One Next Step: Management Tips & Tools for Small Business Owners

Organizational culture is critical for our company’s success, but it’s often discussed like it’s a mysterious force that magically makes things awesome (think ‘Best Place to Work’ awards) or toxic (think ‘lots of bad reviews on Glassdoor’).  While culture is powerful, it doesn’t haven’t to be mysterious, and there are practical things you can do to shape the environment you and your team work in every day.  In this episode, we’ll be chatting with Jenni Catron, speaker, author and CEO at The 4Sight Group. She will help us gain a better understanding of what company culture is, why it's important and how we can create a strong culture within our organization. Welcome to episode 17 of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Like it or not, people are judging us before they know us. That may feel superficial, but the reality is consciously or unconsciously, others assess your appearance, speech, energy, personality, and behavior all the time. From those assessments, they form opinions about your likely strengths, weaknesses, and capabilities, and decide if they want to further engage with you. In this episode, we’re going to learn to become aware of how we’re showing up and what we can do about it. We’ll be joined by Steve Herz, President of The Montag Group – a talent agency representing broadcasters on networks like NBC Sports, ESPN, and CNN – to talk with us about how we can use authority, warmth, and energy to amplify the effectiveness of our communication and connection with others. He’ll help us win trust, respect, and influence at work. Welcome to episode 16 of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Your systems and processes do more than ensure quality; they save your organization time and provide clarity in expectations. If you are doing everything well as an organization, but you're not documenting what you do, your business is vulnerable and unable to scale. You are reinventing the wheel every time, counting on people to uphold an unspoken standard or pick up things through osmosis, overly relying on people who know your business to continue working for your business, or all of the above. In this episode, we want to help you take the lid off of your business's potential by helping you identify the processes and systems you need to grow your business. These processes will help you deliver a great customer experience, hire the right people, convert leads, and more. All great organizations have nailed this down so that they ensure a certain level of quality and consistency.  Welcome to episode 15 of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Let’s be real. If you follow our podcast, you’re likely ambitious and driven to succeed. But, with that drive and ambition, it’s easy for demands at work to compete with priorities at home. At times, the pull of your professional and personal lives can make you feel like there’s no way to experience success in both areas. Today, we’re going to learn strategies to ensure winning at work doesn’t prevent us from winning where it matters most – with our families.  Joining us to talk about how to win at work and home is Megan Hyatt Miller, COO of Michael Hyatt & Company, a leadership development organization. She’s also the co-host of the popular business podcast, Lead to Win. An amazing leader, wife and mother, Megan will be sharing with us how to succeed in our personal and professional lives simultaneously.  Welcome to episode 14 of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As you and your organization navigate or enter the season of annual business planning, we want to help you turn meaningful commitments into measurable financial outcomes shared with leaders and team members in the form of next year’s goals. An essential part of this process is budgeting. Budgets make initiatives real as you outline how these decisions should impact your revenue, expenses, and profit.  In this episode, we’re going to help you build a plan for your company’s money by teaching you how to create an annual budget for your business. While this may not be the sexiest topic, it is the difference between break-even, a black hole, or a growing bottom line. To help you build or refresh your budget BELAY’s COO and former CFO, Lisa Zeeveld, is going to break down the essentials of a business budget and walk us through the budgeting process she’s perfected over the years. Welcome to episode 13 of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Every business leader eventually faces the challenge of reaching a crossroads and deciding then what to do next. This crossroad may happen with projects, products, or even your people. Those moments beg the question: Are we making sufficient progress to continue with the current plan (or person), or do we need to change direction? For some, the decision is easy because you have no choice but to change. For others, it's more complicated. If you decide it pivot, you'll have to navigate changes, but these changes may be the key to unlocking your organization's potential growth. In this episode, we are talking about how and when to pivot in your business with Brian Riley, the co-founder and CEO of Guardian Bikes, a Mark Cuban company. He will share how he made shifts in his organization to create more value for consumers and more cash for the business. Welcome to episode 12 of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Many small business owners, especially in their companies' early stages, are experts on the product or service they provide, not the financial numbers. Even experienced business owners may find themselves so busy making sure everything gets done that they rarely have time to sit down and dig into the numbers. We want leaders like you to understand the financial numbers in their business so you can make better decisions and improve the health of your finances. In this episode, we'll share the top three financial metrics that matter most in your business and how to use them to lead your business. Our guide will be BELAY's financial guru Lisa Zeeveld, the current COO and former CFO of BELAY. Welcome to episode 11 of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It’s business planning season, which hopefully means you and your team will soon be reviewing recent performance, outlining future initiatives, creating budgets, and listing new hires. While leaders want to build a plan that provides clarity and specificity, the plan should also be so energizing and compelling that our teams want to implement it. It must also contain clear accountabilities, so there’s no confusion about who does what. Today, we’re going to learn a blindspot or two in the annual business planning process and receive tips on how to overcome them. In this episode, we’ll discuss why most strategic and annual plans fail (and what to do about it). Our guest is Michael Hyatt, the bestselling author and the CEO of Michael Hyatt & Company — a leadership development company.  Welcome to episode ten of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The number one complaint prospects have about salespeople is they talk too much. Also, business leaders' common complaints about salespeople aren't meeting their sales quote; it's typically related to things like a bad attitude, not being a team player, or being overly aggressive with prospects. Soft skills resolve all of these issues. However, most leaders focus on hiring new sales team members based on hard skills like industry and selling experience. In this episode, we'll be talking about how emotional intelligence and soft skills produce hard sales results with Colleen Stanley, a sales trainer and the president of SalesLeadership, Inc., a sales development firm. She will talk with us about how to build high-performing sales teams through the power of emotional intelligence. Welcome to episode nine of One Next Step.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.