232 Jason and Steve - The Final Push

Are you looking to propel your business to new heights and make Q4 your strongest quarter yet? Jason and Steve share three key factors that helped a client outperform industry leaders, despite operating in a struggling sector. Discover how tying your passion and energy to a deeper purpose can refresh your motivation, how approaching Q4 with a fresh perspective can rejuvenate your business practices, and how the power of measurable goals can drive continual improvement. Gain actionable strategies and elevate your success in this final push!

In this episode, Steve and Jason discuss:

• Rewiring your mindset for a strong Q4 finish
• Tying passion and focus to a deeper purpose for renewed motivation
• Approaching Q4 with a fresh, rejuvenated perspective
• Measuring progress by involving others and seeking new insights
• Embracing measurable goals for growth and long-term success
  
  

Key Takeaways:

• Three key factors for a strong finish in Q4: tie your motivation to a deeper purpose, approach Q4 with a fresh, rejuvenated perspective, and involve others to gain new insights and measure progress.
• Seeking new perspectives from community members or coaches can rejuvenate business practices.
• Measuring progress through fresh eyes enables self-awareness and continual improvement.
• Having a plan with measurable goals requires courage but is necessary for growth and success.
• Strategic ambiguity provides an illusion of freedom, while measuring tangible goals leads to real freedom and success

“For this final push, the three surprising truths we discussed are: tie your efforts to something meaningful, anchor them by knowing your 'why,' and rejuvenate with fresh perspectives. Finally, the third key is to measure your progress.”

 - Jason Abell

Connect with Jason and Steve:

• LinkedIn: Jason or Steve
• Website Rewire, Inc.: Transformed Thinking
• Email: grow@rewireinc.com
  
  

Listen to the podcast here:

Steve and Jason- The Final Push

Hello everybody, and welcome to - I was going to say LinkedIn live, but it's actually our LinkedIn Live, because I got to imagine other people do LinkedIn Live, but this is our LinkedIn Live. My name is Steve Scanlon, I'm the CEO of Rewire Inc., and this is my business partner, Jason Abell.

Hello everybody. Welcome to the show.

Yeah. And so, we sort of tag team these shows. This is both a LinkedIn Live event, and it also gets posted under our Insight Interviews, which you can find where podcasts are found, right? All over the place. And so, we've been doing our Insight Interviews now for a little more than three years. I got that right, Jason?

Indeed. 250 episodes and counting.

Man.

I know.

We want to encourage you. In fact, go back and scan through this. It's so funny. We've done so many sometimes I go scan through and go, oh yeah, that one, and I'll go listen to it, and it's really, really good. But we got a lot to do today, so we want to dive in right away. You know, just, I guess this is a little bit of opening up the kimono to let you, as the listeners, get a little feel for how we do this. Jason and I are both not only the founders and runners of Rewire Inc., which we are an executive coaching company, but we also practice coaching with leaders all across the country, and it's not hard for us to get a feel for some really relevant things that are going on in the world. And so, what we try to do is go, we come together, you and I, Jason, and go, gosh, what can we bring to the table? And that's what we're gonna do today, and it usually starts from some event or something that happens to you and I, like, it's real. Like, this happened, and in this case, we decided, like, what you're gonna tell us about happened, happened, and we ended up building this event around it. So, what happened? Like, why? What happened?

Well, if you're if you're tuning into this, you're listening to this, and you saw the title, the big push, you know, finishing strong in in Q4, here we are in September of 2024, and in less than two weeks, we'll be in the fourth quarter and most organizations, most individuals who are in charge of leading organizations or sales groups, they're just looking, you know, over the horizon, into q4 going, yeah. Most people, like, I don't want to give up. I want to finish the year strong. And so, you're probably here because that is something that interests you. And with many of our clients, you know, it's funny, when you and I were planning this episode a few weeks ago, we're like, I got a client, I got a client. Hey, we've heard from our coaches and they've got clients where they're doing some really neat things to prepare for and really ensure that they close out the year strong. And so, it was like, okay, gosh, we could put them into a grab bag, because there's just so many different examples. But I do have an example, and I'm fortunate enough to coach this one individual in this one group, and in fact, we had a group coaching call this morning, and you know, I'll protect all identities, but here's the situation. So, this individual works in an industry that right now is really not doing that well, so much so that people are actively getting out of this industry right now. And not an industry that's like, dead forever type of thing never to return. It's not like they work for Blockbuster or something like that, but it's just an industry that's in a slump right now. And so, there's organizations getting out, there's people getting out. Well, this particular individual is running towards the storm in a very big way, meaning they ended up deciding to start a brand-new organization right now, this month, in this industry, that's not doing well at all. So, they're different. And he got a very small band of people together, and they are rallying very hard. And man, are they making it happen. The results that they're already having, only three weeks in business is surpassing the best of the best in this particular industry right now. And so, we looked at that, and we're like, what in the world? What is happening with this particular individual in this particular group that makes it different? Because and again, I was on with them this morning. There's passion, there's energy, there's focus, they're growing in all the same direction, and I can tell you right now they will be finishing Q4 strong as ever. So, you and I got together, and we said, okay, well, what is that? What's that thing, you know, that they have? And again, there's multiple clients that we have that are experiencing similar types of things as this particular story, and you and I have culled it down, Steve, to really three things that are happening right now.

These three things.

Well, I'm saying we culled it down, right? Like there's a bunch. Are there more than three? Sure, but there's three where, if we present them to you today, if they produce insights for you, or you grab one of them as your own and take it and run with it right now, with your team, oh, man, that would be great. So yeah, that's what we're gonna do today.

100%. Well, it's so funny, even though these weren't them, yeah, they have passion, yeah, they have energy and focus. I was thinking our next LinkedIn Live should be on passion, energy and focus.

Passion, energy and focus, yeah. Well, I tell you what. Our very first one, and this is, you know, this is where, if you got a pen and paper, or, you know, you're taking mental notes, this is our first key to your final big push to end the year strong, which is, tie it to something. Tie it to something, anchor it to something. Well, what the heck does that even mean? I don't know, Steve, you want to take a crack at that, what that means, or you want me to?

Well, I was waiting for you to crack at it because you and I culled this one. I think it just gets founded on your story, like think about the way that you said that story and what this individual is doing? It's inside an industry. I mean, you could probably tell us even more, but for the protection of confidentiality, maybe you don't. But as you told me that story, I was like, think about what that's tied to. It almost feels like an individual or a group of people going the heck with all this, this and this and this, they're tying it to winning at all costs. They're tying it to, we'll show the world that we can do this, because what we've got that it is tied to something that's outside, just the thing that they're doing.


Yeah, well, I left out a key part of the story to illustrate this very point, about tied to something. And by the way, whether it's Simon Synek’s “know your why”, whether it is foundational principles or anchoring, you know, something.

Purpose.

So, it's all the same thing, but with this particular individual, he wanted to start an organization to be able to build his legacy and turn over the organization one day to some of his offspring's. And the bigger picture, and this is a person that, quite frankly, he just doesn't need to work another day in his life from a financial standpoint, so he could very easily take his cleats off, put them on the field and walk away a winner, the top of the game, but he's like, no, no, I want to do this because I want to build something for future generations. And so, his tie it to something, what he's tied it to is this legacy aspect, this turning over to the next generation, this thing, this organization, this thriving organization that can get go on for years and years after he's done with the industry. So that is what he's tied it to. And it has rewired him, if you will. It's refreshed him. It's given him a new passion. And those in the small organization that he's locked his arms with, oh, man, the passion is infectious, because they're all like, yeah, let's do this, let's do this for the next generation. So that's what they've decided to tie it to.

 

Jason, I'm reminded right now, as we do LinkedIn Live, and you and I come together and we speak, and we speak all around the country at different events and different things like that, and generally speaking, our style of speaking is not really to speak. It's to invite. It's to ask. You know, from time to time, we do keynotes, but we'd much rather do workshops, and the reason is because even when you say tie it to something, if you think about it, that's a truth. That's one of the three things, the surprising truths, and know, it sounds a little bit like a command. I want to just ask the listeners, right here, right now, rather than hear it like Jason and I are telling you to tie it to something, and actually, instead of writing down our command, if you will, write it down as a question. What is my Q4 and the success that I'm going to have in Q4 tied to?

Yeah, thank you. Well said. Well said.

And if we have the time, we pause and we put people like, no, don't just ask that. Let's even invite people to begin to explore and think, which is what we get to do in coaching. And, you know, I just wanted to say, like, hey, in a thing like this, we're going tied it to something, which is, I think, again, might not seem so surprising until you actually write that down and ask, what does your successful Q4 mean? What is it tied to? And by the way, if you're like, I'm not sure, that's awesome. What a great thing to bring to a team. What is it tied to? Because your story, Jason, clearly points out that this person tied it to something, and you're already seeing this phenomenal level of success.

Yeah, and you touched on something that I just want to expand on a little bit. I mean, gosh, if you're listening to this on a podcast platform, or, you're re-watching or recording this on LinkedIn Live, push pause and ask yourself that question. What am I tying my thing to? My efforts, my industry, my career, whatever it is, what are you tying it to? And if you're like, gosh, I don't know, it’s okay. And maybe ask the question and just answer the first thing that comes to your brain. And even that, if that's a little bit more than what you currently had before, you know, I say bravo, and it might be the start of something meaningful for you. All right, Steve, number two.

As you and I have both noticed over the years, I am a self-professed amateur, and by the way, very amateur, etymologist. I love languages. I love the meanings in languages. I was fortunate enough to be able to live in Europe for a little while, and I get to speak a different language in my own home from time to time, and I just love what the meanings of language. I don't know why that's a passion, but I want to point to a word, and for anybody that's a Spanish speaker or an Italian speaker, if you have any thoughts out there, the word I want to point to is young. And again, in a group, I would say, how do you say young in Spanish? And most people would know it's Hoven. In Italian, in case you want to know, is Joven. We get the word, you can see, we get the word rejuvenate. And I think the surprising truth about looking at a season and saying, I want to make Q4 a better thing, how do you rejuvenate whatever it is you're going to do? In other words, how do you make it young? What did you do? Like you might come off and say, okay, I'm going to do this much and this and this and this, and sometimes the things we want to do, I gotta tell you, there could be some things that you want to do in Q4 where it might feel to you, Jason, like, is that just such a been there, done that? Am I going to do that again? And that's the essence of it feeling dated and hold. Here's the surprising truth. The ability to make something young again. What would you do in Q3, and this is just a mental exercise, and it's a question. As you look at what is going to make Q4 great for you, and you examine, and you have some disciplines, and you have some commitments and you have goals, which are all wonderful things, what would you do differently if it was the first time you ever did it? And that is the essence of rejuvenation. So, our number two thing is rejuvenate. And again, I just did my whole little silly language thing to point out that the word rejuvenation means to make young, which brings us back to this essence of, how do we and how can we look at Q4? Because you're as old as I am. I'm not going to say how old I am. I mean, I'm in my 30s.

Dude, awesome.

Just kidding.

You're old.

I've got these years, and I've been hearing about this Q3 to Q4 thing. I mean, even when we came up with, they were like, oh, here we go again. But it is the season, and this season returns, and when it does, how many times have we gone through this season? And so, I even began to look at it for our business, like, oh, here we go again. And lo and behold, you know what you and I did? We got into, like, starting to plan for Q4 and like, we're actually going off on a new thing, and we're looking at some of our own marketing things, and in the last even week in our own company, I gotta tell you, there's an excitement, like it's young again.



Yes, yeah, that's exactly right.

Here's one thing we did. Can't say the listeners got to do this. We were bringing, I shouldn't say brought, we're bringing a fresh set of eyes to an old problem.

Yeah, we’re rejuvenating that aspect of our business.

And we recognize that we need that fresh set of eyes, and that's and it's had an impact on us already. We haven't even executed on some of this stuff, and it's having an impact on us.


Yes, so well said. So, for you, the listener, if you're listening to this, is there anything in your business or your practice that could use a new set of eyes? And for us, it does mean hiring somebody for this specific aspect of our business, but it doesn't need to mean that. It could be your eyes that are looking at something from a different angle, or maybe the people around you, you know? You've got community of people around you.

                                                                                                         
"We've talked about this so many times on the podcast, how important the community around us is to ourselves and the success of our business. If you're listening to this, you have cheerleaders. You have people that are for you, and maybe it's just their eyes that could take a fresh look at some aspect of your business. So yeah, rejuvenate."


You and I both know that we're blessed enough to be those eyes for a lot of people who hire us to coach. I mean, that's part of, again, it's not like we have all the ideas, but we at least don't have all their ideas, right? We at least represent something that is rejuvenating, because we can ask different questions. You know, your guy, the person that's doing that, it's not like they don't know, but they totally appreciate you coming in, reflecting back, asking some different questions, and that is, in part, what it means to rejuvenate.

Oh, big time. Yeah, and you know, we don't do these LinkedIn Lives or podcasts as a commercial for coaching, we do because we want to add value, but it's hard not to go to the place that you're going to, right? Like, Steve, even this morning with this group that I told the story about, man, I was getting excited, feeding off of their rejuvenation. But guess what? Then I was able to reflect that back to them. It gave me joy. I was having a blast, and my having a blasted-ness gave them more energy and more whatever. So, it was like this thing that was happening that was just a lot of fun, but yeah, we get a ton of joy on being that person, that cheerleader, that collaborator, that person with curious questions, with different eyes, to help do the rejuvenation.

And dare we say, new eyes? And to your point, even though we do this for work, we need it too, lo and behold, because we need to keep looking at things and figuring out how we rejuvenate things.

As does everything.

Bring us to number three. You take you take number three.

Yeah, the number three. So, you and I talk often as we prepared this and we didn't want things to be the same old, same old. We use the word surprising in the description on purpose. And so, the last one, you may hear it and go, wait a minute. That's not surprising. What the heck is he talking about? But we've got some twist on it. So, the last thing is measure, which means, okay, you’ve gotten yourself a foundation, you've anchored something, you know your why, you're good on that, and, yeah, you have had other people look at you. You've rejuvenated yourself. Let's say you go check, check, well without measuring what the heck is going on, how in the world do you know if you got there, or you're getting there, or you're improving, or you're really backsliding, or whatever? So, it really is this idea of measuring it. And what I would say is take some fresh eyes, some rejuvenated eyes, on this idea of measuring. Measuring itself isn't new, but we're asking you to look at it in a different way, in a new way.

Jason, under the spirit of measuring, gosh, it's so funny. When we do this together, I could see your brain going in a million places, and my brain's going too. One thing I want to ask is, based on your experience as a coach and people come in, and we all understand that having a plan and measuring that plan is better than not having a plan. Couldn't we all agree with that?

Right on.

Everybody that you coach knows that having a plan is better than not having a plan, correct?

Sure.

Just based on your experience in business, in general, I mean, maybe not the people we coach, but in general, what percentage of people have a plan?

Most do not.

So everybody agrees, almost everybody, and very few people have it, and I want to suggest it's because the measurement component of planning, and maybe this is where it gets a little wild, I think it requires courage.

Sure, it does. I don't think it does, it does.

I mean the surprising thing is not you and I come and going, oh, you should measure. Well, we know that, and we've always known that. Even when you and I were recently doing it, I noticed this tug, like, God, you know, if we say it like that and this, and we whatever, we're putting our neck out.

Yeah, yeah.

And I felt this, oh, we better talk about it more, or discuss it more. And hey, my gravitational pull towards hey, can't we just say, let's be a great company and call it a day?

Sure, it's easier.

Right. But how would we ever know?

Yeah, yeah.

So, you and I recently did that one exercise that we did. We're like, numbers this, that, this, that. I was like, it tugs at your soul to do that. And guess what? You know, I love the saying people say failure is not an option. Here's a little coaching for people that think failure is not an option. Sure, it is it. Failure not being an option is a wonderful thing if you're trying to bring men back from the moon on a broken spacecraft. I get it that. That's a good mantra. In life, it's absolutely an option, and we must confront that and face that, because if failure is not an option, you might have a hard time measuring stuff.

Yeah, that's exactly right. It's much, much easier to not measure, which is why we're talking about this now there. There are some adages that are out there, and one of them is, and you've probably heard this before, what gets measured gets done.

100%.

Boy, is that true. And what I've seen from a coach's chair is, it’s most people's go to be just a little bit ambiguous, because if I can be if I can operate in the gray zone that no one really knows, including myself, if I'm really doing what I'm supposed to be doing, or what I committed to myself to be doing. But when you're specific and you measure, what did we say as we were preparing for this, Steve? The M in smart, right? Specific, Measurable, Attainable, and with a time around it. That is the M in smart goals. Like, if you don't measure it, then you just don't know and it's sometimes it's a little bit more comfortable to not know.

Well, yeah, you brought up what's referred to as strategic ambiguity.

Exactly.

I did a whole lesson on strategic ambiguity, and I actually I taught it really well. You want to know why? Because I do it so effectively. We all do. But yeah, exactly. You know, my wife says, can you bring the garbage out? I'm like, yes. She says, when? And I'm like, soon. That's an example of strategic ambiguity.

Exactly.

And again, this is just an awareness thing. When I'm practicing strategic ambiguity, it gives me the illusion of freedom. It's the illusion of freedom. So, if you're listening to this and you hear Jason say, measure, when you actually do, there will be a small period of time where you feel like, and that's the courage. It's if I say that and I get to that and it's tangible and boom, it feels very emotional. It'll feel like it lacks freedom. But here's the surprising truth.

It’s the opposite.

It's freedom-giving.

Yes.

It's freedom-giving. It doesn't rob you of freedom, it gives you freedom. But it won't feel like that initially, if I'm being honest. It doesn't for me, it doesn't for my clients, and so, measure. That's why the spin on this, that's a surprise. And again, you could even write this down, yes, measure, and still not measure. You could totally agree, and still not get there.

Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right. I had a client the other day give me a, you know, you and I don't do a lot of tweeting on x these days, but if I did, I would write this down. This comes from a client. We were talking about this idea of measuring, and were actually, we're talking about the fourth quarter and how he was going to lead his team into it, and he said around measuring, because we were talking about this having courage and this type of thing. And he said, here's the deal, Jason. Strong people who measure, they win, weak people who don't measure, they lose. And I said, which one do you want to be? He's like, exactly, I'm a winner, so I'm measuring. And I'm like, okay, that's pretty, like, you know, very guttural, like, right down to brass tax type of thing.

My brain was going, well, what about strong people who don't and weak people who do? But we won’t go there.

Uh, oh, yeah, I don't know, but anyways, yeah. If you want to get somewhere, and you think about putting it in your maps app, or Google Maps, or whatever, like, it measures exactly the distance you need to go, until you need to make that right hand turn, and it does the same thing for the left hand turn, or the on-ramp or whatever. It's specific, because if it's not specific, it may generally get you in the direction you want to go, but it may not. But when it is specific and it's measured out, then guess what? You get to your destination at the exact time that the dang app says you're going to get to your destination.

Yeah, well, and we don't have time today, but we coach a lot of leaders. I can hear some of the people that I've worked with come in and go, okay, in Q4 I want to actually develop our culture. And so even with that, it's a beautiful thing. I want to, but let's say we're at the end of Q4, it's December, and without some tangible benchmarks, how would we know? Did we? Didn't we? And I don't know, most people's goals if they just chalk it up to any given day in the future of how they felt about it, that's not really as meaningful as it would be if we said no. What are the things that were?

Yeah, really good. So, for this final push, the three surprising truths that we went over were tie it to something, anchor it, get that foundation, know your why, tie it to something, rejuvenate, with all the languages that Steve brought into it and the entomology rejuvenate and finally, third key is measure. Tie it to something, rejuvenate and measure. Steve, 30 seconds for a last word? Before and while you're giving the last word, I will pull up our QR code. If any of this sounds interesting and you want to dive into it more, you want to figure out, you want to bring this material to your team, live or virtual, or you'd like to look into coaching, snap this QR code, let's get on our calendar and let's chat about this. But Steve, 30 seconds to any last words, my friend?

No, not really. Nothing that would detract from those three things. And I think that was the point. All right, one little last word. We're mindset coaches. We've been saying that for a long time we help people.
                                                                                                     
"We have a saying that you can't help people actually act differently until you help them think differently, and so that's kind of the angle that we take on coaching, and yet we're still about results, because you can have a great mindset and still not get results."

And so, I, for one, really appreciated the time to come through and think about how some of these things are tangible ways that we can make the fourth quarter better and not just think differently. If they help you think differently, that's awesome. Don't forget that all the thinking in the world without action behind it is just maybe, again, might not get you anywhere, even if you do think, right? So, I love the action tied behind this.

Yeah. So good. Well, we hope that every single one of you that are listening has an amazing fourth quarter, and we'd love to hear from you. So, we're wrapping up this episode of The Insight Interviews, which is also this month's feature of the LinkedIn Live. So, from Rewire, from Jason and Steve, see you later, everybody.

We'll see you next time.

                                                                                                              ---

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• Grow@RewireInc.com