Welcome to the six Figure Business Mastery Podcast, where every week
Speaker:Kirsten and Jeanie dive into the essential topics to fuel your business
Speaker:growth, from copywriting to course creation mindset, to video marketing.
Speaker:They've got you covered.
Speaker:Tune in for expert guest interviews on all things marketing and
Speaker:business, and learn how to work on your business, not just in it.
Speaker:So get ready to unlock your business potential and take it to the next level.
Speaker:Welcome everyone.
Speaker:We're so thrilled that you're here and I am excited to
Speaker:introduce you to Leslie Hasler.
Speaker:Her company is called Your Biz Rules, so welcome to the show, Leslie.
Speaker:Lovely to have you.
Speaker:Hey, I'm excited to be here.
Speaker:We're gonna have a great time, aren't we?
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:So tell us a little bit about your business and what you
Speaker:do, kind of how you got there.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Um, so our business, your B Rules is a fractional C-suite firm,
Speaker:which basically means we can be a one-stop shop for our clients.
Speaker:What we do is, what we're really great at doing is creating
Speaker:more profits in a business.
Speaker:So you're cashflow positive, but also helping business owners grow and scale.
Speaker:Um, in our scaling Rich methodology, which is really about.
Speaker:Sustainability, um, so that you don't burn out or go broke in the process of trying
Speaker:to grow, but also doing it in a way that improves your quality of life so that
Speaker:you actually get that freedom you started your business for in the first place.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:We wanna stay away from burnout and going broke.
Speaker:Uh, yes.
Speaker:Generally advisable.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:So we're gonna talk today a little bit about your Scaling Rich, uh, program
Speaker:and, and kind of what that entails.
Speaker:So, uh, the long description I have is nine Strategies for
Speaker:Sustainable Business Growth.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:So, um, why don't you pick like your favorite one or your
Speaker:starting one and let's kind of talk about, um, how that works.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I, I love that you've asked that question, so thank you.
Speaker:And I wanna break it down to maybe even some more simple, uh, ways to look at it.
Speaker:Um, so the first element that you've gotta think about is about clarity.
Speaker:And clarity is super important, especially the longer you've been in business.
Speaker:I think it's super easy to be clear, um, somewhat clear when you first start out,
Speaker:but then as you're growing and you're.
Speaker:Scaling it gets a little more garbled because you're taking
Speaker:advantage of opportunities.
Speaker:Maybe not always if they're in alignment, which is actually our second aspect
Speaker:of scaling Rich, which is alignment.
Speaker:So if you've got clarity, then you can bring the business into an alignment.
Speaker:And this is super important because for the same reasons we're just
Speaker:starting to to go, it is very often that the business owner.
Speaker:Maybe matures and develops and elevates, but the business
Speaker:doesn't always come along.
Speaker:So we have to bring things into alignment and mean that alignment
Speaker:is based on your clarity.
Speaker:And then the third big chunk that we're looking for is leverage.
Speaker:Now, what is leverage?
Speaker:Leverage is the ability to do to, how about this?
Speaker:Instead of everyone here's do more with less.
Speaker:That's kind of a scarcity mindset.
Speaker:We really believe in getting more from what you're doing.
Speaker:That's a leverage concept, right?
Speaker:So it's really comes down to clarity, alignment, and leverage.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Get more from what I'm writing this down you're doing.
Speaker:It's so interesting.
Speaker:I remember when I was first in business, many, many moons ago,
Speaker:and I, I thought this word leverage was so big and cool and, but I
Speaker:didn't really know what it meant.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know, it's actually one of the most popular web, uh, articles on
Speaker:our website is those around leverage.
Speaker:And I think we're all looking for getting more from our efforts
Speaker:and, um, it is super critical.
Speaker:You may not always be ready for it, but it is super critical to have this in mind as
Speaker:you're looking to grow to scale, because it is the difference between grow, growing
Speaker:with ease and growing through sheer effort, which eventually leads to burnout.
Speaker:So tell us a little bit about, um, what types of leverage do you help
Speaker:your companies with your clients?
Speaker:So we're looking, um, in leverage in a couple different ways.
Speaker:The number one is through people now that I like to call team as a
Speaker:very broad umbrella, um, because it includes employees, it includes 10
Speaker:90 nines, it includes subcontractors, and every stage and age of business
Speaker:has a different need for both.
Speaker:So I think we have.
Speaker:So many, um, more linear prescribed methodologies of growth.
Speaker:And in today's market, I think you need something a little more fluid,
Speaker:a little bit more, that ebbs and flows and understanding where do
Speaker:you need that concrete employee that needs to be there all the time.
Speaker:But then how do you accommodate a swell of business, but not necessarily s.
Speaker:Swell of expenses that come along with it.
Speaker:And that's when you really do need, you know, outside parties.
Speaker:Either it's 10 99 or or subcontractors to help shelter that
Speaker:load, but it's an advanced move.
Speaker:Um, it is an advanced profitability move as well.
Speaker:So people is probably, um, one of the, the best sources of that time,
Speaker:um, would be another one of those.
Speaker:Things, but then you also get a lot more leverage through, um, getting
Speaker:greater productivity in the business.
Speaker:And that's gonna be through systems and technology process, um, those
Speaker:types of things, which just amplify.
Speaker:Your leverage from people.
Speaker:So there are these levels, if you will.
Speaker:Um, we, we, like, we have this five levels of leverage, um, that we
Speaker:can talk to if we have a moment.
Speaker:But it really is an evolution in business.
Speaker:And I think what the biggest mistake we see is people try to go
Speaker:too high, too fast, and they don't put in the building blocks into
Speaker:place so that they're successful.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And probably the people who are overwhelmed are not doing it at all.
Speaker:And thinking, I can do all of this.
Speaker:I tell my team today, I went, don't get me wrong, I'm pretty
Speaker:super, I'm just not super woman.
Speaker:You know, like, you're gonna have to remember I'm human too.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Well, we help, um, our clients with outsourcing a lot of different
Speaker:aspects of their business.
Speaker:So we are big fans of leveraging people.
Speaker:Um, and then time of course, and productivity systems and processes.
Speaker:We always laugh.
Speaker:SOPs are not sexy, but they're so necessary.
Speaker:They are.
Speaker:And honestly, even in SOPs, because we do a lot of work with our clients, that's one
Speaker:element that we spend a lot of time in.
Speaker:I think what people are so used to is that binder that we maybe got in our
Speaker:first corporate job that you just put up on a bookshelf and you never looked at
Speaker:that isn't worth your time to develop.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And it's a little.
Speaker:Old paradigm we're gonna talk about, and there's a new paradigm.
Speaker:It's our old paradigm that we're gonna need to shed.
Speaker:Really, when it comes to SOPs, what we wanna do is operationalize them, right?
Speaker:So that they're part of the ever evolving, living, breathing aspect
Speaker:of what people do in your company.
Speaker:Um, that's the difference.
Speaker:And I, I, I agree with you, maybe not the sexiest thing in the world.
Speaker:However, if you wanna stop being the one that's doing it all.
Speaker:You know, if you don't wanna have to worry about the decisions that
Speaker:your team is making, if you don't do these, you're not gonna win.
Speaker:It's just impossible to do it because no one in your company is a mind reader.
Speaker:None.
Speaker:I've yet to hire one.
Speaker:If you have them, do you have one of those on your staff?
Speaker:We could hire them, right?
Speaker:No one's mind, but everybody wants to do a really great job.
Speaker:And I, I, we just believe in that.
Speaker:So SAPs, they're, they're like water.
Speaker:They're not always sexy, but you need it.
Speaker:Oh, no, absolutely.
Speaker:Without a doubt.
Speaker:Um, what I think my business partner says, if you do so something that has three
Speaker:steps and do it three times, you need to have a process for it, because that means
Speaker:that something that's gonna be recurring and it has multiple steps and yeah.
Speaker:It's those things, especially that, that we do or that our team does that don't
Speaker:happen every day, maybe once a month or you know, a couple times a month.
Speaker:But you, but all steps are important in that.
Speaker:Steps are important.
Speaker:And I love that you gave that example because it, it speaks to the simplicity
Speaker:and even the simplest things.
Speaker:They need that type of structure and it's really the structure that sets you free
Speaker:that you need so much in your business to be able to get to that next level.
Speaker:To even think about leverage.
Speaker:It's kind of the secret sauce.
Speaker:And it's funny because I think some people.
Speaker:Don't want structure, especially entrepreneurs because they
Speaker:think that's constricting.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:When in fact it's the opposite, isn't it?
Speaker:Structure and, you know, uh, SOPs help you get things done faster.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And more effectively.
Speaker:And that gives you the time to do other things that you
Speaker:need the creative freedom for.
Speaker:Do you think so?
Speaker:I agree with you.
Speaker:I think people are in two camps.
Speaker:I have.
Speaker:Um, and I will honestly say I'm in the first camp, um, my natural
Speaker:personalities in the first camp of I, I have a high freedom gene.
Speaker:I don't really like repetition.
Speaker:It's not my friend in a lot of ways, but the truth is it kept me away.
Speaker:A lack of structure keeps me away from the freedom I say that I want.
Speaker:And so, because the freedom is more important to me than my.
Speaker:Distaste for maybe structure.
Speaker:I let that go.
Speaker:I draw I, I just let that ego go and now I'm like, does it give me more freedom?
Speaker:If it does, I'm all on board and let's go.
Speaker:I think though there's also this other camp we have to talk about
Speaker:where people over structure.
Speaker:And it capsizes it, it slows the business down.
Speaker:I just wrote an article on this, um, especially in like, how do you
Speaker:motivate employees and team and keep everyone on the same page?
Speaker:And I was like, you know, our old paradigm is either the carrot or the stick.
Speaker:I was like, the thing is, is that a carrot is very subjective.
Speaker:What motivates me doesn't motivate you.
Speaker:Doesn't motivate Joan.
Speaker:Doesn't motivate the next person, right?
Speaker:So that's a hard one to get.
Speaker:So people lean into the stick.
Speaker:I say, and, and, and this is that area of people putting too much structure.
Speaker:They're trying to protect against so much that you effectively
Speaker:are strangling the business.
Speaker:You scare away clients.
Speaker:You're only attracting really not the best team members because the best team
Speaker:members don't thrive in that environment.
Speaker:So we need this.
Speaker:Mm. You know, it's the, what is it?
Speaker:It's the Goldilocks moment, the just right moment, and that does vary, but business
Speaker:by business, we use some companies that are high compliance industries where
Speaker:there's a lot of regulation and so there's a little more structure, right?
Speaker:We have some others that maybe it's not, and you have to find that sweet spot,
Speaker:I think from a business standpoint.
Speaker:But truly, you need structure.
Speaker:The structure will set you free, hands down every day of the week.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:And I love how you pointed out that too much structure, especially when
Speaker:you bring on team members, ideally you're bringing on someone who
Speaker:has some kind of expertise, um, or someone who has, you know, a talent.
Speaker:And so you need to let that thrive and grow as well.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Love that.
Speaker:Okay, so you set a new paradigm.
Speaker:Do you wanna talk about that now or do you wanna move on to one of your other
Speaker:nine, um, processes or strategies?
Speaker:It's an important conversation.
Speaker:It's one, uh, that I'm on a, a little bit of a, a bandwagon for.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:We've experienced a tremendous amount of change.
Speaker:If you even just say 2020 was actually a pivotal year for a lot of different
Speaker:reasons, but it marks a point in time where change happened even faster.
Speaker:In fact, a lot of the estimates say that the amount of change we went
Speaker:through in that one year was the equivalent of five previous years.
Speaker:So that is, is, is huge and it hasn't slowed down.
Speaker:I don't know about, for you, has not slowed down for us.
Speaker:So we're in this race of, of feeling maybe just a little out of control.
Speaker:This is, I think, the quintessential illustration of
Speaker:Old Paradigm versus New Paradigm.
Speaker:So if I give you like a growth measure, old paradigm, it used to be 14.4% growth.
Speaker:Year over year for five years would double your business.
Speaker:Well, now you can double your business in months, right?
Speaker:You can do it in six months.
Speaker:We've done it for companies.
Speaker:We've done it for our own business.
Speaker:You can do this, but our brains are having a hard time rationalizing.
Speaker:Safety of that, right?
Speaker:Because we're still operating on this old operating system, this old paradigm.
Speaker:So what the goal, or even like for premise of Scaling Rich is, is that,
Speaker:you know what, we're never gonna knock 14.4% because some years that's a win.
Speaker:Um, but we're trying to open the doorway, open the possibility to.
Speaker:More exponential growth year over year, just doing it in
Speaker:a sustainable methodology.
Speaker:Because on the flip side, I always talk in ends to our, our spectrum.
Speaker:The flip side of the spectrum is the concept called blitzscaling.
Speaker:It's most popularized by, you know, SaaS companies and our unicorns that kind of
Speaker:just blow up overnight and suddenly in 12 months they're worth $40 billion in.
Speaker:Um.
Speaker:In valuation, but those companies are also have a higher propensity to burn
Speaker:out and collapse and to be some of the worst stories, you know, within 18
Speaker:or 24 months of their best story that Blitzscaling Blitzscaling says that growth
Speaker:should be the priority and everything else is a cost of doing business.
Speaker:Doesn't matter who you're gonna burn through as p personnel
Speaker:yourself, or cash or anything else.
Speaker:The name of the game is to get to that big state so that hopefully you've got enough
Speaker:that it can then stabilize, well, okay, we gotta get somewhere in the middle.
Speaker:Again, we're looking for the Goldilocks moment.
Speaker:And that is, that is part of breaking down some of the old paradigms and
Speaker:bringing in some of the new paradigms and helping our, helping our clients
Speaker:realize they're still in control.
Speaker:But honestly, you never really, were in control.
Speaker:I think control's a little bit of a. I don't know.
Speaker:Uh, a farce.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:I have two kids that are boys and they're in college.
Speaker:God love 'em.
Speaker:I'm so excited.
Speaker:We made it to college and you know, and I have a dog and a cat, and I gotta
Speaker:let you know, I'm just not in control.
Speaker:I. Help guide the chaos, and I think that's what I see our roles really being
Speaker:as the owners in a company, is guiding the chaos to a good end benefit where
Speaker:everybody is succeeding and everybody's winning as part of the equation.
Speaker:So there's a lot in there, but that's probably the biggest reason we need to
Speaker:start talking about what are the old paradigm shifts we need to walk away
Speaker:from, and what are the new paradigm shifts we need to start adopting.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:'cause people say, oh, I wanna grow.
Speaker:I want a, you know, multimillion dollar business.
Speaker:But yeah.
Speaker:That's great.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:That's, I inspire.
Speaker:Inspiring.
Speaker:But are you ready for that?
Speaker:Are you building, you said building those blocks.
Speaker:I love what, how you settle some people growth.
Speaker:That's so quickly it made me think of like people who win the lottery.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know, their lifestyle and their choices are not prepared for that kind of.
Speaker:Influx of cash and a lot of them end up in a really bad
Speaker:place or back in the same place.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:After not a very long time.
Speaker:So it's a mindset shift.
Speaker:It's a paradigm shift, yeah.
Speaker:And it's, I think it's only going to become more prevalent and more,
Speaker:um, evident of the businesses that can shift and the businesses
Speaker:that are holding on tight.
Speaker:So yeah, I just wanna see more people succeed at the end of the day.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:That's awesome.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Old paradigm, new pair.
Speaker:It's so interesting because, um, I will confess, I used to work in a nine to five.
Speaker:I worked in advertising and I worked in ad sales for actually MTV
Speaker:networks and it's interesting to think, I don't know if I could go
Speaker:back like it would be so different.
Speaker:I mean, it was a long time ago.
Speaker:Completely unemployable.
Speaker:I've been, there's just no question about it.
Speaker:I was, I, I was always a great employee, but I have always had an
Speaker:entrepreneurial mindset and, you know, I'd be like, so I've just brought
Speaker:in a third of the company payroll.
Speaker:Um, my entire team is.
Speaker:By my estimates we are profitable.
Speaker:It was so funny, the owner of the company there and he goes, how do you know?
Speaker:And I'm like, 'cause I can do math.
Speaker:I'm like, I don't.
Speaker:I mean, see what you're offering these jobs for.
Speaker:I can approximate.
Speaker:I know what we're charging for on a per hour basis 'cause I'm the
Speaker:one putting together the quote and.
Speaker:I have an advertising background as well where when I first started in
Speaker:client management, I had a p and l that I was responsible for my clients on.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And that profitability was how we were compensated and how
Speaker:we were, you know, evaluated.
Speaker:So, to be in a company that, that didn't, I didn't know my impact.
Speaker:I was like, well, I can figure this out.
Speaker:I've been doing this for five years.
Speaker:You know, so I know I always had the entrepreneurial mindset.
Speaker:'cause I'd be like, Hey, it's.
Speaker:Four o'clock on Friday, I'm done.
Speaker:Do I have to actually sit here for another hour?
Speaker:And they're like, well, yeah.
Speaker:And I'm like, okay, would you walk around your company and see how
Speaker:many people, so gonna date myself in the moment or on my space?
Speaker:And then just know that I actually have worked my 39
Speaker:hours, so I think I can get to.
Speaker:Figure out for four o'clock on Friday.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:That's so great.
Speaker:I hope totally get that.
Speaker:And that was one of my arguments for, you know, for being an entrepreneur
Speaker:was like, why do I have to sit here?
Speaker:I'm done.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I'm just done.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And that's a hard skill to develop as an entrepreneur is knowing when to
Speaker:get up and walk away from your desk.
Speaker:Even if you could see my office, oh my gosh, it's, looks like a hurricane
Speaker:came through, but you know, at the end of the day, you gotta get up.
Speaker:Yeah, you have to get up.
Speaker:But yeah, as an entrepreneur there's, there's always something to do.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Always.
Speaker:Here always for sure.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Um, let's talk about if someone were in a position where they were not at the level
Speaker:they wanted to be and they want to know what the next steps are, kind of what kind
Speaker:of, um, suggestion or tip could you give them to help them kind of identify that
Speaker:and at least maybe take the next step?
Speaker:Direction.
Speaker:That is a really big question.
Speaker:Um, we actually do a service called the Business Audit to, to answer this
Speaker:question because it's super simple for me to give you a stock answer, right?
Speaker:But what we have seen is that every business is very different.
Speaker:I can have two companies come in same revenue amount.
Speaker:Um, we have one company, we took 'em from like half a million
Speaker:to 2 million in nine months.
Speaker:I'll tell you that's not the normal case.
Speaker:Not everybody's ready, right?
Speaker:And I can have another half a million, um, company come in and we
Speaker:spend the next year putting in the foundations of a business because
Speaker:they're typically not ready to scale.
Speaker:So I am actually going to give you a question back.
Speaker:I'm not even gonna give you an answer.
Speaker:And, um, I would be wary of anybody that would give you an answer, honestly.
Speaker:And here's why.
Speaker:I would go.
Speaker:If I were coming in and you were asking me that question about your business,
Speaker:this is the question I would ask.
Speaker:If I were to triple your business in the next 15, 60 days, what would break?
Speaker:Ooh, I love that, right?
Speaker:'cause you know that answer, don't you?
Speaker:I would break, my team would break.
Speaker:We wouldn't have X. There's no way we could bring on that many clients.
Speaker:There's no way that we could do X, Y, and Z. And suddenly you get a laundry list.
Speaker:That might be where to start, right?
Speaker:Because you actually probably already know.
Speaker:You just need to ask yourself that question and that, that the low
Speaker:hanging fruit of things, we start until we get the business audit
Speaker:done, and then we, we, right?
Speaker:We use the facts and the figure of the business, the performance of the
Speaker:business, plus the clarity from the owner of, okay, why are we building this?
Speaker:Well, to what end?
Speaker:What does it do for you?
Speaker:You know, um, what does that look like?
Speaker:What does the business need to do for you to actually pay you back
Speaker:everything you've put into the business?
Speaker:When you marry those two things, you get a strategic plan.
Speaker:We know exactly what to do for the next.
Speaker:You're in a business to just keep it trucking along and to get good growth,
Speaker:but in a sustainable way that, you know, produces some profits along the way.
Speaker:So, um, I know that wasn't a direct answer, but I actually think it
Speaker:might've been the best answer.
Speaker:I think it's perfect.
Speaker:'cause people who are listening can say, okay, I can do that.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I can visualize, you know, what, what break.
Speaker:And then now I know, okay, those are different parts that I need to
Speaker:work on to get to the right place.
Speaker:So that I can triple my business.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:You do have to be ready.
Speaker:Too many people go try to go from crawling to flying and fall in the middle or, um,
Speaker:I, I like to say if your biggest issue is cash growth won't always fix it.
Speaker:'cause growth, devours cash, scalability produces cash.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:So you have to be really honest about where your business is and
Speaker:not necessarily looking for the helm hell, the magic potion solutions.
Speaker:'cause oftentimes they won't fix the problem.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Ugh.
Speaker:I love this has been fantastic.
Speaker:You are, are a wealth of information, Leslie.
Speaker:Um, if people are saying, wow, she's speaking my language,
Speaker:I need to talk to her.
Speaker:What is the best way for them to reach out to you?
Speaker:Well, we have a page just for your listeners, so you'll be able to get
Speaker:that@yourbizrules.com slash six.
Speaker:Um, so the word six spelled out SIX, and what you're gonna
Speaker:find there is a few things.
Speaker:So first off, we actually have a masterclass on the nine different areas of
Speaker:scalability for business so that you can.
Speaker:Get deep and really get a better understanding of what there is to help.
Speaker:Um, we also have access to our, uh, first this than that.
Speaker:When Scaling Rich comes out, we'll add it to that page and then if you're
Speaker:need more help than that, you're ready for a little bit of support.
Speaker:Um, there's a way to reach out and talk with us and see if we can, how
Speaker:we can help you reach that next level.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:That is fantastic.
Speaker:Thank you for doing that for our listeners.
Speaker:You're welcome.
Speaker:Happy to, and we will absolutely put that in the show notes.
Speaker:And yeah.
Speaker:Leslie, I just wanna say thank you so much for coming on and telling
Speaker:us about the Scaling Rich program and you know, just kind of talking
Speaker:through some really, really things to know and to think about when you are
Speaker:thinking about expanding and growing.
Speaker:So thank you for joining me today.
Speaker:Oh, thank you for having me.
Speaker:It was a blast.
Speaker:Enjoyed it.
Speaker:Good.
Speaker:Thanks for listening to the six Figure Business Mastery Podcast.
Speaker:If you enjoyed listening to this episode and you are ready to leverage video
Speaker:marketing on all online platforms, or maybe even start your own video
Speaker:podcast, then you need to check out the Done for You and Done with You program
Speaker:at the marketing va advantage.com and take your business to the next level.