71 | Unlock Business Success: The GAME-Changing Strategy Revealed: Justin Deese

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Show Information

Episode Number: 71

Date: January 27, 2025

Duration: 27:17

Host Contact Information

Host: Justin Deese

Website: JustinDeese.com 

Contact: Justin@JustinDeese.com

Free Gift: copy of my eBook you can text 850-750-5505 or you can get a copy from www.FreedomBluePrintPodcast.com/ebook

Summary

In this episode of the Freedom Blueprint Podcast, Justin Deese discusses the importance of setting goals and having a plan to achieve them. He introduces the acronym 'GAME' which stands for Growth Focused, Automated, Motivated, and Efficient, and elaborates on each component. The conversation emphasizes the significance of a positive team culture, the role of automation in streamlining operations, and the need for efficiency to maximize profitability. Justin encourages listeners to take action and reflect on their business strategies to foster growth and success.

Takeaways

• It's important to check in on your goals regularly.
• Having a plan is crucial for achieving your resolutions.
• Growth can mean different things to different people.
• Automation should serve your business needs, not the other way around.
• A positive team culture is essential for success.
• Motivating your team leads to better performance.
• Efficiency is key to maximizing profitability.
• Engage your team in discussions about improving efficiency.
• Set clear goals and share them with your team.
• Take action today to improve your business strategies.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Goal Setting Reflection

04:26 The Game: Understanding the Acronym

06:45 Growth Focused: Expanding Your Business

09:09 Automation: Streamlining Your Operations

11:29 Motivation: Building a Positive Team Culture

14:44 Efficiency: Maximizing Productivity and Profitability

19:10 Conclusion: Taking Action and Moving Forward

Keywords

Goal setting, business growth, automation, team motivation, efficiency, leadership, productivity, business strategy, personal development, entrepreneurship

Transcript

Justin Deese (00:09.59)

Welcome to the freedom blueprint podcast. I'm excited to be hanging out with you today. And, listen, before we jump into, into today's topic. And I do have a really cool topic. I'm excited to talk about this topic. but before we do, want to check in, check in on one thing before we do, I want to check in on something with you. So, at the time this episode is being released, it is Monday, January 27th.

Which means we're not quite done with January, but how are you doing on your new year's resolutions or your goals for the year or whatever you call them? And I did an episode. Um, actually I think it was the first one of the year. We talked a little bit about smart goals and some other things, and I won't go into that, but, um, one of things I talked about was that there's a national quitters day, which is January 12th this year.

And I think what it came out to be as the second Friday of each year is national quitters day. And they say at that point, 50 % of people stop whatever their goal or resolution was, which I mean, resolution is just a goal. that's, that's really all that is, but, I'm not really sure why they use it. Well, I guess they use this resolution to, so they can, I don't know, feel good about the new year. I don't know. Anyways, point being is I hope that you're on the.

the half of that equation that is still driving forward and still going towards your goals. And listen, if you're off of your goals and you've kind of fallen off track, no harm, no foul, man, just get back on, get back on the bus, right? Get back on and start doing things in order to achieve your goals for the year. It's not too late. Still January. mean, gosh, you got, you still got a lot of time, a lot of time. So one of the things I think that people

get a little bit sideways on when they come up with resolutions or goals is they don't have a plan. And here's the deal. You gotta have a plan. It's no different than anything else you do in life. A really good analogy for us that are in the home service trades is if you're building a house, you've gotta have a blueprint. You've gotta have a step-by-step guide. You can't do the plumbing after the house is dry walled, right? That would make no sense. So.

Justin Deese (02:31.278)

Just make sure whatever your goals are, whatever resolutions you have for the year, just make sure you're sitting down, writing them down and working them backwards so that you can achieve your achieve your goals. So I didn't want to make today's topic about a goal setting or any of that. I know I've talked about that a lot. Um, I want to talk about a little bit of a different, uh, different topic, but before we get into that, I want to, I want to give you a free gift for coming in and hanging out with me. Um,

Which by the way, thank you. I appreciate all of you who, hang out and check out the podcast and send me really cool notes, and text messages. And it's just cool. and it is, it is, it makes it a lot more fun. It's like anything else in life. when it's, when you're doing good at it and people enjoy what you're doing, it just makes it more fun. But, I have a new ebook and the ebook ebook is called pipe dreams to payday.

It's just an ebook that I wrote. It kind of started out as that Jerry Maguire middle of the night thing. And then I finally got the whole thing done and it was great, but you can download a copy. All you got to do is text the word ebook to the number 850-750-5505. Download the word ebook to that number and you will get a free copy of the book. A lot of good information in there.

it's obviously based around, the fact that I've sold a couple of businesses and bought a couple of businesses. It's a little bit of a roadmap on, no matter whether you're in that part of your journey that you're ready to sell your business or not. I still think there's some, things in there you need to keep in mind so that when you do go to sell, you're ready and you're, you're ready to go and you're not playing the long game. or the short game. So let's dive into today's topic.

The topic today is about how are you playing the game? Yes, the game is an acronym. And one of the things about, business is I think sometimes we get a little bit sideways and we forget that it can be fun. Like nobody wants to run a business or be in business. That's no fun. It can be fun. There's nothing wrong with having a good time.

Justin Deese (04:55.214)

doing what it is you're doing. Matter of fact, that's the dream is to do something that you love to do. Um, and, and I think that if you were, if you're running your business, if you're leading your team and you're doing it and everybody's rowing in the same direction, it's just a lot more fun. Trust me, I've done it both ways. And when everybody's going in a different direction, it's not nearly as much fun as when everybody is.

Rowan in the same direction and fighting for the same fight and on the same mission. So that's kind of what inspired this today is I've caught myself a lot saying, you know, how we play the game and we play the game this way and we play the game that way. And finally, somebody called me out and it's like, I don't, you gotta, you gotta help break this down for me. And I thought, well, this be a good podcast episode. So, um, so here you go. So we're going to talk about it. So the game is an acronym and the acronym is.

growth focused, automated, motivated, and efficient. Right. And we'll dive into each of those here in just a minute, but, that's it. Growth focused, automated, motivated, efficient. Now we can go into, we don't, we don't want this to be a marathon, podcast episode. So I may actually go back in and break these down a little bit because there is a lot inside of each of these, but really the point of today.

is really for you just to think a little bit different about your business and you to think a little bit different about how you're going about your day so that you can really make sure that you're driving the way you want to drive. If you're not having fun, you're missing something. So that's what I want to get into today. So let's break down growth focus just a little bit. So are you growth focused? Are you thinking about growth now?

growth can mean different things to different people, right? So for some people it's, hey, if I hit the million dollar mark, for some it's 50 million, for some it's a hundred million, for some it's not revenue at all, for some it's profitability, which let's be honest, I hope that your goal is, even if your revenue goal is one of your focuses, I do hope profitability is one of the, it's more fun when you're making money, like it's just more fun. So growth focuses strive to expand really

Justin Deese (07:14.402)

Both your revenue. Well, it's really three things. So your revenue, your profits and your team, like you want to grow a strong team as a leader, especially when you're being growth focused, your, your attention should always be, how do I replace myself? And I think for a lot of people, that's a little bit scary because you're like, then what I'm going to do? What am I going to do then? But the truth is as your business grows, so does its needs.

Right? So, a $1 million business, that leader looks different than a $10 million leader. And that leader looks different than a hundred million dollar leader. It's so it's, it's growth, it's expansion. And really part of that should also be yourself. Right? So I said, there's going to be two things and now we've ended up before. So it's going to be your revenue, your profitability, building a strong team and building your personal leadership skills so that you can, can work on that and you can be continuously improving.

So think about this, what steps are you taking for your future to hit those, those four marks?

Justin Deese (09:09.6)

Next on our list is going to be automated. Now, automated can be a whole lot of things and we live in this automation world. There's AI, there's softwares now that we have that do all kinds of really cool, automation stuff. The trick I think to automation is not to get bogged down on the not efficient, right? So we're going back to, efficiency, but I think it's

I think it's really good to find whatever problem you've got going on and then look for automation solutions around it. Don't find automation solutions and figure out how to put them in your business. I hope that makes sense, but you should go look for automation as it helps and improves your life in your business. Don't go find an automation product service and then figure out how to plug it into your business. You're looking at it the wrong way.

Because the other way is going to allow you to focus on streamlining the process and really simplifying your operation. Again, go, go find the automation that best suits your business. Don't go find automation and figure out how to make it work into your business. That will get a little bit, a little bit sideways. And really when you're doing it that way, now what happens is you're, really empowering your business and your team to leverage technology again.

I hate to keep repeating that, but so many people go out and find a product or service and then go figure out how to plug in their business versus how does it serve your, how does it serve you and how does it serve your business as a, a way more impactful way in order to, to work with the efficiency of your, of your business and your operations.

Justin Deese (10:59.606)

Automation should really help reduce the manual tasks and really just again overall improve efficiency. So next on the list is going to be motivating or motivation, right? So as you're building your team. There needs to be this positive engaging culture that's that's happening. Cultures really in my opinion cultures at the root of everything. If you've got a team that there is a solid culture.

And again, everybody is aiming for the same goal. Dude, there's nothing that can stop that team from succeeding. Nothing. If you, if you think you have a good culture, this is be a pretty good test. If you think you have a good culture, but you're always off on your goals and what goals you have set, I would say that your culture might not be as good as you think it is. Right. I think that,

Well, and that's another thing too, is are you doing team goals? Right? That is very motivating to people. If they have a goal, know what direction I've seen owners where they have goals internally, they have goals for their business and they know what they want to do, but then they don't share it. And that doesn't do anybody any good because now you're going to be disappointed at your team for not hitting the goal. And your team's like, I don't even know about the goal. Like that would have been great information.

Let's call it January 27th, the day this, comes out. So make sure your team knows whatever the goals are that you have in order to be, to be able to make sure and motivate them and engage them and share the wins and the losses with them as well.

Justin Deese (12:44.332)

And really, as you do that too, what ends up happening is when your team is motivated and they're fired up and they're pumped up, they are going to take care of each other and your customers at a way better level. Like if you want to know, paradise, we call it long yaw. That's one of our core values and line up as a French Canadian term for, that little extra. So like Baker's dozen. And for us, that was always something that we, we talked about is.

is everybody rowing in the same direction and we can tell that a lot of times by the reviews we get or by technicians what they got going on. So, you know, you hear a lot about technicians. They, they know the trash has run that day or let's not use trash as an example. Let's use the, the, newspaper, not that anybody gets it, but back in the day, it used to be, we would teach technicians, you know, if you go to the house and you see the newspaper, pick it up and take it to the house and hand it to the customer. And, and I think.

There's a, there's this really cool mindset or not mindset shift, but there's this really cool thing that happens with a customer. Actually it is a mindset shift that the customer now looks at you as someone who is there being helpful versus just a broke fix kind of person. Right? So, when your team is all motivated and rowing in the same direction, they want to do that kind of line up stuff, but to, in order to make the team look better. And I think that's just such a cool, such a cool thing when that's happening.

Justin Deese (14:15.766)

And last, but certainly not least efficient, right? So you want to, obviously you want to be as efficient as possible. you want to maximize productivity, you want to minimize waste. I think we all know that, but there also has to be these other things in play to do that. So your team has to be motivated in order to be the most productive and minimize waste. They also had to be rewarded for that kind of thing.

for us, a lot of times we talk about billable efficiency, being a real good way to, compensate or bonus technicians is, is that will help them naturally police themselves to minimize waste and maximize productivity. Right. Because if, if you're only paying guys by the hour or girls, if you're only paying technicians or team members in general, by the hour, think about what is their motivation each day.

And the truth is it's going to be either get off, get home and go do whatever else they want to do as fast as possible, or it's going to be work as many hours as possible. Right? The only way to make more money. If you're only paying people by the hour, the only way for them to make more money is to work more hours. Right? So just, just think about that as you talk about, or as you think about how to maximize productivity and minimize waste, because efficiency is how we

are the most profitable, especially in our businesses. Right? So when you think about the two things that can kill your profit, the fastest in our space, the two things, the two things that can just hammer you down faster than anything else is going to be your labor and your material. It's the two things. so just think about that. So as you're, as you're being efficient and as you're thinking about

You know, do I play the game or how do I play the game better or am I even playing the game or is the game playing me? Like as you think about that, just think about how you're, how you're compensating your team. It matters, man. It matters because you want them to win when you win. Unfortunately, you can't really have a, we didn't make any money this month. So nobody gets paid. That's not really a thing as an owner of the business. That's, that's, that's part of the risk you take, but

Justin Deese (16:38.262)

If you give them a way to win when you win, man, I'm telling you, there's some cool stuff that happens because now they want to win because they win too.

Justin Deese (16:49.57)

The other thing on efficiency is be on the lookout for how to be more efficient. Like what are things that you can do to improve the operation? And now if you're an owner or leader that is not in a truck day to day, or you're not in a role where you answer the phone and talk to customers on a day to day basis, which if you're listening to this, I hope you, you aren't any of those. And I hope you don't do any of that on a full time basis.

Which means if you, if you're not doing it, go ask those people how to be more efficient. Don't be scared to sit down and say, Hey, we're, we're struggling with this job. Let's let's call it re pipes. Like plumbing side. We're struggling on re pipes. What is it that we can do to be more efficient? Don't be scared to ask the team. Sit down, bring in some breakfast, have your install team sit and just ask them the simple question. I'm telling you, you will be absolutely amazed.

It's some of the things that you will learn. What's great about it is as you're thinking about efficiency and if billable efficiency is something that's even important to you. If you sit down with your team and go, listen, how do we take this? How do we take this? Job and how do we go from 12 hours to 10 hours? Just throw that challenge out to them. Whatever it is that they need.

Either it's either yes or no while you're sitting at the table. But if it's anything you can do, which hopefully there's nothing completely out of this world that that you can't get them to support them. Then now that they've come up with...