Growth Think Tank

Before you think about hiring a coach for yourself or someone on your team, you want to think about the value of coaching. I hired a coach in the first two years of launching my business, and it was a powerful experience that helped me create a five million dollar business by year three. I would say that the value of coaching is priceless when you decide to transform from the inside out. You have...

To have revenue growth, you have to get good at sales execution. When I say sales execution, it is the art and science of closing the deal. Every company has to figure out the path to predictable sales execution if you want to grow beyond where they are now. My guests today are Chris Cochran and Richard Hoehn, Co-founders of FreightWise. Their company was ranked #2 in the 2019 Inc 5000 list. They...

I sat down with the CEO of a Fortune 50 company that I admired. This meeting was the first face-to-face interaction. He started with a genuine interest in me and my work. Then I shared my research on the founders and CEOs of fast-growth companies. After hearing the big revelation, he quickly said, "I was wrong." I didn't know what to say. If I was wrong, what would this mean for my business? I lea...

You have likely heard that failure should not be avoided. You have heard that failure is part of the process. However, too many companies have a culture that is playing not to fail. This is dangerous in many ways. When you embrace failure throughout your culture, you have people that are innovating and pushing the boundaries of new success. A leader's job is to embrace failure in such a way that t...

Fast growth requires you to be great in many aspects of the business. One area that has many benefits is retaining employees. Your employees have relationships with your clients. Your employees have the skills and experience that drives the business forward. It hurts all areas of the business when they leave, especially the bottom-line. Today's guest is Jeff Hay, founder of RDI Technologies. RDI w...

In today's fast-paced world, you have to be intentional to reduce stress at work and life. One way to do that is to set boundaries. These boundaries are intentional times that you can let go of the pressures of life. I recommend doing something that turns off the brain. If you want to reduce stress at work and life, you want to set boundaries. Today I share with you how I do it. I have been traini...

If you want to have a company that grows fast, you must understand fast-growth leadership. Leaders that I have talked to about their companies, employees, innovation, and even business models have a unique way to think about their growth. One thing they all agree on is that fast-growth leadership is an essential foundation. My guest today is Rex Kurzius, Founder of Asset Panda. His company was ran...

You can't do it alone. If you want to create a company with a significant impact, you must build a team that goes beyond only you. You don't need just any team either. The end goal is to get employees to take ownership of their work and the client experience. My guest today is Stu Sjouwerman, CEO of KnowBe4. His company was ranked #92 in the 2018 Inc 5000 list. Stu shares his insights to get emplo...

When you are the bottleneck to growth, you have created processes and systems that make you the final say to completion of work in the business. The founders of fast-growth companies often face this after months -- sometimes years -- of struggling with being the bottleneck to growth. It comes with frustration as you want others to support the company to grow more, but you have not empowered them....

Can you even imagine what it takes to grow your company by 10x this year? Well, you will be blown away when I tell you the private company with the highest level of revenue in the last three years grew at 36,680 percent. The one driving force for their growth is an ownership culture. This means they have created a company where the employees feel a sense of ownership in everything they do. My gues...

The process to empower employees is often misunderstood. Empowerment takes trust and courage. It also requires that you be the kind of leader that wants others to make decisions. Empowering employees happens to be one of the core principles of having a culture of ownership. My guest today is Jared Hecht, Founder of Fundera. His company was ranked #69 in the 2018 Inc 5000 list and operates a market...

Do you want to continue growing your business as fast as you have been growing? If you could see where I am standing right now, you would see a symbol of growth, the Inc 5000 letters at the Inc Conference in Phoenix, AZ. I work with dozens of companies that have been recognized by Inc for their fast-growth and want to continue growing. Primarily, I see their founders and CEOs are driven, confident...

Creating a mission-driven company is much more than giving money away. Mission-driven has become a buzzword in today's business. The ones that do it right have seen benefits that go beyond philanthropy. Creating a mission-driven company will help you gain customers and even align employees in a way that drives the business forward. Today's guest is Zachary Quinn, Co-founder of Love Your Melon. Zac...

Are you a high-performing leader, and you love to learn? I am attending the Inc5000 Conference in Phoenix this week. I stumbled upon three colleges clustered together and was reminded of my college years. I didn't always love the process of learning. When you are forced to learn things that you don't have much interest in to get good grades, it is hard to stay focused on learning. After college, I...

Every leader I know is charged with finding team alignment so that the company grows in a collaborative way. The process of finding team alignment takes intentional thought and robust strategies. My guests today are Blake Harris and Charlie Matter, Co-Founders of Case Energy Partners. Their company was ranked #78 in the 2018 Inc 5000 list. We talk about how they approach finding team alignment. We...

Shifting from fear of failure to lead the team to higher levels of success takes time. The fear of failure is a common fear among entrepreneurial leaders. It comes from doing something big and scary. It often drives you to work hard and encourage your team to work hard too. However, there is another more evolved way to lead. When you profoundly connect to your mission and vision, you begin to see...

Discover why transparency matters in modern culture. One big reason is that transparency breeds trust. When you are open to transparency in your business, you signal to your people that they are part of the process. My guest today is John Laramie, CEO of ProjectX. His company was ranked #65 in the 2018 Inc 5000 list. John shares why transparency matters. He gives you ways to be transparent so that...

Employee retention is one of the biggest and most expensive problems that companies have. If you have an employee leave before you are ready for them to leave, you know the cost of replacing that person is going to be expensive. Employee retention for some roles can be higher than 50 percent in a 12 month period. My special guest today is Amanda Hammett. Amanda is my wife, and she is amazingly sma...

Invest in your employees if you want to create a strong team. Investing in their skills to do their work is a big part of creating a culture that drives the business forward. You might be tempted to reduce these investments in favor of a healthy bottom line. My guest today is Noah Curran, Founder, and CEO of MonkMedia. This company is #67 on the 2018 Inc 5000 list. Noah shares why he invests so mu...

Culture is often thought of as intangible. I do believe you can measure culture with attributes that make up how we work and communicate together. I interviewed John Mazur, CEO at Homesnap. His company was #43 on the 2018 Inc 5000 list. John shares with me how to measure culture and why it matters. Discover the key factors to measure culture for your company. Get the show notes for How do you Meas...

When you lead a company that has an amazing employee experience, you get more than just happy people. The employee experience shapes how they think about their work, their co-workers, and leaders. Creating an amazing employee experience drives company growth too. Today's guest is Dan Foley, Founder, and CEO of Curate Partners. This company was ranked #20 in the 2018 Inc 5000 List. Dan shares the r...

Companies that want to grow understand the need for investing in employees. Leaders of these companies make the hard decision to put money and time into skills training that lift their employees to a new level. One mistake that is common, not investing beyond just new skills. Gordon Vanscoy is today's guest. He is the CEO of Panther Speciality Pharmacy, #31 on the 2018 Inc 5000 list. Gordon shares...

Creating an agile culture gives you speed and results. Agile is the norm in development teams. They have proven the value of small incremental growth that evolves the technology quickly. Some companies are embracing an agile culture across the whole company to improve growth. Think that each team has a new project that is the prime focus every two weeks. They learn to complete projects instead of...

Maintaining a culture with a remote team requires intention. The culture of an organization is the cornerstone of how work gets done. It is easier when the people show up to the same building and gather face-to-face to maintain culture as the company grows. As companies have embraced virtual workers, the idea of maintaining a culture with a remote team has become more critical. Today's guest is Je...

Discover the rules of making a partnership work from two fast-growth c-founders. Partnerships can be hard. Most tend to end in frustration and turmoil. Partnerships are much harder when you don't have a framework for making the partnership work. Today's guests are Sam Khorramian and Oliver Graff. These two co-founders started Big Block Realty with the right frameworks to guide their growth. Big Bl...