Ep 1: Your Personal WHY
Lindsay and Rael explore and share their personal WHY and how that has impacted on their day to day business activities.
Understanding your personal why and ensuring that personal WHY and business WHY are aligned is one of the fundamental keys to success.
Episode 1 - Why Transcript
Rael Bricker
Hi, I'm Rael Bricker, and I be one of your hosts with the Business Excellence podcast.
Lindsay Adams
And I'm Lindsey Adams, I'm the co host.
Rael Bricker
And together we're going to be talking about what makes up Business Excellence. And we believe that you can never be perfect in anything you do. All you can be is excellent. And in our businesses and in our lives, we want to achieve excellence. And that's why this is the Business Excellence podcast. In today's episode, we're going to be talking about our personal why, because we believe that if your personal why is aligned with your business, then you never have to work a day in your life because you love what you do so much. And so Lindsey Adams will be sharing with us his story of why he does what he does. Lindsey Adams is known as the relationships guy around the world. And Lindsey has a 20+ year track record, as a professional speaker, trainer, and coach and shares today his story.
Lindsay Adams
Thanks, Rael . This one goes back a little way. Once upon a time I worked in the Australian Taxation Office. Yep, true story. How stop a conversation quickly at a barbecue. So Lindsay, what do you do for a living? I'm an auditor in the tax office. And in fact, I was an auditor and I audited small business books of account, served summonses, collect debts, I did all the nasty stuff. I was on a manager development program. It was a nine month extravaganza. And we started off with a one week residential on Bribie Island, followed by a three month work placement. And then a week residential in Byron Bay Beach Resort, tough work. I know, another work placement. And then a week on Stradbroke Island and another work placement graduation ceremony and so on. We had three different facilitators third facilitator on stradbroke Island end of day one, he's the same. facilitator says, okay, boys and girls, we're done dinner at seven. See you at the bar. Lindsay, have you got a minute? Now, I went up to him said how can I help? And he said, What are you doing here? You're not like these people you don't fit. So interestingly, that question led to a three hour conversation, which helped me understand that I was in the wrong job. I was an auditor. But I'm not really good at that stuff. I'm a people person. And that guy held up a mirror for me and helped me understand. I was in the wrong job. Now, it didn't happen overnight. But it did happen that I moved out of audit, I went across sideways into HR and training. And here I am 20 plus years later, working in that field. And today, why I do what I do is it's because of that moment, when I now I do my best to hold up the mirror of other people to help them understand where they need to go in their business or in in their team as a leader. You know, wherever. And so, for me, my Why is about holding others to account and helping them move forward on their journey. So Rael, you too have an interesting story? Why don't you share why you do what you do?
Rael Bricker
Thank you, Lindsay. In 2012, I decided that I was going to do a few triathlons and a couple marathons before I turned 50. And so I stood on the beach at that time, in my pink bathing cap in the 45 to 50 year old age category. And I stared out at the ocean as I was about to start my first triathlon. And I had a revelation. And that sounds quite mystical, but it wasn't. I stood out there and I stared at the ocean. And I realized that I had never done a swim in the sea. Every one of my swims in my training had been in a swimming pool, with a nice black line down the bottom, and an orderly flow of people and no one kicking you in the head, and you weren't kicking anyone else in the head. It was a nice, gentle thing. And I stood there with 50, other so called athletes. And I realized that we were about to dive into what could only be called a washing machine where you would be kicking somebody and they would be kicking you in the head. And in fact, in the book, blue ocean strategies, they talk of the red ocean, I suddenly realized at that moment what the red ocean was, it was this very crowded, overcrowded marketplace. But I also realized something about my life and everything I had ever done in business up to that point had been epitomized in that day standing on the beach, because I was there about to dive in and adjust my course while I was moving. And in fact, that became the slogan and became the key words of my book, dive in and adjust your course while you're moving. And it took a number of years from that moment, until 2015, when the mortgage industry approached me to speak at a mortgage conference about how to build a mortgage business. I realized that what I could do, what value I could add to people, was to help them adjust the course while they were moving, to help them to be not afraid to dive in, and adjust the course while they were going. To build Business Excellence by being flexible, and adaptable, and really applying those same basic principles of how you would do a triathlon to their own businesses. And so that's what I've been doing for the last couple years, is sharing the ideas of how to dive in and adjust your course while you're moving. and not being afraid of risk. Not necessarily not having fear, but just not being afraid of risk.
Lindsay Adams
So Rael you've been, you've been running a very successful mortgage broking business now for quite a long time and, and I get your why it makes total sense. So how do you how do you share that with the people who work with you, the staff, the consultants that you have in the business? How do you help them embrace that? Is it is that you get them to embrace your why or what do you do they embrace their own? Why?
Rael Bricker
Well, I think the business why, which is helping people to get a better deal. I know that sounds a bit trite because every single bank and every single other mortgage broker advertises that. So getting a better deal is not necessarily better interest rates or anything like that. It's about building relationships with people, building trust, building honesty, showing your honesty to people. And so that's the why of our business is to help people be successful along the property journey.
Rael Bricker
Everyone in the team buys into that Why? My personal why running that part of my business is exactly that. It is about the fact that I love sitting with clients. You know, I've booked an hour's appointment, it always takes an hour and a half. Because we talk about their journey, we talk about their personal Why? Why did they want to buy an investment property? Why do they want to upgrade the home. And that ties in exactly with what we do in the business, which is tie all that together, and help them on their journey, make the journey as painless and as seamless as possible. And every one of the staff loves that. Every one of the staff loves dealing with the clients, we've just talked to 5000 clients and everybody in the team loves dealing with them. You know, they, they, they really come to me and say I can't help this person, I feel bad. One staff member had been here about five years and turned around and said, I woke up at three o'clock this morning worrying about a client and I said Welcome to my world. I knew that the why of the business had actually permeated the consciousness, because she would wake me up at three o'clock in the morning worrying.
Lindsay Adams
So I wonder then, for those who are listening, what's your WHY? And do you have a personal Why have you thought about that? And can you articulate it? And or what's your business? Why? And do your staff know that? And can they articulate it? You know, I recall years ago when I worked in Brisbane City Council, I worked with one of the sections called vegetation treatment services. It was a very fancy title for a bunch of guys who went out and mowed the lawns and the footpaths of the parks and streets of Brisbane. And I spoke to one of the guys who was behind the mower one day and I said, you know, why are you doing this? And he said, I'm making Brisbane Look, the most beautiful city in Australia. I was blown away. He was this humble guy pushing a lawn mower, mowing grass, but he got why he was doing what he was doing. And I think Wouldn't it be great if all of our staff if all of our consultants if all of our contractors embrace ROI in that way?
Rael Bricker
Absolutely. It's a there's a famous story told of one of the cleaners at NASA in 1969 before the first successful landing on the moon, and the cleaner was sweeping furiously down a passage and one of the executives asked him what he was doing and he said he's doing his best to make sure the rocket gets to the moon. If a cleaner at NASA embraces that philosophy, then it you know, their whole team would embrace that same Why. Because that was the why. And so, absolutely in getting to Business Excellence in getting to a position of going out there to achieve excellence. We have to clearly articulate our own why, and articulate our own Whys in such a way that the team buy into it.
Lindsay Adams
Okay, so final question, how do we get them to do that, Rael ?
Rael Bricker
I think there's a something called purpose. So in in my speaking world, and I've interviewed 87 companies, and we're going to share through the podcast some of those interviews. What was clear is that the companies that have a rich and robust culture, have a purpose. And the purpose is well beyond the actual business. And so I was interviewing some clients that I was working with, and I asked the board, tell me, what is your purpose? And they said, to make profits and make money, and I said, that's a fantastic purpose. Because you have to do that if you don't make money. You go out of business. So there's no discussion about that. I said to them, but what how do you communicate that to the team member in your warehouse, busy packing boxes, to go out to your customers? How does that person buy into you want to make money, and he said, they don't. And it was interesting, because from that moment, on a month later, there was a full staff meeting 240 staff, that same director stood up and started talking about purpose, and hadn't articulated it yet. But started talking about group purpose to the team, trying to inculcate the ideas, of really having a shared purpose. With one of the big banks in Australia, when you ask every one of their team members, what is the purpose of that bank, they will tend to make money and to help customers. But in this particular bank, they say, we are associated with the surf lifesaving helicopters around Australia. That is, from every staff member, they see the greater purpose of that organization as making sure our beaches are safe. And it's got nothing to do with banking. It's got nothing to do with mortgages, per se. It's just it's got to do with finding the people.
Lindsay Adams
Because Because I mean, beach is such a big part of the culture here in Australia, too.
Rael Bricker
Yes, absolutely. But it's it's just a way that every staff member in that bank gets one day a year. It's a day where they can go out and volunteer. And they're encouraged to volunteer for the surf lifesaving organization for that.
Lindsay Adams
Wow. All right. So I think, some interesting discussion and some, some ideas for you to ponder in your business and figure out what's your Why, what's your business? Why.
Rael Bricker
And so, in today's episode of the Business Excellence podcast, we've looked at what is your personal why, and how does that relate to your business? Why, and how do they tie into each other? We look forward to seeing you on the next episode of Business Excellence.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
