“Be a lifelong learner.” — Ken Keller, CEO of Strategic Advisory Boards, a Southern California-based leadership advisory firm. In this episode, Ken offers his expertise on how to best prepare for your ripcord moment from the perspective of a consultant and coach who works regularly with business owners and CEOs on the challenges of growth, leadership, employee engagement, and increasing profitability.
Ken discusses how he coaches his business owner clients who are looking to sell their business in the near future. This includes always working on and refining the business model, ensuring you have the right management team in place, and staying focused on growth, as a buyer will want to see a continuous track record of growth.
He talks about the importance of creating alignment throughout your organization so that employees can truly buy into your vision for the company. He also stresses the importance of keeping employees in the loop by sharing goals and strategies so that everyone can contribute. He feels that this is especially important today given that only 34% of the workforce is currently actively engaged in their organization.
Ken dives into the significance of owners creating incentives for departments and roles outside of sales. Though few companies currently do this, he feels that implementing this revenue-sharing structure into your business will create an atmosphere where all employees will be more motivated to actively contribute to the results of the company.
He walks us through a typical strategic advisory board meeting, describing it as a monthly four-hour retreat where you get to take yourself away from your desk, work ON your business not IN it, share ideas, learn new ideas, and open up to a group of peers.
Ken discusses a challenge that many business owners face as they are transitioning their business, and it is the concept of letting go. He believes that there is a way for a business owner to retain some involvement and level of control over contracts, purchases, etc., without having to be involved in the day-to-day operations of the business.
Lastly, he shares two action items for owners:
1. Be committed to being a lifelong learner to better prepare yourself for your future and to set an example for your employees that work is about more than just coming in and punching a clock.
2. Making an exit and selling your business requires a lot of teamwork and a good amount of time for preparation. Start with evaluating your current team, addressing underperformers and unengaged employees, and getting everyone on the same page before even thinking about an exit.
Disclosure: Information presented herein is for discussion and illustrative purposes only. The views and opinions expressed by the speakers are as of the date of the recording and are subject to change. These views are not intended as a recommendation to buy or sell any securities, and should not be relied on as financial, tax or legal advice. You should consult with your attorney, finance professional or accountant before implementing any transactions and/or strategies concerning your finances.
“Be a lifelong learner.” — Ken Keller, CEO of Strategic Advisory Boards, a Southern California-based leadership advisory firm. In this episode, Ken offers his expertise on how to best prepare for your ripcord moment from the perspective of a consultant and coach who works regularly with business owners and CEOs on the challenges of growth, leadership, employee engagement, and increasing profitability.
Ken discusses how he coaches his business owner clients who are looking to sell their business in the near future. This includes always working on and refining the business model, ensuring you have the right management team in place, and staying focused on growth, as a buyer will want to see a continuous track record of growth.
He talks about the importance of creating alignment throughout your organization so that employees can truly buy into your vision for the company. He also stresses the importance of keeping employees in the loop by sharing goals and strategies so that everyone can contribute. He feels that this is especially important today given that only 34% of the workforce is currently actively engaged in their organization.
Ken dives into the significance of owners creating incentives for departments and roles outside of sales. Though few companies currently do this, he feels that implementing this revenue-sharing structure into your business will create an atmosphere where all employees will be more motivated to actively contribute to the results of the company.
He walks us through a typical strategic advisory board meeting, describing it as a monthly four-hour retreat where you get to take yourself away from your desk, work ON your business not IN it, share ideas, learn new ideas, and open up to a group of peers.
Ken discusses a challenge that many business owners face as they are transitioning their business, and it is the concept of letting go. He believes that there is a way for a business owner to retain some involvement and level of control over contracts, purchases, etc., without having to be involved in the day-to-day operations of the business.
Lastly, he shares two action items for owners:
1. Be committed to being a lifelong learner to better prepare yourself for your future and to set an example for your employees that work is about more than just coming in and punching a clock.
2. Making an exit and selling your business requires a lot of teamwork and a good amount of time for preparation. Start with evaluating your current team, addressing underperformers and unengaged employees, and getting everyone on the same page before even thinking about an exit.
Disclosure: Information presented herein is for discussion and illustrative purposes only. The views and opinions expressed by the speakers are as of the date of the recording and are subject to change. These views are not intended as a recommendation to buy or sell any securities, and should not be relied on as financial, tax or legal advice. You should consult with your attorney, finance professional or accountant before implementing any transactions and/or strategies concerning your finances.
00:00:00:22 - 00:00:31:29
Joe Seetoo
Welcome to The Ripcord Moment. I'm your host, Joe Seetoo. Today we're joined by Ken Keller, the owner and CEO of Strategic Advisory Boards, where he acts as a consultant and coach generally to clients that have revenues of $5 million, to upwards of $250 million. His clients range from having 20 employees all the way up to maybe 1500 employees. And Ken acts as a strategic advisor in helping the leadership team and the CEOs with the challenges of growth, leadership, employee engagement, and increasing profitability
00:00:31:29 - 00:00:34:29
Joe Seetoo
for these companies. Ken, I'm really excited for our discussion today.
00:00:35:24 - 00:00:37:15
Ken Keller
Thank you, Joe. I'm delighted to be here.
00:00:38:03 - 00:00:59:09
Joe Seetoo
So let's start really with, you know, the concept of the strategic advisory boards, and when you're working with owners who are thinking about some level of a succession event, what are the things that you typically start with in terms of getting them on a path of increasing enterprise value, and where they should really focus their energies and time?
00:00:59:18 - 00:01:27:15
Ken Keller
Let me start by saying "the ripcord moment" is the end of a lot of hard work that takes place, usually over a period of years. So I want to talk about the proper folding of the parachute and the training of jumping from the plane and all those good things. Not exactly the ripcord moment, but if you don't lead up to that, then your parachute won't open.
00:01:27:18 - 00:01:28:26
Joe Seetoo
You're 100% right.
00:01:29:03 - 00:01:54:06
Ken Keller
And you'll be in a lot of trouble. So what do I counsel my clients, my CEO, my business owner clients to do? Three things: first thing is they always need to be working on improving their business model, tightening it up, getting revenue in faster, growing revenue, cutting costs, making it easier for their customers and target customers to do business with them.
00:01:54:25 - 00:02:17:01
Ken Keller
And that's a lot of tweaking, so that's the first thing, work on the business model. Second thing, you have to have the right management team in place. One bad manager is like one bad apple in the barrel. You've got to make sure you've got not only the right people, but they're in the right place doing the right things. Only the owner or CEO can do that.
00:02:17:25 - 00:02:49:24
Ken Keller
And then the third thing is, the owner has to stay focused on growing the company through all the distractions of getting ready for their ripcord moment because every buyer wants to see a track record of growth. So that would be a growth of revenue, maybe growth of client base, maybe growth of product line offering, an average transaction sale. All the things need to be working and working well leading up to the ripcord moment.
00:02:50:00 - 00:03:17:06
Joe Seetoo
So let's actually dig on that last one because I think this is a concept that I hear constantly even with our own business. I see it with friends, with colleagues, with clients who run businesses, and that is this challenge of putting out today's firefights, dealing with sort of working in the business versus working on the business. What are some very specific tools maybe that you utilize or coach your clients in doing to keep them focused at that high strategic level?
00:03:17:28 - 00:03:24:22
Ken Keller
Well, Joe, it's a great question. It's often very difficult to get owners out of the weeds.
00:03:24:28 - 00:03:25:08
Joe Seetoo
Yeah.
00:03:25:22 - 00:03:45:10
Ken Keller
They walk around the business, they see something, they say something, they avoid all the layers of management that they put into place. So getting the owner out of the weeds is the hardest thing. The owner needs to be thinking about the next year, two years, three years, five years. And not today.
00:03:45:18 - 00:03:47:15
Joe Seetoo
Really being that visionary. Right.
00:03:47:18 - 00:04:15:07
Ken Keller
Has to be visionary. And what happens is they don't have strong managers and they don't trust the managers, so they walk around and they see things and they jump right in and get involved So what I tried to do is just ask a simple question. What's one thing you need to be doing today that will have a great impact next week?
00:04:16:12 - 00:04:26:09
Ken Keller
And all I got to do is get them thinking about next week, and then they lift their eyes up off the floor and look out.
00:04:26:10 - 00:04:27:22
Joe Seetoo
Out on the horizon.
00:04:28:00 - 00:04:35:21
Ken Keller
Even if the horizon is only a week. Now, I'd love for it to be next year. But I know that that is not always possible.
00:04:36:09 - 00:04:58:01
Joe Seetoo
So then you mentioned a word in there a few minutes ago that I want to pick up on that I think is critical in terms of creating alignment, and we're talking about trust, right? And without trust, you can't have ultimately alignment and buy into the vision. And so in your experience, so what are the critical things the owners and your clients need to be doing to create that alignment?
00:05:00:07 - 00:05:31:09
Ken Keller
OK. The first thing is the goals of the company have to be shared. So oftentimes owners have goals, they keep them secret. Now, the goal, if I'm going to sell the company, obviously I'm going to keep that secret, right. But where we're going, what our goals are this month, this quarter, this half year, this year, what our strategies are to grow, then how the employee, even at the lowest level, can contribute to that.
00:05:31:15 - 00:05:33:08
Ken Keller
Now, just let me give you a quick example.
00:05:33:09 - 00:05:33:26
Joe Seetoo
Yeah, please.
00:05:34:29 - 00:05:45:29
Ken Keller
Many moons ago in high school, I worked at McDonald's for a year, and they beat into us, you need to ask, would you like fries with that?
00:05:46:06 - 00:05:46:20
Joe Seetoo
00:05:47:06 - 00:06:06:18
Ken Keller
Now, what were they trying to do? What they were trying to do is they were trying to get an incremental sale on every customer that walked through the door. And that's why they wanted the frontline employees asking that question. We laugh about it now when we see somebody say, that kid doesn't have much of a future, he better learn to ask,
00:06:06:18 - 00:06:13:05
Ken Keller
you want fries with that? Well, it is a business strategy to grow top line revenue.
00:06:13:18 - 00:06:35:11
Joe Seetoo
Well, to that point, I mean, so it sounds like you're saying not only sharing the vision at a high level, then specific goals to get them there, but then also the why behind why we're operating this way. Giving the managers and the employees that level of buy in or sort of explanation, it's going to help create the alignment, hopefully.
00:06:35:21 - 00:06:47:00
Ken Keller
Yes. Well, Joe, last night I checked with the Gallup poll and the Gallup organization has been running a lot of surveys on the engagement levels of the workforce.
00:06:47:12 - 00:06:47:22
Joe Seetoo
Okay.
00:06:48:16 - 00:07:09:03
Ken Keller
The latest numbers are that 34% of the workforce is actively engaged. These are loyal, productive, hard working people. 16% are actively disengaged, meaning they are internal terrorists to the business.
00:07:09:04 - 00:07:10:10
Joe Seetoo
I've never heard of that term.
00:07:10:24 - 00:07:14:29
Ken Keller
OK, well, every company's got one, at least one, some have many.
00:07:15:06 - 00:07:20:11
Joe Seetoo
So this sounds incredibly toxic to the culture by the way, we'll come back to that. But let me let you finish with your statistics.
00:07:20:20 - 00:07:43:12
Ken Keller
It is. And then 50% are disengaged. What is disengaged? Clock watchers. You've heard in the races, Indy 500, gentlemen and ladies start your engines. This is the disengaged person at 4:30, they're already ramping down to walk out the door at 5:00.
00:07:43:13 - 00:07:43:25
Joe Seetoo
00:07:44:12 - 00:08:07:09
Ken Keller
These are the people that walk in at 8 a.m. and spend the first hour getting coffee, getting their hair right, make-up for the ladies, walking around, talking to everybody: hey, did you see that on TV last night, what are you going to be doing this weekend, oh I heard that movie was great. And then they finally sit down about 9:00 and move the papers around their desk.
00:08:07:19 - 00:08:22:21
Ken Keller
And then before you know it, it's coffee time, break time, and they go through the day of basically being ineffective employees. They are disengaged. They are only there for the paycheck or because their friends are there.
00:08:23:02 - 00:08:23:14
Joe Seetoo
Right.
00:08:23:23 - 00:08:48:08
Ken Keller
So let me go back to the numbers, in any company, you got 34% of the employees pulling the weight. The challenge to the CEO is getting people engaged. How do you do that? You start by getting rid of the internal terrorists and you start working on the disengaged to move them into being actively engaged.
00:08:48:14 - 00:08:54:12
Joe Seetoo
Well, it sounds like what you're talking about is really building culture, strong culture within the organization.
00:08:54:12 - 00:09:19:13
Ken Keller
Strong culture. Yes, a strong culture, a culture of performance, a culture of results, a culture of caring for the customer, taking care of the customer so that they say good things about you on Yelp or Glassdoor, as the case may be. Those are the kinds of things that are going to help. Now, the other thing is, let me just share this.
00:09:20:14 - 00:09:23:23
Ken Keller
Most companies give a lot of incentives to their sales teams.
00:09:24:08 - 00:09:24:16
Joe Seetoo
Okay.
00:09:24:28 - 00:09:46:03
Ken Keller
They don't give much to the warehouse, the factory, the office workers. And I think owners would be wise to figure out a way to start paying their internal people some type of incentive for doing good work and contributing to the results of the company.
00:09:46:15 - 00:10:15:04
Joe Seetoo
Yeah. I mean, I love that concept, and it's actually one we've adopted here at our own firm where our revenue, actually our bonus structure for the entire firm is based on the total revenue of the company. And everyone gets to participate, and it's a pretty revolutionary concept that our partners and our leadership team came up with within the financial service industry, because historically it's been very much sort of an eat what you kill or like you said, focused on the producers and sales.
00:10:15:17 - 00:10:44:12
Joe Seetoo
I'm going to pivot, though, real quick and sort of play devil's advocate and ask you, and I don't disagree with you in any way, shape, or form. But to your point earlier, about the notion of constantly refining the business model, on the one hand and you mentioned costs and obviously labor costs have been rising because of inflation, so how does an owner balance exactly what we just talked about a minute ago of having the right incentives in place to increase performance, but being mindful of cost?
00:10:44:12 - 00:10:51:23
Joe Seetoo
Because I would imagine you may get pushback from your existing clients around this concept because so few people probably do it.
00:10:53:03 - 00:11:15:19
Ken Keller
You're right. Very, very few companies do it. I will share with you the story quickly of one of my clients, a small, small firm. The office manager went to the owner and said, look, you know, I'd like to get a raise. I know things are kind of tight around here. Maybe we can work out something and he said, Listen, I'm open to any ideas that you have.
00:11:16:02 - 00:11:18:03
Ken Keller
That's the first thing, right? Being open to new ideas.
00:11:18:03 - 00:11:18:27
Joe Seetoo
I love that.
00:11:19:29 - 00:11:38:07
Ken Keller
The office manager came back to him and said, listen, I know that we are struggling with cash flow. Would you be willing to give me a percentage? Not a big percentage, but a percentage of all the cash that I can bring into the company. I'm not doing sales, I am doing collections.
00:11:38:10 - 00:11:38:22
Joe Seetoo
00:11:39:02 - 00:11:56:26
Ken Keller
And that's not a job that really anybody wants in any company, and he said, great, and he said, what percentage do you think would be fair? She said, well, how about if I get paid 1% up to this amount each month, over that amount, I get 2%?
00:11:57:06 - 00:11:57:20
Joe Seetoo
00:11:58:14 - 00:12:04:07
Ken Keller
He said, oh my gosh, I have an employee focused on improving my cash flow, how can I lose?
00:12:04:26 - 00:12:06:00
Joe Seetoo
How can I lose? Right.
00:12:06:06 - 00:12:26:04
Ken Keller
How can I lose? And so the other day, I had breakfast with one of my clients and I said, listen, you've got about 15 people in the office and you need to get them focused on improving. He has one revenue product line. I said, you know, you can give away 1% of what that number is each month.
00:12:27:03 - 00:12:47:18
Ken Keller
They would love you. They would kiss the floor that you walk on if you were to hand out checks at the end of the month because you achieved the goals. He said, I can do that. It's going to take me 30 days and I'm going to get this team aligned on that one revenue stream.
00:12:48:15 - 00:13:08:22
Joe Seetoo
Now, I love those concepts. That's great, sage advice, Ken. Let's talk a little bit more about you know, you create these strategic advisory boards, they function very much like a peer to peer accountability group. I want to dig into specifically what you do there, what the benefit is, and how the owners are then able to take that advice and go implement it in their companies.
00:13:10:00 - 00:13:34:26
Ken Keller
OK, let me just take you through a typical 4 hour meeting. The first part of the meeting, we spend about 10-15 minutes going around the table with quick personal updates. What's going on in your life, how's your health, how's your family, what kind of vacations you got planned? Try to get some kind of life balance there. The next thing we do is we bring in an outside speaker who talks about something that the group is interested in learning about.
00:13:35:26 - 00:13:58:02
Ken Keller
A couple of examples: one of the groups like wanted to hear about ESOPs, so I brought in a speaker on ESOPs. Another part of that followed on was valuations. They wanted to learn about valuations and how that worked. That same group is now asking me for a speaker on how do I handle account management in my company.
00:13:58:02 - 00:14:21:05
Ken Keller
I've got X number of accounts, I've got some people that are handling them. I don't think they're doing it well. What ideas can we get to improve account management? Those are just a couple of things, a couple of speakers. Then we get in to the accountability reports, everybody has to report in each month. How did we do last month, how did we do last quarter, what's the projection going forward?
00:14:22:11 - 00:14:45:18
Ken Keller
That raises a lot of questions, of course, it takes a while to get around the table. And then the last part of the meeting is what we call the round table where specific issues and challenges come up and people in the group want input from others around the table. So that's a typical 4 hour monthly meeting. I was describing it on the phone the other day to a lady who's interested in joining.
00:14:45:29 - 00:15:06:09
Ken Keller
I said, look, what if you had a monthly retreat for 4 hours where you got out of your business and worked on it and not in it and put a little distance between your desk and yourself and got some ideas, shared some things, opened up to the group. And she said, well, that sounds terrific.
00:15:06:18 - 00:15:30:04
Joe Seetoo
Well, it kind of goes back to having, we talked about very early on, right, how can you get someone working not just in the business on a day's firefights, but getting their eyes out on the horizon. And so having this retreat or a peer group where they're forced to get out of the office on a monthly basis and there is accountability, definitely helps to move them in the right direction.
00:15:30:06 - 00:15:34:24
Joe Seetoo
Share with us an example of someone who didn't pack their parachute and what some of the ramifications were.
00:15:39:18 - 00:16:05:08
Ken Keller
For many years, I wrote a column for the local newspaper. My deadline was Friday morning and it was published Sunday, in the Sunday morning paper. This went on for 20 something years. And, you know, that writing a column can be difficult and you oftentimes run out of material. But all I had to do is think about this one particular client and the words just started to flow onto paper.
00:16:05:22 - 00:16:06:03
Joe Seetoo
00:16:06:08 - 00:16:47:29
Ken Keller
So this was a family owned business, a multi-generational, growing, a growing company with an owner who liked being in a peer group and got ideas from the peer group, but was really poor at executing them. I really and truly believe he thought he was the smartest guy in the room. He was wealthy. I mean, but there were other people around the room that had more assets, more cash, etc. But the thing is, probably about 15 years ago, he got a medical report that said, you know, this number is not good.
00:16:48:14 - 00:17:07:11
Ken Keller
And that was kind of the beginning of his health problems, up to this point he'd been very healthy. So he had about 15 years to kind of get ready for exiting the business, and he just continued on as if he didn't get the medical report and he was going to live forever.
00:17:07:12 - 00:17:09:08
Joe Seetoo
In denial it sounds like.
00:17:09:25 - 00:17:27:12
Ken Keller
Well, yes, a little bit in denial, but even more importantly, Joe, I think he just decided but did not announce that my exit strategy is to be wheeled out of my office building with a white sheet over my head on a stretcher on my way to the coroner's office.
00:17:27:21 - 00:17:28:04
Joe Seetoo
00:17:28:13 - 00:17:55:01
Ken Keller
So what happened was he did pass. He was a very nice guy, a lovely guy. Everybody liked him. But the reality is that he didn't prepare. So who's impacted? All the employees were impacted. The family was impacted. The suppliers were impacted. The clients were impacted, everybody was impacted. And he had, I'm going to share this
00:17:55:01 - 00:18:09:06
Ken Keller
it's not public knowledge, and you don't know who this company is, but he had ongoing issues with the Internal Revenue Service. And when he passed, they were still in the middle of, you know, I want to say, discussing it or arguing about it or whatever.
00:18:09:23 - 00:18:10:27
Joe Seetoo
But dealing with the issues.
00:18:11:12 - 00:18:31:22
Ken Keller
Yeah, never any fun. And then all of a sudden, the designated survivor, you know, has to go through his office and find work and so it's just been, you know, when somebody passes and you know them, and you love them, and you respect them, it's hard.
00:18:31:25 - 00:18:32:12
Joe Seetoo
It's hard.
00:18:32:22 - 00:18:37:24
Ken Keller
But it's even more difficult when they leave messes behind,
00:18:38:13 - 00:18:38:23
Joe Seetoo
00:18:39:09 - 00:18:41:05
Ken Keller
for you to try to figure out and deal with.
00:18:41:07 - 00:19:02:25
Joe Seetoo
Yeah. I think, you know, I've seen it several times, which is one of the reasons it's inspired me to get more involved in redefining what a financial advisor does and working with owners pre-liquidity planning. But seeing some clients where they pass away, the founder, the owner, and the wife, you know, has to come in and they're in their seventies.
00:19:02:25 - 00:19:31:29
Joe Seetoo
The last thing they want to do is now be in charge of running a business because it wasn't structured properly for a proper transition, whether it's the next generation to employees, to a strategic buyer or whatever it might be. But that's a great pivot point to the last question, which is what are many of the challenges that owners face as they are making that transition and running up to their exit, the ripcord moment?
00:19:33:00 - 00:19:56:16
Ken Keller
Well, the first thing with the situation, this owner that I just spoke about went through, which was denial about what was going to happen to him. So that's the first thing, that's the first challenge. The other thing is letting go. And I think most business owners believe that letting go means turning the checkbook of the company over to someone that isn't themselves.
00:19:56:16 - 00:20:35:24
Ken Keller
And that's not exactly the case. The owner can still sign off on purchases and other contracts and agreements that, you know, that bind the company to future action. So the reality is that the challenge is to set up a company where the owner is not involved. What does that mean? That means having a designated COO, CEO to take over, having a strong management team, having processes in place, putting people in charge of things that you trust.
00:20:36:20 - 00:20:42:15
Ken Keller
So I hate to say it but it's basically setting up a company to run without you.
00:20:42:27 - 00:21:06:04
Joe Seetoo
Well, absolutely right, because at the end of the day, right, if the business only runs because of you, those earnings are not transferable to another buyer. Especially if you're looking at an external or even a succession plan internally, right. And so finding that fine line. But it comes back to I think one of the critical words, again, I'm going to bring it back to was this notion of trust, right.
00:21:06:04 - 00:21:24:20
Joe Seetoo
And building the right team around you that you can delegate to, seems like it is, it's obviously a very critical thing. And I want to maybe pivot to what we call the action items, right? I call it The Ripcord Moment because my belief is when those owners need to make that jump, that parachute can't fail, the ripcord
00:21:24:20 - 00:21:42:24
Joe Seetoo
has got to be in place. What are the two action items from your perspective on your years of coaching and setting up these strategic advisory boards that owners really should contemplate sooner than later to have a successful transition?
00:21:43:23 - 00:22:19:24
Ken Keller
Well, the first thing, Joe, the first action step is as the owner, I have to continue to learn and grow and develop personally and professionally. I have to be a lifelong learner and for two reasons. Number one, to make me a better owner, to make me more prepared for the future. And also to set an example to those people that work for me that you just don't come to work, put in your 8 hours or 10 hours and go home, that I don't have all the ideas for improving this business or how we could improve this business,
00:22:20:02 - 00:22:21:27
Ken Keller
and I'm relying upon you to help me.
00:22:22:08 - 00:22:25:04
Joe Seetoo
Yeah, I love that. That's sage advice. That's great.
00:22:25:14 - 00:22:54:24
Ken Keller
Yeah, I mean, I often hand out books at our meetings. I send out executive book summaries, I bring in speakers to the groups. I encourage people to go to conferences outside of their industry. For example, Cal Lutheran's got their economic forecast coming up early next week, just good stuff. You just pick, again, if you read a book or book summary or hear a speaker or whatever, you get one idea out of it,
00:22:54:24 - 00:23:07:14
Joe Seetoo
it's worth it. It's worth it, trust me. Can you share with us a book or two that you really you know, that you love that you think all owners should read? I'm sure there's dozens, but one that comes to mind.
00:23:07:23 - 00:23:10:26
Ken Keller
OK, the one that comes to mind addresses the issue of trust.
00:23:11:08 - 00:23:11:21
Joe Seetoo
00:23:12:00 - 00:23:22:05
Ken Keller
And that is called it's on the bestseller list. It's been on the bestseller list for 20 years. It's Patrick Lencioni's The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.
00:23:22:24 - 00:23:23:05
Joe Seetoo
Yes.
00:23:23:17 - 00:23:27:18
Ken Keller
Doesn't matter if it's a team of two, husband and wife or spouse,
00:23:29:22 - 00:23:35:26
Ken Keller
in a company, it's a team. And then within the company, there are teams, there are departments and so forth.
00:23:35:28 - 00:23:37:04
Joe Seetoo
Teams of teams, right.
00:23:37:13 - 00:23:43:10
Ken Keller
Teams of teams, so, Patrick Lencioni's book, it's a fable. It's a business fable.
00:23:43:20 - 00:23:47:03
Joe Seetoo
I've read it. We love it. That's a great book.
00:23:47:03 - 00:23:57:00
Ken Keller
It's a great book. And I would recommend it because it's an easy read and people can relate to the characters. So that's one book that I would recommend.
00:23:57:01 - 00:23:57:06
Joe Seetoo
00:23:57:22 - 00:24:09:02
Ken Keller
There's another book, Keith McFarland came out with a book called Bounce. It's another business fable. I read it in an afternoon.
00:24:09:11 - 00:24:09:24
Joe Seetoo
00:24:10:03 - 00:24:39:15
Ken Keller
How challenges turn into great things. Yeah, so those are two books that I recommend. The second action item is, as we've talked about, getting ready to make the jump and pulling your ripcord requires a lot of teamwork. And so I would suggest that every owner not wake up on January 1st and say this is the year I'm going to sell my business.
00:24:39:21 - 00:24:40:04
Joe Seetoo
Right.
00:24:40:12 - 00:25:10:10
Ken Keller
Know that it takes much longer than a month, two months, three months, six months, a year. It takes awhile, you've got to have your teams in place. And so you start with your current team. Are they, it's a little bit of being honest here, are they the team that I need right now? Chances are you may have an internal terrorist or two, you may have some people that are underperforming, people you need to have a one on one with.
00:25:10:10 - 00:25:31:12
Ken Keller
So that would be the first thing, then the next thing would be okay, next year, what do I need to do? Will these team members contribute enough to get me to next year, and I can have a successful year as the owner of the company? And then finally, there's that ripcord team, that parachute team, which would be outside advisors like yourself, Joe.
00:25:31:27 - 00:25:42:27
Ken Keller
They're all of that trust, estate, IT, all those things that can make the ripcord moment a genuine success.
00:25:44:12 - 00:26:07:07
Joe Seetoo
Ken, that's wonderful advice. I think those are two great action items that owners can start today. I want to thank you for your time and sharing with us what you do as strategic advisory boards, being that trusted advisor and consultant. It's been great catching up and we'll go ahead and wrap up our podcast for the day. This is Joe Seetoo signing off from The Ripcord Moment with Ken Keller and we'll see you next time.