I learned at 50 years of age was to look at the world in a different way.

00:03:18.660 And that included seeing life as a collection of separate processes.

00:03:23.620 Because that's exactly what it is.

00:03:25.880 So, yeah.

00:03:26.260 Give us an example of that.

00:03:27.440 So, you talk about this is like this is the systems mindset, seeing life as a group or

00:03:32.880 a separate discrete systems, basically.

00:03:38.500 So, I mean, how is that different from, say, like productivity and time management tools

00:03:44.560 that a lot of folks use?

00:03:46.260 Is that, I guess, I mean, I guess the productivity tools that help people put out fires faster

00:03:50.440 and then a systems mindset is like don't even put out the fires?

00:03:53.540 No, that's, no, actually, no.

00:03:58.300 What it is is you go a layer deeper from all the productivity tools and all the top 10 tips

00:04:03.840 and all this.

00:04:04.680 You go a layer deeper to mechanical reality.

00:04:07.880 You have to start with mechanical reality.

00:04:10.100 And this is important.

00:04:11.180 Mechanical reality isn't a big confused mass just because we perceive it that way.

00:04:16.060 This is really important in the first part of Work the System, The Simple Mechanics of

00:04:20.420 Making More and Working Less.

00:04:22.280 My book, the first part talks about the systems mindset in this different viewpoint of the world,

00:04:29.560 which is more accurate.

00:04:31.380 And what that is, let's take a car, for example.

00:04:34.500 Everybody knows, well, you can take a human body.

00:04:36.560 I'll do both.

00:04:37.320 A car.

00:04:37.860 What does the radio have to do with the air conditioner?

00:04:41.620 Nothing.

00:04:42.080 Zero.

00:04:42.600 Nothing.

00:04:42.940 And what does the steering wheel have to do with the brakes or the transmission really

00:04:47.780 with the engine?

00:04:48.680 Nothing.

00:04:49.360 Are they connected?

00:04:50.240 Yes.

00:04:51.420 They're connected.

00:04:52.820 And your body, what has your kidney got to do with your lungs?

00:04:55.920 Zero.

00:04:56.680 I know they're connected.

00:04:57.940 I know they all come together to make a human being.

00:05:00.900 But our bodies have circulatory systems, neurological systems, skeletal systems, kidneys, stomachs, 0.51

00:05:08.300 all these separate, independent entities make up a human body.

00:05:14.580 And you can apply that to anything, Brett.

00:05:17.040 For instance, and here's one.

00:05:18.720 People get it when I say this.

00:05:20.500 If you go out on your bicycle and fall down and break your leg, I'll guarantee you the paramedics

00:05:25.840 who pick you up are not going to take you to a dermatologist.

00:05:29.320 Right.

00:05:29.720 So you have specialists in medicine.

00:05:32.200 You have specialists with cars.

00:05:34.200 And so that is a layer deeper.

00:05:37.740 That's the reality of the world.

00:05:40.240 It is not a confused mass.

00:05:41.800 And the cool thing is if you take these things apart, if you take your life apart, for instance,

00:05:46.340 if you're in a house and you go to the kitchen and turn the water on, I'll bet you 99.9% of

00:05:52.120 the time the water's going to come out.

00:05:53.760 Or if you go to start your car, it's probably going to start.

00:05:57.820 And if you start in your car to go from A to B, there's a 99.9% chance you're going to get there.

00:06:03.420 So what happens when you break your life down into the mechanical reality and you start seeing

00:06:08.640 reality for what it really is, this is real kind of metaphysical stuff, but it's reality.

00:06:14.060 When you start breaking things down, you see these separate systems almost always work perfectly.

00:06:21.460 So our bodies, so let's take my body.

00:06:25.880 My body is sitting here talking to you, communicating with you.

00:06:28.860 I have billions of cells all agreeing they are Sam Carpenter.

00:06:32.940 And every second there's trillions of electrical signals going off, allowing me to communicate,

00:06:38.200 allowing me to move my hands around.

00:06:40.440 And that's happening every second.

00:06:43.300 That is a miracle.

00:06:44.880 And so this big miracle people are looking for out there, oh, I have to become enlightened.

00:06:49.520 I have to do this.

00:06:50.280 No, no, no, it's right in front of your face when you get up for breakfast.

00:06:53.860 It's there at night when you go back to bed.

00:06:56.060 It's all during the day.

00:06:57.180 The miracle is right now, and that is the perfection of the universe.

00:07:01.240 The pretty cool thing, you know, I spent the last decade fixing businesses.

00:07:05.280 That's what I do, turnaround businesses.

00:07:07.660 We go in.

00:07:08.460 We help the owner of the business see that his business is 99.9% fine.

00:07:15.380 There's just a few things there that are really gumming the works.

00:07:18.640 And let me just finish by saying this.

00:07:21.280 Okay, so there isn't that much to fix.

00:07:23.900 So let's say there's a successful businessman.

00:07:26.860 He's got a beautiful wife.

00:07:28.480 He's got a couple of great kids.

00:07:30.360 He's making big dollars.

00:07:31.720 There's everything's really perfect except for one thing, and that'll blow everything.

00:07:36.840 And you can guess what that is. 0.87

00:07:38.180 He's an alcoholic.

00:07:38.980 So the truth is, everything could be a lot closer to perfect and a lot less chance of going over the brink of destruction if he just stopped drinking.

00:07:50.440 It's a very simple thing, and that's just one illustration.

00:07:54.600 And within a business, it could be, hey, you've got your brother-in-law working in your business, and it's not working out.

00:08:01.420 He's not doing his job.

00:08:02.660 He's not showing up on time, and the business is really going to hack.

00:08:06.720 What's the solution?

00:08:07.520 The brother-in-law needs to leave.

00:08:10.560 And it's the same with fixing the human body or the car or whatever.

00:08:14.340 I was coming over the pass yesterday, Brett, over here to Portland where I am from very dry Bend, Oregon, and I had had the garage change the oil in my car and put new wipers on my car.

00:08:26.640 And as I came over the pass, the wipers were going clank, clank, clank, clank, and I was just cursing, you know, they put the wrong wipers on, I thought.

00:08:35.340 It was ruining my trip.

00:08:37.720 I was trying to listen to the radio, book on tape.

00:08:42.360 It was just ruining my whole experience.

00:08:44.500 I pulled over, got out of the car, and one of the blades hadn't been put on properly, and I just had to pull it up and snap it into place, and everything was perfect.

00:08:54.260 But that's a good illustration from yesterday, literally.

00:08:57.520 That happened yesterday coming over in the rain, that your whole life can be really, really messed up if one of those separate systems is dysfunctional, just one.

00:09:06.880 And so there isn't that much to fix, but you've got to be able to isolate it.

00:09:12.040 You can't, you can't, if you're having trouble in your business, you can get a book on the top 10 things that a successful business person does, but more often than not, it evades the problem, which might be this or it might be that.

00:09:26.160 And so if you can see the world as a collection of separate processes, then you can easily isolate the problem process, and because you've isolated it, it usually is a very simple process, and it's easy to fix.

00:09:39.300 And then you fix it, reinsert it into the thing, into your business, and then you go on to the next dysfunctional system.

00:09:46.180 And that's what I did 16 years ago to repair my business, to take it from a, you know, I was working 100 hours a week.

00:09:53.400 I worked 80 to 100 hours a week, Brett, for 15 years.

00:09:56.460 That's one five.

00:09:57.820 I didn't make any money, single parent of two kids.

00:10:00.840 And overnight, I got this idea, and I won't go into it here, but I got this idea that maybe I wasn't seeing life correctly, and that it is a collection of separate systems.

00:10:11.840 Everything changed from that moment on, and that's what my book is about, both my books.

00:10:15.980 My new book is about that, too.

00:10:19.000 So, I mean, getting metaphysical here, so there are systems going on in your life or your business, even if you are not aware of it, right?

00:10:26.820 Like, you might have created systems without even being aware that you've created a system, correct?

00:10:32.800 Is that what you're saying?

00:10:33.760 I can tell that you read my new book, Brett.

00:10:38.560 Because that's exactly right.

00:10:40.420 The systems are operating, whether you know it or not, whether you see them or not, or whether you like it or not.

00:10:46.260 The systems of your life are operating.

00:10:48.640 And so if things aren't going right, then it means you might have a faulty system.

00:10:52.160 Like, I guess you say that in both books, that systems do what they're designed to do.

00:10:56.080 Like, they function the way they're supposed to.

00:10:58.100 So if something's not going right that you don't like, the output, you change the system, right?

00:11:03.000 It's all mechanical.

00:11:04.760 It's totally mechanical.

00:11:06.000 The system doesn't care whether you make out or whether you don't make out.

00:11:09.460 And I don't care what kind of a system it is.

00:11:11.540 A relationship system.

00:11:13.400 What I call a soft system.

00:11:15.340 An organic system.

00:11:16.540 If there's a kink in a system, the beautiful part about life on Earth is that there's this thing called mechanical reality and the laws of physics.

00:11:27.240 If the system is not going to create the result you want, then you need to go in and there's some element of that system that you need to tweak.

00:11:37.880 Or if your life isn't going the way you want it to go, there may be some whole system you need to eliminate altogether.

00:11:46.760 And the mantra is this.

00:11:48.340 Automate, delegate, delete.

00:11:50.660 So the guy that drinks too much, he just needs to stop drinking.

00:11:53.800 He needs to stop the drinking system.

00:11:56.280 And then work down and take the next problem and the next problem and the next problem.

00:12:00.820 But they're there.

00:12:01.560 They're working 24-7 whether you manage them or not is what I'm talking about.

00:12:06.160 Right.

00:12:06.520 So the systems mindset is just starting to see life as a series of systems.

00:12:13.320 It's just like taking that sort of like you talking about looking up and out, right?

00:12:16.920 That is the phrase you use.

00:12:19.040 And looking and seeing that and being able to, once you have that view, you can start adjusting things to make things more productive or efficient.

00:12:27.340 Right.

00:12:28.740 Exactly.

00:12:29.520 But this has to be said.

00:12:31.500 This is more than Sam's clever idea or a different way of looking at things.

00:12:36.520 This is looking at things more accurately in your life.

00:12:40.360 So our listeners today, Brett, I challenge them right now to look around the room and see the separate systems.

00:12:46.480 There may be a phone over here.

00:12:48.980 Maybe it's in a living room.

00:12:50.180 There may be a TV over here.

00:12:51.440 But out in the kitchen, there's a refrigerator.

00:12:53.260 See that they're all separate.

00:12:54.780 That's mechanical reality.

00:12:56.200 It isn't this big conglomeration.

00:12:58.620 I mean, you can call it a home, but that isn't the way to fix things in the home.

00:13:03.380 That isn't the way to fix things in your body.

00:13:05.320 The reality of life, the actual reality.

00:13:08.620 And this is why I say it's sort of metaphysical, but it isn't really.

00:13:12.320 It's really mechanical reality that life is a collection of separate systems.

00:13:18.000 Anywhere you look, whether it's the car, your body, your business, your relationships, separate systems.

00:13:23.540 Yes, they are connected.

00:13:24.700 I don't deny that.

00:13:25.840 But you're not going to get anywhere until you can see these separate systems.

00:13:29.220 So I drive down the street here to this office building on the sixth floor on 12th Street in Portland, Oregon.

00:13:36.160 As I drive down the street, I don't see a street and buildings in the city of Portland.

00:13:41.100 I see all the separate things going on.

00:13:43.080 It's just my mindset.

00:13:44.260 It's embedded.

00:13:44.940 It's been embedded for 17 years since that night in 1999 when I kind of got a grasp of this deeper reality.

00:13:54.080 Not deeper reality.

00:13:55.720 The reality that I wasn't seeing before.

00:13:58.700 Gotcha.

00:13:59.320 So in thinking back to business, right?

00:14:01.880 I mean, I guess there's all sorts of systems going on in a business, whether how someone manages customer support, whether how someone, how a company manages communications, et cetera.

00:14:11.960 And I guess a lot of people don't even think of it as a system.

00:14:14.820 They just like start doing it, right?

00:14:16.040 They just like, they start, they do it a certain way and that's the way they do it.

00:14:19.500 But what they've done is they've created a system without knowing it oftentimes.

00:14:23.380 You know, I love having an interview with a guy that's read my stuff and really gets it.

00:14:28.380 So I appreciate that.

00:14:29.860 I want to just throw that in.

00:14:30.960 But yeah, people go to work, quote unquote.

00:14:35.180 They go to work and they work all day, but they're not separating things.

00:14:40.180 They're killing fires.

00:14:41.600 And this is where we get, and I could get into, I'm running for political office and one of the big things out here are the forests.

00:14:47.580 And it's literal fire killing because the forests haven't been managed.

00:14:51.800 So in a business, you go in and you manage the systems.

00:14:55.760 For instance, Central Time, my call center, I have about 40 people there.

00:14:58.940 It's one of my small businesses.

00:15:00.880 All day long, you know what my managers do?

00:15:03.380 They work on processes.

00:15:05.400 They work on the processes that create the results.

00:15:08.240 And remember I said automate, delegate, delete.

00:15:10.820 That's how you look at your processes.

00:15:12.760 And processes are what my business is made up.

00:15:15.260 You're exactly right.

00:15:16.400 So how you answer the phone has nothing to do with the copier machine not working right.

00:15:21.940 It has nothing to do with hiring somebody.

00:15:23.820 It has nothing to do with firing somebody.

00:15:27.620 They're all separate.

00:15:28.660 So what my people do is they work on the processes that need to be improved, tweaked, get caught up with modern technology maybe in the software area.

00:15:38.080 We're always working on processes.

00:15:39.900 We never, quote unquote, go to work and do whatever comes up.

00:15:44.760 So we have no fire killing in my business.

00:15:47.520 They're just, it's very rare.

00:15:49.500 And if it does happen, we love it because it's a red flag to go into a system and fix it.

00:15:54.660 But it just doesn't happen very much.

00:15:56.480 We just don't have many red flags.

00:15:58.140 It's the same with my body.

00:16:00.460 I do the yoga.

00:16:02.680 I do the strength training.

00:16:04.100 I do the aerobic stuff.

00:16:05.780 I eat pretty well for a guy, but, you know, I eat my protein, if you know what I mean, and I take care of myself.

00:16:14.320 And I do the things I need to do with the separate processes and the separate system of my body, and it functions very well.

00:16:22.680 I can take a chainsaw or go up a tree right now on hooks as good as anybody can who's 30 years younger than me.

00:16:31.320 I'm 66.

00:16:33.200 But that's a process, too, is taking care of your body.

00:16:36.780 You have to have a systematic process for taking care of the various elements of your body.

00:16:41.280 Meditation really has nothing to do with aerobic exercise, of course.

00:16:46.060 But those are separate elements that have to be addressed, right?

00:16:48.760 Relationships, too.

00:16:50.100 Sometimes I call somebody, and I'm really too tired, but I'll call them to say, hi, how are you doing?

00:16:54.780 Check it out.

00:16:55.520 So I have this thing called, this group of people called friends.

00:17:00.240 So there's relationship maintenance and tweaking you have to do, too.

00:17:05.160 The cool thing about the systems mindset, it applies to every aspect of the world, everywhere, every element of it.

00:17:12.440 Right.

00:17:12.920 I can see this.

00:17:13.620 You know, your first book was very geared towards businesses and, like, how to get the brass tacks of systemizing a business.

00:17:18.640 But the higher-level principles of approaching your entire life with a systems mindset can help a lot with your personal development, right?

00:17:27.060 Because I think a lot of people approach personal developments like, okay, they just approach, like you said, they just go, okay, today I'm going to eat well today.

00:17:34.280 And they sort of like, okay, I'm going to eat some broccoli.

00:17:37.440 That's it.

00:17:37.880 But you're saying with a systems approach, you'd actually develop a system that would allow you to eat well, and you wouldn't have to think about it too much.

00:17:44.940 You just follow the system, correct?

00:17:46.380 Exactly right.

00:17:48.640 And it doesn't take willpower once you, quote, get it.

00:17:52.740 So Work the System, my first book about business, has three parts.

00:17:57.120 The first part is getting the system's mindset.

00:18:00.000 Part two is about documentation.

00:18:02.200 Part three are odds and ends.

00:18:03.740 But once you get part one, you're there.

00:18:06.240 And then my new book is exactly the same way, except it's two parts.

00:18:09.920 It's not for business, so there's nothing about documentation.

00:18:12.540 There's very little in there about documentation.

00:18:14.040 Part one is getting the system's mindset, and part two is odds and ends.

00:18:19.540 Once you get the system's mindset, this thing about diet or exercise or whatever, you just do it naturally.

00:18:25.240 You don't have to force yourself because you're seeing the world differently than 99% of all other people.

00:18:31.120 Now, Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, you know, we could go down to Oprah Winfrey.

00:18:37.620 Of course, Bill Gates.

00:18:39.120 None of these people had college degrees, but they naturally had the system's mindset.

00:18:44.600 And if you ask Bill Gates right now to describe his mindset, he'd say, what are you talking about?

00:18:48.820 But he naturally gets it.

00:18:50.300 One out of 100 people naturally see the world as it really is, as a collection of systems.

00:18:55.180 And this is what I've got to do over here with these processes to get the results I want.

00:19:01.260 And this is critical.

00:19:02.100 Let me take a second for this.

00:19:03.880 So here's what I call the ultimate formula.

00:19:06.980 And it's in my first book, and there's a whole chapter in my second book.

00:19:10.580 One leads to two.

00:19:11.820 Two leads to three.

00:19:12.780 Three leads to four.

00:19:14.460 One to two to three to four equals a result.

00:19:17.480 And that's a real simplification of every process there is in the world.

00:19:20.880 So every process in the world executes over a period of time and creates a result, a result.

00:19:30.280 And I don't care what the process is.

00:19:32.400 Again, back to the car, to the body or whatever.

00:19:35.220 Every process leads to a result.

00:19:37.720 You need to spend your time in the one, two, three, four part of that equation.

00:19:41.700 Most people spend their time shuffling around the bad results over on the right hand side of the formula.

00:19:47.760 One out of 100 naturally gets the one, two, three, four.

00:19:50.880 And that's why you have what we call one percenters. 0.97

00:19:54.700 That's why one percent of the population does terrifically well in one area or not.

00:19:59.680 Yes, there's a lot of one percenters out there that do very well financially, but their bodies are a wreck.

00:20:06.000 I get that.

00:20:07.240 But as far as their earning money thing, they do get this separate systems mindset, right?

00:20:16.460 So anyway, that's an important element is to see that the systems mindset is seeing the world more accurately.

00:20:24.600 And then when you do that, you naturally take care of your diet.

00:20:28.080 You naturally do these things in your business.

00:20:30.240 And it happens in a moment of time.

00:20:32.600 It happens instantly.

00:20:34.120 You say, oh, I get it.

00:20:35.360 I get this thing.

00:20:36.480 And then you go to work working on the processes.

00:20:38.900 And of course, in business, that means documentation.

00:20:41.000 The big difference between a large successful business – the only difference between a large successful business and a small struggling one, I'll guarantee it 100 percent of the time, is that the large business is documented.

00:20:54.080 Everybody knows what's going on within the business.

00:20:56.760 In the small business, it's fire killing all day long.

00:20:59.160 There's no processes set up.

00:21:01.380 People – one person does it this way.

00:21:03.040 Another person does it that way.

00:21:04.520 And it's really inefficient.

00:21:05.900 Right, right.

00:21:07.240 So yeah, in the first book, you talk a lot about the importance of documentation.

00:21:10.760 So besides increasing efficiencies, I guess the thing that you get out of documenting is that, one, if someone leaves, right, someone can come off the street, look at the documentation, and do the job, right?

00:21:21.560 But I guess the other benefit of documenting things, you can actually look at your process that you do in a business concretely and actually ask yourself, is there a better way to do this, right?

00:21:33.000 Or do we even need to do this – do we even need to do this thing that we're doing that we think we need to do?

00:21:38.700 Maybe we don't need to do that.

00:21:40.420 Yeah, there's magic in writing it down.

00:21:42.200 And we have software to help people create this documentation.

00:21:46.400 And there's other software out there that people have taken off my book and done it their own way.

00:21:50.940 But for instance, if there's a 10-step process – well, take how we answer the phone in my call center at the front desk.

00:21:57.940 There's seven steps.

00:21:59.300 Put a smile on your face.

00:22:01.160 Pick up the phone.

00:22:01.980 Step number two, step number three, what you say exactly.

00:22:06.600 If you don't document it, everybody's doing it in a different way.

00:22:10.640 And that is incredibly inefficient.

00:22:12.440 You have to write things down as they are.

00:22:14.840 And there's something magical about having all seven steps on one piece of paper so you can see all steps.

00:22:22.120 And some of the others – my software competitors will put one step per page.

00:22:26.920 Step one.

00:22:27.540 Then you go to the second page to see step two.

00:22:29.720 You can't see the process unless you've got a one, two, three, four all on one page if you're going to document it.

00:22:37.360 And that's what you're talking about, I believe.

00:22:39.500 And you'll look at it and you'll say, wow, why are we doing that? 0.94

00:22:42.400 Or somebody else in your office will look at it and say, hey, step six is ridiculous.

00:22:46.820 The reason for step six left the real world years ago.

00:22:51.380 Why are we still doing it that way?

00:22:52.580 And you don't see those things until you write it down.

00:22:55.360 Boring but true.

00:22:56.340 And people hate doing documentation, but it is the key to success is to get things down on paper, get input.

00:23:02.240 We call it bottom up.

00:23:03.400 People who are on the front lines, the sales people, the production people, always – you always want to have them contributing to the process, contributing to the working procedure.

00:23:14.840 And then the beautiful part about that is it's the best possible working procedure or SOP, right, that you could possibly put together.

00:23:23.300 But that person, if they've made a difference in a process, has bought into the working procedures methodology 100% because they had a piece of it.

00:23:33.860 Gotcha.

00:23:34.860 So, I mean –

00:23:35.200 Top doesn't work.

00:23:36.220 Right.

00:23:36.860 So, I can see this, you know, if you are a business owner, like you're in charge of this, you can, like, start implementing this.

00:23:42.700 But let's say someone's listening to this, like they're a manager or some sort of mid-level executive.

00:23:47.220 How do they get people on board, you know, around them?

00:23:50.900 Like, this is the thing we need to start doing because this will actually help improve things.

00:23:53.960 Can you see – because I can see that there might be a lot of pushback to this.

00:23:57.020 Like, no, you know, we're doing it great.

00:23:59.060 Things are fantastic.

00:24:00.760 We don't need to do this.

00:24:03.220 So, how do you get past that barrier?

00:24:04.820 Yeah.

00:24:05.380 If we go into a – and we fixed hundreds and hundreds of businesses, Josh Fonger, my field guy and me, the two of us.

00:24:14.460 So, we go into a business and we tell the owner, first thing, when we only work with the CEO, if we can't work with the CEO,

00:24:21.140 we won't work with the company, we've got to have the CEO's blessing.

00:24:23.960 And it usually comes from the CEO that gets us in there.

00:24:27.320 So, we tell the first thing, look, you've got 20 people in your little business here.

00:24:30.600 You're doing $3 million.

00:24:32.360 And I'm telling you, there's at least one and maybe two people who are going to try to throw this off the rails.

00:24:37.440 Be prepared.

00:24:38.240 Be prepared for one of those people to maybe leave.

00:24:41.420 And unfortunately, it might be the brother-in-law.

00:24:45.800 Or be prepared.

00:24:47.240 We have to sit down and have a chat with this person.

00:24:49.320 But the first thing we do is put everybody in a room.

00:24:52.180 I'll just give you the generic way we do it.

00:24:54.560 Put everybody in a room and say, we're going to do working procedures.

00:24:58.060 What is the biggest problem?

00:25:00.460 Frank, what's the biggest – there are no more Franks, right? 1.00

00:25:03.840 Okay.

00:25:07.580 Kyle.

00:25:07.940 Kyle, yeah.

00:25:09.840 Kyle, what is the biggest problem in your department?

00:25:12.760 And, you know, Kyle will have to think about it.

00:25:14.340 Okay, Kyle, we'll talk again tomorrow.

00:25:15.900 But I want the top three problems in your department.

00:25:18.460 We get back together.

00:25:19.680 Everybody's there with Kyle and his department.

00:25:21.620 We sit down.

00:25:22.180 He says, the first problem is this.

00:25:24.120 And we analyze it.

00:25:25.060 And we all agree that's the biggest problem.

00:25:27.080 And then we say the second.

00:25:28.220 Okay, we're going to work on the first one.

00:25:29.480 Here's how we're going to do it.

00:25:30.280 We're going to document it exactly how you do it.

00:25:33.180 You do it.

00:25:34.220 It's best.

00:25:35.040 Or you can delegate it.

00:25:36.400 And then Kyle doesn't want to do it.

00:25:38.520 But he does it anyway because that's his job.

00:25:41.040 And so the next meeting you have, Kyle comes in.

00:25:44.040 And we sit it down.

00:25:44.880 And we read it to the rest of the people, say six people in his department.

00:25:48.620 And so there's no more Sophie's.

00:25:50.740 Okay, Jan.

00:25:53.500 Jan speaks up and says, why are you doing step four?

00:25:56.560 It's better to do it this way.

00:25:58.460 And so you have this meeting with everybody.

00:26:00.180 And pretty soon everybody's critiquing it.

00:26:02.380 And, of course, Kyle's proud because he did it in the first place.

00:26:06.400 But what happens is you have a couple of meetings like that.

00:26:09.060 That's all it takes.

00:26:10.200 You get the working procedure exactly right.

00:26:12.620 It will be different than how they're doing it.

00:26:14.240 I guarantee you everybody is contributing to it.

00:26:17.460 And you get buy-in.

00:26:18.860 This bottom-up thing is critical.

00:26:21.600 Military top-down works because they'll shoot you if you don't.

00:26:25.840 Okay, but it doesn't work that way in a business.

00:26:27.900 You've got to have.

00:26:28.980 So how do you get the buy-in?

00:26:30.200 That's how you get it.

00:26:30.940 You have your people do the documentation.

00:26:33.860 And really the owner of the company shouldn't be doing the documentation.

00:26:36.740 Has to do it at first.

00:26:38.120 It's messy at first.

00:26:39.620 Have to do the basic documentation to make sure the company's headed in the right direction with all the departments.

00:26:44.740 But 99% of the documentation needs to be done by the troops.

00:26:48.200 And they love it.

00:26:48.880 And one of the reasons they love it is if they follow a procedure and something goes wrong, they're not at fault.

00:26:53.940 It's the procedure's fault.

00:26:55.800 And if something goes wrong and they point out to the boss, look, step 11 here just doesn't make any sense.

00:27:01.400 Well, if we put another step 11A and 11B in here, it will make it work fine.

00:27:07.000 There's a double check we can put in here.

00:27:08.620 That person's now a hero.

00:27:10.220 And believe me, they're totally bought into the process.

00:27:13.020 That's how it works.

00:27:14.040 That's great.

00:27:14.520 So how do you solve the problem?

00:27:16.800 I think a lot of people – I guess another sticking point would be like, Sam, this sounds great, but we've got a lot of fires put out right now.

00:27:23.920 And for me to stop and take time and systemize, we can't do it.

00:27:28.840 So, I mean, is it possible to do this systemizing while putting out the fires that you have right now?

00:27:34.720 Okay.

00:27:35.240 So the owner's working 60 hours a week.

00:27:37.680 Okay, owner, for a couple of weeks, you may have to work 80.

00:27:40.440 You may have to work through the weekend.

00:27:42.220 But I want to know what fires are recurring and what the biggest ones are and why they've got you so upset.

00:27:48.200 And we're going to take the time to analyze that fire.

00:27:53.220 And when that big fire is put out and it never happens again, and that's the whole idea, these recurring fires that come up, we have to sit down.

00:28:03.180 We have to document them.

00:28:04.540 We have to make them go away.

00:28:06.100 And once that first fire is gone forever, this person is bought in for life because then you go to the second thing.

00:28:13.380 Then you go to the third thing.

00:28:14.520 I'm telling you, in the average small business in a month, people are rabid.

00:28:19.040 They're foaming at the mouth about documentation.

00:28:21.340 I know that's hard to believe, but the owner is.

00:28:24.700 And the people that have been getting in trouble over and over again are because they're not getting in trouble anymore, and they're seeing their business run like a beautiful machine.

00:28:33.880 And guess what?

00:28:34.980 The owners – so I went from 80 to 100 hours a week.

00:28:37.880 You know how much I work in that same business, which is approximately 400 percent bigger now?

00:28:44.260 And a call center is a really complex business.

00:28:47.280 I went from 80 to 100 hours a week.

00:28:49.080 I work two hours a week now.

00:28:51.340 I pay all the bills because I want to know how that money is going out.

00:28:55.960 And I have a staff meeting when I feel like it.

00:28:58.180 And I do a little R&D.

00:29:00.820 I've been out of town for – what is today?

00:29:03.820 Yeah.

00:29:04.160 Well, I've been out of town for three days, and I haven't had one communication with my – oh, I had – my COO sent me a message this morning and asked me a simple question.

00:29:13.860 And then I sent her a simple request.

00:29:15.640 But in three days, that's all I've had to do with Centratel.

00:29:18.360 So, the beautiful thing is your business ends up being a separate entity, a machine.

00:29:26.160 And guess what?

00:29:26.980 If you don't need to be there, you can sell it someday.

00:29:30.460 Right, right.

00:29:31.920 So, yeah, you've got to work on the business.

00:29:34.540 So, I guess your job now is just working on the – working on the system, right?

00:29:38.900 System Maintenance.

00:29:40.300 Right.

00:29:40.680 It's real Stephen Covey stuff.

00:29:43.000 Yeah.

00:29:43.400 You work on your business instead of – I mean, he nailed it.

00:29:46.560 Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is Mandatory Reading if You Have a Pulse.

00:29:50.960 Right, yeah.

00:29:51.680 I'm actually reading it again.

00:29:53.140 I've read it several times, but I'm reading it again just because –

00:29:55.500 It's a masterpiece.

00:29:56.520 Good for you.

00:29:57.200 Really good book.

00:29:58.400 Yeah.

00:30:00.700 So, one of the other things you talk about, I guess a principle that's related to the system's mindset that helps the systems run efficiently, I guess.

00:30:08.200 This idea of point-of-sale thinking, which I think is really – applying it, it's helped my business and my life out a lot.

00:30:13.980 So, can you talk a little bit about what point-of-sale thinking is and how that can help improve your life or business?

00:30:19.020 Yeah, you know, and you read my second book.

00:30:20.860 That's a big aspect of my second book, the point-of-sale thing.

00:30:24.600 And point-of-sale is from the cash register industry, the retail industry, and that means when you go to buy a blouse at Nordstrom's, a lot of things are taken care of, including inventory, bookkeeping, making change.

00:30:37.500 Everything happens at a specific time, and you don't put anything off.

00:30:44.760 Let me give you another illustration of that.

00:30:46.820 So, I have this app on my smartphone called Say It and Mail It.

00:30:51.020 It's an iPhone.

00:30:52.060 And there's another app if you've got a Droid.

00:30:54.320 There's dozens of apps.

00:30:55.620 But what I can do, if I have something – I had something for Andi, my COO, this morning, and I thought of it coming in here.

00:31:04.880 And through my Bluetooth, as I was driving, I was able to record a voice message as I was thinking about the thing and send it off to her within 30 seconds.

00:31:16.380 Now, the voicemail is an attachment to an email.

00:31:18.880 Now, okay, so Say It, Mail It, I get on here – I've got my phone in my hands here – but I get on here, hit a few things.

00:31:26.240 Hey, Andi, do this and this and this.

00:31:27.780 Will you get back to me?

00:31:28.540 Let me know how it goes.

00:31:29.420 Dot-da-dot-da-da. 0.81

00:31:30.220 Send – I mean, in 20 seconds, I can do the whole thing.

00:31:33.500 That illustrates point-of-sale exactly.

00:31:35.900 You want to take care of things right now, all day long, if you possibly can.

00:31:41.340 And what this means is we rarely have a staff meeting because the other thing I'm able to do is I've got email addresses with everybody in my business, for instance, 40-some people at Centfortel.

00:31:53.440 I can be driving along and thinking, God, things are going really well at the office, and I need to thank everybody for that.

00:32:00.040 I hit a few keys.

00:32:01.280 Hey, everybody.

00:32:02.220 I just want to thank you.

00:32:03.280 You know, I've been out of the office for a couple of weeks, but Andi tells me our gross revenues are up and this and that.

00:32:09.680 And I just really appreciate all of you so much.

00:32:14.040 That's all.

00:32:14.860 Thank you.

00:32:15.820 Hit a couple more keys.

00:32:16.960 Bam.

00:32:17.220 It goes to everybody in the office.

00:32:19.920 How many times can a CEO with normal communications protocol get that done, like, right now?

00:32:28.180 And so the cool thing is this goes back to mechanical reality.

00:32:32.460 Right now is all we have.

00:32:34.420 The past is gone.

00:32:36.100 The future is conjecture.

00:32:37.480 So we've got to do 100% with what we have in this moment.

00:32:41.540 And this idea of a – and the other thing you need to remember is ideas go through our mind like a film strip.

00:32:48.140 I love this analogy.

00:32:49.220 I don't remember where I got this.

00:32:51.040 But there's a film strip going through your head.

00:32:52.860 You have one idea.

00:32:53.900 It kind of attaches to another idea.

00:32:56.000 And then you have some input for somebody else or something else, and you have another idea.

00:33:00.820 Brilliant thoughts go in our heads and out within seconds.

00:33:04.240 So what if you could have a brilliant idea come up in your mind as this film strip goes through your head and isolate it and act on it, like, right now?

00:33:14.400 So the other thing I do with this technology – and it's just voicemail attached to an email.

00:33:19.200 It's real low-tech stuff.

00:33:20.620 If I have a great idea for myself, I do the same thing and send the message to myself.

00:33:26.980 And the app is set up so if I don't put somebody else's name in the email window, my name is there automatically.

00:33:34.240 So I can really, really fast – hey, Sam, don't forget to dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot.

00:33:37.400 I send it to myself, and it's in my inbox.

00:33:39.880 That's a perfect idea that is never lost.

00:33:43.640 Point of sale – I don't know.

00:33:46.120 I'm on this kick on point of sale over the last three or four years.

00:33:49.560 I'm just really enthusiastic for the whole methodology of getting through the day with point of sale.

00:33:55.020 It is so critical.

00:33:56.440 Right.

00:33:56.660 So instead of – I mean, is there a point where you would, like – if there's a task that you just, like – when would you decide, okay, I can't do it now.

00:34:02.620 I need to defer this.

00:34:03.720 Is there any – are there tasks that come up like that?

00:34:05.800 Are most tasks you can solve within a couple minutes?

00:34:08.600 Usually I can do them in a couple of minutes because I delegate most of what I do out.

00:34:14.000 But in this last experience, this last example I just gave you, maybe there is something I need to go home.

00:34:20.200 It might be around the house.

00:34:21.920 Hey, Sam, don't forget to do this or this or this.

00:34:25.300 And I can't do it now.

00:34:26.740 I have to be somewhere else.

00:34:28.300 Or I need other resources to do it.

00:34:31.800 But, yeah, that always happens.

00:34:33.260 But I'm telling you, Brett, 90% of what we do during the day can be automated, delegated, and – or deleted right now in this moment.

00:34:42.060 And so those few – I don't put off a lot.

00:34:45.360 I put off a little bit compared to what I used to do.

00:34:47.800 But most people go through the day putting stuff off over – David Allen talks about if you can do something in three minutes, do it now.

00:34:53.920 He's exactly right.

00:34:54.880 And – but you really try to do things in the moment and you get real efficient because the stuff is going to keep coming at you all day long.

00:35:04.700 And it's going to keep coming and coming.

00:35:06.800 And you don't want to build even more stuff up with things you could have handled in this moment.

00:35:11.760 You want to be ready for what's coming. 0.98

00:35:13.360 You don't want to have a tidal wave wash over the top of you and make you want to put a bullet in your head. 0.99

00:35:18.780 Right?

00:35:19.220 Well, Sam, you know, what's one thing – as we're winding down this conversation – if there's one thing someone who's listening to this podcast right now could do to start developing that systems mindset, what could that one thing they could start doing?

00:35:36.800 This is pretty cool.

00:35:37.980 And I love this question.

00:35:39.360 And I – here's what you can do.

00:35:42.220 Wherever you are right now, you might be at home listening carefully.

00:35:46.260 You might be jogging as you listen to this.

00:35:48.500 You might be in your car listening to this.

00:35:50.260 Wherever you are – I don't care where you are – look around and see the separateness.

00:35:55.480 It's a beautiful thing.

00:35:57.140 Oh, we all want to be one.

00:35:58.800 We're all connected.

00:36:00.080 Yeah, we are on an atomic level.

00:36:01.760 I get that. 1.00

00:36:02.660 But that's stupid to go through your life like that. 1.00

00:36:04.840 And most of us do. 1.00

00:36:07.780 So wherever you are, sitting in your car, see this tree over here?

00:36:12.060 It has nothing to do with that hydrant over there.

00:36:14.140 In fact, this tree over here has nothing to do with the tree next to it.

00:36:17.020 And see the car come by and think about that car that comes by the other way and passes you.

00:36:22.500 The 10,000 separate components of that car.

00:36:25.020 The miracle of the driver, their body in there.

00:36:28.140 All those components working.

00:36:29.920 See the separateness.

00:36:31.000 Look at the dashboard of your car.

00:36:32.900 See the radio?

00:36:33.820 That has nothing to do with the speedometer.

00:36:35.940 It has nothing to do with the gas tank, which has nothing to do with the brakes, which has nothing to do with the engine.

00:36:40.160 They're connected.

00:36:41.440 But until you can see that separateness, you can't hope to unravel a frazzled life that doesn't seem to be going anywhere.

00:36:51.040 Gotcha.

00:36:51.500 Well, hey, Sam, before we go, where can people learn more about your work?

00:36:55.080 Okay.

00:36:55.440 Go to workthesystem.com.

00:36:57.960 Gotcha.

00:36:58.440 And everything's there.

00:36:59.640 The synopsis and the FAQs I'm particularly proud about.

00:37:03.160 They explain the whole thing very, very well.

00:37:06.740 And you can jump over to thesystemsmindset.com from the site.

00:37:11.460 So it's best just to go to workthesystem.com.

00:37:14.040 So if you have a business, you want workthesystem.com.

00:37:16.560 If you don't have a business, if you have a job, you're retired, you're a kid in school, whatever, start with the systems mindset, managing the machinery of your life.

00:37:26.200 It's slightly less than half as long as workthesystem.

00:37:29.680 Workthesystem is definitely geared to businesses.

00:37:32.460 Gotcha.

00:37:32.860 Well, Sam Carpenter, thank you so much for your time.

00:37:34.680 It's been a pleasure.

00:37:36.340 Thank you, Brett.

00:37:37.140 I appreciate it very much.

00:37:38.500 I love talking about this stuff.

00:37:40.300 I got to say with Sam Carpenter, he's the author of the books Work the System as well as the System Mindset.

00:37:44.960 And you can find those books on amazon.com.

00:37:47.740 The System Mindset is coming out in March.

00:37:49.640 He's got a great thing going on here.

00:37:51.340 You can go to workthesystem.com or thesystemsmindset.com and you can download those books for free.

00:37:59.080 They're unabridged versions in PDF and all electronic formats as well as audio formats for free again.

00:38:06.080 So go to workthesystem.com and thesystemsmindset.com.

00:38:09.540 Get those books.

00:38:10.380 Give them a read.

00:38:11.380 You won't regret it.

00:38:12.220 You'll get a lot out of it.

00:38:13.160 Well, that wraps up another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.

00:38:19.900 For more manly tips and advice, make sure to check out the Art of Manliness website at artofmanliness.com.

00:38:24.020 And if you enjoy this podcast, I'd appreciate it if you'd give us a review on iTunes or Stitcher.

00:38:27.900 It'd help us get the word out about the show.

00:38:30.140 And I really appreciate your support.

00:38:31.380 And until next time, this is Brett McKay telling you to stay manly.

00:38:34.000 We'll be right back.

The Art of Manliness - February 05, 2016

#175： Systemizing Your Work and Life

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