Management Principles

Below, our goal is to teach you principles we’ve learned over the years about management and leadership. These are lessons we learned the hard way so you don’t have to! Let’s dive in ⬇️

General Principles

Inspect What You Expect

We put this near the top because it’s just that important… and by not doing this, we’ve lost a LOT of money. What does it mean? As the title suggests, inspect it if you expect it. If you expect one of your sales guys to have the details of a deal in everyday by a certain time, check that. If you expect the call team to listen to the script, listen to some of the call recordings. If you expect a DP to put their homework texts in a folder, make sure the folder has it in there.

Example

There are a number examples that I could use here, but the one that stands out the most to me is how we lost $100’s of thousands by not checking in on the Gate Keepers. I use this simply to teach you a lesson, not to rag on the Gate Keepers (who I do love).

For around 6 months I didn’t pay attention to the Gate Keepers. There was a lot of other stuff happening in the business that was requiring my attention and it seemed that the only thing that WAS working was the Gate Keepers team. And while it was working, it was barely working and bleeding the company’s money.

Essentially when someone calls in, there is a script to follow and a process to walk them through. Long story short, they weren’t doing that. They weren’t using the script, giving out other trainers info, saying things that just made no sense, etc.

Of course, this isn’t their fault. They knew what to do, there is no denying that. I wasn’t watching them though. I expected something and didn’t inspect it at all. We retrained them and got them back on track and it’s a happy ever after story from there, but ultimately our mistakes here costs us a LOT of money.

What can we learn from this?

1) If you expect it from someone, inspect it.

2) Trust but verify. I was WAY too trusting of the GK’s. I was trusting them to do it how I taught them and they just weren’t. I didn’t verify at all until months later and the only person I can blame is me. So, train your team, trust them and ‘decentralize command’ as Jocko would say, BUT VERIFY! Please, please, verify.

Take Some Time In-Between What Happened & The Follow-Up

If something happens and it makes you emotional in a negative way (angry, frustrated, rage, etc.) sometimes, before responding or dealing with the issue at hand, it is best to take some time to process and then respond. This will not only be helpful for you, but for the people you’ll be working with.

Note: Sometimes, this isn’t able to be the case. Sometimes, something will happen and there is no time to process, you must act. But, if you’re emotional and able to take some time, take some time.

Example 1): Using the example above about the GK’s, when I found out about how backwards things were and how much money we lost, I was furious. Truly. I don’t get mad easily, but I was very angry. While I knew that this needed to be addressed, I knew I could’t do it right then, as much as I wanted to. So, I went home, made a plan and went into the meeting with the GK’s the next day. And while I was still angry, I was much more level-headed than I would have been that day. It worked out well and ended great!

Example 2): One time after training the GK’s back up and turning them into superstars we had a day filled with 5-6 evals. It was awesome. As the day got going, 4-5 of the evals cancelled and we had one eval. The one eval turned out to be an aggressive dog, which we don’t train, and the EP was frustrated about his bad luck. What’d he do while frustrated? He called the Gate Keepers (who are there to make sure he has evals to go to) frustrated about all the evals cancelling and the aggressive one (for reference, the aggressive dog was an 8 month old Doodle and there was no reason based off what the owners said to the GK’s it was different than any other Doodle).

What did this do? Well, when the EP called the GK’s to vent, he was frantic about he dog being aggressive (it was scary and did catch him off guard) and he was upset about all the cancelled evals and the combo of that hurt the GK’s feelings. It left the manager at the time to solve a team dispute. It was all handled well by all parties and ended in a happy ever after story!

Example 3): We had a network partner refer us a client one time. The client had a puppy that barked all the time. Seriously, non-stop. They also lived in an apartment and so the trainer used the remote collar, as taught, to address the barking. The client called the network partner to tell them we abused their dog. The network partner called me and was upset with me. I was upset that the situation happened and shocked by the call (particularly their perception of the events not the events themselves). I didn’t have time to take space, gather my thoughts, take a breather, etc. I just had to jump in and go. This situation also ended fine. There was something wrong with the dog, they got another dog and it went well.

What can we learn from these?

1) If you’re emotional about the issue at hand, wait until you’ve had time to cool off. Make a plan. A rational plan (it is hard to be rational when you’re angry) and then do the plan, have the talk, whatever it is. But doing it angry/upset isn’t the way.

2) The old saying, "Don't speak when you're angry, because you'll make the best speech you'll ever regret." is what I think of.

3) Sometimes you don’t have the time to wait and collect your thoughts, settle your emotions, etc. Sometimes you just have to jump in and GO.

Get Buy In & Make Sure They Have Skin in The Game

This one is kind of a twofer. Get Buy In refers to getting buy in when passing something off to a teammate. Use the communication and delegation guide in Cert 1.1 Communication Section to make sure all your T’s are crossed and your i’s are dotted. The second one refers to making sure on big things, your team has skin in the game. Let’s break ‘em down with some examples.

Example 1): Get Buy In. I ask a manager of a department to write down everything her team calls her about for one week. I let her know the intention of this is to see the commonalities of the reasons for calling so we can make trainings on this. I sold her on the WHY and my reasoning for the request. She also sees the importance of this. Now I need buy in. I ask her “Can I count on you for this?” She replies yes. She knows why she’s doing it and then agreed to it. Note: You can do more than this using the Communication section, but this is all I need for this example!

Example 2): Make Sure They Have Skin In The Game. There are a multitude of times I have messed this up but the easiest example would be with sales. With our EP’s if they don’t sell, they don’t get paid. They have skin in the game and an incentive (making money) tied to their performance.

What can we learn from these?

1) We as leaders must get buy in. We need this so we can count on our team to do what we ask and in the timeline we assign them. If we don’t get their buy in, we run the risk of it being forgotten, it not being understood and then not done, etc.

2) Make Sure They Have Skin In The Game. If the results are important, if there is a lot on the line, etc. Make sure that the people executing have a reason to make sure it’s done. AKA skin in the game.

Empower Others To Come Up With solutions

Part of Value 5 and ‘decentralized command’ is empowering others. As leaders, it is our job to let other people come up with solutions to the challenges they bring us. What does this look like? A team member calls you with a question/challenge/concern/etc. and you reply with, “What do you think you should do?” (or something similar) and allow them to come up with the solution to their problem. The only time you step in is if they are completely wrong/way off track or going to cost the company money. If this is the case, you follow up with, “Have you ever thought about it this way?” and proceed to give them a new idea they can run with.

This is really important because it teaches them to think critically and to come up with the answers to their problems. It also empowers them which helps them make decisions better in the future and increases efficiency.

Example: We had a LT one time who was getting calls non-stop with her team asking her various things they knew the answer to or had already been trained on. We came up with a number of different ideas for her to implement, but one of the main ones was to get back to the principle above. It helped her reduce her call volume because her team was able to make decisions on their own.

What can we learn from this?

1) It pays to let people come up with their own solutions. It increases their confidence and builds efficiency.

Don’t Let Bad Stuff Settle. If There is A Problem, Handle it

There’s an older saying about marriage that says “Never go to bed angry.” In short what it means is that if you’re arguing with your husband or wife and y’all are mad at each other, y’all should settle it then. Before you go to sleep angry, you should stay up and fix it before bed. If you don’t the problems can spill over into the next day. You do this long enough and next thing you know you’re arguing all the time and divorced. Wow. That went from 0-100 real quick. But it’s the truth and the lesson you need to know. As someone in a position of leadership, it is your job to handle biz when it pops up and not allow others to go to sleep angry at you. Below are the perfect examples…

Example 1): A team example to start us off. We had a bad client one time in Memphis. He didn’t like the first Dog Pro we sent out. No big deal, we’ll get ya another one. We sent our best we had at the time. Known for getting great results and not taking no s*it, she was the perfect fit. Only problem is, the client never texted back, didn’t answer the phone and would show up very late to appointments or not show at all. One day after warning him, don’t be late, answer the phone, etc. We show up. He isn’t there for his appointment. Shocker! The DP waits for 30 mins and then decides to leave. He pulls in, blocks her in the driveway and they proceed to yell at each other and the Dog Pro leaves.

He call the me and threatens to sue if don’t make the Dog Pro go back and apologize. In my ignorance I didn’t realize at the time this made the Dog Pro feel unsafe, I thought this was more of a pride issue, so I made her go back. She says sorry. He doesn’t sue. Life’s good. Or so I thought.

The Dog Pro goes cold. You can’t get her by text or by call. She won’t talk to me. She lets a trusted colleague know she felt unsafe and that if I ever did that again, she was out of here. This conversation took place on a Saturday. I was off work for the weekend and did not have to do this, but I had to for the good of the company (there’s a lesson in here.)

I knew it wouldn’t be good for this particular Dog Pro to sit and ruminate on what happened all weekend, so I told her to meet me at a place for a sandwich and we handled the issue at hand right then. I heard her side, gave my meager side of the story, I humbled myself and said sorry (and meant it) and then we hugged it out. Problem solved.

I'm not 100% for certain that if I hadn’t done that she would have left, but I can say that if I hadn’t done that, it would have been a blemish on our relationship forever. And she may have left after a weekend of thinking about it over and over and over and over again. This particular Dog Pro is an over-thinker and can be a bit anxious (no different than the CEO :)) so, leaving her to think about it all weekend may have just been the final straw. This ended in a happy-ever-after story, btw!

Example 2): Client service for this one. We get a client text that comes in Saturday at 4 after the last lesson of the day saying “I’m not happy and I want to talk to a manager.” Now you have two options, do you call her right then and help her, in the time of her frustration? OR do you say, screw it, it’s the weekend I’ll get with her on Tuesday? Well, I’ve been in this situation before. I call the lady, even though it’s the weekend and I’m off. Turns out her issue is really small and able to be worked out relatively easily. I’ve also been the guy that waits to call and gets burned by the fact that the client gets to sit and think about how upset they are all weekend. What happens? REFUND!

Note: If you do get a client complaint and you do wait when you had the ability to call when necessary, you’ll be disciplined. Maybe fired. Not joking. Client service is #1 priority. Making sure people are happy is what we do and why we’re the best.

What can we learn from these?

1) Squash problems quickly and don’t delay. Call today.

2) When you can, meet in-person. Remember from hierarchy of communication in Cert 1.1 that in-person is better than zoom, zoom is better than a call, call is better than text/email. The person can see you, feel you, etc. Meet in-person when you can.

3) If you let people ruminate when they are angry/upset and you don’t fix it, allowing them to be upset for long periods of time, you run the risk of losing the person. If they don’t leave, you run the risk of harming YOUR reputation with that one person.

4) It quite literally pays to handle biz as soon as it creeps up.

Be Early

As a manager, it’s up to you to lead by example. By this point, I trust you know that. It is crucial that you are early to every team function. If we’re having a meeting, be early. If you’re bringing a new employee onto the team, be earlier than them to where you’re meeting them on Day 1. Be early. Not only does it set a great example, but it shows them your commitment and it sets a high bar for attendance and timeliness.

Example: I showed up every Tuesday late to the team by a few minutes. This was very early on in my biz career and my biz partner pulled me off to the side and told me that it’s very unprofessional to be late. Especially when you’re a leader. It clicked instantly and I changed. I’ve never been late to a meeting since and been at least 15 minutes early to every team meeting since.

If you’re ‘above’ someone in rank and you’re late, they resent you.

If you’re ‘below’ someone in rank and you’re late, they feel disrespected.

Don’t be late. Be early.

What can we learn from This?

1) Don’t be late. It looks bad and it’s disrespectful.

Your Team

Support the people you employ

One of the cool things about being a manager is having employees. One cool thing about employees is that they are all into their own things outside of work. If you can find a way to relate to your people around the things they like outside of work, you can build a stronger bond. Examples could be going to and event or something their hobby does, commenting on their social posts, sliding up on their stories, etc. The idea is to show a genuine interest in them and build rapport.

What can we learn from this?

1) Showing interest in your team builds the rapport you have with them. This is small, but it increases trust. And trust = speed!

Support their partners

One high level hack of management is to not only to support the people you employ, but to also support their significant other. If their significant other is doing something cool and you show interest, that can get buy in from their significant other and get them to like the company more. This is really helpful because lets say your employee is having negative thoughts about the company or work one day/week and wants to leave, then their partner will go to bat for us and talk them into staying. It also gets more buy in from your employee for caring about their partner as well.

Example: One of our employees at one of our various locations has a significant other that makes films. When his film came out, I rented it. I then went to dinner with them and talked to them about the film for an hour or so. I did this because I actually cared and wanted to be supportive. Not to be manipulative. There is a difference. But I know our employee thought it was really cool because she texted me privately thanking me for supporting her partner. He also messaged me as well and was super thankful.

What can we learn from this?

1) Support the partners of the people who work for you, it may help in the long run!

Challenge Your Most VALUABLE People

If you have someone who comes onto your team or who is on your team and shows a lot of promise, or is doing a lot or is just overall really valuable, then it’s your job to challenge them. It’s your job to push them a bit more than the rest of the team and bring them up.

Pass off something you need to do to them and have them take a stab at it. Then take time coaching them on what they did right and wrong. Bring them things you’re thinking through and have them help you think through it. Give them a little extra to do and let them know you’re doing this because you see them and their potential.

Example: We have an EP who loved Wonder Dog. Before even getting hired, he saw the vision and what Wonder Dog was about, where we were headed, etc. He wanted in. He carried that same energy when he got hired going above and beyond. His first ‘challenge’ was to help me think through some of the Cert stuff for the Lead Eval Pro from his point of view. He was very excited about the opportunity and I gave him a lot of free will to try to create what he thought was best.

What can we learn from this?

1) Challenge everyone on the team but especially your MVP’s!

Being friends w/ your team? 🧐

We teach people in Cert 1 Common Language that we don’t complain to clients about our lives, work, etc. We teach people to be personable but not personal. What is the difference? Personable is likeable, friendly, etc. Personal is giving them details about you they don’t need.

We suggest when it comes to team and your relationship with them that you be friendly, but not friends.

Friendly is calling them, checking in with them, going out with them as a group after work, team night, etc.

Friends is hanging out one-on-one not during work time, talking about your problems with them, etc.

The reason we suggest not being friends with your subordinates is it typically skews judgement. If you’re a LT and you hang with one of your DP’s all the time, when that DP slips up on something for the third time, you’re more likely to take it easy on him/her than you would be if you weren’t hanging with this person as friends.

Note: We’re not saying you can’t be friends with your team (yet). We’re saying if you are, be wary of it as it will skew judgement, get them favorable treatment, etc.

The Dichotomy: You can be of service to your team 1-on-1 and still not be friends. Example: We had a DP one time who was slippin’ on her work. Her LT called her and asked if she was okay and it turns out she wasn’t. There were a lot of reasons for this, but the main one was her family was coming in town that weekend and her house was a wreck. So the LT goes over to her home with her husband and helps the DP clean her home. Not friends with her, but friendly with her. DP improved as a result of that!

Leadership

Never Force Something Upon Anyone (or Team)… & If You Must, Make It A Last Resort

When selling people on a new idea, a change coming up, a new policy, etc. basically anything at all, you want to do three BIG things. 1) You want to sell them on the WHY of the thing. 2) You want to explain how it benefits them. 3) Get their buy in! Other things you can do: Let them know you expect them to implement, let them know you’d love feedback, make sure they don’t have questions, make sure they don’t need anything to do what you’re asking, etc. The big three are sell the WHY, what’s in it for them and get them to agree (buy in)!

Example: We installed an app called Boards once upon a time (not sure if we’re still using it at the time of you reading this), but it was with the intent of helping the Dog Pro’s and making their life easier. It made it where all their homework texts were literally at the click of a button to send to clients. It would make their job easier, faster, more efficient, etc. Our LT at the time presented it, asked them to try it for a few days while she was out of town and give feedback when she got back. Not only did they not use it, THEY COMPLAINED ABOUT IT. There was no logical reason NOT to use it. It made their job easier, faster, more efficient, etc. but people hate change. She then proceeded to say we’re using it because X said so, so use it. The error here is force. No one wants to be forced to do anything. Because I said so should always be a last resort.

What can we learn from this?

1) Sell the WHY

2) Make it benefit them... ALWAYS!

3) Get their buy in

4) Let them know your expectations, answer Q’s, let them know you want feedback, etc.

“Can this person rebound or did you write them off?”

Sometimes when dealing with team members and having similar things happen over and over again can be tough. It’s easy to get frustrated after the same thing happens again and again. And to be fair, it actually is frustrating. At some point you may have written the person off. We are all capable of this if we aren’t careful. When dealing with a troublesome employee and you throw your hands up, it’s important to ask if this person can rebound or if you’ve written them off.

Example: We had a DP who was great but his attendance was terrible. After many talks with the LT, nothing was changing. Attendance continued to be an issue. After a while, she thought the only think we could do was eventually let the DP go. We changed the policy to make it much more clear cut and never had an issue again with the DP taking time off after that. She was ready to write him off and spent a lot of time angry over the ordeal, but ultimately, it worked out.

What can we learn from this?

1) Don’t write people off until its necessary to write them off. And if you’re writing them off, may as well just call it anyways!

2) Sometimes when you write people off, you haven’t done all you can to solve the issue at hand and that means you’re at fault

Take The Hits & Roll w/ The Punches

As a leader, sometimes you just have to take it on the chin and roll with the punches. It’s part of life. This means humbling yourself, pushing your ego aside (even if you’re in the right), because the team, the company and the organization comes first.

Example 1): A team example to start us off. We hired someone one time for a position that was base plus commission. We had a 60 day training window where she would make what she needed to make to be comfortable during that time and then she would be on a small base salary + commission. The details don’t matter but when the comp plan was presented, she wasn’t very clear on things and thought she was getting commission during the training window. I told her what the actual plan was and clarified. I could hear the annoyance and disappointment on the other end of the phone. I decided to pay her commission on what she thought was right. She then said, “Why don’t we go half?” Boom. Deal. The potential for what she was going to be doing for us was so big, that arguing about a few hundred dollars wasn’t worth the stain that would put on our relationship. So we paid the money. Pride swallowed and things went well!

Example 2): Next, a client example. We have a client who swears up and down that the EP said when he brought the program that we have a “lifetime guarantee”. He swears he said it three times. The EP swears he did NOT in fact say that. Someone is lying or someone misunderstood the guarantees. I think the client got really mixed up on the guarantees vs. the tribe vs. the lifetime phone support we offer. He took it as we offer a lifetime guarantee. He calls me furious. Say he doesn’t like being lied to, played, scammed, etc. He wants a full refund. He questions our integrity. He’s done. Somehow, I talk this guy off the ledge, say I’m sorry, and convince this guy to stay a client. I don’t think he’s right. I know he is wrong in fact. But I add three free lessons for him to cash in on anytime he wants to cash in on them. I know this isn’t right in my eyes, especially since he is in the wrong and was simply confused, but it save us $2k and make someone happy. Roll with the punches.

What can we learn from this?

1) Sometimes it’s better to take it on the chin rather than ‘win’ for the sake of being right

2) Take the hits as they come, even when it sucks and roll with the punches

NOTE: I am by NO means saying do things NOT in the companies interest or that will LOSE us money. I paid up the few hundred dollars because the return on the position she was working in would be so worth it. This principle is NOT an excuse lose money or give it out.

Overall

Complaints Go up The Ladder

If you have something you are upset about/want to change/don’t like/criticism/feedback/etc. that goes UP the ladder and the “chain of command” not downwards or laterally. Complaining downwards to someone on your team is not only toxic to the culture, but it is also a culture killer.

Example: The leader the level above you wants to implement a new idea or strategy. You don’t like the idea for a number of reasons. Rather than give your feedback/ideas to the leader above you, you complain to the people on your team. This not only undermines your leaders ideas/strategy, but it creates distrust between your team and YOUR leader.

The clear solution here is a fairly easy one: Complain/critique/give feedback UP the ladder. Not downwards or sideways. Pass all that stuff upwards and come up with solutions. If you don’t you’re going to add toxicity into the culture here and potentially ruin all that we are trying to build here.

If your team is complaining across departments or to each other about something, you need to handle that quickly. We do not to toxic BS here.

What Can We Learn From This?

1) Complaining down the chain of command kills culture

2) We much squash toxicity as soon as it arises inside the teams to promote a healthy culture