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15 Mistakes I Made as a CEO


today I want to talk about the 15
mistakes I made as a CEO that can save
you millions of dollars so look a lot of
it has to do with what phase of your
career you’re at as a CEO meaning your
startups you you’ve never been a CEO
before maybe you mean a CEO for about
five years but you got a plateau your
CEO for ten years counter experience and
you feel good about your philosophies or
maybe you’ve shadowed under some mario’s
and you’re a CFO CMO CEO you’re about to
get promoted to CEO and you’re trying to
figure out some areas blind spots that
you may have I want to share 15 of them
with your dog a lot more mistakes I made
I’m gonna give you 15 it done let me get
into a point number one not
understanding the pendulum of decision
making process let me explain to what I
mean by this when you’re first getting
started you have to touch 100% of your
decisions because you’re the only
employee you don’t have a lot of other
people maybe may have five employees
maybe that 100 percent of decisions goes
to 90 percent of decisions 80% of the
decisions 70 percent of the decisions
the goal is to eventually get to 10
percent of the decisions for you to make
so why 10 percent because you have built
the right amount of leaders and they’re
taking responsibility for 90 percent of
decisions and you run the five to ten
percent mark now why is that some people
like to know and make decisions for
everything when you’re not really
building leaders and sometimes your
leaders don’t like that because you’re
not showing enough trust into them and
knowing that they can do it and that’s
one of the mistakes you can make too
early on but also sometimes as people
just let go of all the decisions too
early I don’t need to be part of
anything you make the decisions you make
the decisions you make the decisions I
made this mistake
multiple times some have to do with
contracting some had to do with verbage
some have to do with negotiations some
have to do with the relationship with
vendors with carriers with partners with
technology vendors I had a technology
company that was upset because somebody
prior to us was communicating with them
and there was a miscommunication but the
point is whatever that 10% is for you
your goal is to get there when you do
get there
never release all the decisions out know
what you have to be a part of and still
touch the main decisions to be made
number two just focusing on the positive
let me explain to what I mean by this
you don’t want to talk negatives with
your executive team or your leadership
it’s always positive positive no no
we’re not going to focus on this
positive positive positive positive we
it’s positive thinking because we have
to stay positive wrong
positive thinking may be good for
somebody that’s in sales or somebody
that’s an independent contractor real
estate agent selling as a CEO a big part
of your job as a CEO is to take the
negatives off of other people and you
have to bring up the negatives you have
to talk about the crisis you have to
talk about the problems not everything
can be positive all the time because
first of all it’s not real its fake and
your people kind of see a level of fear
and insecurity in you and not wanted to
talk about the problems that’s out there
everyone knows the problem exists
everybody your folks working with you or
not fools they know it exists you got to
bring it up and talk to them and you
have no idea how many times when you
bring up the negative the Christ is the
issue to talk to them about they have so
much respect for you because I said Wow
he’s not afraid she’s not afraid we like
following him in the way he’s leading us
right now number three hiring people you
like so many times people only hire
people they like it’ll not only cost you
a lot of money normally it’s a friend or
relative that you hired because you like
them it’ll end up hurting you with the
relationship costing you money confusing
your peers some of your peers may sit
there that are working with your
employees and they say you know what
this guy favors people ends up hurting
you so don’t just hire people you’re
like how are the people that you’re
really looking for for whatever the
position is number four don’t compromise
the non-negotiable let me explain to
what this is when you’re dating and
you’re looking for somebody you’re gonna
have a few things that you are not
willing to compromise that no matter
what it is even if I like everything I’m
not willing to compromise the following
three things that’s right was that I’m
not compromising these three things so I
may date somebody and I like them we
have a lot of connection together but if
there was a few things I am not
compromising it everybody has that in
the world of business I had a meeting
earlier on and I sat down and I said I
just want you to know this I am very
good in my decisions hey pal we’re doing
this check can we do this with 401k
match and check can we do this with
health insurance check can we do this
world health check and we do benefits
program with this explain it to me then
up can we do this with check check check
can we do this nope this is where I draw
the line
because this is part of my
non-negotiable whoa Patrick’s pretty
serious about this everything else you
just got in for me I mean negotiate
and say I’m gonna go come and you know
have a call with them because I think I
can negotiate a little bit more on this
I think they’re winning right now we got
to get to the fifty-fifty part but
everything else that’s part of the
non-negotiable I am NOT negotiating this
is where I draw the line we’re not going
to pass this do not compromise you’re
non-negotiable stick that I could be a
cultural thing it could be the standards
you have expectations you have don’t
compromise it because if you do it once
everybody else is what he did with Mary
you did it with Johnny you did it a
billion how come you’re not doing with
me and then you have to explain yourself
to everybody then you lose your
leadership influence that Chef and
everybody’s like yeah but yeah but yeah
but and that’s gonna hurt you and keep
you up at night so do not compromise
your non-negotiable you know exactly
what those things are don’t compromise
next second-guessing yourself I
second-guess myself multiple times in my
career but here’s the key if you look at
the sentence how I ended it says
second-guessing yourself in areas you’re
an expert in what does this mean
look there’s areas that I’m not an
expert in what I do second-guess myself
so if I’m second-guessing myself in
areas I don’t know a lot about I bring a
pool of people so we can make a decision
together and I’ll bring three to five
people say what do you think about this
what do you think about this and
sometimes people that are disagreeing so
I can kind of get the balancing on who’s
making the decision right but there are
areas you are an expert in there are
areas that no one knows more than you do
not second-guess yourself in those
specific areas I am in my fifth year as
the CEO I believe four tiers of CEO and
at this one was like 2013 2014 and we’re
going through an interesting time
challenging time and a couple guys that
work with me they made me second-guess
myself and I was constantly
second-guessing for about an 18-month
period that 18-month period
we grew but we weren’t growing out 100%
over 75% rate we were growing like 15 20
percent
I said no more second-guessing this is
sue Peabody is in these areas I know
what I’m doing I know what I’m an expert
in I’m gonna lead this way I’m not
negotiating this is what my expertise is
all the other areas if you want to give
feedback sure I’ll get other people’s
feedbacks but not in the areas that I
that you are an expert and do not
second-guess yourself in areas you’re an
expert and nobody who’s a real CEO
that’s got 50
toys 20 employees 30 employees you
didn’t get to that point by pure luck
would have been an expert in an area you
are an expert in an area trust your
expertise next speed of decision-making
process look there are some decisions
you got to make a move on and there are
some decisions that take a little longer
down there was a decision I had to make
that affected every department and what
I noticed all of a sudden was as I was
not fully ready for the decision in my
mind I was 90 percent there but I was an
honor percent it was a very big decision
all of a sudden I noticed every
department was kind of not moving
swiftly because everybody was waiting on
me this lasted three weeks I had a
meeting one day I said listen I just
wanna let you guys know here’s my
decision this is what I’m doing I’m not
going back here’s what we’re doing
moving forward were going with this this
is a decision everyone should have seen
the look on everybody’s face relieved
everybody said Patrick thank you so much
for finally making this decision we know
it was tough but we’re glad you made
this decision because everybody can now
move on so a lot of times you are
hanging on to a decision thinking it
only affects you we’re in reality it’s
affecting so many different departments
they’re just waiting on you to make a
decision so either no decision
yes decision what is it we’re not doing
it but make sure you make a decision
depending on what some of these things
are on the timeline can hurt everybody
in that organization next taking your
eye off the money early on in my career
probably your two or three who are gone
gone gone going I’m hiring I’m hiring
I’m getting technology investment office
you know marketing big event conference
speak all these things I’m the market
I’m trying to get everything going with
the company then one day I come in and
my Director of Finance comes up and says
hey I just want to show you the check-in
account all around and she brings up
that this was 2011 late 2011 early 2012
she brings a business checking account I
said really she said yes I just I think
you should need to know this and I
looked at her she looked a little
concerned I said wow we ought to be
concerned the count is very low I had no
idea the count was that low I said and I
said what do we need to do about this
right now step back made a list
everything we had to do cut the few
things that we have to cut go out there
and you know drive sales every time you
don’t pay attention to money it’s
normally
do not pay attention to sales I wouldn’t
look at everything every behavior that
had to do to drive revenues back up pom
pom pom pom 36 months were back at it
we forex the amount of savings we had in
the account and we were good to go on we
were solid now from there on everything
with data with dollars with numbers I am
paying attention to the money because we
have to if you don’t nobody cares more
about the money in a company then you as
a CEO you’ve got to pay attention to the
money because no one cares about the
money more than you
now if the CFO CMO CEO nobody they’re
good at what they’re doing but nobody
cares more about the money than the CEO
the company next having outside counsel
outside of your board meaning when you
build a business and let’s just forget
an investor you have a board right this
board is giving you advice on what to do
and here’s what we do with this and you
have to go through the governance and
all this stuff and you want to do with
this you want to do with that what do
you feel about this and they’re all
giving you feedback and sometimes as
you’re dealing with board the board
wants you to take feedback it’s very
weird dynamic let me explain – it’s
almost like a relationship where whoever
does that whoever’s the leader of the
relationship somebody always leads a
relationship sometimes it’s a man
sometimes a woman but somebody always
leads a relationship and the dynamics of
very depending on whatever the
relationship is say you are the person
that’s the leader that relationship if
you get to a point where maybe you’re
second guessing a little too much you’re
putting concern on everybody else people
don’t mind you asking feedback but
little too much makes them feel like you
don’t know if you’re leading an
organization in the right direction as
well so as you’re dealing with board ask
questions take feedback well you got to
have an outside board outside of that
that you are getting counsel on some of
the stuff you’re processing and you go
into the board prepared a Vistage is a
great organization to be a part of it’s
all over the world
you pay twelve fifteen hundred dollars a
month to sit with another eight other SC
executive CEO CMO CEOs and somebody
who’s the chairman of the board you come
into the Vistage group they’re all over
the world you’ll come and say here’s
what I’m ranking with my personal life
my marriage my finances my health and
there’s one crisis that I want to talk
to you guys in process together then you
take the lead and everybody gives you
feedback I’m trying to raise money we’re
about to lose money so Vistage YPO yo
there’s a lot of em out there depending
on what size that organization you are
but you typically my recommendation is
to get a board outside
existing board that you are reporting
all the numbers to and we have enough of
a position where you are willing to take
but at the same time you got to be
assertive so they know you’re leading as
well
number nine favoring people number nine
is favoring people favor favouring
people is very similar to hiring people
you like you’ll have a team you’ll have
people you work with you’ll have certain
people that you favor the moment
favoritism takes place in an
organization if you lose trust with a
lot of other people like let me give you
an idea I immediately had an environment
where I realized look I had somebody
that I liked and I wouldn’t fire this
person wouldn’t let her go I moved her
in five different departments and
everybody started saying Pat we know you
favored her we know you’re like her it’s
just not working out finally I had to
sit down and course direct them into a
career they told me what timeline they
have they finally chose the career that
they were excited about said are you
excited about the snow maybe you ought
to consider doing this she got excited
then she chose to leave and we made a
decision realize and I’m not gonna be
doing that anymore this was in 2012-2013
and we moved on what’s the moral to
store here with you once I made that
adjustment I made it very clear even
people that I have a relationship with
or a friendship with or an association
with in the company it was very simple
if they were out of line it was very
clear that listen I don’t favor the
decision that was made if even family
was out of line I don’t favor this
decision that was made now you have to
be respectful diplomatic all of that
this is not being a jerk about it but
people then started realizing you don’t
favor people Trust goes up because
you’re gonna treat people fairly not
equally because some of your guys are
more important than others but at least
you’re gonna be fair favor and people
you’re gonna lose a lot of trust in your
organization number ten knowing who to
take counsel from and who not to very
critical let me explain everybody is
gonna give you advice everybody so for
for example we started going through a
phase which it was like so we want to do
a meaning and you guys give your advice
on how we can make the company better
because this is out of an article we
read it’s so nice because it’s great
when everybody gives feedback give us
your feedback on what you think so all
of a sudden this feedback I think we’re
doing this wrong I think we’re
not wrong I think we’re doing this wrong
and then all of a sudden I’m sitting
there saying terrible idea who are you
to tell us we’re doing these things
rugged and I realized credibility is
what’s predicated based on your advice
being heard you can put a lot of advice
you want by the way again what I’m
saying a lot of people are not gonna
agree with because if you go read
Huffington Post if you go read Fortune
magazine or money magazine written by
these journalists they say things like
you have to be willing to want to hear
everybody wrong if you want to build a
big organization because you could be
taking advice from somebody that’s never
made more than $45,000 a year telling
you how you’re doing 10 different things
wrong and then you sitting there saying
what am I doing this here for this makes
no sense to me
you can’t lose your core so I started
looking who has given the advice what is
the credibility what is the expertise
what is the background how long have you
been here to know the culture to know
what we stand for to know the history of
it then I’m willing to take counsel from
you there’s a lot of consultants when
you start a business when you become a
CEO you pay me $20,000 I’ll be able to
fix your problems for you ma’am if
you’re so good at solving my problems
for me you would never be a consultant
you go run a company and be a CEO if
you’re such an expert you become a
concern the first place you know a lot
of times people become consultants
because they couldn’t make in the world
of business running a business is not
easy
all of these coaches I’m a life coach
I’m doing all this other stuff if you’re
so incredible at being a life coach why
don’t you go build a company and have a
couple hundred employees and sell it for
a couple billion dollars but that’s not
what I like to do no because you know
it’s hard there’s a big difference
between talking about all these cultural
articles 19 points where people don’t
love each other and have autonomy and
all these other things nice great suite
looks very good in a utopian world where
unicorns fly when you’re running the
business there’s a complete different
ballgame you have to understand who to
take advice from and who not to take
advice from based on where they’re at
again not a lot of people gonna agree
with this but I’m giving you those
mistakes I made and you can do whatever
you want to do with the number 11 not
studying data so you’re running you’re
gunning now some people are studying way
too much data and they forget about the
emotional side of human side there’s
human side you cannot ever lose the
human touch ever you cannot ever have
that conversation I was having a
conference call earlier this morning
this conference called I’m talking to
one of our executives and he sounded
defeated and I’m going through it with
them and he reported numbers for their
office on what they were doing and it
was the worst ever so rather than taking
the approach of just going Dadda Dadda
Dadda Dadda that we didn’t do this and
you didn’t do this and you didn’t do
that
I took completed front approaches tell
us how much you know I don’t you
understand something here I said you
know I can give you ten different things
I can give you five different things but
here’s what I can tell you you got an
office with about 60 people that work it
worked there right he said yes I said
sometimes when you have something you
face where it’s a loss right and you get
defeated you lose that defeated energy
is felt by everybody and you don’t even
know it it’s felt by your support your
customer service your sales your
organizational people your processors
everybody you just got to pick yourself
up I said listen
how many times have I told you how much
I respect you for your character your
values who you are as a human being as a
father just a guy that never drank in
his life he’s disciplined church-going
so kind to his wife incredible kids
every time I’m around his kids I’m like
I wish my kids had more friends like
their kids because their kids are
incredible kids literally I love this
guy’s kids and I told him who he is as a
human being I said listen you lost I got
it you ain’t defeated though and you got
to change your attitude go take a cold
shower make a list of 20 things that
makes you special as a human being
remind yourself who you are and then go
do that to everybody around you because
if you are defeated your people aren’t
you’re drained they need to hear from
you he says thank you so much for it
counts like to call them afterwards we
had a funny conversation take a cold
shower already ha ha now yet anyways we
took took care that I moved on here’s a
point though going back to this not
studying data set that emotional side
aside now go to the other side so many
times you don’t look at their data they
look at their trends they don’t measure
month to month they don’t measure all
this and there’s a lot of things I’m
going to be talking about that the vault
conference we’re holding at May 1st to
May 4th in Dallas that’s three days I’m
going to be covering a lot of data in
two ways to study sometimes people say
we’ll study dad or predictive analytics
and people say I have no idea what
you’re talking about what do you mean by
predictive analysts what I mean by data
I don’t understand what you’re saying
really I don’t even know where to start
you got to look at your numbers and
measure all of them maybe I’ll do
another video or something like that of
course specific to data but you got to
study your numbers all of it measure
everything to everything season to
season quarter to quarter month to month
week to week day to day you will learn
so much about the trends of your
business number twelve avoid hiring
resume builders mistake I made so this
whole idea of well you know what why
don’t we hire people and train them here
and develop them here and do this and do
this and do that and we build them up
home office support not sale sales you
got a build sometimes sales I want
greenies I’m not really looking for a
guy that’s been in sales for 20 years
because sometimes they come in and they
are they know everything can’t teach
them everything I’m talking home office
support right so you hire resume
builders and so what you don’t know
about these twenty four year olds are
coming here because they only want to
work here for two years get a couple
raises then use that raise and go
shopping to other company saying this
company pays me this much are you
willing to pay me eighty if you do I’ll
leave and then boom they leave you all
that time into them they left or they
threaten you they’re off for me that’s
what you’re gonna give me and then you
are in a position we’re like oh my gosh
this is kind of like what is the
situation I mean and it’s kind of tough
and you’re kind of annoyed and you’re
not but you do you don’t you are the
linchpin or they’re not a lynchpin so
here’s what I recommend you do many
times you can’t afford it when your new
company I fully get it believe me I
hired you know people that I had to just
bring on board to help me out of many
different areas that we’re not experts
in the goal is to get to a point where
you don’t just hire resume builders
depending on the kind of culture you
want to build you hire people that are
already done that two to three other
companies okay they’re coming to you
because they want to stay and they’re at
a number in the market where that’s
their value it’s not gonna be a 50%
spike anymore
they want to come to you I want to work
with you perfect now bring all the value
that you learn to me rather than getting
maybe a 24 year old getting a 36 year
old career wife kids husband settle down
the economy to get their parkland they
need a little bit more stability than
just risk to go all over the place so
avoid hiring resume builders avoid
hiring resume builders next a comp plan
that doesn’t produce the results you
want what do I mean by this so many
times I look at a company they’ll come
down a CEO will come here with their
executive team or I’ll do call
them were some like that or they say Pat
here’s where I’m at what do I do to dry
my organization I’ll say listen let show
me your comp and say what do you mean
show me all the executives you have and
show me their comp plan and if show me
your sales ppm and show me their
accomplish them your support team you
haven’t show me their comp plan I don’t
get what you’re talking about
how do you pay them well I just pay them
like this well that’s the problem your
compliment sucks how do you want me to
pay them you got to readjust
I have probably and I’m not kidding with
you I probably changed my comp plan
probably a hundred times I’ve changed my
comp plan a hundred times you know why
every time I was trying to find what
produces the emotion and the results I
want sometimes your comp plan could be
the reasoning that some people are you
know cutting the line and breaking the
rules and sometimes breaking the laws
because it’s affected by your comp plan
you’ve got to have a comp plan that
produces exactly what you want from your
employees your staff your support your
exec and your salespeople number
fourteen experience talent equals money
don’t be cheap if you want to get the
right kind of talent maybe you get
somebody that’s cheap but their talents
are also cheap if you want to get some
legitimate quality talented people that
come with value to you not you have to
train them everything sometimes you got
to cut that check but by the way
normally when you’re hiring people a lot
of times people hide for now they hire
for a month from now there are for two
months from now when it gets too pomo
you really want to build an empire you
are hiring for a year from now you are
hiring for eighteen months from now
you’re not hiring just for a month you
know we go through a lot of times with
our businesses different businesses that
we have and sometimes we need this
person today and then we need that
person today we need this person today
it’s crisis Crisis crisis hiring you’re
not hiring for twelve months you got a
higher six 12 18 months similar to when
you get a lease you don’t get an office
space for what you need today you get an
office space for what you need twelve
months from now 18 months from now
that’s what you do we got a big office
space here nearly 30,000 square feet and
guess what we’re now trying to get the
next-door space we’re negotiating to get
another 15 20 thousand square feet
because we grew now we’ve been here for
about 18 months so we did that properly
but we all of a sudden out but we need
to get more space so the same as goes
with space the same goes with talent and
last but not least micromanaging let me
explain so you’ll read these books
article
they’ll make you feel guilty about
micromanagement don’t micromanage your
real leader doesn’t need to micromanage
your real leader doesn’t need to do this
and all this other stuff so typically
what this is what people do that’s once
you know I’m not the type of person that
micromanage as I leave you alone yeah
but six months later after they break so
many different things then you start
micromanaging so this person is not used
to you being that way rather you
micromanage upfront and you let go later
and you trust them to make the right
decisions because you micromanage them
early on and if you don’t micromanage if
you don’t hold people accountable don’t
expect to get people hitting deadlines
hitting the numbers you want the results
you want then you’re definitely upset a
lot of different people anyway so
there’s two videos I want you to watch
one of them is 19 qualities of a great
CEO and the other one is 7 audiences
every CEO has this one is one of my
favorite videos because sometimes when
you’re communicating with different
audiences you can’t speak the same way
and I had to learn this the hard way 7
audiences every CEO has and if today’s
video you want the PDF click on a link
below in the description to go get the
PDF for today’s video and last but not
least if you haven’t subscribed to this
channel please do so take everybody thanks for watching
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