Every week, Drew records another video on a topic that has come up in his conversations with agency owners. You can view them chronologically (most recent on top) by different categories, or you can search for specific key words.
This Week’s Video
Take Back Your Time
I am rereading a book by Dan Martel called “Buy Back Your Time." Many of you have probably read it; if you have read it once, I highly recommend you reread it. The whole premise of the book is that we spend a lot of our time doing things that are of low value because we haven't either decided that they don't need to be done at all or that someone else could do them as well if not better than we do, and that we are literally robbing ourselves of the time we need to do the things where we add the most value to our business, to our family, whatever it may be. And you know, the truth is, I think everybody feels like if I just had a few more hours in the day, if I had a little more wiggle room, we're not going to get that. So we really have to use that resource of our time better if we're going to get a different result. Full Transcripts »
Decide
What would it be if you could wave a magic wand and something would be different? Would it be possible for you to get more new business? Would it be a different relationship with your clients? Would it be a shift in the culture of your agency? Would it be something about profitability? Would it be something about you having clarity around your succession plan? Whatever it is, there's actually a straightforward solution. We overcomplicate things all the time. We create these big, elaborate Gantt charts and reasons why something is or isn't the way it is. This is the reality for most of us, and Danyel and I see this weekly as we coach agency owners and leaders. The reality is that when you are very clear about what you want and you're very clear about what you have to do to get it, the answer is actually straightforward. You have to decide. You have to determine that it's no longer acceptable for it to be how it is. Whatever it may be, you must decide it is no longer acceptable. And that the work you have to do to change it is no longer optional. The solution is simple. Executing the solution is hard. If somebody wants to lose 50 pounds, the solution is simple. Exercise more. Eat different. Be thoughtful about how much you sleep. All the things that we know. But doing it is hard. Solution – simple. Execution – hard. So I want you to think about the one barrier, burden, obstacle, goal, whatever it is that you want to be different in 2025. I want you to look yourself in the mirror and ask yourself, am I willing to decide to change this? Am I willing to do what it takes to have this no longer be a problem? And then actually decide. Watch »
I Spy
Reach out to everybody, and either while you're all on Zoom in a team meeting or prep them in advance, or do it by email or Slack. Say to them, I spy something meaningful in your office. Tell me about one thing. Show it to me. Tell me one thing in your office that has special meaning to you and why you keep it near you during the workday. I think you're going to learn some fascinating things about your employees. And start it off by sharing something that you keep in your office that is near and dear to you. That's very meaningful. Try and avoid the cliche of it's a picture of my family or something like that. Find something that is going to reveal something about you that maybe they didn't know, or they didn't know was as important to you as it is. But set the tone and then invite them to share as well. I think it's a great way to close out the year. Connect with everybody. Get to know everybody a little bit better, and share a little of yourselves with each other. Watch »
Year End Tax Strategy
As we approach year-end, many of you are scrambling to manage your taxes and ensure that while you want to end on a profitable note, you don't end with so much profit that it all goes right out the window to taxes. Many of you are prepaying rent and other things, which is a great idea, but if you consistently end the year with over $50,000 in profit, if that's sort of like that's a given for you, some years it might be $200,000, some years it might be $51,000. But you typically end the year with about $50,000 or better in profit, one thing that might be worth considering is a defined benefits program. It is basically a private pension program. It's a great way to not just prepay for things but really to tuck money away for you and your family and for your team rather than just pay excess taxes. Watch »
Words are like burrs
When I was a kid growing up in Minnesota, there were many places to hike and be in the woods. And one of the things that I still distinctly remember was what we called stickers or prickers or burrs. You would walk through the woods and they would stick to your clothes. Right? They were these thorny parts of a plant. I don't even know where they came from, but they would get all along your pant legs and your sweaters or your shirts. They were sharp and sticky, and they stuck around. Sometimes, you would find them for days. I can remember going out in the woods with the dogs, and you would find the burrs under their bellies days after you had been out of the woods. Our words are like those stickers long after we have delivered a message. So often, we think that we are being directive or prescriptive, especially if we're frustrated with a team member or a client. Or we're angry, and we say something, and we have been building it up. We've been planning it in our head. We've been practicing it. Or maybe just in a moment of anger, it comes out, and we feel better. We feel better because we've expelled that emotion. But we forget that long after we feel better, long after the conversation is done, and long after we think we've delivered the message and moved on, the recipient hasn't moved on. That sticker, that burr is still on their pant or under their belly, and they can't take it off. They can't shake it. They can't forget it. And that leaves a mark. And it leaves a mark that sometimes is permanent. And even if it's not permanent, it lingers much longer than we think. Watch »
AI is not optional for agencies
Any agency that shuns all AI and stays completely old school, whatever that means today, is an agency that most clients will feel is out of touch. They'll believe their agency is not bringing them all the resources they can and feels dated. It would be best to decide what AI means for your agency and how you use it to serve clients. How do you use it internally for systems and processes? How do you use it to crunch data, gather facts, and research? It can do many things; you don't have to do all of them in your agency. But not understanding AI, not experimenting with AI, not having a policy inside your organization about internal use, and not having a client-facing policy about how your views about AI will translate to your clients and prospects down the road means that you are out of touch. Watch »
What do you want your team to feel?
As agency owners and leaders, we are the messengers. We set the tone and tenor of how people feel about working in the agency. I don't think we spend enough time thinking about how we want to kick off our all-team or state-of-the-agency meetings and how we want them to walk away from those meetings. What do we want them to know? And, more importantly, what do we want them to feel? So before your next all-team meeting, think carefully about the chaos of all the messages you have to deliver because you have 30 minutes an hour or 90 minutes of stuff to tell them. But how do you bookend that with how you want them to feel? Watch »
Autumnal Truths
Are there things in the fall season of their life cycle in our agency? Maybe it's how we work, maybe it's where we work, maybe it's the kind of clients we serve. Maybe it's an employee or two who have been amazing, but maybe it's their autumn season, and we need to help them figure out how to have a good last chapter through the winter of their career. Maybe it is the way we do billing; maybe it's the way we do new business. But I want you to challenge yourself as agency owners. It's so easy because there's so much chaos always going on around us. We want some stability, I get it. We want something that stays the same. But I think sometimes we cling to the past or things that we feel are evergreen, and maybe they're not. Watch »
Work ethics
There are many assumptions about our employees, the way they work, and their understanding of work. First, I think we assume that they know how we want them to work. Second, I think we assume that they know how we work. Third, I think we assume that there is no wiggle room in their perception of work. Want to know the fix? Keep listening. Watch »
No wonder you can’t make any money
We're working with two agencies with identical issues: They were struggling with timelines, profitability, and process and system bloat. Interestingly, they both recently changed to a new project management software and hired a consultant to help them map their processes. When we got in there, we discovered that the processes were bloated. People who weren't doing the work every day were the ones who had their hands in building out the process. They hadn't included the team as well; they should have to figure out how long things took and what the handoffs were. Instead, we found that with the consultant's help, the project management team had created a complicated, bloated, over-layered system and process that frankly meant that from the get-go, every project they bid on came in way over budget compared to everybody else. Number two, there were many steps in there they didn't need. Number three, they could not get profitable to save their life to get the work done. So, we had to deconstruct and reconstruct their processes to figure out precisely what it took to complete the work. Want to know the fix? Keep listening. Watch »
