Ever wondered about the dynamics of your team and how its structure could be hindering your business’ growth? With a focus on loyalty’s impact on business, we’ll delve into a real-life case study of a business where an over-loyal team member was an obstacle to growth and development.

You’ll discover how the GWC framework can help assess your team’s skills and motivation. We’ll also unravel how this information can pinpoint organizational needs and address any misalignment. And as a cherry on top, I’ll let you in on a personal story that will illuminate how to make the tough decisions that can set your business on the path to success.

In this episode you’ll hear:

• The impact of loyalty on business
• Real-life case study of an over-loyal team member hindering your business’ growth.
• Exploring team dynamics and their impact on business.
• Introducing the GWC framework for assessing team skills and motivation.
• Using the framework to pinpoint organizational needs and address misalignment.

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• Rick’s website
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• Full episodes of The Art of Online Business Podcast on YouTube

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Timestamps:

02:15 — Rick shares a personal story about loyalty and how it can hinder progress in business
07:15 — Challenges of addressing performance issues and resistance to role changes
13:36 — Importance of aligning roles and responsibilities with the vision of the business
22:36 — Increasingly common occurrence in mature businesses
22:46 — Conclusion: Process for handling the situation effectively

Please support the podcast by giving an honest Rating/Review for the show on iTunes!

Welcome to the show, my friends, Rick here for this quick tip Friday episode. Quajo is off on this episode here today. We’re gonna be talking about loyalty. Specifically, is loyalty holding you back? And I want to start this episode with a little bit of a story, a little bit of a personal story. It’s actually very personal.

So back in 2006, I believe it was, I started dating this girl and ended up getting engaged to her in, I don’t know, after like a year and a half or something like that. And let’s face it, I knew it wasn’t right, but I kept telling myself. Things would turn around and get better. I had this loyalty to this person that essentially made me ignorant to how poorly I was being treated.

And then one day, I want to say it was… The end of 2007, towards the end of 2007, maybe it was the fall of 2007, I was in the Charlotte airport, and I don’t remember what I was doing down there, I think I was connecting, but, uh, I was in the Charlotte airport, ready to fly back to LA, and so, a six hour flight ahead of me, and I was on the phone with my then fiancé, and She was on a trip herself on that conversation.

It comes out that she cheated on me and that was finally finally the kick in the face wake up call that I needed to end things and I got to tell you that was the longest East Coast to West Coast flight I’ve ever taken. So anyway, that was the wake up call right to to end things and things did end. And for a long time after that, I was really angry with myself for not seeing the signs sooner.

Like I said, like, I knew things didn’t feel right, but because of this loyalty that I had to this person, and yes, I had asked her to marry me and everything, I was ignorant to all the different signs. I didn’t allow myself to see those. And it wasn’t until I processed… All of that anger and so forth later on that I became super thankful that she cheated on me because if that didn’t happen, I would have gone through with it and I never would have met my wife, Amy, and we wouldn’t have had my daughter, et cetera, and just had this, you know, the amazing life that we have.

So this is the whole everything happens for a reason, right? So with that in mind, let’s shift gears a minute and talk about loyalty in a different light when it comes to your business. And in some cases for, for many of you, it might even feel like a marriage, what I’m about to share with you. So there’s a direct correlation here.

One thing I’ve been noticing more and more of as I talk to business owners is that there is this loyalty to a key member of their team. Usually it’s someone. At the leadership level, somebody who is responsible for a key part of the business and the loyalty comes from usually comes from they’ve been with the business for a long time, or they are friends.

And, you know, and they’re working in the business and I’m going to share an actual example of this, not, you know, specific names or business or anything like that, uh, from about a year and a half ago. But what I see happening is, you know, this key member of the team, something’s going on. They’re not really performing.

To the expectations of whatever role that they’re in and again, this is something I’ve seen on more than one occasion is that that key member wants to add additional responsibility to what they’re already doing, even though what they’re already doing, maybe suffering a little bit. But let’s just say they’ve already kind of taken that additional role on for whatever reason and that additional responsibility that they want to take on or that they already have taken on is way outside of their wheelhouse.

They’re simply not good at it. You know, whatever they’ve. Additionally taken on, they’re not good at it. And because they’re not good at whatever they’ve added to their plate, they’re actually holding the business’s growth back. And oftentimes we, as the CEO can see what’s happening, but because of this sort of oblivious loyalty, we tend to brush it off, right?

Because there’s this loyalty to this person. And, you know, we never want to do anything to rock the boat with them, right? So what happens is we make excuses for them. So then something happens, right? Something falls through the crack and cracks and it’s not good, whatever that might be. And that necessitates a discussion with this person, right?

Because results aren’t being hit. And so there’s a discussion. There’s talk about that person’s role and your desire as the CEO to get them back to what they’re best at, to the role that they’ve been in, which is their expertise. But what happens is the person digs their heels in. And is super resistant to it all because they feel like they have a seniority in the business, right?

And have earned the right essentially to take on whatever it is that they’ve added to their plate. And so here’s an example of this. And again, this is about probably about a little over a year ago, large business. I started working with, uh, this business and. The first call I had with them was the CEO and then their right hand person.

And I don’t remember exactly what the right hand person was doing. I think it was in some form of marketing role. I forget. But one of the first things that I said to the CEO is with the size of the business and where you want to take it. This is the type of example where I think a, you know, a director of operations or a COO or an integrator, you know, whatever you want to call it is, is needed.

It would be really beneficial. For someone to be running the day to day of the business, running the team, ensuring that all the different departments in the business are doing what they’re supposed to. And so the right hand person kept saying like, Oh, this is something that that I do. This is something that I already do.

So here’s the example I did share with you. They’re already doing something in their expertise. And again, it was something in the marketing realm, but they were also managing some people that were outside of their marketing scope. And things were falling through the crack, right? Because the integrator is the how person you as the CEO, I’ve talked about this a lot of the podcast you as the CEO are the what and the why person you say what you want to happen based on, you know, the vision of the business and where you’re going and the why, why is it important?

This is the context of, you know, why you want. You know, whatever you want to start a podcast or start a whatever it is, right? There’s a why and where that fits in so that the team understands. And then it’s the integrators responsibility or the OBM or the operations person, whatever you want to call it, it’s their responsibility to make sure that it happens.

They’re the, how not necessarily them doing it specifically themselves, but they’re ensuring that it’s getting done. They’re owning. That result of said project getting done. And so there’s a lot more to it than just, you know, running the day to day. Like the integrator role is, is quite expansive. And so this right hand person was saying, Oh, Oh, this is what I do.

And I’m like, well, wait a minute. You know, aren’t you, you just said that you’re in the marketing role. But, you know, now you’re saying like, Oh, you’re doing this already. And this is over zoom as we’re doing this call. And I’m looking at the CEO and they’re just kind of sitting back and not saying anything.

I could tell immediately that this set up in the business is not going to work. Is not going to take the business to the next level that the CEO wants to get to. And so the, in the next phone call. It was just the CEO and I. The first thing I said, look, your right hand person is not the person to run the day to day of this business, even though they want to, even though they say that they’re already doing it, this is not the person to take you to the next level where you want to get to because they’d already shared.

You know, their goals and stuff with me and, and all that. And the CEO is very resistant because of this loyalty they had to this person. They, you know, like it was sort of like this person was untouchable, the right hand person, and it was holding the business back, unfortunately, it’s still the case.

Because there is this loyalty to the right hand person who there’s, you know, a history there and they’ve been with the team and the business for a long time. And so, you know, they’re super resistant to any kind of change. They said on that first call, I don’t want somebody above me. And that’s interesting, you know, so that’s where sort of a, you know, that seniority start to take over and they feel like they’ve earned the right to sort of call the shots, if you will.

And if that’s the position that they’re in, that’s one thing, but that wasn’t the deal that this role that this person was in, it’s not what they were. It didn’t align. Okay. And so I share this example, you know, very broadly, very, very high level. But again, I see this quite a bit and it’s this sort of ignorant loyalty, if you will.

And there’s no like no judgment here. But I, I, I, I wanted to share this episode with you because I want you to have your eyes open when Or if you start to see this sort of thing, or if you have that person in your business that has been with you for a long time, or you’ve become really good friends with.

Which is great, but if their responsibilities or what have it with their results are slipping or they think that they can do this other larger role than they’re already doing, but it’s not in their wheelhouse that is going to hold your business back. So if this is happening to you or when this happens.

We, as the CEO have a choice, right? We can let the loyalty that we have to this person win out and it will affect your business. And I can say that really confidently because again, I’ve seen it time and time again. And it’s, it’s one of those unfortunate things that like, I know I can see what’s holding the business back, but there’s this such a reluctance to make a change because of this loyalty.

Please don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying to like stop being friends with this person or anything. It’s going to make more sense here in just a second. Okay, I’m not saying that at all. So the other choice is we can have the tough conversations as the CEO. We can have these tough conversations about what’s best for the business.

And if something like this is happening, I like to use the EOS system. That is the entrepreneurial operating system that’s outlined in the book traction by Gino Wichman. And specifically in this case that we’re talking about here today, he talks about the people analysis. Within the EOS framework. And so within the people part, there’s a bunch of different parts to it, but within it, one of the things within the people part is the accountability chart.

Right. It’s kind of like your org chart, but it’s sort of, you know, org chart, uh, 2. 0, if you will, where it is an org chart, but it clearly maps out the, the account that the core responsibilities and the accountabilities for each role. And the idea is to be reviewing it. To ensure that there’s alignment with the person in that specific role.

You know, you’ve heard the whole Jim Collins, good to great, right? People, right seats. This is the same thing. So are the right people in the right places? One exercise I like to do with many of the people. So I I’m doing one on one coaching now, and I’m no longer. Um, accepting people into the accelerator coaching program.

I’m doing one on one coaching. I’m doing five spots. Three of them are already filled. It’s month to month. Stay in as long or short as you want. if you’re interested in that should be an email, Rick at Rick Mulready. com and we can see if there’s a fit, but anyway, one of the exercises I had people do is like, look, if you don’t already have an org chart.

I want you to, or even if you do have an org chart, I want you to create your org chart with wiping everybody’s name off of the org chart. I’m not saying fire. I’m just saying for this exercise, wipe everybody’s name away. What are the roles that you want in the business? That will align to accomplishing the vision that you have for the business.

And once you have the roles, okay, what are the responsibilities and who is this role accountable to? It’s a very different exercise when we remove, you know, people like, oh, I don’t know, whatever. Rhonda is in this role or Jane’s over here or. Tom is over in this role. We remove the people’s names and now we just go by role.

And then, you know, what are the core accountability and responsibilities for each of these roles? Again, we’re getting to that, you know, right people, right seat sort of thing. So there’s the accountability chart. Then also in the people part of EOS, there is the, they call it the GWC, right? The get it, want it capacity to do it.

And this is where. You’re sort of rating people on your team based on their skill level, their willingness and motivation to do the role. And then also do they have the capacity to do it capacity? Meaning like if this is a 40 hour, a week role or what have you, and they only have 20 hours to devote to the business.

Well, they don’t have the capacity to do for this specific role. Okay. And so what this exercise does is it helps identify. Needs for specific people from a developmental standpoint, right? Like, okay, this person doesn’t really want it. Okay. Well, let’s look into that. Do they not want it because they don’t like the role that they’re in?

Do they not want it because they’re, you know, unhappy with the business or the mission or whatever it might be? Maybe they have something going on at home, whatever it might be. This sort of exercise allows you to dive into that and start to identify things, give you data. And then there is the, what they call the three step process for the misalignment, if you will, if somebody is in the wrong seat on your team.

Then there’s a process to address it, right? According to this EOS framework is basically tell them, tell the person you want to address whatever’s going on, show them what is the right way to do it. Not right way to do it because there’s never a right way to do it, but show them what the result is that they’re responsible for.

And then if necessary, move them to a different role or maybe out of the business or what have you. And so there’s this framework. And in addition is asking yourself three really important questions, right? And I actually kind of touched on them already. Number one, is this current structure of your business, the right structure?

To get you to the next level is the current structure, the right structure to get you to the next level. Number two is everybody in the right seats, right? So once you’ve done that accountability chart, then you start to put the people in that you currently have, and you might find, Oh, you know, Rhonda’s over here doing this in fulfillment.

Wow. She’s really good at. Marketing or what have you, okay? And then lastly, does everybody have enough time? Do they have enough time to own the results of the role that they’re currently in? Okay. So now going back to this person in the business that, that you have this loyalty to, and if results are not being hit by that person between that, and now you have EOS analysis, like I just took you through.

You get to make at this point, a hopefully unbiased business decision. And remember, nothing is personal. It’s just a business decision. Now, and again, I’m not saying fire this person or anything like that, but I, what I am saying is you might have to make a tough decision to support what’s best for your business.

And this is going to necessitate going beyond this loyalty that you have to this person. And again, making decisions that are best for the business, not going to lie, it’s not easy to do, and it’s going to take these tough conversations and you have to remember, and I’ve talked about it here in the podcast before, it’s a business decision.

It’s always the business needs, right? And it’s nothing personal. I know another business that in the past year, there was a sort of a falling out in a role and it wasn’t this sort of ignorant loyalty or anything like that. It was more of like the CEO had a really good relationship with this person. Uh, friends with this person, but things for whatever reason, I don’t remember the exact details didn’t work out in the business and the person had been with the business for, you know, several years and they were able to have a friendship.

It was kind of rocky rate at first, but like, you know, the friendship was what’s most important. And today they’re really good friends and they talk all the time. It just didn’t work out within the business. And so this scenario that I’ve shared with you today and kind of walked you through might seemed super far fetched, or you might be thinking like, Rick, this would never happen to me.

As I’ve been mentioning here, unfortunately, this is becoming all too common, especially I’m seeing this most often in and

doing quite well. That’s generally when I see this happening. And so just keep your eyes open for it, right? And you’ve got a process now that I’ve just taken you through in this episode to follow if this does start to creep up in your business, you can confidently handle it now. Cool? All right, my friends.

Thanks so much for tuning in today. I appreciate you. We’ll see you right back here for the next episode here of the Art of Online Business podcast.