What’s the difference between being in charge and being in control? In this episode, Dan Sullivan shares his surprising insights on managing teams and creating a productive work environment, offering practical strategies for empowering team members, fostering independence, and creating a thriving organizational culture. Tune in to discover Dan's proven approach to entrepreneurial leadership!

Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:

• Why self-managing has to be built in from the very beginning.
• What gives Dan confidence in his concepts and tools.
• What people rely on entrepreneurs for as leaders.
• Why Dan doesn’t intervene when a team member might fail on a project.
• The difference between leadership and management—and being in charge versus being in control.
• How Strategic Coach® makes sure their team members don’t get burned out.
• Why Dan doesn’t even think about anyone who might be competing with Strategic Coach.

Show Notes:

• The number one skill for having a Self-Managing Company® is profound ignorance. The number one structure is Unique Ability Teamwork®.
• If you don’t get everyone’s roles right, you won’t get anything else right.
• It’s hard to correct a mistake you’ve made from the beginning.
• Confidence in your concepts and team is more crucial than trust.
• Confidence can come from knowing that you’ll always transform when you fail.
• A truly Self-Managing Company operates successfully independent of your constant oversight.
• Giving your team members the freedom to innovate, contribute, and pursue their Unique Ability® is essential to long-term business growth and success.
• Many entrepreneurs pride themselves on being hands-on with everything that happens at their company, but it’s important to resist the urge to rescue struggling teams.
• Being hands-off means allowing your team to learn from failures and trusting that they’ll develop problem-solving skills.
• Trust means that you’re taking a risk, and entrepreneurship is founded on risk.
• Everything that Strategic Coach needs to be is organized on teamwork.
• Strategic Coach has great institutional habits and institutional wisdom.
• In science, the experiment cannot depend upon the experimenter. The same applies to business.
• Being in control is management; being in charge is leadership.
• Make sure the little things that have to be there every day are right—the freedoms and supports that allow team members to thrive—and everything else will fall into place.

Resources:

Unique Ability®

Blog: What Is A Self-Managing Company®?

Blog: Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage

Blog: Time Management Strategies For Entrepreneurs (Effective Strategies Only)

Blog: Transforming Experiences Into Multipliers

A Free Day™ is a 24-hour period with no work-related activity whatsoever. A great many entrepreneurs struggle with taking true Free Days™. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about The Entrepreneurial Time System®—which consists of Free Days, Focus Days™, and Buffer Days™—and why it’s essential for you to provide structure to your Free Days if you want the greatest business success.

Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:

• The purpose of each of the three types of days in The Entrepreneurial Time System.
• Some non-work activities you can use to structure your days.
• Why it can be much easier to work than to take a day off.
• Why entrepreneurs are so resistant to taking days off entirely without work.
• Why you shouldn’t have an unplanned Free Day.

Show Notes:

You gravitate to the part of your life that has the most structure.

Taking a day as if it were a Free Day, but structuring it with activities that are business activities, means that you're not going to be rejuvenated by the day.

You can have a lot of structure to your days even when you’re not working.

You can do activities on Free Days that you would never touch on a workday.

Structure means that you’ll be supported by things that are already planned.

If you have an idea on a Free Day, wait to see if it sticks with you until a workday.

It’s a lot easier to set out to write 100 books than to set out to write only one book.

An idea that is really great bothers you because it wants to be born into the world.

You can still use all your strengths when you’re on a Free Day.

Profitability means you’re not only making money, you’re keeping money.

Your plans regarding retirement affect how you take your Free Days.

Resources:

Article: What Free Days Are, And How To Know When You Need Them

Perplexity app

Article: Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage

The Impact Filter™

Podcasting is the future of content. Are you ready to master it? Join Dan Sullivan, Shannon Waller, and industry veteran Paul Colligan as they dive into the business of podcasting, from where it was to where it’s going. With over 20 years of trailblazing experience, Paul shares secrets to podcasting success and the mindsets that separate the amateurs from the pros. Learn how to create a hit show and leverage this booming medium to skyrocket your business influence and growth.

Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode

• What it was like in the early days of podcasting.
• The factors that led to podcasting becoming what it is today.
• What entrepreneurs love about podcasting.
• Dan and Shannon’s early experiences with podcasting.
• How podcasts let you find people who share your mindset and values.
• The type of people who are plugged into podcasting.
• Predictions on the future of podcasts.

Show Notes:

It takes less than five minutes to submit your podcast to Audible for free. And you’re in the directory less than 10 minutes later.

It's always mindset that stops people from trying something new.

The value of the content needs to be understood as greater than its packaging.

The best thing about podcasting is the speed of creation.

It’s easy to tell when a podcaster is following a script.

In a good podcast, you don't know what the second question will be until you've asked the first question.

If you try to control the experience of a podcast, you lose the authenticity of the end product.

Listeners feel like they have a personal relationship with podcasters.

Podcasting has had a profound impact on how politicians speak.

People now use the podcast standard for judging all public speaking.

Podcasts are only popular in countries where they have cell phones.

The only problem with new media is when you treat it like old media.

Resources:

The Gap and the Gain by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

Podcast: Podcast Payoffs with Dan Sullivan and Gord Vickman

Podcast: 10xTalk with Dan Sullivan and Joe Polish

Podcast: Shannon Waller’s Team Success

The Team Success Handbook by Shannon Waller

AI As Your Teammate by Evan Ryan

Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

descript.com

Article: “Scary Times” Success Manual: How To Be A Leader When Times Get Tough

Article: Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage

The Positive Focus®

Once You’re Lucky, Twice You’re Good by Sarah Lacy

Entrepreneurs are aware of all the tasks that need to be completed to run a successful business, but if they try to do it all themselves, complexity arises and it’s simply not efficient. In this episode, Shannon Waller and guest host, associate coach Gary Mottershead, talk about why you have to find the right people when you just don’t have the skills, talents, and energy for certain tasks.

After entrepreneurs reach a certain level of success, they can feel “held hostage” by a variety of things, from competing through price cutting to not being able to hire the right people. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain how the entrepreneur themselves is partly responsible for being stuck like this, and how they can make a decision and take action in order to free themselves and create a better future.

Strategic Coach® has been growing for three decades by sticking to our core values. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller describe each of the four values and how they lead to attracting the right team members and providing the best experience and value to our entrepreneurial clients.

Dan Sullivan has been coaching entrepreneurs for nearly 50 years. In this episode, he and Shannon Waller discuss the key aspects of Strategic Coach® thinking tools and why they’re unique and invaluable to entrepreneurs.

David Braithwaite worked evenings and did everything else he thought all entrepreneurs had to do until Strategic Coach® taught him a better way: planning your days so that you’re taking effective time off—and getting more done when you’re on the job and dealing with clients. Here, he explains how The Entrepreneurial Time System® challenges the status quo and revolutionized the way he does business.

You want to be yourself and provide unique value, so it’s not fair to expect other people to conform to your way of doing things. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about the importance of granting others the freedom to be themselves.

When our situations dramatically change, many people focus on the negatives and get paralyzed by them. But entrepreneurs are used to scary times. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss and give examples of how entrepreneurs can find opportunities and success when things don’t go as planned.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In the conclusion to this mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how, with the right mindsets and strategies, scary times can lead to your best ever growth.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 10 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss forgetting about your complaints and focusing on your gratitude.

Employment opportunities for people with blue collar skills are going to keep growing. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk to Kenny Chapman, CEO of The Blue Collar Success Group, about his entrepreneurial path and how skilled blue-collar work is going to be much more crucial, popular, and needed going forward.

Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:

• How Kenny’s experience in the military led him to becoming an entrepreneur.
• What The Blue Collar Success Group helps with.
• How Kenny “leveled up” his self-esteem.
• The biggest benefits he gets from being in The Strategic Coach® Program.
• How Kenny used his growth mindset to expand his business and then branch out.

Show Notes:

In the 1940s, being a plumber was a valued career.

Blue-trade industry covers hundreds of different specialized skills.

It takes good leadership to have a good company.

If you don't operate an effective, good model, you're not going to have what you need in order to pay people top of market and above.

Mindset drives everything, and clarity drives direction.

Identity limits us a lot.

You're much more valuable the more you learn and the more you see.

When we hear the word “education,” we've automatically trained our brains to think “higher education.”

Like colleges, skilled trades are not created equal.

Customers complain about price no matter how much it is. So you might as well get customer complaints at a profitable number.

Resources:

The Blue Collar Success Group

Blue Collar Success Laws by Kenny Chapman

The Six Dimensions of C.H.A.N.G.E. by Kenny Chapman

Visual Thinking by Temple Grandin

Kolbe

CliftonStrengths®

GravyStack

The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan

The Impact Filter™

Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

Unique Ability®

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 9 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about forgetting about what’s missing and focusing on what’s available to you right now.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 8 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller share why it’s important to forget about the event and focus on the only thing you have control over: your responses.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 7 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about giving up who you used to be and focusing on who you can be in this “new normal.”

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 6 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller advise forgetting about the future you had envisioned and focusing on the only place you can take action: the present.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 5 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain what you need to do to forget about your difficulties and instead focus on the progress you can make.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 4 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss forgetting about the opportunities that have been lost because of the current situation, and focusing on the ones that have been created.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 3 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about the dangers of trying to make sales as if these were normal times.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 2 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about turning your focus toward bringing value to your most important relationships.

When events happen that disrupt our lives, it can be scary—but there are ways to be positive even now. In part 1 of this ten-part mini-series, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller break down why it’s best to focus on others, and how best to do it.

What happens when you can’t plan for the future? What do you when your old ways of running your business, connecting with clients, and providing value are no longer relevant? In this second of two installments of Inside Strategic Coach, Dan and Shannon share proven strategies entrepreneurs can use to not only maintain their businesses during periods of instability and change, but grow their capabilities (and usefulness!) too.

Every great entrepreneur wants (and deserves) to have a dependable team around them so they can be freed up to develop new ideas and focus on growing their business. But how do you get one? After all, the first question most entrepreneurs ask when they join The StrategicⓇ Program is, “Where do you find such great team members?” In this episode of Inside Strategic Coach, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller finally answer this question in-depth. From identifying and nurturing your team’s areas of Unique AbilityⓇ and creating a positive and collaborative work culture to investing in team members’ growth, Dan and Shannon share everything that makes Strategic CoachⓇ a magnet for skilled and passionate talent—and how your business can become one too.

Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:

•  The number one tool necessary for building and maintaining a great team.
•  How to determine if an activity is right for an individual.
•  Why Strategic Coach team members don’t really need to be managed, monitored, or motivated.
• How Strategic Coach creates an incredible sense of safety for its team members.
• The two things that team members are looking for.
• Why you should think of hiring someone as an investment, not a cost.

Show Notes:

At Strategic Coach, you’re always either winning or learning.

There are a lot of Coach tools that support having a great team.

Everybody's on their own unique growth path in terms of who they are and the kind of work they’re most likely to enjoy and excel at.

Strategic Coach team members can continually focus their time at work on doing what they’re excited about.

The moment someone is hired, Coach invests in learning about who that person is and how they can grow their skills.

At Strategic Coach, if something doesn’t work, the system gets blamed, not the individual.

The four core values of Strategic Coach (PAGE) are: positive and collaborative teamwork; being alert, curious, responsive, and resourceful; getting results; and providing an excellent first-class experience.

Strategic Coach has uniformly very helpful and very positive team members.

Some Coach clients have been with the company for 15, 20, 25 years, and so have some team members.

The educational system generally disparages successful business people.

Almost all Coach team members are directly in contact on a person-to-person level with the company’s clients.

A team member can’t be at their best if they don’t feel safe.

If you want great team members, you have to be a great entrepreneur. And that also includes being a great person.

Great team members who want a bigger future aren't interested in being with someone who doesn't have any future.

If you're going to be able to attract and retain the best people out there, you can’t have an entitled attitude.

Resources:

Unique AbilityⓇ

Article: Your Business Is a Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage

The Team Success Handbook by Shannon Waller

Everyone And Everything Grows by Dan Sullivan

Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

What happens when the marketplace shuts down or people aren’t buying what you have to sell? What do you do when fear and anxiety have taken over? In this first of two installments of Inside Strategic Coach, Dan and Shannon share proven strategies entrepreneurs can use to not only maintain their businesses during periods of instability and change, but provide leadership and value at the same time.

Entrepreneurs often reach a point where they’re still making money but the work is no longer exciting or stimulating, leading to boredom and ultimately to poor decisions. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about what you can focus on and the ways you can take on new activities so that you’ll expand your world, love the work, and the money will just come in.

Unique Ability is one of our core concepts at Strategic Coach. In this special episode, associate coach Teresa Easler discusses the true value of Unique Ability and why understanding and utilizing your Unique Ability is so important as an entrepreneur. Among other invaluable lessons, Teresa tells the story of why she walked away from a $500K proposal because it didn’t utilize her Unique Ability and refutes the number-one complaint that prevents most entrepreneurs from fully utilizing their own Unique Ability.

If you’re like a lot of entrepreneurs, part of your mind is still on work when you’re away from the office. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how to get real rejuvenation out of your days off.

What does an entrepreneur do once their company has grown 100x from where they started? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about growing 1,000x with their clients over the next 25 years.

It can be hard to succinctly convey ideas using words, but one diagram can communicate as much as ten written pages. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss how using graphics can be the best way to get your ideas across clearly.

Thinking about doing something you don’t like can be more unpleasant, and take longer, than actually doing it. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller share how delegating tasks and changing deadlines can eliminate “dread time.”

Many people think that it’s impossible to be a hero in the world today, but they’re thinking of the wrong kind of hero. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how entrepreneurs can go about becoming heroes to their customers by helping them change their lives.

Strategic Coach® is celebrating 30 years of coaching entrepreneurs to be bigger and better! In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller look back at how the company name and some of its core concepts came about.

Once an entrepreneur has achieved some degree of growth, it’s easier to take the next steps and grow exponentially bigger. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how to continue growing, building on what you’ve already begun.

When things need to get done, it doesn’t mean that you, as the entrepreneur, need to do them yourself. In fact, for the best kinds of business growth and business success, you need to do as little as possible. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller share the three rules for having a friction-free future.

Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:

• The way to achieve more by actually doing less.
• Why you need to be clear about what you want to be doing.
• How to determine the minimum you need to do for a goal to be achieved.
• Why things getting done without your doing them yourself means you’re growing.

Show Notes:

Strategic Coach has a lot of tools for creating teamwork where other people do work that you don't like doing.

For every task, there’s someone who’s great at it, loves doing it, and finds it energizing to do.

There are times in your past where you’ve done a lot, but someone else would have done it if you’d done nothing.

Friction is where you’re moving, but you’re being resisted by forces.

When a new thing has to be done, ask yourself three questions: Is there any way this can be achieved by me doing nothing? What’s the minimum I have to do for this to be achieved? Is there anyone else who can do my minimum?

The more you stick to the three rules, the more gets achieved by things you instigate.

Rather than having pride about the things that get done, some entrepreneurs have pride about doing the things that get things done.

An entrepreneur is only required for the activities they love doing.

Resources:

Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

The Impact Filter™

Unique Ability®

Article: Your Productivity At Its Best With This Guaranteed Hack

Strategic Coach® has been making dreams come true for entrepreneurs for 30 years and counting. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how they’ve found lasting success by sticking to their coaching model in a changing world.

It’s a common myth that all entrepreneurs have to deal with competition, so many entrepreneurs convince themselves that they enjoy competing. But the truth is that there’s a way to operate completely competition-free and to be able to price your product or service without paying attention to what anyone else is charging. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain how focusing on doing what you’re unique at means nobody can compete with you.

For a lot of entrepreneurs, the only options seem to be to tackle the activities they don’t like doing or else manage someone else as they do them. But in this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain how you can instead link up with people so that everyone’s doing what they want to do while working toward your company’s goals.

Intelligence, smarts, and IQ are only part of the success formula for entrepreneurs. You can be the smartest person in the room, but if you're not in the habit of taking action and recognizing opportunity, you have no advantage over anyone else. Dan and Shannon share the difference between your mind and your brain, and how to use them both for a rich and fulfilling life.

Most entrepreneurs charge according to what their competition is charging, but that isn’t the way to get what you’re worth. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about why setting your price should be determined by what customers will be willing to pay.

Most people are held back by how much time and effort they think is needed to get big results. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about a way of thinking that allows you to go against gravity.

Even if you know that you need an entrepreneurial coach, how do you know the differences and benefits of one-on-one vs. group coaching? Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller share insights on how to make the right decision, and how the community you'll discover in a Strategic Coach workshop is part of what keeps entrepreneurs with us for life.

Female entrepreneurs face obstacles that male entrepreneurs don’t because of expectations of both men and women. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain how, if they stick with it and become successful, female entrepreneurs will eventually have advantages over their male peers.

A lot of entrepreneurs are motivated to introduce an idea that will disrupt an industry, but there will be negative reactions and consequences to taking that approach. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how it’s better to focus on creating something new than to attack something that already exists.

Highly-charged emotional reactions are normal. Especially when you’re dealing with unexpected wins and big upsets. It’s what you learn from those experiences, however, that can have the biggest impact on your future success. In this episode, Dan Sullivan shares some personal life experiences that he transformed into big breakthroughs as well as a process you can use to take the good and bad from every situation and learn from it.

Everything that humans create is done with tools. But the skill level people have for using tools varies drastically. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss why it’s essential to be good at using the tool of language for both thinking and communicating, and share the thinking tools that all entrepreneurs can use for both business success and business growth.

Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:

• Why Dan vowed years ago to never again operate his business with receivables.
• Why you’re never starting from zero.
• How entrepreneurs can learn what to do in the future by looking at their past.
• How Strategic Coach® thinking tools improve clients’ lives.
• Dan’s process for developing and introducing new Strategic Coach thinking tools.

Show Notes:

One of the reasons to get really good at language is because it gives you the tools for thinking and communicating.

If you don’t have the language to think about things, you’re trapped by your emotions.

If your language skills aren’t good enough, people can only respond to your emotions.

A lot of small businesses stay small because they never really comprehended what entrepreneurship really was.

Some things that are impossible can become possible if you change your thinking.

Strategic Coach currently has roughly 250 thinking tools in the company’s 35th year.

Every quarter, Dan creates three or four new thinking tools.

New thinking tools address new things that are happening to entrepreneurs where there isn't a structure for thinking about it.

Questions about the future are tools for instigating a thinking process.

You always have to have a bigger and better future to bounce your present off of.

In today’s world, ideas and processes have tremendous value.

Resources:

Total Cash Confidence by Dan Sullivan

Article: This Tool Will Help You Make Sense Of The Past AND Take Charge Of Your Future

The Impact Filter™

Your Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan Sullivan

The Transformation Trilogy by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

Article: The Four Freedoms That Motivate Successful Entrepreneurs

Everyone And Everything Grows by Dan Sullivan

The Positive Focus®

The Entrepreneur’s Guide To Time Management

Managing is about being given answers, while coaching is about being asked good questions so you can come up with your own answers. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain why coaching is what’s needed for entrepreneurs to keep growing.

Has it ever seemed impossible to make a lot of money off your new idea before competition swarms in? There are ways around this problem. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how you can stay competition-proof while making as much profit as possible from your idea.

Bureaucracies are necessary for much of society to function, but they’re not a good fit for those who value unpredictability and positive recognition for being a hero. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about how the values that are unappreciated in bureaucracies are rewarded in the creative field of entrepreneurship.