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Getting the right people in the right seats on a Founding Team
61 Plays10 months ago
Jo Harley has co-founded two businesses: Korero, a tech platform which enables leaders to have great career conversations with their teams and gives organisations the data they need to plan for success; and Hendrick and Hyde, a consultancy which helps organisations to build authentic cultures through diagnostics, analysis and strategic advice. Jo, her technology and her colleagues are behind Best Places to Work in Hospitality and Best Workplaces in Travel and work with many amazing clients on their employee surveys. Jo regularly judges The Best Employer Catey, The Hotel Cateys, The Food Service Cateys, The Springboard Awards for Excellence, HR in Hospitality Awards and The Purple Umbrella Awards.
In this episode of the First-time Founders Podcast, Jo shares a wide range of insights relating to her recent implementation of the Entrepreneurial Operating System.
Interested viewers can reach Jo via https://www.linkedin.com/in/jo-harley/ or jo@hellokorero.co and Rob (https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertliddiard/) at Rob@mission-group.co.uk (or to book some free time with Rob, visit https://www.eosworldwide.com/rob-liddiard). Alternatively, if you’d prefer Rob to send you a free copy of Traction (the book by Gino Wickman which explains The Entrepreneurial Operating System) just complete the form here: https://www.eosworldwide.com/traction-giveaway?implementer_email=rob.liddiard@eosworldwide.com
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Transcript
Introduction to 'First Time Founders' Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Hello, welcome to the first time founders podcast, the show where we talk about how to start a business from nothing and grow it into something meaningful. I'm Rob Lydiard.
Rob's Background and Mission
00:00:08
Speaker
I'm a professional implementer of the entrepreneurial operating system or EOS. Before this in my prior life, not too long ago, I was the founding CEO of a software business called Yapster. It was acquired in 2022. So today I work with entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial leadership teams to help them get more of what they want from their business by implementing the entrepreneurial operating system.
00:00:28
Speaker
But in my spare time, I love speaking to entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial people about the first time founder experience, the mistakes that we made along the way, the scars that we now carry as a result, and pay those experiences forward so that other entrepreneurs coming down the track can hopefully avoid our mistakes and go ahead and make your own mistakes because nobody gets through the first time founder experience without some brutal learnings. So that's the purpose of this podcast.
00:00:55
Speaker
If anything that I've just said resonates with you, I love hearing from people that are watching or listening to this content. If you've got ideas for content, maybe you'd like to feature, then please do reach out.
Introducing Joe Harley
00:01:05
Speaker
Today I'm speaking to Joe Harley, who's the visionary, we take visionary in entrepreneurial operating systems. It doesn't really matter what title you take, could be CEO, chair, MD, but effectively it's that kind of classic starter, founder, entrepreneurial personality seat.
00:01:23
Speaker
And so Joe serves that role in her company Carrero, which is a SaaS platform that drives better quarterly conversations for businesses. What's interesting about Joe is that she was the kind of functional MD of another business for about 20 years. So more like think of that role, like we call it the integrator in EOS, think of like a COO type character. So chalk and cheese between the two roles. And in this episode, Joe talks about the journey that she's been on a founder,
00:01:49
Speaker
finding her calling in a more visionary seat, the team that she works with in Carrero and the different skills and personalities that they bring to bear upon that business so that they can realize their collective vision for the organization. So whether you're a flaming visionary like me or Joe or more of an integrator type person that likes to get shit done, I think you'll get a lot of value from this conversation learning about Joe's business, Carrero. So without further ado, I give you Joe Harley.
00:02:21
Speaker
Jo, welcome to the First Time Fan's podcast. Thank you for doing this. Pleasure. You're my second ever podcast, so count yourself privileged. We're on the record now. Obviously, you and I speak a few times a month. I'm going to have to remember that there will be other people listening in to this conversation versus normally when we're talking about entrepreneurial life and Carrero. Yeah, although I don't think there's much that I wouldn't share. Although, yeah, I mean, you have definitely got me nearly in tears cooking my
00:02:51
Speaker
my kids tea and try and make them have all 65 things at the time. I'm a bit bored with it today. So why don't we fill people in on what we're alluding to
Understanding Carrero's Purpose
00:03:02
Speaker
here. Do you want to explain what Carrero is and the capacity in which we work together? Yes, of course. So Carrero is a
00:03:10
Speaker
a tech product that helps organizations to, well, talent and performance manage their people really. So it's all about having the right conversations with the right people at the right time.
00:03:22
Speaker
most familiar you'll probably be with it is that you will have probably in your lifetime had an appraisal and it is in its very loosest sense that but it's not that so I often use the hashtag no more appraisals I hate the word appraisal it makes me cringe it's very backward looking it's something that people don't look forward to so Carrero is all about career conversations so that's really defining what it means to sit down with somebody and talk about
00:03:48
Speaker
their performance, their development, their career aspirations, their well-being. It's far more holistic. And more importantly, it can be driven by the employee or the business, but most importantly, by the employee or the manager to make sure that the conversation is happening at the right time for that person. It works best when it's driven through a comms app or is part of an integrated tech, HR people tech stack. And that's how I met you through your lovely product, the App Store.
00:04:18
Speaker
who I still work with, we still work with. Other comms apps are out there. But yeah, you were the first comms app that we really did sort of a deep integration where we can notify people through their communications tool about it's time to talk about what happened in week one. It's time to happen, talk about where you are now at month three, whatever the business wants it to do, and also regular cadence around having these types of conversations.
00:04:44
Speaker
which most operators tell me, we do it anyway. They do. They talk to their people all the time. Of course, operators talk to their people all the time. But actually what happens is you end up talking about what's happening operation on a day-to-day basis and what you might have done on the weekend, not deep down how are you, how are things going, how can we get you from here to here, all that kind of good
The Role of Structure in Conversations
00:05:07
Speaker
stuff.
00:05:07
Speaker
I've just talked for a really long time. That wasn't an elevator pitch, was it? That was a sitting on a plane pitch. No, it's great because I think anyone listening and most of the people listening are first-time founders, sometimes multi-time founders and advisors and just people interested in the entrepreneurial journey.
00:05:24
Speaker
anybody that's tried to build a business that isn't a solo entrepreneur effort is going to have assembled a team and dealt with the awkwardness of either talking to their people too much, not enough in a structured, unstructured way, feeling that constant frustration of expectations not being set and not getting what they want out of organisations and
00:05:44
Speaker
So I think that preamble is extremely helpful. Before we come back to going probably fairly deep on the people side of running a business and the role that conversations plays in that, do you want to give people some context on your entrepreneurial journey?
Joe's Entrepreneurial Journey
00:06:00
Speaker
Because I would say you're highly entrepreneurial, you're also super modest. So I think you sometimes describe yourself as kind of an accidental entrepreneur, don't you? Like what's your role in Carrero and how did you end up being
00:06:12
Speaker
The fabulous Joe Harley. Well, I've always been the fabulous Joe Harley. It's just not necessarily as an entrepreneur. No, I didn't even want to be an MD or a managing director of a business, but it got to the point where it almost became unavoidable that I would end up doing what I ended up doing. So I started off, gosh, just having fun. All I wanted to do with my career was have a good time.
00:06:42
Speaker
And I left university, went and did a couple of summer seasons in Greece, came back, was going to get a graduate job. My mum and dad were like, you've got no money, walk down to the bus stop. So I walked down to the job centre and I couldn't even afford a bus. So I walked to the job centre, it was a really long way away. Got there, looked at this building and there was a pub opposite. I thought, I can't go in there, I'm going to go in there. And I walked into a pub
00:07:10
Speaker
And I said to the people, have you got any jobs going while I was looking for my graduate job? And I started working there and I just absolutely loved it. I'd worked in what you said, the summer behind bars, just loved people, loved the atmosphere, loved the sort of irregularity, the different things every day thing about it. And then I got approached to go on their graduate scheme, it was for Allied Domet, many, many years ago. And I was like, I can't tell people, like my managers at the time, old school, pub, East End,
00:07:40
Speaker
sort of fagging one hand, whisking the other, like real old school, brilliant. I loved them. They were on my second parents. I lived with them. I was like, I can't tell people like that what to do unless I've done it myself. So I decided I would run my own pub. So I had a license at 25. And then as my dad told me, because parents are always right. As I tell my children often now, he said, you'll get bored of that. And I did.
00:08:07
Speaker
So I went on and worked for Bacardi Martini, where I had the best three years of my life going out selling Bacardi breezes to pubs and bars, independence, you know, where the idea of a quick win, we had to do seven wins a day and it was like going in the same, can you put double optic up on your Bacardi? And breezes went massive, lived with three girls, we had breezes up the hallway, we had parties,
00:08:37
Speaker
did Notting Hill Carnival that year, making big barrels of rum mixed drink. So much done. But what I soon realised, that you can only have fun for so long before you want to progress your career, and neither, because I did my team at that particular time, or the business that I'd worked for before, I liked to met, had any real opportunities beyond doing what I was doing. And nobody really sat down and spoke to me about that, told me about, you know, what was going on with my career. And so I started looking around again, and I met a woman called Jane Suddenly,
00:09:07
Speaker
She'd just started a business at the time called Learn Purple and it was all about talent retention because employee engagement at that point in 2001 wasn't a term anyone had used. And she decided that she was going to build a piece of tech. You know, Jane and I, neither of us are techie. She was with North America by something like
00:09:29
Speaker
I don't know, one of that, lots of old school appraising systems or whatever, buy something, bring it back to the UK and like sell it. But that just didn't seem possible. So by chance you met a guy who
Evolution of Carrero Post-Pandemic
00:09:42
Speaker
said, yeah, I'll build that for you. It was literally written down on six bits of paper. And one of the companies, she sort of gave me the six bits of paper. So we've got a couple of clients, they really like the idea of it because their network's amazing. Can you sort this out? And they're starting my journey into tech.
00:09:59
Speaker
Although if you ask Stephen Shaw, my co-founder, is what I know about tech. They will literally roll their eyes and say, don't let her anywhere near it. Yeah, Jane and I ran and then Purple went on to be Purple Cube for 20 years. And that was all talent retention. So we did some consultancy around the whole employee journey.
00:10:20
Speaker
how to be a great place to work mainly in hospitality and hospitality companies and then we had our technology at that point called Talent Toolbox and we did learning and development for Cashflow and we spent that 20 years funded through Cashflow having the best time working with amazing partners and great people in the business until things changed when we had a global pandemic.
00:10:46
Speaker
When Carrero was spun out of that right. You've just alluded to Steve and Sean. Can you talk about your respective roles as co-founders? I think that's really interesting because you've become a reluctant visionary, haven't you? We've only given you that internal title recently. Describe the two boys and the dynamic as a trio.
00:11:06
Speaker
The talent toolbox technology lived inside Purple Cube and post-pandemic, we just decided to restructure. Jane wanted to go off and do different things. Other people in the business had other opportunities. We had very few clients at that point. It was a bit dire, if I'm honest, probably one of the darkest times ever coming out of the back of the pandemic. Anyway, Steve, Sean and I saw that
00:11:29
Speaker
we still had a tool that was being used that we can make something with, but we realized we needed to redevelop it and make it into something a bit more dynamic, more user-friendly. And so, yeah, we sort of came together and did a management buyout and Carrero was developed and, yeah, both Steve and Sean are developers. So they are, yeah, very different in personality somewhat to
Team Dynamics at Carrero
00:11:55
Speaker
me. Although I do call them creative developers because they
00:11:58
Speaker
They're not the type of developers that literally just sit in a room and code all day, because I need people to talk to, if anything else. They're both very invested in the product and the vision and how we present to market. You know, they do everything. But when we started on Ariash, I mean, I've been an MD for almost 20 years, and now I realize I was probably the most useless MD in the world. Because I know you've learned, it's insane. Well, I mean, we had a good time.
00:12:27
Speaker
But I'm certainly not as good as Steve is being our integrator. When I look back now, I think, oh my God, all the stuff that Steve does in our business as an integrator, I should have been doing that. And Jane is a complete visionary. Jane is nothing but a visionary. She probably had the wrong person in her integrator seat. But we had a really good time, so no regrets. Now I'm suddenly this visionary and an entrepreneur and a woman in tech.
00:12:58
Speaker
I just left university and wanted to have a bit of a laugh and do some anti-clockwork. None of that happened. So we got you as the kind of visionary MD, we got Steve as the integrator, and then Sean's an engineer like Steve, but Sean covers something slightly different in the business to Steve, doesn't he? Yeah, he does. Sean's amazing because he's super, super adaptable. And he's literally one of those people, like with sport as well, I think, like you can literally say, what about this? And then he can just do it.
00:13:25
Speaker
Yeah, he does make me sick. He's good looking as well, isn't he? Yeah, he's the cute one. He's the hot one. I'm sure Steve won't mind saying that. Yeah, he's now picked up looking after all of our clients. And I think, do you know what? I think it's so good for us as a business that we've got somebody who is so deep and understands the text so well, speaking to our clients.
00:13:53
Speaker
Now, for him, that can be a bit challenging sometimes, because obviously the client will say, oh, I noticed XYZ, or can we do this, that and the other. He can, because he knows, he can say, yes, we can do that. When I say to a client, yes, we can do that, that's something I'm not allowed to do. That's wrong. That's why we're talking right now. But he can do that. So there's a lot of learning that's going on there for him at the moment in terms of
00:14:21
Speaker
it would be really easy for them to get off a call, jump straight into the code and change stuff. And Steve and I are like, no, no, no, no, no. We need a process. There's only three of us. We have got another developer as well. And we've got Emily who... And some contractors there. Yeah. But actually, yeah, like Steve and I are like, don't just do stuff.
00:14:43
Speaker
And would you say that the culture you've created in Carrero is broadly same as Purple Cube? Did you say you've sort of got a, is it a culture that's derived from Purple Cube? Because I'm just curious, as we now start digging into your, what you've learned as an entrepreneur, I think the last bit of context setting is just helpful for folks to imagine what kind of vibe Carrero is, and then we'll get into some learnings. I think, you know, we care. I think that's probably the main thing that I would say about us.
00:15:13
Speaker
We genuinely, like we do, we care about each other deeply. I think you've only did it to it before. You're not going to scare this business if you carry on acting like you're a family. Yeah, we know that. Like the Care Bears, that was a trio. It's great though, because it's uniquely you. I love it. Yeah.
00:15:32
Speaker
Yeah, we massively care. We really care about our clients. I hate, like, poor client relationships and client success really. You know, that doesn't need to happen in life. You know, everybody makes mistakes. It's how you deal with them. And, you know, we don't get it right.
00:15:54
Speaker
like any way, shape or form all of the time. But I think we do hand up our hands when we are going to say look and explain why. And, you know, a massive believer of this, you know, everything starts with why, you know, give people context, let them understand why things are happening. So I think, yeah, I think that's the
00:16:14
Speaker
One of the most important things to us is just having that culture of real care about people. And our products about that, our purpose as a business is for people to have better conversations, therefore better careers, and therefore better lives. It might be a very niche piece of HR tech, and it could very easily sit in within a whole tech stack ecosystem. But for me, it's the most important part of somebody's journey.
00:16:42
Speaker
is how are they communicated with? How's their leadership show up? What's their own career path? Has their development individualized? And are there values and aspirations and what they stand for, the same as you in the business? And Carrero hits all those things. And if you hit all those things with individuals, pay becomes number nine, certainly in the service industries. So it's really, yeah, it really is important. It all comes back to that
00:17:09
Speaker
We care about each other, we care about our clients, we care about what's happening to all of our users, however we interact with them.
Maintaining Culture with Business Goals
00:17:17
Speaker
I mean, one of the things that comes across, certainly to me, but I think to anyone that knows you and Carraro is the care and the authenticity. So that's the good stuff. Now, what's the dark underbelly of that sort of that caring culture and that friendship that you have as co-founders? I'm assuming you've learned a ton coming out of COVID, learning to work effectively together. Like where would you say have been the points of like greatest development for you as an entrepreneur and for you guys as a founding team?
00:17:46
Speaker
I think, I mean, our biggest learning was that we were all doing everything and implementing the EOS way of doing things has just changed the way we work. I can't even tell you, it's immeasurable. I don't need to worry about what Sean and Steve are doing because I know they know what they're doing. The expectations that we've set are so super clear.
00:18:12
Speaker
there's always too much to do. I'm sure any founder in any small business will tell you there's always so much to do and I think our L10 meetings which for those of you who don't know about EOS are our weekly meetings every week where we have seven measures and we're either hitting them and we're not and then we talk about them and we look at any issues in the business you know having those
00:18:34
Speaker
meetings weekly has really helped us, you know, when it does feel hard, and it does feel tough. I know that there's only a number of days before we can all just get together and go about stuff and prioritize and communicate and all that stuff.
00:18:49
Speaker
So read in between the lines, would you say previously, although you were close, you perhaps weren't as clear as you could have been, because I think there'll be founders listening that will be like, we couldn't be more open as a team. And you're like, I'm pretty sure you could. There's a difference between openness and everybody knowing exactly what they need to do when they need to do it by, you know, that's, that's a real, I think that's a real difference. And I think having healthy content, having healthy conflict, that's hard for us, because
00:19:19
Speaker
we're all really nice, and he is a reflector and a real people pleaser, and he's the person who's got to deal with it. And Sean and I bicker, like, we're like, you can see Steve, and I'm like, but didn't he? And we'll go, and Sean and I'll go down massive rabbit holes, and I've got a little bit of space, and he'll soak a bit, and I'll soak a bit. And so having Steve now in that almost position of power, where
00:19:47
Speaker
We've just learned more about our own personalities and how we interact. It's almost like it should never be like this by the way, but sometimes it's like Steve's like the parent. Yeah, I'm sure it's good for parenting skills dealing with us sometimes.
00:20:05
Speaker
It's given me the freedom to be able to sort of be able to express how I feel, and to be visionary, to be able to say, I think we should do this and think we should do that. And then to go, that's a shame thing to stop here. Or here's the process, Jo, for doing that. So I don't come out of a meeting going, oh, and someone's doing this, and so now we have to do this, and oh my God, and what about that, and what about that? And they're just like, bring it to the L10. And we're just about to implement brain, menopause of brains gone.
Adopting the Shape Up Method
00:20:31
Speaker
What am I doing with the tech, Bob? You know? Oh, shape up.
00:20:34
Speaker
Yeah, we're just about to we're implementing shape up at the moment. And that will make things a lot easier for Steve from his perspective as not only the not only the integrator, but also helping Sean and look after sort of product and where we're going with it. And he's the one with the most technical experience. And I think again, that will really help us in terms of when I come back with my crazy
00:20:59
Speaker
why can't we just use Google Translate to translate a whole system, you know, and going and searching AI Translate on Friday, because someone vaguely mentioned translations to me. How are we going to do this now? At least then we'll have a process where they'll just say, right, bring that to this meeting, or you can make a bid for it, or go away and find out how much. So yeah, I think you're right, it's clarity that has helped us do it. And also that
00:21:30
Speaker
I do think we are getting better now at having conversation because we've transitioned right from me having power being MD of a business that they were both worked in, to them being co-founders where you'd sort of say, okay, now we're all equal. As anybody knows, having three people all equal can't be. But Steve now has permission from me and from us as a business to
00:21:54
Speaker
have the final say. And it means that I have to be even more compelling when I want to get something out of my way. And you can be very compelling, can't you? Actually, although you've been classically modest there, and yes, I have some mad visionary tendencies as well, so I totally get that having just read a book or had a meeting and then wanting to change the whole business and giving everyone whiplash. But you also play an extremely, just a little less modest for a second, because I think there'll be a lot of similarly mad founders listening.
00:22:23
Speaker
Can you talk about digging in when you know that something's wrong, even if you can't articulate it? Because I've seen you do that a few times in a room and it is actually a really important contribution of the person in your seat, isn't it? Not to not allow yourself to be dismissed when you know something's wrong with the customer experience. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it won't, I can't go against my own personal
00:22:48
Speaker
like what what I know is right and yeah and I think having the days with you has been really good because instead of us getting into a you know backwards and forwards you step back and you do pull back and say and why do you think you feel like that and we tend to get to why it is and then this it sort of explains it in a different perspective so it's in the you know if it is something that
00:23:17
Speaker
I'm really adamant about, then I do get that sort of respect that, yeah, okay, that's why we should continue to do all, that's why we should do things in this way. And I can't tell you what they are, but as soon as they come up, I'm almost like, yeah, that's, you know, it gets to the point, I think they're probably fed up with me going, we can do it like that, but I won't be in business.
00:23:44
Speaker
I am it's actually one of my favorite things watching someone with a kind of visionary type character dealing with somebody that's more of a kind of integrator type where if you've got nice people both are inclined to back off and you have to it's really interesting watching a team just stay in the discomfort and you're like you have to say to the visionary
00:24:04
Speaker
I can see that you're not satisfied yet. You've still got that feeling in your tummy that you're pretty sure something's wrong. And the integrator's like, I don't know what you're saying, so I don't know how to fix this for you.
00:24:16
Speaker
And you can see both desperately want to just throw up their hands and say, fine, let's try it your way. And you're like, no, we have to find, like, understanding some sort of data to validate or not. And then like, try an initiative to see if we can make this go away. And if it doesn't go away, we'll try and solve it again with something else next time. And I think you guys are brilliant at that. I think it's funny how you'll tease yourselves to sort of, you know, diminish your contribution and elevate the other persons. But actually, there's real magic in the way
00:24:47
Speaker
you collaborate. And I love watching you dig in and stay in the struggle, like all of you and on their side as well. Steve must find it exhausting, like hanging on and making you explain what it is you're feeling. Exactly. And I think that's why it's important that I need that, you know, why we're continuing to work with you is that
00:25:13
Speaker
I think, you know, having gone into so many businesses myself and not only with the tech, but I also do consultancy around helping organisations be a great place to work, whether that's helping them understand what their values are and all that kind of stuff. I understand it's so much easier to see it when you're not in it and not have really bought so much of that into Purple Kit over those years, I think.
00:25:42
Speaker
you know, it was what it was. But now, you know, for me as a visionary, that's what I need. I need somebody who can hold a mitt, who can come in and sort of look at what's happening and very quickly go, yeah, Joe, let that go. Or Steve, you're right, keep pushing her. Because sometimes I don't know, sometimes I don't know, sometimes something feels wrong. And then it, you know,
00:26:08
Speaker
it might not be, you know, we might have to go in a different direction or we might have to do something different. And I don't know sometimes. So I think that's, you know, having that every three months, just knowing that we will see you for a day every three months and we can just go, you'll help us.
00:26:25
Speaker
keep on track. It's the process. It's not me because it did the same thing for me in that seat because it is overwhelming, isn't it? There's so much happening coming on. You've got these 136 different issues and you, you know, it's like you say, it's so different being on the side and having it set at all. So there are three things I would love to get your perspective on.
Challenges with Scorecard Metrics
00:26:45
Speaker
I'm gone then. Scorecard. I'd love you to talk about what it feels like with a scorecard that's all red and then eventually a scorecard that's all green and how you go from one to the other and what that feels like. Yeah. Love to talk a bit about Right People, Right See and I just love to talk as well about
00:27:00
Speaker
vision and not really just like the big picture of where we're going, but what it's like to then boil that down to 90 day initiatives and being forced as a visionary to leave things on the issues list and accept that they're not going to get done. So if we start with a scorecard, yes, can you just, you don't need to tell people what the numbers were, but can you give people a sense of what it's like the first time you put a scorecard in and each week you're looking at your contribution, knowing that you just did an 80 hour week? Oh, I mean, it's great.
00:27:30
Speaker
it's pretty tough and with me as well, what I want to do is change the numbers. I think I came a couple of times or change the whole sport. Well, I don't think that's the right, so I'm putting in a sales and marketing seat, which doesn't come naturally to me. Yes, you're like, yeah, you're at the top of the organization and also in the middle of it, right? Doing the sales and marketing to generate revenue. So from a
00:27:58
Speaker
You know, and that's where my numbers come into play is, you know, how many people are we speaking to? How are we getting ourselves out there? What, you know, what the number of proposals that we've got out and what, you know, what are we converting? How many new clients have we got? And look, we're a, we're a micro business and we don't yet know, we want, we want to grow. I think, I mean, the last time it was like, we'd like, you know, a million people to be using Carrero. Um,
00:28:29
Speaker
And that can change, right? But, you know, at the moment, I think we're quite happy where we are as a business that our growth doesn't, you know, I don't, we don't need a new plan on career every week, but we need to be having new clients and therefore we need to be working through that pipeline. And that means that I have to do some marketing activity, which means that I have to, you know, be on socials and go and speak in front of people. And that's really uncomfortable for me. I don't like doing it. I've always,
00:28:58
Speaker
managed to get somebody else to do it for me. So that's taken a real lot, because one of my scorecard measures is that I need to have, you know, at least one, what we call Connector Conversation Week, which is doing a podcast or, you know, or, you know, talking to somebody about how Carrera can assist with their business or building a partnership, that kind of stuff. So that's sort of my marketing element of it. And then my other one is to have two new conversations with
00:29:26
Speaker
new people or people that are going to be new to Camaro.
00:29:30
Speaker
And again, it feels really uncomfortable for me. But anybody that listens to you, you're so warm and friendly, you're good with people. Can you explain why did you struggle in the first few weeks of having a scorecard to hit the input numbers that you wanted to when anybody that's listening to this or watching you is going to think, how can this woman possibly have a problem having conversations? What were you doing that wouldn't have driven it green?
00:29:59
Speaker
Anybody who knows me really quite well will tell you that I don't actually like being told what to do. These things will just happen because I know what I'm doing. So that was getting my head around that for a start. I'm sure Jo will say, oh yeah, make Jo think it's her idea. And she's brilliant at that. She's really good at that. So I think having an actual measure that every week you have to do, that felt quite different to me and fairly uncomfortable.
00:30:28
Speaker
And then just pushing outside my comfort zone every week. I've just done a 30 day LinkedIn challenge. Oh, it's been, I'm really glad I've done it and I'm going to carry on doing it. And there has, you know, I have had some traction there. So I think it's knowing.
00:30:43
Speaker
that to impact the numbers on the scorecard, I've got to do stuff that isn't not like the stuff that I love doing. So it's totally about pushing outside comfort zone. And that's why it felt so uncomfortable for me. And also reporting into Steve, like, oh, no. If it makes you feel better, I hate my own scorecard as well. Like I know it's essential to my like wellbeing and happiness in life.
00:31:10
Speaker
And I get to Wednesday, and if I'm off pace, I'm like, why am I carrying, why am I dragging this ball every week? But then if I don't do it, within three weeks, I'll have totally fallen off, and I'll be inadvertently implementing the wrong strategy for my life. Totally. And on a Friday, when something happens, we do our level times on a Tuesday. But, you know, by the end of Friday, I've hit everything. And, you know, it's almost like Monday.
00:31:38
Speaker
No, my feet are not up, Stephen and John. I don't know why we were saying that, as if they're going to listen to this. So, you know, I'm like on slap on Friday, just to let you know. Because when I do it, I'm like,
00:31:55
Speaker
How I look at me with all my numbers. It feels so good, doesn't it? No, I agree. All right, so I think that's a really good insight into what it feels like to lead using your scorecard. What do you want to talk about next? Write people write C or like connecting vision to traction?
00:32:13
Speaker
Yeah, probably right people by seat. And I think probably from the conversation we've had up to now, we've alluded to it that when we started Carrero, we had probably the right people in the wrong seats. And that was difficult. I was definitely pretending I was going to do financial stuff. You know, we went, you know, Sean and we had
00:32:42
Speaker
a guy called Tom come with us just for the first year just to help us embed in, you know, Tom and Sean, I was dragging them out to networking, not their thing. You know, so the wrong people in the wrong seats, or, you know, the, yeah, the wrong people in the right seats. Anyway, you know, you see what I'm saying
Sales, Marketing, and Role Clarity
00:33:04
Speaker
with that. Completely. It just doesn't work. You know, yes,
00:33:09
Speaker
I would love to be just going around being completely visionary the whole time and not have to do the sort of go to market seat. And at the moment, we're not there, but it's on our issues list. And at some point, we'll get someone there. But actually, right now, where we are at our stage of growth, I do think it's super, super important that I am in that seat, actually, because I'm understanding what needs to be done. I don't think I could sit down hand on heart, even if we had a load of money and employ someone to do that
00:33:38
Speaker
sales and marketing role, we started working with somebody just on marketing, outsourcing. And actually, after the first couple of months, we realized that actually, I'm not super, super clear on what our messages are to market beyond the people that know us already. I'm quite comfortable within hospitality, I'm quite comfortable within sort of my wider network, and I have got quite a good network. But if you said to me, right, we're going to go into a new industry, or, you know, that
00:34:08
Speaker
That's still a work in progress. And well, as we've spoken to about reading, obviously, Awesome by April Dumpett.
00:34:16
Speaker
Is that her name, Dunford? Reading that has just clarified to me that there's still some work to be done there. Now, if I had a person in that sales and marketing seat, I'd probably be saying, why aren't you doing more marketing? Why aren't you selling? But I haven't set them up to be in that right place yet. So I think it's really important I am in that seat until we've really, really super, super clear that I can literally tell you what it is in an elevator, not an airplane.
00:34:42
Speaker
that I am in that seat, but eventually I don't want to be. Steve is great and integrated, but he's also full time developing. So he's doing two jobs as well. And Sean has just, his seat is way too big for him. So he's the right person, but he needs more people to help him. And at some point we'll decide either we'll make the technology better. So we don't need the manpower or we'll, um,
00:35:10
Speaker
or he'll get him some new people and maybe we'll look to get some investment or sell more or whatever it looks like. Yeah. And for people listening, the context there is clients that choose Carrero and Joe's organisation really value the values and the service and the standards. And so there's always this interplay between, well, shall we make them self-serve so it's quicker for them, more capital efficient for us, but
00:35:38
Speaker
remove some of that white club service element so and just Joe I hope that's you don't mind me sort of clarifying that because it's not as straightforward as just let's just build it and make them do everything themselves because actually you have to be really clear as the visionary as to why people picked you in the first place and sort of stay true to
00:35:56
Speaker
to what you've sold to. You're right, Jo, it's a real visionary meet, sales and marketing challenge, isn't it? And we always want to get rid of it, but sometimes you just have to. Hold on. Yeah, I do. And I also think that, you know, our product, if I could go back in time, 100% go, hey, comms app, you did that.
00:36:18
Speaker
or like payroll or compliance or something super, super sticky, our product isn't, and every single organization manages their performance differently. And it was only when I came across EOS that I realized actually there's a group of people that all now manage their goals, rock, nickel and rocks in EOS, but goals, KPIs, okay, whatever you want to call them, all manage them in the same way. So we've built Carrero to
00:36:45
Speaker
to be able to manage how you want to do that kind of stuff. So it's super, super flexible, but therefore it does need, it's quite high intensity. In the first instance, it's working out what it looks like in the organization, how we can use the tool to do that. But, you know, you never know if anybody wants a piece of technology to manage their ERS. Yeah, then they should.
00:37:10
Speaker
Well, I mean, I love it that you run your, your court initiatives using your own, your own product. And before we talk about the role of quarterly initiatives within a vision, just finishing off the right people, right seat stuff. Do you, do you see.
00:37:23
Speaker
poorly configured or leadership teams lacking clarity kind of everywhere you go now. I mean, I know one of our favourite topics of conversation are organisations that have a visionary, a second visionary in their integrator seat, sort of posing as their COO or MD when it's really clear they're just a crazy founder like me and you. Yeah, 100%. And I am, I'm so lucky, whereas a business so lucky that Steve is our integrator because he's not
00:37:51
Speaker
what people would, you know, the integrator is an MD role, right? And I think there's a lot of perception around there that MDs are the people that bring it all together, but also like the face of the business and the charismatic, you know, the one that's going out there and talking about it the whole time. And I think, you know, a lot of organizations can't, don't have a, small as ours, don't have a visionary and integrated that role does have to be combined, but
00:38:20
Speaker
the personality types and the skill sets you need to be both, I think are really rare. I haven't seen many people that I've thought, oh my God, you could do both of those things. Either see them being like amazing visionary, and then it sort of all collapses a bit unless they've got a really, really strong senior leadership team, or they're really good integrator, but then people don't really know where their business is going. And, you know, it's, it's quite a process driven business.
00:38:47
Speaker
So I think it's so important to have both. If anybody's doing that first bit of the VOS when you're sitting down and doing it, don't be tempted to just think, oh, we need go-to-market, we need product, we need this and we need that. Rather have visionary integrator and then pick up secondary seats. I just, yeah, I think you need both. I really do. I don't, yeah, it's crazy not to. And yes, so much now, I go, I work with a lot of senior leadership teams.
00:39:17
Speaker
But also I don't, I think EOS is the best thing that's happened to us. And I think that's only because we've gone all in. I think that a lot of businesses I've talked to about it and they're like, Oh my God, that sounds amazing. That sounds amazing. I'm like, read the book, speak to Rob. But I also think that unless you are prepared to change the way you run your business and everything that comes with that, then you're almost going to be doing, as you call it EOS theater.
00:39:44
Speaker
And I think in some respects, that's even more dangerous. Don't introduce something, go, this is how we're going to do it. And then not follow through on it. Like, that's just a car crash waiting to happen. So it is a bit cult-like. I remember when you first, I was like, yeah, we do all that stuff anyway. And you're literally sitting there going, no, you don't. And then we're doing, I'm like, I can't call them rocks. I'm not calling them rocks. Rocks, that's stupid. I'm not doing it. Well, so now 10, that doesn't mean anything. No, I'm not calling it that.
00:40:13
Speaker
You can't call it anything but an L, and we do rocks and we're proud of it. It is like
Impact of EOS on Carrero
00:40:20
Speaker
a cult. And again, why you need someone like you because you can you can all read the book as a senior management team and you can go, yeah, let's do this. But the best example in the world of it's really simple, but it's so difficult.
00:40:37
Speaker
It's funny as well. It's not like I have any secret set of skills. It's just as hard for me to implement in my own life, my own business. It's just not natural, is it? To be that clear with folks and press to be really clear on what are you supposed to do? What am I supposed to do?
00:40:56
Speaker
do we actually genuinely believe in this definition of the vision of where we're going, sufficiently to agree on the trade-offs of what we're not going to do this quarter. We're not even going to do this year because it's not in service of this vision that we agreed up top, which in turn has to be consistent with the focus that we've agreed. I think you don't need very much gap between you in each of the parts of defining the vision.
00:41:22
Speaker
for you to end up in completely different places, actually, even though you think you're aligned. So do you wanna talk to folks a little bit about that? Again, you don't need to be specific, but what's it like deciding what not to do and setting numbers where...
00:41:38
Speaker
you actually need to hit them. So many of us that have built tech businesses have grown up in an environment where we sort of set these aspirational targets and then hope we get somewhere near them, but it doesn't really matter if we don't. I mean, the whole philosophy of EOS is set it and then achieve it, right? I mean, for sure, from a visionary perspective, it's unbelievably freeing.
00:42:05
Speaker
I have more clarity now than I've had in 20 years about exactly where we are in terms of forecast cash flow, where we are in terms of where we're going to hit the end of the year in terms of, you know, are we, you know, are we sort of okay in that respect? You know, I've, I've always thought I knew before, but now I have this, this absolute clarity and
00:42:32
Speaker
And the same, I think we all, yeah, it's, there's no mystery anymore. You know, the things that I worry about on a day-to-day basis aren't, what are we going to do with the company? How are we running the business in this way? That's not what I think about now. What I think about is, how am I getting this to market? Like, because that's that seat, right? But as a visionary, I'm like, no, we are.
00:43:00
Speaker
we're hitting this, I can be out there being visionary all day long in terms of what visionary means in the OS, not necessarily. No, I know what you mean. And Joe, would you mind explaining, because you've got this massive 10 year vision, right? Like a million people having quarterly conversations through
00:43:24
Speaker
through Carrero, you don't envisage having 10,000 employees to achieve that. So that's that's creating life changing outcomes for people that were involved with Carrero massive impact in the markets that you serve value for clients. So that feels quite big. But actually, and again, you don't need to be specific on the numbers. But I remember when you and the guys set the one and the three years, it almost felt a bit too
00:43:45
Speaker
pedestrian for you. I remember you almost wanting to kind of commit too much too quickly, even though you didn't need to in order to hit this fairly lofty 10 year goal. Can you just talk through, do you remember that? Can you talk through that process and how that, and why it was you were inclined to set preposterous one years?
00:44:03
Speaker
Well, I think isn't it always like, I think society is a whole instant gratification. It's like, I want it and I want it now. And like, what do you mean it's going to take another 10 years? Are you joking? You know, I've gone around and also advising clients on, you know, it's really difficult to even have a three year plan now. I think what became really clear is that it can shift, things change, and that's okay.
00:44:28
Speaker
you need to have that vision, you need to think this company will go on beyond me. That was freeing when we had that conversation because it's almost like this, this whole piece of technology has been part of me for a really, really, really long time. And like, sometimes I just think, how can I ever, like, what's my exit? How would I ever come away from this? And I think it was through AOS that you just like,
00:44:53
Speaker
the product and the company will go on and I don't necessarily have to be there and that's okay. That, again, was freeing. It makes it a choice, not that you have to. I get up every day because I want to do this, not because I have to do this, because the company will carry on. And sorry, just to jump in. So just so I understand what you're saying there, you're saying that
00:45:16
Speaker
Once you divorced the 10 year from you having to be on a kind of ball and chain connected to it, then it felt easier to set the right 10 year and then the right three year, whereas previously you were inclined to shove 10 years of aspiration into three years because you couldn't see yourself doing it, working this hard for another decade. Yeah, that basically. Yeah, I mean, look, I'm 50, like, tech is a young people's game, you know, I know that there's a lot around, you know, the older generation and coming back into the workforce, but, you know, I see myself
00:45:46
Speaker
working at a bar or something. Not trying to innovate in technology. Not doing LinkedIn challenges when you're 60. I mean, I probably will be. Yeah, I think it's, I think that we went hard, as everybody did. And you warned us and we did it anyway. We went in hard with, you know, we
00:46:15
Speaker
So our one-year vision is going to be met by doing a number of three-month rocks. And the first time we set rocks, we all went in with, of course, we're going to do that in the next three months. We did not do that in the next three months. And you knew we weren't going to do that in the next two months. And I remember you saying, this is the cadence of your vision-building days. Why are we waiting? Why are we waiting? Why can't we do it? Why can't you do it in three days? You'll see. You'll see.
00:46:45
Speaker
It makes sense and only, I think only this quarter, so we're on our third quarter now of rock setting, only this quarter will we all hit our box because it takes a while to understand what your own capacity is. And we still, I'm sure, think we're going to do more than we actually physically can. But I think we're a lot more sensible about it now. And certainly our dev roadmap feels like it's
00:47:13
Speaker
becoming a lot more structured and sensible rather than a bit scattergun. I've loved watching it. I think it's so impressive. And Joe, I know we're coming up on the time you got allocated. If people have listened to this, and even if they've got no interest of running on EOS, but they're interested in helping their organizations become more aligned and hit their strategic initiatives in the short term,
00:47:38
Speaker
so that they get whatever they want from the business in the long term. And Carrero does have a role to play in that. Are you happy if I put your details in the show notes for people to reach out to you? And I mean, maybe it will help you hit one of your scorecard measurables, right? Talking about, I mean, because joking aside, a lot of what we've talked about, whether you do it through EOS or through whatever your existing company operating methodology is, Carrero can be tailored to that. So I guess if people have enjoyed what you've said, you'll be happy to
00:48:07
Speaker
to sort of sidebar and talk about what they're doing in their business and maybe career will be relevant. Yeah, I mean, you know, I, my question to people is, can you hand on your heart, say, you know, what good looks like for everybody in your organization, and you can touch of a button, bring that metrics and find out how people are performing in terms of your values and behaviors, how they're performing against their goals or rocks or whatever you want to call them. But also,
00:48:32
Speaker
How engaged are they with the business? How their wellbeing? What's their risk of leaving the company? What aspirations do they have? All that stuff, all that stuff. Anything to do with someone's career and the conversation you might have with them is wrapped up in it. So yeah, if you can't clearly say, yeah, I'm super clear on what good looks like here and where everybody is and towards hitting that, and I know everyone's aspirations within the business, then yeah, we can definitely have. Fantastic. Well, I'll put your details below. Joe, thank you so much for doing this. It's been great fun.
00:49:01
Speaker
Pleasure. See you soon.