SPI 645: How and When to Hire Help — The Ultimate Guide with Kelly Roach

SPI 645: How and When to Hire Help—The Ultimate Guide with Kelly Roach

Kelly Roach: Your responsibility as the employer is to create and cultivate an environment in which people can thrive. Having a clear focus, having a definitive North Star, having an ability to say “This is where we’re going and I’m gonna lead the organization there.” Right? And do it in a way that people can follow along and they can contribute and participate. And to set people’s responsibilities up in such a way that they can contribute in a meaningful and profitable way. Their responsibility is to show up and deliver.

Pat Flynn: Here’s how we’re gonna start this episode. I’m gonna ask you a question, and if you say yes to this, you have to promise to listen all the way through. This is a great way to filter, because if this is a no, then don’t waste your time. But here’s the question. Have you ever considered building a team to help you in your entrepreneurial endeavors?

That’s it. Now, the definition of team can be different to different people, but if you at any point have considered hiring help for what it is that you are doing or have done, then this is for you. If not, then you can move on. But I would highly advise listening to this episode all the way through because we’re bringing on a guest, Kelly Roach. She and I connected recently. I was on her podcast and I wanted her on mine, and we discovered that she has this amazing superpower amongst many of helping you hire a dream team.

I want you to envision your business running in such a way that even if you weren’t doing work, it still is able to serve your audience and still run.

We’re gonna do the blueprint today, cause Kelly brings it, and I told her at the end of this episode that this is probably one of the most valuable episodes people will ever listen to. And I know that’s tall order, but I want you to give me a chance and give Kelly a chance as well. Kelly Roach, she has an amazing podcast, the Kelly Roach Show, and she has many books, many expertise, much of an expertise across the board.

But this episode will rock your world when you’re hiring. So this is the blueprint for hiring. Who to hire, how to hire, when to hire, et cetera. And this may be the exact episode you need to listen to at this moment in time. So welcome to session 645, right here at the start of the brand new year. And even if you’re listening to this in the future, it might be mid-year, you gotta get caught up cuz this is amazing.

So Kelly Roach, Kelly Roach Show, episode 645. Here she is.

Announcer: Welcome to the Smart Passive Income Podcast, where it’s all about working hard now, so you can sit back and reap the benefits later. And now your host. He’s 40 years old now, but he still feels like a kid. Just with achier muscles. Pat Flynn.

Pat Flynn: Kelly, welcome to the Smart Pass Income podcast. Thank you so much for taking the time to join me today.

Kelly Roach: I’m so happy to be here. Thanks for having me, Pat.

Pat Flynn: And I’m grateful for you. You had me and Matt on your podcast very recently, had a great conversation about some new things that we were doing in this space. But you know, when I was thinking about entrepreneurs and the big needs that our listeners have, many of them are doing this on their own, they want to build a team, but they’re really scared about it. And I know you know so much about this. You help people build not just businesses, but empires. And in order to do that, you need people. And you’ve even wrote a book about this. Can you take me back to the first time you started working with people for the first time and what that was like for you and how did you get over a lot of the fears that come along with that?

Kelly Roach: Yeah, absolutely. Well, I mean, I’ll have to take you way back for that one and then I’ll, I’ll leap forward into the world of entrepreneurship. You know, when I, I came from the Fortune 500 world. I started in the most entry level job. I was a sales rep. I loved it. I was free. I found the thing that I was great at.

I was making a lot of money. I was having fun. And you know, my boss came to me one day and he said, Kelly, we need you to start leading people. I need to promote you. I need you to take over a branch. This is the worst branch in the country. I need you to go turn it around. And I said, Dave, I don’t wanna manage a team and I don’t wanna turn a branch around.

I’m killing it. I’m loving what I’m doing. Why would I ever wanna go do this? And he said, Kelly, he said, what you can do alone will always pale in comparison to what you can do by linking arms with other people. It doesn’t matter if you’re the best in the world at what you do, your results will pale in comparison and you’ll never meet your potential if you don’t learn how to get results through others.

And that conversation really changed my perspective on leadership and what I was capable of and how to get things done, quite frankly, because I think a lot of us, and, and this applies to a lot of entrepreneurs, we come into the world of entrepreneurship and it’s like hustle, right? You come in, you are the business, you’re hustling like crazy, and if someone’s gonna get it done, it’s gonna be you. Right?

And I think one of the reasons why there’s such high burnout, and by the way, that story ended really well. So I took over the branch, I turned it into one of the top performing branches in the country, and I went on to build a team of a hundred people. So I started with one hire in that one location. Turned it around. And then slowly I built 17 branches and turned it into a team of a hundred, and then basically came into the world of entrepreneurship. And I fell in love with this idea of we’re better together, we can get results when we link arms with other people. You have to slow down a little bit in order to speed up sometimes.

And I think it’s a great message at the beginning of the year for entrepreneurs, Pat, because I think a lot of entrepreneurs suffer from really severe burnout and very severe isolation. And I think one of the biggest reasons for both isolation and burnout is that no one is really teaching in the entrepreneurial world, the power of building a winning team.

And I’m not referring to a couple VAs. I’m not referring to an O B M or a part-time integrator. I am talking about building a dream team, a group of people that have vested interests, long-term vision, strong capability, and that are gonna go all in with you on the dream that you wanna create.

Pat Flynn: Yeah, I mean, when, when we do hear about getting help, usually it is in the realm of a VA to do something and there’s nothing wrong with that.

There’s still some great value in that, or even now, more recently, the OBMs or the integrators of of the world. But this idea of of a dream team, it sounds amazing. It also sounds scary. It sound, it also sounds expensive. Can you help us who are thinking, wow, this sounds great, but I’m just starting my business.

Like I don’t have money to invest in a dream team, let alone maybe a full-time hire. Like how do we even begin to wrap our head around the beginning parts of building that team?

Kelly Roach: It’s such a good question. And by the way, we all start off, I started off with a part-time VA for one hour a week. Probably you started off, Pat, how did you start?

Pat Flynn: I did. I started actually with a VA in the Philippines courtesy of my good friend Chris Ducker. He leads a outsourcing company, which is great. But to fast forward like my team now, they’re all US based. We’re all in it together and, and there’s just something different about that. So, to your point, it’s a different kind of team and it’s so much more powerful.

Kelly Roach: And it’s a different experience. Absolutely. So let’s talk about it. So first of all, you start from where you are with what you’ve got, right? Everyone starts in the very beginning with some sort of part-time help, interns, contractors, VAs. It’s a beautiful place to start and it’s your first taste of what this could be. A lot of entrepreneurs are really scared of making the investment a k a commitment to hire a full-time team member, but they’re spending loads of money on all different things in their business that make far less significant contribution to the actual progression of the company than an employee would. And there’s always this conversation about commitment. And I wrote actually a lot about this in this book because this fear of commitment to hiring people is something that holds so many entrepreneurs back.

And yet if you are not willing to commit to the people on your team and go all in on them and say, you’re my person. I’m gonna give you a full-time job. I’m gonna give you benefits. I’m gonna, you know, invest in having you here. Then how can we expect them to be all in with us on that dream, right? So most of the time what happens is people start off with contractors and slowly but surely, they kind of gather this clan of misfit toys, right?

We have a contractor for this and a tech VA for that, and an O B M for this. And people get to the point where they have three and four, five. Sometimes I see people with eight different contractors. And what they don’t realize is that the amount of time, energy, and money that they’re spending a lot of times on fractional support and part-time help could be consolidated, condensed, and redesigned in a way that they would already be able to afford the first real hire in the business.

And so for most of you listening, if went through all of your subscriptions, all of your expenses, all of the things that you’re already spending money on your business that you’re not fully utilizing, or that you no longer need, chances are most of the people listening to this show right now, Pat, could cut expenses that they’re not using and reinvest those expenses in a full-time hire that would literally make all the difference in moving their business forward.

I don’t think people realize the amount of bandwidth and energy required to have your energy diluted in managing all these different people and vendors and contractors. And not only that, but the expense. I’ve done the math with many of my clients where they were actually spending more on fractional help than what it would take to actually get full-time support as the first big step towards team in their business.

Pat Flynn: All right, so you’ve crushed the objection of, well, either maybe I can’t afford it or it doesn’t make sense for my business right now we, we’ve crushed that one. But how about for the person who’s listening who’s like, okay, that makes sense on paper. But I, like you when you started, I don’t wanna manage people.

I don’t know how to manage people. That sounds scary. Like now I have another job to do. I have to train this person. I have to now watch over them. Like tell us around that. Like let’s crush that objection.

Kelly Roach: Yeah. No, I’m, I’m so happy you brought it up, Pat, because we, we need to talk about these things cuz it’s the only way we’re gonna change this culture of burnout and entrepreneurship. For sure.

Really. And you know, I hear this burnout from entrepreneurs constantly and it’s because, quite frankly, they’re trying to put 15 pounds into a five pound bag and it’s overflowing at the seams, and they continue to try and solve a problem in an unsolvable way, which is working harder and putting in more hours of their business. And so many entrepreneurs, it is an epidemic of health issues amongst entrepreneurs of all walks of life. Much of it from mental and physical exhaust. And so even if you’re a person that’s like, I love running free and wild, I like working independently. Maybe you’re like me and you’re like, I’m doing great on my own. I don’t need a team.

Right? That was the initial mindset that I had, and now I’m obsessed with team and it’s my favorite part about running my business. I want you to know that you will get to a point where when you stop, the business stops and that becomes a problem. And when you don’t have a team, you are the business. Literally you were the business.

So the moment you take your foot off the gas, let’s say a health issue comes up, let’s say you have a child that gets sick and you need to take time to focus on them, you have a parent that falls ill, who of us has not had that issue come up? There are so many life circumstances that happen over the course of the time that you’re running a business that it is, in my opinion, the most reckless thing you could possibly do to not protect yourself and your family by setting your business up in a way that it continues to run when you are not available. And I know none of us wanna think that way, but you all have big dreams and big visions, and you obviously, you come and you listen to this show on an ongoing basis because you’re, you’re working towards something bigger than yourself.

And if that’s the case, you have to think beyond the current scope of how much work can I personally do and start dreaming bigger than that and saying, what could I do to exponentially multiply my impact and my income by narrowing in what I’m doing to the things that are actually in my zone of genius, and then hiring people to my left and to my right that can apply their genius to what we’re doing to make this whole equation run faster and smoother and more profitably and more efficiently. That’s one of the big things for me, Pat.

Pat Flynn: Yeah, I mean, so you’ve sold us now on the why behind this. I mean, that’s a huge reason we often don’t think about that. We live day to day and we don’t think about the future.

And to set this up as almost a way to create a sense of business insurance, if you will, is huge. And the ability to, perhaps one day sell the business if you wanted to. I mean, if it’s just you, that’s not possible anymore. But with a team, that can be something that can be moved around and handed off to and grow and create more of a life beat inside of the business without you.

I still need to be sold, however, on how am I gonna manage this per, like, I, again, I’m not a, a manager. I didn’t go train for managing. Like, tell me how easy or not easy it will be to bring somebody on full-time. And help them do a part of the business that, you know, is something that I’ve done myself the whole time.

Kelly Roach: Yeah. And, and I just wanna say this, and I’ll say this again and, and I’ll, we’ll talk about it later, but I wrote an entire book on this because I could not believe that there was no education on this happening. I run entire programs on this topic because there’s just no education for me. I was super lucky.

I ran drills on this for 10 years in corporate before I came in. So here’s what I’ll tell you about beginning to hire help in your business. Number one, you will fail. You will fail multiple times. You will hire the wrong person. You will delegate too quickly. You will make mistakes during this process. You will lose money in this process.

And so I’m not here with rose colored glasses with any fairy tales or butterflies for anyone, but we all know the truth of the matter is anything that’s worth anything in life is gonna include all of those things that I just mentioned. So once you get through the learning curve of the fact that there’s certain elements of this that you can learn by reading a book, by studying, by watching videos, by understanding the process, and there’s certain elements of becoming a leader that can only be developed through experience.

but. That’s anything that’s worth anything in life. Right? Anything launching, designing a course, running a business. You look at anything that you do well in your life right now up to and including our very first attempt at walking. What does a baby do? It gets up. It takes a few steps. It falls down. It gets up, it takes a few steps, it falls down.

Somehow when we get to the adults, we try something new, and if we don’t go from, I stood to full on sprint in 30 seconds or less. We’re like, well, that strategy doesn’t work. Let me move on to the next thing. Clearly, that’s a fail. That’s not life. So to answer your question, Pat, you will fail in this process and you know, you and I both have teams that we love.

I got to meet Matt the other day. He’s absolutely incredible. I shared with you, I have a very similar relationship with Danielle and Crystal and my team, and the rest of our exec and leadership team, but I failed immensely in the process of building that team. I hired the wrong people. I delegated and trusted too quickly.

I didn’t have clarity on some of the roles, and I hired someone that wasn’t really what we needed. But this is the only way to cross the bridge of entrepreneurial freedom, and I really want to like underline, highlight, circle, star. So many people feel like they got sold a bill of goods when they get into entrepreneurship because they were told, I’m gonna make more money, I’m gonna work less hours, and I’m gonna have more freedom. I mean, I wish we were all on Zoom together and I could say, can I get a raise of hands? Right? Because every person listening to this show right now, no one goes into entrepreneurship saying, yes, I’d like to work 80 hours a week. Yep, I’d like to dial my salary back to an entry level employee, and please make sure I have the worst, most demanding boss in the world.

Right? That’s us. So ourselves, right? The only way to cross that bridge and to cash in on that thing, that’s the whole reason why any of us got started, is by being able to duplicate and multiply your efforts and be able to create something that keeps going with or without you, that produces money and produces workflow and is an entity that can, it can last, right? I just had a, a customer actually that just signed the deal on selling her business this week, which was huge. I have another customer that’s in the exit process right now. People in the small business world, they don’t realize the power of building team and what it facilitates for your future.

Because to your point that you made earlier, Pat, the whole point is you build something, you create it, and then at a certain point, there’s only three ways a business is gonna go. You’re gonna close it. You’re gonna pass it on to a family member, which most of our kids don’t wanna do the business that we’re doing cuz they have big ideas and they have a big dream for themselves.

They’re gonna go do their own thing. And the third option is selling. And most entrepreneurs don’t realize that your process of building to sell starts from the day that you start building your business. And most entrepreneurs get to the point where they’re like, I want out but they haven’t done the thing that needs to be done five in 10 and 15 years in advance of that to reap the benefit and the reward that should come with the fruits of their labor for so many years leading up until that point.

Pat Flynn: This has been so great. Kelly. We’re gonna keep going. I do want to mention that when we started this show, or even before we hit record, I asked Kelly, I was like, Hey, we could talk about all kinds of things cuz you have so much expertise across the board of anything entrepreneurship. And Kelly turned around and said, well, what would be most helpful for your audience?

And so that I already know is gonna be a good sign and this is gonna be a great episode because you have our audience’s interest in mind. And I said, you know what? Here at the beginning of 2023, it’s team building cuz I see it too often, we talked about it already, people running themselves to the ground cuz they think they either have to do all the things themselves or they don’t know how to hire a team.

And then boom, you whipped out this book and you’re like, I wrote a book on this. Tell us about the book and where people can get it.

Kelly Roach: Oh, you’re awesome. Thank you, Pat. So the book is called Bigger Than You: The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Building an Unstoppable Dream Team, and this is a literal guidebook. This is not a fluffy feel good book.

This is a step-by-step guidebook that walks you through every single step of understanding how to build a team. Starting from zero, starting with no experience. As a leader, as a manager, it walks you through acquiring talent, retaining talent, coaching, teaching, training, designing deliverables, managing them, elevating them in your company and then rinsing and repeating. So it is a literal step-by-step guidebook. You can grab a copy on Amazon, you can grab a copy on KellyRoachCoaching.com. But it, it is literally, I, I wrote the book because my track record in Fortune 500, we actually broke every record in the company’s history for profitable growth.

We had CEOs flying over from other countries to come study my team and what we were doing and, and it was a hundred percent Pat because going back to that conversation that my manager had with me when I did not wanna take over our team, and he said, you will never reach your potential in life, Kelly if you do not embrace getting results through others.

And that hit me like a freight train. Changed my entire perspective on life. And so when I came into the world of entrepreneurship and I started teaching small business owners how to grow, what I kept seeing over and over again was they were learning how to design a good product or program or service.

Everyone in the world was teaching them how to sell it and market it, and then the business was just collapsing because on the back end there was no infrastructure for ongoing success. And then the entrepreneur is just backsliding because yes, they know how to market and get a couple customers, but they can’t retain them because it’s just them.

So now they’re torn between, am I selling, am I marketing, am I serving, am I the billing person today? Am I the leader? Am I the follower? Right? So I wrote the book, Pat, because I wanted to provide a resource that anyone can access for like 20 bucks, right? That can start filling in these gaps for people.

And it is a learning process, but I’ve had many, many people tell me that this book is the first and only resource that they’ve ever, ever experienced like this, that really was the difference maker for them in transitioning from being the business to building a business. And that’s the key distinction.

Pat Flynn: Yeah, that’s perfect.

And again, I, I wanted to make sure that was highlighted because it, I didn’t know that you even had that particular book about this particular topic. And then here we are. What does the dream team look like? How can a person imagine what, like before the how or the what or the even the who, like what does that dream team look?

What are those components so we can sort of imagine what that might be like?

Kelly Roach: It’s such a great question, and I wanna talk about both sides of this, right? Because people that know me and see me in the team with my market, we have a team 25, 35 full-time people at any given time, and a lot of them are visible in the market, which is very intentional because I don’t wanna be the business.

I, I want us to be a company. And they say, I could never have a big team like that. I don’t want a big team like that. I don’t have the money for a big team like that. And what they don’t realize is we didn’t have a big team like that until we were an eight figure company. So when you talk about where do you start, who do you hire?

You start by hiring one person. One person. And the way that I look at building a business, there’s front of the house and there’s back of the house, okay? So front of the house, their job is to create visibility for the brand and to acquire customers, sales and marketing, right? People gotta know about you, and then people gotta start to buy from you.

Okay? That’s the front of the house. Then the back of the house. You need to keep those customers, which means you need to serve them, you need to engage them, create community with them, and make sure they pay their bill. That’s the back of the house, right? So I always say the entrepreneurial journey is about continually narrowing into your zone of genius, figuring out who are you as the leader in your business.

Are you the face of the brand? Are you the person that loves being the operator? Are you a person that doesn’t really wanna be involved down the line, just wants to be an investor. So start by hiring one person that allows you to step back just a little bit in either the front of the house or the back of the house to narrow in just a little bit into your zone of genius. So if you are a natural born marketer, you love to sell, you love to be on camera, you wanna be out there, then keep doing that, right? And hire someone that can help you with building community, managing the clients customer service, and making sure the bills are paid. Or if you’re someone that is like, marketing is not my strength, I wanna build my business more passively. I don’t wanna be on camera all the time, that’s not my gig. Right? And it’s not a core strength. Go find someone that is gonna focus on either customer acquisition or someone that’s like really strong on the marketing side of business that can help you with either passive funnels or some of the more like low-key marketing strategies that can allow you to acquire.

And then you can work more on the backend. So I think people get really overwhelmed, Pat, with the idea of building a team because they’re looking at the whole picture of a developed company. When I just say you just start from where you are. Literally just start from where you are and take one step closer to you operating in your zone of genius with each hire that you make.

Pat Flynn: That’s really smart. I like the idea. And thank you for bringing us back to Earth, by the way, cuz I think my question came from, what are we ultimately building toward versus, well, what’s the next step? Like you brought us back there. So I appreciate that. And I think a lot of people who are looking to hire don’t think about, well, what do they want to continue to do or focus on and then find the other parts that to, to hire out to.

They, they just see somebody else like, oh, I need an integrator, so I need an integrator. Or I need a sales marketing person, but I like doing that. So should I hire somebody who can also do that? Like, I’m thinking about, for example, the, the designer who’s listening right now, and they do a lot of freelancing work, but they’re starting to take on a lot more clients and they’re starting to feel the overwhelm, feel the anxiety of just having too much to do.

And they’re just wondering, well, what, what do I hire out? And it’s not necessarily a backend or front end yet until you know where you lie in that business.

Kelly Roach: Yeah, it’s, it’s such a good point that you’re making Pat, because I think what happens is we start off as entrepreneurs with a huge vision and a very clear North star and a ton of optimism and excitement, and then once you get into business, It. It’s almost like a tornado that you get sucked into. And for most business owners, they get very reactionary in the business, right? And you’re just reacting and responding and trying to keep your head above water. So you are no longer now thinking, what’s my vision? Who do I wanna be? How do I wanna show up in the business?

What do I want my role to be? They’re just thinking like triage, right? Like 9 1 1, triage. But we all know, and Pat, you know this because you are a veteran in this field, and I know this. When you do things out of panic, urgency and overwhelm, it never works out well. Never, ever, ever. So I always say when it comes to hiring, slow down, take a breath, really go back to the drawing board of why did you get in this business?

What do you want to create? What is the vision for how you can really show up in the world and use your zone of genius and let’s go find someone that compliments that. That’s why there’s all of these assessments and all of this focus on like strengths finders, for example, in building teams, because if you build a team that is more of you, it’s always just this lopsided entity. It’s like having a flat tire in the car. Whereas if you go out and you’re strategically adding people one by one to your company, that brings something that is not your strength or that you’re not, you know, good at, or that you don’t want to be good at. You’re constantly rebalancing and enhancing the strength of the business to be able to have four tires on the car, and that’s what allows you to create speed and momentum and velocity and ultimately scale. Right?

Pat Flynn: Can you help the person who is now convinced that, and they probably already knew this, but that they had to hire somebody and you’re giving them permission to hire small, start small, find one, but then those, those voices start to come in that say things like, oh my gosh. Like now I am now responsible for another person’s livelihood.

The food that’s on their table and the house that they live in is now my responsibility. I know I felt that weight when I first started, which is in fact why I avoided having people come on full-time. I always hired out and had contractors, and thankfully they were all under one house. It was Matt’s company Winning Edits, so that made the sort of communication a little bit easier.

But then in 2018, I just acquired this whole company and everybody came in because I finally got smart about it. But like to the person who’s just in the beginning, who’s looking to hire, who’s, who’s never done that before, and it’s like, wow, that’s, it feels safe to have it be a contractor still. And there’s that push and pull. Can you speak to that?

Kelly Roach: I totally agree. And I remember the night that I hired my first hire full-time. I did not sleep. I was sweating. I was so nervous. I was up all night the night before because I felt exactly everything that you described, Pat. But here’s what I realized. Unless you have a child that’s a minor, okay, you are responsible for their life and if you are an adult, you are responsible for your life. Besides that, when you bring someone into your environment, your responsibility is to create an environment in which someone can be successful. And to create an environment in which someone is able to contribute to the profitability of your business in a meaningful way that is gonna afford them an opportunity to stay.

You can’t do it for them. You can’t ensure it for them. You have to invite them to be a responsible co-creator in the success and profitability that allows you to keep them there. And oh, by the way, if you don’t do those things, guess what you’re gonna have to do to a contractor. You’re gonna have to cut ’em, right?

So people don’t feel bad cutting a contractor when it has the same net effect for that person. Okay? As hiring and then firing an employee, we need to change our mentality around it, because I felt literally the exact same way as you, Pat, and I, I write about it in the book and I talk about what are your responsibilities as the employer.

And what are their responsibilities as the employee? Your responsibility as the employer is to create and cultivate an environment in which people can thrive. Having a clear focus, having a definitive North Star, having an ability to say “This is where we’re going and I’m gonna lead the organization there.” Right? And do it in a way that people can follow along and they can contribute and participate. And to set people’s responsibilities up in such a way that they can contribute in a meaningful and profitable way. Their responsibility is to show up and deliver. Right? You can’t do it for them. So it doesn’t matter if you’re a big business or you’re a little business.

Look at Meta who just laid off 11,000 people last week. Okay? All of these big corporations are laying people off. And guess what? A lot of them did not set people up for success cuz I guarantee a lot of those 11,000 people that just got laid off, they were 18 layers away from doing anything that impacted the profitability of that company.

So when they got terminated, was it their fault? Nope. They probably were so many layers away from doing anything that meant anything that they were collateral damage. You as a small business owner, however, are agile enough, you’re small enough that you can be hands-on with your people and you can cultivate meaningful roles for them that allow them to contribute and be a part of the continuity of profit and the growth of your company.

So they inherently, in the way that you’re designing the role, should be contributing to not only covering their salary, but bringing in profit above and beyond.

Pat Flynn: That is a great answer, Kelly. Thank you.

Kelly Roach: Sorry if it was a lot.

Pat Flynn: No, that was the gem. No, it’s, it’s in the mind there.

Kelly Roach: There’s so much mindset around this, Pat, and it’s why I am, I’m so committed to this topic because there’s an inextricable link between freedom and team, and I don’t think people understand it.

And so I’m really trying to share with people like this is the path and it’s not an easy button. It’s not an easy button. That’s why when you ask me like, how hard is it gonna be? Like, what’s this gonna be like? I’m like, you’re gonna fail. It’s gonna waste money. It’s gonna be all the same things that any new marketing strategy that you try is, think about when you start with ads.

So many people jump in and out of the ads game and they say, I tried ads. They didn’t work. And you’re like, oh, you tried ads and they didn’t work. How long did you try ads for? I tried ads for two months and they didn’t work, and you’re like, oh, okay. Right? And you know that there’s a learning phase, right? That AI has to learn, the technology has to learn, you have to build an audience, all of those things.

Anything that’s worth anything is going to take time and repetition and optimization to really make it count. And building a team is exactly the same way.

Pat Flynn: Amen to that. I have a few more questions with relation to team. Let’s, let’s fast forward to the person who is looking to find somebody. Yes. Do you have any recommendations for, I mean, this is gonna be the most common question, where do I even begin to to find people? Like where do I go?

Kelly Roach: The best place to find the most qualified hires is going to be with promoted posts on LinkedIn. I’ve used Monster, I’ve used Career Builder, I’ve used Craigslist, I’ve used everything. And I’m talking about on large scale over many years.

LinkedIn is the best place. You’re gonna get, the highest caliber candidates. You’re gonna get the most serious candidates. You’re gonna get the best reach. That is definitely the place to start. It is worth paying to promote. It’s not expensive. But what I would say, going hand in hand with that, Pat, is I see that a lot of business owners, when they’re going to create an ad for who they wanna hire, they’re like very like bullet pointing out all the things like they need to have this and they need to have that, and they’re listing out all the tasks. And we all know that at the end of the day, when you’re talking about bringing people into your family, which your business is essentially your family, it’s so much more about culture, values, experience, connection, vision, passion and purpose.

So what I would guide against is giving a two page bullet point list of all the tasks you want someone to do, and instead describe the kind of person that is going to thrive and the kinds of things that you would like them to impact and what it’s like to be a part of this beautiful you know, business that you’re building, and then maybe down below, of course, you know, list out some of the tasks that are aligned with that.

But you wanna attract people that think in terms of vision and career, not tasks and checking boxes. And so if you promote your job that way, you’re gonna get those types of people, if that makes sense.

Pat Flynn: Yeah, it does. That’s a great starting point. Thank you. And I’m sure we could go deeper into the science of hiring. The interview process and all that kind of stuff, which I’m sure is outlined in the book that you have. But I wanna, let’s say you now hired that person, and in my experience personally and in helping a lot of my students, it’s a very difficult thing to now let go of some of the stuff that you once used to do.

You either feel that only you could do those things and or you start micromanaging people because of that, or you just feel like, well I don’t think that person can do that, so I’m just gonna do it myself cuz nobody else can do it like that. So like, there’s a again, mindset. Can you help us in our minds, wrap our heads around letting other people do things? And like letting them do those things.

Kelly Roach: It’s one of the most important points, and I wanna talk about both sides of the pendulum with that and, and it’s both mindset, right? There’s either people that delegate way too fast and way too aggressively, and they have the boomerang effect where they just hand it off to people, they take it, they create a big old mess, it ends up back on their plate. They didn’t actually set the person up for success and give them a clear enough roadmap to be successful doing it the way they wanted it done, and then it’s a disaster. So let’s not do that.

And then on the flip side, we have the people that say that they want help. They hire help, they spend lots of money to get help, and then they’re not willing to relinquish control. And the big message that I would share to everybody on that piece is, your way is not the only way. I know it hurts.

Pat Flynn: That hits really hard.

Kelly Roach: This was so hard for me to learn. You are so used to carrying the burden yourself and having an intuitive clarity on exactly what you want done and how you want it done.

That when you start bringing someone with a different lens of life, different experience, different knowledge, different, you know, work history than you, and they come in and you tell them that you want something done, they’re going to do it differently than you would. And our fear kicks in immediately and panics us into thinking and to responding, like, that’s not right. That’s not how we want it done. That’s not what I said I wanted you to do. Right? And there’s this huge distinction between something that is done well or done poorly versus something that is done your way or done an alternative way that’s equally as effective. And those are two very, very different things, and they always say, you can either have control or you can have growth, right?

Your job is to set people up with enough clarity around why you want this done. What is important to you that it be done in a specific way and then allow someone the autonomy and freedom to bring their knowledge and expertise. And I wanna add one more thing to that, that’s really important, Pat, because I hear feedback from entrepreneurs every day of the week that they’re frustrated that no one on their team thinks for themselves.

Most of the time, if you are experiencing that, no one thinks for themselves on your team, it’s because you created an environment in which they don’t feel that they have the autonomy to think for themselves. So they’re always deflecting and they’re always defaulting to you because when they don’t do it your way, you’re gonna reject it and make them do it over again.

So people are smart enough to say, I put my hand on the unit and it got burnt. I put my hand on the unit, it got burnt. The third time they’re not putting their hand on the unit to get it burnt. They’re just not gonna think for themselves. And they’re gonna wait for you to spell out exactly how you want it, play by play, exactly how you vision it.

And at the end of the day, if you want really high performers, those high performers expect and require trust and autonomy. And there’s a difference between trust and autonomy, right, and abdicating power, they are two very different things. You have to keep your hands on the steering wheel. It’s your business and the buck stops with you.

So there has to be a level of control. But if you want high performers that add something to your business, you have to give autonomy. So I know that was a long answer.

Pat Flynn: No, it’s a great answer too. And it’s something that we have been practicing in our business for a while with our directors. The directors are the commanders of the ship.

And as long as the ship goes to where we need to go, like however commander you choose to get there in the way that you know how to do it best, do it. As long as we get here all together at the end, like that’s fine. And that’s why it’s really important that we have, and I’m sure you have this too, and you talk about this in your book, everybody on the same page, like, we know what our goals are and our goals aren’t the tasks.

Yes. Our goals are the transformation for our audience in our, in our case. And so, now we have people at all levels coming up with ideas. Ideas that we wouldn’t have thought of ourselves. And that’s the beauty of this cuz now the second part of this is they have the autonomy to figure it out on their own, but when they figure it out on their own, they own that.

They feel a responsibility for that idea now, and they’re gonna be more likely to do it. In fact, we have to struggle to say like, Hey, You’re working too much on this now because you love it so much. Like can you like slow down a little bit? Which is the opposite. It’s a good problem to have, but like our team works so hard cuz they care so much and I love them so much.

Super good. The last question I wanna ask, cuz again, we can go on, get the book everybody, we’ll have links in the show notes and everything. But the last thing is, and this is really important, it’s one thing to hire a person and they might be the perfect hire, but how do we keep them, how do we make them happy?

How do we get them excited about the work that they’re doing?

Kelly Roach: It’s such a great question and there’s a whole chapter in the book on this as well, and it’s something that small business owners don’t think about because they say to themselves, I’m just trying to like get to the next day. I’m trying to get to the next month.

I’m trying to get to the next goal. If you wanna bring in all star players to your organization, you have to have vision and foresight. And what I mean by that is, let’s say you’re going out and you’re hiring a marketing manager for the first time, and this is gonna be the first hire in your company for marketing.

Well, you need to sit there and think to yourselves. , what is the goal and objective that this person is being measured against? How do I know if this role is successful in my company and how do I know if the goals are being met? And when that person comes in, you better believe if it’s the right person, that the first question that they’re gonna have is, What are my goals and what do I need to do to take the next step in my career with your company?

And most small business owners do not sit down and think about career progression for their people. Creating an environment of growth, setting up a long-term plan so that people are feeling challenged, and inspired and stretched in a positive way. And so, to answer your question, Pat, in retaining great people, obviously culture is the number one thing, right?

Culture is everything. Culture override every other thing they say, people leave managers, they don’t leave companies. We all know that. Right? But beyond that, if you want people to stay long term and grow with you, There has to be a path for them to stay long-term and grow with you. And a lot of small business owners are really hesitant to do that cuz they’re like, Kelly, I don’t know, how do I know that I’m gonna be able to hire a vp? Or how do I know I’m ever gonna have that role? You don’t need to sign in blood that this is what this person’s next step is gonna be on this date at this time with this specific. But what you do need to sit and have the foresight to do this is what being a visionary leader is all about, is to say, if this goes well, what’s my next step?

And that next step is no longer you taking a next step, it’s how does this person’s role now split and what is this person going to then elevate into? And who is the person that will hire next to compliment this person? And it’s not committing to something that you don’t know in advance, but it’s having a vision of a path to progress. And it’s being able to show this person that’s putting their trust of their career and their life in your hands, that you’re a person that has foresight for them and not just for you and for the business. And I think that’s a big miss in small businesses. They have the foresight for themselves, what they want, what the business wants, but they don’t have the foresight for their people.

And you have to have the foresight for your people. Otherwise they’re gonna go find someone else that does.

Pat Flynn: And then together you can both work toward those goals now, knowing that that’s the direction that you want to go and and them the same way. So, exactly. Kelly, this has been a goldmine of information. I think this may be, and I know I’ve said this before, everybody, but it’s like, I always say like, this is the most valuable episode, but like this is one of the most valuable episodes of the podcast.

Thanks to Kelly here. Kelly, one more time. Where can people, A, go get your book. Name of it again and where, where to get it. And B, where can they go and, and follow along with you and, and your services and what you have to offer?

Kelly Roach: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much, pat. So it’s called Bigger Than You: The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Building an Unstoppable Dream Team and you can get it right on Amazon.

That’s the easiest way. Click one pay, boom, you’re done. Be at your house tomorrow. So grab Bigger Than You. Of course you can get a copy on my website as well. And then the best place, if you just wanna like learn along with me and be a part of my community go tune into Kelly Roach Show. My episodes are 20 minutes or less.

I have amazing people like Pat coming on the show. I do a lot of solo teaching on the show, so just check out the Kelly Roach Show.

Pat Flynn: Thank you so much, Kelly. We appreciate you and this is gonna be life changing for a lot of people, so thank you.

Kelly Roach: Thank you. I loved every second.

Pat Flynn: All right. I hope you enjoyed that interview with Kelly.

Kelly brought the goods today. Thank you so much, Kelly. I appreciate you and again, thank you for having me and Matt on your show to talk All Access Pass. I know a lot of you listening right now know that we just launched that. It went massively, massively well. The episode on Kelly’s show, the Kelly Roach Show, is not yet available at the beginning of the year here.

That’ll come out a little bit later, probably next month. So look out for that. Be sure to subscribe to her show so you can catch me on that podcast and definitely check out her book as well for hiring. If you are here, then that means that hiring is of interest to you. Bigger Than You is the name of the book, and we’ll put all the links on the show notes.

SmartPassiveIncome.com/session645. Again, SmartPassiveIncome.com/session645. Kelly, thank you so much. Thank you for listening all the way through, and best of luck to you and your first and next hire on your way toward a dream team to help support you. I’m grateful for you and I look forward to serving you in the next episode.

Cheers, peace out. And, as always, Team Flynn for the win. Have a good one.

Thanks for listening to the Smart Passive Income Podcast at SmartPassiveIncome.com. I’m your host, Pat Flynn. Our senior producer is David Grabowski. Our series producer is Paul Grigoras, and our executive producer is Matt Gartland. Sound editing by Duncan Brown. The Smart Passive Income Podcast is a production of SPI Media. We’ll catch you in the next session.