My Business On Purpose

For six years Ashley and I coordinated the meeting of a group of young men who met weekly during the school year.  Some weeks there were four, and others there were sixteen.  All between 15 and 18 years of age and all at different stages of maturity.   We walked these young men through a variety of discussions, situations, and scenarios and even adapted a five stage growth pyramid for each to understand where they were at in their level of maturity.   For these young men we relayed the identification of those stages as  Boy Adolescent Man Mentor Patriarch Upon introduction many of the young men in our group presumed that age was the entry point to each stage.  Turn 13 and you become an adolescent.  Turn 18 and you become a man. One astute young man asked a resonating question around our communal fire pit, “at what age do you become a mentor?” It was akin to asking, “at what year do you become an expert in your field?” In 1964 US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart was providing an opinion on the use of obsce

Before English was widely spoken in the far corners of the globe, Latin was the lingua franca for much of the European world from the days of the Roman Empire into the middle centuries. Latin stands at the root of many of our English words and offers us contextual insight into the flavor of our language. Some Latin words proved so powerful in the fullness of their meaning that we simply adopted them without alteration into our common language. Such it is with the financially laced Latin phrase pro forma. With past-centric financial statements like profit and loss and balance sheets, it is helpful to see what-was in the lifecycle of our business.   With the power of subdivided bank accounts and the Level Two Dashboard merging the perspectives of real-time cash, real-time receivables, and real-time payables, it is helpful to see what-is in the current state of our business in real cash. We need the what-could-be picture to help us with a complete past, present, and future snapshot of our business.   The pro for

Listen to Jessica VanBrunt, owner of Van Brunt & Company, as she talks about how she implemented processes, a strong company culture, 12-week plans, and effective meetings to achieve business success. 

“It’s just easier if I do it myself.” “No one does it as good as I do it” “They just don’t care as much as I do.” These are all statements that I have heard you make, and they are all statements that will sabotage your Executive Leadership. The leader could drive the tractor, could fulfill the order, could supervise the build, could execute the transaction, could meet with the client, and could negotiate the material pricing. But the Executive Leader reminds herself that she has “Proximity to motivate a team to pursue the named future you see” The Executive Leader creates proximity.  They receive a phone call from the client and elect not to respond, or to immediately pass it to the trained and capable team member who can respond within the core values. The Executive Leader intentionally withholds their response…even when it is helpful, knowing that their discipline will create an opportunity for their team to get more reps in a crucial part of their business. When an Executive Leader willfully withholds a na

Listen to Thomas Joyner, Director of Coaching, and Brent Whitaker, Business Coach, as they discuss the importance of having a clear mission statement. They talk about the difference between passion and purpose, and how purpose is what drives us forward even when our passions change. They also discuss how a mission statement can guide a business and why it's important to define your own mission instead of letting others define it for you. Ultimately, a well-defined mission statement helps us understand the "why" behind our work and keeps us motivated to push through difficult times. LISTEN HERE to learn more! Are you working IN your business or ON your business? Do you have all of the foundational elements that will liberate you from the business chaos?  Take the assessment to find out which areas you can grow and improve on.  Take our Healthy Owner Business Assessment HERE ➡️ https://www.boproadmap.com/healthy SIGN UP for our Newsletter HERE ➡️ https://www.boproadmap.com/newsletter For blogs and updates, visi

Partnerships are hard.  I’ve heard it said, “the only ship that doesn’t sail is a partnership.” Partnerships sound great in theory, almost a no-brainer structure for a small business.  You get two (or more) minds, two skill sets, and twice the available time that in many cases can lead to an exponential outcome.   You also typically get two visions, two opinions, and divergent expectations. Many partnerships function just enough but don’t thrive. In the hundreds of partnerships that we’ve been exposed to we’ve only seen two that can seriously claim that the business is in far better shape due to the partnership than without.   I met with a startup excavating contractor who laid out his plan for his young business, including the threshold levels that would be achieved in order for a second person to be given 49% of his youthful company.   My first question to this eager and excited business owner was, “is this formally agreed upon and in writing?” “Yes.” He assured me that the friend-soon-to-be-owner would be

For 21 years, Ashley and I raised, led, and parented our daughter.  On a beautiful Friday afternoon in April, I had 56 seconds to walk her down a sweepingly curved walkway of gray pavers under an aged live oak tree into the hands of another man who within a few minutes would become her husband.   My time as her dad did not end in the 5 o’clock hour of that Friday afternoon, but my time as the primary male influence in her life did.   In the months and years leading up to this moment, I felt calm and intentional thinking through where we were trying best to lead our children.  In the hours and days after those 56 seconds, my emotions began stirring in realization of a new reality, and one that can bring a man either to joy or regret. I will relish those 56 seconds.  I remember them.  Those few paver-stabilized steps were clear, and I even remember telling my daughter that we should slow down because I had waited 21 years for this short walk together.   The song being sung in the background was entitled Gratitu

She sent us a voice memo saying, “I don’t see my husband or my kids anymore… money is not the issue, I just don’t have the time…I feel trapped by my business.” This Mom is trying to wear the superhero cape in life and at work and feels she is doing neither very well brewing a mental cocktail of disillusionment about the value and gift of business, while also fueling 100-proof guilt straight from the still of societal expectations. Life and business necessarily intersect and can be of mutual value to each other.   Humans were created as a gift to one another, so to work was created as a means of mimicking small little moments of creation each and every day.  This treatise that I am penning now is a small act of creating something new… a small contribution of work.   This morning I was able to sit with my daughter for a short breakfast a mere five days before she is to marry her fiance.  I cannot hide my family emotion from my work creation, or vice versa.  The space for breakfast was set and crafted long befor

For many, work has become an unavoidable and sustained pot hole along the chaotic highway of our day to day that knocks the alignment from the goal of peace each of us has in life. Beckoning a variety of responses from the menu of emotions available to us throughout the day, we respond to life's potholes with entitlement and exasperation feeling betrayed when we get thrown off track.   We want happiness, when truthfully, we expect a nonlinear annoyance to be the theme of our Monday through Friday. It would serve us well to contemplate a novel concept; happiness is spasmodic, temporary; joy is manufactured and intentional. Canadian psychologist Philip Brickman and American psychologist Donald Campbell coined the aptly named phrase “hedonic treadmill” in the 1980s.  It is the thought that happiness is fleeting, always seeing it in the short jolts by which it comes, and yet always looking for more.  The elation or misery that comes typically returns to a baseline emotion quickly. The happiness we seek in our wor

Ick... that’s what most Owners AND team members think when they hear the dreaded phrase, “Performance Review”. To the Owner, you might as well have said, “Hey, you want to spend loads of hours preparing for an uncomfortable discussion that will be totally worthless?” To the team member, you might as well have said, “Hey, would you like for me to stick a hot poker in your ear?’ Truth is that Performance Reviews are very rarely an actual review of performance and are more often than not a mis-matched reflection of previous work with no clear outcomes nor forward-facing objectives. Are they even necessary? We would like to propose a different type of review... an actual PERFORMANCE REVIEW!!! It’s the same words with a completely different method and purpose. Ultimately, the Owner wants the team member to do what the business needs, to accurately assess the team member and how they are doing relative to what the customer and the business needs them to do in their role and beyond. The team members will want the qu

Multiple Bank Accounts are a nonnegotiable for a growing, thriving business. We've received a lot of pushback on this one, so let's talk about it. Business On Purpose is here to talk financials! Scott Beebe and Thomas Joyner are giving us an overview on subdividing bank accounts, whether or not the "it's so much work for my bookkeeper!" is a good enough excuse, and why P&Ls may not tell you everything you need to know.  If you're wanting peace of mind around your businesses' financials: profitability, "do we have enough for taxes?" and growth planning, you need to listen to this episode!  Are you working IN your business or ON your business? Do you have all of the foundational elements that will liberate you from the business chaos?  Take the assessment to find out which areas you can grow and improve on.  Take our Healthy Owner Business Assessment HERE ➡️ https://www.boproadmap.com/healthy SIGN UP for our Newsletter HERE ➡️ https://www.boproadmap.com/newsletter For blogs and updates, visit our site HERE

The irony of this training is the fact that I am writing the script while flying on a private plane from a secluded island in the Bahamas after spending 3 days spearfishing, eating, and hanging out with friends and clients. That was a moment of privilege. Spending your days with continual electricity is a privilege.     If you are listening to this talk, you have privilege. Privilege is “a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group”.  A more direct definition is to be “exempt from an obligation from which others are subject.”   How do you know if you are in a class of privilege?  Others shoulder a burden you don’t have to shoulder.   It wastes our time to try and determine if we are privileged, and instead to ask “because we have privilege, what does that mean?”  In the barren desert of the middle east, a man hears a message.  “I will bless (privilege) you so that you can be a blessing (offer privilege to others).”   This training is about the so that.   Wh

On the outskirts of Atlanta, we drove past the waterfall, walked through the front doors, and stepped into a world of positivity and smiles.  Each delivered through a well-rehearsed cocktail of sincere stories that provided a peek into why this “chicken business” is a homebase of hope and life-change for so many.  One small business is a powerful, accessible opportunity for so many teenagers and adults to engage in their community, develop relationships, solve problems, earn income, and develop powerful and usable skills.  A collection of aligned small businesses, if well led and obsessively focused on vision, mission, and values, has the opportunity to scale the hope and life-change beyond one or two locations.   This is the opportunity for Chick-Fil-A.   Indeed, their chicken sandwich is remarkable, use of “my pleasure” noticeable, and waffle fries laced with a special serum of deliciousness - and their support of local small business is a Master’s class of intentional scale.   It is not lost on the Support

 Business On Purpose Founder Scott Beebe and Director of Coaching Thomas Joyner talked about the importance of Vision.  Know the answers to the following questions: ➡️ What is vision? ➡️ How does it differ from your mission and values? ➡️ Why is knowing where you're headed important and what does that do for your team? ➡️ Lack of vision from business owners, why does it matter? ➡️ Why do you think it's become cliche or stale and really lack the punch it needs to have? ➡️ Why does having accountability from a source outside of your business important?  ➡️How does it get you where you need to go? WATCH THE VIDEO to learn more! Are you working IN your business or ON your business? Do you have all of the foundational elements that will liberate you from the business chaos?  Take the assessment to find out which areas you can grow and improve on.  Take our Healthy Owner Business Assessment HERE ➡️ https://www.boproadmap.com/healthy SIGN UP for our Newsletter HERE ➡️ https://www.boproadmap.com/newsletter For blogs

An influential teacher was slowly traveling towards his intended destination and along the way would make time to connect in a variety of towns.   As is the case for most teachers, politicians, musicians, and artists of influence, this teacher had supporters… followers. There was one controversial stop along the campaign route where the local population was more hostile to the teachers message.  Argumentative conflict ensued. The supporters immediately asked the teacher's permission to antagonize and put the locals in their place.  The teacher said “no”.  In effect, he censured his supporters. His supporters desperately wanted to control the narrative…to make the locals either like the teacher and the message that they themselves liked, or else they wanted to burn the place down. Instead, the teacher provided a model of having self-control and realizing that it is impossible to mandate conversion to any sort of message.   Labor to control others and you will either get blind subjects or chaotic revolt. Live u

We recently hosted an online Masterclass on how to build your entire business on one sheet of paper. Near the end of the Masterclass, a business owner lobbed this question into the chat window, “How do you ensure, your processes aren't stolen and replicated by employees who leave?” The short answer is, “you don’t.” Owning a business is risky, leading people is risky, serving customers and clients is risky, and bringing your product and service into an open market is risky. What are some things you can do to ensure that others don’t “steal” your proprietary process? First, legally it is always good to have each employee sign an employee agreement that has been drafted by a legal professional. Within that agreement, there can be language and clause that reflects the desire to maintain “trade secrets" and proprietary process.   Some would say that the agreement is as valuable as the paper it’s written on.  Maybe, however, you would rather have that signed in the rare case it would need to be referenced.   Second

“Nobody wants to work anymore”...the problem is that has been said for well over 100 years now! I saw a headline all the way back to 1894 declaring that “nobody wants to work anymore”.  This is not a new problem.  If we’re not careful, our negativity will breed a culture where work is seen as… Cursed A means to an end  As a lifeless 9 to 5, tryin’ to make a livin’  Hallucinating that it’s 5 o’clock somewhere Something to “take and shove it” Just another Manic Monday  Work is deeper than that, more powerful than that Work is an opportunity… Proverbs 12:11 - “A hard worker has plenty of food, but a person who chases fantasies has no sense.” We say, “nobody wants to work anymore!”...when in reality they just don’t want to work for you because you are grumpy! Instead, we need to build  A CULTURE WHERE PEOPLE DO WISH TO DO HARD THINGS! There will always be a mountain to climb in building a culture of intentionality within your business.   Business is hard…running a business is even harder.   Let’

It was five days since I had called to check in on a contractor owner with no response.   Finally, hoping everything was ok, I texted another check in, to his simple reply, “Honestly, when I said I work all the time I wasn't embellishing the truth. I just wrapped up another long day and headed home now.”   That was on a Sunday night for a business that shouldn’t have much to do on the weekend. For too many business owners, the harsh reality is that the business is owning them and it may be time to sell.   There are three helpful filters to flush a decision through when timing a potential sale of your business. First, do you have a desire? Desire cedes ground to opportunity that has lured many business owners down the path of “profitable distractions” - where the potential of profit distracts from what the owner desires.   Ownership is hard, and owners must have a continued desire to own and lead the business in a way that others desire to follow.   Second, are you at a relational impasse? Many owners are lead

"Recruiting And Hiring: The 4 Systems Every Homebuilder And Remodeler Owner Needs To Build The Right People That Builds The Right Business" Thursday, February 2, 2023 Austin Build Expo by Thomas Joyner Director of Coaching Business on Purpose People, people, people! How do we find the right people to hire? How do we find ANY people to hire? The Boomers retired early, and the emerging generations are much more selective in the work they choose. How can you find the right people, recruit them the right way, share the right vision, and then onboard them the right way that aligns with the right mission? This life-changing and engaging 45-minute talk pulls from our work with hundreds of contractor owners that led to our proprietary and proven roadmap. This roadmap will equip you to beat chaos with predictability and to build the team that will build the business to make time for what matters most.

"How Homebuilding and Remodeling Owners Attract The RIGHT People Like a Division 1 College Football Powerhouse" National Association of Home Builders- International Builders' Show 2023- Las Vegas, NV Wednesday, February 1, 2023 by Scott Beebe Founder | Headcoach Business On Purpose As a Division 1 Football player in the powerful Southeastern Conference (SEC), Scott has seen firsthand the behind-the-scenes system that is being constantly updated and refined to ensure that athletically talented 16 and 17 adolescents choose the right team. Remodeler and home builder owners are in a season of work where they have a choice: see the next generation as a hindrance with excuses like “they won’t work” or see this new generation as an opportunity to pivot with a renewed mindset like “I’m excited to see how they own the mission!” There is a shortage of workers for the old-school methodologies, but there is no shortage of people willing to work… toward the right mission. However, chaos creeps in, and owners feel they spe