I began my entrepreneurial career in my family’s printing company, where I became an owner, and helped the firm grow from $2million to $18+million in revenue. I then made the difficult decision to leave it all behind. My passion for helping people led to a degree in counseling, and my love for family business inspired my to help families grow, transition, or exit their business.
Since then, I have expanded my focus beyond family business to working with organizations of all sizes and stages of growth. Along the way, I discovered that business owners and their leadership teams need a simple, practical way to run their companies. That’s why I became a Professional EOS Implementer®. EOS®, the Entrepreneurial Operating System®, provides a structure and process to help business owners and their leadership teams clarify, simplify, and achieve their vision for the business.
That’s why I became a Professional EOS Implementer®. EOS®, the Entrepreneurial Operating System®, provides a structure and process to help business owners and their leadership teams clarify, simplify, and achieve their vision for the business.
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-Transcript-
Brad Burrow:
Welcome to In a World with Real Media. I’m your host, Brad Burrow. In this podcast, we’ll dive into the lives of the most successful people in business. We’ll learn how they overcame adversity, took advantage of opportunities and learn from their experiences. Learn from our experts, get inspired, then go live your story. It’s In a World with Real Media.
Brad Burrow:
Hello, and welcome to In A World with Real Media. I’m Brad Burrow, and I’m here with Kyle Danner. Kyle, thanks for joining us today. I really appreciate it.
Kyle Danner:
I appreciate the invitation, Brad.
Brad Burrow:
If you’ve listened to any of our podcasts, we like to get into a lot of the things that have helped you be successful in business. I really like to dive into experiences and things that you’ve gone through, because I think every experience prepares us for something.
Kyle Danner:
Oh yeah. Definitely.
Brad Burrow:
If I look back at my career, man, I’ve gone through some stuff.
Kyle Danner:
Are you talking about those experiences where you’re kicked in the butt?
Brad Burrow:
If you own a business, you’ve been kicked in the butt, right?
Kyle Danner:
Couple times a day actually.
Brad Burrow:
Most people if they would have known that, I don’t know, I don’t know. Would I choose to do that again? I don’t know. Would you?
Kyle Danner:
Some days I’m not so sure.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. That’s very true. The last two or three years have been really just weird for everybody. That’s a challenging thing. In some ways, honestly, not that this is a podcast about Real Media, but in some ways we’re better.
Kyle Danner:
It’s easy to get sucked into the negativity across everything. COVID, politics, what’s happening in American society, all of that. And it’s easy to focus on the negative. We have to be aware of what those problems are, but quite honestly, there’s been some really good stuff that’s come out of it that we should not lose sight of.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. Let’s just dive right into this a little bit because I want to ask you some questions. I have questions about Real Media, maybe you can give me some advice on Real Media on this podcast too. Talk about the EOS implementer, what that is. Kind of give us maybe a little bit more than the elevator speech.
Kyle Danner:
Sure, sure. Well, EOS really, it stands for the entrepreneurial operating system. And really, it’s a complete set of simple proven tools to help business owners and their leadership team. And I’m doing the elevator speech, it rolls off.
Brad Burrow:
No, that’s good. That’s perfect.
Kyle Danner:
What we do is we help them get better at three things. It’s not just the business owner, but it’s their leadership team. And we help them get better at three things we call vision, traction and healthy.
Kyle Danner:
And vision is just getting everybody 100% on the same page, moving in the same direction with a plan to get them there. Traction is about bringing that vision down to the ground and instilling discipline and accountability so that no matter where you look in the organization, everyone is executing on that vision. And healthy is helping everyone become a more open, functional, cohesive, healthy leadership team, because honestly, most of the time, they’re not. Get a bunch of leaders in the room and they end up knocking heads.
Kyle Danner:
And we find that as goes the leadership team, so goes the rest of the company where everybody’s 100% on the same page of the vision, everyone is executing on that vision with discipline and accountability. And along the way, you’ve created a culture of people you really enjoy spending time with.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. What size a company is perfect for this? Is there a certain size that’s better?
Kyle Danner:
We say about 10 to 250 employees privately held, but Brad, I have companies that, six people, and really it’s a way they love, it helps them get organized and execute on their vision. And they appreciate it. And I have a company that has as many as 130 employees. It’s really not about size or industry, it’s about mindset. You’re willing to be open and honest with yourself and each other on your leadership team, you’re willing to do the hard work of being vulnerable, which is really hard for folks to do. And then holding you each other accountable. And so, it’s really about wanting to grow, wanting to be better. However you define better for yourself and for your company.
Brad Burrow:
Why is it that we struggle with being vulnerable? Is there something about that? I’m sure you kind of know the mental makeup of somebody is like putting out there that I might not be perfect in this area.
Kyle Danner:
Human beings, our brain is naturally designed to protect us. Typically just protect us from physical harm but it’s also that emotional harm. And so, the whole idea of I’m now going to bear my soul and share with you everything, or what’s really scaring me or where I feel incapable, that goes against our very nature. But when we do that, when we’re able to kind of step over that initial reaction of not wanting to be vulnerable, so much growth can happen from that experience and it can be an absolutely wonderful thing.
Kyle Danner:
But you think about a business owner where everyone is looking to them for direction, for guidance, especially over the last two years, and then you’re asking somebody to then instead of having all the answers saying, I don’t know, I don’t know how we’re going to get through that, that’s a huge leap for someone, well, for anybody to really take.
Brad Burrow:
I think from a business, where my mind went when you said that is when we first started in Real Media, I was competing with companies that were a lot bigger. And so, I wanted to put out this idea that we were not a small company. We want to look big, our website, we want to look big, all these things. Instead of really just being who we were, that was something I had to learn. It’s like, okay, we are what we are, but there’s advantages to that as well, not being a huge, huge company. I think that was kind of a moment for me where I had to realize, okay, let’s be honest about what we really are here.
Kyle Danner:
Absolutely. I’m laughing at that because at one point, and we’ll get into this a little bit later, but when I started my consulting practice, I went out and I spent a whole bunch of money on a whole bunch of suits because that’s what I thought a consultant was. I looked good, but it felt absolutely weird because that is not at all who I am. It’s not what I grew up in. But that’s what I thought I should do.
Kyle Danner:
And so we try and put ourselves into these molds that we think people want or expect from us. And it doesn’t feel right. And it doesn’t come off right. It comes off as inauthentic. As human beings, we can sniff out inauthenticity or the BS, and that just goes back to that whole vulnerability and authenticity that you don’t come off that way. And people can detect it, they can sniff it out, they know it. And that just creates all sorts of problems for you in trying to build relationships and do business.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. Yeah. Very interesting. It’s taken me 25 years to figure that out, but I’m almost there. We’re quick learners around here at Real Media. I want to talk about EOS more, but let’s go back, talk a little bit about you, I’m looking at your LinkedIn profile here a little bit, this is my source of all my information, your LinkedIn profile here, it’s like the holy grail, right?
Kyle Danner:
There you go.
Brad Burrow:
Rockhurst, UMKC, right?
Kyle Danner:
UMKC, sure.
Brad Burrow:
Your first job as a bookkeeper.
Kyle Danner:
Yeah. So I went to Rockhurst at the time I was college and that’s university here in Kansas City. Graduated with a degree in political science and history.
Brad Burrow:
Oh, wow.
Kyle Danner:
Yeah. So my plan was originally, I was going to go into the field of education. Wanted to be a college history professor. Tried to get into graduate school. Honestly, did not have a clue at what I was doing. So I joined the family business. I think I kind of invited myself in, if you maybe talk to the family.
Brad Burrow:
They can’t say no to the family, right?
Kyle Danner:
Exactly.
Brad Burrow:
We’ll find a place for you.
Kyle Danner:
Yes, we did everything you’re not supposed to do. What’s funny is my first job was not as a bookkeeper, it was as a book binder. So I took this really nice degree in political science and history from a private Jesuit university. And the next day I’m cutting paper, I’m running folding machines, I’m sweeping floors, all of that. But quite honestly, it was kind of a nice change. But then a bookkeeping position in the company opened up so I moved over to that and did that for a while. And then another opportunity opened up.
Kyle Danner:
It’s so funny that you’re bringing this up because I’m sitting here thinking, I finished my degree, and about three months into working in the business, it hit me one afternoon when I was sweeping the floors in our shop. It’s like, wow, so this is what it’s like to work full time eight to five or seven to four Monday through Friday. I remember that so vividly thinking, oh, okay, so this is what it’s all about.
Brad Burrow:
What light bulb came on for you there? What happened when you realized that?
Kyle Danner:
It’s really interesting because it just came out of nowhere. I liked what I was doing. What I was doing was very physical, it was mechanical, it was a complete stretch for me, and I enjoyed learning. And this was learning in a different way. I liked what I was doing. I think from a larger life perspective, it didn’t really sink into the thought like, you can create whatever life you want for yourself. I was very much in this, like, okay, I’m in the family business now, I’m going to do this for a year, then I’m going to reapply to graduate school. Well, that never happened. I stayed in the business.
Kyle Danner:
But I think for me, it’s like, okay. And so it started thinking about like, well, so what else do you want in your life? What else do you want your life to be? It kind of started that long, you talk about taking 25 years to learn, started that whole lifelong learning about that.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. When you look back at your life and kind of the experiences, we’ll kind of jump into some of the other things as well, but do you see, there’s kind of some purpose to some of those things that happened in your life that have taught you things that now you’re using to help other people.
Kyle Danner:
Oh yeah, absolutely. So for example, I’m thinking about joining the family business. There’s four reasons why we choose a career. Desire, obligation, need, and greed. Desire, I want to do this work. Obligation, I have to do this work for purpose outside myself. My family needs my help, I got to put food on the table, whatever it is. Greed is I want the money, fame, power, and all the toys that come from owning a business or this career. And those are not really problematic, it’s the last one, need. I need this job because I don’t know what else I’m going to do with my life.
Kyle Danner:
And to be quite honest with you, I think I fell into that. We bounce around in all those categories throughout our lives. We have to do jobs for different reasons. But the last one I need this job because I don’t know what else I need to do with my life, honestly, that’s kind of where I fell into this, into the family business because I really didn’t know what else. I realized that the path to become a college professor involved a lot of work that was not interesting to me because I wanted to teach and there was a lot of research components that didn’t interest me.
Brad Burrow:
Why is that? Why didn’t it interest you? I’m really curious about that.
Kyle Danner:
Really, the sad thing about at the university level, especially at public universities, it’s about doing research because that’s what helps generate revenue. That’s what’s valued by the institution. I really wanted to spend all my time teaching. That’s what I love, teaching and working with students. And that doesn’t have as much value, even though that’s the really important work, that’s why we go to school in the first place. It would’ve been five years of doing research and it was like, oh man, I don’t know if I really want to do that for that position. I don’t regret not going.
Brad Burrow:
So that was the job up description then?
Kyle Danner:
That was a lot of ways and what it would’ve been. It would’ve been a lot of research. I just didn’t want to do that. Now, I have a sister who’s an academic. She loves it. She’s a sociologist. Give her a big, huge data set and she’s a happy camper. She’ll go work on that all weeks long. Not me. I like teaching.
Brad Burrow:
So let’s transition kind of as we’re moving forward here, product division production manager. Was that at Mail Print?
Kyle Danner:
That was at Mail Print.
Brad Burrow:
So you kind of worked your way up the ranks a little bit. Was Gina running it at that point?
Kyle Danner:
At the time was my brother, my brother and my sister Gina owned it. They were officially owners. I became an owner a few years later officially. And product division, what we found is that we were doing a lot of work for either in the casino gaming or in the real estate industry that involved merging client data with printed assets, customizing it to the recipient.
Kyle Danner:
So, think about like a Microsoft word mail merge on steroids with all sorts of custom data, every piece looks different, all that kind of stuff. And quite honestly, I was right in the middle of that, I was responsible figuring out how to make a lot of that work. And I love that because there’s a lot of problem solving, thinking big picture.
Brad Burrow:
Making databases work together. Printing.
Kyle Danner:
Yeah. All of that stuff. It involved the entire company. We used every department in the company to make this thing happen. And so what I discovered is I’m a big picture thinker. And I think in systems and relationships and I love that. I love that big picture view. But yeah, that’s how we really started growing that piece of our business, especially in the 2000s. There was some new technology that came out that allowed us to even go further with it, and it was an exciting time for us as a company to grow.
Brad Burrow:
Really, if you look back at the printing industry and the problems that the printing industry’s had that probably set Mail Print up to really move past a lot of those things. I mean, that technology.
Kyle Danner:
Oh my gosh. What’s interesting about how the printing company came to be is it actually grew out of a packaging and shipping store. So my brother and my dad wanted to get out of commercial residential real estate investing. And they said, hey, we’ll do a packaging and shipping store. So think like the UPS store or the FedEx store. This is back in 86. They decide three weeks later, we have a store. And it’s the first December, we have a banner month, of course. It’s a new service, people love it, lines out the door.
Kyle Danner:
January 3rd comes and no one has anything to ship because the holidays are over. So we started stuffing envelopes and doing bulk mail or third class mail preparation. People brought us stuff that was printed wrong. They were paying more for it than they had to. It’s like, hey, we’ll open our printing shop. Yeah, we’ll do that. That’s easy.
Brad Burrow:
Geez.
Kyle Danner:
So we start out mailing, and quite honestly, that starting there and enrolling in the printing, differentiated us in the marketplace. And just like you pointed out, it gave us a competitive advantage. So we weren’t just doing business cards and letterhead. And as we grew into kind of this digital mail or digital printing space where it was all customized, giving really sticky solutions to clients, that really set us apart from just a regular printer that you find down the street around the corner.
Brad Burrow:
So that turned out being a pretty amazing thing that happened. That was the foundation of a huge company now.
Kyle Danner:
Yeah. And so when I left, we had grown to 18 million and about 80 million in revenue. Now, it’s 130 employees and well over 20 million in revenue.
Brad Burrow:
Amazing.
Kyle Danner:
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
Brad Burrow:
So up in the caves and pretty cool operation.
Kyle Danner:
It Is. Currently, I think they have 130 or 160,000 square feet underground on Hunt Midwest SubTropolis. The cave’s under Worlds of Fun. What’s funny about as we’re talking is that, so I left 10 years ago, no, 11 years ago in 2010. About a year or so ago, I walked to the plant, first of all, I got lost because it had grown so much and I didn’t quite know which way to turn, which was hilarious. And I’m walking through and I don’t recognize anybody. And they’re looking at me like, who are you, and I’m looking at them like, oh my gosh, so much has changed.
Brad Burrow:
One of the things, what’s the takeaway for an entrepreneur? I can see it in my mind, the store that you’re talking about, and there’s an idea, and you guys acted on that idea. That’s how careers are launched and how businesses are launched. What’s the takeaway for an entrepreneur to think about, there’s a problem I can solve? Can you talk about that a little bit?
Kyle Danner:
Yes. Yes. So you see a problem that can be solved and you go to work solving that problem. And that’s the beauty of entrepreneurship, that’s the beauty and the driver of the American economy. And that’s how new opportunities are created that everyone can benefit from.
Kyle Danner:
The thing that entrepreneurs have to understand and really remember is one, they can’t do it on their own and they got to have good people around them. And they got to let those good people do the things they’re great at. So you can keep focusing on delivering that product or service. So I think so often what happens is entrepreneurs, they get running, and oh my gosh, there’s this whole other thing that’s called the business that you got to take care of. And such an important part of that are the people. It’s about building relationships. It’s about investing in people.
Kyle Danner:
It’s a lot easier to go out and buy a new piece of equipment, whether it’s a printing press or servers or something because you can itemize it, you can see the ROI on it. But when it comes to people and investing in people, it’s always like, how is this going to pay off and how am I going to check the ROI on it? And the thing about is entrepreneurs are so often afraid, and businesses in general are afraid to invest in their people because they don’t know how, do they have the right people? What’s this going to look like? How am I going to get my return on investment? All of that.
Kyle Danner:
And I think that’s what we’re seeing, that hesitancy in investing in people and valuing people, that’s what we’re seeing right now, if you want to call it the great resignation or the great reorganization, it’s all coming to light that, oh my gosh, we have completely neglected people in our business in so many different ways.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. One of the things that I’ve always struggled with, Kyle, is just, I guess a moment of transparency here just a little bit, but as an entrepreneur, I’ve always been driven, pushed forward, put the time in, put the effort in. New idea, let’s figure it out, work it out. And employees aren’t driven like that. If we had video cameras, we’d see …
Kyle Danner:
I’m laughing right now, I’m laughing right now because of a, yeah.
Brad Burrow:
But that’s always been a struggle of mine. How do I handle that? I’m not going to change, but you’re not going to be able to bring employees to, well, maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m wrong on that. But it doesn’t seem like they’re ever going to be as engaged or passionate about what you do as you are.
Kyle Danner:
Well, first of all, I was laughing because I remember this lesson, kind of those blinding flash of the obvious at one point, probably when I was in my late 20s, early 30s, where it occurred to me, oh my gosh, my team is not going to put in the hours that I do because they don’t get this same return, that emotional return on their work. This is a job for them.
Kyle Danner:
So I think we have to understand, first of all, that their motivation is different, and that’s just the way it is. You just got to accept it. But we have to remember also that people want to be valued, they want to be heard, they want to make a contribution. And so, in Daniel Pink’s book, Motivation, Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose, they want to be recognized as human beings, first and foremost, and not employees. They want to have mastery over their world, and they want to know that what they’re doing matters.
Kyle Danner:
And so, as you think about working with your team and really for anybody listening is, one, are you micromanaging? Do they feel like they have the power to be able to make decisions throughout the day and do the things they want to do to make sure they have a good job? Are they given an opportunity to really learn and develop their skills and grow within their profession, what they’re doing? And if they’re going to work their tail off, what’s the purpose? What’s the purpose of coming in and working, Brad, what’s the purpose of somebody coming in and working for you, some weeks it may be 30 hours, other weeks it might be 80 hours? What’s the payoff?
Kyle Danner:
And we think that immediately it’s money. And of course, we need a certain amount of money to live and have a nice life. But it’s about how am I making the world better. And I know that sounds all rosy and warm, fuzzy and all that, but that’s really who we are as human beings. Ultimately, I believe we want to create a better world, we want to know that what we’re doing is make a contribution. So if I’m going to come in and bust my tail for you, 40, 60, 80 hours a week, what’s the impact that I’m having?
Brad Burrow:
Do you think that’s more important for millennials and gen Zs and as the younger generation is getting into the work force, feels like that’s like an old school, I was told I was old school the other day. I guess I am. I want to put the hours in, I guess that’s kind of old school. But the younger generation, completely different in their motivations. Is that correct?
Kyle Danner:
I’m always hesitant to say that the younger generation is different because I think for all human beings, we want to be heard and we want to matter. Ultimately, that’s what we want.
Brad Burrow:
That’s just throughout.
Kyle Danner:
I think that’s throughout. You think about what does mattering look like? So for you, it was putting in the time and those long hours, that was how your generation felt like it mattered. For the younger generation, by the way, I’m gen Z, no, I’m an gen Xer, so I’m the middle child of this conversation so no one cares what we think.
Brad Burrow:
Well, let’s stop the podcast right now.
Kyle Danner:
We’ll just stop right now. They also want to matter, but it looks differently. They want to have a more, I don’t like the word balance because it always seem like [inaudible 00:24:24], they want a more harmonious life. It’s not just about work. But if they’re going to work, they want to know what they’re doing is having an impact on the world, not just maximizing shareholder value.
Brad Burrow:
Right. That’s a challenge for a small business. We’re in a business doing videos and content. We can’t impact the way people think about things. We do a good job. We do have that. Other companies don’t necessarily, I guess it’s not as easy to make that connection.
Kyle Danner:
And I think for those who are listening, when we’re helping implement EOS, we talk about your core focus. And one of the ways in which we talk about core focus is having everybody pull out a sheet of paper. So maybe you’re with your leadership team or maybe just some folks in your company. And having everybody sit down around the table and think about a time where they feel like they absolutely nailed it in the business, that they did something that was just like, oh my gosh, if I could do this every single day all day long, I would be the happiest person in the world. I would know that what we’re doing is important.
Kyle Danner:
And think about that, because there’s a story there. And having people write out what that story is and how they felt and what was the impact, and share that with the team. That’s part of building that vulnerability, that’s part of building that kind of open and honest culture. And what’s great about that is one, it reminds people that, oh my gosh, what we’re doing is so much more than just making money. It’s also a great reminder for the owner to kind of help bring them back to center to like, oh, okay, what we’re doing does have impact. That we can really improve people’s lives, and it can help change the conversation in the company.
Kyle Danner:
And that’s one of the ways in which you can go about building a culture. It’s like the things that you do, what’s the impact you’re creating from it?
Brad Burrow:
You’ve given me an idea. That would be a pretty cool exercise to say to every employee, what would be your home run from working here? What would that look like?
Kyle Danner:
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Brad Burrow:
Is that something that EOS does, those types of things?
Kyle Danner:
So, when we are going about building out the vision of the organization, we talk about core values, we talk about core focus. And so in that core focus space, we talk about your purpose, your cause or your passion, however you want to call it, why you do and your niche, what you do you. So if you think having that conversation with your team and saying, so tell me about a time where you feel like we absolutely nailed it in our organization, where we had a real impact. And then what do we do?
Kyle Danner:
So you’ve got your purpose or your cause and your niche. So what exactly did we do? We helped an employee or we helped a company change the conversation around their product. And because of that, not only, okay, yeah, they made more money, but you know what they were able to do, is they were able to meet another goal of being able to donate X amount of dollars to their favorite charity. I mean, really getting down into understanding what that is.
Kyle Danner:
And the great thing about thinking about from your client perspective or learning more about your clients, it’s really digging in to find out, what is your client’s core focus? What’s their purpose cause or passion? What’s their niche? If we’re going to work together, tell me what it is that’s important to you? How do you make an impact? And what that does is that just deepens the relationship between both companies.
Brad Burrow:
Can you talk about some success stories that you’ve had? That’s got to feel pretty good to go into a situation and help a company really rethink how they’re doing things and seeing, I mean, maybe even turn a company around. Can you talk about some of those?
Kyle Danner:
So one of the things, especially now, the real frustration now is because everybody is competing in a tight labor market. Everybody’s competing in a tight labor market. There’s an exercise that we go through where we do the accountability chart. And this is where we basically wipe the slate clean and create the ideal structure. And the accountability chart is an organizational chart on steroids. So we don’t do titles, we do functions because titles breed ego and personality and all that kind of nonsense. And then we also clarify what are the five most important roles.
Kyle Danner:
For one of my clients I worked with, we did the accountability chart exercise. And once we clarified what the structure is and what they needed to grow row over the next six to eight months, or six to 12 months, they realized, oh, wait a minute, we don’t need to hire two people. We can just rearrange some of our work. Oh, and by the way, we’re able to get rid of some of the nonsense, the busy work that we thought was important that really isn’t important. And so we’re able to streamline.
Kyle Danner:
I would say that’s one of the things that’s come out of COVID is that people are starting to realize, you know what, we’ve done a lot of BS work here that we don’t need to do anymore. How can we streamline things so we don’t have to have so many people around? There’s that.
Kyle Danner:
I think another activity, another exercise we do is defining core values. Who do you want to surround yourself in this culture? And in clarifying core values, they realized why the last two hires did not work out. And so, we’re thinking, this is a law firm. So it was very expensive bringing on new attorneys. And just being clear on what it makes for a right person, they realized, oh my gosh, this is why it was so painful, and by the way, that was 120, $150,000 mistake hiring those two people. And so, that helped create some clarity.
Kyle Danner:
I think the other thing, the scorecard, so scorecard weekly, high level numbers for the leadership team to get a pulse on the business. Usually the thing that’s the hardest for folks to do because they don’t have the metrics in place, they’re not quite sure what to track.
Brad Burrow:
That would be me.
Kyle Danner:
Yeah, I know. That was us too. No, we’re not going to talk about me today, we’re going to talk about you. You know how that goes. But in doing that, they started to get a sense of what was important and what really drove their business, realizing that a business line was not profitable and that they needed to let it go. But the reason why they had kept it around is that it had kind of special meaning to the ownership. After looking at the numbers, it’s like, yeah, this doesn’t make sense. We’ve got a whole bunch of other stuff on our plate we need to deal with. Let’s get rid of it.
Brad Burrow:
As you’re talking, obviously my mind goes to Real Media, and I’m thinking about us. Core values. So I’ve done some things where we’ve talked about core values. What I don’t know that we’ve done a really good job is really communicating that well. We’re small. So I think everybody knows how I feel about things. But I think we could do a better job in that area. Do you think most companies even consider communicating core values to their employees? I just think that’s probably no, right?
Kyle Danner:
Well, they don’t. So, this is one of the things that when I came out of, when I left my family’s business 11 years ago and I started looking at this whole area of business advising, the thing that just absolutely drove me bonkers is everybody talked about vision and values and mission and purpose and all this. And it’s like, who the cares.
Brad Burrow:
I have a beep button if you want me to hit that.
Kyle Danner:
We may have to drop, sorry, folks. It’s like, okay, great, we do all of this. We go off and we vision and we do all this. What do we do with it? Mom and dad grew up on a farm, get your butt out of bed, get your work done, do it all the next day. That’s the way we are in the Midwest. And so seeing all this more heady stuff, it’s like, oh, that’s all just nonsense.
Kyle Danner:
I have now learned that actually that stuff is important, but you have to be able to do in such a way that can be used. So that’s why I fell in love with EOS so much because what happens is companies go out and do, they post their core values on their website, but if you go around, I love doing this, I was giving a talk to an investment firm and they said, oh, well we have core values. Well tell me what they are. And no one around the table knew what they were. And so that’s the other thing is like, okay, you do them and you have to repeat them.
Kyle Danner:
So, so first of all, every 90 days, if you’re running a 90 day world, which is what we teach in EOS, every 90 days, you are, first of all, reminding what you all stand for with your core values and what your purpose is with your core focus as well what your plan for execution. That’s one way.
Brad Burrow:
Every 90 days.
Kyle Danner:
Every 90 days, you get everybody together and you remind them these are our core values, this is our cover focus, this is where it works for the long term. Our marketing strategy, our three year picture, our one year planner, 90 day priorities. Because then you’re also going to push the rest of this down on the organization. So one, people are reminded as human beings, we need to hear it seven times before we hear it the first time.
Brad Burrow:
As in advertising. Same thing in advertising, right?
Kyle Danner:
Oh, yeah, yeah. When I heard that the first time, it’s like, oh yeah, that does make sense, we do need to be reminded. And that’s part of it. So that’s one way. But another way, core values callouts. If you have a weekly meeting-
Brad Burrow:
Who did a great job in this.
Kyle Danner:
Who supported that core value of collaboration? These two people worked late on a project together, they collaborated, and they got it done. Or respect. Whatever your core values are. How did they practice that core value? And call them out.
Kyle Danner:
You also use it in hiring. Hiring, rewarding, and retaining. Hey, before you sign up to work here at Real Media, I got to let you know, this is what our culture is. These are our core values and these are what they look like. After hearing that, are you still in? We want to make sure.
Kyle Danner:
And the thing about is it starts with the leadership. Quite honestly, it starts with the owner. Looking at you, Brad. But quite honestly, starting there, you model the behavior and then people start doing it with each other. You start reinforcing, it’s like, hey, this is what it means to work at real media. These are the people we love to surround ourselves with. It develops that habit in the organization.
Brad Burrow:
Man, I’m so bad at this. I’m sitting here, I’m like, what you’re saying, I totally get it, I understand it. As a business owner, three months go by and I’m, what happened those last three months?
Kyle Danner:
Here’s the thing about it, we grew an 18 million printing company, great jobs, great benefits, all that, without that. And we didn’t value, and again, I’m speaking for myself here, so my brother and sister may have different opinions, but didn’t add that people component, we didn’t look at it that way. It’s like, this is your job, do your job. People aren’t like that. They need to be reminded why they’re here, they need to be reminded what’s important as far as what your core values are, what makes a great person, what makes a right person.
Kyle Danner:
To anybody who’s listening and thinking, oh my gosh, I don’t do that either, I’m awful, I’m horrible, no, you’re not. It’s like you’re good at delivering your product or service, but it’s all part of running that business. It’s like a whole nother mystery for so many people. It was for us.
Brad Burrow:
One of the things that I wrote down as you’re talking is, if you’re a business owner, you’re running a business, whatever, if you’re not a learner, you’re not going to be successful. Isn’t that true?
Kyle Danner:
Oh my gosh, leaders are readers. If you are going to be a business owner, you have got to be able to learn to take in information. And it’s not just about reading books, podcasts, interviews, news articles, whatever. You always have to be learning. And that’s one of the things I love about EOS so much is that if you create the right structure and surround yourself with the right people, and if you are that visionary entrepreneur who’s looking out in the horizon. And I’m not talking about three months from now or six from now, I’m talking about 3, 5, 10 years from now about what your business needs, it gives you the space to be able to do that, to where you think.
Kyle Danner:
How many of you, and by the way, we teach this, and admittedly, I’m bad about this, take an hour once a week, go somewhere quiet and just think? Put the phone away, go to the bar, go to the coffee, shop, whatever, and just think about your business. What’s working, what’s not working? What’s my big problem that I have to manage? What do I see out on the horizon that’s keeping me up at night? Just think about your business. And by the way, asking you to take an hour out of your week, it’s like, are you kidding me. I have got all this other stuff to do.
Brad Burrow:
An hour doesn’t sound like very much, but when you’re in the middle of a battle, it’s a lot, isn’t it?
Kyle Danner:
Yeah. And here’s the thing about it, it’s the difference between, you can be hearing, it’s like, yeah, that’s important, I should do it. It doesn’t feel urgent. The emails and the phone calls and the client demands, that all feels urgent. I got to take care of that. But taking that time to think, that’s important. We don’t do that enough as business owners.
Brad Burrow:
So take me through the EOS process. Say somebody was going to engage with you. What would that look like? And I don’t mean every meeting. What does it look like? Probably a little discovery, then we start, you know.
Kyle Danner:
So let’s say somebody raises their hand and says, hey, I want to learn more about EOS. So we schedule a 90 minute meeting with you and your leadership team. I come in, I give you 90 minutes of my time, share a little bit about us, learn a lot about you. I share the tools that is of the EOS process and the six key components of your business, and the process for implementation. So at the end of that 90 minute meeting, you have all the information you need to know to say, is this for us or not? If you say, you know what, this is for us, we want to do it, we schedule a focus day. Focus day is a full session day.
Brad Burrow:
A day, a whole day, huh?
Kyle Danner:
It’s a whole day. You are stepping out of your business for a whole day. And that freaks people out.
Brad Burrow:
I bet so.
Kyle Danner:
Quite honestly, except for one business I’ve worked with, except for one, it is the first time the team has really sat around the table thinking of themselves as a leadership team to work on the business. We schedule a focus day, we go through five things. Really, the big thing is we start work on the right, we set your priorities for the next 90 days, we call those rocks. Teach you how to run an effective weekly level 10 meeting. And then we also work on your scorecard.
Kyle Danner:
You say, okay, this is great, we know we want to do this, send you back in the business for 30 days, come back for the first of two vision building days, the end of the day, send you back into the business for another 30 days. Then we have the second vision building day. So those first three session days are together about 60 days apart. At the end, you have a two page plan that’s going to be your guide and a set of tools to keep you on track. And that’s the foundational phase.
Kyle Danner:
From there, we go into full execution mode meeting every 90 days. Typically our clients are with us for about 10 days over a two year period. This is the thing I love about EOS is one, we don’t teach dependency. Our goal is to teach the tools and get out of the way so you can run your business. I have clients who have, they’re with me for the long term. Others, they feel like, hey, we got it, I coached them how to facilitate the quarterlies or every 90 day meetings. They’re off and running, they’re great. Awesome. Whatever it is you need. So there’s that.
Kyle Danner:
The other thing I love about is it’s an open system. There are no secrets here. It’s not like, Brad, if you give me $5,000, I’m going to share this much with you. But if you give me $20,000, I’m going to share everything with you. It’s all out there, folks.
Kyle Danner:
The other thing is we also guarantee our session days. If you don’t feel like you got value, you don’t pay. So at the end of the day, you bring a check, hand me the check if you feel I got value. If not, you don’t pay me. We don’t trap people into any type of long term commitment. It really is about helping you get what you want from your business.
Brad Burrow:
I’ve had had so many business coaches over the years. And most of the time it’s not worked out very well for us, for whatever reason. Tell me why EOS is different.
Kyle Danner:
I would say one, it’s different because it is a proven process. Gino Wickman, who wrote the book, Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business, he conducted 1500 session days before he even wrote the book. So he tested, retested, iterated, brought somebody else in who was completely different, completely different than him to see if he could do the same thing, got the same results. I’m part of a community of over 500 implementers worldwide. We’ve worked with over 12,000 companies. There’s been over 100,000 session days. So we’re required to report our numbers. So it’s a proven process.
Kyle Danner:
The other thing though I think is really what’s helpful, is that it is not all on the owner. It really is about building that leadership team that you need because you can’t do it all yourself, and it gives you the space to do the things that you are really, really great at, and then let everybody else take care of everything else around you. And I think because it’s not just you working one on with a coach, because coaches do have value, I don’t want to not coaches or the other consultants out there, but it really is about building a healthy, functional, cohesive leadership team. And that’s the difference because then it’s on the leadership team to push it down into the rest of the business.
Brad Burrow:
I think a lot of coaches try to come in and figure out the problem and do their thing without the owner, it sounds like to me in some senses.
Kyle Danner:
Coaches, consultants, advisors, we are hired for expertise. And quite honestly, in the relationship, and I have been guilty of this when I’ve been more in advising role is, I want to prove my value to you because I’m going to share all my knowledge with you, because that’s the way I’m going to prove my value.
Kyle Danner:
The most valuable thing we can do is listen. Listen to one another, listen to our team members, listen to the owner, the owner listen to the team, other people in the company, and be able to listen in a way to take that information in an open and honest way. That’s where the power is. I firmly believe I’ve seen it time and time again that when you have the right people around the table, you can solve well over 90% of the issues in your business.
Brad Burrow:
Getting the right people on the bus. I’ve heard that said so many times in the past.
Kyle Danner:
Right people in the right seats and all that. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Brad Burrow:
That’s an old saying, isn’t it?
Kyle Danner:
Well, we use it a lot. We talk about right people, right seats. It is so painfully simple, but yet it is so true and powerful.
Brad Burrow:
Well, I want to wrap up. How would people get ahold of you? I think the other thing I want to ask you is who is the perfect candidate for this system? Is there?
Kyle Danner:
Do you want to be better? Do you want to grow your company? And by the way, grow does not mean scale it to $100 million. If you want to do that, awesome. Cool, let’s do that. But if you just simply want to provide a nice balanced life for you, your family, and the people that work for you, let’s go do that too.
Kyle Danner:
Again, it’s about mindset. Do you want to be better? Are you willing to be open to new ideas, open to change? Are you willing to be honest with yourself? That’s the big thing, we’re not superheroes.
Brad Burrow:
Not everybody wants to be honest with themselves either.
Kyle Danner:
I’ve had some really bad engagements because people weren’t willing to be honest. You got to be able to call it out. Like I said, do you want to grow? So, it doesn’t matter if you’re just two people starting out a business or you’ve got 250 employees, it’s really more about mindset.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. Probably one of the hardest things to change in an entrepreneur too, right?
Kyle Danner:
Oh my gosh, yes. Oh my gosh. And by the way, I say that with no judgment because I was the same way when I was in my family, I would say leaving the family business and in doing my thing, going on my own entrepreneurial journey, it is incredibly humbling, especially over the last two years, and something for which I’m incredibly grateful for, even though I feel like my butt’s been kicked so many times every day, just like everybody else who’s listening.
Brad Burrow:
Yeah. Boy, that’s so true. I mean, that probably really impacted your business. I didn’t even think about talking about COVID but I mean, how could you even, I mean, a Zoom, probably a Zoom expert now, aren’t you?
Kyle Danner:
If anybody seen me, I’ve been talking with my hands, kind of gesticulating, all that kind of stuff. I love being in front of people. That’s really hard to do when there’s a pandemic going on. And so, not only for me, it was completely changing how I sold, moving into a virtual environment, and then delivering what I do in a virtual environment.
Kyle Danner:
I’ll be honest with you, Brad, the first six months, oh my gosh, not good, man. It was hard because I like being around people in person. I did virtual work, but man, it is exhausting when you put all this energy into the monitor and you don’t get any of that human energy back. In a moment of vulnerability, did not do well with it. Was able to continue building my business, but it wasn’t until the second half of 2021 where people felt comfortable getting together and being around one another and all of that that really I was able to kind of take off and continue growing.
Brad Burrow:
Hopefully, that’s happening right now.
Kyle Danner:
Oh yeah. Yeah. It is. Here’s the thing about us, we are now after two going into our third year, we’re learning how to manage this. We’re learning how to manage it. Everybody’s making the decisions the best they can.
Brad Burrow:
How would somebody get ahold of you if they wanted to reach out and find out more about the program?
Kyle Danner:
You can find me on LinkedIn, Kyle L Danner. You can also find me online at eosworldwide.com/kyle-danner. And you can also email me, kyle.danner@eosworldwide.com.
Brad Burrow:
And we’ll have all of that in the notes on the podcast. Man, I really appreciate you coming on here. It made me think about a lot of things.
Kyle Danner:
And I appreciate because it’s fun to go down memory lane, share what I do. I’m walking away with as many notes as you are, Brad.
Brad Burrow:
Oh, good, good. Just a little transparency, I have worked with Gina in the past. I’ll just tell you real quick, I did the Women Who Mean Business video for 15 years.
Kyle Danner:
Oh cool.
Brad Burrow:
And I believe she was one of the women who mean business.
Kyle Danner:
I think it was class of 2008, if I remember correctly. Yeah, yeah.
Brad Burrow:
So that was when Joyce Hayhow was still the publisher. We done that from the beginning. Met a lot of incredible women in business. She was one of them. And then we’ve actually been up at the cave shooting in their location up there and seeing all the cool stuff. I’m just fascinated by printers and all the moving parts and all the stuff that happens in there. Pretty cool deal.
Brad Burrow:
Well, I’m really excited to meet you and I wish you the best of luck. I’m anxious to hear more great stories of success stories.
Kyle Danner:
Great. Thanks so much.
Brad Burrow:
All right guys, thanks a lot for joining us. Oh, before we go, you’ve got to do the In a World with Real Media, I got to hear your movie voice.
Kyle Danner:
In A World with Real Media.
Brad Burrow:
That’s pretty good.
Kyle Danner:
Is that good?
Brad Burrow:
The closer you get to the mic, the better.
Kyle Danner:
In A World of Real Media, we don’t know what’s real.
Brad Burrow:
There you go. Thanks everybody for joining us. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast because we want to have that control of whenever we upload a new podcast, you get a little ding on your phone. All right. See you later.
Brad Burrow:
This has been In a World with Real Media. Thanks for joining us and be sure to subscribe on iTunes and follow Real Media on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn, so you never miss an episode.