142: Ethan Martin & Dale Meador — Inattention to Results and Cash
We see CEOs and leaders make a lot of the same mistakes and today’s show highlights a frequent mistake that occurs: inattention to results and cash. This is episode has two high-level coaches to chime in on the subject!
Ethan Martin is the Founder & President of PFD Group, Inc. and a Rockefeller Habits Certified Coach. Ethan has a passion for helping mission-driven CEOs build their companies. Prior to this, he has always been a serial entrepreneur and was an EO member for seven years.
Dale Meador is the Founder of Finanza Coach and has been a Rockefeller Habits Certified Coach for the last two years. Prior to this, he ran his own CPA firm and helped his clients implement systems of strategic planning and financial controls into their business.
Today’s subject is about the inattention to results and cash. As in, not having dashboards or having too many metrics, or not paying attention to the data that’s in front of you! We also dive into some of the common struggles people are faced with when trying to implement the Scaling Up framework.
Ethan shares an example of a CEO that was pursuing different business strategies for his distribution company and didn’t have a clear purpose on cash flow or profitability by customer. Ethan and his team came in and used the Scaling Up framework to help guide this CEO into understanding his strategy and what the main priority should be.
Dale believes one of the things that’s critical for when a team comes together is to really get a clear definition of what is ‘winning’ for them. Dale shares an example of how there was a disconnect between leadership and the owner on what a successful, thriving company looked like, and thus, why it was hard for them to retain a positive cash flow.
In some teams, the financial team might guard their financial numbers so close to the vest that the rest of the leadership team end up being blind or unaware of how successful or unsuccessful the numbers are. And for good reason too, sometimes when it is revealed how much money the company is making, everyone wants raises even though it is simply not feasible.
In cases like these, Ethan recommends the leadership team have a clear dashboard where anyone can look up the numbers and the health of the company within a matter of 15 minutes. For things like this, it’s important to get the core numbers right so that the entire team can take the correct steps to ensure the company has a positive cash flow.
Interview Links:
Resources:
Scaling Up for Business Growth Workshop: Take the first step to mastering the Rockefeller Habits by attending one of our workshops.
Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.)
TWEETABLES:
“What got you to this stage of growth won’t get you to the next stage of growth.”
“If there’s not clarity on that one thing, that one number, especially financial, it really holds the team back.”
“Make sure the leadership team has a very simple and clear dashboard on these critical things like cash that anyone can look at in a matter of 15 minutes.”
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Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Gazelles Coaching, on how the fastest growing companies succeed where so many others fail. My name is Bill Gallagher, host of the Scaling Up business podcast and a leading Gazelles Coach. Gazelles is the term we use for fast-growing companies.
We help leadership teams with 4 Decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth success. Scaling Up for Gazelles companies is based on the Rockefeller Habits 2.0 (from Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits).
