Transforming Learning and Development with Marty Baird

Speaker A: Good day, everyone. I'm excited to welcome you to the Shocking Profit Podcast. I'm, um, Tim Van Megham, your Shocking Profit host. Today's guest is Marty Baird. And if you've ever looked at your business and thought, we're working hard, so why does this deal feel harder than it should? This episode is for you. Marty is the CEO of Robinson and Associates and and is the creator of the RAD Method, a practical, battle tested way to help business owners get unstuck, to make better decisions, and to actually see results from all that effort. And it's not theory. Marty spent decades in the trenches helping leaders bring clarity to chaos and discipline to growth. Reveal Ask do the RAD Method builds on replacing lectures with engagement. Join me in welcoming Marty Baird. Let's dive in.

Speaker B: You're listening to the Shocking Profit podcast, a show for business owners and leaders who are interested in finding new ways to claim and create value in their companies. Shocking Profit is a practical and endlessly fascinating study of how to effectively run

Speaker A: a company and build wealth.

Speaker B: Host Tim Van Megham has decades worth of business battle scars from working in the trenches with business leaders. He is here to share his experience to make your journey a bit less treacherous and a lot more profitable.

Speaker A: Shockingly profitable. M Now here's your host, Marty. First, thank you for, for joining us. And I think this would be, oh, total pleasure. Total, uh, pleasure. And here's a very basic question. Rad Reveal Ask do tell us more.

Speaker B: So we've been in the learning and development training space for over 30 years. And what we realized very early was that most training has a high failure rate. And the reason, and we've looked at the research from schools and education and it's very well documented that I'm going to ask you to guess what percent of information is retained in a lecture environment.

Speaker A: Hmm. M. Uh, 30. 30%.

Speaker B: See, that's what most people think. It's usually between 3 and 5%.

Speaker A: Oh my.

Speaker B: And so when you look at schools, when you look at any place that is a, um, lecture or learning place, it's just a low success rate. And then people say, but we did the training, why didn't it stick? And so we spent a lot of time looking at it. And the answer was because people aren't engaged, they're not involved. And we always talk to talk about it as they're being talked at instead of talked with. And so when you create that environment where people are engaged. And so rad is all this designed around the Socratic method? Socrates said, everyone knows everything all we have to do is ask the right questions. So the RAD method with Reveal Ask do is we can talk about a topic, reveal ask questions, to bring in that engagement, to create that part of participation. And then ultimately the do is people remember more if they do more. And so even if it's something as simple as before our, um, meeting tomorrow, come in with these three things, well, they're more likely to do it. And if you build the pattern, then they understand at the end of every meeting or every presentation, it's not just going to be, well, walk out in the hallway and get onto our merry way. It's like, no, I've got to be prepared for tomorrow or next week or next month.

Speaker A: And, uh, it makes very good sense. And we see the same thing. Uh, if you tell somebody something, they're going to forget it before you're done. If you show them, they may remember it. But if you involve them, if they are part of the solution, that is when the magic happens.

Speaker B: It absolutely is. And it's weird that we all know it, but somehow we've been programmed to not do it. Uh, we do work with a Fortune 500 company, a semiconductor company, and everybody in the RAD session is either an engineer, a master's level, or a Ph.D. and so they're very, very smart people. And when we're sharing the RAD method with them, um, their first instinct is to go back to being the subject matter expert, talking at the room, even though we're telling them that's not the most effective way. And it's weird how it just takes repetition and it takes practice to kind of break that muscle memory. And I think we have kind of programmed into us because if you went to church, the priest or the preacher lectured, if you went to school, the teacher lectured, um, you're there. In Indiana, I went to Purdue University. And we would have 500 people in a class and we'd have a professor long time ago with a chalkboard, and they would write and write and write. You'd see their back, and then they would roll up one chalkboard and they'd go to the next one and roll up another, and you'd walk out saying, I've got a mountain of notes. I wonder what was important. And the challenge is we just have been programmed that way for so long that it's really very counterintuitive and hard for people to break that pattern.

Speaker A: Yes. So, uh, ty this. Uh, it makes perfect sense about being thoughtful and preparing for training. And I would imagine for any kind of communication, even A meeting can help help you transform it from maybe something close to a waste of time to something that actually engages and grabs people. And they, they change, they incorporate something into their performance, into their plan or what have you, um, tie it to though performance for the company. How. And maybe it's the term I've heard you talk about frontline consistency.

Speaker B: Well, it's interesting because you kind of separated out training from presenting and all

Speaker A: the rest of it.

Speaker B: Um, we talk about this all the time. That when you're presenting, whether it's one on one or one to ten or one to a hundred, there's two outcomes you want. One of these two things is the big buckets. It's either for them to learn something or to sell something. You're selling an idea, you're selling a process, you're selling them on improvement. And the challenge is because it's not seen as a learning experience, it's more of seen as a just share. I've just got to get it out. And if you kind of take that half step back and you say, okay, what's in it for the people that I'm talking to? What do they care about? What's important to them? And then you structure the information so they see value in it. Again, I see this all the time is. I think of Charlie Brown's teacher. When you would watch one of the cartoons, say it a little louder. Wa, wa wa. Exactly. And so it seems humorous. But to a child, when a teacher talks, oftentimes it's wa, wa, wa, wa, wa wa wa.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: Well, the challenge is when we have supervisors and managers and even C suite people talk, oftentimes it turns into that because they're telling me things that are important to them. But I don't know, it's important to me. And so if I'm engaged in it, if I'm part of the process, if you're asking me questions now all of a sudden, I always physically talk about leaning in. You know, does the room lean back as though you're just talking at me, or do they lean in? Because we're going to have a conversation. We're going to have a discussion.

Speaker A: So the. And I, um, imagine this has a big impact. How it ends up impacting performance profitability is through employee engagement, morale, retention. M. Maybe it would be good to just share a story, Marty, about a, uh, journey. You've helped a client walk through what you found, what you helped with. And what. How did that change their world?

Speaker B: Well, it's interesting because your group is in the area of looking at productivity, how do we improve performance? And I'm just going to ask you, if you were to guess your average client, where is their biggest budget item?

Speaker A: Uh, it's a couple of areas. It could be, if it's a heavy material, the cost of materials, otherwise it's labor in salaries.

Speaker B: Exactly.

Speaker A: People. M mhm.

Speaker B: And we spend all this money and all this time improving, but we don't focus on our biggest expense area, which is people.

Speaker A: Well, yeah. And even just. I want to put an emphasis on that before you move on from that point. Because the other part of people is. Is also very closely tied to process. It's not about productivity or efficiency, it's about velocity and how much more can we get through if we do it well. Uh, so people is not only a major line item, but it can have an outsized impact on profitability, performance, customer service levels. When you help people to not have to spend their time doing things that the customer won't pay for.

Speaker B: Absolutely. And part of that is, again, going back to rad is if they're engaged, if you're creating that environment where it's a collaborative effort, where you're having conversations and you're showing why this is not only important to the client and not only important to the company, but it's important to you because your job. We say it all the time with our clients. It's like, you start off and you say, who wants less stress? Everybody raises their hand. Um, everybody raises their hand. And then we say, but if we show you how to do this, this and this, you have less stress. And I'll tell you, make more money. And who knows, you could be promoted. Because one of the things we find in many of our sessions is there are so many hidden gems. There are these people who are, uh, pigeonholed. They're kind of locked in, and people see them a certain way, and then all of a sudden, when they start to share ideas and information, it's like, wow, I didn't know that.

Speaker A: Uh, diamond in the Rock.

Speaker B: We talk about it all the time. Have you seen the movie Moneyball?

Speaker A: Oh, yes, absolutely. Love that movie.

Speaker B: In the movie, he talks about, you know, the, the people who are identifying talent. And he talks about the eye test. And it's like, oh, that guy's not very good because his girlfriend's ugly. He lacks confidence. Oh, that guy's not very good because of this. And they're doing it all by their eye. And instead of looking at and letting the person really demonstrate what their potential is, they're Kind of cast away and just a, uh, fun statistic. Companies pay a person to come in 20% more on average than if they would have promoted somebody from the out, um, from the inside. So that's kind of a tax, if you will. The other part about it is only 40% or no 40% of new hires don't make it 18 months in the kind of supervisor, manager and upper level. Well, the challenge is it takes 18 months for them to learn the culture, learn the process, learn the system. So you're wasting so much money. And again, it's just kind of a unseen cost.

Speaker A: You know, this reminds me, uh, of my own personal journey on the business development and sales side. I'll, uh, share with Marty. My inclination is to do exactly what you described as essentially the before picture. I love when I go into a sales call and I explain how amazingly brilliant we are. I share our case studies, I dazzle them with, you know, all that great stuff. And it, that doesn't work when I can go into a meeting. And when I think about that, we all like to be heard. Every, I think every human being likes to be seen and heard. I like to be valued. Right. And here's the challenge that you're giving to the executives, uh, is if you're willing to let that go, and instead of you being heard, your team is heard, the kids are outside.

Speaker B: I'm sorry to interrupt, but that is absolutely in line with what we talk about is most presentation skills training is how to be a great presenter.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: And they're teaching how to be an actor. I'm going to act like a presenter. Well, the reality is, and this is where we make 180 degree shift is the presenter is the guide, the heroes are the participants. And it takes all the stress, fear and anxiety out of presenting because I don't have to be the hero. I'm just helping you. And as we talked about, you present. So people learn. And again, whether it's one on one or one to 20 or 200, I'm doing it so they learn or buy something. So if they're the heroes, I'm going to have a much better outcome than if I'm the hero. Because then it's just like, oh, that was fun, and I forget about it two minutes later.

Speaker A: That's right, yeah. And, uh, so much of what we focus on in shocking profit in this podcast and is truly helping, uh, is for the leaders of the company to not drive change, but rather to have their teams constantly developing the next level and driving change down to, uh, so that everybody in the company owns some aspect of it, something they take pride in, something that they have the resources and tools and authority and to affect it, to make it better, to make it what it should be. Um, and the. So a, uh, million questions. One of them is, uh, how, let's say there's business owner listening in, sees themselves in here and recognizes, yeah, most of my meetings are monologues, not dialogues or not pulling people in. Um, and one option is that they call you and, and, and get some support. Uh, but if just talking to them and say, hey, here's something to try, what, what should they be doing that

Speaker B: they don't think of that is so easy? And the answer is mas preguntas. And it just has more questions.

Speaker A: I love it. I remember my seventh grade math. I mean, Spanish. Seventh grade Spanish.

Speaker B: I was going to say you learned Spanish in math class.

Speaker A: Exactly. You went to a fancy teacher. Yes, it was.

Speaker B: I say this all the time. If you feel like you're running out of breath, our acronym is wait, and it means why am I talking? If you're running out of breath, you're talking too much. If your mouth is dry, you're talking too much. If the room is starting to go on their phones or lose attention, you're talking too much. And so just remember to ask questions, lean into it. And um, in the four day session, we spend a lot of time on different types of questions and how you, uh, create what's called a scaffolding model. And you always want to start from easiest to hardest and known to unknown. Because I want to take it, make it really easy for the room. You know, again, earlier when I said, who wants less stress? You're really not going to get many people go, no, no, I want some more, please.

Speaker A: Right, exactly.

Speaker B: So the answer is you want to have those questions organized in a way that makes it easy for people to join, kind of the conversation. And, uh, I'll share one last thing. I know I said I was only going to give you two, but the other is every presentation, every meeting should be a story. It's not just data or information. We call that a data dump. It's a story. So how do I bring them into the story? Uh, when somebody walks into a meeting or a presentation, whatever we want to call it, they're thinking about their stuff that's outside, because that's what we think about. We think about ourselves first. And so somebody watching this podcast right now probably is on their phone, they're doing something else because the answer is their stuff. Is more valuable than my stuff. And so you've got to have a story that brings them into it so they stop what they're doing and they become attentive to the information you're sharing. And so just for fun, I want to try something great. So we have this thing and we call it a tax, and it's an execution tax, and it's what it costs businesses when they kind of fail to execute. Kind of going along lines with what your company does. I'm just going to ask you a couple of quick questions. I don't want a company name, but if you would give me, uh, how many employees are in the company you're thinking of?

Speaker A: Uh, 130.

Speaker B: I'm going to do 250. I like it better.

Speaker A: Good, go with 250.

Speaker B: What percentage of the time in a presentation is the leader or whoever talking?

Speaker A: Yeah, the meetings that I've witnessed, uh, it's primarily the, the presenter. Sometimes there's a couple presenters, but it's mostly, there's not a lot of, there's a little dialogue. It's, it's usually being presented. I know, uh, 80% of it is being presented.

Speaker B: 80%. Do they end with. Does anyone have any questions?

Speaker A: Gosh, I, you know, uh, I, I, I'm not as clear on that one, but I say at least a third of the time that's happening.

Speaker B: Okay. And then lastly, what is the retention rate 24 hours later? Now, I told you at the beginning lecture has a retention rate of 3 to 5%.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, it's, oh, it's, it's no higher than that. No higher.

Speaker B: I'm going to go crazy and give them a 10% rate.

Speaker A: That sounds generous.

Speaker B: Well, uh, I'm trying to be, because, you know, you're a nice guy. So their execution tax is 70%. And what that means is they're going to have about a 70% potential failure rate on whatever they're trying to propose or get the team around or help move forward. And based on research from Gallup and SHRM Society of Human Resources Managers, they find that that tax is about $12,500 per employee. And kind of the way they come to it is it's wasted meeting time. It's employees who are disengaged, so they leave, it's employed. And just so you know, when they leave, they're taking their knowledge and so it creates all these ripple effect costs. So for that company, if they had 250 employees and they behaved exactly as you said, their tax is the thousand dollars a Year.

Speaker A: And here, you know, just. That is. At first, that sounds really dramatic, and then as I think about how much does it cost to replace somebody? Right. Uh, and we're working with so many clients today. We're talking about 30, 40, and in some cases, higher turnover on an annual basis. Uh, and it goes so much further. I know, like, we're talking about training classes and meetings, but I think what you're really talking about is a change in culture where the leadership is asking questions and really inviting the company as a whole from the floor to. Throughout the management team to own and to. To. To be the ones that are heard. Instead of the leadership, the leader. Think of every meeting they have in every department. If the leader is. Is replicating that methodology, that's going to cascade throughout the company.

Speaker B: Absolutely. And the challenge is, if the CEO does it this way, the VP says I have to do it this way. And if the VP does it this way, the manager says, I've got to do it this way. And if it cascades down, so then the supervisors do it that way.

Speaker A: Exactly.

Speaker B: It's one of those things that you create a culture over time. And the old saying is, the best time to plant a tree 20 years ago. The second best time is today. Well, yeah, A lot of these companies have been around for generations, and grandpa did it that way.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker B: And I'm 62 going, I guess maybe I'm 63. I'm 63. Um, things that were done in school. My wife always tells a story about being in Catholic school. And a boy said something he shouldn't, and the nun took a bar of soap and put it in his mouth to today. Today, if that happened. Oh, my goodness, yes. Right. But the challenge is. Is companies. The good part about culture is some of it's strong and great and very important. The challenge is sometimes we've got to adapt. And it's time to say, you know what? Maybe the way we were doing it worked really well in 1940, 1960, 1980. But it's 2026, and we have people who are now more comfortable on their phone than they are with a pen and paper. They're more comfortable. Um, and you think about when YouTube first came out, it was like, oh, my God, I can learn anything in 20 minutes. Well, now we're at TikTok. If I can't do it in under 15 seconds, I'm bored. We were doing a project with AI the other day, and it took two minutes to figure this thing out. Well, the person I was working with said it's taking so long. And I said, okay, if I had given this to a human a year ago, it would have taken them five days to calculate the data. It would have taken four days to create the strategy from the data, and it would have taken a designer three more days to come up with the graphics for it. So the idea is we've got to evolve. And from a people perspective, much of our processes and much of our development hasn't evolved. We're behind the times.

Speaker A: Absolutely. Um, and you know that it's so similar, Marty. The same exact discussion happens. We think about operations directly, the issues. We're doing it the way we did it, you know, 30 years ago, and it's not part of. It's related to time. And we have better tools and more knowledge than we did 30 years ago. But I think just as or even more important is we're not the same company. When dad was doing it or grandpa was doing it 30 years ago, we had 30 people in the company, and he knew everybody. And that personal interaction, he was involved in every order, knew every customer. Today, it's not possible. And we, uh, have to evolve.

Speaker B: Well, in 30 years ago, we were competing with the people maybe across town, maybe, you know, in Indiana, a town two away. But now the answer is I can look and be connected with anyone in the world and find out, you know, when can I have it, what will it cost, and how good is it? And so, again, those things are just natural.

Speaker A: Now it's, uh, a different world.

Speaker B: I grew up in Northern Indiana, in Elkhart, and we had one sporting goods store, and I needed wrestling shoes when I was in high school. And the answer was, we'll have them in two weeks. We'll order them for you. The idea today of needing a new pair of shoes and not expecting them in 48 hours.

Speaker A: Uh, right, right. Where do you live, man? Yeah, exactly.

Speaker B: Yeah. And. And the answer is, you know, I see Dick Sporting Goods. And the answer is I think they're paired up now with, like, doordash. So the answer is you can order the shoes online and they will have them delivered, you know, in three hours.

Speaker A: That's insane. That's insane. What a. Yeah. Uh, Marty, I have a. A few more questions before we go into them, though. I would love to hear more, uh, a little bit about how do you work with a client. So when, when you, when. When you work with, get invited in and the things you're talking about aren't, you find there's signs it's one way communication, people are retaining it. And it kind of instills or points out the culture, uh, of the top down. Uh, what's step one? And what. What's it look like? What's the journey look like?

Speaker B: The first step is the leadership team has to see that this is a real problem, and we talk about it all the time, is as soon as it gets labeled as a soft skill, the CFO says, well, we're not wasting money on that. And it's kind of comical. Do you know where soft skill came from?

Speaker A: No idea.

Speaker B: The military, a tank, a gun, an aircraft. Those are hard skills. Everything else is a soft skill. And it just stuck.

Speaker A: Wow. And it sure did.

Speaker B: M. Yeah. I mean, it's a misnomer, but in their world, back in the day, that was the easiest way to say it. Um, the challenge is, again, as we go back to where we started, most companies spend more on people than they do on anything else. There are the occasions that it's materials. But the answer is, so why am I investing in. And this is a personal pet peeve of mine, is I can invest in a machine from a tax and accounting standpoint, but employees are a cost.

Speaker A: Yes. Expense. Yeah.

Speaker B: Shouldn't we just put them in the same category? I mean, aren't they. Can't we invest in both of them? But you have to get the leadership team to understand there's a better way. And usually, just like you and I on this podcast is when you start to, uh, put it in your brain and say, okay, this makes sense. You start to go, maybe that's a good idea. And so they need to be open to it. And usually one of the first questions I'll ask, and so I'll do it with you. Tim, what teacher or class do you remember from your high school or college days?

Speaker A: Yeah, well, I'm going to actually go back further. I remember my fifth grade teacher because.

Speaker B: Do you remember their name?

Speaker A: Mrs. Holmbaugh. Yep.

Speaker B: Why do you remember her?

Speaker A: Because, uh, that she connect. I, I was like, she got me reached. And, And I, I. It was, it was so interesting. My. I was always a CED student up until that point. And my parents were kind of like, well, maybe he's just a C or D student. Like, it is what it is. And she had team time instead of the. And this so fit. It's so fascinating how this fits in. She didn't stand up there and lecture. She gave us projects, and we worked together in teams, and I thrived. I had a ball. Like, it was it. Uh, and. And that's when I realized, yeah, that, that was the. That was the experience that changed, changed my life.

Speaker B: And it, it really is the methodology. I mean, I'm sure she was a great person and a great teacher, but it's all about using the right methodology and so getting leadership to understand there's a better methodology and it creates that success. Um, then we ask is, can we just do a pilot? Let's just do one test program. Give us 12, 15 people, and let's test it out here. Maybe it won't work. Uh, when we started work with Micron here, the way we started is we said, bring 18 people in the room and we'll see how it goes. And fortunately, after that, we've been now working with them 18 months and we continue on. Because the answer is, I'm sure there is an environment, um, it will not work in. There's nothing that works everywhere all the time. But the reality is people are people. And Whether you're a PhD in engineering or you're a frontline worker in a factory, we connect the same way we connect around stories and conversations. And if I asked anybody anywhere, who's that teacher? It always has that commonality of that methodology. And they were using a version of the RAD method. Um, and whether it was fun for them or easy for them or how they got into it, I don't know. But we've got a friend who's a PhD here at Boise State and teaches education. And he's like, marty, your method is the one that all of our research says. That's the one. That's the way you increase retention. And the hard part, it's no different in schools. The hard part is getting schools and teachers to want to change.

Speaker A: Yeah, that, uh, that's, that's always that. That's, that's a big issue everywhere. And, you know, we. One way that we try to address that is by focusing on the return on investment. Yeah. Whenever we come in and assess and understand the current state for a company and we project the future state, uh, it's to make it one of the best. One good tool is to show that there's a big payoff for doing this. Well, uh, that's often a starting point. The only other way that I find that people will change is when they're in extreme distress. Right. It's when their backs up against the wall, they have no choice. We're going to lose this customer if we don't change. Right. So, um, with that in mind, and you m. You, you gave some, you know, examples earlier. When you think of some of the clients you've worked with, what is, how would you describe the before and after? Like, what was different once they, once they started engaging and using the RAD method?

Speaker B: It's funny, I don't think of clients, I think of people. And there's like four or five that come to mind right off top of my head. Uh, one is a client and uh, the gentleman was an expert at what he did and very well liked. Everybody knew him, very gregarious, very comfortable. But everybody again, the eye test was he's kind of reached his limit and they saw him, they liked him. It wasn't like, oh, uh, we're going to get rid of him. It was just, he's, that's kind of the most he can do. And he went through our four days of RAD and came back and people are like, oh my God, he's a different person. And it's like, no, he's not a different person. He just has some tools that makes it easier for him to share ideas and information and you're seeing him differently. And since then, he got promoted to acting general manager and now he is the full time general manager. And I can't say that RAD created that because he had it in him. Well, we gave him some tools to help him let it out.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker B: And you talk about that stress. Uh, the four days of training is very, very stressful because we're asking him to give presentations frequently. And it's really interesting because they look around the room and they're like, oh, this person's going to be really good. They're better than I am. And uh, I always say it's a very non linear growth. They kind of grow like a heartbeat. And so a person on day two may give a presentation and they're like, oh, they're amazing. They're just going to crush it and the next day they struggle. And it's all part of giving them a safe environment where they can try new things, kind of put themselves to the test. And those that step in and really lean into it, you see amazing things. Thinking, uh, of another client, uh, a young lady was in their training department and was very good and she went through rad and we spent a lot of time together and they had a promotion, an opening in another part of the company. And the leader of that area, the vice president came to her and said, I want you to apply. And she said, but I'm not in that department. And he goes, I want you to apply. And he said, I watch you, I see how you communicate. I see how you share stuff. You will be a resource for our department. And she goes, but there's people who've been in the department 10 years. And he just kept saying, I want you to apply.

Speaker A: I want you to apply.

Speaker B: And she got the job. And she uses RAD when she talks about team members for employee of the month or employee of the year. She uses RAD when she talks to her team. She uses RAD when they roll out new programs in her department. And it's kind of her go to tool in her toolbox. And one of the things we always say is most companies have a leadership development toolbox. They say, this is how we develop our leaders. And what we say is, you just want to add this one more tool because it's just one more important part. Again, going back to that. That tax that happens when people are in bad meetings because they leave all of those things. I just, you know, you talk about roi. I don't remember the number I gave you for the tax for that company. But if you cut it by 10% over.

Speaker A: Over 2 million a year.

Speaker B: Well, yeah. And if you cut it by 10%, that's 200 grand. And in a company that size, that's a significant number to EBITDA means something. Um, yep. You know, like, it's. It's just having a bigger picture approach. Um, you talked about the people who come to you have that immediate need. It reminds me of the burning platform. You know, the idea that the platform's out there and it's burning and you're on it and you're like, oh, I think I smell smoke. No big deal. Oh, I see fire. But I can go to the other side. And it's not until they're feeling the heat. And unfortunately, that's not the best way to do it.

Speaker A: Right. Um, right. It's just the most common.

Speaker B: Well, yeah, you know, the old adage of the oil change place is saying, you can pay me now or pay me later. It's much better to start moving your culture in the right way, start developing your team and those leaders. And we talk about bench strength. The idea is, I want to have the next person who's ready to go and can step in and step up. Because do you know the Silver Tsunami?

Speaker A: Yes, yes. The. All the, uh, Generation X. Yeah.

Speaker B: No. Baby boomers. The baby.

Speaker A: Baby boomers. Thank you. Baby boomers.

Speaker B: The answer is we're aging out. And so we're taking the corporate knowledge, we're taking the corporate culture, we're taking all of those things, and we're leaving and it's creating this vacuum. So how are companies preparing today so that even though I know they're going to retire in four years or five years, how do I put that person in place that says I'm ready in two years or I'm ready in three years and you can do a gentle handoff as opposed to, oh, yeah, James left the floor. We're going to find somebody tomorrow.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker B: That's not the right time to do it.

Speaker A: No, absolutely, absolutely. Um, and, uh, before I have a couple final thoughts and questions before we get to that. How do people learn more about. Marty. About the RAD methodology?

Speaker B: The easiest way to do it is just go to the radmethod.com uh, kind of fun where we like technology and so we've put a AI agent on there and they can ask it everything they want to know about the RAD method and it will just answer their questions. It makes it so easy. Instead of downloading reports and stuff, you're going to put in your briefcase and never read, just have a conversation.

Speaker A: I love that. It. And uh, uh, I'm, I, I am very much looking forward to visiting your website to do that myself. That's going to be fun to see. You know, uh, I couldn't help think, Marty, as you're talking about going from known to unknown and easy to hard. Uh, a major part of our methodology, we, we kind of take, uh, borrowed. Been inspired by, you know, Toyota, Dr. Deming. And the problem solving methodology starts off by simply, without judgment, identifying what is happening today.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: And the, the part that blows me away when I watch as I learned this method and watch it in practice, including when I'm involved or, or, or I'm more of a, a spectator, is. It drains the room of emotion. It's. I love it because, uh, shows the principle, at the level of principle, what you're talking about works. I'm going to put words in your mouth or, or put an idea out there that, that um, what you're doing with communication is what Toyota did with problem solving and flow. It's about getting everybody involved. Uh, it's about taking the emotion, curiosity, not judgment. And by pulling and setting it up so that everyone's heard, not just the leader.

Speaker B: Well, and just real quick. And I love that analogy. Thank you, Tim. Um, before Toyota, General Motors said we're doing it the right way. Ford said, we're doing it the right way, we're doing it the best way. And it took that. Um, I remember when there was the first Toyota car in my hometown. And everybody was like, what's that?

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: Well the answer is we are doing that same thing. It's funny because most, um, and I'm putting air quotes around it, presentation training is from the 1930s. They're using really old, I mean almost a hundred year old methodology. And not all, not all old methods are bad, but they're using something that just doesn't work in today's environment.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: And the good news is again, a company like Micron and our other clients, they're saying, you know, uh, Micron's motto is we're ahead of the curve. They're going to be ahead of the curve and all of a sudden people are going to go, what are you using? How do you keep your leaders? How come your meetings are so successful? And the answer is they're just using a better way. And to your other comment, when we do it, um, I say it all the time. It's a loving and supportive group. We all want to succeed. We know that if everybody in the room gets better, it's not oh, they're going to get promoted. I'm not. It's not a competition, it's just developing. And when you develop new skills, it makes everybody better.

Speaker A: Absolutely. And uh, uh, it's easy to focus on performance. And I think about this a lot. Chasing profitability I would like to suggest is like chasing happiness. It's not a good approach. If you're trying to be happy, it's hard to be happy. But if your goal is to serve and uh, what I love like it, it almost makes me emotional to think about intentionally hearing people. Is it that's actually I gotta share this. One of my favorite parts about being a consultant is that we get to go in and ask questions. And sometimes I get the strong feeling we may be the first person who's heard somebody in a long time and they have so much experience, knowledge, desire to be involved that when you, when you actually just say just, you know, what do you think? How's it working? What's working? What's not working? What would you do? It, it opens up such a lovely conversation and, and, and they get to be heard.

Speaker B: I couldn't agree more. And I think the, the even better part about that from our perspective is oftentimes they really know, but they've never been given a platform to share. And it's like, oh yeah, we waste half of this stuff because we x. Have you ever told anybody? No, they never asked. And you're like, oh my goodness, yeah, you know, you're selling boxes of $20,000 or $30,000 a week, and you didn't share because nobody asked. Well, the other side of that is nobody gave them an environment where they felt confident and comfortable sharing. They felt safe.

Speaker A: Uh, exactly.

Speaker B: But it is so much about creating that dialogue. And kind uh, of a pet peeve of mine is companies that fail to value what their team knows. And every day that we do training, I'm so blown away by how smart people are what they know. And it's like, this is an untapped resource. It's a hidden gem.

Speaker A: That's right.

Speaker B: So bring it out. Who knows? They could have the next way to create whatever. And they may say, no, we should get rid of this and this and this and just do it this way. Wow. We never thought about that. There's value. There's value.

Speaker A: Absolutely.

Speaker B: And are you getting the most out of it?

Speaker A: You know, Marty, to wrap this up, I just have to share this. That you're. If. If all what your. The rad method did was help with the. What are often thought of as the soft skills, and they helped to create an environment where people were felt safe to express themselves and encouraged to do so, where people become engaged or heard, uh, it'd be enough. It's a good way to live. And the impact on the morale and the atmosphere, the tension, the liveliness is enough. But that's not all, because there is an roi.

Speaker B: Absolutely. It pays for itself a hundred times. Well, my calculator will tell you how long it takes for the roi. It's usually less than a month. Um, but the answer is, you know, we're running businesses, so money's important. Don't get me wrong, I'm not, um, on the boat.

Speaker A: It's a good outcome.

Speaker B: Everybody, everybody's got to make money. Um, but the flip side is, uh, our first client ever, 30 plus years ago, we told them, you know, if this doesn't work, at least the people who went through the training will be able to get a better job somewhere else. And they were like, you mean. And I'm like, yeah, instead of being on the loading dock, they can be in customer service or they could be whatever. And I really believe that when you develop people, you invest in people. I don't know, maybe they stay, maybe they don't. Maybe they're, you know, that boomerang that leaves for a while and then comes back. But the answer is, nobody forgets that fifth grade teacher. Amen. Nobody forgets the people who cared about them, heard them, listen to them, valued them. As opposed to the place where it was just, I'm just a number. Nobody knows who I am, nobody cares.

Speaker A: Exactly.

Speaker B: And the hard part about that is then productivity just drops through the floor.

Speaker A: Right?

Speaker B: Because I don't care if it didn't go out right. I don't care if. Oh, yeah, I noticed that was bad, but I didn't say anything. Why would I?

Speaker A: What a beautiful way to wrap up this episode, Marty. Thank you for joining us, Tim.

Speaker B: A pleasure. And it's all about shocking Profits. They're out there.

Speaker A: It is, it is, it is. You know, and what. What you really made clear today, which I love and thank you for sharing, that is, uh, you know, it. Shocking profit. The biggest idea here is not we're coming in to add value or to find something new or to add something different and go into a new market to. To drive performance and profitability and morale. It's rather. It's already there, Right. It's like the farmland that's got oil underneath. When they find the oil, they didn't add the oil. It was already there. And what the stories you shared are the people who. They're truly an oil field, but everybody sees them as farmland. They're planting corn when they should be, you know, drilling for oil, letting it out. Uh, it's a beautiful thing.

Speaker B: Absolutely, Tim. Thank you.

Speaker A: Thank you, Marty. What a powerful way to wrap up this episode of Shocking Profit. The rad method complements some of the great demonstrations of how engaging people converts friction into momentum. And it's a good way to live. Be sure to tune in to our next Shocking Profit episode. And in the meantime, please tell your friends about us. And if you have a question, a challenge, or a life hack, reach out to us@elwoodshockingprofit.com and remember, everyone, focus on what matters to shock your profit. See you next time.