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People Before Tech With Scott Greenberg
9 Plays1 month ago
Each of us has our own value system, influences, priorities, preferences, desires, fears, and ambitions. Understanding that this is a unique combination for everyone and respecting this is the key to attracting, retaining, and motivating talented people. This human side comes first, distinguishing one organization from the next, and then here comes technology that can create cohesion, build community, and support a healthy culture. Scott Greenberg – international speaker, business performance expert, founder of the Hourly Employee Management System, and author of The Wealthy Franchisee and Stop the Shift Show is overflowing in this installment of MustardHub Voices: Behind The Build.
About Scott:
Scott Greenberg is an international speaker, business performance expert, and founder of the Hourly Employee Management System. He’s the author of The Wealthy Franchisee and Stop the Shift Show, and a contributor to publications like Nation’s Restaurant News and Entrepreneur. Scott has delivered keynotes and training in all 50 U.S. states and around the world, with clients including McDonald’s, KFC, Allstate, Wyndham Hotels, RE/MAX, and the U.S. Air Force.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Fireside Chat
00:00:06
Speaker
Hi, everyone. Welcome to today's Fireside Chat, Mustard Hub Voices Behind the Build, where we talk with people building, backing, and running better workplaces.
Meet Scott Greenberg: Speaker and Author
00:00:18
Speaker
I'm your host, Curtis Forbes. My guest today is Scott Greenberg. Scott Greenberg is an international speaker, business performance expert, and founder of the Hourly Employee Management System.
00:00:31
Speaker
He's the author of The Wealthy Franchisee and Stop the Shift Show and a contributor to publications like Nation's Restaurant News and Entrepreneur. Scott has delivered keynotes and training in all 50 US states and around the world with clients including McDonald's, KFC, Allstate, Wyndham Hotels, Remax, and the US s Air Force.
00:00:53
Speaker
Welcome, Scott. Thanks, Curtis. I could not have said that better myself, even though I actually provided you those exact
Scott's Journey: From Cancer to Consultancy
00:01:00
Speaker
words. So nicely done. Thank you.
00:01:04
Speaker
it's ah it's It's really good to have you here. Now, ah you have been ah getting to know each other a little bit. You have a really interesting career.
00:01:15
Speaker
How do you explain what you do to to others, especially those in completely different spaces? Right. Well, it sort of depends on you know the situation and if I think that they're a prospect or someone who's just engaging me in chitchat.
00:01:31
Speaker
If it's a person sitting next to me in the airplane they not a client, then I just say I'm in insurance. um No, you know again, it really does depend on who I'm talking to and how much I want to go into it. But generally, I say I help people grow their businesses.
00:01:45
Speaker
um And sometimes I'll be more specific and I'll say I might i help people build high performance cultures of hourly employees. um Or you know I do a lot in the franchise space. So I say I help people run better franchise businesses.
00:01:57
Speaker
And then when they start to ask follow-up questions, I say my focus is on the human side of business. So I help um business leaders think, lead, and serve at a higher level. I love that. Now, I know a little bit about...
00:02:12
Speaker
what that what that journey was like. or you've You've told me a little bit about it, but for everybody who hasn't heard that, how did you get here? What did your career journey look like?
00:02:26
Speaker
I was a um graduate film student at NYU when I was diagnosed with cancer, stage two Hodgkin's disease. And so I to drop out of film school, spend a year fighting that. And at the end of that, a friend of mine was putting on a leadership conference and needed a keynote speaker and got the idea to invite me to talk about my experience and how that applied to leadership.
00:02:48
Speaker
So I did it thinking it'd be a one-off. It went pretty well. And I started getting phone calls, being invited to speak at other events ah for a fee. I'm like, are you kidding? And they've been calling for more than 30 years.
Challenges in Franchisee Management
00:03:01
Speaker
So you know my content has evolved dramatically since that first speech, which was about you know overcoming adversity. What really interests me is what each of us brings to our own circumstances.
00:03:14
Speaker
And now my focus is on business. So um anyway, so I was just doing straight out motivational speaking for a number of years. so But I found i was doing a lot of leadership content to people with more experience in management than I ever had. So to get some more experience, I kept speaking, but I invested in my first of what would be two edible arrangements franchises.
00:03:34
Speaker
So I did that while still speaking, either I'm on the road speaking or I'm at my stores and did that for 10 years as well. Starting then getting a lot of opportunities to speak and do training consulting and the franchise industry.
00:03:45
Speaker
And that led to my first book, The Wealthy Franchisee. And then I found that in that space, people really struggle with hourly employees. So the last few years I've written a book and created a whole system that's all about helping people manage their hourly workers at a higher level.
00:03:59
Speaker
So the whole thing has evolved into a lot of speaking and training, a lot of writing and consulting, just helping people be more effective with the human side of their business, which I think is the most important side.
00:04:12
Speaker
ah love that. and And you don't just talk the talk. I mean, you you lived it. You worked it. You walked the walk. You saw how the things that you teach, that you write about, that you consult about, you saw firsthand, you know, how they work.
00:04:31
Speaker
Yeah, well, like I'd like to say that i I walk the talk, but I also you know fell the fell. I mean, I made a lot of mistakes, right? And learned from those mistakes. And you know i think that's important as well. you know What I've learned as a speaker is, yeah, people enjoy hearing about people's success stories, but they really get a lot from hearing about people's mistakes and how they overcame it and what they learned you know along the way.
00:04:55
Speaker
So I've had some successes, but I've also had some very useful failures And so I try to share my you know roller coaster of a journey to help other people. what's the What's the saying? Good decisions come from experience and experience comes from bad decisions.
00:05:11
Speaker
That's yeah, absolutely true. um Well, you do some amazing things for people in the franchise space. Specifically, you brought that up. What kind of clients do you work with and and why do they come to you?
00:05:25
Speaker
A lot of franchise brands come to me because they realize they've got the system down, they know how to market, they've got a great desirable product and service, but believe that their franchise owners could benefit from a little bit of outside perspective about how they are a factor.
00:05:41
Speaker
And there's a lot of things that impact a franchise business, but nothing more than the franchisees themselves. And that's part of my messaging, that you're either an asset to your business or you're liability. you know And often it's you know you're doing a bit of both to being in different areas of the business. And so I really get a lot of satisfaction out of helping franchisees see all the areas of their business where they're in complete control.
00:06:03
Speaker
and help them see all the ways in which they could be more effective. So getting out of their own head and making decisions with courage, building a more trustworthy relationship with better communication with the franchisor, focusing on continuous improvement.
00:06:17
Speaker
Spend a lot of time these days telling them how to get more from their teams, how to do better hiring and have better retention and how to boost employee performance and how to create customer experiences that it turns customers into brand ambassadors And it makes them want to shout out from the rooftops about your business and make them want to you know come back and use you over and over again. so those are the areas where I help ah you know franchisors who bring me in to speak or do training for their franchisees.
Franchisee Success: Beyond Myths and Misunderstandings
00:06:45
Speaker
So for these organizations, I mean, tell me, what are these problems... Specifically, and I guess it so it sounds like the franchisors are typically the ones that are reaching out to you, not necessarily the individual franchisees, although the message really speaks to the entire network of business owners. What problems are you obsessed with solving for these organizations at both levels?
00:07:11
Speaker
I do have individual franchisees who reach out to me for for you know coaching, consulting, or to take you know one of my online courses. Most of what I do is the live speaking. And so, yes, it is the franchisor who is bringing me in to speak to all of their franchisees generally at their annual conference.
00:07:28
Speaker
um So, you know, i clarify that, but I forgot your question. So the question was... You're just talking specifically about the the problems that you might be really sort of obsessed with solving at both levels. Yeah.
00:07:41
Speaker
So again, I began as a motivational speaker. So all that personal growth stuff is what I just find delicious. And a franchise is such a great um ah great model to really understand human behavior because you have all these people running the same business.
00:07:57
Speaker
So there's these controllable controls. control so But then you can identify the variables. like we're If we're all selling the same thing in similar markets for the same prices, with the same opportunities and the same threats, what is it that separates the high performers from those who still aspire to be high? That's the stuff that I find really interesting.
00:08:16
Speaker
and so And franchisors come to me to discuss that with their franchisees. Because lot of franchisees, they have they buy into myths about why the top people are great. Like they think it's just about location or they're working the hardest or putting in the most hours, or maybe they're the franchisor's favorites.
00:08:34
Speaker
And like location, yeah, these things matter. But what happens all the time is someone thinks they're a terrible location. They get out of the system, they sell it cheap to another franchisee who turns it around and makes it ah you know hugely successful.
00:08:48
Speaker
So the franchisees themselves are the biggest factor along with everything else. And so franchisors will come to me saying, we care so much about our franchisees, but they don't think so. Or we've got a system that's proven, but they don't they don't think so.
00:09:02
Speaker
Or we have this new technology or these new systems, but there is resistance to embrace it. Or we understand because we work with them, been doing this for so long, you know, the marketing that needs to be done or the level of customer service that's needed to really win over your community.
00:09:18
Speaker
And so they come to me to help franchisees understand all the ways in which they still have control over their business. And because I'm not the franchisor, I'm someone on the outside, but who's been in the shoes of the franchisee, I can come in with hopefully a little bit of credibility so I can help them,
00:09:35
Speaker
ah see the bigger picture. And, and, you know, it's, it's gone well and, you know, written a book about
Training Gaps in Management
00:09:42
Speaker
that. And so I'm there to kind of help franchisees be the best versions of themselves because until they are, they'll never know how good the business can really be.
00:09:52
Speaker
So, you know, I see a lot of businesses that, that will sometimes promote people into management roles, maybe without actually teaching them how to lead. And in in your work, i'm I'm really curious how often you see or maybe some examples of these kind of people challenges that get in the way of the progress that, you know, either they're they're trying to, you know, promote or that you're trying to help them implement.
00:10:19
Speaker
Yeah. So, you know, a little more than half of my clients are franchises. I'll talk about that first. And so what happens all the time is that, you know, people who've had very little or no experience at all managing people, they buy the franchise and suddenly they're the boss.
00:10:34
Speaker
Right. And most franchise brands don't provide a whole lot of training in managing employees for a few reasons. Number one, I don't think they really know how to do it. And it's you know it's a tall order that they should. i mean, they have to be experts in oil changes and ice cream and, you know, killing mosquitoes and all the things that franchises do.
00:10:53
Speaker
They're not necessarily experts in managing people, right? So the hope is that the franchisee brings that, but that's not always the case. So they don't necessarily know it. Sometimes they're afraid to teach it, if they do know it because they don't want to be looked at as joint employers.
00:11:06
Speaker
Even though when you look at the laws, it's really about dictating HR policy as opposed to educating franchisees. and that's what I'm trying to help these brands understand. um But often it's just considered this like you know second tier soft skill, you know which I just think is ridiculous. It's really important. So people have no experience often managing and suddenly they buy a business, they become a a boss.
00:11:28
Speaker
Or maybe they have a lot of experience managing employees in a white collar corporate setting with educated, self-motivated people. who then are are shocked when they're working with hourly workers who very often have less experience and less education.
00:11:42
Speaker
They don't do as well with abstraction. Mission statement might not mean anything to them. It's completely different marketplace. you know We always have to adapt our products and services and marketing based on who we want to sell to.
00:11:54
Speaker
We also have to change our management based on who we're managing. So in the franchise world, I feel like there's just so much room to improve. And that's why I am... You know, really trying to own that space. I've written the book and created the hourly employee management system, doing all these presentations on that.
Employee Engagement: Beyond Technical Solutions
00:12:10
Speaker
Outside of franchising, um you know, it's the same thing that you people running businesses or people running gigantic companies. And there's so much that's got to get done that they promote a really competent employee to management.
00:12:22
Speaker
Not appreciating that management is a completely different skillset. So they'll teach them the systems, maybe how to run payroll, how to you know file do certain reports that only managers do that kind of thing.
00:12:33
Speaker
But the people management side, how to build culture, how to engage employees, how to motivate. Um, That's usually just glossed over. And you know Gallup just came out with their annual you know report on the state of the workplace.
00:12:45
Speaker
And every year they talk about you know how you know employees are not engaged. Well, level of engagement has gone down even more, but in particular among managers. So these companies are not doing a good job even engaging their managers. How can they possibly engage their employees?
00:13:00
Speaker
So it's a real problem. I see it as a real opportunity that I'm trying to help companies you know embrace. Well, you've mentioned the books, The Wealthy Franchisee, Stop the Shift Show. and And I do want to give you an opportunity, which I will later, to make sure you can tell everybody where they can find it and where they can get their copy. I highly recommend them.
00:13:20
Speaker
ah They're a great read. But tell me about a people issue that your clients will often overlook when they're trying to fix something that's maybe tech, ops, marketing, sales problem, things that they've identified as fitting into one of these buckets. But you know, it's maybe a piece of ah ah people issue that they've overlooked.
00:13:44
Speaker
It's amazing how when there's a technical issue, there's a process that people go through to fix it, right? Starting with, you see the symptoms, then you have to do research to find out what's going on under the hood.
00:13:56
Speaker
What's going on in that technology to identify the problem so then you can offer the solution. That's precisely what we need to do when managing people. We see the behaviors that we don't like or the behaviors we wish we could see in them.
00:14:10
Speaker
And so rather than looking under the hood and really identifying what's the issue, we just make assumptions. They're lazy. They're entitled. They they don't care. they're eating in All these things, these cliches, this narrative that people have been echoing for generations, right? Every generation has said that about the generation that comes after them.
00:14:29
Speaker
So they make assumptions about what the problem is, and it really might be something very different.
Generational Dynamics in the Workplace
00:14:35
Speaker
And so I think that management needs to do a better job of really understanding their employees, what slows them down, what causes them anxiety, what gives them excitement, what do they value, what really matters to them?
00:14:46
Speaker
Because the answers to those questions might be very different than the assumptions that management makes. You were just making reference to how every generation...
00:14:57
Speaker
you know, has these same feelings or or or, you know, comments or perceptions about the upcoming generation. And you tell a really great story. Last time I saw you speak, you told a really great story about that.
00:15:12
Speaker
um I want you to tell us some of that right now. i love i love hearing this and I desperately want to hear it again. Sure. what So we have this phrase, kids these days.
00:15:25
Speaker
Right. And it's not just these days because people have used that phrase for generations. And so I think when you saw me speak ah last year, I know the conference you're talking about, you you know, I shared that, you know, when suddenly millennials enter the workforce, there was this Time magazine cover.
00:15:44
Speaker
referring to them as these you know lazy narcissists, that sort of thing. And that was written by a baby boomer, right? But in the 70s, New York Magazine had a cover you know referring to to baby boomers as the me generation, right?
00:15:58
Speaker
Then I shared a quote, um again, criticizing young workers that came back from like the early 1900s. Then I shared another quote bagging on young people that dates all the way back to Aristotle,
00:16:09
Speaker
It was a quote from Aristotle. And the joke that I make is that, you know, Aristotle's parents, you know, were, you know, criticizing him. You know, what's wrong with this kid? All he does is sit around and think. but and Every generation does this, right? What's interesting is this. So my kids are now, my son's going to graduate college in a few days. My daughter's in college. And so we have more time. So my my wife has gone back to work.
00:16:32
Speaker
She's into ceramics. So she's now working at a ceramic studio. She is one of the older people there. She's in her mid fifties. So she reports to someone who's in her mid-20s. So now they wouldn't say kids these days, if anything, quite the opposite, like all these old people who don't understand.
00:16:48
Speaker
But what's interesting is in this workplace, there is the same dysfunction as every other workplace. you know My wife being expected to do things where they've never trained her because they're too busy. Communication problems, all that kind of stuff. And again, my wife is smart and she's mature, so she's like navigating through it.
00:17:05
Speaker
But it's still you know poor management that's going on and and and not the best culture, not the best team dynamic. And so you know we can blame younger generations.
00:17:16
Speaker
But sometimes I think that there's a gap between generations because we make assumptions. We're not understanding what they value. And we don't know what drives them. And I will say this about the youngest generation in the workforce right now, which is Gen Z, is most of them are still growing. Most of them aren't 25.
00:17:32
Speaker
our brains are still growing and developing and maturing through age 25, right? They're not yet the people that, that they're going to be. So they will be the leaders. They will be mature. They will, you know, just like millennials have survived and I'm Gen X. And even though our parents my parents called us slackers, somehow we've survived this long.
00:17:49
Speaker
Gen Z is going to be fine, but they're what they need our help to grow and to develop, especially in the workplace.
Organizations That Get It Right
00:17:56
Speaker
And it's those managers and business owners who are willing to to facilitate that growth.
00:18:01
Speaker
They're the ones you arere going to see better performance. Yeah. Yeah, i I totally agree. um I want to hear. So some of these, let's talk about some of the organizations that you really admire, some clients maybe that you've worked with that you um that do a lot of really great things. and And among some of these organizations or the teams, right, that you might admire the most, what are you what are some common traits that stand out when they, you know, when they truly get it right?
00:18:29
Speaker
First of all, they make it a priority, right? Their mission statement isn't just something that's slapped up on a poster or on the website. It's like a living, breathing part of their operation that they talk about it, they focus on it.
00:18:41
Speaker
When they talk about performance with employees, they connect it back to their mission or to their values or however it is they talk about it. They're willing to take that step back and talk about the bigger picture. And I'll give you an example of two you know well-known restaurant chains that are known for this.
00:18:57
Speaker
um And i don't want to you know that beat a dead horse because they've been talking about so much, but I'm based in California. So we have In-N-Out Burger, bit of a cult brand out here. And then there's Chick-fil-A. Both are really big into the culture. Now, I've written about this and some people have posted in comments, well, you know it's also worth noting that both of those organizations identify with religion.
00:19:20
Speaker
right thats That's widely known. And so I do think that's significant. Not that they're praying their way to big cultures or to success or great sales. But I think because that factors into how they think and how they operate, they have different, bigger conversations.
00:19:35
Speaker
They think more about the welfare of employees and welfare itself beyond profits. Of course, they want to make money, but they want to do it in a way that's consistent with their value system. So my son, his first job was with In-N-Out Burger. He has no recollection of discussions of religion, but he did have discussions about culture, about things bigger than just transactions.
00:19:58
Speaker
So great organizations, whether there' they do it for religion or just because they appreciate the importance of it, great organizations don't just get into the dollars and cents and they go beyond transactions.
00:20:09
Speaker
They think about all the relationships that they are facilitating and spend a lot of time focusing on how to improve those relationships, how to you know honor a set of principles and honor a set of values.
00:20:22
Speaker
And in the course of doing that, they save time because they have less employee issues and they make a lot more money because they're ultimately providing better customer experiences. Right. They aspire to you know something bigger that I think young people can appreciate.
00:20:35
Speaker
So yeah you do and you do it you you can inspire you know humanity that way, I guess, to some degree, when you have those conversations. Yeah. And the data shows that younger generations are much more...
00:20:47
Speaker
articulate about a desire to be part of something important, to be part of something good. Of course, they want to make money. They have ambition, but their value system is a little bit different than earlier generations where it might be mean more about you know achievement and you know your own professional growth and making money, which I have no judgment about those things. I certainly want that.
00:21:08
Speaker
But younger generations are willing to make less money in order to make more of a difference, to be part of something that's big and wonderful and cool. And so we have to think differently and continuously update the way we think about management and the way we think about culture, because what might have worked with a labor force that was you know made up of baby boomers, those tactics may not work in ah in you know today's environment.
The Role of Trust and Technology in Management
00:21:34
Speaker
And so we need to update all of our technology, including our management technology. Yeah. How often, should say, how do factors like trust or communication or even alignment, you know tend to influence outcomes in these situations? Yeah.
00:21:54
Speaker
Completely. i mean, if I trust you, then I'm more likely to you know take the risks that you ask me to take. I'm more likely to you know respond to what you're saying.
00:22:06
Speaker
I'm going to feel better about myself, better about the place where I'm at. And the opposite is also true. If I don't trust you, then I'm always looking over my shoulder and I'm always looking on indeed.com for another job. yeah um you know It's like any other kind of relationship. I mean, this is just basic human interaction and the distinction between you know My life and my work, the lines are increasingly blurry because people know that they're spending their life at work, so they want balance.
00:22:32
Speaker
And so I think all of those issues, the human side of it, the emotional side matters. We've always known this when it comes to the customer experience, right? We all know that we won't need to make customers feel good. Not that every business does, but...
00:22:45
Speaker
It's not a you know and particularly innovative thought that we've got to make people feel good in the marketplace. We also need to make people feel good in the labor marketplace because that influences their behavior so much.
00:22:57
Speaker
So I'd love to touch a little bit on workforce tech. i mean, have you noticed any new or surprising ways that companies are like leveraging software to support their people or streamline ops?
00:23:10
Speaker
Sure. So I think that really smart companies are embracing software that or or apps, that sort of thing, that facilitate this process. Now, there always needs to be a human element. Ultimately, employees will be talking with each other.
00:23:27
Speaker
Bosses will be talking with employees back and forth. And when companies rely exclusively on technology for that interaction, now we're missing that human connection. yeah Right. and so it's so it's not and But I'm certainly not saying, well, let's just have human connection and no technology.
00:23:43
Speaker
What's great about technology in the hiring process, in the motivation process, I know that at Mustard Hub, you do amazing things. to facilitate the interaction. The technology allows us to do it in more efficient ways and more cost-effective ways.
00:24:00
Speaker
Really great technology still preserves the humanity. And sometimes really great technology, it allows us to have you know the ones and zeros take care of certain tasks so I can focus more on the people.
00:24:13
Speaker
Right. So I can focus more on those the human interaction. So I think technology is really important. I think younger generations not only are OK with it, they expect it. um You know, it just has to be smart and deliberate and really great technology, I think, um embraces the human factor and and and mixes with it beautifully.
00:24:37
Speaker
So, you know, you talked a little bit about the ones and zeros, right? When it comes to these systems, when it comes to data, do you ever notice maybe a disconnect between what's being tracked and what actually drives results? You know, talking about a lot of the the ah consultant work that you've done, a lot of the things that you talk about in your book, right? They're all talk a lot about just, right?
00:25:03
Speaker
sentiment, right? A lot of it has to do around ah has to focus around sentiment. And I'm just kind of curious in your mind, is there a disconnect sometimes between what people are measuring and what actually you find drives those results?
00:25:20
Speaker
I think that's the case. I think it's easy to hide behind data and not look at what's actually happening. And I'll give you an example. yeah um I am a proponent of net promoter score, right?
00:25:32
Speaker
Or employee net promoter score, right? And for those people who are watching or listening don't know what that is, we've all gotten emails or those phone calls where they has just ask the one question on a scale of you know zero to 10, how likely are you to recommend this business or in the case of an employee net promoter score, how likely are you to recommend this job to a friend?
00:25:50
Speaker
The person gives the number and then there's a way I won't get into the whole thing to calculate it, but you end up with a a score. And so a lot of companies use the score as a way to measure and for an employee net promoter score to measure culture or to measure customer service when we're just asking customers to answer that question.
00:26:09
Speaker
But it's still a hypothetical. How likely are you to recommend someone? Right. I'm as if someone who ran a business, I'm less interested in how likely someone is and how much they're actually recommending.
00:26:21
Speaker
Are they coming back? Like to me, that's the stuff that matters compared because ultimately a net promoter score just measures like any kind of survey. It just measures survey responses. But sometimes the easiest thing is just to click a certain answer just to kind of get this over and done.
00:26:35
Speaker
you know So I think there's value there in the context of of other metrics, especially in terms of what's actually happening. So I think with technology, I think with data, there's more than a place for it I think it's really important. We need it to compete. We need it to be at our best.
00:26:52
Speaker
But we also have to look at the reality of what's happening and not forget that human factor. So if you could design... a dashboard to reveal just one key people signal inside an organization, what insight would you want to surface?
00:27:08
Speaker
Yeah. If I had a dashboard, you know, I, I was on my iPhone today and I just clicked the weather. I want to know what the weather is going to be. If I'm a boss of a large organization where maybe there's more employees and I'm able to manage on my own, I'd love to be able just to kind of check and see what's the temperature of my team.
00:27:26
Speaker
How are people feeling today? Right? On a scale of whatever, like are they... Are they totally stoked with their job? Are they excited, to feeling connected, engaged? Are they kind of bored and not feeling and feeling resentful? Like, I'd love to be able to monitor that so that I can intervene.
00:27:42
Speaker
Because what I don't want is to think that they're okay and find out that they're not okay. um Or you know if they are okay, then I want to
Stories of Cultural Impact
00:27:49
Speaker
reinforce that. ah i you know i want to be able to to take action before it's too late, before I lose people, but before before and culture takes a hit.
00:27:57
Speaker
um And when things are great, I want to feed that fire. I want to reinforce it. Right. so I love that. I feel like I should, I'm i'm actually really glad this is being recorded. so So I can go back and take notes on it.
00:28:11
Speaker
for And there's evidence that I gave you that idea. So just yeah remember that too. Yeah, for sure. So um I would love, um so I think one of the things that's really powerful for me, especially when I talk to you, I feel like I get a lot of real, just real world stories about um about impact, right? I want to hear about a team, about a client, you know, or an organization that experienced maybe a a turning point, right? Good or or bad, actually. And like you said, sometimes we learn the most from our failures because of a people-related dynamic.
00:28:50
Speaker
Any that stand out? Yeah.
00:28:55
Speaker
Okay, I'll share one story. sort of like, hey, tell me a joke. I know a thousand jokes till someone says, tell me a joke. So you're putting the spot. But I'll share one story that involves the business that I had. And you know i'm I'm a humble guy. And even when we we won an award for best customer service out of a thousand stores, available arrangements, and my manager won manager of the year.
00:29:15
Speaker
I attribute a lot of the success we had to my manager. so I'm going to give her credit, not say it's because I'm such a good boss, other than setting her up. to be an amazing boss. so She actually won the first ever manager of the year at Edible Arrangements. So they could have given that award to anyone. They gave it to to Jennifer.
00:29:32
Speaker
And so um I'd like to think with some of my input and guidance, Jennifer worked really hard on building culture. She held people accountable. She watched our labor costs, but she also made sure that people's needs were met. And we had conversations about their their values and what they wanted. And you know I was really you know big on making sure that this job for every employee was a stepping stone towards whatever their ambitions were. And we had those conversations. I want them to feel that way.
00:29:59
Speaker
So sometimes we'd have after work training programs. They're still on the clock. And I would be you know giving them a workshop that I might give to clients on something about professional growth that wasn't directly related to our business.
00:30:12
Speaker
They didn't need these skills to do business, but I knew by giving them these skills, it would engage them more in the job. Anyway, we had an awesome culture eventually. It took a few years and I made a lot of mistakes and I drove some people away. i mean, i learned a lot through my mistakes, but we had a great culture.
00:30:26
Speaker
Then we sold the business and the guy who bought it from me, you know knew that Jennifer was amazing. He said, does she come with the business? And I'm like, well, i'm not a pimp. I can't sell her out, but she'll be open to staying. And so um he ran the businesses very differently.
00:30:42
Speaker
He didn't believe in celebrating you know birthdays. you know He's ah only in celebrating work anniversaries. And undid a lot of things that we did for you know tour culture. I just didn't think it was important.
00:30:55
Speaker
Just went back to the regular business metrics. And you have to rule with an iron fist across the board. rather than looking at the employees and thinking, what does each employee need at this moment?
00:31:06
Speaker
And ran with an iron fist. And I don't know what his sales numbers were, but I know that I had built this awesome team that by the time I sold the stores, most of those employees had been with me for more than five years, which environment rare you know is is amazing.
00:31:21
Speaker
yeah Just about all of them were gone within a year. And after one year, even Jennifer was gone. Because it was just a very different place. Different. right Even though it was the same business, right? It just was managed very differently. And so look, for all I know, the guy maybe doubled sales. I don't think so, but it it could have happened. And so I'm not going to say that my way was better, but yeah.
00:31:45
Speaker
Yeah. I really should say it's Jennifer's way. I want to give her the credit. She's the one who actually did it. It's really interesting how you can see, and it's almost um as close as you'll get to a side-by-side view, literally because you sold the business and left and almost from day one right of the new ownership, you know a very different culture. Five years in
Understanding and Motivating Individuals
00:32:12
Speaker
five years in ah in in in an industry and business like that is remarkable.
00:32:17
Speaker
Um, you know, if they'd stayed with you that long and that's, um, so one, give me one insight that you've gained, not about tools, not about tactics, really purely about human nature.
00:32:31
Speaker
Give me something, some insight, just purely about human nature that you know, something that you've gained.
00:32:40
Speaker
I've come to appreciate that each one of us has ah unique value system. What that means is each one of us has things that we care about.
00:32:52
Speaker
And, you know, our parents try to influence our value system. They do their best to teach us what's important and they have some influence. Our friends influence us. The news influences us. Every environment that we're a part of has some kind of influence.
00:33:06
Speaker
But ultimately, you know, I'm one of three siblings and my value system is very similar to my brother's. It's very similar to my sister's, but they're not exactly the same. So each one of us has our own unique set of desires and fears and ambitions.
00:33:21
Speaker
And I think understanding that every person's individual combination, understanding their unique frequency is the key to attracting, retaining, and motivating them, whether it's an employee or whether it's a customer.
00:33:36
Speaker
That if I really can figure out what my customers want and I can provide that better than anyone else, Yeah. Then they're going to come. And it may be different than what I think. Now, again, we you know we talk about a customer base. You kind of have to generalize. There's no way to really get deep with every individual customer. And you can't do this with every single employee.
00:33:55
Speaker
But with with open eyes and open ears and you ask the right questions, you can start to see some trends. you know And so I found out that Edible Arrangements, my customer base, they didn't care as much about price.
00:34:07
Speaker
I mean, of course, they'd save money. They didn't want to spend money. But that was less important to them than reliability, less important to them than quality. And so if someone's pushing me to you know to always offer a discount or that kind of thing, that's not speaking to what they want.
00:34:21
Speaker
yeah And same thing with my employees. And so I guess the idea is we have to clear our heads of our assumptions and dump the golden rule. Curtis, I shouldn't treat you the way i would want to be treated because you have a different value system.
00:34:35
Speaker
You might have have different preferences. You want to be treated differently.
Integrating Technology with Human Connection
00:34:39
Speaker
So the platinum rule treat other people the way they want to be treated. And so I think the more we can embrace the platinum rule and infuse that into every area of our business, the more value we're going to put out to the world, the more we're going to connect with others, and the more they're going want to do business with us.
00:34:57
Speaker
So looking forward a a little bit, as companies become more deliberate about how they support their people, how do you see maybe your own work adapting or evolving?
00:35:16
Speaker
I think that the dependence on technology is not going away. It's only getting bigger. And so, you know, for me, I have to stay on top of that. But then find the human side of it.
00:35:29
Speaker
How can we make sure that that human side is still there? Because it's generally the human side that distinguishes one organization from another. Because eventually everyone's going to have you know the same technology, that kind of thing. And so um I think it's important to always see what's the human side. So AI, everyone's embracing AI. I embrace AI. I think it's amazing.
00:35:56
Speaker
But there's still a human side of it. So how can I use AI to better connect, to better inspire, to make people's lives easier, as opposed to how can I replace myself?
00:36:08
Speaker
um And so I think that that's something that we need to do. So, you know, one thing I appreciate about, you know, the business that you're in is that, you know, it's technology, but the purpose of that technology is to create cohesion, to create culture that ultimately comes down to that human thing.
00:36:23
Speaker
So for you, it's not about technology. You're in the business of building culture. That's the focal point. The technology is just a tool to make that happen. So I think that all of us need to, I think there's lots of opportunities with technology, but we can't lose focus of the thing that influences human behavior more than anything.
Prioritizing People Over Transactions
00:36:41
Speaker
And that's how we make others feel.
00:36:43
Speaker
So I want to, I want to, you, you made a comment a little while ago. I kind of want to go back to this scenario, right? You're ah you're on a plane, a person sitting next to you. This is a, let's say this is a business leader, right? And it turns out you just landed. So you only have,
00:37:00
Speaker
a little bit of time before you get your bags in your go and go, what's one common misunderstanding you still see among business leaders, right? We've talked about a lot of the um talked a lot about the labor workforce and the people and the things that people need to be considering, right? What's one misunderstanding you still see among business leaders when it comes to people dynamics? And then second,
00:37:28
Speaker
If he comes to you asking for advice on how to truly get it right with their team, what's the one thing you tell him before he walks down the jetway?
00:37:39
Speaker
Wow. Generally, we're at the point where standing the aisle, waiting to pull down our bags, leave, business is done by then. If I haven't made the sale or made a connection by then, I didn't have it now. It's all of us just want to get off the plane and get to the bathroom and then you know get to our Uber.
00:37:56
Speaker
ah Now you know my routine. to But I think, okay, so a common you know misconception is, as I said before, I think it's that we take our values, our assumptions, our way of seeing the world, and we superimpose that on those around us.
00:38:10
Speaker
Assuming that what I want is what everyone wants. Assuming that my view of the way things have always been is how they still are or how they should be. yeah um And so I think we need to be a little less dependent on our own lens.
00:38:24
Speaker
um in In terms of how I would advise someone to kind of get a handle on this people thing, I would say to make it a priority. I, you know, stop being so fricking busy.
00:38:36
Speaker
Stop getting so caught up with all your transactions and all that stuff's getting done if it's preventing you from going to that people place because there's nothing more important than the people place. There's nothing more important. You know, I yeah have this one workshop that I teach called 30 Second Leadership. And all about how to coach employees for high performance. And the point I make is that if if you're not coaching them, then they're not improving, that kind of thing. and So i had a woman come up to me afterwards and she said, i just hired someone to do development for me, to do take care of her sales.
00:39:04
Speaker
And she says, but she's been too busy to train them on how to do it. So would I advise her to invest in some training for this employee? And I scratched my head. I said, are you asking me if I think it's important that you provide training to the person who's exclusively in charge of all your sales?
00:39:20
Speaker
Like, how could you even ask a question with such an obvious answer, right? But I guess it's not so obvious because we're all so freaking busy. And so we need to prioritize. We only have 24 hours in the day. We have to prioritize our focal points. I think needs to start with people.
00:39:35
Speaker
And then as people around us can be more successful, they're going to save us time because they're going to take care of all this stuff for us.
Conclusion and Call to Action
00:39:42
Speaker
I love that. I love that. Before we wrap up, I want you to tell everybody about the Wealthy Franchisee, Stop the Shift Show, where they can find it, and how they can learn more about the hourly employee management system.
00:39:56
Speaker
ah Sure. So ah yeah, two books. One is called The Wealthy Franchisee Game-Changing Steps to Becoming a Thriving Franchise Superstar. It's all about what franchise business owners can do to be just like those top franchisees who are killing it and making money of high quality of life.
00:40:11
Speaker
So in all like real world stuff, there are lots of tactics and stories, that kind of thing. um My newer book is called Stop the Shift Show, Turn Your Struggling Hourly Workers into a Top Performing Team. Billion books out there in management and leadership, almost nothing out there on how to manage hourly workers.
00:40:26
Speaker
So this book is about them. um And I also tell the stories of lots of really great high performance workplaces made up of hourly workers, including fast food, including factories, including places that are known for having poor employee retention performance.
00:40:41
Speaker
I found places that are the exception and I've learned what they do to make them special. So this book is about stopping that shift show and making great. So these books are available. There's also an audio book. There's an ebook as well available wherever books are sold. on Amazon is probably the easiest place.
00:40:58
Speaker
Then I've also created the hourly employee management system, which is a whole course. I do it, present it live, present it as a webinar series. but There's also a self-paced course that people can sign up and go through. It's five modules on how to manage hourly workers.
00:41:12
Speaker
Lots of downloads and tools, a color digital workbook that people can download. And then you take quizzes throughout. And then when you pass the final at the end, there's a certification. So you can actually become certified in managing hourly workers.
00:41:25
Speaker
So information on that, you can go to HEMS, H-E-M-S, the Hourly Employee Management System, HEMSworldwide.com to get information on that. And my website is scottgreenberg.com.
00:41:36
Speaker
Love that. Can definitely vouch for those books. I've read them. Very powerful insights that ah i know have helped me personally. So I can't recommend them enough.
00:41:48
Speaker
I want to say thank you to Scott. Thanks for tuning to Mustard Hub Voices Behind the Build. If you got something out of this conversation, share it with a friend or teammate.
00:42:00
Speaker
Check out mustardhub.com to see how we help companies become destinations for workplace happiness and and turn culture into a competitive edge. Until next time, thank you.