Jody Holland (00:01.32)
Hey guys, Jody Holland here with Megan Slaughter, Malia Grigsby, and Mike Grigsby on the Become the Leader podcast. And we're going to be talking about a really important topic today. We're going to be talking about the mid-year check-in and how you continue your momentum and your improvement. So I'm going to kick it over to Megan. This was her idea. So kick us off.
Meghan Slaughter (00:21.443)
Just think back to at the beginning of the year, you're setting your goals and you're laying out a plan for the year, but sometimes we just forget about it. You know, we set this milestone checklist, and then we never actually make sure that we're on track for achieving our goals. And I think the middle of the year is an interesting time because summer vacations are happening, you're taking a break, you have all of these holidays, you're spending time with family.
Mike Grigsby (00:45.912)
So we'll
Meghan Slaughter (00:48.045)
And you get really bogged down and you start losing your momentum and it can become really difficult to get back on track. And so as an organization, I think this mid-year checkpoint is really important because you can see what you've done so far in accomplishing your goals for the year and what you have ahead of you. And sometimes we need to reevaluate what our goals are and come up with new priorities. And sometimes we just need to refocus on things that we had been working on.
And we've kind of forgotten about. So it's just a time where you're recentering your priorities and working as a team to figure out what needs to be done in these next months so that we can achieve what we set out to accomplish for the entire year.
Jody Holland (01:34.396)
Yeah, Mike, you've been through a lot of the Geno Wickman stuff with traction and and going through that whole how do you create that entrepreneurial operating system? This sounds a lot like what Wickman describes in some of his work. Traction's the one that I've read. I know he's written several other books, I just haven't read the other ones yet. So
Mike Grigsby (01:52.16)
Yeah. Yeah. If you take if you take a macro view of what I'll just call the the EOS framework, the entrepreneurial operating system framework, the ability or or the the I guess the the goal of breaking the the year down into more manageable terms. in this case it's a it's a ninety day term, right? You're you're able to to look at what you're trying to accomplish across an entire twelve months.
But you're doing it in a way that's that's way more manageable. And you look at this and you break it down into these ninety-day sprints, so to speak. And what it does is it just allows you to to kind of say on track, off track, right? Hey, are we heading towards the thing that we said we wanted to accomplish this year or are we not? And okay, if we're n if we are, great. Meeting meeting dismissed, meeting adjourned, right? Let's let's keep going. If we aren't, it just begs the opportunity or gives you the opportunity to say w why.
Jody Holland (02:44.239)
Yeah.
Mike Grigsby (02:50.518)
I if if this was the goal, if this is the thing that we all stated that we wanted to achieve over these next twelve months and we're not doing it, we don't think we're on track to get there, why why wait until October, Q four, to start looking at it? Why not ask that question in Q one at the end of Q one or at the beginning of Q two and say, What's gonna prevent us from doing it? I think i you know, I've taken several clients through that that framework.
and I have watched with amazement to tell you the truth the how s something simple like that framework can just help reorient people and and not not overcomplicate how people are trying to achieve their goals.
Jody Holland (03:32.847)
Yeah, and I I think good to greats, obviously, has been one of my favorite books of all time. I've read everything that Jim Collins has put out. And he kind of talks about that too, but he talks about it with that flywheel concept. And I know you've done consulting on that. And I'm sure Malia, you've heard all about the flywheel, at least from Mike. But you think about just coming back every week to what's our drag point? What's the thing that's holding us back from moving forward? So go back to what Megan was saying about.
Mike Grigsby (03:39.619)
Yeah.
Jody Holland (03:59.48)
You get to the mid-year and you're like, my gosh, I'm so tired. I've got so much thing, so many things going on. How do I stay on top of this? The flywheel, in combination with what Wickman talked about, and then I'll add in Brian Moran in the 12-week year. You look at that combination of things and you start going, well, we know who we're supposed to be, we know how we're supposed to organize our our business and our drive.
And then we know how to execute on the goals. And you start putting those together. The mid-year is when you think of it like the locker room at halftime. You come back in and you go, all right, here's what we gotta do. So I want to ask Malia a question. You work in a lot of community projects. So I'm sure there's a lot of, we're so excited when we get started. And then you get, I don't know, halfway through the project, and people are like, I'm so busy with other things. How do you keep people like that?
That you're not necessarily paying, but you need them to stay inspired. How do you keep them on track and then kind of correlate that to the mid-year refocus?
Maleah Grigsby (05:06.961)
Yeah, I think it's actually really funny that we're having this conversation because I just had a refocusing personally since I manage all of our projects. I literally just had a refocusing today where I needed to, I was like, there's there's too many different things going on all at the same time. I just need to like purge like my to-do list was all getting too long and jumbled together. I was like, I need to purge it all, rewrite it, restructure it, all the things. So
What helps me as as far as not only just engagement, but also my own like kind of thought work is really taking things not just like in time chunks but in like project chunks and like goals. for there's roughly like five different projects that I'm ahead of right now. So recognizing what each of those five goals are. Sorry, there's a dog. Recognizing Yes. Yes.
Jody Holland (05:46.55)
Yeah.
Jody Holland (05:57.576)
I assumed that was a dog.
Meghan Slaughter (05:58.512)
All the tippy tappies.
Mike Grigsby (06:01.998)
I thought she was typing.
Maleah Grigsby (06:02.497)
she's really excited to go in and out of each room. but anyways, recognizing what the five goals are for each one of those projects and then being able to kind of recognize what is the next right thing for us to be able to get to that goal, not trying to understand the project as a big whole, but just thinking about what the next process is to be able to get us there.
Jody Holland (06:03.585)
Ha ha ha ha.
Jody Holland (06:24.585)
Yeah.
Meghan Slaughter (06:29.699)
Yeah, and I think it's really important to take time and reflect on what's going right. So obviously we need to know what we need to do moving forward and what's left on our projects and goals, but also recognizing this is something that we did well and then celebrating that with your team really helps with morale and engagement because you need the positive along with the constructive.
Jody Holland (06:54.826)
Yeah, and you think about the celebration piece. I do think we missed out a lot. And I I don't care if it's Gina Wickman or Jim Collins or whomever. We talk a lot about the drag, but not the win. So I do think you have to know what's building your momentum, but also what's killing your momentum. So you look at both sides of it. I just taught continuous improvement over the last three and a half months to one of my clients, taking them through.
my version of what Six Sigma should have been if it was easy to understand instead of what it is in its 842 page manual. I've been through all the Six Sigma stuff, but I think the simplification is number one, you have to know where you're going. Number two, you have to know where you're starting. So if I know where I'm going and where I'm starting, that puts me in a good position to then say, what are the things that if we executed them on a daily basis,
would make that an automatic advancement towards where we want to go. It keeps moving you in that right direction. Early on when I would teach people priority management, that was the first thing that I would tell them is priority management is not about figuring out how to get more things in there, because that's what people talk about, just get more into your time, you're gonna be successful. It's about figuring out what is essential and killing everything else. And in any organization, there are typically
By position, gonna be about three habits that if you would do those habits every single day, your success becomes automatic. And I I joke, kinda, but I know in the beginning of my business, what made me successful was habit number one, get up and learn something. I need more information so that I can provide more value. So people keep calling me back to to pay me more money. Habit number two, go teach something. So I had to go.
teach or coach or share some information with people that I learned. Habit number three, send an invoice. If I do those three things, learn it, teach it, and bill for it, I will always be successful. But you get caught up in the minutiae and the distraction of, ooh, what if we did a shiny new website? Ooh, what if we did this? Ooh, what if we did this? And I'm not saying those things are not important, but I'm saying they're not as important.
Jody Holland (09:13.659)
The success habits come first. Everything else, if you have time, comes after that. And when you're doing your mid-year check-in, you have to go back and evaluate where are we? So we knew where we were. Now where are we actually? And where are we going by what date with what outcome? So your your mid-year check-in is saying if we have, you know, 400 miles in a year we're supposed to travel and we're at mile marker 120.
And we're halfway through our time. We better hit the accelerator if we're going to hit the 400 mile mark. But let's say you're halfway through and you look at it and you Holy cow, we're at mile 370. We have 30 miles to go. Maybe we're driving a faster car than we thought we were in our business, and we can advance the goals a little bit. So you adjust it based on a realistic view of where we are and where we're going, and then where we are and where we were, and that
I know that sounds very simplistic, but when you're looking at continuous improvement, daily habits are the most important thing that we have.
Mike Grigsby (10:16.442)
Yeah. Listen, simp simple is what rules and simple is what moves the needle. It's not the complex stuff that does it. You know, I think honestly when we talk about the continuous improvement, I think one of the single best tactics that anybody can use for continuous employment is stop thinking that there's this place called done. There is no there is you you won't arrive. And if you keep thinking that you're gonna arrive, you're going to run out of steam.
when you probably should be pivoting or probably should be expanding or probably doing the ne next thing. And I don't mean that to say like there's never a place called rest. That's that's not what I'm saying. It's the evolutionary process of whatever it is that you started, whether it's your business, whether it's, you know, your your exercise program, whether it's the PTA, whatever it is that you're doing is in a continuous evolutionary process or it's dead. Go ahead and have the funeral now and and
Put it in the shell on the heart's gr grave, right? Otherwise, if it's alive and thriving and growing, then it's continuously evolving and you have to get away from this thing, this belief that there is a point where it's done and you can just kind of wash your hands of it and, you know, what was the old Ron Papeel thing? Set it and forget it. No, that doesn't exist. It it doesn't exist. So I think that's there's a there's a wonderful scene in the in a Clint Eastwood movie. He's the old gunnery sergeant in the
Jody Holland (11:15.917)
Move on, baby.
Jody Holland (11:37.015)
Yeah.
Mike Grigsby (11:45.282)
His his troops think that they know where he's going and they bl blast past him running and everything and they get to where they think the stopping point is and they're heaving hands on their knees just sucking in wind and he casually jogs up, vectors right and keeps on going. And that's what happens every time we think that we found the end point something.
Jody Holland (12:05.059)
So Megan, I want to jump back to you for a second. You're talking about how you refocus your mind when you were talking earlier. So what are some strategies that let's say we are behind the eight ball, we're supposed to be further than we are and we haven't gotten there. What would be some strategies that people could use that would re-inspire them to get back on track?
Meghan Slaughter (12:29.103)
As simple as it sounds, checklists are huge. And I have a planner, a physical one and an online one, and every week I map out exactly what I need to get done. And then the next week I evaluate, did I accomplish what I set out to do last week? And if not, how do I need to incorporate that into my schedule this week so that I'm not falling behind? Talking about your projects with your team and understanding that
Other people may be better suited for certain roles than you and letting go of that control is another huge thing. I'm a little bit of a control freak. And so when I'm doing something, I want to be the one to do it so that I know that it gets done right. However, if my schedule doesn't allow for that, I may need to pass that on to somebody else who's still able to accomplish it, that it's on my team, and then we can come back together and discuss it.
Or if I'm really struggling with accomplishing something and I'm stuck on this task, talking to somebody else and just getting their ideas can be really helpful for me because my biggest thing is perspective. I love hearing other people's perspectives. I love trying to challenge my own perspective. I'm not going to see the problem from every single angle. So if I can present it to somebody else and get an outside viewpoint.
that can help me overcome that obstacle significantly faster than if I just sit here and think about it all day. Because that's exhausting and I'm gonna get frustrated because I'm in the middle of it. I'm in the thick of it. So somebody else they can see that objectively and they can offer their opinion or their help or whatever it may be. So having a checklist and just being able to talk through things with somebody that you trust.
Jody Holland (14:02.132)
Yeah.
Jody Holland (14:22.702)
So one, I'm gonna push back. I don't actually think you're a control freak. You've never been a control freak. What you what you have is high performance standards. And this is where I think we're too hard on ourselves sometimes. For those of you listening to this, just because you want it done right doesn't mean you're a controller. wanting it done right means you have standards, and standards are fantastic. And I think there's a lot of people like, my gosh, look at the standards she's got.
They don't they can't say that because that would say, I have horrible standards and I'm lazy. So they go, she's such a control freak. And we make fun of people like that instead of recognizing sometimes, hey, I I need to up my game. Second thing, I was going to point out something that you said there that I thought was really good is when you do let go of something to another person, one of the strategies that I've taught people for years is ask for when you need the follow up. And you said, you know, and you follow up and you talk about it.
But you you need to say, and this is the way I explain it, I need to know when that's completed to this standard. Because when you're setting an expectation, it's what do you want? When do you want it by how you measure it? It is okay to ask for that feedback loop that says it is completed and we're good. Otherwise, I have to keep it in my head the whole time. If I don't know when you're going to follow up or if you got it done, then the whole time I'm thinking, well, did they do it? Did they not do it? Should I check on them? Are they going to get mad at me?
And we kind of run through that weird dialogue in our head. but I think you put those things together, and I think that's really good. What you said is it is okay to let go of things, and the metric that I would use is can you do it 80% as good as me? If the answer is yes, you should be doing it. It doesn't need to be a hundred percent of my standard, just eighty percent of my standard, and then it's good. And then the checklist thing is beautiful, and the science, the psychology behind that.
Mike Grigsby (16:02.616)
Good. Yeah, it's good.
Jody Holland (16:16.135)
Shows that if you have a list, the likelihood of you getting all of the actual tasks done, it like quadruples. So you have a massive increase in the likelihood of your success just having a checklist. So it does, I know it may sound simplistic, but the checklist is powerful. Very, very powerful. And Mike can remember this when we were selling early on. I would come in every Monday morning and I had a list of 50 people to call. And I had typed up,
You know, the person's name, the company name, the phone number, and maybe one little tidbit about the company. And I would call until I got ten appointments, but I had a checklist. Call until you get 10 appointments. Here's your list. And it's like I was my secretary making this list for myself. So that I go in there. Not once did I go, goody, I get to cold call on Monday morning.
Maleah Grigsby (17:09.833)
Mm.
Jody Holland (17:10.556)
That is not normal human behavior. People that love cold calling need medication. But I did it because it's what made it where I could stay in business. And it was on the list. And when it's on the list, I love checking off the list. So that's pretty good stuff. So let's jump back to Malia. sorry, go ahead.
Maleah Grigsby (17:15.161)
Ha.
Meghan Slaughter (17:27.255)
Yeah, I can't really quick, I was just gonna say I can't tell you how satisfying it is too to be able to put that check in the box there and then or like highlight a name or a company and just to say that I did it and I can move on from it.
Jody Holland (17:42.587)
So Malia, you talked about you just went through all five of your projects and evaluated where you're at and where you need to be and that kind of stuff. So I'm gonna switch the question up on you a little bit. When things are vying for your attention that are not relevant to your success, how do you handle telling people no?
Maleah Grigsby (18:03.271)
Hmm, that's really interesting. I'm not great at it, truthfully. It is a big area that I'm working on. but I I think I have been able to in the last probably maybe even the last two or three months, I have really grown in this area. I know I've talked about this on past episodes before, but one really big area that I'm trying to grow in is really valuing my time and my thoughts.
And my words that I share with people, and not coveting them or saying that I'm better than someone else, but just showing that I value myself and my time. and being willing, like when you when you genuinely value your time, you're willing to do kind of whatever it takes to continue showing that. so I don't know, I I think of
Jody Holland (18:55.321)
Yeah.
So do you block your time? Is that kind of what you do? You say, Okay, well I've got this. So somebody says, Hey Malia, can you take on X? You go, Well, I've got this right now. So I can't during that time frame.
Maleah Grigsby (19:08.551)
So totally. And it depends on who it's coming from too. So if it's someone that is kind of outside of the organization, maybe doesn't entirely understand, I am one of the biggest proponents of I like this is really interesting. I would love to have this conversation with you. Can you reach out to me after this date? is a really big help helper for me. if it's coming from my boss, one of the biggest things that I will do is saying, I'm happy to take that on.
But I either need someone to take over X, Y, and Z or these things are gonna fall through the cracks. If that's something that we're willing to allow happen, great, happy to take that on. If not, then I have to decline at this time.
Jody Holland (19:51.704)
So I I taught my employees years ago, and I haven't with this group of employees haven't taught them this. But I had a guy that was like, dude, you have a new idea every seven minutes. I can't keep up. And so I was like, well, okay, so let's come up with a plan. So we came up with a two by four plan. What are the two most important things you're doing right now? And what are the four things that come after that? And when one of the two is completed, then one of the four moved up, and one of the things on another list moved into the
One through four spot. So there was never more than six priorities on their plate, and there's really only two that were critically important. So here's what I taught them is that if I come to you with another brilliant idea, it is okay for you to say, well, here's my two and here's my four. Which should I remove? Do you know? In the 18 years that those two guys worked for me, once did I have them remove anything off the two before list.
Every other time, and it was gotta be a thousand times in eighteen years. Every other time I said, just write it on the other list. If I don't ask about it again, just forget it. And I usually never ask.
Maleah Grigsby (21:01.833)
One of my totally. One of my colleagues literally has a drawing of a parking lot and little like toy cars essentially that each of the cars represent a different topic and they have like a little whiteboard kind of thing on them so you can erase and write on the whiteboard. And things get there's like the VIP spot, there's the like 15 minute parking, and then there's the like general parking. So the 15 minute is like the priority has to happen end of day today.
Jody Holland (21:18.326)
That's awesome.
Mike Grigsby (21:19.694)
Yeah.
Maleah Grigsby (21:31.687)
The VIP is like next in line and then the general parking is like like that. Like if it never comes up again, then you get towed.
Jody Holland (21:39.628)
Yeah. So Mike, I want to turn I like to get toed. you get towed and you get toed no. Both of those. All right. So Mike, I know one of the things that you have pushed on is you've run some very large groups of people from the IT department, Kansas City Police Department, to Innovation in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and a lot of other stuff. Think about how many things try to get your attention.
Mike Grigsby (21:41.538)
You get you get towed.
Maleah Grigsby (21:47.049)
Ha ha ha.
Mike Grigsby (21:47.288)
Yeah, yeah.
Meghan Slaughter (21:48.025)
He
Jody Holland (22:08.969)
And so we take this from a slightly different angle. You know, mid-year that you've got five key projects that were started at the beginning of the year. Now it's mid-year, and you've got 3,812 key projects that people are asking about. How do you keep your parking lot clean? Go to that reference there. So that you don't get overloaded with the wrong cars. You don't get that traffic jam of too many priorities and not enough focus.
Mike Grigsby (22:37.582)
Well, it's it's really the same thing that you know, Malia's already shared and I think somebody else shar shared it too, is right. It's you've gotta be willing to say, or you just said this, right? You've got to be willing to say which of these other things are off the table. Because, you know, the the kind of the the temptation is to try to take something else on, either to try to improve or try to defend that you're worth, you know, you can handle it, that you're not lazy or to
Like there's a whole bunch of other things that are happening that that cause you to try to take on more than you can actually actually handle. So you have to be okay with going, I only have 40 hours in the work week, just like you. My my my 40 hours are as consumable as yours. I don't get to remanufacture any, I don't get to make up any new ones, I don't get rollover minutes. you gotta help me understand like the the f yeah, that's right.
Jody Holland (23:29.49)
For those old enough to know what a rollover minute is.
Maleah Grigsby (23:32.393)
Yeah.
Mike Grigsby (23:34.698)
So so you have to you have to be okay asking them and saying, listen, I will absolutely Malia says it best. She probably she probably heard that heard me say that one point. I will absolutely jump on that right now. Which of these other things is off the table? Because because two weeks ago you told me items one and three were your top priority. Now you're telling me this new thing that's not even on my list is your your new high priority. What does that do for items one and three that are already in motion?
Like being able to do that, the the the trick is how do you how do you get that at scale? How do you take that to an enterprise level? And I will tell you the first thing, and I might have even said this on a previous episode, if you don't protect your own time, you are giving everybody else permission to violate your boundaries. If you can't maintain your own boundaries, I I I I think I did share this on every mor every Monday morning from from eight until I think eleven, eight until eleven, I am
Jody Holland (24:20.935)
Mm-hmm.
Mike Grigsby (24:32.098)
Book solid. That is my administrative time. I don't schedule anything. I don't let anybody else schedule anything. And I make sure I don't violate my own boundaries. It's the only way I'm going to get it done. And ironically, nobody tries to schedule anything in there because I don't violate it. So that's how you that's how you get it at scale and make it kind of enterprise, is you start by not violating your own boundaries.
Jody Holland (24:47.217)
Yeah.
Jody Holland (24:54.055)
So and I want to add one other thing in there. Look, I do agree with what you said, but I also think we have to take an honest look at the part we've played in where we're at at mid-year. As an entrepreneur, there's nobody coming in and saying, Hey buddy, I know you've been working hard, but I think you need to get back on track on this. They just go, well, he'll eventually just fail. You know, or he'll succeed. But that's that's on me as an entrepreneur. So I have to be
a tough manager on myself. And I think self-leadership is the first layer of leadership that you're always working on and always renewing. But I I use a a process that came out of Toyota. A guy named Taiichiono was one of the I would call him a godfather in the continuous improvement movement. You know, Edward Stimming was out there, Taiichiono, Mr. Toyota. But the term gimba means in this place in Japanese. So a gimba walk
Is be present in this place and evaluate what's really going on. And I I've been teaching companies to do this for years, mostly in manufacturing or food production. Be present and walk through. If you're sitting looking at your Excel spreadsheet monitor, you're not in the place. You you're in your spreadsheets, but you're not in the place. So you don't really know what's happening. And
Mike Grigsby (26:15.886)
Yeah, it's good.
Jody Holland (26:20.287)
So walk the the facility, look at what's happening, and then notice what seems to be going off track. That's your drag point. Find the drag point, fix the drag point, get things back on track. The mid-year is about discovering what have we been allowing to slow us down, and how do we accelerate that back to the pace that it needs to be in order to keep everything on track? So I think the gimbal walk.
And the true evaluation of where are we on our flywheel or our entrepreneurial operating system or whatever you want to call it. Where are we? Where are we going? Where were we supposed to be right now based on what we said we were going to do at the beginning of the year? Because I know I am hard on myself, but I'm also the only reason I'll fail. There's nothing going on in politics. There is nothing going on in the world. There's nothing going on anywhere that will cause me to fail.
I am the only cause of my failure. I am also the only cause of my success. So, as a leader, I have to fully own responsibility for me and for what I did or did not do. Without excuse, I am who I am and where I am because I made the choices to get here. And that's really hard for a lot of people to swallow. So I'm gonna do just a quick round, Robin. We're gonna start with Megan and I'll
end at the end. We'll go Megan, Malia, Mike, then me. Just one piece of advice in sixty seconds or less of what people should do to make sure they win the second half of the year. Megan, you're out.
Meghan Slaughter (27:59.888)
I think the the biggest thing to maintain your momentum and keep keep yourself on track for success is do something every day towards your goals. So have a physical reminder and do something that makes you happy in addition to that. So work towards your goals and something that brings you enjoyment and you're going to be happy doing the work and it'll set you up for success.
Jody Holland (28:24.404)
Excellent. Good advice. All right, Malia, you're up.
Maleah Grigsby (28:27.317)
I would say evaluate the goals that you had at the beginning of the year and recognize that those are still the goals that you wish to accomplish by the end of this year. figure out how they align and then every Monday when you or whenever your work week starts, think about three things that will get you closer to those goals, similar to what Megan was saying. but it doesn't necessarily have to be accomplishing each of those goals, but just one next step. It could be writing the list of the things that you need to do in order to get
to that success point or whatever that looks like, but do three things each week to be able to get you closer and be able to focus on what those success points are.
Jody Holland (29:06.654)
Excellent. Great advice. Mike, you're up.
Mike Grigsby (29:09.762)
I'll I'll say what I said earlier is stop thinking that there's a place called done. I'll I'll add to it and say there's also no place called smooth sailing either. So those two things, no place called done, no place called smooth sailing. If you can keep that, you'll orient around your your goals mid year or otherwise all the time.
Jody Holland (29:28.669)
And my advice, even though I try to be a hyper logical individual, is get emotional about it. I remember doing an exercise where I wrote down all of the benefits of achieving my goals. And then I had to say, knowing that I could achieve these, what are all the things I would be missing out on if I don't? And so I stacked emotion of the positive of getting there, how people are going to celebrate you and all that kind of stuff, and the negative.
Of choosing to fail. And you need to say choosing to fail. And let me tell you, that will kick your butt in gear and get you moving in the right direction. So I hope you guys have enjoyed this talking about the mid-year check-in and kind of recentering and pushing to where you ought to go. If you did enjoy it, please consider sharing this with others. Also, check out our website at jodyholland.com. If you want to book any of us as a speaker for an event, we would love to be a part of your event. We know we'll bring some fire and
Make it a whole lot of fun, but until next time, I hope you become the leader you would want to follow.
