EP134 - Break Fix Edition - Regaining Focus After 40 Bank Holidays with Ian Luckett

INTRO

In this episode the IT Experts Podcast, we're going to help you to regain focus, get back on track and get some momentum in your business after what it seems like 40 bank holidays.

Welcome to the IT Experts Podcast, the only podcast to help MSP scale to 1,000,000, and if already there get to 5 and go fast at the end of the day, isn't it all about building a business that works for you rather than you for it. I hope you enjoy the show.

IAN

So, good morning, good afternoon, good evening. Welcome to the IT Experts podcast. And I just wanted to slide this one into the schedule because you know at the time of recording, which is June 2023, we've just had May, we've just had the most amazing coronation.

But it seems like there's been like 40 bank holidays. Everyone's been on holiday, clients have been on holiday. Your team's been on holiday, which has been great. Okay, cause it's been a great time for the nation and it's been an amazing time, you know, for everyone to reconnect with their family and really get back to your purpose and what this is kind of all about. But in this quick break Fix Edition, we're going to help you to give you, we're going to give you 3 tips and tricks to get you back on track, to get you back focused, to get you back with that momentum so that we can close out quarter 2 coming up to the end of June, close out quarter 2 with a bang and let's really, really get things together.

So what happens a lot at this time of year? Obviously, we do have a couple of bank holidays. We've had some more, where you lose momentum. Things get dropped, projects start taking longer, whether they be for the client or they'll be internal projects. People aren't around for you to have those conversations with about strategy and about how we deal with our marketing and what we're doing. You know, in terms of the structure of the team and things like that. So look, I've got under 10 minutes, so I need to get cracking with this.

So the first one I want to share with you today, really simple. It's really free and it's really, really easy.

Point 1 is, I wanted to communicate and check in with your team. If they can't see it, it's not existing. Okay? Many of our clients, we run through a very rigorous, you know structured program, a structured way of creating the growth plan. And when they got that in place, we then bounce back to that, we come back to it when you get distracted and we help you to share and communicate that with your team. So if you're just walking in, if you've been away or they've been away – Regroup your team. Get them together. Find out how they've been over the last month, who's been in the office, there could be some people have been in the office, a lot of the time who's been in the office, a lot of the time. How are they getting on? What projects are going on? What problems are going on? How's the performance of the business and just kind of have a bit of a regroup. If you don't communicate with them, they don't know what's going on. Communication is free, so it's like. One of those tools. That's the easiest thing in the world for us to not do because it's easy not to do. But when we do it, you'll be amazed at the results you get. So I want you to check in on your vision and your values with your team, or to check in on the business performance and how well it's going, go around the department. See what the initiatives people have got to get this last push, to get June, to really get those results that you need. Is it some businesses you need to close? Is it some projects that you need to close off? Is it some initiatives that you're working on in your in your business at the minute around, you know bringing in a particular tech product or something like what do you need to do to really push and check in with your team? The reason this is also important is because this is where your leverage starts. If you come back from a two week holiday. And you sit down and you lock yourself in your office for the day and you trundle along and you work through your To Do List - You're missing out. And the reason you're missing out, is because if you spend an hour or two hours with your team and you then refocus them redelegated to them, you know, reset them, their targets get them on their way. The ability to scale and the ability to move forward faster is going to be much greater when you do it with your team than you do it on your own. So yes, I know you want to go through and get your To Do List ticked off. Yes, I know you want to go through and get your emails ticked off and everything like that, but connect with your senior leadership team, connect your senior people and connect with the whole organization. And get them running first. Then you can sit back, relax, have a look at what's the priorities for you right now. Have a look at what are some of the things you need to be working on for yourself personally. So communicate and check in with your team, prioritze. You know, delegate correctly, another podcast all about that, but make sure that we're doing that in isolation.

So the second part is we need to revisit our financial and business targets. As I just said, end of June, is really near, you could actually use this podcast at anytime of the year when you've got an opportunity to have a bit of a reset, how's your turnover going? How's your profitability more importantly going, how's the cash flow going? What things do you need to do in the next 4 weeks to make a big difference and focus like it's Christmas? And what happens at Christmas? Everybody focuses at Christmas because they got a couple of weeks off and amazingly, bucket loads of stuff gets done, so make sure that you're refocusing on your financial targets to make sure the bloodline of the business is up and running. Also have a little look at your business targets as well. What have you set for the year in terms of the yearly goals, quarterly goals, you know, a monthly goals? As it would be, have a look to see how quarter two is doing. I'm talking pipeline. I'm talking customer service. I'm talking project completion, project profitability and all of that kind of good stuff. So have a look at some of the targets. Have a look at your plan. Have a look at some of the things that you were hoping to get done this year or by this time of the year. And if you haven't managed to do, absolutely fine. You can, you know, push them back if they're not a priority. But you've just got your priorities, remember, because you've just communicated and you've checked in with your team and now you looked at your finances, you know, that's in a good place now, looking at your business targets to make sure that they're in a good place and any projects. And that's when you can then pull back and regroup your team to do that. So revisit, number 2 is around revisiting the finance and your business targets and just see where you're at and which ones you really need to focus on in the next 4 weeks.

Last but not least, point 3 is around creating weekly outcomes and what we see all the time here is people pick up a thing they want to do in the business, a task, a project they want to do in the business and they normally underestimate the different elements, the different, you know, the different parts, subtasks, I suppose what I'm trying to say, split the words out to achieving the larger task and then they get in over on and then they pick the bits that they want to do. And the bits that they don't want to do, or they find a little bit tricky or a little bit sticky then they then they leave and then the project just falls over or it doesn't quite get where you need to be. So why don't you say I want you to think about where you want to be in terms of cash flow projects, you know, items, tasks, outcomes, priorities, whatever it might be at the end of June. And then I want it to break it down into weekly outcomes for June. So what do you need to do? Week 1 - What does success on this project task issue priority look like in Week 1. Where do we want to be by that Friday? Week 2, Week 3, week 4. How do you eat an elephant said it many, many times, bite size chunks. I want to break down these goals, want you to break it down into weekly chunks and then have a check in. Get yourself accountable with one of your team members and make sure that you're breaking that down so that you know what the task involves, who's going to get involved in it, what actually needs to happen, and then you're going to start to get a little bit of traction there and you never know, you might start using that tactic in July and right through the end of the year and then you'll end up getting where you need to be in terms of your business growth. So we are at the end of quarter two have a check in to see where you're getting with your plan. Currently we've just been spending a lot of time, which is why it's been a bit a little bit busy at the growth hub over the last couple of weeks. We have a 16 week program we run with our clients or a 16 week cadence and we've reset all their goals and we're having all these one to one goals which is, which is obviously quite a like Christmas for certain people very, very busy, very, very busy time of the year. We do that three times a year, but we reset their plans and many of them are in overwhelmed because of the bank holidays. Those people being absent clients been absent, not being able to move things for words. And one of the things we've really as I mentioned a little bit earlier, one of the things we've been working with them in is breaking down those tasks. And once you've written your plan down, you've got it on the system of your choice. However you want to track it, and then you break those tasks down into individual subtasks, and then they can see where they need to be, what they need to be doing this month. Over the next four months, what is it that they need to achieve? What does the outcome look like? What does success look like? What do we need to do? Who do we need to be involved with? And I know it sounds really boring. We've talked about it before, but you know when you've got a plan that's at this level and at this level of that, not necessarily complexity, but is connected, I guess is what I'm trying to say. Then all of a sudden you're going to start to get traction. It's going to feel a bit clunky to start with, but that's really, really important. And once you, you know, kind of absorb what we've talked about today, why, what's the point of doing this? The opportunity is that you can have a clearer vision on what you're going to be doing. You're going to have better focus at work. People are going to be more connected. They're going to be better connected. They're going to be reengaged. They're going to be motivated. They're gonna have more energy in the office to get things done. And this is not only going to help from a business point of view, but this is going to help you personally as well. You're going to have a healthier mind. You're going to be feeling better. You're going to be feeling less stressed. You're going to be feeling less overwhelmed.

So look, I can see the clock it's running up. I need to make sure that we've got this one nice and under 10 minutes. Another podcast I just want you to quickly check and go and have a look at is Episode 100 I did with Stuart and it was how to align your team so you can step back from operations and I think this is also going to be a really great episode that relates to. How do you use your team properly? How do we align your team? How do you delegate correctly so that you can achieve more with your team and make sure that you're getting the best bang for your buck out of your biggest investment, which is your people.

So look, I hope you enjoyed this show real quick short, sharp blast. Communicate with your team. Get a check in with them, find out where they're at, revisit your financial targets and your business targets. Create weekly outcomes. Don't get yourself into overwhelmed by trying to eat the whole elephant all at once. And if you're curious about how this can kind of work in terms of moving forward with your business and how do you get it to a million or even go faster to five. Then look, I'm going to drop a link in this podcast to the MSP Mastery quiz takes you 5 minutes. Hit a load of buttons gives you a great report on where you are today. What you need to do, What are things we need to focus on and it will help you to get your business to the next level and more understand what those foundations are the building blocks that might be a little bit clunky in your MSP right now. So that's it for me today. I'm going to let you crack on with the rest of your day. Good luck. Catch up with you on the next podcast and my fingers are crossed for you for an amazing productive and successful June, see you later.

OUTRO

So I hope you enjoyed the show. If you did, I'd love it if you could leave a rating and review on your favorite podcast platform. If you want to learn more about how to take your MSP to a million, or if you're already there, go faster then come and join Stuart Warwick and myself in the Scale of Confidence. Facebook group. Link’s on the Show Notes. You go and enjoy the rest of your day and. I look forward to connecting with you soon.