EntreLeadership - Should I Take on a Leadership Role Again? (I Failed Last Time)

Episode Date: February 4, 2026

Today, we’ll hear about: ·      A leader questioning if he should take a promotion ·      A son weighing if he should leave his successful business to help save his father’s failing company ·      Dave’s advice on how to deliver difficult feedback to a team ·      A business owner considering leaving his business in the hands of his team so he can move to another country   Next Steps: ·      📞 Have a question for the show? Call 844-944-1070 or send us a message: https://ter.li/ask-us ·      📚 Learn about the EntreLeadership System™: https://ter.li/system-p ·      💻 Get EntreLeadership Elite™ for your business: https://ter.li/elite-p ·      ✉️ Sign up to receive tactical tools, advice and resources in your inbox every week: https://ter.li/enl ·      🏢 Attend EntreLeadership Summit: https://ter.li/summit ·      🎤 Attend EntreLeadership Master Series: https://ter.li/masterseries  ·      📖 Order Dave’s new book, Build a Business You Love: https://ter.li/b4kru2 ·      🔎 Explore business coaching options: https://ter.li/wveycm ·      📄 Get the Strategic Planning Template today: https://ter.li/7z7qu6 ·      🚢 Set Sail with Dave Ramsey! Book your cabin today: https://ter.li/s8xnyo   Connect With Our Sponsors: ·      💼 Go to Belay Solutions or text ENTRE to 55123 for their free resource! ·      💻 Visit NetSuite today to learn more. ·      📈 Grab Sales Gravy's free resource to help you hire and lead better.   Listen to More From Ramsey Network: 🪑 Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman 🎙️ The Ramsey Show 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights 🧠 The Dr. John Delony Show 🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 💡 The Rachel Cruze Show💰 George Kamel   Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, this is Entree Leadership, where I take calls from leaders like you about what it takes to win at any stage of business and leadership. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host with over 30 years of experience leading in the trenches right alongside you. If you've got a question you want to ask on the show, fill out the forum at Entreeleadership.com slash ask or call and leave us a number, and we'll get to you and put you on. The phone number here is 844-9-44-1070. That's 844-9-44-1070. Tyler is in Naples, Florida. Hi, Tyler. How are you?

Dave, I'm doing well. Thanks for taking my call. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I was hoping to get some advice from you. I am entertaining a new position at my company. and it would be a leadership position in the company.

And specifically, one of the person that would be on my team is older than I am. And I had an experience earlier in my tenure at the same company in a leadership role. I was leading a guy that was older than me as well. And it didn't go so well. I was very, very challenging to build trust and relationships with the guy that was on my team. And just wanted to see if you had any advice for me on what I could do differently this go-round. How old are you? 29.

Okay. What type of business is this? It's a general contractor. Okay. So the guy that you're leading, what's he do? He is on the sales team. and so am I. And so he would be a sales rep

and I would be leading this specific industry that they want me to focus on. Okay. And how long ago was the other experience? 18 months, 24 months ago. Okay. And what happened?

What was the end of that? The company hit a little bit of a rough road and the position that I was in was, I guess, pseudo-eliminated. And so I was asked to just go back into the field as a sales rep, which I did. And another opportunity has come along since then. Where'd the guy go that you had trouble with before? He is still with the company, but reports to someone differently now. Okay.

What happened? What do you think went wrong? Yeah, I don't want to, I don't want to make assumptions. but it just felt like like it was hard to get over the barrier or so it felt of the age gap between us you know I tried to I tried to do what's best for him

I tried to lead with a with a servant's heart but you know every time we would I shouldn't say every time but many times when we would have conversations they would start to I don't want to say get aggressive, but they would be more conflicting than they needed to be. And I don't believe or it never felt like he trusted that I had his back. Sounds like he didn't think you were worthy to lead him. You could put it that way, yes.

That's different than not having his back. He didn't want this little snot nose telling him what to do. That is a fair statement. I could agree with that. Yeah. So that's not on you. Nothing you could have done would have changed that. Is that my, am I wrong? No, I don't think so. And the other reason I would agree with that is because I ended up hiring another guy on my team. But he then departed to go somewhere else. But he was also older than I was, and we didn't have any problems. So I don't know that it was an age gap. It was a lack of someone that has an inability to be under authority.

And so, or at least they perceive themselves as not to be under your authority. So your leader, if you take this role, this new role, or I guess you have taken it, has your leader got your back? Yes. Okay. With this type of sales arrangement, we have regular rhythms of every two weeks or every week. each leader will sit down with each individual and find out what's going on good, bad, and ugly, and how the leader can help.

And also, that's a time that you course correct if there's any issues. And so it's just a one-on-one accountability, very short, maybe 30 minutes, once a week or once every two weeks. Each leader meets with each person on their team. That happens all through Ramsey, not just on the sales teams. And that's an opportunity then for you to build relationships. for you to understand what's going on in their personal life, hear all their feelings out, and find opportunities to knock down blockers and serve them and ask questions,

how can I make your life better? That's my job as a leader, is to serve you in that way. And also, I'm going to let you know where you're not on track and where your sales calls aren't where they need to be. And if you don't have sales calls where they're not being, then sales aren't going to be there. And if sales aren't there, then we're going to have another problem. And it's a serious problem. So we've got to get these sales numbers.

We've got to get these call numbers up or whatever it is that your course correcting, right? Sure. So are you going to be able to do that with that type of regular leadership rhythm of an accountability meeting with the new guys? Yes. Yes, I do believe so. Okay. So, you know, what I would do then is just sit down with each person, including this older person, and say, boss's name and I have talked about it and we think the best way to get this thing running

is to have a short meeting once a week or once every two weeks to where I can find out how you're doing and I can find out how I can help you because my job is to make sure that your job is as easy as possible and that you make the most money possible and therefore you make them a company the most money possible and everybody's smiling and so we're going to be doing that. The decision has been made, and I'm going to be here to help you. And also part of helping you is going to be if we see something that's off track. But most of the time, I'm just going to be learning from you because you're older than me. You've been here longer than me. You've been doing this a while, and I probably got a lot. I can pick up from you.

And so you're going to help me be mentored and get better because, you know, I really want to tap into all of your knowledge base and learn from you. But at the same time, I want to be able to help you. And at the same time, I want to be able to speak to you if we need a course correct on something. And look at the guy and go, would you help me with that? Okay. No, I think that makes a lot of sense. And Dave, I think one of the other areas where I was gaped in the past, and maybe you can shed some light on this for me as well, I don't feel like I was great at, I guess, vision casting for the guy on my team or maybe even the team. in general, not to say that that would have solved anything or everything,

but certainly something I feel like I could have been better at. Do you have any advice or best practices on what you've done as the owner and founder and leader of Ramsey when it comes to vision casting for the company? Well, you're really for your department and your area is what we're talking about. It's not the whole company, but like, okay, you know, boss man, whatever his name is, has tasked all of us with, you know, increasing sales at this amount. And if we do that, we're all going to be happy because we're all going to be cashing some checks.

And the company's going to be happy, and the customers are going to be happy. And so what we need to do is figure out how we can get there together. And let's sit down together as a group and kind of come out with a desired future. What is our desired future? What's the goal that as a department we're aiming at? and then what are each of our jobs in order to get there. And so you might even come up with a number. This is our annual goal.

It's not a quota. It's something we're coming up together. This is what we're shooting for. We want to, you know, the team is having a team meeting and saying, we want to go to Super Bowl. Okay, well, what has to be true that wasn't true last year? Well, we've got to hit the wait room.

Well, we've got to have to get rid of the O.C. and get a new one. Well, we're going to have to whatever, right? What's it take to get to the Super Bowl that we haven't done before because we've got to do something different to get the, a place we've never been before. And then just everybody together, pull together and come up with a shared desired future, as Henry Cloud calls it.

And when you've got that desired future, then you can come up with some elements of what has to be done. And if we do these five things to do the desired future, you know, we'll automatically hit the desired future. And those are called defining objectives. And as a matter of fact, there's an actual template that we'll put on this episode. where right now you can jump in on the thing and click, and you'll get the desired future template, and you can put that together.

And we'll put that in and make it part of the episode for all of you listening. But Tyler, you can pull it up too then when you go back and listen to yourself on the podcast. And our guys will send it to you in the meantime, because we've got your phone number, so we'll get it out to you. But bottom line is, we rally the troops around a goal that is not imposed, but that they participate in creating. A goal that is imposed is called a quota. No one wants a quota.

But a goal that we've agreed to is good for the health of every individual on the team and the customer. And then we start figuring out what has to be true to hit that goal. Then the troops rally around that. Okay, I'm going to hit the weight room. All right. I'm going to do the workouts. I'm going to do the wind sprints. All right.

I'm going to do the, I'm going to make the extra calls. All right. We're going to spend some more money over here on this CRM product. So we get you a better lead generation thing in here. whatever it is. What are we got to do to get this thing moving and we're going to do it together? And let's go to a place we've never been to before and make more money than we've ever made in our lives and help more people than we've ever made than we've ever helped in our lives. Let's kick this thing in the butt and make it run.

And that's vision casting. That's all it is. But you get buy-in, it's not you come in with trumpets and announce where we're going. Instead, we talk about, okay, where could we go if we dreamed a little bit? And let's start coming up with some numbers. And if we did an average order value of this and we made this many sales last year we did this, a 10% increase would be that. Well, what would a 25% increase look like?

Oh, that'd be looked like that. Can we get that? Is that possible? I don't know. Wow. What do you all think? And just kind of keep throwing that stuff out there and then germinate and create at the first of the year, create something that we're going to do by the end of the year.

And then we start aiming at that. And if we're off, we got to pick it up. You know, we got to get with it. And that's all it is. It's a vision. All goals are our vision with work clothes on. That's all it is. And so goal casting is what we're talking about more than vision casting.

But it's the same thing. We're still figuring out a defined, clear target. And then we start, you know, sending rounds downrange at the target. It's that simple. That's good. Good stuff, Tyler. Good stuff. Those are really humble and solid questions.

Very, very well. Well done. I love entrepreneurs. Don't forget, guys, I started my company on a card table myself. So I know what it's like to have people counting on you. Your team, your family, not to mention your customers. And when you're the one signing the paychecks, you can't afford to fly blind. But I'll be honest, early on, one thing that nearly sunk us was wasting time with spreadsheets that didn't add up because business units didn't talk to each other.

I finally told my team just fix it. And they did. We got NetSuite. That was years ago, and we've never looked back. See, NetSuite isn't just for tech giants. It's built for growing businesses like yours. Over 43,000 businesses already run on NetSuite, including a lot that started just like you. And now with built-in AI, NetSuite is helping them even more.

It's one system connected to every part of your business. for real-time insights, not guesswork. NetSuite AI, flags inventory issues, cash flow risks, even supplier delays before they become problems. So you can trust the data, stop wasting time, and make the right decisions faster. Take a free product tour today at netsuite.com slash Ramsey. That's netsuite.com slash Ramsey. Well, it's hard to grow your business when you're stuck in the day to day. If you're working 60 hours a week and most of that time is spent putting out fires, you're a fireman.

You've got a big problem. Your business is running you instead of the other way around. Here's the reality. You can't grow a business until you grow yourself. That's why many of you need Entree leadership executive coaching. Our coaches have helped thousands of small business owners go from stuck and frustrated to scaling and confident. They'll help you uncover your blind spots, overcome what's holding your. back and focus on the work that actually grows your business, not just the work that keeps you

busy. So if you're tired of spinning your wheels, you're ready to lead the business with clarity and confidence, go to Entreeleadership.com slash coaching, fill out a form to talk to our team or click the link in the show notes. Cole is in Springfield, Missouri. Hey, Cole, welcome to the show. How can I help? Hey, Dave, thanks for having me on.

I appreciate it. Sure, man. So I am a part owner of a property management company. We manage around 400 single family homes, duplexes, and apartments for real estate investors. I have a team of five employees and our gross revenue this year is going to be around $550,000. For a bit of a backstory to better help explain my question, I'm very much in the treadmill stage of my business. I started this company right out of college and have spent the last five years really in the day-to-day, you know, slowly getting team members. And I'm finally starting to see the benefits of the work that I've put in.

So my struggle or my issue is my dad has a family trucking business that's been very successful for over the last 20 years. But in the last 30 months, it's experienced some significant financial hardships, some due to poor business decisions. and some do to economic factors. So my question for you is, should I stay focused on my property management business? Should I leave my property management business to go help my dad? Or should I try to run both my business and help out my dad's business? How old is your dad?

He is 59. 6-9 or 5-9? 5-9. How big a business is that? They do just under 20. million dollars a year in gross revenue. What happens to the business when he's done? He does not have a succession plan.

He's always really wanted me to come take the business over. But you haven't wanted to? It's not that I haven't wanted to. I really wanted to go out on my own. I think after college to learn business and kind of learn how to do things on my own before just stepping into my dad's business. I just always kind of thought that would be the easy button. And I've been in a unique situation now where my business is making a lot of money and his isn't.

And now they're essentially begging me to come. They are begging you to come help? Yes, him and my mom are. You don't have any siblings involved? No, I have two younger sisters, but they are not involved at all. That's hard. I'm trying to think through the different aspects of this. It's a bigger business.

but it's struggling partly from some outside things. So you're going to have to overcome him doing stupid things and overcome the outside things. Is he going to take that kind of input? I think he will. He's a very smart businessman, but I think this whole situation has kind of made him paralyzed. He's just not making smart decisions.

And I think it's because he's been so successful for so long and then just kind of nearing retirement and having all of these things hit him at once that has caused him truthfully to be, you know, on the edge of filing bankruptcy. So it's losing money? It's losing money, yes. How much is it losing? He, his main business runs in the lower 48.

It made about a million dollars this year. He acquired a company out of Alaska and it's projected to lose about $2 million. So that's really the main issue. issue here is he bought this company out of Alaska and it's losing every dollar that his main business brings in it loses two dollars does it owe money it does they have a lot of debts which is the main reason he can't get out of it how much debt million dollars so the unwise business decision was he bought something and paid too much for it that's killing him so if Alaska went away he'd be okay yes okay I assume he's

signed for those notes? He did. Who does he owe the money to? To local banks here in our town. So he borrowed money from Missouri to buy Alaska? Yes, he did. And to make the plot even thicker, he has a business partner on those trucks. So he has a local doctor here in town that buys these trucks with him for depreciation and tax

benefits. And so really truthfully, what's your opinion as to why the thing's failing so dramatically because he obviously had no idea. I mean, this is, he didn't just miss the projections a little bit. This is like a scam. I mean, he like got scammed. Yeah. Or something, or he missed it so amazingly bad.

How did, I mean, what in the world happened? I'm not, I'm not truthfully sure. I think, yeah, I think he really did get scammed. He just didn't do his due diligence during the acquisition. He overpaid so much that, Yeah. So he's got two and a half million debt, but he's also losing $2 million a year. Correct. If he's only making a million in the lower, where's he coming up with the other million on losses?

Borrowing it? He has a really good friend that is his partner, who's a doctor who is making all of his payments and essentially keeping his business alive. It's about $100,000 a month that he's paying. Okay. So if you go over there, what's the way out? out. I don't see a way out. I think the way out is to have a tough conversation with his partner to sell all of these assets at a loss and try to get a loan to his friend rather than to the bank.

And then I think there's some issues with team members and employees that could be fixed that could really help turn his business around as well. So just sell off the assets for Alaska, close it, and move the debt from the bank to the doctor. That's kind of what I'm thinking unless you have a better suggestion. That might work, but you still got a $2.5 million problem laying there. And let's see. So, okay, if you move that over, what would the assets bring if you sold Alaska off for book? They would bring, we're in the middle of getting quotes, but probably a million dollars.

Okay, so you'd move a million and a half off and you make a million a year. you get rid of the bleed and you pay the million and a half back in a year and a half and you're out of debt. Is the lower 48 got debt on it? It does have some debt, but the business is covering all of the debt and is making good money. But if you're making a million dollars a year, you can recoup the partner, put him back whole pretty quick on the million and a half plus whatever else he's put into it, right? So it's like a three-year turn. Yes, yeah. And then the question is, do you want to do that with your life?

Yeah, that's what I'm struggling with. I'm finally making good money. That's a fair struggle. Yeah. So if this all turns around and let's okay, three years, the partner is an owner to what degree? It's he's an owner in a separate, essentially just a holding company. So he doesn't own anything in the actual business that all the revenue flows through. It's just a LLC.

that owns the assets that's the semi-trucks. For the lower 48 as well? Yes. Okay. So, I mean, where in this story do you end up with this business free and clear of the partner and the debt? Ten years down the road of working for nothing, and then you end up with this business. Is that what you want?

I'm not sure. I would do anything to help my family, but I don't. You'll be giving up a decade of your life to help you. your family. That's what we're saying. And then if your dad hands you the keys and doesn't want anything for the business, but by then you've worked your way all the way out of the partner, because, you know, that partner owns, you know, owns you as long as he owns all your assets. Duh. And so we've got to get him out of there and we've got to get him repaid and we've got to get Alaska cut loose and we've got to turn this thing around. All of that. So you end up with a

trucking company 10 years from today and you're how old right now? I just turned 26 yesterday. Yeah. So you're 36 years old with this thing, and your dad is 69, and he's retired and didn't get anything. Or if he wants something, it takes it even longer. Wow, Cole. This is hard. The end game for you, the juice is not worth the squeeze.

The only reason you would do this is just to help your dad, but you've got to keep the other business open. because you're not going to be in this business because it may not make this turn. And you actually, you don't want to go down, you don't want to go over and help them rearrange the chairs on the Titanic. So you want to be over there helping and as long as you can. But I don't, and no offense to you, but even if it was someone super experienced, if I came in there, okay, I'm not sure I could turn this dadgum mess around. in time to make it fun to have bothered to screw with it. And that's not being cold or anything.

It's just your dad has got such a deep hole he's dug here with so many different ditches running out of the hole that by the time we get all that fill back in, there's not enough fun. Yeah. You know, if you did go over there, it would just be to try to help and not really casting your. future on that. Instead, it's just you putting some business energy, some, you're not in the forest so you can see the trees stuff. You can encourage your dad, coach him along, give him some ideas, even help him implement some of the ideas. Meanwhile, you've got to keep your other thing running. Because I don't, I don't think you had any desire to go over there and run this thing ever. And the fact that it's in the ditch and your dad's and mom are asking you for help and you love

them and you want to help them, which makes you a good guy, that's your, they only appeal to you, because there's no business appeal at all. Am I missing something? I mean, it does make good money prior to this acquisition. He was making, you know, $1.5 to $2 million a year every year. Yeah, but you're going to have to use all of that to clean the partner out, clean the partner up and clean the partner out. Yeah. And that's going to take three to five years. And then the, So there's no fun for the first decade. That's what I'm saying. Yeah.

And then at that point, what's your dad going to want out of this? Do you, did you say to yourself before this all happened, gosh, someday I'm going to go over there and run that company? I did. I've kind of always thought that. Okay. So the thing you built was kind of a temporary thing? Yes. Yeah.

All right. Then that's different. So then if you're going to go over there, you need clarity on the end. end of the story. If this works, where does it leave you? Okay? If you sell off the assets, we restructure with the partner, then we buy the partner out over time, then you buy your dad out over time.

What's the timeline? What's the dollar amounts? And where does this leave you at 40 years old? You've got to have clarity on that, because if you go over there assuming all these people are going to take care of you, well, you know what assuming does. Yeah. Yeah. So we don't want to do that.

I want lots of clarity from dad and the partner that, okay, I'm going to come over here and I'm going to pour myself into this. And I guess you're going to sell off your other thing or just let somebody run it for a while and see what happens. In case this thing blows up on you in six months, you could go back over to the property management thing if you kept it running a little while. You've got somebody can run it for you? I don't, but I could always try to find someone. Yeah. Or lift somebody up from inside. and say you're now the manager and I'm going to give you a percentage of profits and then you

and I are going to meet once a week for an hour and we're going to help you keep running it mentor you over here and then you're going to spend your other 52 hours over at the trucking company yeah you really need to know not just I always thought I would work there and not just it's a big business it makes a lot of money no it doesn't it sucks right now and not just I'm helping my mom and dad but also where do you end up and that's not self-reesome fish because when you're down there fighting through with dealing these stinking bankers and selling off these assets and you're got the grit and grime of this whole mess on you because this thing's messy there's a lot of fish hooks in this you're going to get stuck you're going to bleed

before this is over and so you've got to know that the blood and the calluses are worth it and that at the end of this thing your dad's not going to go oh well i want 20 million dollars for this and you're like you've lost your dadgum mind you know after what after i'm gave up the other thing came over here and now you're getting agreed i mean you need to get all this cleared up ahead of time and and then if he gets early on set or something you've got it all on paper and you know where you're going and um you guys need a letter of agreement uh that this is where we're going and involve the involved the uh partner if you go over there blind i i have to recommend you don't do it without knowing where you're going to end up at the end of the story you should not go

over there. And I think he's at a place. He's humble enough. He's willing to give you that. I don't know if the partner is, but the partner's writing some big checks, so maybe they're ready to get a little help over there and stop the dead gun bleeding. Wow, that's an interesting case, Cole. I hope it works. I hope you can turn it around. I will tell you, though, man, you've got some heavy lifting to do, no pun intended. Sales gravy understands that managing a sales team is one of the toughest jobs in the business. You're trying to get your team aligned, motivated, and paid in a way that drives real results, not just busy work. But let's be real. If your commission plans aren't working, that mission turns into a daily battle. You're

fighting to spark the right behaviors without setting your budget on fire. And instead of leading with confidence, you're stuck second-guessing every comp plan that's rolled out. Sales gravy walks this road with sales leaders just like you every day, leaders who are tired of chasing short-term wins and ready to build something sustainable. That's why Sales Gravy created the sales-leafes guide to incentives and compensation. The ultimate roadmap to help you lead with clarity. This is a battle-tested blueprint that shows you how to build comp plans that align with your goals, motivates your team to hit their targets, and gives you the confidence that your

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Question of the day is from Megan and Boulder, Colorado. Dave, I want to give my team better feedback, but every time I do, someone gets defensive. What's the best way to give honest feedback without triggering drama? Well, we don't do drama. So drama is a deal breaker. So, well, I think you need to be real careful

about how you're giving honest feedback and the setting in which you're giving the feedback. If you're giving negative feedback in front of other people, then you deserve the drama. You should never do that. If you're giving feedback, corrective feedback with an inappropriate level of volume or laced with cuss words, then that's not negative feedback. That's cussing somebody. Don't do that. and you're going to get drama.

But if you say, all right, every Thursday morning at 8, you and I are going to meet and see how you're doing and see how I can help you. And we're going to have a regular rhythm of an accountability meeting. And we're going to set the goals together and we're going to work together to hit those goals. And I'm here to help you. And I'm also here to observe and let you know if you're not,

you know, if you're missing a guardrail here. And if, based on that, very calmly and with a schedule, accountability meeting that you sit down and you learn about their personal life and you find out that their daughter is sick or you find out that they've had a just had a new baby or you find out these things and you take all of that into consideration you you're you know you care and you love about you love your people and you care about your people and then you're sitting down and saying hey we're trying to hit this goal this is the agreed goal and you're not carrying your part of the weight and then if they get defensive um probably not

not going to do that very often. I'm going to say, look, we're going to work on this. And so if you don't want to do this, then you may be opting out. And because we all adhere to this guideline, and this is what we all do. And if you want to be a we, this is how you get to be here. But, you know, occasionally we'll have somebody lose their mind and go into drama mode. But it's so rare because we don't tolerate it.

So the leader is not in drama mode and certainly not the person. But, you know, I don't know the extent of what you mean by drama, obviously, from an email coming in. But I guess I'm just going to, one of the corrective measures is the drama. We're going to correct the drama. look the proper way to react to this is say yes I see it be self-aware understand what's going on but you are dropping the ball on this and if you can't see that then we've got another problem a we have a drop ball B we have a lack of self-awareness even after I pointed it out so this is a problem now we're going to have to work on that because we've got to get aligned on this you and

I because we're going to work together and we're trying to win the Super Bowl we've got to put the ball in the end zone. And so push, push, push, push. And if you get push back then, then you've just got an immature person and you've got a bat higher. And what that means is they're going to have to work somewhere else. We're going to set you free in Jesus' name. And so, you know, that's, we just can't, we're not going to do, I'm not going to sit with somebody three times and they're defensive on the same thing and still not hearing me. We're going to be talking about other things other than the thing they're defensive about, like their defensiveness or their drama. You know, this is a new thing we have to work on now because before we were just working

on this other problem, but now that you got defensive and drama about it, now I've got to work on the defensive and drama part. And so if we can't correct on that, then we're agreeing that we can't work together and that means you leave because I own the place. So I'm not leaving. You are. And that's that, you know, that's what's going through your head. We're not that smart aleck with them, okay? But, you know, you just take that strong a stand with them, Megan. very calm, very kind, very clear, but very strong. And a regular rhythm with an accountability meeting that's working towards a set goal. And one of those goals is to correct the issue on this.

And so I am going to give you a guess the way you worded this, that I want to give my team better feedback, but every time I do, someone gets defensive. Okay. this sounds like you. It doesn't sound like them. It sounds like your delivery might suck. So,

you know, you can give feedback, but you've got to do it in the context of we're all trying to win and how can I help you get to the place I'm helping you feedback with. I'm going to serve you, walk with you, lift up your arms, make sure we get this done together.

We're not doing it. But, but, just walk past someone in the hall and tell them to do something, that's way different. And yeah, you're going to get, you're going to create problems with that, especially if you embarrass them in front of other people within an earshot of other people. And so, yeah. So since it isn't a singular person, it's every time I do someone, I kind of think this is

on you. I'm going to put you, I'm going to let you spend some time in the mirror and think about it. how you're giving the feedback, when you're giving the feedback, what it sounds like, reverse moccasins a minute, walk a mile in their shoes, and let's hear what, let you hear what you're saying back to yourself and see if you can adjust the way you're delivering this. I'm very sarcastic and bombastic in my head, but I don't, I would never talk to someone directly, individually like that that I'm trying to change. That's counterproductive. and so I'm going to be kind, I'm going to be clear, I'm going to be direct, I'm going to be strong,

but I'm not sarcastic like I am here on the air, and I'm not, you know, I'm not going to bust up on somebody like that. We're not doing that. But in my head, I am. I'm going like, I own the place. You're confused, you know, in my head, but I wouldn't say that to somebody. So you kind of got to think that through, Megan, is the inner monologue leaking out maybe? Is that what's going on?

I'm not sure what it is. But, yeah, the wording of your email might be a clue. If you're working 60 hours a week and most of that time is spent putting out fires, you got a big problem. Your business is running you instead of the other way around. You're a fireman. That's why you need Entree Leadership executive coaching. Our coaches help you uncover your blind spots,

overcome what's holding you back, and focus on the work that actually drives results. If you want that kind of clarity, go to Entreeleadership.com slash coaching and fill out the form to talk to our team or just click the link in the show notes. Thanks for being with us. If you want to help us out, click the follow button or the subscribe button. Leave us a nice five-star review. Share the show. Tell people about the show. Spread the word, baby. We need your help. You are our only marketing chance. If you want to be part of the program, leave us a phone number at 844-944-1070.

That's 844-9-44-1070. Luis is with us in Helena, Montana. Hi, Luis. How are you? Hey, doing well. Dave. Thanks for taking my call today. Sure.

What's up? Hey, so I think to boil down my question simply is, you know, how can I manage to run my business? with my permanent absence. We run a contracting business in Montana. I have been in operation for about seven years. We did about 2.7 million year of 2024. We had a projection of probably increasing that to about 27 percent. But in that time, my family felt the calling of jumping into the mission field. And so we've been in Kichay, Guatemala serving for the last nine months. And so since then and being here, our company's been operating by our project manager

and then kind of, you know, I guess another project manager, which is family. And it's been running smooth. But now that we've made this commitment of staying long term in the mission field, I just kind of have some, you know, some nerve, I guess, some fear of not being present because I was very present. You know, the last seven years, I kind of grew this business alone. simultaneously working in the fire service full-time. And then it kind of just grew where I stepped out of the fire service and just focused on my business. So just wanted to see your thoughts on that or if it was even feasible and just kind of, yeah, see what you think on that. How many team members?

So we have two team members that are leaders. And then we have sub-crews. We have two sub-crews that range about six. to eight total, they fluctuate. And that's essentially who carries out all of our work. And I guess to be a little bit more specific, we were in the contracting field, which was building envelopes. But then we started seeing that our profit margins were a lot better doing roofing and siding. So then we transitioned to exclusively roofing and siding. And then ultimately, with my leave, just to help the team out, we dropped down to just roofing.

And now all of the roofing jobs are actually coming through another partner company in our hometown. So essentially, they don't have laborers. Our company has laborers, and they've been in the area 20 plus years serving. And so the relationship was doing work for them exclusively with my absence. And it's worked out well. We're all Christians, believers. and it's just the flow has been a lot better than what we expected as an entire, I guess, team effort. And so that's some of the piece that gives me in making this decision to stay long term.

But at the same time, like I said, in hearing your Entree Leadership podcast at times, that can also, I guess, be sticky. Yeah. I mean, what you're describing is very difficult to run absentee. and because there's a lot of day-to-day decisions, these project managers or whatever we want to call them, managers at this stage, are they're running the business. And so the best you can do is train them to do it the way you would do it,

be able to finish your sentences. What would Luis do? What would Luis do in every one of these cases? And then if they know the answer to that, they can execute and then just report to you, you know, once a week or once over two or three days whenever you get updates what's going on plus or minus emergencies and so that can be done um you guys it sounds like you have pivoted three or four times since you started this and uh i don't know without your set of eyes on it when if they will

recognize where when you have to pivot the next time because there will be a next time and i don't without your eyes there i don't know that they'll see it so that might bring the end to this, but for a while, I think you can run it this way until some major shift or disruption occurs. And then if they don't catch that before it occurs, then that wave of that disruption, some shift in the market, a shift in the relationship with those people, they can be Christians and still decide not to use you. Absolutely. Absolutely. And we did take steps before the transition of a pretty intensive training.

program. So like you're saying, you know, to answer those questions, where they could be the eyes and the ears and do the transactions and have an understanding of the lingo that is involved with roofing and all of that. So it sounds like you got, it sounds like it's working pretty well right now. What's your fear today? Um, well, one is, um, I think was more, I think the distance, uh, you know, we're 5,000 kilometers away from home and, you know, not a phone call. You know, I think we can get phone calls. It's just, I don't know, I think it's maybe that, I don't know, the buildup of what, what, it could be pride, I guess, of what, what's been created and I don't know, it could be maybe outside noises of, you know, that sounds, you know, like a terrible idea. But I think it would be that, really just, just maybe losing that or more, I think, because we love, we love our subtrus. They've been working with us a long time. I'm Mexican. heart and my cruiser that. And so when we thought of shutting down the business or the idea of shutting down the business, we just looked at it. You know, we saw all of the people involved,

all their faces and the revenue that is generated and that pays and feeds them, which I'm sure they could probably find work elsewhere, but it's almost been this attachment of such a really good working environment. You're a good man. You care about your team. That's good. Absolutely. Absolutely. I think the operational aspect, as long as it keeps running the way it is, is doable. It's when it shifts next time that bothers me. Because it's one thing for them to be able to finish your sentences inside of an operational situation. It requires a different level of delegation for them to have vision on your behalf and see the next change.

coming and knowing what to do with that change. You pulled that off. I don't know if somebody trained to do operations and might pull it off. I know they won't pull it off as well as you. But you can keep your finger on the pulse of it enough. I mean, there's not any reason with email and phone calls. You can't stay fairly involved. It's not that time consumed.

And so correct. And we've implemented that, hey, coming into the new year, 2026, regardless of revenue, our main focus is to stay connected. you know, once a month, Zoom call at a minimum, if not quarterly, and just, you know, checking up to speed on everybody, making sure things are good, you know, what's needed of me so I can prepare. And so we're having these conversations now as we gear up, you know, for the first quarter. And actually, you know, starting the first year, we moved here to Guatemala March. So I did have first quarter to kind of do all of that before leaving. And so now that we've made

this decision, you know, now I think it's just the next gear. The distance is not an issue. It's just the flow. It's the flow. of communication and your finger on the pulse of the business. So that some major portion of this, one of the big gears in the cog, if it's wobbling, you need to be able to feel that wobble. And you can do that from Guatemala. You don't have to be on site to do that. Now, I don't expect to see 27% growth annually without you there.

If they maintain or slight amounts of growth, I'm going to be really, really, really thrilled with that if I'm you. And you should be given the situation. So if you can keep it running and it stay about as profitable as it is or get a little bit better, a little bit better, and keep these folks all employed while you're taking this time on the mission field, I think that's God's and that's a blessing from God that you can do that. And it funds then also your mission work, I'm sure. So you're self-funding that in the process. That's not bad at all. So, hey, you're a good guy. I like talking to you. Very good stuff.

Folks, remember better a wary warrior than a quivering critic. This world needs more high-quality leaders, so take courage and lead. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Thanks for joining us on Entree Leadership. If you're a business owner who's been grinding it out and rarely gets time to step back and think clearly, I want to tell you about something special. The Live Like No One Else Cruise is a seven-day experience in the Western Caribbean with me and the Ramsey team. This isn't just a vacation.

It's an intentional time away to reset your perspective and celebrate the progress you've made financially and professionally. And in 2027, we're bringing Entree leadership at sea back. That includes special Entree Leadership breakout sessions you can sign up for, designed specifically for business owners and leaders. You'll get practical teaching, real Q&A, and focused time to think through your business with people who understand what you're carrying. space is limited learn more at ramsysolutions.com slash events or click the link in the show notes