The CEO Project Podcast

In this episode of The Lazy CEO Podcast, host Jim Schleckser discusses the importance of deal terms in business transactions. He introduces the concept of "your price, my terms," emphasizing that the terms of a deal can outweigh the price in determining its quality. Jim compares two theoretical deals to illustrate this point: a $20 million deal paid over 10 years with potential deductions versus a $16 million cash deal with no backside risk. He highlights the significance of closure risk, timing, level of due diligence, time value of money, escrows, and representation and warranties in deal negotiations. Jim also discusses the impact of the buyer's fit and treatment of employees, as well as the distinction between asset sales and stock sales. He explains that the choice between the two can have significant tax implications and advises listeners to consult with their advisors to determine the most favorable option. Throughout the episode, Jim shares personal experiences and insights from his involvement in various deals. He concludes by emphasizing the importance of paying close attention to deal terms and seeking expert advice to ensure a successful transaction.

In this episode of the Lazy CEO Podcast, host Jim Schleckser interviews Trent Gardner, a member of the CEO Project and part of a family-owned business called GJ Gardner Homes. They discuss the dynamics of family-owned businesses, including succession and emotional issues that are unique to such enterprises. Trent provides insights into the evolution of GJ Gardner Homes, which started as a small operation in 1983 and grew into a franchise business with over 150 franchises operating internationally. Trent explains that the business was passed down from his grandfather, who also worked in the construction industry, to his father, who started GJ Gardner Homes with his mother. Trent and his younger brother are both involved in the business, with Trent primarily focusing on operations in the United States. He highlights the challenges and opportunities of running a family-owned business, emphasizing the importance of surrounding oneself with capable and smart individuals who complement one's own skills. They also discuss how GJ Gardner Homes differentiate itself in the market by making the homebuilding process fun and engaging for customers. Trent explains their customer-centric approach, which involves open communication, collaboration, and ensuring a positive experience throughout the entire construction process. They have implemented processes like pausing construction to get customer sign-off at key stages, providing transparency, and instilling confidence in the customers. The conversation touches on the topic of succession planning and future leadership in the company. Trent expresses his commitment to leading the business for the next 30 years but acknowledges that circumstances may change, and he remains open to adjustments in the future. He emphasizes the importance of attracting and retaining talent in a family-owned business, noting that growth and opportunity within the company are key incentives for employees, even if they may not have a direct path to the CEO position. Trent also mentions the family's commitment to maintaining the business as a family-owned entity, with no intention of selling to private equity or pursuing a liquidity event. He emphasizes the significance of the family legacy and the desire to continue building the brand's reputation and success. The interview concludes with a discussion about the challenges of family relationships in business and the need to make rational decisions while considering family dynamics. Trent mentions the importance of addressing nepotism and ensuring that family members earn their positions based on merit and competence. He highlights the need for professionalism and accountability within the family business. Overall, the podcast episode provides insights into the journey and dynamics of a successful family-owned business, offering lessons and perspectives on leadership, succession planning, and maintaining a positive customer experience.

In this episode of the Lazy CEO Podcast, host Jim Schleckser discusses the importance of measurement and different measurement methodologies. He introduces KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) as backward-looking measurements that inform how the business has performed in the past. Financial metrics are highlighted as an example of backward-looking measurements that provide a scorecard view of the business's financial performance. Jim explains the concept of the balanced scorecard, which incorporates financial, internal, customer, learning and growth metrics. He emphasizes the interconnectedness of these metrics and their alignment with the organization's strategy. The balanced scorecard provides a comprehensive view of the business's performance and helps identify areas for improvement. Another measurement approach discussed is the strategy map, which takes the balance scorecard one step further by linking strategic goals to specific objectives and key results. Strategy maps create visibility and accountability within the organization, ensuring that everyone understands how their efforts contribute to the overall strategy. Jim also introduces OKRs (Objectives and Key Results), a popular measurement system used in Silicon Valley. OKRs focus on short-term objectives and measurable results, typically within a quarter. They involve collaborative negotiation and a shared leadership model, encouraging commitment and accountability within teams. The episode emphasizes the importance of having a measurement system in place, regardless of the specific methodology used. Jim encourages organizations to start implementing a measurement system and iterate over time to refine and improve it. The goal is to have observable metrics that provide a clear indication of the business's performance and alignment with strategic objectives.

In this episode of the Lazy CEO Podcast, host Jim Schleckser, founder of the CEO Project, discusses talent management within organizations. He starts by highlighting the importance of focusing not only on individual talent but also on how the executive team should engage with talent at a broader level. Jim explains the concept of A's, B's, and C's to assess individual performance. A's consistently overperforms, provides innovative ideas, and drives the organization forward. B performs as required and meets expectations, while C's consistently underperforms and fails to meet the standard. Jim acknowledges the reluctance to rate individuals as C players due to the negative energy and conflict involved. He emphasizes the need for accurate assessment and avoiding a central tendency problem where everyone is rated above average. He shares examples of government employee evaluations that showed 82% of employees rated as above average, highlighting the issue with inflated ratings. The podcast delves into the consequences of the central tendency problem, particularly during challenging times or raising discussions. It becomes crucial to identify C players for potential exit during a recessionary environment. Additionally, Jim discusses the challenges of giving equal raises to all employees, which can demotivate high performers and lead them to seek opportunities elsewhere. To address these issues, Jim introduces several tools for talent management within the executive team. The first tool is stack ranking and normalization, where individual ratings are transparently discussed and analyzed collectively. This helps identify and address any disparities in ratings and promotes fair and appropriate compensation distribution. The podcast also introduces an annual evaluation one-pager, focusing on leadership competencies and the "Five E's" (Energy, Execution, Excitement, and Edge). This one-pager allows for a comprehensive assessment of individual strengths and weaknesses and helps determine the development plan for each employee. Succession planning is another crucial aspect discussed in the podcast. Jim suggests creating an org chart indicating individuals' current positions and rating their promotability and readiness to move up in the organization. This exercise helps identify potential successors and highlights the need to develop talent at all levels. Jim emphasizes that talent is owned by the organization and not individual managers, discouraging shielding behaviors that hinder talent development. He encourages executive teams to engage in open discussions and assessments to ensure organizational capacity building and avoid stagnation. Overall, this episode of the Lazy CEO Podcast provides practical insights and tools for executive teams to effectively manage and develop talent within their organizations, fostering growth and success.

In this episode of The Lazy CEO Podcast, host Jim Schleckser discusses the concept of executive gravitas. He explains executive gravitas is about exuding confidence, trust, and credibility professionally. It goes beyond just the content of what you say and encompasses how you present yourself. Jim highlights the importance of having confidence in oneself and belonging in the role or position. He suggests that poor reference groups often undermine confidence, and one should focus on their accomplishments and merits. The podcast also delves into gravitas's verbal, vocal, visual, and physical aspects. Verbal skills, including clean and positive language, eliminating verbal crutches, and using effective idioms, play a significant role. Vocal factors, such as tone, pace, and pauses, contribute to the impact of one's communication. In terms of visual elements, being well-groomed, dressing appropriately in neutral and powerful colors, and paying attention to personal hygiene are emphasized. Physical aspects cover the importance of a firm handshake, appropriate proximity to others, and understanding power positions in different settings. Lastly, Jim discusses the role of energy and emotional control in projecting gravitas. Effective leaders can calm others and maintain composure in stressful situations. Striking the right balance between managing stress and motivating the team is crucial. The podcast provides insights and practical tips for developing executive gravitas, enabling individuals to make a strong impression and establish credibility in professional environments.

In this episode of The Lazy CEO podcast, host Jim Schleckser discusses organizational design for mid to large-sized companies. He emphasizes that there is no perfect structure and that the key question is what inefficiencies or problems one is willing to tolerate in a particular structure. Reorganizing too frequently can be detrimental to organizational performance, as it disrupts stability and takes time for teams to readjust and perform. Jim suggests using reorganization as an occasional tool when the current structure no longer delivers value or desired results. He explains that structure should follow strategy, meaning the organization's structure should align with its strategic goals. Different strategies, such as cost focus, customer intimacy, or innovation, require different organizational structures. The organizational design should elevate critical processes that drive competitive advantage while less important processes can be minimized. The importance of roles should be based on their relevance to the company's success. Jim advises considering talent-driven approaches and ensuring that high-potential employees have room to develop and take on important positions. Middle management is crucial for organizations with around 50 to 400 employees to coordinate work and facilitate progress. Jim also discusses the impact of reorganization on social networks, power dynamics, and influence within an organization. Reorganization can disrupt these relationships, affecting leaders' effectiveness and performance. He advises being cautious about reorganizing and emphasizes that no structure is perfect, but occasional changes can provide different forms of optimization and improved outcomes. For more about Organizational Design, listen to the complete podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

These high inflationary complicated environments are a bit unprecedented. There are many people that, in their entire working career, have never seen interest rates over low single digits and never seen more than a couple of points of inflation. And so, 3% raises look pretty good, but that's all changed. It's common for the people we work with to see 5-7% average raises. Some are even a bit higher because they're behind the market because we've got a few people pressing the point in a constrained labor environment to try bringing people on board. To the extent people have been talking about minimum wage, the new $7.75 an hour is $15 or $17 an hour. It is tough to get anybody to do manual labor and entry-level job for less than $15. That is still a tough number to live on. So is a lot of upward pressure on many costs, making it difficult for us to deliver our business results as we go forward. As we go through turbulent times, many organizations are what I would call fragile. In other words, when subjected to change, stress levels increase immediately. Not to get too material science geeky, but they have a relatively low high modus, meaning it's stiff like we press on it and create stress immediately. Low modus would be something that we press on it, and it's got a little squishiness in it, right? It's got some give in it. Those are kind of the elements of organizational resilience. The definition is they can easily adapt to changing circumstances without stress, easily adapt to changing circumstances. Look at your organization as to whether that induces stress into your people and your structure in your organization. Resilient organizations have sort of four key characteristics. One is they are robust, meaning they're not always maxed out. They've got buffers built into the organization, both economic and people buffers so that when there's a problem, we've got some ability to absorb that change with money, people, whatever, as we try to do it. As we try to deliver results, we're always trying to optimize. Still, I'm advocating in this environment that you want to back off that just a bit to create a buffer to create robustness in your organization, which is an ability to handle change you may not have anticipated. Are we maxed out, running on fumes, pounding it out every day, getting every ounce of everything we can out of every process, person, and dollar? Then you are highly vulnerable to changes. We got some buffer built into the organization to deal with stuff. That's probably where you want to be. Redundancy is interesting—another one. We talk about single points of failure, and this is the opposite of that, which is to have some redundancy built into your systems. It is too expensive to have a completely parallel organization, like redundant up and down the organization. And so, you may want to think about where are the critical points of failure. Building redundancy into that particular area improves your organization's resilience to change. Resourcefulness is the nature of people, their ability to find answers that don't currently exist or maybe piece together what you do happen to have to come up with an answer. The last one is what they call rapidity. Do your people run to the fire, or do they run away from the fire? So houses on fire, do you grab a hose and run in? Those are the people we want in a difficult situation, or do they step back or run away? And so, the willingness to take action in the face of complications and difficulty is a key factor. For more revenue or cost moves to make in an inflationary environment, listen to this full episode of The Lazy CEO Podcast.

A discussion about the history of wine in Napa, between Jim Schleckser, CEO of The CEO Project and host of The Lazy CEO Podcast, and Mark Gudgel, author and wine expert. Jim: For those of you that know me, and maybe some of you do, some of you don't, but I have an alter ego, and my alter ego is my involvement in wine. Several years ago, I decided to get kind of into wine beyond the drinking part, but the studying part, and, if anybody has ever done this, it's got phenomenal history and agriculture and geology and, and chemistry and all of this comes together in wine across thousands of years including, wars, death, taxation and just crazy what intersects with wine. So when offered the opportunity to talk to somebody who is working on a book in the wine space, and particularly for a very, very critical moment in history, I jumped at the opportunity to talk to him. So I have today with me, Mark Gudgel. So let's start with what got you interested in wine in the first place. Mark: Back when we were dating, my wife and I would drink wine. We had gone to a train concert while we were dating right after we got engaged, and Train came out with a wine they sold at Target called Drops of Jupiter, and it cost $12. And occasionally, I would splurge on that, but it cost twice as much as the wine I was used to drinking. So it was a splurge. Jim: That's funny. Well, even now, 90% of all wine that's drunk is below $20 a bottle. So, I get asked, is it good wine? For ten bucks a bottle. It's not a bad bottle of wine. It's all relative. Mark: A lot of times, people will ask me what's good wine. And I tell them every time - whatever you like, as long as you can afford it. I like Petrus, but I can't afford it. Not good wine for me. But if you like Sutter Home White Zinfandel, enjoy the heck out of it, and know that I'm jealous of you because I don't enjoy that bottle, and it costs about four bucks. So I wish I did. Jim: Sutter Home White Zen is known as the gateway drug to all wine drinkers. I think we all started on Sutter Home White Zindel, and hopefully, our tastes evolved over time. Mark: That's so true. I reviewed Sutter Home for the American Winery Guide years ago. My editor called me; you're giving Sutter Home four stars out of five. I said this is one of the most important wineries in the world. How do people get from Bush Light to Cabernet Sauvignon? You know, not without rungs in the ladder. Jim: Let's go to geography for a minute. Let's go back to the beginning of Napa; what group of people really got Napa started? Mark: You've got this beautiful riparian space that carves its way in between these two small but beautiful mountain ranges, and everything grows there. And wildlife and game, and fish were abundant; it was an idyllic space. And the Spanish are attempting to make their way up the coast. The Mexicans become independent, but Mexico is this immense sprawling empire, and there just aren't that many Mexicans. And so they can't keep a grip on it. So, they attempt to build outposts and send expeditions up the coast and to hold onto their land. This is when California, as we call it today, was part of Mexico. So, they wind up engaging in a strategy, and there are whole books about this where they issue massive, what they call Ranchos to people. Huge swaths of land are usually measured in leagues anywhere. Usually, they're somewhere between six and 12,000 acres. The largest was about 80,000 acres. That one was issued to General Vijo late in the process. But they're issuing big chunks of land to people, partly to encourage them to live there and partly to get some development going, and it works. For the longest time, it was a no man's land, he named that town Sevastopol when he built it. So, you've got these pioneers, if you like to call them that. And then you've got folks really establishing the wine trade and building. For more on the history of Napa Valley and wine, listen to The Lazy CEO Podcast.

Today we're going to talk about stock. As you know that there is common stock and preferred stock, but we are going to dig deep into preferred stock because it is a less understood instrument. It's particularly important for entrepreneurs because this is an investment vehicle used by private equity firms. So if you are ever considering either a partial sale, maybe bring in some cash or cash for growth, or maybe even a total sale. You need to understand the ins and outs of private equity because this is the way that the private equity firms use to gain control to gain preference to kind of get to the front of the line. Sometimes that can have tragically bad consequences for you as an entrepreneur. This is also relevant for anybody who's sort of in an early-stage company because preferred equity is used all the time in the early stage. It can have odd and complicated outcomes if you are not careful. You may not have a choice, but at least you know what you're signing up for. Common Stock If I buy common stock, I have a little piece of a company; I get a vote. We're in a season where we're all getting our request for voting for annual meetings - you get to vote for your board of directors who represent your interests in the company and so forth. And if there are dividends, meaning the company does well then you get a share of those dividends, right? Provided, of course, that the company does well. Some of these companies hesitate to drop their dividend rate because it can hurt their share price. But, you are at risk on your dividend. Preferred Stock We don't play any funny games with preferred stock. When you bring in your friends and family, your first round of money, your first half a million or million, and you got Uncle Bob and, your neighbor and a few other people coming in, normally you are selling them common stock when you do that. So that was common stock, and there was no preference, but preference is a thing, particularly if you get to slightly bigger numbers or involve professional money. This would be venture capitalists or private equity groups. The first sort of fundamental thing that you get with preferred is that you are in front of the line in terms of getting paid out. So, you're preferred. When there are dividends, you get first. If the dividends are enough to pay everybody something, then all is good. If the dividends are not enough to pay, everybody preferred gets paid, common doesn't get paid. There have been situations where preferred got their money and common got nothing. And that happens all the time in the case of dividends. And normally there is a dividend rate on preferred shares. Not always, but many times there are, particularly if you're a cash flow positive business, they might say, we're going to put the preferred shares in, and we're going to get an 8% dividend rate or 7% dividend rate. It won't look like bank debt. It will be more expensive than bank debt, but it is different than debt because you don't have all the covenants and you don't have to talk to the bank, but it does come with some other things you need to talk about. But dividends are one thing. And usually, that's in cash on an annual basis. Cumulative Preferred Stock You want to grow the business; we want you to have the cash to grow the business to make this thing more valuable for all of us. And so they'll do what's called cumulative preferred stock or pick and pick is called payment and kind. And what that means is there are two ways - A, don't pay me my 8% dividend; just throw it on top of the pile whenever there's a transaction. You owe me what I put in plus my 8% for whatever number of years you didn't pay me. So my 1 million turns into $1.2 million because you owe me some interest that you've never paid me, and I was okay with that, but I'll get paid when we sell the company. Or B - payment inkind or pick, when people talk about picking the interest, you may have heard that phrase before. That means putting it at the end, right? Payout at the end. The other way it's done is they go, look, we'll pick it, and you can pay me in more shares. But the idea of compounding interest and the impact on their value versus your value, particularly if you don't sell quickly, like, let's say 3, 4, 5 years, you're going be shocked at how much you owe your preferred shareholders when the time comes. Non-cumulative Preferred Stock There is also a bit rarer preferred, which is non-cumulative. Non-cumulative means if we can't pay you for one year of your dividend, then it just goes away, and we don't owe it to you. The other thing you get is in the case of preference, when there's a distribution of assets, meaning we sold the company or we got a big payout or something, debt goes first, but then second is the preferred shareholders, and then third are the common shareholders in terms of who gets paid. Cumulative Participating Preferred It accumulates interest if there is any; most of the time, they do what they call participating preferred; when you're not going to flow any cash, there aren't going to be any dividends. So there's no ongoing payment to them. So they are going to get it all on the backside. So it's going to be juicy for us if we do that. And what that means is they participate in the up. Not only do they all get all of their cash off the table, but they also participate in the upside that has been created while you use their cash participating preferred. For examples of preferred stock and more from Jim on this topic, listen to the complete episode of The Lazy CEO Project.

We've got another phenomenal guest today, Ian Altman. As a business growth expert and bestselling author, Ian is recognized as one of the top 30 global gurus on sales. And his same side selling academy is ranked in the top five globally for sales development programs. Everybody's running a business, and when I talk about the secrets of a great business, a great margin is one of them. Ian has identified some areas that are what he calls margin vampires. Ian shared with us what he sees as the biggest margin vampire we should think about as CEOs and leaders. Margin Vampires the biggest margin vampire is that oftentimes as organizations, we believe that our client hasn't made a decision because of price. And our sellers often lead with price, and they don't even realize it. So they'll ask somebody in a competitive environment, well, you're working with so-and-so, well, what are you paying now? Maybe I can save you money. And we've just made it so the client has been taught that the most essential part of the conversation is the price when it isn't. So it ends up being we're a victim of our undoing. We caused the problem by how we package what we do, as opposed to if we think about it as a C E O; when's the last time you made a really important decision based on price? It's almost a selection process when you lead with price. If you sell to them because you were 5% less than somebody else, guess what? Six months from now, they're going to switch away from you. Why? Because somebody else gave up 5% of the margin, and now you're at a race to the bottom, and as Seth Godin says, unfortunately, you might win. Instead, we want to say that when people are looking for this type of solution, they're usually looking for a partner who operates at one of three levels—our industry's shaped like a pyramid. The base level is what we call the effective level. The next level up is enhanced. And the pinnacle is the engaging level. As long as you fit into one of those models while you can be successful at the highest level, you're dealing with an organization that's tailoring what they deliver to what you need. They measure the results and outcomes, ensuring you're moving market share. So which level are you looking for? And now the client says, I want that top level. Now what I've just done is if my marketing, my sales, and my messaging is aligned around presenting those three levels, then I will attract the people who want that engaged level. And those people generally don't care that much about price. You can't be 300 times what other people are; those selling results are 20% higher than their competitors. The Finish Line When I ask people, so what's the finish line? It's the sale, the contract, and getting paid. But when you're the customer, what do you care about? It's just the results. And then people say, well, I think it's delivery on our end. It's not delivery. If you deliver everything you said you would deliver and the client doesn't get the results they're looking for; they wouldn't blame you, would they? Of course, they will. Absolutely. So we need, we need to be focused on results. And when we do that, we get that pivot where people say the price doesn't matter. If you had two vendors, one asking you about the results and the other asking who needs to sign off on this, which vendor would you rather deal with? The one who's talking about results. Would you pay more for that one? How much more? How much less would you have to pay for it to be a good deal? So if you paid 20% less and didn't get the results, that would be a good deal. No, the answer is it doesn't matter what you pay. It wasn't a good deal if you didn't get the desired results. If we flip that around and say, how do we have that same conversation with our clients? How do we make sure our messaging from a marketing standpoint says, if you don't get results, we're not happy? What does that tell your client? Our results are more critical than their sale. And what's the net effect? You'll get more sales. They see value in getting better results. To listen to the entire conversation between Jim Schlecker and Ian Altman as they export the power of selling results, listen to the full podcast wherever you get your podcast.