[00:00:00:07 - 00:00:27:09]
Shawn FitzGerald
Hello, and welcome to Intentional Change, the podcast for business owners and leaders who want to navigate growth, technology, and transformation, not by accident, but with intention. I'm your host, Shawn FitzGerald. With my co-host, Joshua McNary, we explore practical ideas and share insights to help lead you through change with clarity and confidence. Be sure to follow, share, and subscribe so you don't miss the next insight that could change how you think, lead, or grow your business.
[00:00:31:06 - 00:01:33:06]
Shawn FitzGerald
Picture a high-performance sports car, engines roaring, sleek design, top-tier parts, but the driver has no idea where they're headed, without a destination, or even a pit crew that knows their role. That's what too many businesses look like. And today on Intentional Change, we're stepping into the driver's seat with Rob Taylor of EOS Worldwide. Rob helps leaders see what's been hiding in plain sight, looking for that clarity that comes from a shared vision and the power of having the right people in the right seats. Through his work as an EOS implementer, Rob has helped countless companies stop spinning their wheels and finally get traction. And if you've ever felt like your team is working hard but not working together, or like your vision is clear in your own head but blurry everywhere else, our discussion today will touch on perspective shifts that your business might just be missing. Rob, every time that we get together, I'm fascinated by your ability to spot those little things in businesses that are tripping people up. How did you get started doing this?
[00:01:33:06 - 00:01:41:19]
Rob Taylor
Well, first off, Shawn, thanks for having me. I'm enjoying having time just to sit and talk with you and talk about things like this. To your question,
[00:01:43:04 - 00:03:00:20]
Rob Taylor
you know, it started way back in my growing up, in my family's ag business, watching my parents as owners work together to run the business. And after college, I went to work for a founder visionary, relocating his business from California to Iowa and helped him do that. And through that journey, we started to realize that we needed a process to scale the company, take it to the next level. And it really didn't exist out there. So we organically created something, had some success with it. And after 20 some years, I found a need to go off and help others grow their business. I just love building things. I love the making an impact in businesses by building things. And started to see that what worked for one company didn't always work for others. And that's that lesson in life that we sometimes find things that need to be fine tuned to make it work for the majority. And I've had some successes along the way where I found even with great strategic planning events and helping teams with development, sometimes that's the execution and the conflict and being able to work together to get on the same page that makes the difference is those little things.
[00:03:01:21 - 00:03:13:04]
Shawn FitzGerald
What are some of the things that you have found when you're working with your clients? That is a common issue. Is there something that no matter what industry, they always have something in common?
[00:03:13:04 - 00:03:16:01]
Rob Taylor
It tends to be the assumption.
[00:03:17:03 - 00:03:23:00]
Rob Taylor
Are we on the same page? Where are we taking the company? What do we want? Sometimes the
[00:03:24:01 - 00:03:31:19]
Rob Taylor
team feels they understand it. But once you succinctly put it down, this is in a simple sentence what we want to achieve.
[00:03:33:00 - 00:03:42:22]
Rob Taylor
Sometimes find that leaders realize that that's not what they were wanting. They're not on the same page. And over time, even after some months, years,
[00:03:43:22 - 00:03:53:18]
Rob Taylor
they may say that that's what they want, but when it really comes down to it, they don't. So it's that alignment, getting clarity on is this what success looks like for us as an organization?
[00:03:54:20 - 00:04:10:11]
Shawn FitzGerald
When I opened up the podcast as I was introducing you, I described you as an EOS implementer. For our listeners who have never heard of EOS or traction, can you give us a little bit of explanation? What is EOS? What do you do?
[00:04:11:12 - 00:04:11:17]
Shawn FitzGerald
Why?
[00:04:11:17 - 00:05:03:02]
Rob Taylor
EOS is an acronym for entrepreneurial operating system based on the book traction, which I have here next to me. It's really a system for helping run a business. It's something simply put, we help clarify what the leaders want to achieve, the vision, help them simplify it down so that it's easy to communicate and share and focus on and to really help them achieve it. Clarify, simplify, achieve that vision. And we're talking about something that is five, 10, 15 years out and it's going to vary by company. What does it they want to achieve? What success look like? Do they agree on it? And then get a leadership team in place to create that vision and work the plan to execute the plans, if you will, and achieve that vision, which is the hard part. We can all have ideas, but we have to go achieve it, work, do the work.
[00:05:03:02 - 00:05:16:11]
Shawn FitzGerald
Oftentimes we talk about vision and that's kind of the focus today, but why is the vision one of the most important foundational pieces that a business needs to have before they go and do anything else?
[00:05:16:11 - 00:05:30:01]
Rob Taylor
If a company doesn't have a vision, there's this concept of the company will die, which sounds really harsh, but it's this idea that if leaders want to grow, they want to improve
[00:05:31:06 - 00:05:37:23]
Rob Taylor
and they find a way to clarify that and get on the same page and yes, that's it. It becomes compelling.
[00:05:39:10 - 00:05:54:12]
Rob Taylor
It helps the organization all rally around it, that rally cry, the focused at our core, putting our energy toward the thing we want to achieve. That's not going to happen overnight. It comes from a book called Good to Great, the big Harry Audacious goal.
[00:05:55:15 - 00:06:25:07]
Rob Taylor
And for those companies that find that and they get energized by it and they pull together to make it happen, it's a wonderful thing to see. Some companies just want status quo and it's okay. Some are not ready for growth. Some think they want growth, but they're not comfortable doing the work to achieve the growth. So the vision becomes the point of what are we trying to achieve so we can focus our energy on something called the mission, the core focus, to where we're going.
[00:06:25:07 - 00:06:43:02]
Shawn FitzGerald
When you start trying to bring a vision together, when you're working with your team for a session and they think they have a vision, but it's not real solid, hasn't been tested, whatever it might be, what are some of the signs that there are problems with the existing vision?
[00:06:43:02 - 00:06:59:12]
Rob Taylor
Well, that's a great question and I love when that happens to see it because it's really helping a team acknowledge the fact that they're not crystal clear on what it is. It could be that it has been stated and you clearly see their disagreement.
[00:07:00:19 - 00:07:34:14]
Rob Taylor
Sometimes that disagreement shows up in people's faces, their actions, but it's ultimately to help them have the discussion to discern that vision, ask the questions, have the debate, the discussion, and in some cases a disagreement left in the room to say that leadership team member may be leaving the room disagreeing. That's where to take the company. And I have seen people leave teams and then the company thrives going forward because they're aligned. They've got all the people helping take the company in that one direction.
[00:07:34:14 - 00:07:43:01]
Shawn FitzGerald
Whose job is it to have the vision? Is it one person? Because you've been talking we and they and as a collective,
[00:07:44:08 - 00:07:47:12]
Shawn FitzGerald
is it a we, is it a they, or is it starting with one person?
[00:07:47:12 - 00:08:12:19]
Rob Taylor
The vision comes from leadership team, but typically a company has someone who or some group of people who are true visionaries and we're hoping that if that is the case, that person is able to verbalize, share, help people see it as well, and be influential and saying, "Hey, this is what I think we need to achieve. Do you all agree? Here's why."
[00:08:13:19 - 00:10:06:02]
Rob Taylor
And to help coalesce around this direction. It ultimately has to be accepted by the whole team, the leadership team. If that is not the case, that's where we start looking at do we have the right people in the right seats in that in that room. And sometimes we do have the right people in the right seats, but if we're not aligned, we can have power struggle. This is where we help coach a team through people issues, just as disagreement, conflict, if you will, to say some point we got to make a decision. Is this where we're taking it to? We typically have a seat which will look like a president, general manager of the company. We call it an integrator. That person is who really runs the company, integrates the functions of how do we go out and get business? How do we sell for what we've sold? How do we either make it or provide the service? We call it operations. We have that financial management piece. How do we then make sure if sales is getting orders and operations is putting the product or service out the door, that we have a financial management function to make sure we're making money, profit, net income. The integrator helps us all pull together to make sure we're locked up with each other, working together to not only have a vision, but have a plan to achieve the vision and that we're executing on it. We tend to sometimes see a visionary person who maybe usually is the founder, not always, but usually the founder, that person who has the idea or is able to help the team see the idea. When we have that person, that's a person we love to set free to help us go and then work the plan to achieve it. Maybe it's research and development. It's that we've been a business for years and now we're starting to move a different direction toward a different vision and it's going to take some work in helping us to restructure the business,
[00:10:07:09 - 00:10:08:21]
Rob Taylor
put things in place we don't have yet.
[00:10:09:21 - 00:10:29:17]
Rob Taylor
And when we have that, we as a team all need to understand when that needs to happen and what needs to be happening and who owns what and that the integrator helps us work the plan. The visionary helps us keep focused on the why we're pursuing it. But ultimately, it's a team effort. It has to be a leadership team effort.
[00:10:29:17 - 00:10:45:15]
Shawn FitzGerald
Some people are really good at looking five, 10 years down the road and putting the flag in the ground and saying, this is where we're going to go. Other people can't do it beyond a year or two. And that disconnect suddenly makes the word vision two different things.
[00:10:46:17 - 00:11:15:11]
Shawn FitzGerald
So what are some of the things that if I was listening to this podcast today and I wasn't really familiar, maybe I heard a little bit about EOS or traction and I'm like, you know what, I think I have a problem with vision in my business, but we've got all these strong personalities. We've got all these people who can see things, not see things, and we're not aligned. How do you start? How do you look at that one year, three year, five year, 10 year, and check those against each other?
[00:11:15:11 - 00:13:04:05]
Rob Taylor
It ultimately starts with that Steve and Covey concept begin with the end in mind. And I say that saying someone, the founder, the visionary, the leadership team, someone at some point says, what if we, in 10 years, we are able to double our market share? And I've had some teams look at that and say, well, that's great. But ultimately, that means that means we're going to replace this competitor on the list of market leaders. And this is an example. They start to realize that if we are able to overcome and supersede the competitor number two, and we become number two, where number one is then the market leader is right above us at that point. And that's going to take us five years. And we agree that that's it. That's helping us say, we're going to have to create new product, new services, we're going to have to scale, we're going to have to improve our game and how well we go out and develop and produce and sell product. That helps us have a vision of an agreement on what a success look like. And you start thinking, if that's where we're going to be at in 10 years from now, and we know what that means, it's we're going to be number two, we're going to have 50% of market share, we're going to be number two in size, in terms of revenue or sales in our market, that gives us a destination to drive the company toward. Then you come back saying, if we're going to be at that in say five years, where do we need to be at three years from now? Where do we need to be at next year? So it just becomes a little bit of a math equation up front, but with real work to start the process of getting momentum, putting in place structure and things and changes and new accomplishments toward that long term goal.
[00:13:04:05 - 00:13:28:17]
Shawn FitzGerald
You set a 10 year and a five year and a three and a one. But in a year from now, in five years from now, the industry may change or will change or is changing. And your 10 year plan suddenly is out the window. How do you help your clients keep that fluidity of something that still needs to have some sort of rigid formation?
[00:13:28:17 - 00:13:45:11]
Rob Taylor
Well, I ask a lot of questions. And that's part of what I'm teaching a team to do is what is our 10 year? What is what do we look like in three years? What are the core values by which we work together? You know, there are guiding principles that we will not go against.
[00:13:46:14 - 00:15:38:23]
Rob Taylor
The point I'm getting at is we ask lots of questions and are we're asking the team to be able to get clear on what do the answer those questions look like for them, knowing that, you know, six months ago, here was their long term vision, something changes, they start to realize maybe that vision is changing. So we facilitate discussions on is this all the same? Is it are you abandoning it? If you do, do you see this vision changing every six months? And is that really then the vision? So it becomes a it becomes a question and facilitation of the discussion on really in our heart in our heart, what do we really want to achieve? What does success look like? Not just on paper, you know, numbers, you know, revenue and profitability. But ultimately, what is that? What's the impact to us as a business and or to the owners, if you will, if when we achieve this, at some point, that vision becomes rock solid, and they're locked in. And okay, every so often, maybe there's a little bit of a question as new members come on and go off. But ultimately, they become dedicated to that. And so rally cry, especially as they start getting momentum to it. Now, if things change, like just for fun, say there's a business model that artificial intelligence is starting to really change it, is that going to impact it negatively, positively, depends on their business. But those are things that are real world that they may not have anticipated three years ago, here we are, where's what's going to happen. And it's a chance to either we relay out our vision, and or tweak a little bit, or some other option, but it creates the questions to where ultimately the team's got to decide. Let's talk about the team for
[00:15:38:23 - 00:15:47:00]
Shawn FitzGerald
a little bit. What are some of those traits or characteristics that make a team stronger and more effective
[00:15:48:13 - 00:15:50:14]
Shawn FitzGerald
than a team that just struggles and goes nowhere?
[00:15:50:14 - 00:17:16:05]
Rob Taylor
Well, one of the things that we actually walk teams through at some point in the process is this concept of team health. How healthy is leadership team? We're basically asking them to look in the mirror and openly share with each other. How well do we trust each other? How well are we how good are we at addressing, having debate, healthy conflict? How well are we at once we've addressed and overcome those conflicts? How good are we at committing to what we've agreed to? How good are we at being accountable to our commitments following through on them? And then ultimately, how good are we as a team collectively at working together to get the results we want. And that comes from a Patrick Lencioni model that really helps the team understand that when we're healthy, we can have open honest discussions and we can say what needs to be said. We can agree to disagree, but we can leave the room committed to go fulfill our promises and work the plan, which helps us not have so many egos and the distrust to where we won't even share the concerns that by not sharing them, we're not able to be aware of them and overcome them, which can create train wrecks.
[00:17:16:05 - 00:17:30:10]
Shawn FitzGerald
How often do you review this roadmap, this vision? Is there a certain window that you find is healthy if the team comes back and reviews or discusses or have some of these conversations that we've been talking about?
[00:17:30:10 - 00:18:42:12]
Rob Taylor
A common cadence in the world of, I would say, strategic planning is to say, okay, here's where we want to be at three to five, 10 years out, but every year have an annual planning session. What does the next 12 months look like? What's success? What we want to achieve? Then once that's in place, to then break it into 90 day quarterly sprints, if you will, and to look at it and say, okay, a year 12 months from now, we want to achieve X. What do we have to achieve in Q1, the next 90 days? And you get into this habit of setting it at the end of the 90 days, review how, what did we do and learn from that, reset the next quarterly plan for Q2, set it, get to the end of Q2, reflect how would it go, learn from that. That process of setting it, reviewing how well you did, relearning and reset, just continually improving. It helps a team get better and better at strengthening their ability to predict what they can and should get done. It also helps them be able to just focus on the next 90 days.
[00:18:43:18 - 00:19:32:12]
Rob Taylor
I see sometimes visionaries who in the middle of the quarter have the new idea, and it's not a bad idea, but it can derail the plan for the next 90 days, which is where that integrator can jump in and say, hey, Rob, love the idea. But remember, this is the plan we're working. How about we wait until this next 90 day discussion so we can have the strategic discussion, that way we're not having to interrupt our ability to execute the plan in the field. And I find that that ability for them to focus on the plan and wait until those every 90 day quarterly sessions to have those strategic discussions helps them improve their ability to execute plans and be successful in following through on commitments.
[00:19:33:15 - 00:19:50:11]
Rob Taylor
Then at the end of the quarter or at the annual, it gives them a chance to really dig deep and have some open, healthy discussions on the why we're still going this direction or not, new ideas pop up. What do we pursue, not pursue? It helps them not get whipped around.
[00:19:50:11 - 00:20:19:16]
Shawn FitzGerald
Have you ever worked with any of your clients who may have had such a strong leader that people were afraid to say, hold on, we're going to talk about that later, or to push back? If you're on a team where you have someone like that and you know the plan was we delayed it out and all of a sudden this turn is happening, what do you do on the team? What do you recommend to the people that you work with who may have to fight that battle?
[00:20:19:16 - 00:20:36:09]
Rob Taylor
That's tough. It is, especially if that person's the owner. This is the 100% majority owner who has that ability to snap fingers and make changes. It really comes down to how does that help us get to what we want to achieve?
[00:20:38:23 - 00:20:46:00]
Rob Taylor
What's the impact to our plans if we change direction? We're the pros and the cons.
[00:20:47:01 - 00:21:22:07]
Rob Taylor
Is that still helping us get to our end vision or goal? It just becomes a question of discernment and agreement and hopefully alignment on yes, we're going to do it, no we're not, or if we are going to do it, when to do it. That's also a key thing. We have so many ideas many times that we start to realize that when you start seeing a team get crystal clear on what's got to get done every 90 days, they tend to come away, wow, we've got a lot to get done. When you throw in a new idea,
[00:21:23:07 - 00:21:30:10]
Rob Taylor
sometimes they're very quick to push back and say, we can't handle anymore. Even if it's going to help them get more done better,
[00:21:31:16 - 00:21:35:20]
Rob Taylor
sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. These ideas, the visions,
[00:21:36:21 - 00:22:06:15]
Rob Taylor
they're great things to help a team do what I call pressure test. Great idea. Do we do it or not? If we're going to do it, when do we do it? Pressure testing, our vision, our plan, even our core values, what do we stand for? And over time, I welcome those ideas and I want the team to welcome those ideas. But it's ultimately helping them get better at looking at what's really worth us changing our plan for.
[00:22:06:15 - 00:22:27:16]
Shawn FitzGerald
As we're looking at this team and trying to strengthen it, what are some of the things that we need to be aware of when we are wanting accountability, but we also don't want to have many people trying to own or maybe not own things that need to be taken care of. How do you balance that? Or how do you set that up on a team?
[00:22:27:16 - 00:22:34:00]
Rob Taylor
Well, in simple terms, we are just getting crystal clear on expectations.
[00:22:35:01 - 00:22:47:12]
Rob Taylor
What is expected of you, Shawn, and your seats. Rob, here's your seat in the business, your position in the business. Here's what's expected of you, what's expected of me, what do we own?
[00:22:47:12 - 00:22:49:23]
Shawn FitzGerald
And who is setting those expectations first of all?
[00:22:49:23 - 00:25:17:19]
Rob Taylor
As a team, it helps the leadership team have leaders of those functions around the table, especially in quarterly meetings where we make plans, and then week to week to make sure we're working the plan so that we have the right people around the table who own those parts of the business to make the decisions need to be made. And if just for fun discussion, we have an area that is going through a tough moment, sales are down, becomes crystal clear in a leadership team meeting, who owns that? The sales leader. Rob, you're in charge of sales. Are you going to, do you have a plan to turn this around? I'll come back next week with a plan. And at some point, after time and time again, I'm struggling to come back with a plan that really is effective. At some point, the question becomes, is it because we're not focused on the right thing as a business? Or is Rob not the right sales leader to effectively help lead us toward this? And that's not a light decision. But ultimately, we need someone in that leadership seat to for sales to drive the sales function, have the sales process, have the leadership of the sales people in the field. How do they sell? What does that mean? Who do they approach? What's the technique? And are people following through on that? Are they putting in the reps to go out and do the sales work, having crystal clear functions and seats to help us know who goes in those seats? Because when I'm in that seat as a sales leader, or as a salesperson, there's two different expectations there. One is to lead the team through people as a leader, one is to actually go do the sales work, which are those am I more comfortable with as a person. And that helps us get clear on here's the expectations of those seats. And do I understand it? Do I want that? Do I have the knowledge and the experience to be the sales leader or just a salesperson? And it's ultimately what's the best for the company. And that when you start to go through and make the seats and then decide who goes in what seats, what we call the the Jim Collins, right person in the right seat, that helps us make the cup make sure the company needs are first and foremost, the expectations of those seats are in place. And that we're putting people in that seat to be successful based on the needs of the company.
[00:25:18:22 - 00:25:28:12]
Rob Taylor
And then that helps us have crystal clear expectations and accountability. When things go bump in the night, we know we got great people, we're going to be able to handle that.
[00:25:29:21 - 00:25:49:22]
Shawn FitzGerald
How do you deal with someone who's been at the company for a long time? They might have been the owner or vital to the success to where we are now, but they can't change, they resist change, they don't know how to change whatever it is, and they're not the right person in the right seat. How do you deal with that? Because to me, that is one of the hardest problems to resolve.
[00:25:49:22 - 00:25:54:01]
Rob Taylor
It can be emotional, it can be, it can be very stressful.
[00:25:55:06 - 00:27:04:23]
Rob Taylor
One of the ways we help teams with that proactively, and this isn't 100% bulletproof, but it's the best we can to help a team indicate what success looks like. So again, we refer to that accountability chart. It looks like an organizational chart, but it has in the seats, not titles, but area of responsibility with the roles. Then we decide who goes in the seats. And the whole point of mission that Shawn is that helps us say what is the right structure look like, the right structure, the right seats, the right roles in the seats look like to get us to the next level in the next six, 12 months. But when we have the right structure for helping us get to where we want to go, and we then put people in a seat where again, they understand it, they get it, they want that seat, they love it even, and they have the skills, the knowledge, the experience, the expertise to do it, we're sending people up to do what they love, they're great at, and it gives them positive energy. That not only energizes the people, but it sets the team up to work even better together.
[00:27:04:23 - 00:27:30:01]
Shawn FitzGerald
What are some tactics so that you're not placing a responsibility on someone who definitely doesn't want it, but it has to be done? So what do you do? Just roll it into a separate job or a separate position of other things? Do you outsource it? I guess what are some things that a company could do so they don't have to saddle an employee with something that they know is going to turn out bad if they push that responsibility on that employee?
[00:27:30:01 - 00:27:55:22]
Rob Taylor
When you have someone who's in a seat at leadership team level that really doesn't want it, what you start to see is quarter to quarter, week to week, you start to see that they're struggling to follow through on commitments. They're not executing well. They're being distracted by things. They're avoiding things. I hate to use the word excuses, but there's always something that gets in the way of them getting something done.
[00:27:57:11 - 00:28:16:13]
Rob Taylor
And when you have an integrator or a manager, leader manager holding that person, having one on one discussions, Fred, how's it going? I'm struggling. How can I help? What do you need from me? What's not working? And if every time is just the same thing, they're not making progress,
[00:28:17:13 - 00:28:30:13]
Rob Taylor
you start to look at it and say, Fred, do you understand what's expected of this role? Yes or no. Sometimes it's the, you know, I really didn't want this. I felt, I felt like I had to do it, but this isn't only what I enjoy.
[00:28:31:17 - 00:28:42:21]
Rob Taylor
Or it's the, you know what, you're asking me to do something that I don't have the skill and knowledge for. And yes, I've got people I can kind of lean on, but you're asking me to do things outside my comfort zone.
[00:28:44:01 - 00:30:52:20]
Rob Taylor
When you realize that, and the ideal is if that's not the right, that person's not in the right seat, they're a great fit for the company. Usually you're looking around saying, do I have another seat that Fred would be better in? And what I've seen is, is when you're able to move Fred from a seat that he or she is not comfortable in, now it's, it's energizing him or her too. And they're successful. To your point of what do we do if it's just not working out? Do we put them someplace else? Sometimes the answer is we can't. I've seen teams make that hard decision and then look back maybe as early as two or three weeks after they've made a person change, where they then onboard somebody who is clearly a rock star, right person, right seat person. And I've heard people say this many times, what took you so long? And that's, that's very painful for a leader to hear. And, you know, the employee sometimes I've heard say, you know, why did you wait so long to, to make a change for me? I knew it wasn't working. And that just usually, that usually shines the light on that, that leader manager of that employee, they really weren't having the conversation they needed to have. As a company grows, sometimes leaders need to let go of things that they've been holding on to that made sense at the time. But, you know, maybe three, five, 10 years later, they need to let go of those things to have the right person doing it. Sometimes we just keep things because it's how we've always done it. And as our organization thrives and grows, we start to need to be looking for how do we increase our own personal capacity. And by letting go of something that's actually weighing us down and giving it to somebody who truly enjoys it, that's creating amazing capacity gains in the organization for me to focus on really the things I should and letting George do what he enjoys. If you can get to the point that 90% of the people are doing majority of what they they're doing is something they enjoy and they're great at, that again is a game changer for a company.
[00:30:52:20 - 00:31:35:03]
Shawn FitzGerald
And isn't that what it's all about? Having that mission that everybody's aligned with, but then making sure that all of the parts, all the people are moving in the most efficient way possible and enjoying it. Because if not, then you're not getting the output, you're not getting the productivity or all those things that can make it great. And life is short. And life is short. Yeah. So spend your time wisely, right? You know, if you could go back and coach your younger self, go back five, 10, 20 years, whatever it is, some distance, but is that one thing that you've learned now that you're like, Oh, if I would have only told myself starting out, anything come to mind?
[00:31:35:03 - 00:33:03:23]
Rob Taylor
Really two things. I didn't realize how much of a visionary person I am. Some visionaries struggle with focus. And that's me. Once I get on something, I have a hard time letting go of it. And I struggled to get things done. Because I just, I'm a bit of a perfectionist. Not all visionaries are like that. But that's, that's one trait of a visionary. My point is, I thought over the years, I was really good at organizing and project management follow through, which I am good at it. But I started to realize that I had this internal struggle going on with being an organized person, but also working until it's perfect, which is usually not possible. If I would have realized what I know now about me, and what I also help owners today and leadership team members understand, if that's us, it's basically understanding myself and then leveraging those strengths and focusing on areas where we're using that strength to where we're best at, versus where it's not. And I know there was things in the past, personally, looking back now, projects and things that saw what held me back in my personal and professional life, because of my visionary tendencies. It's not a bad thing. It's just understanding myself to know when to use that visionary skill and when to tame it down some.
[00:33:03:23 - 00:33:14:10]
Shawn FitzGerald
The last thing that I would ask before we wrap up is, what's that one thing that people who have been listening to us talk through all this could do to start making a change for the better this week?
[00:33:14:10 - 00:33:57:10]
Rob Taylor
Wow, that's a great question. That has lots of tentacles to it. The one thing I would encourage teams to do is find a way, cast and align on a vision, and work the plan. And for us and our lingo, having the weekly level 10 meeting and not only communicate, listen, work out issues, but that ability to make sure numbers are on track, rocks are on track, to-dos are getting to done. Here's the problems of the week. Here's the solve. Here's who owns it. A lot goes into making that successful. But if you can just start with that, that will take a company a long ways.
[00:33:57:10 - 00:34:14:11]
Shawn FitzGerald
Yes, I will absolutely agree because I have seen the before, the L10 in the meetings, and the after. And when it runs well, it's incredible the amount of things that can get done. And it cuts out the noise. So it's wonderful.
[00:34:15:14 - 00:34:27:11]
Shawn FitzGerald
How can people get a hold of you? If they want to reach out to you, have a question, talk to you about any of the things we talked about in further detail, where you at, how can they find you?
[00:34:40:10 - 00:35:12:08]
Rob Taylor
I'll give out my cell phone number because that's what I'm thinking of right off. 641-6600-463. Call me anytime. I'm a help first. Just sit down and listen to anybody who's got a business or with challenges of growing or issues. And I provide tools to get you started. And at some point, it seems like companies that tend to be of a certain size north of 20, that's where they tend to say, "Hey, Rob, we need your help." So I'd be happy to help.
[00:35:12:08 - 00:35:41:16]
Shawn FitzGerald
Great. And if anybody has heard anything in this that they are intrigued about, I would absolutely recommend reaching out to Rob. He's great fun to talk to and has incredible insight and I know can absolutely help your business. So Rob, thanks for taking the time to come over today and dig in a little bit about the vision and the team and making sure we can help get businesses up and running and moving forward. I appreciate your time. Thank you, Shawn, for the opportunity.
[00:35:43:21 - 00:36:54:17]
Shawn FitzGerald
As today's conversation with Rob Taylor comes to a close, I came away reminded that clarity, vision, roles, and responsibilities is often the turning point between a business that's stuck and one that's gaining real momentum. Rob's work with EOS has given him a front row seat to the moments where leadership teams recognize they're not actually aligned or what assumptions about who owns what finally comes to the surface. What resonated deeply with me was the idea that a vision only works when the right people are in the right seats and everyone understands what success looks like in their own role. It's not just about talent or putting in the effort. It's about making sure it's a right fit, that you have the proper ownership and whether you truly get it, whether you want it, and whether you have the capacity to deliver it. And one of the other big takeaways for me is how structure and rhythm create space for real progress. Having an accountability chart that clearly defines each role will give a team the visibility and consistency they need to stay focused and on track. And on a personal level, it's also a chance to ask if I'm in the right seat. Am I doing work that energizes me and plays to my strengths?
[00:36:55:17 - 00:37:09:12]
Shawn FitzGerald
Rob reminded us that having a vision isn't enough. It only works when it's supported, shared, and truly understood by everyone on the team. That's what creates alignment, purpose, and the ability to move a company's vision forward with confidence.
[00:37:10:19 - 00:37:47:17]
Shawn FitzGerald
Thanks for listening to Intentional Change. If today's conversation sparks something within you, I hope you will apply it with purpose in your own business. I'd love to hear how our Intentional Change podcast is helping you make a difference in your business. To drop me a note, visit ReadyToLevelUp.com and click on the Let's Talk button in the top right. To contact Joshua McNary, visit McNaryMarketing.com. And one last thing, don't forget to subscribe and share this show with others in your network. Help us bring Intentional Change to every growing business. Until next time, I'm Shawn FitzGerald. Take care.