Tony: Revenue Chat Episode 169. Hey, check out my other great interviews at tonydurso.com/radio, or using your Android or iPhone, get the app at tonydurso.com/mobile. That’s tonydurso.com/radio, or /mobile. This is Revenue Chat Radio with your host, Tony DUrso. Interviewing successful entrepreneurs and giving you actionable advice and insights. Let’s rev it up. Welcome to Revenue Chat. I’m your host, Tony DUrso. Some quick news here. With over 2 million downloads on my weekly talk shows, our audiences loving our guest interviews, and I just wanna say, thanks a million. Or actually, thanks two million. And I am now on television with the Tony DUrso TV show. Check it out at tonydurso.com/ tonytv. Also, if you wanna get major shoutouts for your business, or get interviewed, just go to tonydurso.com/ tonytv and check out the links. All right, Revenue crew, let’s rev it up. Here we go. The following is from my TV interview with Bob McGannon. He’s the author of a revolutionary book titled, Intelligence Disobedience: The Difference Between Good and Great Leaders. He’s an 18-year veteran of IBM and an entrepreneur, who founded three businesses in the United States, and Australia. He helps businesses worldwide. Rethink the relationship with their rules and procedures, which yields him impressive results through training, consulting, and keynote programs. Also, stick around to the very end for a little bit of information on how to accomplish your vision. You’ll love it. Hi, and welcome. I’m your host, Tony DUrso. We showcase successful entrepreneurs, along with humanitarian and note- worthy projects. We share wisdom, advice, and guidance with you to assist in your life, career, and business. Some great solutions and advice for you just ahead. And before we begin, I wish to thank all the supporters of the Tony DUrso show, who made this possible. In addition to today’s guests, who provided great support, I also wish to think Rob Kessler at milliondollarcollar.com. Jean Ginsburg and jeanginsburg.com. Jordan Goodman at moneyanswers.com. And a big thank you to Rich De Mayo, our Emmy winning director, who helped design and produce a fine show. Thank you all for helping make this possible. The success of this show is yours. And lastly, I’m wearing the Million Dollar Collar created by Rob Kesler. I love it, and I have it on all of my shirts. Your shirts always look sharp. No more dangling collar. How about that? And remember, success awaits those who persevere and remain steadfast despite the odds. Be righteous. Join me. Let’s begin. Bob McGannon is the author of what I consider a revolutionary book, Intelligent Disobedience: The Difference Between Good and Great Leaders. Now, Bob’s an 18-year veteran at IBM and he’s an entrepreneur. He’s founded three companies in the United States and Australia. Bob helps businesses worldwide rethink their relationships with their rules and procedures, and yields impressive results through training, consulting, and keynote programs. Now, can you imagine that? Disobeying the rules, and yet succeeding. Here’s Bob again, and to tell us about his startling book, Intelligent Disobedience. Welcome to the show, Bob. Bob: Great to be with you, Tony. Tony: Bob, it’s an honor to have you. Thank you so much for joining us. I’d love to know all about this. It’s quite an oxymoron of a concept. So, let’s start first with a definition. Can you define what is intelligent disobedience? Bob: I wish I came up with the phrase myself, Tony, but I didn’t. The phrase comes from the world of Seeing Eye dogs. You don’t want the Seeing Eye dog to obey its master’s every command, or they both get hit by a truck. The dog understands the goal and the objective, and has the task of getting there safely. Now, when you take that context and you put it into business scenario, I think about business processes. A good business process works quite well maybe 95-98 percent of the time. But what about the other 3-5 percent, when it’s not going to yield the outcome that the business (or your client) wants? What do you do then? That’s intelligent disobedience. When do you disobey the rule, break a rule, add a new process, in order to get a better business outcome. Tony: I see. So, for starters, a business leader would want to have everyone engage in intelligent disobedience. Bob: Well, maybe not everyone. If I’m going to break, or disobey the rule, I need to understand enough about my business environment, what might be a legal requirement and not just a rule within my business, of what my short and long term objectives are, and what those short and long term implications might be changing the rule. So, first and foremost, people would need to have done their homework, and they’d have to be in the environment long enough. Secondly, we might have some individuals, and you know them and I know them, very, very kind-hearted individuals. They’re gonna wanna do the right thing for a client, but might empty our bank account in the process of doing that. So, it’s a matter of having the right amount of homework, and information about the business, and having the right personality, as well. Tony: That’s beginning to make a little bit more sense to me now. Can you give us some examples of how an owner would actually apply this in his company? Bob: I can tell you a story about a trip I made to the bank. And, I walked into the bank with an unusual request. Now, in case you’re thinking otherwise, I didn’t have a firearm, or anything associated with this unusual request, but it was something that was not a common item. And I was working with a person, and she went through all the rules that she possibly could to try to find the process by which she can satisfy me. And she couldn’t. She couldn’t satisfy the request, even though she knew it was reasonable. That took an hour and a half. And then we get the bank manager involved, who ultimate says, “Yeah, we can vary your rule.” How much cheaper would it have been for that bank, for thank branch manager to give this 15-year veteran individual, who knew where all the rules were. If they only give her the opportunity to vary those rules a little bit, I’d been happier, they’d saved money because they wouldn’t have taken so much time, and we would’ve been – everybody would’ve been at a much better position. From an entrepreneur’s point of view, an entrepreneur’s often gonna break the rules anyway. That’s natural, that’s why they’re gonna create an entrepreneur of your product. But sometimes they have to sell it to investors, who don’t think as radically as they do. And intelligent disobedience and how you package this information and how you communicate it is something I detail in the book quite frequently, and that’s ultimately the key to success. You might have a great idea, but you have to ultimately convey it, and apply it to someone else’s business problem. Tony: Bob, that’s fascinating. Now, let me get this better understood. Let’s go over what would be an overview of the steps necessary to actually implement the principle of intelligent disobedience within the workplace. Bob: So, first and foremost, a manager would have to take a look at his or her environment and say, “What are the impenetrable boundaries?” In other words, you don’t wanna break the law. So, let’s define though. And then you might look at other financial perimeters, for instance. You could spend more than 10 percent of a designated amount without getting permission, if you are a person that is inclined to engage in intelligent disobedience successfully. For other people that might be a more narrow band. And then you determine those processes that are intended to create a consistent outcome, but won’t always consist – create a consistent outcome. And you’d define those for your team, give them the ability to have a bit of flexibility, again, to get the right outcome for the business, and for the client. And then it becomes a full circle process. As someone maybe modifies the rules, or maybe breaks the rules, get your team together. Understand what happened. Did it create the right outcome? And then maybe you ultimately modify those rules, so you can accommodate that additional, or different process to satisfy more of your clients more quickly. So, it is the classic learning organization exercise. But, Tony, a number of years ago people were all hiked up in the leadership space about empowerment. But no one defined a structure around which to convey what you were empowering people to do. That’s what this intelligent disobedience perimeter set does, and that’s what the process that I’ve outlined in the book does. It gives the ability for the leader to get better outcomes by empowering their people just like the master empowers its Seeing Eye dog, because that Seeing Eye dog has more information to get better, safer outcome. Now, that’s hitting the nail on the head for me. I’m getting the whole picture here on intelligent disobedience. What a radical concept. Now, I gotta ask you, I have a couple more questions. But one thing is, as an author, when we write a book, we have a concept, we know where we’re going, what we want the reader to get away with it. What do you want to impart? What do you want the person to come away with? I think there’s two things really, Tony. The first is, understanding the processes were not written with a crystal ball, and one’s job should not be the to follow the process. One’s job should be to use the process as a tool, when that tool works for them. That’s the first thing. So, again, as we talked about earlier, it’s changing the relationship with process. But the second, from a leader’s point of view is, if you give your team the flexibility to do the right thing to make adjustments, to break the rules once in a while to get that better outcome, they’re going to approach their job more authentically. Just picture two people. One that goes to work, and goes home and saying, “I had the ability, I had the smarts, I had the capability to do the right thing, but the process inhibited me.” And how are they gonna feel, vs. the person that faces the very same situation with the ability to engage in a bit of intelligent disobedience, and get the right outcome, and then go home. How do you think those two people are gonna feel? I betcha the latter one is gonna be much happier. Much happier at work, feel much more authentic as a person that goes to work. And can you imagine the performance improvement, or the more – and the moral improvement you’re gonna get if everybody in your team felt like that second person, that could engage in intelligent disobedience, vs. the first that goes home frustrated. Those are great points. And as I think about this, Bob, I think back on the years of people telling me stories just like this where they couldn’t implement something that would help the company, but they were blocked by a rule, or something. And how dumb, you know, the company is to not look at that point. And this is absolutely amazing. I bet you’re having tremendous success implementing this process in companies. Hey. Think of all the things you were carved to provide your family. Your home. A college education. Your entire lifestyle. How do you make sure all of those things are still possible? Even if something unexpectedly happens to you. You know, the old way life insurance used to be a pain? You would deal with an agent who came across like a used car salesman? Or sketch your blood test at a doctor’s office, and read over paperwork filled with fine print and legalese? Now with Ethos the application only takes 10 minutes online with honest, upfront pricing. No doctor’s appointment for policies under $1 million. Get your free quote and submit your complete application in just 10 minutes now at revchat.getethos.com. One more time, that’s R-E-V-C-H-A- T.getE-T-H-O-S.com. revchat.getethos.com. And we’re back with Bob McGannon, talking about intelligent disobedience. Bob: I will share with you, it’s – what I have hoped to do is create a lot of dialogue, and I’ve actually been pretty successful with that thus far. And Tony, this is hot off the presses. My book has been nominated for the Financial Times McKenzie Business Book of the Year Award in London. So, we’ll find out more about that in the Autumn, I should say in London. And we’re pretty excited about that. But that tells me that this book is creating dialogue, which is really what I hoped to do. If we can get more people more fulfilled in their job, we’re gonna get better performance from the business point of view, and we’re gonna have happier people as well. And what a positive outcome that would be? Tony: Thank you so much for sharing this with us. And to everyone, please go to intelligentdisobedient.com. You’ll find out more about it. You’ll see some videos on how this process was developed, you’ll find out more about the book. Check it out, and help your company, help your business grow. Once again, Bob, thanks so much for sharing. Bob: Thanks for being with you, Tony. It’s been a lot of fun. Tony: Our next episode is with Robert Isenberg, talking about his very humorous book, Why Men Are Suspicious of Yoga? Please, go to tonydurso.com/vision and get the Vision Map free. Do that now. Follow the steps, and you can guarantee yourself much success. tonydurso.com/vision. And thank you again for tuning in. I greatly appreciate you. Please come back and check out my other shows. They’re all in that making you more and more successful. And please, follow me on social media. It’s tonydurso on Twitter, and Tony S DUrso for Facebook and Instagram. Remember that ‘S’ for Facebook and Instagram. Thanks again. And remember, success awaits those who persevere and remain steadfast, despite the odds. Be righteous. Join me on the next episode of the Tony DUrso TV show. You heard that a majority of businesses fail. Don’t be a statistic, get my book free. The Vision Map. Beat the odds for your business success. Get it free at tonydurso.com/ vision and set up your own successful vision map. tonydurso.com/vision We have just a few minutes left. So, yes. That’s right. It’s Tony’s time. And here’s a word on your vision. I’m in your future vision. What is a vision? Well, the dictionary states that a vision is the ability to think about, or plan the future with imagination, or wisdom. Now, can you see that just having a vision is not the end all? Can you see that just having a vision is actually the start of the entire process? Can you see that just having a vision (and nothing more) will inevitably lead to failure? Now, some define a vision statement as a picture as a company in the future. Some others define a vision statement as only the inspiration for the company. Do you see how this is confusing from the get go? Do you now begin to see why, well, a preponderants of businesses actually fail, instead of the plethora succeeding? Also, a vision statement often gets confused with the mission statement of the company. A vision statement often gets confused with the purpose of the business. Why does the business exist at all? To illustrate my point, there’s a poor example of a vision statement. “We wanna give our customers the best shopping experience possible from choosing quality items to a fast and friendly checkout system with a speedy delivery system at the end.” Now that business will fail if that’s all they have. They could pull it off, but they need some pieces in place. Here’s another poor example. “From the moment you walk into our salon, you’ll feel good about yourself, and after our wonderful, happy staff takes care of your needs, you’ll feel great, like you’re walking on air.” Now, that business is gonna fail, if that’s all they have. And again, if they have some other pieces in place, they can pull it off. A good vision statement requires several well thought out, well crafted items. It can take hours, even days to construct. A good vision statement is really and truly a combination of all of the following points: The Vision Map makes, or breaks the company. A good vision map in place makes a great, effective leader. The Vision Map contains The Vision, The Purpose, The Long Term Objective, The Master Plan, which includes strategy and tactical actions, and lastly, it includes the breakdown of actions to take, also known as the ‘Things To Do List’. The Vision Map is a combination of my life’s work. This map takes you through everything you need to ensure extreme success in any endeavor, in any relationship, in any project, in any business you care to undertake, and I do mean any. A successfully completed vision map will make your relationship or career shine greatly. A good vision map in place makes you a great, effective leader. And I’m gonna give you the full vision map formula completely free. Go to tonydurso.com/vision, and get it now. And again, the Vision Map contains The Vision, The Purpose, The Long Term Objective, The Master Plan, which includes strategy and tactical actions, and lastly, it includes the breakdown of actions to take, also known as The Things To Do List. I’d like you to know that using the Vision Map, I took my first podcast Revenue Chat Radio to 500,000 downloads in the first year. Using my Vision Map, my radio show, The Spotlight With Tony DUrso became the No.1 show on Voice America’s Influencer’s Channel in under six months. Using the Vision Map, I helped other achieve great success. You know, one of my students went from a few products sales a month, just a few, to nearly a dozen sales a day. A day. This student went from thinking about quitting that business at the beginning, to now thinking about quitting his other job. And using this knowledge, I am with my wife for 25 years now, and that is an anomaly in this day and age. What do you want your life career, or business to really be? Go to tonydurso.com/vision, and get the Vision Map free. Do it now. Follow the steps. This will change your life dramatically. Follow the steps, and you guarantee yourself much success. And I wanna thank you again for tuning in. I greatly appreciate you. Please come back and check out my other shows. They all in and making you more and more successful. And please, follow me on social media. It’s tonydurso on Twitter, and Tony S DUrso for Facebook and Instagram. Remember that ‘S’. All right. Thanks again, everyone, and until next time, remember, you can make life better for yourself and everyone. Choose wisely.