Ignore everything but the bottleneck with Ken Brickley - Episode 35 of Better Business, Better Life!

Ken Brickley is CEO of MacroActive, who has a vast range of experience from working in Silicon Valley and large businesses like GE, to founding his own startup.

In this episode, he shares the life lessons he's learnt on the journey from Silicon Valley employee to co-founder and CEO. He discusses how to capture world class talent long before you're technically hiring for the role and growing at a pace that puts clients first. 

Find out the biggest challenges he's faced as a CEO, how he streamlines his focus & energy to free up mental headspace and how to feel the happiness of swimming downstream every day! 

Ken's Top 3 Tips

1. Read The Goal by Eliyahu M. Goldratt

The theory of constraints is, imagine a box, like a manufacturing line, and you think of where the bottleneck is in your manufacturing line. You solve for that bottleneck. Treat your business, your startup the same way and ignore everything except the bottleneck, within reason. Then when that bottleneck is solved, it immediately shifts to somewhere else on the manufacturing line, and you immediately have a new bottleneck. And so then focus on that new bottleneck, but try as hard as you can, to really just focus on those bottlenecks.

2. Define your why in a single word

Really understand and know and define your why. My challenge is to try to write down a word, a single word that resonates so much with you that that word could answer the reason why you were put on this earth. It's going to be a different word for every person, right? But then really ask yourself, am I going to work and living by this word? If you're not, you're swimming upstream and if you are, it legitimately feels like you are swimming downstream, it is the coolest feeling in the world. I have done both and I can tell you hand on heart, swimming downstream is lot easier and more fun. It's profoundly impacted my overall happiness in life and I recommend it for everybody.

3. Have core values entirely aligned with your co-founder

The core team that you start with, your co founder or your first hires, make sure that your values are entirely aligned and they're really clearly spelled out. If your values are not aligned, when the downs come - and they will come, things are gonna wobble. Being super aligned on those core values makes the tough days so much easier. You know you've got each other's back. The alignment of values is one of the core ingredients in building trust. And if you don't have absolute complete trust, with your founder, or your first hires, it just makes it really hard.

Listening to this right now you might be thinking, oh man, I kind of know that person is not the right person, or whatever. I will tell you this, walk away from it. There's gonna be another idea. Idea is 1% execution is 99%. If you guys are not on the same page, the execution is gonna go wrong later on down the road, and it's going to be exponentially more difficult to unwind yourself, when you've had investors and all that kind of stuff. Make sure that you and your partner have a circle of trust that's unbreakable.

Head to our website - https://www.debrachantry-taylor.com/podcast

Debra Chantry-Taylor

Professional EOS Implementer | Entrepreneurial Leadership & Business Coach | Business Owner

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