Transcript
WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.559 --> 00:00:08.509 Hey there, this is James Carberry, founder of sweet fish media and one 2 00:00:08.509 --> 00:00:11.390 of the cohosts of this show. For the last year and a half I've 3 00:00:11.390 --> 00:00:15.150 been working on my very first book. In the book I share the three 4 00:00:15.269 --> 00:00:19.670 part framework we've used as the foundation for our growth here at sweetfish. Now 5 00:00:19.710 --> 00:00:22.820 there are lots of companies that have raised a bunch of money and have grown 6 00:00:22.859 --> 00:00:25.780 insanely fast, and we featured a lot of them here on the show. 7 00:00:26.539 --> 00:00:30.780 We've decided to bootstrap our business, which usually equates to pretty slow growth, 8 00:00:31.300 --> 00:00:34.899 but using the strategy outlined in the book, we are on pace to be 9 00:00:35.060 --> 00:00:38.850 one of inks fastest growing companies in two thousand and twenty. The book is 10 00:00:38.929 --> 00:00:42.929 called content based networking, how to instantly connect with anyone you want to know. 11 00:00:43.490 --> 00:00:45.530 If you're a fan of audio books like me, you can find the 12 00:00:45.570 --> 00:00:48.649 book on audible or if you like physical books, you can also find it 13 00:00:48.770 --> 00:00:55.000 on Amazon. Just search content based networking or James carberry CR be aary in 14 00:00:55.200 --> 00:00:59.119 audible or Amazon and it should pop right up. All right, let's get 15 00:00:59.119 --> 00:01:03.200 into the show. Welcome back to be to be growth. I'm Logan lyles 16 00:01:03.280 --> 00:01:07.189 with sweet fish media. Today is another episode in our behind the curtain series. 17 00:01:07.430 --> 00:01:11.629 As always, in this series I am joined by my good buddy, 18 00:01:11.670 --> 00:01:15.790 founder and CEO and now author of content based networking, James Carberry. Once 19 00:01:15.829 --> 00:01:18.859 up. Man. Hello, man, that's still feels weird to hear and 20 00:01:19.140 --> 00:01:23.579 say I'm signing books this morning. That feels even more weird to think that 21 00:01:23.739 --> 00:01:27.540 people actually think my signature is worth anything. So, man, I'm but 22 00:01:27.620 --> 00:01:30.299 I'm I'm pumped to be talking about we're going to be talking about today. 23 00:01:30.340 --> 00:01:34.650 Yeah, absolutely, Man. So we are fresh off of spending some time 24 00:01:34.890 --> 00:01:38.489 in person together from our leadership team retreat last week. We were it was 25 00:01:38.489 --> 00:01:42.849 kind of fun being in the same place that the week that that your book 26 00:01:42.849 --> 00:01:46.489 launched. So that was fun, a little chaotic, as you talked about, 27 00:01:47.159 --> 00:01:51.879 but one of the big things that we was focusing on and putting language 28 00:01:51.920 --> 00:01:55.159 to what we call our why and our mountain top. Now a lot of 29 00:01:55.239 --> 00:01:59.680 people call these their mission statement and their vision statement, and I think maybe 30 00:01:59.760 --> 00:02:01.269 to set the stage a little bit there, let's talk a little bit about 31 00:02:01.390 --> 00:02:06.310 why we chose to give different language to them and then we'll talk about, 32 00:02:06.349 --> 00:02:09.069 you know, the process of landing on what we landed on. Yeah. 33 00:02:09.189 --> 00:02:13.909 So, so mission envision was really what I was going into this thing thinking 34 00:02:13.990 --> 00:02:17.860 we were going to call it. I've been just I'm a leadership junkie and 35 00:02:19.340 --> 00:02:23.939 have been listening to a lot of folks talk about mission vision values. And 36 00:02:24.180 --> 00:02:29.860 last year we spent a good part of last year not just establishing our values, 37 00:02:29.979 --> 00:02:31.889 we did that at the beginning of the year, but then really baking 38 00:02:32.050 --> 00:02:38.490 those values into the fiber of our culture. And so we instituted things like 39 00:02:38.610 --> 00:02:44.719 doing a monthly values champion that the entire team votes on every every month and 40 00:02:44.800 --> 00:02:49.479 we celebrate those on slack and and so we're talking about why people exuded, 41 00:02:49.800 --> 00:02:53.240 you know, one of our three court values. It's probably the best email 42 00:02:53.240 --> 00:02:57.039 of the months that that we all get, just seeing how everybody on the 43 00:02:57.120 --> 00:03:00.469 team is being in our values. I close all of my leadership team videos 44 00:03:00.870 --> 00:03:06.430 with our values. We talked about our values all the time on slack when 45 00:03:06.469 --> 00:03:09.949 we see people operating out of them. So really baking the values and was 46 00:03:10.030 --> 00:03:14.099 huge for us and I knew that coming into our leadership or treat this year. 47 00:03:14.300 --> 00:03:17.979 I wanted to get clear on mission envision and as I was talking about 48 00:03:19.020 --> 00:03:22.340 it with Ryan from our team, he's our director of people, ops and 49 00:03:22.419 --> 00:03:27.770 culture, he was really confused by the language. Now, Ryan doesn't necessarily 50 00:03:27.849 --> 00:03:31.129 come in with, you know, a whole lot of business background or he's 51 00:03:31.210 --> 00:03:34.610 one of our first employees, are sweet fish, so he's been with us 52 00:03:34.689 --> 00:03:38.210 for close to half a decade now. So all of his experience is really 53 00:03:38.250 --> 00:03:43.400 sweet fish experience and when he hears the term mission envision he's like, man, 54 00:03:43.439 --> 00:03:46.319 James, that just that sounds kind of confusing, like I don't know 55 00:03:46.520 --> 00:03:51.840 how to delineate between the two. And the more I tried explaining to him 56 00:03:52.240 --> 00:03:54.439 why and of it needed to be mission and vision, the more I convinced 57 00:03:54.520 --> 00:04:00.110 myself that it really is confusing language, like you're you're on a mission and 58 00:04:00.310 --> 00:04:02.789 this is the vision, and I can very much see how that's confusing. 59 00:04:02.870 --> 00:04:06.509 And so we were at the retreat, we were talking through some ideas and 60 00:04:08.270 --> 00:04:12.500 he came outside and he was like I got it. It's not mission envision, 61 00:04:12.699 --> 00:04:15.180 it's our why and our mountain top, and I was like, oh 62 00:04:15.259 --> 00:04:17.339 my gosh, I guess soon as he said it we all thought that's it, 63 00:04:17.899 --> 00:04:21.220 that's what we're going to call. What most people call their mission envision 64 00:04:21.699 --> 00:04:26.290 is our why. WHY ARE WE IN EXISTENCE? Obviously, Simon Sink, 65 00:04:26.689 --> 00:04:30.370 you know, kind of made that verbiage a lot more popular the last the 66 00:04:30.449 --> 00:04:33.009 last several years because of his Ted talk and his book. But our why 67 00:04:33.250 --> 00:04:38.009 is really why we exist, and then our mountain top is where we're going. 68 00:04:38.449 --> 00:04:41.879 And that doesn't mean that once we get to that mountain top we're not 69 00:04:41.920 --> 00:04:45.839 going to keep climbing and and set a new mountain top, but it does 70 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:48.639 mean that that's where we're heading right now and I just thought that was really 71 00:04:48.720 --> 00:04:55.230 cool language to wrap around the work that we were embarking on a time over 72 00:04:55.269 --> 00:04:58.069 the leadership or treat yeah, I love it, man. I mean I 73 00:04:58.269 --> 00:05:00.589 saw I saw this debate going back and forth on twitter a little while back 74 00:05:00.629 --> 00:05:05.149 and then Dave Gearhart, Andy Raskin, I think maybe Guy Tano was was 75 00:05:05.350 --> 00:05:09.180 in on that. I can't remember who else, but this, okay, 76 00:05:09.259 --> 00:05:12.860 mission and vision really feels like like splitting hairs, kind of like what you 77 00:05:12.899 --> 00:05:16.220 were saying there and trying to explain it and talk about it between you and 78 00:05:16.339 --> 00:05:19.860 Ryan. A couple things I like is you get away from that. Oh, 79 00:05:19.980 --> 00:05:25.689 the words just sound the similar. So there's there's that issue and your 80 00:05:25.810 --> 00:05:28.610 why and your mountain top. You know, we talked a lot about in 81 00:05:28.810 --> 00:05:32.089 coming up with our language for these in coming up with our values last year, 82 00:05:32.569 --> 00:05:35.480 what sort of visual metaphors we want to have, and I just love 83 00:05:35.560 --> 00:05:39.680 that that mountain top. It's very clear. Okay, why? All right, 84 00:05:39.759 --> 00:05:43.040 that's very self explanatory and mountain top, that's where we're trying to go 85 00:05:43.439 --> 00:05:46.480 and that gives us a goal and you know, we spent a good bit 86 00:05:46.560 --> 00:05:48.920 of time on it and you know, you said something was weird chatting this 87 00:05:49.029 --> 00:05:54.029 morning about, you know, the importance of this that you know we have 88 00:05:54.149 --> 00:05:59.310 been very growth gused. We've had some exponential growth in the last three years 89 00:05:59.790 --> 00:06:04.220 and you know the this language is going to be important as it informs how 90 00:06:04.300 --> 00:06:08.620 we approach growth. Can you speak to that and kind of the importance and 91 00:06:09.019 --> 00:06:13.339 where you feel that plays a role for maybe other leaders and other teams man? 92 00:06:14.019 --> 00:06:20.569 Yeah, so establishing your why really gives you much more purposeful meaning for 93 00:06:20.850 --> 00:06:26.009 pursuing growth. I think for for a long time, I mean I'm guilty 94 00:06:26.089 --> 00:06:29.769 of this, it was really pursuing growth for Growth Sake. I mean, 95 00:06:29.810 --> 00:06:33.000 if we're we're honest, growth is exciting, growth is new, growth is 96 00:06:33.480 --> 00:06:39.480 it's I think as human beings we are wired to desire growth, but when 97 00:06:39.519 --> 00:06:46.279 you layer in understanding the why and really being thoughtful about what is it, 98 00:06:46.399 --> 00:06:50.670 what's a deeper, more purposeful meaning behind what you're doing thing, it just 99 00:06:50.910 --> 00:06:56.189 gives you more fuel to want to grow, because now you're not just growing 100 00:06:56.389 --> 00:07:00.620 for Growth Sake, but you're growing because there's something meaningful that's going to make 101 00:07:00.660 --> 00:07:03.779 the world you know a little bit better. And I want to be real 102 00:07:03.899 --> 00:07:10.259 careful about you. You know every SASS company mission statement is. You know 103 00:07:10.420 --> 00:07:14.139 something about you know how our data analytics platform is going to change the world 104 00:07:14.180 --> 00:07:17.129 and and that like and I think you'll see, I think listeners will will 105 00:07:17.250 --> 00:07:21.050 hear as we talk through what our why and what our mountaintop is. We 106 00:07:21.209 --> 00:07:26.209 went away from that direction. We didn't do this super ethereal. You know, 107 00:07:26.370 --> 00:07:29.610 anything you do can change the world, even though I do believe that. 108 00:07:29.689 --> 00:07:31.519 I think how we live in our day to day lives has an impact 109 00:07:31.560 --> 00:07:35.920 on the world. It may not be at the scale that that statement makes 110 00:07:35.959 --> 00:07:40.160 you think it is, but it does have an impact. But I still 111 00:07:40.240 --> 00:07:44.120 wanted to stay away from that language because it just it didn't feel like us 112 00:07:44.550 --> 00:07:47.470 and it felt too much like what everybody else is saying and so all that 113 00:07:47.589 --> 00:07:51.470 to say, I do think that nailing this stuff down, whether you decide 114 00:07:51.550 --> 00:07:57.310 for your organization that that having that lofty you know, we want to change 115 00:07:57.310 --> 00:08:01.300 the world language, is is you and is something that works for your organization 116 00:08:01.379 --> 00:08:07.139 and will empower and motivate them toward pursuing the goals that you want to pursue. 117 00:08:07.740 --> 00:08:09.100 We even though we didn't do that. I'm not saying that that's wrong 118 00:08:09.139 --> 00:08:13.649 and they shouldn't, but I'm saying that having your why define, whether you 119 00:08:13.810 --> 00:08:16.930 call it a mission or a vision or why, or whatever you want to 120 00:08:16.930 --> 00:08:22.689 call it, man, it just gives so much more purpose to pursuing growth 121 00:08:24.089 --> 00:08:26.600 when you have that is your North Star. Yeah, absolutely, Man. 122 00:08:26.879 --> 00:08:31.680 So with that you want to you want to share both of them today and 123 00:08:31.759 --> 00:08:35.799 then speak a little bit to how we're planning to kind of bake those into 124 00:08:35.600 --> 00:08:39.279 our regular rhythm as a team throughout the year. Yeah, so this was 125 00:08:39.320 --> 00:08:45.470 a fun process. I came into this for the probably last six months I 126 00:08:46.029 --> 00:08:50.110 have been thinking about, you know, mission vision and I knew that in 127 00:08:50.190 --> 00:08:52.350 two thousand and twenty, the same thing that we've been able to pull off 128 00:08:52.429 --> 00:08:56.940 with our values really getting everyone on the team on board with our values, 129 00:08:56.539 --> 00:09:01.860 knowing what they are, using them in everyday language. I wanted that to 130 00:09:01.940 --> 00:09:05.779 be the case with mission and envision what obviously turned out to be wide mountaintop. 131 00:09:07.100 --> 00:09:09.090 But the reason for that is because I really do think that you can 132 00:09:09.090 --> 00:09:13.690 go further faster when everybody's on the same page and everybody's aligned around where the 133 00:09:13.769 --> 00:09:18.450 organization is going and why they're going there. So I'd been crafting some messaging 134 00:09:18.690 --> 00:09:22.210 for prop for on and off for about six months leading up to this retreat. 135 00:09:22.450 --> 00:09:26.840 Maybe not quite exposed to like for four or five months. Regardless. 136 00:09:26.960 --> 00:09:31.080 I had some pre you know, kind of prebaked notions of what it would 137 00:09:31.080 --> 00:09:35.799 be and I remember we're sitting at a pizza place around the table and I 138 00:09:35.960 --> 00:09:39.429 threw out like hey, this is what I'm thinking, and it basically got 139 00:09:39.509 --> 00:09:43.590 shot out of the sky like like, you know, like it really cannon. 140 00:09:43.870 --> 00:09:46.230 I mean I threw it out and it was just like I could just 141 00:09:46.429 --> 00:09:50.669 tell everybody is like, which nobody wants to be told that their baby's ugly. 142 00:09:50.990 --> 00:09:54.019 I've been working on this for four or five, six months like that. 143 00:09:54.100 --> 00:09:58.419 Kind of sucks to hear that. Every you know everybody's reaction. It's 144 00:09:58.460 --> 00:10:01.860 just kind of like like that. That's not you know, that's not super 145 00:10:01.940 --> 00:10:07.649 motivate anger. And I think the one thing that I was really excited about 146 00:10:07.769 --> 00:10:11.809 is as much as kind of in that moment I had hurt feelings and, 147 00:10:11.970 --> 00:10:15.929 you know, my baby just caught called ugly. What ended up happening is 148 00:10:16.289 --> 00:10:18.889 we, together as a team, kind of took what I said as a 149 00:10:18.970 --> 00:10:24.519 base and kind of reshaped and reformed and over the course of the next I 150 00:10:24.879 --> 00:10:28.639 don't know, twenty four hours. It didn't we didn't land on anything that 151 00:10:28.799 --> 00:10:31.200 night, but you know, a couple people had some really good ideas. 152 00:10:31.279 --> 00:10:37.830 Ryan in particular had a kind of a fundamentally different way of US thinking about 153 00:10:37.870 --> 00:10:41.509 it, and that took us into the next day where we ended up landing 154 00:10:41.669 --> 00:10:45.350 on on what those two statements were going to be for us. But we 155 00:10:45.429 --> 00:10:48.470 ended up getting to the better result because we collaborated together to get there. 156 00:10:48.789 --> 00:10:54.460 So for the CEOS listening to this, I would say him be be open 157 00:10:54.620 --> 00:10:58.580 to what like allowing your leadership team to have input. If it works out 158 00:10:58.580 --> 00:11:03.580 the way that it did for us, the end product of what those statements 159 00:11:03.620 --> 00:11:07.850 are are going to be so much more rich and so much more fulfilling if 160 00:11:07.850 --> 00:11:11.169 you have other people in your organization speaking to them, because they're really going 161 00:11:11.210 --> 00:11:15.289 to be the flag bearers for this. As much as it's going to come 162 00:11:15.330 --> 00:11:18.399 from the top and the CEO is got to preach it, your senior leadership 163 00:11:18.440 --> 00:11:22.120 team has to be preaching it as well. And something that Ryan said to 164 00:11:22.200 --> 00:11:26.240 me when I first, you know, kind of told him what are, 165 00:11:26.559 --> 00:11:28.840 what our why or what I wanted our mission vision to be. He said, 166 00:11:28.840 --> 00:11:33.429 James, if I've got to be a flag bearer for this, I've 167 00:11:33.470 --> 00:11:35.669 got a really believe in it and I've got a really be passionate about it 168 00:11:35.870 --> 00:11:39.909 and what we have right here, I just I don't know that I understand 169 00:11:39.950 --> 00:11:43.950 it and I don't know that I can get really excited about it. And 170 00:11:43.029 --> 00:11:46.789 as soon as I heard that I thought, man, will we go back 171 00:11:46.830 --> 00:11:50.019 to the drawing board then, because because I need everybody at this table being 172 00:11:50.059 --> 00:11:54.580 a flag bearer for this, for this mission and vision. So so the 173 00:11:54.700 --> 00:11:58.299 next day what we ended up landing on is something that I just I am 174 00:11:58.379 --> 00:12:01.330 super fired up about, and it's this. It's our why is to inspire 175 00:12:01.370 --> 00:12:09.649 people to own their career, because ninetyzero hours of your life shouldn't suck and 176 00:12:09.929 --> 00:12:13.049 what I like so much about that? Why? Statement One. It's not 177 00:12:13.409 --> 00:12:18.279 grandios and we're going to change the world, but it's very specific and it's 178 00:12:18.360 --> 00:12:22.360 very focus. We spend according I think it was a either a deloit study 179 00:12:22.080 --> 00:12:26.519 or might have been another study we were looking at, say that you spend 180 00:12:26.559 --> 00:12:31.669 over ninetyzero hours of your life at work, and when I read that last 181 00:12:31.710 --> 00:12:35.590 year I thought, man, that is a powerful statistic because when I talk 182 00:12:35.669 --> 00:12:39.830 to most people about their work, they hate their job. They have no 183 00:12:39.029 --> 00:12:45.539 passion for their job. There's another study we read that eighty seven percent of 184 00:12:45.940 --> 00:12:50.100 Americans have zero passion for their work, and that to me is just freaking 185 00:12:50.139 --> 00:12:56.500 sad that the thing that we spend ninetyzero hours of our life at we have 186 00:12:56.659 --> 00:13:01.250 no passion for. When I think about how sweetfish can solve that problem. 187 00:13:01.009 --> 00:13:05.450 You know, there are lots of organizations. Patrick and see Onis Organization is 188 00:13:05.570 --> 00:13:11.490 one that they consult leadership teams. They go in and they help organizations get 189 00:13:11.610 --> 00:13:16.000 healthy through Patrick's, you know, consulting and is speaking and his books and 190 00:13:16.159 --> 00:13:20.639 it's phenomenal. They're coming at it from the top. They know that if 191 00:13:20.679 --> 00:13:24.879 they can change the leadership team, they can change the cultural organizations and ultimately, 192 00:13:26.320 --> 00:13:30.909 you know, create much healthier organizations and and help people not hate their 193 00:13:31.429 --> 00:13:35.070 hate their work. The direction we're coming at it from is from the content 194 00:13:35.190 --> 00:13:39.470 that we create, and so that verbiage of owning your career. We're not 195 00:13:39.590 --> 00:13:43.019 talking necessarily just to the leadership team, though I think our content is helpful 196 00:13:43.059 --> 00:13:48.820 to them. We're talking to everyone in an organization and with our strategy to 197 00:13:48.340 --> 00:13:54.019 launch shows in hundreds of industries and job categories, you know, in HR 198 00:13:54.220 --> 00:14:00.129 industry and manufacturing, like all of these different topics that we're rolling out shows 199 00:14:00.169 --> 00:14:03.090 for. I think if anybody in those industries consumes our content, it is 200 00:14:03.210 --> 00:14:09.289 going to inspire and empower and equip them to really own their career, take 201 00:14:09.330 --> 00:14:11.240 their career into their own hands and not say, oh well, you know, 202 00:14:11.399 --> 00:14:15.000 I got a wake up and go to this job that I hate because 203 00:14:15.440 --> 00:14:18.440 that's just the cards I've been dealt I'm so packed. You know, our 204 00:14:18.519 --> 00:14:22.000 third core value is on the result. Take your life into your own hands. 205 00:14:22.120 --> 00:14:28.509 Like don't, don't let life happen to you. You happen to life. 206 00:14:28.029 --> 00:14:31.710 And if someone doesn't love what they're doing, we hope that through the 207 00:14:31.830 --> 00:14:39.179 content were producing, they are empowered and inspired to pursue something different or become 208 00:14:39.340 --> 00:14:43.539 better at their job so that they don't have to hate what they're doing. 209 00:14:43.620 --> 00:14:46.700 And so that's that's a little bit of the thinking behind behind our why logo. 210 00:14:46.779 --> 00:14:50.419 What are your thoughts on I mean, I had a couple times. 211 00:14:50.419 --> 00:14:56.330 So you mentioned for CEOS going into this exercise with their team and while you 212 00:14:56.450 --> 00:14:58.570 know, like you said, it sucks when your baby gets called ugly, 213 00:15:00.090 --> 00:15:03.529 you know I recommend, as you're saying, that that whoever kind of is 214 00:15:03.649 --> 00:15:07.360 coming to the table with with kind of the first idea or some things that 215 00:15:07.399 --> 00:15:11.320 they've been mowing on, keep your mind open, because if you're not getting 216 00:15:11.320 --> 00:15:16.519 pushed back, that means that you're probably you don't have people who are vested 217 00:15:16.600 --> 00:15:20.919 in carrying that flag. Because if they're not pushing back and they're just saying 218 00:15:20.320 --> 00:15:24.029 okay, maybe they're in any agram like me, any Graham nine like me, 219 00:15:24.149 --> 00:15:28.950 and they're just agreeable, but the more likely thing is that it's not 220 00:15:30.029 --> 00:15:33.669 going to mean much. They're not going to carry carry the flag forward on 221 00:15:33.789 --> 00:15:37.980 that. So the pushback that that may feel tough is actually something you should 222 00:15:37.980 --> 00:15:41.700 be looking for, because the lack of it should actually be an alarm bell 223 00:15:41.820 --> 00:15:46.179 for you that your leadership team might not be bought in Blie Gage, leaving 224 00:15:46.220 --> 00:15:48.419 that flag for it right. So I really like what you said there and 225 00:15:48.700 --> 00:15:52.610 I think that's a big takeaway for other leaders. Let's talk a little bit 226 00:15:52.809 --> 00:15:56.970 about the mountain top. As we moved on to that, you know, 227 00:15:56.090 --> 00:16:00.289 to me going through this exercise, at times I kind of caught myself thinking 228 00:16:00.370 --> 00:16:04.000 like and we're spending a lot of time on, you know, two sentences. 229 00:16:04.600 --> 00:16:07.080 But what I loved about it is, you know what you were talking 230 00:16:07.080 --> 00:16:11.000 about, both with our why and with our mountain top, it was like 231 00:16:11.120 --> 00:16:14.799 this molding process. We're adding some we're taking some away. We were seeing 232 00:16:14.840 --> 00:16:18.039 some good parts and then we saw parts that were like up, maybe that's 233 00:16:18.039 --> 00:16:19.509 not as good, you know. And to your point about the why, 234 00:16:19.950 --> 00:16:25.350 we started with something that was a little bit more narrow and didn't encapsulate that. 235 00:16:25.629 --> 00:16:27.590 On your career, it kind of spoke to well, let's see, 236 00:16:27.629 --> 00:16:32.429 just get better at your job, because then you'll be happier. But own 237 00:16:32.509 --> 00:16:34.899 your career could mean be better at the job that you have, move up 238 00:16:34.940 --> 00:16:38.139 within your organization. It could mean hey, you totally want to switch, 239 00:16:38.179 --> 00:16:42.700 you want to go from selling copiers to joining a startup in podcasting like I 240 00:16:42.820 --> 00:16:48.570 did, and so I think in both just thinking, having that mindset, 241 00:16:48.649 --> 00:16:51.690 that that words do matter and it's going to have an impact on your team. 242 00:16:51.929 --> 00:16:53.570 So with that, let's move to mountain top. I need have yeah, 243 00:16:53.649 --> 00:16:57.970 so Logan we ended up defining our mountaintop is this. It's to educate 244 00:16:59.210 --> 00:17:03.759 one million people every single day. And when you think about that, you 245 00:17:03.879 --> 00:17:07.799 think, well, that's that's really short. Like that's aren't most? Aren't 246 00:17:07.880 --> 00:17:11.799 most statements like that, more along and grandios and I would say yeah, 247 00:17:11.799 --> 00:17:18.349 they are. Most statements are really long and grandiose and most employees have no 248 00:17:18.549 --> 00:17:22.990 idea what their company's vision is. And as we were looking at kind of 249 00:17:23.029 --> 00:17:27.309 some examples of some other really large companies, quite frankly, man, I 250 00:17:27.509 --> 00:17:33.059 was bored reading through a lot of where these where these companies have said that 251 00:17:33.180 --> 00:17:37.900 they're going and what their vision is, and it was it was long and 252 00:17:37.980 --> 00:17:41.619 drawn out and not exciting. And I think something that I've been very passionate 253 00:17:41.619 --> 00:17:45.930 about, I'm very aligned with Donald Miller's line of thinking on this, is 254 00:17:45.529 --> 00:17:51.369 clarity is everything and if you confuse you'll lose, and that means both internally 255 00:17:51.410 --> 00:17:55.130 and externally. So with your marketing message, externally, but internally with your 256 00:17:55.210 --> 00:18:00.279 people. If your messaging is not clear and concise, people aren't they're just 257 00:18:00.359 --> 00:18:03.119 not going to remember it. And I think knowing that the direction that we're 258 00:18:03.160 --> 00:18:08.079 going as a company, shifting away from being a podcast service provider, shifting 259 00:18:08.240 --> 00:18:14.950 into becoming a media company that owns media properties, this statement means so much. 260 00:18:15.190 --> 00:18:18.950 I mean it changes how we measure success here at sweetfish. Instead of 261 00:18:19.109 --> 00:18:23.789 looking, you know, just at the number of downloads for a given podcast 262 00:18:23.829 --> 00:18:29.539 as a metric of success, we are now looking at daily reach numbers. 263 00:18:29.740 --> 00:18:36.900 So how many times has the content from this show been seen across instagram, 264 00:18:36.980 --> 00:18:41.450 across youtube, across it's linked in, across the podcast, across the blog 265 00:18:41.569 --> 00:18:45.250 article associated with it, and starting to kind of package all of that up 266 00:18:45.289 --> 00:18:49.410 together, because it's not so it's not as much about the medium anymore. 267 00:18:49.690 --> 00:18:53.809 We used to be very focused on podcast, podcast, podcast, podcast, 268 00:18:55.049 --> 00:18:59.000 and that was a great way for us to start, but now we're really 269 00:18:59.039 --> 00:19:04.079 a podcast first media company. But the implication of that is media company is 270 00:19:04.160 --> 00:19:07.799 much is way more all encompassing than just one channel. And Yeah, the 271 00:19:07.880 --> 00:19:11.589 content starts as a podcast, but the video that we're creating from it, 272 00:19:11.710 --> 00:19:15.710 the written content were creating from it, all of that stuff has the potential 273 00:19:17.309 --> 00:19:21.630 of inspiring someone to own their career. So, you know, the dashboards 274 00:19:21.670 --> 00:19:25.099 were going to be creating this year, allowing us to give us really insight 275 00:19:25.299 --> 00:19:30.660 and and visibility into how many people are we reaching every day with each of 276 00:19:30.740 --> 00:19:33.339 our shows, is ultimately going to roll up to, you know, US 277 00:19:33.460 --> 00:19:37.769 achieving our vision. What sure you measure in John Door's book, you know 278 00:19:37.890 --> 00:19:44.450 about okrs. It's you measure, measure what matters and having clarity around this 279 00:19:44.569 --> 00:19:47.650 vision. You know what we call our mountain top. I think is going 280 00:19:47.730 --> 00:19:51.650 to help us set the right metrics so that we can start measuring what actually 281 00:19:51.690 --> 00:19:55.039 matters to us as an organization. Yeah, absolutely, Man. I mean 282 00:19:55.079 --> 00:19:59.839 the why gives you that that motivation. That mountain top helps you see where 283 00:19:59.839 --> 00:20:03.519 you're going and either motivates you more to get there. So it kind of 284 00:20:03.519 --> 00:20:06.680 has a similar effect, but it also tells you are we there or not? 285 00:20:06.880 --> 00:20:08.789 Right like if you're just in a fast growth company. And again, 286 00:20:08.829 --> 00:20:12.069 going back to that growth for Growth Sake, yeah, we're growing. Are 287 00:20:12.109 --> 00:20:15.829 we growing at the clip that we wanted to? And it gives us that 288 00:20:15.990 --> 00:20:18.950 language to make decisions. Are we going to invest here? Are we going 289 00:20:18.990 --> 00:20:22.460 to are we going to take on this project? And we can stop and 290 00:20:22.500 --> 00:20:26.579 say, very much like when we're evaluating, you know, team performance or 291 00:20:26.619 --> 00:20:32.299 celebrating wins. We have that language, as you talked about earlier with our 292 00:20:32.380 --> 00:20:34.849 values. You know, we use on the result as a Hashtag on slack. 293 00:20:34.930 --> 00:20:38.849 Often Times they're baked into the values champel word that we give out each 294 00:20:38.890 --> 00:20:44.250 month. Are Why in our mountain top give us that common language to talk 295 00:20:44.289 --> 00:20:48.410 about our goals, like our OK ours, as we get into that methodology 296 00:20:48.490 --> 00:20:51.680 this year. So I'm really excited about it. I love where we landed, 297 00:20:51.759 --> 00:20:55.640 even though I thought the first iteration it wasn't super ugly. So I'll 298 00:20:55.680 --> 00:20:59.799 give you. I do really like where we ended up landing and and I 299 00:20:59.920 --> 00:21:04.150 appreciate our leadership team so much for being willing to push back, for putting 300 00:21:04.430 --> 00:21:08.950 thought and effort to it and, you know, being able to disagree in 301 00:21:10.029 --> 00:21:12.910 a very healthy way. I'm so thankful for our team in that way and 302 00:21:14.430 --> 00:21:17.950 can't wait to see what the rest of two thousand and twenty and and beyond 303 00:21:18.029 --> 00:21:21.180 looks like. Man Well, as always, thank you, so much for 304 00:21:21.259 --> 00:21:23.579 listening. Folks, this is this is always fun. Hope you get a 305 00:21:23.660 --> 00:21:27.220 ton of value of hearing from hearing James and I riff a little bit, 306 00:21:27.299 --> 00:21:30.980 sure, a little bit behind the curtain here. If anybody listening to this 307 00:21:32.099 --> 00:21:36.369 would like to stick connected with us, Linkedin is often an easy way to 308 00:21:36.410 --> 00:21:38.690 do that, or hit us up on instagram. James, thanks so much, 309 00:21:38.690 --> 00:21:45.650 man. This ton of fun. Thanks, Atma man. We totally 310 00:21:45.769 --> 00:21:48.559 get it. We publish a ton of content on this podcast and it can 311 00:21:48.599 --> 00:21:52.240 be a lot to keep up with. That's why we've started the BTB growth 312 00:21:52.440 --> 00:21:57.039 big three, a no fluff email that boils down our three biggest takeaways from 313 00:21:57.039 --> 00:22:03.750 an entire week of episodes. Sign up today at Sweet Fish Mediacom big three. 314 00:22:03.069 --> 00:22:07.430 That sweet PHISH MEDIACOM Big Three
