00:21 Hey, welcome back to the show. And today I cannot wait to introduce you to our guest because he is a growth and scaling guru. HR, will you please tell us who you are and what do you do?

00:31 First of all, Todd, thank you so much for having me on the show. I've been looking forward to this for a long time. 

00:37  Ah, thank you.

00:38 So I you bet I am HR Huntsman. I'm the founder of leaders edge. And what I do is I'm an organizational strategist. And we help leaders and their companies break through growth barriers. Companies call us in when they're kind of stagnated, they've stopped growing, they've plateaued a little bit. And then we help them scale upwards through whatever their barriers are through building of systems, leadership infrastructure, and of course, developing a high performance, a very attractive culture. So that's what we do.

01:10 Love it, love it. So you're a culture guy, you're a growth guy. Who's your avatar? Like who are you trying to help? What kind of businesses?

01:16 Perfect. Yeah, and that's, that's exactly the term we use as well as an avatar. So we love we love working with companies in the 10 to $100 million range that are really wanting to grow growth minded people, but they're humble, they're authentic, they're teachable, they hold themselves to a high level of accountability. Those are great companies for us, especially leaders that really like to invest and develop their emerging leaders and their teams. Those are our very favorite people.

01:47 I love it because, you know, the ones that never tend to grow are the ones that don't put that time into building other leaders. They're too focused on themselves and they don't get people to do stuff. Would you say?

01:59 Todd, that's a fact. We call it the leadership bottleneck. John Maxwell calls it the law of the lid. You know, there's lots of names for that the owners that they bottleneck everything because they are either too much in control, they're too much in the weeds and they don't know how to develop or they're too afraid to develop people so they get really stuck. And we love the leaders who are willing to get unstuck.

02:26 Right, right, right. And so talk to us about being stuck because our audience is primarily made up of people who are dealing with leadership bottlenecking where they are, during launch phase, they're very involved in every little part of the business. And as they grow in scale, they have a hard time pulling themselves out of the day-to-day on all parts of the business. How do you see that? And what are the factors are there in getting stuck?

02:53 You are you're absolutely nailing what is going on. That's exactly what happens. They begin the plumbing company or the law firm and they're good at plumbing or law or widgets or whatever it is, but they don't know how to scale they don't know how to develop people and build a leadership infrastructure. And they have all this intellectual knowledge here, but they haven't documented it so it's not scalable. And they get stuck because they really trapped as an employee in their own organization now, rather than really acting like a true CEO or a developer of leaders. And so they really trapped themselves in their own company.

03:37 100%. I totally agree. So with that being said, you know, you and I both know that this happens with everyone from the pie maker and the emith to the plumber, to the lawyer, to the tech company. How in the world do you get these people to understand that, first of all, that they need someone like you, and second of all, that they are a bottleneck, actually. And then after recognizing that what's kind of a good course of action for them?

04:11 Yeah, before we ever have conversations with our teams, we have to have hard conversations with them for sure. And they'll paint me a picture of putting out fires and caught up in the weeds and they don't have enough vacation time and their, their work life balance is terrible. So they'll tell me all these pain points. And then I will have the wonderful conversation of saying, well, the origination point is you, uh, controlling all these things and not giving them away. I'm going to teach you how to give this stuff away so that those pain points either are diminished or no longer exists. But it begins with the understanding that they are the bottleneck, they are the problem. It's not their team. They always want to think it's their team. Their teams not doing their job, their teams not accountable, their teams up functioning at a high level as no sir, it's you or no ma'am, it's you. Once they can swallow that pill, Todd, then we can begin to break their white knuckle grip of control off and learn to develop other leaders around them. But first they have to understand it's them.

05:13 Right, right, right. And that is tricky. I mean, I can't imagine you going into negotiation with somebody saying, all right, the problem here is likely you, how do we fix this? Like, how do you get them to, I guess, soften up the idea that there is a bottleneck problem? How do you get them to realize that?

05:36 Yeah, again, I'll point out this. They've called me in for a reason. So they've called us in. So they've called us in for a reason. And so they're feeling the pain, whether it's turnover or low sales or their own work life balance or so they call us in for a reason. And we really open up that reason. And then I'll point out the root causes of that reason. And then what I'll do is I'll paint them a picture. I'll pretend that you Todd, Where would you like to be a year from now? All the pain points you've just told me about? What would it what would a great first year with leaders edge look like at the at the end of this first year? And they'll tell me what they'd like it to look like. And then I'll point out the roadmap of how we get there.

06:22 Right, right, I love it, I love it. So this doesn't happen overnight. So walk us through a typical scenario. Who's someone that you've been able to kind of help unstuck themselves and pull themselves out of the way in their business that you can kind of share with us? Because let's be honest, the vast majority of people listening to the show are in this growth phase where they're trying to figure out why they're stuck. Help us through that because this is, this is, it's, Awkward for a founder to think I'm stuck when they're making money, but they really are stuck cause they're not growing. What does that look like?

07:00 So the first few conversations have to do with their relationship with the team itself, and laying a foundation for the future. And what we've realized is most companies haven't laid a really good architecture or infrastructure to start with. They've worked really hard. These are good women. These are good men. They've worked hard. They're generally good people, but they haven't built the necessary infrastructure that they need to scale. It's all been on grinding and hard work and passion and all those things. And so the opening conversation begins with what is the architecture or the infrastructure we need so that the growth you're looking for has something that can sustain it because right now it's not sustainable, which is the reason you're stuck is because you don't have this scalable infrastructure. So I began laying out the framework, the architecture or the scaffolding, the systems we have to develop the leaders we need to build the messaging we have to lay the vision and mission values that form the foundation of all that. So those are the early conversations we lay out the architecture of the journey for the year or two ahead of us.

09:34  Oh, that is music to my ears, and I know a lot of people in theory like the sound of what you're saying. But how does that, what kind of timeframe should they give themselves? I mean, this is not an overnight fix. What is the, what do you focus on first? You talked mission, vision, values, you talked, you know, goals. Where do you, how do you guide someone through this?

09:59 Yeah, we have six systems. So we have a whole year long journey that we focus on the six systems we've identified are the most important systems of business. We begin with the foundation system where we identify and collaborate on their vision, mission and values. And we make those operational Todd, we're not the people just put a nice saying on a wall. That's ridiculous. We make it operational in their hiring, their interviewing, their onboarding, it's going to roll into their marketing messaging. So we have the foundation system first, then we go to the team building system where we talk about onboarding, we talk about seat descriptions, we talk about accountability processes and reporting structures, and all this is done in a group dynamic setting of workshops where the secret sauce is everyone has a voice to it. It's not just developed, it's not developed in the, so,

10:53 Interesting.

10:54 People have voice and they're learning to develop what we call creative conflict, this highly collaborative culture. So while we're working on the thing, the secret sauce is how we're doing it and it's having all these voices put in. So the team development system, then we have the efficiency system, the accountability system, the financial system. So six major systems and it takes us a year to go through it.

11:21 Wow, wow. So you're saying that it doesn't all happen from the one person at the top who says, this is what we're gonna do and this is how we're gonna do it?

11:31 know, that's a terrible approach, isn't it? I mean, you know, as well as I do, people want to be seen, they want to be valued, they want to be heard, especially the new generations, the Y and Zs, they want to participate in their own success. And when you give them voice to participate in their own success, you're going to get them to be engaged, you're going to get them to work hard. But you have to develop that culture of getting their voices out.

11:55 Crazy, crazy, I love it. All right, so as you work through this stuff and you spend a year kind of dialing the stuff in for the companies, a lot of them are expecting fast results in a hurry when you start engagement. What are the things that people could expect as they start to align their teams and they start to kind of get behind a joint mission that they've developed? Are those some of the earliest things or what do you see happen with the culture as you start working with them?

12:29 Yeah, so the lagging indicator, which is the revenue, the lagging indicator at the end of the first year, you'll normally see with us a 20% jump in revenue. So you're going to see a good lagging indicator. But early on, what you're going to see is people wondering, is this for real? Like do you really want my opinion? Do you really want us to share our ideas and these workshops we put on? They're highly collaborative. Highly interactive. In the first two or three months, it's almost humorous. Most of the team members are sitting back like, I don't know if I want to jump in yet. They haven't developed that culture. So it does take us a good quarter, quarter and a half to get everyone's buy-in that this process, this collaborative, highly energetic, interactive process is going to be in your best interest because we kind of got to get the leaders out of the way a little bit. And that does take us a good quarter or quarter and a half to build in that trust.

13:28 Interesting, interesting. I love it, I love it. Well, I think that quarter, at a quarter and a half, or whatever that means to people, it is something you gotta take into consideration. Whenever you're trying to steer a larger ship than a little ski boat, it gets really hard to decide, okay, these little things are gonna turn the sails, which are gonna pull us that direction. And it doesn't happen where you're just pulling a 360 on a wave runner. You know what I mean? And so you're in the water, you're doing the thing. Walk us through the end results. How do people know that what you're doing is working with them?

14:09 So along the way, I'm teaching two sets of people we're teaching the leaders that they have to go from directors to developers. That's an entirely different mindset. So I'm getting the leaders to change their mindset from directors who are used to giving answers and orders and direction to developers of a culture developers of a team. I'm teaching the team to be more interactive collaborative and to risk saying things like I have an idea or I disagree or and once that begins and the culture begins to warm up and heat up, ideas and creativity and innovation just naturally begin to float to the surface. And midway through that first year, you see a very stark difference between where we began and where we are now. And we do assessment at the beginning, midway and at the end of interaction, of clarity, alignment, accountability and the growth in those numbers. And I pointed out to them, this is what you said you were at day one, and here's where you are at day 180, and there's a radical difference. And they get to say, it feels like it. We're more open, we're more honest, we're more collaborative, we're able to challenge each other, we don't have fear of retribution. So that comes pretty early on, about midway through that first year, and that trust continues through the rest of that first year.

15:37 Love it, love it. Okay, so, I love these conversations because for those of you listening, you know that I talk about a lot of these things all the time. I'm very passionate about what your message is today because you really cannot grow and scale without the types of things you're talking about being put in play. For those listening, I highly recommend you check out HR's content. He's posting, he's doing things, he's got course programs all sorts of stuff you can participate in. We're going to put links to all that in the show notes here, but HR, if you were to identify with the types of clients you work with who don't adapt, who don't follow these foundational principles in trying to grow and develop. First of all, does that happen? Second of all, what happens to the company? Have you been able to monitor and see what happens to those after three, four years? 

16:39 Sure. Yeah. And we have experienced a handful of those, for sure. Unfortunately, not all leaders who say they want to change really want to change because change is painful. It is for any of us to learn and grow. It's a painful process. And some leaders who say they want it aren't willing to go through that transformation. So what happens is they revert back to what they're comfortable with. And that usually is giving direction. They just like to tell people what to do and they'll throw their hands up and, why can't just people do their jobs? You know, that's their, I just want people to do their freaking jobs. And so we do see that. And what happens is sadly, the people who had the guts to risk trust and vulnerability and authenticity, I asked them to risk that and to try and to give into the process and they have the guts to say I disagree or I have an idea and then it's shut down and it breaks my heart when those people they'll go back and say I gave it a shot. I have the scars to prove it. I'm not going to do it again.

17:50 And then they self sabotage their entire operation.

17:52 They self sabotage their entire operation. They don't break through the barrier. And they usually end up blaming their team or you know, whatever. And it's really their unwillingness to change. And it makes me sad, because there's so much creativity and innovation left on the table. There's so there's so much brilliance out there and people aren't going out to get it, Todd.

18:12 Well, and it's heartbreaking when the business model itself is absolutely phenomenal, but then the execution falls into that bottleneck again and again and again, and it's like, come on, this could be an amazing operation if you just let go of the reins a little bit and put some trust. You know what I mean, it's crazy. 

18:35 That's a fact. Yeah, go ahead.

18:36 So HR, yeah, so as you work through these initiatives and you work through these programs, and I know you're not the only person out there that does this type of thing, what do you recommend to the typical person who's finding themselves in a scenario where, hey, I just launched my business from the last five years and I'm profitable, I'm making money but we are stuck in that five to 15, maybe five to $20 million revenue range. What do you suggest they do first off?

19:08 So I gave a keynote last year to large medical conference and I likened starting a business or growing a business to climbing a mountain. I've climbed Mount Rainier eight times. I've climbed Kilimanjaro once and there are a lot of crossovers and one of the first pieces of advice I give is get a guide to help you with your climb team. Don't try to climb the mountain yourself. It's a tough freaking climb to build a business is really, really hard. And so get a guide to help you with your climb team. I've had guides on all my summit climbs. I've been a guide on summit climbs. So my first piece of advice is lay your ego aside and stop thinking that you have to climb this thing on your own. Get a guide, work with a team. That's my first piece of advice.

20:00 Love it. Love it. And a guide can come in the form of a an individual, a peer group. Like, what do you suggest?

20:10 Yeah, mentors, I've had mentors throughout my journey. I've hired coaches, I've hired consultants. The smartest thing I've ever done is surround myself with people smarter than me. I'm, I'm not all that I'm not all that smart. But I'm smarter. I'm smart enough to know that I need people smarter than me. So surround yourself with good podcasts, good books, good mentors, a good peer group, a good consultant, a coach. Lay your ego down and get a good climb team around you.

20:42 Love it, love it. I think that's a fantastic first step. And before we wrap up this interview, which by the way, I know we could go on and on and on about this stuff, but I really feel like this is a lot of meat for a lot of people to take in right now. And if you're listening and you're thinking, holy crap, maybe I am the problem, there's a really good chance that you are. And so I need you to take a step back. I need you to follow HR's advice here and, and just take a look at what is the bottleneck of your growth and there is a very high likelihood that it's you. Take that step back, eat some humble pie and say who's going to help me? Is it a coach? Is it a consultant? Is it a peer group? Is it all three? Is it multiple places I can get this help from? And HR, lastly I want to know for you, is there a mentor? Is there a group? Is there someone that's been kind of that stabilizer or that mentor for you in the growth of what you're doing.

21:45 Absolutely. I've hired quite a few people over the years. But through throughout it all, I have good mentors. Jerry. Jerry is a very wealthy businessman here locally. He's 30 years. He's 30 years my senior, an amazing almost father figure to me and helping me grow my business. I started 28. He's been with me the entire 30 year journey. I've been doing this. Nancy was a high executive at Starbucks. And and she's invested in me. Absolutely. Jerry and I would not be where I am. I wouldn't be able to give the advice I can give without these two people investing in me, which is why I love investing in young leaders. I want to pay it forward.

22:27 Love it, love it, love it. I love it, it's great. A great, great interview for, it's actually perfect for the audience. And so I appreciate what you're doing and I know that we're gonna be throwing some links down in the comments below of things you wanna push people towards, some initiatives that you're working on. And lastly, HR, if there's one thing that you could leave in everyone's ears as they leave this interview, what would that thing be?

22:58 First of all, starting a business and running a business is very hard. I commend any of your listeners that are trying to do what we're talking about, climb that summit and build. It's really hard. Leadership is difficult. So the first thing I do is I applaud all of you. You Todd, every one of your listeners is doing this. I applaud you all. It's hard work. I champion you. Again, the first thing I would encourage you to do is reach out to someone me, people like me to help you help you climb your summit. I'd love to chat with you myself if that's something that you would like to do.

23:33 Love it. Fantastic. Well, thank you so much again for the time, and HR, again, thank you for the time. Thanks for what you do. Thanks for all the people you help. And for those of you listening, check it out. Go see what he's got to offer you and see if there's a good fit there. If not, find somebody, find some people, find anyone to help you see the things that you're not seeing in your business because chances are there's a lot of them. And when you do, That's when you start to see the change that you need to make and grow in the way that you should. So, appreciate you very much.

24:07 Thanks, Todd. I really appreciate you and what you're doing. I champion you. Thank you for having me on. I really enjoyed our conversation.