Description:
Building a great business is a marathon, not a sprint. Without the commitment of time and effort, you will start and stop in short order. Nick talks about the moment when he began to think of building a great business and the journey to beginning that marathon.
Transcript:
00:01 Nick Bonadies: Hey, how are you? It’s Nick Bonadies here.
00:03 NB: Recently, I had a mentor of mine that challenged me within my business. He knows all the inner workings of my business, everything behind the scenes and behind the veil, I guess you could say. And basically what he asked me was this, he phrased it in this way, he said, “Listen,” he said, “You have a really good company.” He said, “You’ve got happy clients, good culture, happy employees, good processes and procedures.”
00:27 NB: But his question was this, he said, “When are you gonna become a great company and get away from being a good company?” And it was a good question. The first thing that came to my mind was the book Good to Great from Jim Collins, really good book, by the way, I’ve read it several times, but we ended the conversation with him saying, “Hey, think about it and get back to me.” Okay, no problem, I can do that.
00:46 NB: Well, I thought about it for a few weeks and I pondered a lot of different things in my mind, and the one thing that came to my mind was, well, I got the company to this point with what I know. I don’t necessarily know how to get us to a great company.
00:57 NB: So I went back to him and I said, “You know, I’m ready to do that. Can you help me?” He’s done this many times before, and he said, “You’re not ready for it.” He said, “You’re not committing.” And I said, “Well, what do you mean?” He said, “For example,” he said, “A lot of people want to lose weight,” and he said, “They think about it.” He said, “They even say, I’m going on a diet, I’m gonna eat properly, I’m getting rid of sugars or whatever it might be,” and he said, “But you know what?” He said, “They never actually lose the weight because they never made the commitment and they never actually moved forward to do that.”
01:26 NB: So he said, “You need to go back and think about it. And then, until you’re ready,” he said, “I can’t help you.” So I went back and I thought about it a little bit more. And here’s what came to my mind. Years ago, I was doing a lot of running and I decided… When I say a lot, at the time I wasn’t doing a lot, I just started to kinda do a lot. And I started thinking, I was running about three miles or so and I’d decided I was gonna run a marathon. I’d never run one before in my life. Well, I thought about it for a little bit, and finally I committed in my mind, and boom, that was it. I figured out how to run a marathon and I did well at it and loved it, and I ran a lot of them. And then, from there, it’s history.
02:00 NB: Well, it’s the same thing in business, I found. What happened was until I made that decision, “Hey, we are going to have a great company. Come hell or high water, there’s nothing that’s gonna stop us and I’ll figure out how to do it. If I have to read, whether I have to find mentors, whether I have to go to seminars, whether I just have to step back and reflect within or whatever that looks like,” once I committed to have a great company, it’s amazing the things that have changed within our company. Little tweaks here and there, and then some big tweaks as well. So my recommendation is if you have a really good company and you’re considering being a great company, you have got to commit and make that decision to become a great company before it will ever happen.
02:40 NB: When you make that decision, just like somebody that decides, “Hey, I’m gonna lose weight.” Maybe they need to lose 100 pounds, great. I’m gonna make the decision to lose 100 pounds. Talking about it and thinking about it is not it. Action and determination, and that decision to do it is what actually makes that person do it. They’ll figure out how to lose the weight in their mind once it’s done, so same concept within business. It’s amazing over the last several months what’s actually happened within our business. I’m excited to say that we are on the track to becoming a great company.
03:11 NB: I just thought I’d share that with you, because I never thought about it that way before. But it’s made a huge difference within my business, I think it may make a huge difference within your business, so hope that helps. Once again, Nick Bonadies, and thank you for listening.
