Bottleneck Breakthrough Step 3: Passenger Seat

This is the Momentum podcast. As entrepreneurs, one of the most challenging things we do in running a business is start growing the business, start expanding and hire a team, get help around us. Yeah, as we add more help, as we add more team, as we get more resources, we still feel like we're the biggest bottleneck. And you know, if you've ever been in this situation, you know what that feels like. If you feel like you're holding everybody back, you feel like you are slowing things down. You feel like if you could just stop being the biggest bottleneck, the business could really, really grow. And I want you to know something. You're probably right if that's how you're feeling. And so this video is all about the third step of releasing the bottleneck. So step one, what was it? Step one is to look at the business, examine what's going on and make sure that you have a strategic plan that your team understands so they can get out in front of you. So the team has a roadmap so the team knows where you're going, so the team has clarity. Now step two is to do the same thing, examine the business and look at everything and make certain that you have a system through which everyone is getting communicated in that plan. And everyone in the team understands that. And you, as the CEO, are showing up in a consistent way that the team can trust. Now, step three to getting out of the meeting the biggest bottleneck. Now this is going to sound obvious. I'm not trying to make jokes and this is actually real. If you want to say I'm being the biggest bottleneck in your business, you have, I'm doing everything. I'm Alex Charfen, and this is the Momentum podcast made for empire builders, game changers, trailblazers, shot takers, record breakers, world makers and creators of all kinds, those among us who can't turn it off and don't know why anyone would want to. We challenge complacency, destroy apathy, and we are obsessed with creating momentum so we can roll over bureaucracy and make our greatest contribution. Sure, we pay attention to their rules, but only so that we can bend them, break them, then rewrite them around our own will. We don't accept our destiny. We define it. We don't understand defeat because you only lose if you stop and we don't know how. While the rest of the world strives for average and clings desperately to the status quo, we are the minority. The few who are willing to hallucinate there could be a better future. And instead of just daydreaming of what could be, we endure the vulnerability and exposure it takes to make it real. We are the evolutionary hunters, clearly the most important people in the world because entrepreneurs are the only source of consistent, positive human evolution and we always will be. Let me let you all off the hook, if you know, I talk all week, I talk to people who are entrepreneurs who have grown in business. They're grown. I just talked to one yesterday, incredible guy. And he's grown his business. He's expanding the business now. He's gotten to the point where he has some help on his team. He has some people that are supporting him, but he is still working 60 hours a week. And here's what happens to us as entrepreneurs. If we continue to do everything in our business, we will always be the biggest bottleneck. But here's why we do it. This is why I want to let you off the hook. Every one of us as entrepreneurs has gone through this scenario in your lives. Like if you have gone through this, do me a favor and blow in the comments you say been there or I totally hear you or I've been that person because here's I've been through it. I've watched that movie is another good thing you can say below, because here's here's what I mean by we've all been through this as entrepreneurs. We have every single one of us has had a time in our lives where we see a light at the end of the tunnel, we see a destination, we see something that we can do put out there to make happen and help the world around us. And the people around us are saying, Hey, that light at the end of the tunnel is a train. You're not old enough, you're not young enough. You're not strong enough. You're not small enough, you're not big enough. You're not tall enough. You know, short enough, you don't have the right resources, you don't have time, you don't have the right experience, you don't have the right energy, you don't have whatever it is. And as entrepreneurs, we have compelled ourselves towards that light at the end of the tunnel. We compelled it towards us. We've stepped through that light and that is where we become who we are. And here's why I bring this up. Because as entrepreneurs, we're used to taking on a lot to putting up with things that most people won't take doing things that most people don't think we can. We associate really tough times of working really hard with growing our business. We associate doing everything with business growth because in order to successfully start a business, let's get real. We all had to do everything so successfully starting a business conditions us to do everything. So if you want to stop being the biggest bottleneck in your business, let your team step up and help you and make things happen and grow the business without doing it all yourself. We want you to slide into the passenger seat in your business. Now, this might sound passive being in the passenger seat. This might sound like you're no longer in control. This might sound like you're no longer making the business grow. But let me define what I mean here. See, driving on a road trip is actually a tactical activity. The strategy of where you're going, where are you going to stop, where you're going to stay? What are you going to do on that road trip? That is the strategy. But if you can focus on those things and not have to actually drive, that's when you'll really enjoy a road trip. That's when you can be really strategic. That's when you can drop the tactics and be totally strategic. So now let's drop the analogy. What does it mean to be in the passenger seat in your business? It means that you are running the business from a place of helping make decisions. You are running the business from a place of strategic and strategic thinking. You're running the business from a fifty thousand foot level and you're letting someone else or your team do all of the driving. And here's what I mean by driving. When we're in the passenger seat, we're no longer setting up the calendar for the business. We're no longer doing everything. We're no longer trying to achieve everything because I actually made some notes here because as entrepreneurs, everything we do in a company actually creates a liability for our team because we might stop doing it one day. And so I used to tell people, you know, every time you say you're going to step up and do it, you're telling your team they're not. And so the more that we can get you out of the tactics, the faster you can actually predictably and strategically grow your business. In fact, I always tell entrepreneurs, if your days are getting tactically harder, you're building a house of cards. Now, at the beginning, yes, during the business growth, you're going to have some days to get tactically harder. But once you start building the team, if your days are getting tactically harder, you're building a house of cards. If there's more and more for you to do every day, if each day becomes more overwhelming, if there's more for you to accomplish, you're building a house of cards. Here's why. If your workload is going up as you grow a team and as you get leverage, that means you're becoming more of a liability. And let's get real. You are firmly planting yourself in that place of being the biggest bottleneck in the business. And so the more you do, the more you're a liability, the more you step up, the more your team can't because you're doing it yourself. And so how do we do this? Well, it was in the first two videos combined with this one. First, we create a strategic plan that we have confidence and we're excited about. We feel like, Hey, if this got done, I know my business would move forward and I know things would really shift. Second, we communicated to our team in a consistent way and then we where we show up consistently, where we build trust, where we where we build confidence for our team. They get more and more excited about what they're doing. And then once we have the plan and the communication and the consistency, we step out of the way. And as entrepreneurs, we start methodically and systematically offloading what we do well in the business, creating process and structure, routine and policies around what we do in the business. And your team steps up and helps you do this. See, the more that you move into the passenger seat in the business, the more you stop trying to control everything. The more that you give responsibility to the people around you, the more you prevent yourself. In fact, the more you build a moat of. Around you becoming the biggest bottleneck in the business, but this requires a change of thinking, is a change of thinking, and I was saying earlier, you know, June when we started this successfully starting a business requires us to do everything and then we associate success with doing everything. So we need to start letting go. When you start letting our team do the things, we need to start having someone else do the tactical driving while we actually grow. And here's how we do this with our members. Here's how we will show you how to do this. We look at every entrepreneur as needing an operator. This is the execution person in the business. This is a person who takes care of all the details. Who handles all the operations. Who handles. What are we doing? A policy? A product? How are we delegating something? We only get into a policy, to a project, to a process, to a person. And once you have an operator in your business, that person can run, the calendar, can run the meetings, can can do. All the tactical things that require a business within a business requires to grow so that you can just do the strategy and you can have more time to yourself, more time for your family, more time to think of where the business is going next. As entrepreneurs, we should always be creating space for what's coming next. We should always be opening up our calendars for the stuff that's coming next. We should always have time available for what's going to eventually happen in our business. And so the more you're willing to step into the passenger seat and let that operator drive, the faster your business will grow. Now, if this feels ambiguous, if it feels confusing, if you're thinking, what does he even mean by this? Well, set up a call with a member of my team. Let us show you go to go to simple operations dot com. The website is up and running. It's very simple, but you can go to simple operations dot com, fill out a quick survey and then set up a call with a member of my team. And let us show you how not only to step into the passenger seat, but how we will actually train your operator for you. Let us show you how we will train your team for you so that they can support you so your operating team can support you in growing the business the way you really want to. And we would love to have the opportunity to talk to you about it because here's what happens when you, as the entrepreneur, stop doing everything and create space for your team, flight into the passenger seat and truly transfer responsibility to the people around you. That's when your business can truly start growing and you step out of transactional management, which is telling people what to do, check into the got done and telling them what to do again, which is how 90 plus percent of the businesses in the world are run unsuccessfully. Why we have such a huge failure rate in business, and you can transition to transformational leadership where you give people clear outcomes. That's the strategic plan. That's that's having a clear roadmap. Then you coach their success along the way, which is talking to your team, supporting your team, not doing everything for your team. And you'll get leverage results because when your team has a plan and you're coaching them, you're going to be successful, you're guiding them along the way and you will get the results you want in your business. And when I say leverage results, that means you're getting results without doing everything yourself. So if this sounds like something you want and it sounds like something, even if it sounds a little unbelievable or like, it just could never happen for you or you think everybody else might be able to do this and you can't? Well, then here's what I would love for you to do. Go to simple operations dot. Answer a few questions for my team. Set up a call with us and let us show you how we help entrepreneurs and a ton of different industries around the world. Step out of doing everything in their business. Get a clear roadmap for their team, communicate it with confidence and get into the passenger seat where you're growing your business from a strategic place, not from a place of doing all the tactics. And your days will start getting tactically harder and you will build a concrete, solid foundation under your business growth. Go to Simple Operations dot com. We look forward to talking to you soon, and thanks for being here.