Your Transformation Station - 57. Okay.. "Methods to Avoid" Charles Read w/ Favazza

Episode Date: September 25, 2021

Favazza embarks on an emotional journey of personal loss and refined leadership principles. Charles Read and Gregory Favazza are able to share their "military stories", detail the types of leader and "employee dynamics", as well as the "purpose" of Read's GetPayroll software.   Support the showPODCAST INFO:Podcast website: https://ytspod.comApple Podcasts: https://ytspod.com/appleSpotify: https://ytspod.com/spotifyRSS: https://ytspod.com/rssYouTube: https://ytspod.com/youtubeSUPPORT & CONNECT:- Check out the sponsors below, it's the best way to support this podcast- Outgrow: https://www.ytspod.com/outgrow- Quillbot Flow: https://ytspod.com/quilbot - LearnWorlds: https://ytspod.com/learnworlds- Facebook: https://ytspod.com/facebook- Instagram: https://ytspod.com/instagram- TikTok: https://ytspod.com/tiktok- Twitter: https://ytspod.com/x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're tapping in to surpassing expectations from the most successful people in the modern day and honing in a new foresight, methodologies, and clairvoyance you never knew. This is your transformation station with your host, Greg Favaza. Hey, Charles. How's it going? It's going, yourself? Pretty good. Good. How can I help you?

Well, how can I help your listeners? That was going to be my next question followed by that. What can not really help, but what could you teach my listeners? Well, you know, I've been at this for a long time. Yeah. So, you know, I've been through a number of scenarios in my life from growing up to military to business to college to running a business, to college, to running a business. business, corporate life, and then going out on my own. So there's a lot of things going on that, you know, if they're of interest to your listeners, I'd be more than happy to talk about it.

Of course. Yes. No, I was curious what you would bring up. But the way I want to do, well, first, I wanted to say thank you for your service. I'm also a veteran myself, five and a half years. And I was in the Army, four and a half active duty than one year with the National Guard. I spent four years in a core, probably before you did. Yeah. Probably before you were born, but I'm 30 years old, so I would imagine. That was 67 to 71. Oh, wow. Okay.

What was your job or MOS? Well, I started out as a computer operator, well, actually, a key punch operator, moved to computer operator, then got sent to. IBM for programming. It was a cobalt programmer, a systems engineer. And then when I was in Vietnam, I was young and dumb and spent a stint with a infantry company as an O311 and radio operator. Yeah, that's me right there. That's all I had to choose from when I was enlisting. But I mean, I outsmarted the system and learn not to be at the ground level, but to rise up and work with the kernel, which I was his radio operator, his terrain model expert, seatball operator.

That's a lot better than current a prick 25 in the jungle, believe me. Oh, I can only imagine with your scenario. That frigging whip antenna that makes you the target. That's true. At least you weren't doing, or were you doing those, where you had to climb telephone wires to kind of get the, no, you didn't have to do that. No, we, I carried a prick 25 and we were in the jungle. around Red Beach, north of Danang. Okay.

So. Wow. Yeah, you've seen some shit. You know, it made you the target, but it was a lot easier to hump on that M60. Yes. No, I imagine so. No. No.

So did you get drafted in or were you? No. Okay. Marine Corps had only literally a double handful of draftees in the, in the whole war. I think like seven of them served in Vietnam. Wow. So, I mean, literally almost, almost nothing. So there were very, very few marine draftees.

It was been volunteer most of the time. And just once or twice they had to fill in just a little short, and they grabbed some of the draftees, but it was very unusual. That's very interesting. I always like to hear from old timers. Just you have unique wisdom that generations that follow lack and definitely could use an old perspective, which they can polish up and make something refined. Well, you know, you say that. And I was reading a essay by a gentleman. It was talking about the newest generation

and how they were bringing the country to ruin. And it was written by plume, the elder, in approximately 50 BC. Wow, okay. So every generation thinks the new one is terrible. That's funny. Like we repeat history, but we also repeat silly philosophy. It's just with your experience in life with all of you've accomplished, just outside of business context.

But as far as I would say, a humanistic understanding or just a present look at the here and now when you reflect, what was. what brought you to recognize your life and what could you do and what you're doing and how did you start looking forward from whatever experience that made you start to look forward if that makes any sense I'm not sure it does but there's there's a lot of points in your life that that are meaningful You know, early on, graduating from high school, your first job. The first time a bullet one whizzed by my left ear, not my right one, my left one. And I asked myself, Charles, what are you doing here? Yeah. My marriage.

I love my wife. We were married for 45 years before she passed. She's the most important person in my life. The loss of my eldest daughter, the cancer. the loss of my wife to a series of strokes. These things are all, you know, focal points that change how you want. But somewhere along the line, I determined, and through my reading and my studying, that happiness is a condition that you can choose.

And I choose to be happy. I don't succeed all the time. But, you know, I choose to be happy. And this is something that people can learn to do. You can be happy almost anywhere, almost any time if you choose to be. Possibly it goes back to a book I read when I was 14 and having trouble in school. And my father gave it to me, Psycho Cybernetics by Maxwell, I think. And it's all what you choose if you want to be.

important. You think of yourself as important and other people will think it that way. It's almost, you know, fake until you make it type thing. But if you decide to be happy, if you decide to be successful, if you decide to be wealthy, if you decide to be desirable, whatever, choose that, practice that, go after it. And you can become that. I've chosen to be happy. So for the most part, I'm a happy person.

There's days, there's times. You know, I let it slip because I forget my own self. And while in my own misery, it was difficult, particularly after my wife's death. But I can't fix it. I can't change that. That's done. I think about her every day and I love her to this day. But being sad and morose about it,

doesn't help life at all. So was there something that struck your perception saying, hey, you, Charles, you need to be happy. Like, you've lost your loved one. This has happened with your child, which is, I can't imagine a father outliving their own, their own child. That's the hardest thing to even fathom. But what brought you back to reality? to say, hey, Charles, you have to be happy. With my wife, I had to consciously make a choice.

Whether I like many elderly men, and I was 65, 66 at the time, when she passed, would give up, just lay down and die. And many men do after they lose a wife of that length of time or not. I had to make that choice. And once that I made that choice, and that didn't happen overnight, believe me. At that point, I was able to revert to my attitude of Charles being happy as a choice. You've now decided to live. So live happily. It was after a number of dark nights and screaming.

minute God and a lot of tears because we'd spent 45 years together. But at the point I made the decision to live, I wanted to live as fully as I could. I wanted to be as happy as I could. And it allows me to do things. I'm funding a scholarship in her name, a memorial scholarship through my Rotary Club. And it'll be substantial. It's where most of my assets will go when I die. So living the life allows me to achieve things that I couldn't, if I didn't live and happy and prosper and get ahead in the world.

So it allows me to accomplish things, which I like to do. I'm a problem solver by nature. So I'm solving future problems for for kids that can't afford college. Guys, here's a scholarship. All you have to do is apply for it and meet the criteria, which are minimal. And my wife will put you through college. Either that or joined the military, one of the two. Well, you know, that's what I did.

And I use my GI Bill. Absolutely. Yes, I'm doing that right now as we speak. I got one more year left and I'll have my bachelor's. It put me through graduate school because by the time I got to college, I'd been out of the military. I married. I married. Ruth had five kids when I married her. So I had family. And I was motivated to get through it in a hurry. My GI Bill got me all the way through graduate school. That's fantastic. That's good. Good men like you deserve that. We all do. That's really good. I appreciate you giving me just a little.

taste of that. Right now, this is our introduction. And I wanted to humanize you and I wanted to look at something that's unique that can put a spin on what are episodes going to be like. Yes, we'll talk about business, but I want to look at it from an organizational level, from just one person from taking a top down approach, but then also looking at it from a bottom up covering organizational culture and behavior and leadership. One of the big things that organizational, culture is I had to unlearn Marine Corps. You know, in the service,

they either jump for you or you jump for them. Yes. It doesn't matter. It's hierarchical and it may come down to, well, I got promoted at 8 a.m. and you got promoted at 9 a.m. So you do what I tell you. Okay. That don't work in civilian life. Believe me, it doesn't. And it doesn't work in a marriage.

Well, it does because I learned that when my wife said jump, I jumped. Yes. Happy wife, happy life. So, but, you know, your employees, your staff is so critical. You can't do it all yourself. If you don't keep them happy and give them the tools they need to be successful, you're not going to be successful. So that's critical.

And that was a learning experience. No, I'm going through that now. It's just like I try to hire somebody and I would just start barking orders at them and tell them to do something. Because, I mean, I was a sergeant. I had soldiers. So I figured it's the same thing, you know, just do this. That's all you have to do. And they would just look at me like, what are you talking about?

It's like, I was speaking another language. Yeah. And let me tell you, my service was, you know, 50-some-odd years ago. And maybe it's my perspective, but I think the kids are worse now than they were then. Yeah. About discipline and wanting to do what they want to do and having their culture and so on. It may just be my older perspective. But yeah, if, you know, Michael does my videographer, who helps us, up, who's listening.

Great. I call him a kid. He's 30. He's married. But I ask him to do things. I suggest things. I cajole him occasionally. But I don't tell anybody here what to do anymore. I mean, there's a few things that are hard and fast that these things have to be done. And a checklist on payroll, for instance. When they do a business. payroll, there's a checklist. And if you check off the checklist and didn't do it, that's termination because you've lied to us. You haven't done your job and you've lied about it. If you didn't do it, you forgot it, you screwed it up, you made a mistake. We'll work with that. But that's about the only thing here, you know, again, when I started out, there was dress code. Well, the dress code at my office now is you

must. Okay. Anything else? They won't listen to me anyway. Yeah. But we're on a good topic here, because now I got just another question for some sound bites. What about with remote work? So typical normal leadership, transformational leadership, or I would say a visionary leadership, trying to get their message through digital means through the virtual room. I, from, the people that I've spoken with, it's a lot harder to read a Zoom meeting than it is to read an actual auditorium full people. I agree. I think that we are so wired to personal communication.

You'll find that most of the time I'm looking over here at you and not looking at the camera, okay, because I want to see your reaction to what I'm saying. because you read facial expressions, you read eye movement, you read body language. This is all a major part of communications. Now, my people do work remote some. During the heavy COVID, they all worked remote for a while. And some of my CSRs are Friday or Monday at the house, and we track the time and so on and so forth. It's not something I really like.

but it's now part of life. And remote work is going to become more and more common, doing a series of trying to do a series of blogs on how to remotely manage and track time and legal requirements with payroll and so on and so forth. So it's a big thing and it's going to get bigger, I think, which puts landlords and people who want large office complexes in a pinch. We'll see what happens. But yeah, communication is, interpersonal communication is far more than just either words or even voice.

Can you go a little deeper than that? Okay. I play poker. I like to play poker. You're watching people. You're watching their movements. You're listening to their tone of voice. You're watching how they handle their cards.

You watch how they handle their chips. You watch for micro expressions. Well, that's true in everything. Just then, when I finished earlier and you said, you know, go deeper, you had a little pensive, you know, you wanted to hear more. I just didn't know quite what you wanted to hear more, but I could tell you were you wanted something more. And I can see that. Getting that off of a voice is much, much more difficult. So when you're dealing with employees, you're dealing with clients.

Interpersonal works best. Zoom is better than a telephone, frankly. And so I find that some of these Zoom calls give me access to seeing you, where if it's just a phone, I don't even get that response. So I don't know when you're laughing or you're going, ugh. Okay. I know I see what you're putting down now. this is really good because a lot of people don't pay attention to this kind of stuff.

It's the, we're talking about the tonality, the emphasis that people will apply on in certain words. When we highlight that, people won't be aware of it when we're in person unless some people are just hypersensitive to their social interactions. Look at your hand movements just then and just now. Okay. If I'm not saying that, I don't get that emphasis. okay that you just made. I don't get that from phone call. And I don't get your expressions.

I don't get your micro expressions. I don't get your raised eyebrow, your pursed lips, the turn of your head. You know, if you're distracted by something over there on a phone call, I may or may not realize that. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. It was a notification, something about Facebook or something. I'm like, yeah. Exactly.

That shit. I like that. So what if how can we apply that, that understanding to say somebody in a leadership or management position or someone inspiring to lead others? What what can we give them that just this like a little tidbit that could bring some awareness in what they're doing but also how they're being perceived by others? Well, you know, from my personal point of view, it's, it's, communications is a difficult thing to start with. And if you don't practice it, and if you're not aware of it, if you're not paying attention, not only to the person and what they're doing, but to the personality of the person, you should know if this is an analytical person and you need to talk in very specific. hard, fast terms, or if they're an expressive and it needs to be emotional content, or if they're an amiable, and you need to make sure that it's friendly, it's, it's camaraderie. With an analytical, camaraderie goes, what the hell are you talking about? Okay? I'm not your friend.

I work for you. You know, tell me what you want. Okay, tell me what you need. Tell me how you want it. Don't tell me you like me. I don't care. That's an analytical. You know, a driver is, which most executives tend to be, are very, tend to be short, tend not to communicate well because they don't have time. They're busy people and they don't think they should do these things. And if you don't do them, if you don't pay attention, not only to the,

physical outward portion of the communication, but to the meaning of the words as they relate to the person, you'll not communicate as well as you could. See, I try to imagine executives, people in these high positions. I feel like they are constantly in their head thinking, just strategically looking at the playing field on how they can move. forward and then when they have to interact with somebody that's very low level like god you should know this like that's what I feel like is the first thought where why aren't you in my brain you should already know this very question that you're asking me executives tend to be

caught up in things and tend to be focused I find myself with blinders on at times and I I tell every new employee that if they think I'm ignoring their input, literally wave a hand in front of my face because I have my blinders on and I'm not seeing this. And if you realize I'm not seeing it, interrupt me. Bring it to my attention and I will refocus. And I tell every new employee this, okay, because I do tend to get, blinders on and focus too intently on where I'm going and not pay attention to input that I should. I interviewed for years ago with a computer company in California, and we were talking,

and I mentioned in the conversation about talking to the people on the dock about return packages that were damaged. And he said, why would you ever talk to anybody on the dock? And I said, because they know more about some things than I know. And went on. I did not work for the guy. And the company went bankrupt because he wasn't paying attention to important things. And I miss at bad at times and I get my blinders on and I'm not paying attention. That's why all my employees know that they can interrupt me and force me to stop and listen to them.

Because they make the company run, my job is to make their life easier. My job is to make their job easier. My job is to make them more efficient, more effective. That's my job. My job is not to bark orders and, you know, this kind of thing. I have some strategic responsibilities. But day to day, my job is to make their job easy. That's what makes my job easy and makes me money.

So if they're more efficient, more effective, and happier, I am too. Yes. And I can agree with you with just exploring like different avenues that revolve around your job. I mean, some people don't want to learn other people's jobs. But I mean, that's how I excelled in the military at a faster rate than every other soldiers because I wanted to know what the radio operator was doing when I was just a rifleman. I wanted to know what the computer guy was doing. I wouldn't know what the driver is doing because it's like they know something I don't know.

And I want that information so that makes me a knowledge expert then now people want me because like, oh, Favaza knows some shit. Like, we need him here. That's true to a level. Okay. But at some point, you no longer need to be the smartest person in the room. you need to know how to hire the smartest person in the room because you can't do everything. When you start out, you wear all the hats. You're responsible for everything.

The moment you start hiring people, you start handing off hats and delegating responsibility. Yes. Okay. The lieutenant doesn't need to be the best map reader in the company. he just needs to know who is. Okay. He doesn't need to be the most accurate rifle model. He just needs to know who a sniper is.

Okay. He doesn't necessarily know how to build the radio from scratch. He needs to know how to operate it or how to give orders to the radio operator to effectively communicate his needs to combat control. So a lot of this is delegation. business and it is in the military. As you got to be a sergeant, you had people clean the heads. You had mess, mess people. You had other people that you delegated responsibilities to and expected them to be able to complete them effectively. Now, it's nice to know their job, but at some point in time, as you get bigger, you can't know it all. We've changed software here a few

years ago. And my staff doesn't let me run payrolls anymore. I know the payroll law and I know a lot of things that they still are learning. But when it comes down to operating that particular piece of software, they're far superior to it than I am. I just messed it up. So I've got a group of them and they do that. If they have payroll questions, they come to me. If they have software questions, they go to the vendor because he knows it better than I do. Tax law, I'm the expert. Okay, I'm the compliance expert here. That's what I do on top of everything else.

That's my expertise. CPA, U.S. Tax Corps practitioner, Ersac member, all kinds of things. So that's my expertise. but Michael's my videographer. He sets all this up for me every time. If I had to come in here and do it, maybe it'll work. But when he was out with COVID here recently,

this background was different, and I was a much paler person on here because we didn't have the right background up. My marketing manager, maybe we didn't know what Michael had done. You know, you have to delegate things. You can't do everything. thing that day at age, somewhere around 1900, an educated gentleman could still have a grasp of

basically everything that was going on in science. Today, there is no way a single individual could be even marginally versed in all the sciences. There's just no way. The world has gotten way too complex. You can't be a, you can't know what's going on. Physics, chemistry, computers, engineering, archaeology, on and on. There's just too much data. Yes. So, and I learned this personally.

I used to be a registered investment advisor. Carried a 7 and a 66 securities licenses. I gave him up because I couldn't keep. up on the market and properly advise my clients on investments and keep up with the tax world. There was just too much information. Now, it's nice that I was a registered investment advisor and I've got a lot of knowledge and when I work with other RIAs, I can talk to them and speak their language. It's just like when I talk to computer people. I was a programming engine systems engineer. I can talk to them, but I can't program and Ruby on Rails

or C++, I don't know the languages, but I know the concepts. I know the logic that goes into it. So I can talk to them. So it's nice to know those things. Let's back up because I have one question I want to ask you now, but I want to hold on to that and rewind a little bit before we lose what my focus was. With employees, or I would say with managers that are running the workforce, do you think it would behoove them?

I can't believe I'm using that on there. But do you think it would be a good idea to offer like a, how do you say it? Pixar, they, they started doing this about two years ago where they, they offer like a safe, like it's, I forget what they call it, but it's a, it's like you don't get in trouble. if what you feel your boss is doing within the operation is stupid. Like if you see a better way of doing it, there's like a psychological safe base is technically what they would call it for the employees or the workforce to point out and say, hey, what we're doing here isn't going to get us to towards our short-term goals.

We need to cut here and go straight. And this will be, this will save us a money. We'll get there more effectively. Do you think organizations should start offering something similar to what Pixar is doing? I think that good management has that already. Now, my opinion of American corporate management, frankly, it's abysmal for the most part. But my staff knows that if there's a better way to do something, they tell me. And they tell me forcefully, if need be.

I learned this 25 years ago. And my people understand that I am open to their input. I've made that very clear. Most of the time, we go with their decisions, their solutions, because they know their job better than I do. Very rarely do I override them with marketing. Anash comes up with things all the time. We try most of them.

The ones we don't try are ones that I've done before, before he got here. And I'll show him where it didn't work. And if he says, well, I think things have changed and it might work, we'll go ahead and try it again. We won't spend a lot of money, but we'll try it. And usually, if I've tried it before, I'm still right. Not always, but usually. So that's why even if I've tried it before, he insists, we'll try it again. Because he's the expert at that.

I can't market my way out of a paper bag. So, you know, I listen to him. Michael's my videographer. Jesus, I don't even try to do this stuff. Okay. If I see something, you know, in the trades or whatever, I'll mention it to him. And he probably has a reason that we're not doing it. Or that he said, well, yeah, I've looked at that, but the cost is such that it's just not worth what we get for it.

Okay, fine. You know, and some things we'd like to do, but the budget is excessive. and we won't do them now. We may do them in the future. We have a one camera setup. We'd like to go to a two camera setup. But for the extra $8,000 bucks, it may not be worth it. So that's for the future when prices come down.

My operating staff updates their procedures for operations on a regular basis. It's a regular procedure to update that procedures constantly. So they're constantly coming up with better ways of doing things. A lot of them I don't even know about it anymore because I've got an operations manager I trust. So with that now, would there be some sort of like universal questions? Since we don't know the answers to everything. That's never going to happen, especially with interdiscoptery outlooks that's going towards economics, towards psychology, towards sociology, towards sociology, everywhere.

You can learn something about everything about anything. So would there be universal specific questions that you would ask yourself that would just highlight the very surface that can get you to the specific answer you're looking for? Yeah, there's some things you can ask. You can always ask people how they feel. What can be done better? What are their suggestions? how do they feel about things? How do they think about things?

These people that you've hired should know more about their job than you do. And if you're unwilling to listen to them. So it really comes down to eliciting their input. And that's something you should do on a regular basis. You should elicit their input. I try to make it so it's constant. So if something comes up that they think is, is better, faster, more efficient, easier, quicker, whatever.

Let's talk about it. So in some cases, it's not a matter of asking the question. It's a matter having the right culture. If you have a culture of not bringing these things up, they won't. They just flat won't. It'll never come up. Even if you ask for it, if the culture is not invented here, then they won't bring things from outside

because you've made it clear that if you didn't come up with it, you're not interested. So why are they going to open themselves to ridicule or dismissal or anger or anything else that you might do if you're not going to be open to it? If you're open to it on a constant, regular basis and encourage them to bring it to you, they will. If you're closed off, they won't, even if it's a good idea. Because they've learned that you don't want to listen to them.

You might listen to this one, but they're not going to bring it to you because you pissed on their ideas before. So if you already have a culture like that, You're pretty much screwed. You better change it or you are going to be screwed. I've seen it over and over. People with egos like that that can't accept input from subordinates or associates, they lose because people want to contribute. People want to be part of the organization.

People want to feel like they're important. Dr. George Washington Crane used to say the easiest way to get along with people is to imagine tattooed on their chest are the words, I am important, and treat them that way. And if you treat them like they're important, they'll feel like they're important. And if they feel like they're important, they'll want to contribute, they'll want to help, they'll want to be responsible, they'll want to make the organization work. It's culture. It's corporate culture and they don't teach that in school. At least they didn't when I went. But we can come into Charles Reed's class and he'll give us the rundown and all of that.

I'll give you the master's class on it. You got it. I think I just did. No, you lay it out. That is inspiring right there. Like I'm kind of motivated to go do something. I don't know what I need to go do, but I just need. to go do something.

Okay, so I feel like we're kind of recording and we're kind of just getting an episode in as we speak. If you're okay with that. Sure. Okay. That's good. So let me get a few more questions in and I feel like that would contribute to a good size episode. What is some good advice to follow and some bad advice to avoid? Okay.

Good advice in business, in life. There's never a traffic jam on the extra mile. Go the extra mile for your clients, for your employees, for yourself, for your family. Treat them better than they need to be treated. Treat them with more courtesy. Pay them better. Give them better working conditions if possible. Go the extra mile.

Your competitors won't. as I said, I don't have a lot of faith in most corporate management. So if you go the extra mile, you'll stand out and you'll get outstanding results from doing so. Bad advice is to do the opposite. Don't go the extra mile. Pinch pennies. Keep salaries low. Don't give them good facilities.

Be nasty to them. one classic example to me. I was working in North Carolina. And in North Carolina, unlike Texas, it tends to snow in the winter. The three spots next to the door were for the three executives. I could have had one. I chose not to. I parked out in the parking lot.

And when people would be trudging in through the snow for their shift, there'd be those three empty parking spots. as they trudged from the outer parking lot in through the snow to get into the door, there'd be those three empty parking spots waiting for the executives to show up later in the day. How disheartening was that? You're cold, you're wet, you're in the snow, and you know the boss is going to come in later than you, and he's going to park right there, get out of his car, and walk immediately in the door. How disheartening does that have to be to an employee to see that?

that's the kind of abuse that employees suffer all the time. Executives, owners have egos and think they deserve all these things, and they should have all these privileges and special things and so on and so forth. And, yeah, they've earned a lot of things, but they haven't earned the right to disrespect their employees or to disregard their feelings or their wants or their needs. they haven't earned that. You never earned that.

So, disrespect your people at your own peril because it will cost you and sometimes could cost you everything. I've seen that happen. Another good thing to remember is the marathon guys. Bill Gates put this in a way I like.

People will overestimate what they can accomplish in a year. and underestimate what they can accomplish in a decade. It's a marathon. Long term. It's not, it may not happen today. It may not happen tomorrow. It may not happen this year.

It may not happen next year. But if you work at it, you'll be amazed at what you're accomplished over the next 10 years or 20 years or 30 years. I've been in business 30 years. I'm tickled pink. If you don't told me 30 years ago, I'd be the size I am and, make the money I make and have the good time I have, I'd have been tickled pink with that concept.

Now, would I like to be bigger and richer and more handsome and have more hair? Yeah, but, you know, sometimes we have to settle for things. That's true. But I really like that. Just underestimate the things that we can accomplish in a lifetime. When you first heard that, did you start applying that towards your life? Or did you just happen to know that already? And he kind of articulated the words for you.

He articulated the words for me. I learned young to look long term. I probably look longer term now than I did then because it's a different point of my life. And I've not shortened my outlook. I'm 72. Very frankly, I plan on dying at the age of 106, shot by an irate husband. Hell yeah.

Long term, baby. Long term. Yeah, I've made plans and secession planning and so on and so forth. We're working on that because I know I'm not going to live forever. You'll get to that point in a few years, maybe 30 years before you get there, but you'll get there. So, yeah, I make plans based, because I, you know, life's a fatal disease and none of us are going to survive it, okay?

So, and I understand that, but there's no reason to be sad or upset about it. Just plan for it. And it's not planned for me. It's planned for the people highly behind, so to make their life easy, which is part of your job. So, yeah, I've always been much more of a delayed gratification person. But the words that Gates spoke really gave me a way to crystallize that and to express it. So I appreciate that from Bill.

Now, we know how much you love corporate management, but that's an additional question we're going to add on there just because it tickles me a little bit to hear that. What can they do to improve their performance overall within an organization? park their ego at the door, be willing to listen to their employees, be willing to be open, be open-minded. Don't let your ego get in the way. Don't think you know it all. Don't think that you make the best decisions. Go back to the Bible, you know. He who is without sin shall cast the first stone. you're not perfect. You make mistakes. You've sinned.

You've failed. You've screwed up. You've made bad decisions. Understand that. It's life. We all do. Okay? If you're lucky, you make more right ones than wrong ones and you succeed.

Okay? And that margin doesn't have to be very big. Just a few more right ones than wrong ones and you'll end up on the right side. And understand that. And understand the more inputs you have from people who know what they're doing will allow you to make better decisions and understand things you don't understand, have concepts that you didn't conceive of. People can bring you ideas that you never would have imagined. And that's a wonderful thing. So be open for it.

If you're close to it, you'll never get them and you'll lose thereby. And the ideas come from the strangest places at times, whether it be the guy on the dock, a clerk, a friend, a lover, whatever. It's amazing. And brainstorm with your people, uncritically. And brainstorming forces you not to criticize ideas that come out in a brainstorming session. Criticizing ideas is just going to make sure that you. you don't get them anymore.

So you want to make sure that you have brainstorming sessions that are effective. And you'll be amazed at what comes out of them. Now, establishing an effective brainstorming session, how can leadership management, how can they elicit feedback in a way that if they, if they, if they, don't know how to do it. What are some steps they can do to elicit feedback in a brainstorming session? Okay. Listen uncritically. Listen to the idea. Listen to it in full. You may not agree with it, but don't criticize it. Say thank you. Let me think about that. Let me put that into the hopper. Let's revisit that next week, next month. and thank them for their input. People want to be heard.

People think they're important, and they have important ideas. And if you treat them that way, they'll bring you others. If you disparage what they give you the first time, even if you know it's wrong, even if you know it won't work, even if you tried it before.

If you disparage it, not take it and work with it or explain why. Yeah, oh, Sally, yeah. Yeah, I like that idea. Let me show you something here. We tried this, this, this, and this. Basically what you're saying, am I right? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And this is the result we got. So, you know, we may not want to try that again, but, you know, we tried it, just like you thought of it, We tried it as well. And, you know, we had the same idea you did that it would be great. But this is where it got us. And she'll go, oh, okay. And then say, Sally, the fact that that idea we've tried before doesn't mean the next one we'll have tried.

So don't hesitate to bring me another one. Encourage them. These are knowledgeable people. If they're not knowledgeable people, why are you working for you? Okay. Again, I don't care if they're in the warehouse. They know that warehouse and how it works better than you do. Okay?

You probably haven't worked in it. I made a point one company. We'd get in late shipments. I'd take off my tie roll up my sleeves and get out there and unload trucks with them. They loved it. They thought it was great. They'd laugh at my ass when I take this box of shoes and try and toss it up on the thing and have it fall back on me. I thought it was great.

And it got so. They didn't invite me out on Friday evenings because on Friday evening, it's unknown to me and unknown to my boss. The local shipping companies would bring by cold beer for the warehouse people, the dock people. This was a way of ingratiating the shipping company with the dock people that chose the shippers. Okay.

So they started inviting me to come out on Friday evenings to have a beer with them. And I learned more about how they, they chose shippers and what the trucks, trucking companies were, and who you could trust and who you couldn't, and who had the best. I learned a fascinating amount of things because I was willing to go out and unload some containers with it. And they loved it. So they would talk to me. These were things that my boss, the owner, had never learned. And he'd been there a lot longer than I had.

But they wouldn't talk to him because he didn't respect him. Now I see it. It opened your eyes, but I'm assuming his, by God, I better have opened his to... Never did. He had an ego that wouldn't quit. That's a fucking asshole. Of course, it killed his business, but... It opened your eyes to a culture that was happening right in front of you and his, but not even knowing it was existing because he didn't pay attention. Yes. And by being open... showing respect, I got respect in return and I got information and I got communication and I got

ideas and I got help. All that comes from respecting, you know, and this is this is the thing about coming out of the military. You know, you can't be hierarchical in business. Okay. You have to, You have to be, it's almost familiar. It almost is family. Okay. Yeah, I keep a distance. I don't go out drinking with my people. They've been out to the house a couple of times for major occasions.

But we don't eat lunch together normally. I eat in the cafeteria. I think a private dining room for an executive is an absolute mistake. you should eat with your people. I'm always open. If I'm heating up soup in the kitchen, fine. If I'm sitting down in the kitchen having a meal, sit down and talk to me. I don't care.

I've done this at every place I've worked before I ever started my own company. I always eat in the cafeteria, in the lunchroom, whatever. And I'm always open to anybody sitting down and talking. It's amazing what you were, but you're giving them respect. You're willing to listen to them. You're willing to talk to them. And that gets you information, respect, loyalty,

longevity, all these things, because if they respect you, they're willing to work for you. You go back to the military. If you don't respect an officer, you know, you don't give him his all.

You don't do everything you could for him because you don't respect it. Exactly. And you talk nasty about it behind his back. Okay. And anybody new comes in the company, you say, you know, Lieutenant so-and-so,

that's a, yeah. And they, and they pick it up immediately. So respect is important, and you earn it differently in the military than you do in business. And in business, you do it by communication, respect, understanding, compassion. For instance, our bereavement policy is real simple. You take what you need.

If three days is enough, fine. If it takes two weeks, one of my ladies that has happened. handles by HR and now AP and so on. Her father died and she was responsible for everything. It took two weeks. So I'm going to lose her because she had to take two weeks off to take care of a family tragedy. Why would I do that? I love her to death.

She's great at what she does. Why would I say, no, you have to come back after three days and then lie to me about what you're doing? Because you're still going to do these things because it's a family situation you have to handle. So I'm going to force you to lie to me and go around me because I'm going to force you to be in the office. How stupid is that? If I don't trust them, to be honest about it, I'll get rid of them. Okay? I don't keep people around.

I can't trust. So if I've got good people and I trust them, what do I care? I'm happy. They're happy. I get more work out of them, more efficiency, more enthusiasm, more enthusiasm, more and things. enthusiasm than I would be in a micromanager. That is the mentality every corporate executive needs to have right there. I agree.

And most of them don't. And is it because I hate to say it. But like is it that old school generation that's still hovering in the air? No. It's it's entrepreneurs who build companies, people who move up through the corporate ladder effectively, aren't people people. And I have to work at it because I'm not a people person. I have to work at it. I have to practice it.

I have to think about it daily because I'm an analytical. I'm a CPA. I'm a numbers guy. Okay. You know, to me when I was young, when I first started, the perfect job was an office with an outside entry to the parking lot in a slot in this wall for incoming work and a slot for outgoing work on that one. No phone on the desk. That was the perfect job for a CPA. You can't run a business that way.

You can do it as long as you're a sole proprietor, but you have to be good to your clients, and your clients don't like that either. So you learn very quickly that you can't do that. And if you're lucky, I read enough books. Tom Peters is one of my favorite authors. Michael Gerber is another one. And you learn because this is not rocket science. This is simple psychology and sociology in dealing with people. And there's dozens of books out there, hundreds, thousands of books out there on this kind of thing that they come out all the time.

There's some that come out that that are contrary to that. But that's a different story. Recommend one. In search of excellence. Ah, yes. Okay. That's my favorite. The second one is Michael Gerber's The E-Myth Revisited.

Okay. You read those two. Read some Drucker. You know, you'll learn a lot of things. And the books are out there. And if you'll read them, and I love to read, you can learn these things. But those two alone will, if you follow, if you learn from that and understand what they're saying, you'll be amazed at how successful you can be in interacting with your staff. Okay, Charles. Tell us a little bit about you and how can they learn more about your

product in your specialty? Well, I'm glad that you asked. My newest book, The Payroll Book, a guide for small business and entrepreneurs. 30 years of wisdom distilled down to 95,000 words available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, wherever fine books are sold, or at the payrollbook.com. We provide payroll services to small and medium-sized businesses around the country. Payroll and payroll-related services. We can work with benefits.

handbooks, HR, but our unique selling proposition is compliance. We're specialists in payroll and employment tax compliance. We know all the ins and outs. I've been living this for 30 years. I've been a member of the Internal Revenue Service Advisory Council. I am a U.S. Tax Corps practitioner, which allows me to represent clients in tax court without being an attorney. But to do that, I had to learn all about evidence and procedure and so on, which allows me to do that. But I'm an employment tax specialist, and we keep our clients out of hot water. And when the IRS screws up, and they do constantly, we can fix it. The IRS in fiscal 19 issued $13 billion in employment tax penalties.

More than half got abated by people like me who know what they're doing. My favorite analogy on that is that when I grew up Pele was the world's best soccer player. Today it may be Messi or Ronaldo, but it was Pele. Wonderful athlete. Still alive. I was in the hospital the other day, but still alive. But if you took him at his prime and you put him at second base in a New York Yankees uniform, he'd be lost. Doesn't know the game, the equipment, the rules, nothing.

He'd still be a great athlete. But he's lost. Well, if you take a business person, a small business, a mechanic, a dog groom, a chef, a lawyer, a doctor, they're great at what they do or they wouldn't be in business very long. But the IRS comes calling, they're lost. They're pale at second base. They don't know what to do. They're good at what they do. They may be very smart, but they don't know what to do.

So outsourcing payroll to me is a no-brainer. one of those things you should do. And we do it. And our competitors are reasonably good at producing paychecks. But when the problem arises, they don't have the professionals on staff to solve your problems. We do. That's what we do better than anybody else as far as we're concerned. We're basically insurance for your payroll. You may never need some of the specialty that we bring to the table. hopefully you won't. But 40% of small businesses get penalized every year by the IRS to the tune of $800 on average. So if you didn't get one last year or this year, you're due next year. So give me a call. Now, for those that are the do it yourselfers that would probably think, well, I could just

learn about this. Now, for those that are trying to learn about it or they have a general knowledge, time that they have to take away from their business rather than just to learn about all the little concepts to all of this. It change all the time as well. I keep up on them. I get five emails, newsletters a week from the IRS. I read the trades. I study this stuff.

I teach on it. I go to classes on it. I had this conversation with an engineer a number of years ago. I'd done up a tax return for him. And he said, you know, Charles. I can do what you can do. I said, Steve, absolutely. Go back to college.

It'll take you about three years, spend 20 years in the field doing this, and you can do exactly what I do. But you know, Steve, if I go back to college for three years in your field and then work in your industry for 20 years, I can do what you do. I'm just as smart as you are. So what? Okay. Big deal.

You can't do it today, and I can't do it. your job today. So you pay me to do yours. You pay me to do my job and I pay you to do your job. What do you want? He thought about it. He said, Charles, you're right. I said, thanks. You outsource because I don't make my own clothes. I don't build my own car. I don't grow my own food. I don't build my own house. I don't make my own computers, my own cameras. microphones, lights. I don't do any of that. I do employment tax. I do payroll. I'm an expert at it. I buy computers from people who make them. I buy cars from people who make them. I buy clothes from people who make them who know what they're doing. Payroll is the same thing. Yeah,

you can learn to do it if you want. You can spend your time on it. If your time isn't better spent on your business than doing something I do every day of my life and can do for you for a pittance. Fine. Help yourself. One last question. Then I'm going to let you go. For those that want to scale their corporation, their startup, or just their personality, we can make this universal.

We can make an organizational. What's one thing they can do to help them reach that next level? Oh, dream. Imagine. And then plan. Imagine what you want to be. Imagine where you want to go. Envision what you want to be.

Fake it till you make it. Okay? You can be whatever you want to be. You just have to choose to do it. And then follow through. Plan. Work. Put in the effort.

Put in the time. Gain the knowledge. It's not going to have. happen just because you dream it. Once you have your dream, then you have to implement the program to get there. So it's basic stuff. I mean, you know, plan, plan your work, work your plan, however you want to put it. But if you can imagine it, then lay it out how you get there in the stepping stones and the mileposts and markers and start achieving them one after the other. Find out what you need to do to get there. Whether it be like me, get a CPA,

get an MBA, become a U.S. Tax Corps practitioner. I did that in my 60s because I wanted to be able to do more for my clients, so I can now. Hell yeah. So dream and then implement. How can you get anywhere you want to be? Hell yeah. Well, I like that.

I mean, six years old and you're like, how can I improve to give a better customer service? What will make me better? Oh. take this course. That's awesome. That is really, that's great. You can never stop learning. How can our listeners get in touch with you, but they want to learn more about you? Get payroll.com. My email is CJR at get payroll.com. If you need a quick answer, 972-353-0-0-0. The only good thing Verizon ever did for me. That's excellent. Thank you, Charles.

I really do appreciate you coming on the show today. My pleasure. Thanks for having me. You take care. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope you guys enjoyed today's episode. Subscribe if you have not already done so. But leave us a review. Let us know how we can continue to improve your transformation station.

I appreciate every one of you for tuning in. And I look forward to the next episode on your transformation station. You've been listening to Your Transformation Station. Rediscovering your true identity and purpose on this planet. We hope you enjoyed the show, and we hope you've gotten some useful and practical information. In the meantime, connect with us on Facebook and Instagram at YTS The Podcast. We'll be back soon. Until then, this is your transformation station, signing off.

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