Hello, everyone.
Hi, Bridget.
Happy Wednesday.
Hi, Owen and Amber.
Good to see you guys.
Cindy, we have Joe.
We're just giving a few more seconds for folks to jump on and connect to audio.
Right.
Hey, Sue.
Bonnie and Dustin.
All right. Hi, Addy. It's good to see you.
Okay.
All right.
Welcome.
Welcome to Wednesday.
You guys have fun last week was shaping up the first in the series of shaping up this is the two part series.
Do you guys set, did everyone set a pitch day a standard day for one pitch day per week. Did you all do that together.
So, show of hands. No.
Dion, do you see hands, I'm not seeing hands. No.
Don't worry guys.
We just do this for one another, Dion and I.
All right, well welcome.
So as you know last week we began with week one of shaping up work that matters. That's based on the book by Ryan Springer shape up.
And that technique empowers every member of the organization to be an innovator.
And as you know the homework was to set up a weekly pitch day. And so we'll leave that as homework again.
For today we're going to focus on part two in the shape up series, and want to leave you with the pro tip, it's it's one that you guys have heard before.
And the pro tip for today is that deep work is your superpower to become the master of your craft. So you guys don't skimp out on deep work, prioritize it because this is where the best ideas, and your most meaningful progress will come from.
And if you remember Dion talked about deep work as being rocks that you put in your bucket you fill up your bucket with the rocks before you put in the pebbles and then the sand.
So I think we've got just about everyone on here connecting.
All right. Are you guys ready to dive in to number two of the, the shape up.
Dan I'm going to go ahead and hand it over to you.
Yeah, thank you.
Always great to hang out with you love these sessions.
So today, we're going to do something as you know a little different.
What we're going to do is we're going to take a couple of your pitches, we're going to walk through those pitches.
So we can get through it. What we have found is that once you've done one pitch.
It's, it's a whole lot easier it's 90% easier than doing the second one, once you got two or three of them done, you'll be amazed how you start to think about everything you do, because what it does is it stops you from being overwhelmed.
When you're thinking of a project. How many of you right now, just by a show of hands, have projects going on so many projects going on now that it can be a little overwhelming anybody in that mode.
A lot of projects, got to do this got to do this. Okay, so I would say, right, for most of us, this is the case. And what this does is it stops the overwhelm, it stops us getting into the position where we feel like we're overwhelmed by everything that's
going on in our, going on in our, in our work lives. So what we're going to do is we're going to catch a couple of pitches so we're going to do this in two parts today first, I'm going to take time and do kind of one on one mentoring here with anybody
who wants to jump on and do this. No, everybody's learning. There are no dumb questions. You know, you know, I don't know what this meant or I thought that was what it is and so forth, because I think if we do a couple together.
What we have found is that everybody needs help the first time, everybody needs help. And I have taught this in so many different contexts. And I've never seen a whole team say, got it. Everybody does it next week, everything's cool. So if your team did not do all of that, you're normal.
You're good. Now if your team did do it, you guys are amazing. That's all I think. So I saw Nancy there, we all each filled out our template that's very cool.
What I'd like you to do is throw into the chat anybody who would
like to be or raise your hand if you would you feel you have a
pitch that you'd like to share with us. So that would mean
bringing it up on the screen, a screen share, bring up on the
screen so we can see your, your pitch and then walk through it.
Any bold volunteers. Come on, let's do this. Let's go and do
this kind of fun. Robin keeps asking to come into the meeting
those with a six or seven time is he okay? Bonnie? Do you know
where he is? Is everything alright? He keeps asking to
join. He's having a problem. He's having a problem. I'm
sorry, Dionne. He's trying to connect but it shows him up
there. But then he he can't get in for some odd reason. So
sorry. I made it. Okay, there is as long as you take a little
bit as long as you didn't take a personal Robin. We didn't
program it in. If Robin goes just keep kicking him up.
Yeah, okay. You say so.
Yeah. Trust me. So here's what we're gonna do. Anybody have a
would like to do a pitch and show us your pitch. Be bold.
Nancy, I know you said you had a bunch of them. Do you guys do
you have guys have something you can bring up on a screen? Where
did Nancy go?
Mine was incomplete Dionne because to be honest, I just
didn't know how to finish it. So that's why I didn't volunteer.
Okay, well, a half one is perfect. If you do as long as
you can put on the screen. Do you have something you can show
on the screen?
Yes, give me one second. I'll pull that up.
Okay. Anyone else would like to evolve? Throw in the chat there
was raise your hand. Let me know. Let me know you can do
this. Hey, this is a wonderful opportunity to do this. While
we're doing that, Jenny, can we pull one or two up from from
this week, you yourself did coaching, right? You were
coaching several people who are doing their first pitches as I
went through that, right? Yes. And maybe we can show a couple
of them. Some of them are super simple. Some of them are pretty
sophisticated. Sure. Okay. So while while Nancy is getting
organized with her pitch, what I'd like to suggest is to every
leader here, I want to say, please set up a pitch day.
Please set up a pitch day. So the pitch day doesn't have to be
long, can be less than half an hour or less. And if you can
pick like, you know, for us, it's Tuesdays, Tuesdays is pitch
day. At some point, it was Friday, somebody's Thursdays,
we've moved around, you know, over the last couple of years.
But if you can pitch, set a pitch day, and then if it's
helpful, we can go through and make a little video again on how
to fill out a pitch. And what we want to do is once people go
through it once they get to see what it does. Because this, by
the way, might be one of the biggest power tools we're
handing you. And if you pull this off, you're going to take
your career to the next level. Absolutely, because it will
allow you to knock out any single project quickly. And as
we said, don't think of eating the whole loaf of bread, just
the thin slice so thin, you can see through it, you must be
wondering, are we actually doing work here. And sometimes the
thin slice is to figure out what it is I want to do with the
project, you know, sometimes you don't even know that. And so
that's okay, too. Well, I just want to figure out what the
starting point is, I'm going to do one deep work session and
just figure out what is this thing? What should be the
starting point? What should my next slice be? And what you'll
find is those thin slices will start to move your your projects
forward automatically. Okay, here we go. Nancy, are you ready
for us? Yeah, yes, I am. Let me share screen here. Okay. And
like I said, it was incomplete. So please have mercy. So we're,
we're totally happy. Thanks for being bold. Of course. So
basically, we are inadvertently kind of being forced into
expanding the company at the request of potential customers
that are knocking our door down that not only want us to inspect
tiny homes on wheels, but also begin inspecting modular homes.
So we really all of us right now, you know, are wearing 10
hats simultaneously. And we need to hire someone to be able to
head this up, you know, themselves and really take take
the lead on this and getting approvals for us in every state.
And so the problem that we're needing to solve is just hiring
someone to achieve modular inspection approvals. I don't
know if that's called a compliance specialist or what.
And then we need to create an ad create a job scorecard run the
ad select candidates do a first and a final interview. I didn't
know about what is not I didn't I didn't really know what.
So let me let me jump in. As we go through this. This is great.
Firstly, so let's go scroll to the top.
the starting point always has to be the appetite. How much time do you have to do this?
It can't be, well, let's start with a project and then add the appetite. That's the mode we're
trying to change. So the appetite that you have to have some appetite. So let's say,
you know, if it's something like you can just sit down and just knock this out,
can you do this in four hours? Well, I believe because we already have the ad and the
job scorecard created, it would just be a matter of running the ad and waiting for candidates. So
yes. Okay. So let's give it one, let's give it four hours or one deep work session that you can
now in this case, because you're, you're, you're starting something. Remember the project is to
initiate it, then all the interviews and all the other stuff and all that can happen. That's a,
that can just be, you know, the consequence of you launching this project. So, so what we're,
so again, you can do lots of slices to get to the same project where while we're trying to
sell the thinnest possible slice here is what problem are you solving? You're saying, is it
to actually hire someone or is it to, is it to create the job description? It's to hire someone.
So you already have the job description. Yes. And you already know where they are, where,
where you might likely find them. Well, I believe we've already got the job description and the,
and the scorecard created. It's just a matter of creating the ad on Indeed. That's where we were
going to run the ad. Right. So you've already identified the job description, you know,
you want to post it on Indeed and you know that you've got your scorecard, you've said. Yes, sir.
Okay. So with those items, the problem you're solving is doing what specific to do the actual
hire to end up with somebody in that slot. Correct. That's the project. Okay. Got it.
Okay. So you got a compliance specialist and the fact that you were not sure the title made me ask
the question, if you had the job description. Okay. What I would like to add to your, what's
included is to review the, the review, the, the to write the ads in such a way as to get the most
compelling applicants. If you put a generic ad up on I've done Indeed, and I did it very recently.
So when, when you put up a generic ad on Indeed, you are literally going to, as you know, in Indeed,
they're going to just stream in and then you can say how many, and then stop, you will literally
get 50 applications. And a lot of them are just flying a kite. Right. If you're not on, you
understand that expression. So what you want to do is you want to, you don't just want to write an
ad, you want to write a highly targeted ad. So it's going to be very specific in what's included.
I'm going to write a highly targeted ad that will filter out the very best applicants.
And so, you know, I would add that into your section three there. You want to write the
highly targeted ad that will filter out the very best things. And how many applications do you want?
So let's say I want to write a highly targeted ad and I want
10 it's included here is to get 10 really, or five really serious candidates.
Does that make sense? So what you're doing is you're, you're measuring your success.
Cause if you've got one candidate, were you successful or did you want, you want to select
the top five candidates. And then you want to do now we haven't gone through how to do the
interviews and we haven't gone through this process in the training yet. So I assume you're
using whatever system you're using now. And I can tell you if you really want that level of
interview, that level of candidate, get ready for four interviews. Okay. And the reason there's four
interviews is the following. Number one, first interview is you're trying to establish fit.
How do these people think, what are they like? Will they be a fit culturally? And so on.
The next interview from that first interview, we can identify all the, all the areas of
weakness there. And the second interview is going to drill deeper into those particular areas.
The third interviews is an introduction to the team where you get, they get to meet and the team
get to interview them. The people that actually work with, they don't have to have the whole team,
but just people who worked with them. And the last and final interview will be with, I assume it'll
be with the owners or the, you know, the leaders. So in that particular final interviews is just to
give that one last check. So you've got a four interview process there and you, four hours is
not going to be enough to do all that. No, but I thought the four hours was for the first slice
of like us placing the ad. You can do that, but then what's included is not interview one, two,
three, and four. So we have to pick now. So that.
Did you see that starting with the appetite has contained what's included?
Yes.
So you can see immediately we saw, Oh, hang on a second.
I did that on purpose to over, over committed your hours.
So you could go hang on a second.
That's way too much.
That's another slide that doing the actual interview.
So I think you should land with five candidates period for the slice,
take the rest out and put that into another slice, doing the interviews
and actually hiring somebody so that, because we've said that let's go
back and talk about the problem we're solving is not to hire someone,
but to identify five, to bring, to find five suitable candidates.
Do you see that's a thinner slice than actually going in and hiring them?
Yes.
Now, now we've made the thing a whole lot more four hours to do that.
Okay.
That's achievable, right?
Goes well.
You can do it in two hours.
So you want some margin in what you're doing.
So they, one deep work session, five candidates.
That's what this thin slice is.
I see Robin, you were checking up there.
So why don't you weigh in?
Well, no, I was going to do, I did a session too.
So I was putting my hand up.
Okay, great.
You guys are taking advantage of this.
Well done.
So what's not included now?
You tell me, Nancy, what's not included based on what we just said.
Everything, everything I just cut from that last.
Right.
Interviews is not included and it's not.
So just put interviews and the actual hiring not included.
Now notice that when you pitch this to your team, nobody's going to say to you,
but Hey, Nancy, you said you're going to hire someone.
No, I said, I'm not doing interviews.
I'm not doing hiring.
You're setting their expectations.
So when you come to show at the end of this, this, this process, right?
So one deep work session means one week, assuming you're doing
one deep work session a week.
So that means if you're pitching it to us today, and if, and if pitch,
do you have a pitch day yet, Robin?
We're probably going to do it on Tuesday during our strategy meeting.
Okay.
Standing meeting at nine, 9am Tuesdays.
Okay.
So let's say next Tuesday, you pitch this to the team.
The minute they give feedback, some input when it's finished.
One week from then the following Tuesday, you're going to come
with your five candidates.
Do you see how this starts to jive innovation pretty quickly?
And when you present that, you can also say, here's my five
candidates and here's my next pitch.
We're going to do the four interviews and do a hiring.
And I think it's going to take two weeks.
So it's going to take one week, whatever you think it's going to take.
Now, what you're doing, you can see how it's setting it in motion.
Sure.
Okay.
That helpful?
Yes, it is.
Very.
Thank you.
Okay.
So fat market design is usually when you draw the big dime.
Well, there's no actual drawing needed here, but what's
the deliverable here?
Let's go through.
What's the deliverable.
Tell me what the deliverable is.
I guess that we've achieved approval in many states and we're
issuing insignias in those states.
We're actually able to provide inspections and insignias in those states.
But that's not connected to, let's go back to what is the project?
The project has come up with five candidates.
So the deliverable will be five resumes.
Um, yeah, it would be, I guess, narrowing the search down to five
viable candidates.
So the actual deliverable, the physical thing you're going to
be delivering is five resumes.
Yeah, no, you don't have to say narrowing the search.
You just need to say five resumes.
You're going to be physically handing five resumes to the team.
Yeah.
The five top resumes we've, we've, we've selected.
We want to follow up with.
See, that's the deliverable.
The deliverable is what are you physically going to hand over to the team?
Is that a document?
Is that a design?
A piece of software?
What?
And that's tied.
That's tight.
So now we're all very clear what you're doing.
You're going to spend four hours.
You're going to go and identify five candidates.
You're not including interviews and all that stuff.
You're going to write the ads.
You're going to do that.
You're going to highly targeted ads.
You're going to come up five.
Can the deliverables?
Yes.
Five resumes.
Yes, it does.
So it's getting simpler, right?
It is the more I understand it.
That's why I so appreciate you doing this.
Okay.
Let's go to the risks and rabbit holes.
So the risks and rabbit holes here are why could you get stuck?
So let's clearly that let's rewrite that part from where could you get stuck in
this process of finding five candidates?
Yeah, that's a different kind of stuck than what I initially thought.
Okay.
Yep.
So you can delete that, right?
And we start with where could you get stuck?
Well, where could you get stuck?
Do you think that would make you go past your four hours?
I'm allowing other work to seep into my bucket.
Well, we're gonna assume you're gonna protect
your deep work session.
So that's fine.
Or you may break this up into one hour slots
just because of the nature of this job,
this particular project.
That's fine.
You can do that.
Deep work four hours is one way to do it.
You can break it up into four one hour sections.
So what I'm saying, when you're doing the one hour,
where could you get stuck?
Not limiting the number of applications.
Like you just get 400 applications.
How do you read them?
So not limiting the number of applications.
Number two, you could get stuck if you didn't,
if you made your application so broad
that you got a lot of unsuitable candidates applying
and wasting your time reading through them.
Okay.
So not targeting properly could get you stuck.
You could just get overwhelmed with too many applications.
Okay, excellent.
And then how could you expand the solution?
If it goes well and you've got five candidates
and you did it in an hour and it was just great,
how could you expand this?
What could be the next step you could do?
Think about it.
You've got five candidates now.
Things have gone really well.
I guess we move on to the interview stage.
Yeah.
Do the initial interview, exactly.
Do the initial interview with all five.
Or I would say even pre-qualify them with very short-
Yeah, that's better.
That's better.
Pre-qualify them.
Now, pre-qualifying on Indeed is something
where you can turn back to them
and you can actually have them engage
in an online pre-qualifying interview
where you require them to ask a set of questions.
Have you done Indeed before?
Yes.
Okay, so you know what I'm talking about.
Yes, the assessments.
Yes.
So there's a basic assessment
and you wanna pre-qualify them.
And so sometimes you wanna go back and ask them questions.
So if you have extra time, you can do some assessment
and you can do some questioning,
like clarifications on this element of their resume.
Could you clarify that?
How would you feel about working in this kind of environment?
Whatever it is you think would be really helpful
in pre-qualifying them.
Okay, if things go badly and you have to cut stuff out,
what would you do?
Delegate.
That's your project.
What would you do if things got too rough?
I'd have to stop running the ad and reevaluate.
Right, and maybe we cut it down to two candidates.
Yes.
Okay, so you can see now I've set expectations of the team.
I'm gonna bring you five, but if it goes badly
because I've got so many bad and I wrote the ads badly
and then I had this problem and that problem, that issue.
Hey guys, I'm gonna go two candidates.
So no, not a lower number, you have to specify.
What should I put?
Two, three, you're the leader.
So you tell me what would be the lowest,
lowest valuable thing?
I'd say two because one candidate seemed a bit light.
Yeah, I think three, just so we have it.
Okay, so now in your mind, I don't get five,
but I got three solid ones.
I've still been successful.
Number D there is just you walking through with the team.
Okay.
That's all that is.
So you, well done everybody.
Let's give Nancy a round of applause.
That was amazing.
Thank you, Nancy.
You've done your first thin slice.
Okay, comments, Nancy, did that feel overwhelming?
Uncomfortable, but a lot less overwhelming
because, you know, it really helps
when somebody shows you how to do something
instead of just trying to figure it out on your own.
So I appreciate you.
I have no idea.
So let's talk about just for a second, Robin,
then you'll be up next.
Let's talk for a second.
And by the way, guys, if you want to jump in,
take advantage of this.
If you, let's talk about why this is so hard
because we're not used to thinking in such small steps.
Think about what Nancy went through there, right?
Nancy, when you went through that,
if I still have you on audio.
Yes.
Nancy, what you went through there,
your experience, right?
You kept oversizing, upsizing it, right?
Yes, I kept thinking about the big picture, the end goal.
Right.
And that's why this is so counterintuitive.
But once you get it, you go,
my goodness, I could just thin slice projects all day long.
Yeah.
Okay, two advantages.
The team now know what you're doing.
And secondly, not only does the team know what you're doing,
but when you pull off,
you get to be the hero of that project.
And that's what we want.
We love the hero thing, right?
All right.
So we'll all remember that Nancy was the one
who found the compliance specialist.
Oh, well, thank you for your help. And I appreciate it.
Absolutely. Great job. Nice. Thanks for thanks for boldly
stepping out. We appreciate that Robin. Go for it.
Alright, by the way, this is the first time we've done group hot
seats. So I'm glad I'm glad we're doing this. Oh, yeah,
you're doing it straight out of notion. It's doing the real deal
here. Okay. All right. That's easy a notion for sure. Alright,
do we have you on audio there, Robin? There we go. Can you
hear me now? We can.
Okay. Yeah, so this is Yeah, just straight out of notion.
Um, basically, would be one deep work session. Problem of
solving is recognition as a player in the remote inspection
arena. What's included is a comprehensive research paper on
remote inspections used in the construction arena. And what
it's not, it's not in person inspections. It's not insurance
inspections. It's not bank inspections. Am I going too
fast? No, good. Um, what's the deliver a complete research
paper? Um, doesn't have any drawings or anything? Risks
rabbits, what could get stuck? This is not a high level
requirement. It's more like a branding thing rather than going
to produce money right away. But other more pressing issues like
value opinions could take precedence. How would you expand
or add the solution a paper on RDI, remote digitized
inspections, and insurance or bank inspection? If I had time,
I could add to it, you know, some of the other remote
inspection possibilities, or a paper on new tiny house
standards. What I could cut out is a lot of the quotes from
other research papers, because I'm getting a lot of getting a
lot of a lot of information as I'm doing this research.
Okay, let's back up. Firstly, well done. That's really that
was a really, that was a really good first time at it with a
couple of little tweaks we need to make firstly is that's a lot
to do in one deep work session. So if you can do it in one day,
I would if you can, if you can squeeze it into one deep work
session, always add an extra deep work session. That's one
of the things because one of the things you want to do for you
for yourself and for your team is never set yourself up for so
definitely make that too. If you think you can do it in one set
to if you need to do add three, always leave margin because
stuff happens, right? The second, what problem are you
solving recognition, you're talking about recognition for
Noah as a player in the remote inspection arena. Is that what
you're saying? Yes. Who would be providing that recognition?
Well, this paper is going to be going out to 10,000 colleges in
the US. So I've got a connection with somebody at HUD
in Washington, DC that asked that I write something.
So this project is not to send out the report to 10,000, but to
create the report. Right. Okay, which you said, so that's good.
Complete the research paper. Is there a size that you want to
write? Do you have a sense of this? Is this 100 pages or 10?
No, this is probably three pages.
Okay, to complete a three to five page research, because when
you said research paper, you know, I'm an academic, so I'm
thinking, okay, so I'm like, okay, but you can see that three
to five pages for you on that topic, what's not included, was
the stuff you said there, which is fine. We lost, I think you
jumped out of
Yeah, I made it smaller somehow or another.
Yeah, it's okay. Yeah, we can follow. No, we can't. Now it's
gone too small. Just drag it off to the just drag the things.
Yep. Thank you. Yep. Okay, so let's go to deep work sessions,
recognition as a player. So here's what so what's not
included. And number four, so a four, you need to say, what's
not included is the distribution of the paper to colleges and
whoever, you're not distributing the paper. You're
not talking about in person inspections, insurance
inspections, bank inspections. So what you were saying was not
including the research paper, what this project doesn't also
do, does this project mean? Are you going to lay this research
paper out? So is a graphic designer going to do it is going
to be professionally laid out?
No, I was just gonna do a Word document.
Okay, so it's a so I need to go back to when we get to the
deliverable now.
completed research paper in Word, in a Word document, try to
be precise as possible what it is you're delivering in a Word
document. Now everybody knows you're giving a Word document.
And what's not included is it's not professionally laid out. So
back to forward the head. It's not professionally laid out.
It's not that you're not going to give it to a designer is
going to then really laid out beautifully. That might be just
separate project you delegate to somebody. Let's go back to
risks and rabbits. So where could you get stuck? This is not
a high level requirement. I've dropped down to C, C1. This is
not a high level requirement. Okay, we need to say where could
you get stuck in this research project talking about delivering
what would get you stuck from delivering the Word document?
That's the question. You've got the four hours you can or you've
got the eight hours to this. So you know, you got the time so
it's not other other stuff interfering is not it's not.
That's why deep work locks out while I have other work to do.
Yes, that's why it's a deep work session protected. We know you
have work to do. And this isn't taking the place of other work.
This is taking the place of what you would have done in a deep
work session. So we know you've got time. So the question is
what would get you stuck in delivering that document?
I can't think of anything. Something's going to come out in
four hours. I don't know whether it's going to be good.
Would you get stuck if you got to, you got to detail the too
much in the detail, you know, get overwhelmed, try to review
too many sources.
All right, I can go with that.
Because research can get carried away. As a guy who's write a lot
of dissertations and theses, I can tell you, you can get
completely carried away with more research and you go down a
rabbit hole, you know, with detail, you start over
researching small details.
Okay, how would you expand or add to the solution? And may I
make a suggestion how you might do that in this case? What if
you had it professionally laid out if you had extra time?
Oh, expand it? Yeah, that's a good.
Yeah, that's a lovely expansion. Now it's not only done, it's
done beautifully.
And to be honest with you, Leon, I hadn't even thought of that.
You know, that's not even on my radar, that you could actually
do something like that. But yeah.
So some of you are sitting and thinking, yeah, I wouldn't have
thought of that, which you just said, Robin. But that's the
point of the pitch. The pitch is someone in your team, you know,
someone in your team might have thought of that. Somebody in
your team said, Hey, Robin, what about this? What I'm doing is
I'm acting as your team here. I'm not just acting as your
coach through this. I'm also acting as your team. So a lot of
times the team will bring up something you just didn't even
think about. That's why we pitch the team. Right? So we're not
only letting them know they're helping us to really nail it
down. So that paper on the RDI and stuff, I would cut that out
because you just, you know, I would do it professionally laid
it feel easy to yourself, make this project feel super doable.
If you're feeling like, hey, that's a bit on the edge, you've
overdoing it, you're stretching, don't stretch, set it up as an
easy one for yourself. This is the whole team always do that.
Okay, let's go to how would you expand or add to the solution?
Have it professionally laid out? Good. What things could you cut
out?
A lot of the research.
Yeah, and cut out some of the research.
And deliver two pages.
And deliver two pages. Okay.
It's got to be like, if I can't spend eight hours and do two
pages, I need to get another job. Yeah.
It's got to be, you got to make it almost no brainer. Especially
these first few slices. Guys, just give yourself a lot of
margin. Does anybody else have have input with for Robin on
this?
Okay. Now, I appreciate you Robin jumping in and doing it.
Thank you to you and Nancy for doing those hot seats. I'm happy
to do other hot seats if you want them done. We can help do
this. If we see there's a real need for this, we'd be very
happy to, to set this up so we can all, you know, participate
in this. I want to say to the leaders, here's a couple of
things you really, really need to do. Number one, set up a
pitch date. Number two, encourage your team to do simple
slices. Now that I've gone through that once, you know, and
if you do a thin slice, and just watch for people making it too
big. That's always the number one problem. They don't cut it
thin enough. They're still eating half a loaf of bread, or
a third of a loaf of bread. Get it down to a thin slice that
seems completely, almost no brainer level.
Because once you've done that slice,
that'll be such a success experience.
This will accelerate.
You'll do more and more in less than this,
but not straight away.
Start with a very comfortable margin.
People say, well, I have other work to do.
That came up twice with both of you.
No, you don't.
You have a deep work session.
It's not other work.
Other work is general work and focused work.
That's got nothing to do with your deep work.
Now we're telling you what to do
with your deep work session.
So I know we wanna do a little breakout here,
but to do that, I wanna take a second longer
on trying to help the team get to the next level.
So what I'm gonna do, if you'll give me one second here.
So I wanna share my screen.
So I'm sharing my screen here.
I wanna show you, do we have a screen share?
Do we have the right screen share there guys to tell me?
You're just seeing me, right?
Just seeing you.
Mm-hmm.
Good.
So basically what we're saying here,
this on this episode 13 is we do wanna do,
shaping up work that matters.
This idea of thin slicing is one of the biggest power tools
we've just handed you,
because what this does is it expands your career
as an individual.
It expands innovation to every level of the organization
and makes it self-managed.
We don't have to have a project manager now
running around trying to coordinate all this.
Now innovation can explode at every level,
I'm gonna improve.
And it literally every aspect of the business
from finance to products, to customer service,
to every single aspect of the business,
reporting, whatever you want.
And it gets everybody in the mode.
So we should be seeing pitches every week.
Now, not everybody has to do a pitch every week,
but there should be a bunch of pitches.
On Tuesdays, what's happening?
You're getting pitches on new projects,
and then you're getting the results,
the presentations from people who are finishing up projects
that are due that day.
So you've got those two parts going on,
new pitches, presentation from previous pitches coming in.
And if you do it correctly,
you should never miss a deadline ever, ever.
And the reason that's so important
is that you're never getting to the mode of,
oh, I got busy, dog ate my homework.
Just don't let that even be a thing.
Just always do and never miss a pitch day.
If you do, put that project on hold for six months.
The reason is we got to make it lethal to miss.
Therefore, if we do that,
it causes you to put in a lot of margin on the front end
so that you never miss.
We never miss.
You say, is that practical?
I don't know, I've lost count of projects at Brilliant
because I keep adding new ones,
but it's over 40 projects
and we've never been an hour late on a single project
over several years.
So I'm absolutely, and this is substantive projects,
building AI backends to all the different complexities
to super simple things
like we want to improve the communication for our customers.
All these little projects can be super thin
and they gain momentum.
Don't do the big six week thing when I was your first one,
do a one week thing for your first project if you can.
Technically, Robin probably has a one week project there.
I just gave him more margin
because he said research project,
but now that I know it's three to five pages,
I probably agree with you now, Robin,
that it was probably one teamwork session there,
but nonetheless, it made the point.
Here's what I want to say.
Here's the bottom line.
Why have we been doing all this training?
We're on week 17.
Where are we?
Why should we engage in this?
I can tell you from just doing this a long time
that when we get to this point in the program,
what's happening is people are hearing the concepts,
are kind of dabbling with it.
I tried the deep work.
I don't really do deep work.
I don't know if I'm going to do this thin slice thing.
I don't know this.
I don't know that.
Here's the thing, guys.
This is about making you amazing in your career.
This is developing your superpower in your career.
This is not just about the company
sucking productivity out of you.
That's not what we're trying to do here.
We're trying to create a culture of trust,
an environment where you can genuinely thrive.
So there's three things we're measuring you on.
As the leaders, what your CEO is looking at to you
is measuring three things from you.
Do you feel a sense of cognitive control?
Do you feel like you are empowered to do work?
Number two, are you functioning at a high enough
energy level?
Do you have shiny eyes?
Do you come alive in what you're doing?
Number three, is this a good career path for you?
Regardless of whether it suits us as a company,
are you growing at the same rate as the business?
So let me just break each of those down very quickly.
We've talked about power tools.
So here, I'm just cutting it down to the bottom,
bottom line.
If you're not doing this, please stop.
For your own sake, not just.
because the company requires it of you, you do it for you.
And we're gonna talk about why.
Cognitive control, the QBook gives you control,
gets those to-do lists out of your head
and into a system you trust.
Number two, deep work.
The four hours, if you can't do four hours,
do two two-hour sessions,
but find a way to do uninterrupted new work,
however that looks to you.
If you can't get to four hours, break it up.
I already suggested, Nancy,
four one-hour sessions of deep work is fine.
That is a way to do it.
Four hours is just the goal we want you ultimately get to,
but deep work is what's gonna make you
the master of your own craft.
This is what's gonna develop your superpower
because that research, that innovation,
when you go to a new job,
that's the stuff you're going to talk about.
I'm the guy who wrote the report.
I'm the person who hired the new specialist.
I'm the person who did that.
You're the person that,
what did you do at your last company
is gonna come out of your deep work stuff,
and particularly your thin slices.
When people see you can innovate,
create something new and go somewhere,
it doesn't matter what level you are in the company.
It doesn't matter what your educational background is.
It doesn't matter any of that.
It only matters what can you contribute
and are you able to do that in the new company?
So this is for you.
This is also for the company.
This is also for the team.
Number two, the high energy zone.
It is our goal that at the end of this 40 weeks together,
you will be alive, feel alive,
because you have shiny eyes.
And why would you have shiny eyes?
Because you're operating in zone one.
Do you remember when we broke it up into four squares,
finding delight at work?
We asked you, where's your energy?
Where's your delight on the Y-axis?
Where's your joy?
And on the X-axis,
what's your contribution to the company?
And we made four squares
and we're trying to get you to zone one.
And getting rid of the stuff in zone four completely
and getting you into your high energy zone
means you come alive.
Remember the A-seat conversation?
A-seat is when I'm doing that thing, I feel most alive.
B-seat is like, ah, it's a wash.
C-seat is I'm depleted.
I can do A, B and C equally, but A energizes me.
We are trying to get you into your high energy zone
in this team.
We're helping you with things like deciding what done means
so you don't fixate on something.
You don't get, and then slicing will help you
super quickly decide what done means.
You saw what's the deliverable here.
Sometimes doing the thing 80% and just having it done
is way better than trying to get 90, 95%.
We've talked a great deal around these ideas,
but here's the bottom line.
We want you to find a light in your high energy zone.
It doesn't mean you're there now,
but we want to migrate you there, which
leads us to your career path.
Are you growing at the same rate?
The fact that your leaders signed up for this program
was because they wanted to increase the growth
rate and the innovation rate of the company.
So if the company is growing, we've
talked about this at this rate, and you're
growing at this rate, that gap's going to get bigger and bigger.
So you can tune out, but all you're doing
is you're securing your exit to go somewhere else where
the growth rate is slow to non-existent.
There are very few companies in the world
who do this, where they invest in you, where they're really
building into you.
So well done to the owners of the companies
who stepped up and made the investment in this program
for you.
So your job, you can tune out and say, that's not my thing,
I don't like this, it's too complicated,
whatever excuse you want to make, or you can engage.
And I know this sounds a little bit of a fatherly talk,
and I mean this in a kind way, because I'm
really jealous for you to gain the most out of this.
And then, are we even on the right path?
Are you in the right seat on the bus?
Do we need to move you to a different area?
Do we need to transition?
We can't move you at once.
Nobody can handle, OK, we'll just
put everybody in their hide zone.
That's not realistic.
But can we head you in that direction?
Can we take steps in that direction?
Because at the end of the day, the company
is investing in you.
If you leave this company, we want
you to be the smartest person.
Can you imagine your next job?
So here's how it goes.
So what did you do in the last job?
Well, we learned this whole thing about thin slicing,
I had deep work sessions.
What's a deep work?
What's a thin slice?
You're explaining to them, you're
already in a position of command in the interview.
Well, then I did these nine projects,
I was never an hour late.
What?
We've never had that.
Oh, our whole company was like that.
We did over 40 projects, and none of them
were an hour late.
Where did you work?
And by the way, now everything you're talking about,
thin slicing, Qbooks, all that stuff,
you are in a different league.
So what we're doing is when you leave,
so here's a call to you as a coach,
please engage, invest in your own growth.
Don't let the corporate growth rate be faster than yours.
Is that fair?
Is that good?
Okay, end of speech.
And I mean that because I'm really, really jealous
for what you're doing.
And hey, we will show patience.
This is very normal for it to be a very hit and miss
at this point.
It takes, that's why we do it for a year.
It takes about a year to get all this up.
So don't beat up on yourself.
No self-condemnation needed.
Just be patient, but engage.
At some point, start doing deep work sessions.
At some, get your cue book going.
If you forgot, get it going.
If you did it for a while and you lost it, get a new one.
So get engaged in the process.
I'm gonna open it for a second.
I know we're gonna break out,
but we won't be able to do that breakout thing right now.
So let's do the following.
Could we just take a second?
Let me give a chance to Ben, Robin,
any of the others who, people who lead teams
who would like to have a weigh in on that.
Ben?
So I missed the very first part, unfortunately,
but I am, we're wrestling to find the time, truly.
So true confessions, but we're believing, man,
that we're gonna get there.
We're gonna keep coming back and hitting it.
So I think the, I'm excited to get to catch up
with the team a little bit and hear what they've come up
with, if anything.
And really, I think that we're, we are where you described.
Very normal, super normal, that's,
but we don't want you to stay there.
That's not why you signed up.
Yeah, yeah.
Totally not why we signed up.
No, no, of course.
We wanna make sure we're delivering, that's what it is.
Robin, over to you.
Yeah, Ben, I can certainly relate to you there.
We're busy doing our thing, doing the business things
and all of that and trying to add more to that.
If you stop, if you wanna add something,
you have to stop doing something else.
And I'm hoping, cross my fingers,
that once we start doing, adding these other things
that will free up more time in other areas,
things will go more smoothly and we'll innovate
and we'll grow and we'll have the money to hire
the people that we need to.
And it's gonna be this kind of stair-step process.
But I'm right there with you, Ben.
We're all here at Know.
We're like, we gotta do what?
It's that kind of thing.
But I appreciate you, Dion, saying that you'll be patient
with us and you'll give us some time
to kind of figure this thing out.
I had no, I can't be disillusioned
because I wasn't illusioned in the first place.
I really appreciate the invitation to slice thinner.
And I think that that's probably the key for us, honestly,
is to not have some grand idea
that we're gonna build the skyscraper today,
but just really, just even learning it
and stepping through the process will be progress.
Absolutely.
Guys, look, here's the thing.
Just the fact that you're here,
that you're taking this on,
you're already ahead of the game, already.
But I would hate it for,
this, what I've spent my career doing
is figuring out how to take these big ideas
and make them simple enough
for small and emerging companies.
That's what I do.
That's my thing.
That's my superpower, if you wanna call it that.
So Joe asked a great question.
I've got all these projects.
How do I know where to start?
So Joe, you know what you could do?
Do that little four square thing, right?
Talk about time versus value to the company,
put four squares in there
and find the one that has the lowest time.
In this case, low time, high value
is your number one category.
So number one always changes
depending on where the emphasis is, right?
Sometimes, like if it's contribution versus joy,
you would then want high contribution,
high joy would be your number one.
But in this case, low time, high value.
Contribution is your number one, right?
So what I would do, take a few seconds,
you have all these tools,
just plot out three or four or five projects in there,
and it'll be really obvious to you
where the low-hanging fruit is.
Which project will take five or 10% of your time
that can produce a 70, 80%, you know,
let's do the Pareto principle.
And that's what done means, right?
So when you figure out what done means
and you thin slice it, you get it really tight
and you get impact from your input from your team,
here's something else, Joe, you may wanna think of,
which we have done.
If you have more than one project,
you could then slice up three projects,
pitch them all and say to the team,
I only can do one, which one do you think I should do?
And let the team give you the feedback and say,
yeah, Joe, I know you're all passionate about that project,
but it's not great value.
It's not as much value as you think it is, you know,
we will love it if you did, you know, project B,
because project B would really help us.
So this thing, I'm keeping,
I'm trying to keep it as simple, simple, simple
as part of that one pager, fill it out, pitch the team,
get the feedback and even have the team, you know,
kind of bid on which project they all think you should do.
So what happens then is then you create alignment
with the team, you create expectations.
Now, nobody's expecting you to deliver miracles
because you said, you know,
you were gonna build the universe
and you'll have it done by two weeks, you know,
you might even have three examples of it.
So, you know, I mean,
that's the problem with the wrong thinking.
What we're doing is we're going against all your training,
all your thinking, boil the ocean.
Okay, very cool, very cool.
Well, I know we used up your breakout time,
but I did want to take a minute to just talk with you.
Also, I do have one other announcement to make.
Jenny, I'll just jump into that if that's okay,
since we're not gonna do the breakout time.
Yes, please.
So the special announcement is I would like
on the first Friday of every month to do a CEO call.
So companies can bring two people.
So the CEO, if you're a husband, wife, team, whatever it is,
whoever the two people are on the team,
come every Friday at 10 a.m.
and we're just gonna take one hour.
What I'm gonna do is I want to give you tools
because you're getting to the point in the process
where there's some tools that could help your team
adopt and change and adopt your culture.
There's enough language now, there's enough concepts now,
there's enough commonality now for you to start steering.
And so I'd like you to be more steering the boat than me.
So I'd like you to be able to,
what paths can you change, customize to your culture,
to your particular industry?
I mean, you all come from such very different industries
and there's uniqueness to your industry.
And so we're gonna talk about those things.
So it's gonna be very hands-on.
I'm gonna talk about a couple of things
that I think are the sort of thing
that really helped the CEOs of the different teams.
So, hey, if you can do it, if you cannot,
we will record them.
We'll send them, we'll figure out how to get them to you.
But the idea, actually, I take that back.
We will not record them.
And the reason is so that you guys can talk freely.
I forgot we were doing that.
There'll be no recordings.
You can get in and say, you know,
I had one guy get on and say, I don't even like my team.
I'm not sure you are not those people.
Nobody here said that, but I have had people say,
I don't even know if I like half the people in my team.
I don't even know if I should have hired them.
You gotta have a forum where you can talk, right?
So it's gonna be cool.
And well, I got the superstar.
How do I handle the superstar?
I got this person who's growing faster
than the growth of the company.
How do I make more space for them?
I don't wanna lose them.
How do I keep them engaged?
That's a great problem,
but actually quite difficult one to solve.
So we wanna have CEO level conversations
and I'm telling everybody
because I want them to know you're getting extra support.
I know that wasn't included in the initial plan,
but I just wanna ramp that in.
You say, well, that's only once a month.
So it's not every Friday.
Is that good?
Thank you, Dion.
It's above and beyond, you know, what we signed up for.
I just wanna be the first to say, thank you.
I'm really looking forward to that.
That's certainly most welcome.
Okay.
I think we're, Jenny, over to you in the last few minutes.
Is there anything else we have to do?
Not anything else that we have to do.
Do you wanna ask, you have the special announcement,
how do folks join that call?
The CEOs will send them an email with the call information.
Yeah, it's just gonna be my personal Zoom link.
I'll just send it to you.
Yeah.
And I'm also gonna set up some other opportunities
and we'll talk a little bit
about some more support things we can do.
I've got a couple of extra bonus stuff
I wanna share with you that I've lined up.
I think I've already shared with you, Ben,
some of the stuff.
As you, as you guys have needed things, I've been responding, but I want to open
that up to everyone, you know, we've got a couple of resources that may help, et
cetera.
So yeah, it'd be my personal zoom link number.
Great.
Um, and if I could just say as someone who's gone through this training, just
like you guys that in the beginning, I had very much the same thoughts.
How am I going to fit this in?
Oh my goodness.
This is something else that I have to manage.
I have to do this every week.
And I just want to let you know, the hardest part was actually doing it.
And so once I did it, just like Nancy's response was once she did it, she
realized the freedom that it actually opens up for her.
And that's what thin slicing does is it does really give you freedom to fully
innovate and to give yourself to innovate and encourage you as leaders, um, that
your team is going to see the benefit of this.
And so I've had that experience of walking through it.
When Dion came on it, brilliant.
Learning it from the first time myself, and then also walking team members through,
um, the power tools that he just shared with you and have seen the difference
in, uh, in just their shiny eyes.
When they recognize they have the tools, they're empowered to be fully
innovative at work, to be fully productive and to manage their own workloads.
So just want to encourage you all to stick with it.
If you haven't set a time, that's the hardest step, set the time, just do it.
Get your favorite thing, your favorite drink, your favorite
music, or your favorite snack.
Sit down, commit to it.
And I guarantee that once you do it the one time, your perspective on it, on thin
slicing, on deep work, on QBook, it will be changed.
And, uh, we are the evidence of that.
So just want to encourage you all.
All right.
Very good.
Excellent.
Well, thanks everybody.
We'll end up a minute or two early here.
Um, and then we'll, we'll see you back next week.
All right.
Bye guys.