This week we have Monte Wyatt on the podcast to talk about choosing a culture to create and refine during work from home. Monte goes into details about how to do this well. From making consistent efforts to having one on ones to engaging your team through virtual team building. Monte recently also wrote a book titled Pulling Profits out of a Hat. He talks a bit more about the book and what inspired him to write it.


Find Monte on his website!

Full transcription below: (may contain typos)

[00:00:00] Monte: [00:00:00] That, that's a fabulous question because. Leaders of business needs to need to coach their team on how to work through mentally this aspect of it.

And when I say mentally it's getting people to share what's concerning them and too many times managers, business leaders, whatever they. They don't have time for that. We have to make time for what are your concerns right now? And how can I help you through that? That's a big piece of leadership. 

Keerstyn: [00:00:29] hi Monte. Welcome to the podcast.

We are so excited to have you here today to learn a bit more. Bit more about what you do and how you got involved in the work. Do you want us, or do you want to give us a little bit of a brief bio intro of how you got involved in your work and what you do 

Monte: [00:00:45] now? Sure. I'm a farm boy from Iowa, my dad and my brothers still farm corn soybeans and hogs.

And I actually went to Iowa state and studied agricultural business. And I spent 14 years in agricultural [00:01:00] industry in different positions from sales, training, sales management, marketing management lived in five, six places around the country. The downside of all that is I traveled most of my time.

So in 2004, I said that was enough. And because of my career path that I had in that organization, and some of my ambitions, I chose to be a, an executive leadership coach back in 2004. And so the last 16 years have been focused on helping CEOs and executives, teams bring clarity to how they lead and manage their organizations.

And  focus on helping them to think differently, act differently and create greater discipline in their organizations. So how about that as a start? That 

Keerstyn: [00:01:46] sounds great. So the first question I have for you are when your clients come to you, obviously they have a few problems. What are those problems that they're experiencing?

There may be more than one. Do you want to just explain a few of those [00:02:00] and those pain points that they're struggling with? 

Monte: [00:02:02] Sure. I've, I'll give a couple of examples of clients. I had one that I'll give a couple here. One is they approached me and said, do you help with customer service?

And I said, absolutely, of course. And so I sat down with the CEO and the executive team and dug a little bit deeper into what they were thinking around customer service. And it was actually. It's really much deeper than customer service. And  became about their culture. It became about do they have goal setting?

It came about that they've been stagnant in their growth. And so it was a number of things, but they saw it as a surface issue of customer service. And we found a number of ways that we're going to improve that another client They were getting ready to transition the company.

One gentlemen was going to retire as he was leading the company. And another gentleman was moving into that chair. And so they wanted a clear strategy. And so a lot of what I do is I help people create their strategy and [00:03:00] help them implement it. But the strategy encompasses their people side. It encompasses who we are, where we're going and how we will succeed.

Keerstyn: [00:03:10] Yeah, absolutely. So during this COVID-19 thing, what has, is Ben, some of those issues, I guess we could call them that they have experienced to transition to this new, normal, so to speak. And how have you successfully done that? 

Monte: [00:03:27] Think every business on the planet is in this place right now where they have to reevaluate their strategy.

And what I mean by that is, what are the products and services that we're offering? And who is the core customer, especially as we're coming out of this and opening up the world. We really have to be more specific on who do we want to be talking to? Who do we want to be interacting with?

And so that we are focused and who is the right audience that want our products or need our products at this point in time. So I'm [00:04:00] focusing every one of my clients and even prospects to, to really rethink what is our strategy of how we're going to win. Because that includes our services or products or core customer and how will we fulfill it?

Because we have to think differently on how we're fulfilling  our products and services. It may be more remotely. It may be more carefully. However, we need to look at that. So it's a really rethinking everything in this new world. 

Keerstyn: [00:04:27] Yeah, absolutely. And then in terms of that employee engagement side too, is what have you been doing in that realm to really engage those employees?

Get them on a new level of engagement too, because I'm sure that many of them are not used to working from home or being so technologically 

Monte: [00:04:45] involved. Yeah, that is an interesting thing. And every business is so different when it comes to the team. But what I'm focusing on again is what is the culture that we're choosing to create through this?

And when I say culture, we choose it [00:05:00] and then we have to change our behaviors to try to really implement it. Right now, communication is probably the biggest thing that every business needs to focus on. Not just communication of how should we be wearing the mask and how do we interact with other people, but communication on what we're doing as a company to ensure that we are sustainable longterm.

And that is communication is so powerful right now in some organizations that's the big challenge for them. And it really doesn't take that much. It just takes some thinking and some some consistency that, that needs to be done regarding communication. So I think that's a big one, but I also believe that.

A company needs to help the employees understand that we care about them during this time. And if a company isn't showing that we care about them and their safety and their health, we're making decisions based on that. That's good. And I impact engagement and let them share their [00:06:00] frustrations.

That doesn't mean their frustrations are wrong. And that doesn't mean they're right, but people need and want to be heard and then we can take their inputs and see how does that help us continue to grow in how we interact and communicate. So I think that's a big part of his listening, communication, communicating, and showing that we care, especially right now.

Yeah, 

Keerstyn: [00:06:24] absolutely. So that almost goes into coaching to coaching your team. Not necessarily you, you are coaching because you are a business coach, but also then helping your, the teams understand how to coach, what have you been doing in that realm? 

Monte: [00:06:39] That, that's a fabulous question because. Leaders of business needs to need to coach their team on how to work through mentally this aspect of it.

And when I say mentally it's getting people to share what's concerning them and too many times managers, business leaders, whatever they. They [00:07:00] don't have time for that. We have to make time for what are your concerns right now? And how can I help you through that? That's a big piece of leadership.

That's a big piece of coaching others to share. And then now that you've shared that, what can we do about it? What what can. You act on mr. Employee, what can you do that you control? Because we, as business leaders, can't take everything on our shoulders. We have to help our team take ownership to some things.

And that's what the real coaching is about. 

Keerstyn: [00:07:30] Yeah, absolutely. I love that. And I love the fact that you said that it's not just on the manager to be in control of that. It's also the employee and being able to take responsibility for that. And then also the manager asking the hard questions and listening instead of just simply.

Here's what you have to do. Here's X, Y, and Z plan. It's them formulating a plan so that they are successful in the 

Monte: [00:07:54] process. Absolutely. Yeah, 

Keerstyn: [00:07:57] absolutely. So I wanted to [00:08:00] jump into a little bit about your book as well. Can we? Yeah, sure. Awesome. So do you want it, tell us a little bit about the book. Give us a brief overview of what it's about, and we can ask a few more questions about that as 

Monte: [00:08:13] well.

Okay. It's interesting. This book is really a culmination of the last 10 years of working with executives, CEOs, their leadership teams, and it's recognizing the discipline that organizations need to have. Now you think about discipline, you think of a person first, what is the discipline that an individual have?

And. To really get an organizational focus of growing the business and revenue and profit and engagement. We need to have organizational discipline. And that's what this book is about. It talks about five disciplines that organizations need to instill to make sure that they create a great business.

And I'm going to define [00:09:00] a great business maybe differently than a lot of people have thought about it. I define a great business as one that sustainable, predictable. Stable consistent and has an emotional connection. Now sustainable means that it's here a long time. The business should outlast everybody.

That's in it. If we're building it correctly, it's predictable. We're doing the right actions so that when we know we do a, B or C, we get more customers. We get a returning customers. It's stable because we have high retention of our team members. We're training them. We're teaching them. We're. Getting great engagement.

It gets consistent. So no matter internally or externally, when something happens, we know what to expect because we have the right processes and we manage the organization and that emotional connection. That's about who we are, what we believe in and how we make an impact on the world. And each [00:10:00] of the five disciplines really drive home some actions to fulfill that definition of a great business. 

Keerstyn: [00:10:09] Yeah, that's awesome. I love that. So how so say I'm a business owner and I want to go through those five steps. What are some of those actionable advice that you would give to these business owners?

Monte: [00:10:23] For example, and I mentioned strategy earlier, and so I'll touch on it. Their strategy is one of the five disciplines. And when you have a discipline of strategy there's a number of components. One of the components in clear on what is our opportunity in the marketplace. Meaning, what is the need or want in the market that we are going to fill.

And so that is defining our strategy of how we're going to win by going after that opportunity. Another piece of strategy is how are we scalable [00:11:00] and what I mean by scalable. If we were to grow to a, another market, another geography, another country can we. Pick up what we have here and move it there because we have the systems, the processes, we have to learn how to be scalable in a business.

And for example, I've got a client when we started, they were in two States. Now they're in nine States because we created systems and processes that we could duplicate the business into another geography. And yeah. It is very much a global business today, no matter what you're in, it's a global opportunity.

And so thinking through your strategy of scalability, who is the opportunity and how can we make that fulfilled. By defining that, that stuff to be defining how we're going to win. So that's strategy. And I'm going to say that most organizations that is a big gap is not being clear. We're going after today's revenue and profit, which [00:12:00] we got to have, but we have to think about it.

How do we make this business sustainable? Real CEOs and executive teams need to focus on sustainability. 

Keerstyn: [00:12:09] Yeah, absolutely. So a few things that went through my head while you were saying that is moving the business from one spot to the other. And how is that sustainable? What would you say to people who might be moving out of state?

And there are just different culture things, or maybe it's even out of the country. And they're dealing with a few different culture things, and they're a little bit concerned that this might not necessarily be sustainable, say in a different country, different 

Monte: [00:12:34] States. And that goes back to the question, what is the opportunity the want or need that we are filling in the marketplace.

And if you are going to duplicate into another state or another country, you do have to do a little market research. You have to understand that marketplace and is that opportunity that we're going to fill. In geography. [00:13:00] One is that opportunity still valid in opera, in that geography number two. And that's the critical thing is we have to understand our markets probably better than ever today, because it is such a global, a world that we live in.

We have to be knowledgeable. We have to understand those markets. Not only to make the best decisions, but maybe one geography has a different approach than a different, another geography, but, or backbone of how we do things is the same. But we have a slightly different approach based on the water.

Yeah, 

Keerstyn: [00:13:34] absolutely. I love that. That's awesome. And I'm so glad that you went through those five things. That's. That's very helpful to understand the book and how it walks through. Does it walk through in those five ways? So sustainable, stable, predictable, consistent, and then emotional appeal. Does it go straight through those or does it leap around 

Monte: [00:13:53] throughout the book?

I wrote the book as more of a resource guide. So the five [00:14:00] disciplines are actually strategy, business development, people, execution and mission. And so there is a segment on each of those five disciplines that, again, Support that definition of a great business, but it gives specific actions on each, a process on each to follow.

So to create organizational discipline. And like I said, it's more of a resource guide. So if you're working on something for marketing, you pull up the marketing and the. Business development area. So it's a very powerful message. And  the titles pulling profits out of a hat.

So there's a little magic theme in it. And the reason I went down that path of magic is. Too many people in the world, success looks like magic because the world doesn't see all the hard work that went in or the hours of pain that went into it. And the magic side of it is, Hey, we need to do that.

Have that discipline every day. So it does look like [00:15:00] magic to our customers that no matter who they interact with, this is the kind of response we will have no matter what happens in the marketplace, we respond to this way and it looks like magic to them, but we have the discipline to ensure that it's it gets done.

Keerstyn: [00:15:18] That's awesome. I love that. That's such a great tech and such a great poll throughout the entire book. That's awesome. That's awesome. Cool. We will definitely put that the title in the show notes for people to be able to access your book. Can you just buy it off Amazon then? 

Monte: [00:15:34] You can get it at any one of your favorite bookstores.

It's on Amazon. It's been an airports it's Barnes and noble and every place to buy a book. It's an audio book it's in e-book and so just some powerful things too. It's everywhere because it is something that every organization really needs to think about. 

Keerstyn: [00:15:54] Yeah, absolutely.

And then Monte, if anyone wants to get in contact with you about potentially working with [00:16:00] you as a coach or just having a conversation with you, how can they access you? 

Monte: [00:16:04] You bet, a couple of different ways you can go to Monte wyatt.com, M O N T E w Y a T t.com or add zeroes now.com. And in both places, you can learn how we help our clients and at add zeros.

Now you'll actually see our global team. We have a global team of facilitators that help businesses go through and implement these disciplines. So we're our objective is to really. Give executive teams the tools to think differently and act differently in today's world. And that's what our facilitators do.

Keerstyn: [00:16:41] Awesome. Awesome. Do you have any final parting words for our audience? 

Monte: [00:16:46] Want to say this, that the, I believe the world today needs leadership and management more than ever, and they are two different things. Leadership is creating passionate and focused team members [00:17:00] and management is creating competent and productive team members.

And  just because you're in a management role does not mean you're a good leader and leadership is not about position. It's about title and it's about action. So I just want to stress that leadership and management is needed more than ever. And there's some great tools in the book but some great tools of we, we need both areas today that we have to be intentional about to support our business, to support our team.

Keerstyn: [00:17:29] Yeah. Awesome. Thank you for that reminder. That is so important. I agree that it's so important to have leaders and managers in the workforce, not just one or the other. Awesome. Thank you so much for joining us Monte. This was fun. 

Monte: [00:17:41] You are welcome. I appreciate the opportunity.