- Outlier Growth
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- Set expectations. Build leverage.
Set expectations. Build leverage.
Micro-management kills your leverage
Read time: 3 min, 24 secs
Nerd warning. Live screenshots on biz building
Hey there - it's Brian š
Hot take:
Managers use dictator controls to avoid awkward conversations.
I saw it this week.
The awkward conversations are setting expectations for the role you hire.
It feels fluffy.
You want to get right to work.
But if this person will be with you for yearsā¦ take the time to make sure they do the work right every week.
Set expectations right and youā¦
ā You spend less time fixing problems
ā They make you more money by doing the job right the first time
ā And results compound weekly 52 times a year
THATās leverage.
Multiple that across 10 - 20 people? Geez š¤Æ
Iāll tell you the mistakes people make that break the leverage.
Weāll use a real client example of bad onboarding that happened this week.
We fixed it. Iāll share how.
Letās get into it:
šØ Nerd warning
Iāve been getting great feedback from people asking to see tactically how we build our business behind the scenes.
Going forward youāll get a peak behind the curtain at everything going on at our staffing agency, TalentHQ.
ā Problems weāre wrestling with
ā How we fix them
ā Internal systems
ā How weāre scaling
etc etc.
Very tactical. Very nerdy. Very real examples.
Iāll share the systems I stole from 6 years in consulting Fortune 500s at Deloitte.
And the tactics we took from my co-founderās last business. He exited an email marketing agency with 53 employees.
Read on if youāre a current or future business owner / manager and want to learn the weeds of building a business.
When bad results is really bad onboarding
I got this client email this week.
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/5b255543-6b85-481e-a53c-a0226be6350a/image.png?t=1720708720)
Donāt set expectations right and you resort to ātrackingā work
Really smart guy. Very impressed with what heās built. Excited to be helping him add talent to his business and growing together.
He hired talent to run ads.
But he rushed the onboarding process. Now heās resorting to āwatchingā work.
This kills leverage. Heās losing time and missing results.
He assumed talent would know what success looks like. So he covered the basics and got his media buyer right to work.
Hereās what happened:
Thereās a misalignment of expectations on speed and communication.
His media buyer is smart. So she can do it.
But because his media buyer is misaligned on what success looks like:
He spends time micromanaging. His media buyer doesnāt deliver as fast as heād like. Doesnāt communicate as well as heād like.
This is where leverage comes in.
Imagine if weād spent an extra 3 hours at the beginning being obnoxiously clear on what success looks like?
In communication. In delivery. In speed etc etc
Then every single day his ads get done right the first time. They donāt lose hours in miscommunication. And thereās less friction so the business owner loves going to work every day.
Every company is different.
So assume that success at your company is NOT the same as success at the talentās last company.
So how did we fix it?
We āre-onboardedā the media buyer.
How we āre-onboardedā talent
Since I canāt share my clientās onboarding, Iāll just share our own at TalentHQ.
Hereās screenshots from our internal onboarding process covering 4 topics:
1) Values
2) Culture
3) Communication
4) Performance
Hereās the inside look. Steal what works for you:
1) Values
Values explains how you make decisions and work together. Talent needs to be onboard or the business culture falls apart.
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/a2533953-2bd2-40e7-bbd9-7952b675264a/image.png?t=1720711275)
2) Culture:
I read this note from Bezos on how you can teach people to expect high quality.
We do that by clearly listing guidelines for our culture.
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/25d1bbbf-9d48-494f-88d5-b19f775514c0/image.png?t=1720711314)
Quick note on culture: One thing that HAS to be shut down immediately at every company is gossip.
It destroys your company.
In our policies we say point blank:
āWe donāt tolerate gossip. If talking about someone elseās work use specific examples. Talk to them directly about it.ā
Gossip is against company culture and will be brought up at performance reviews if we see it happening.
3) Communication
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/21ff2783-67db-4a9f-96a0-ce15f7bbdf5f/image.png?t=1720711496)
Details inside each toggle
Note: our communication guidelines go into detail in each toggle. How frequently. Frameworks for communication etc.
4) Performance
We do 1:1s weekly for the first month or two. Then switch to monthly.
1:1s are an hour to make sure we can go in depth.
Topics covered:
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/d1d45918-9fdd-41fc-b16f-74ffa2ac043d/image.png?t=1720711602)
We are obnoxiously clear on what success looks like when it comes to performance. If we talk about something and our team is not improving after 3 conversations they are put on warning.
We call it our PIP (Performance Improvement Plan).
In a PIP we list performance expectations by when. If they still cannot hit performance goals on our performance plan, then they are let go.
No surprises. This is obnoxiously clear from day 1.
Want to see how we onboard our talent?
After I got off the phone with our client I asked our account manager what she thought of her onboarding
She smirked and said āitās never been this good.ā
Anyway if you want our onboarding process reply to this email with āonboard.ā
Iāll go into details in the next issue.
Off to filming ads!
Also feel free to reply with any questions. I read every email.
See you next Thursday š
P.S. For my friends: Whatās going on with Brian?
Iām in Cuenca, Ecuador closing a partnership deal to expand our marketing talent pool in Latin America.
Weāre also filming ads today for client acquisition.
Check out where weāre filming ads. Itās the view from my co-work.
Cuenca is beautiful.
![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/427907c8-e088-4f56-9ae9-5e0daf8dc142/image.png?t=1720712682)
Filming ads from Cuenca, Ecuador
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