August in Review: 3 Insider Insights

??Something to ask yourself

As Labor Day is coming up, it's a good reminder to reflect and ask yourself, when's the last time you untethered from your phone and COMPLETELY disconnected?

I know it's it's hard if you own a business.

According to a survey of small businesses conducted by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), 71% of small businesses said they were VERY dependent on one or two key people for their success.

And if you're the owner, chances are you're one of those key people--which means, even if you don't want to, you feel you have to be chained to your phone, email, etc.

So, how do you unchain yourself and regain a sense of work/life balance, especially if you don't have the budget to hire more staff?

Rather than making you read yet-another-article on process documentation, business continuity, delegation, or automation (all topics that I'm sure you're already well aware), I'm going to show you a fun activity you can do with your team.

It's called the Chaos Monkey (originating from Netflix). Here's the purpose:

Under controlled conditions, Netflix engineers will systematically turn off pieces of their technical infrastructure to see how their systems would respond, identify gaps, and implement changes. That way, if something breaks for real, you can still enjoy The Umbrella Academy and Stranger Things.

The same principle applies to your critical business processes.

Let's start with an easy one. If you're a B2B Professional Services company, chances are the key components for converting leads into paying customers looks something like this:

Given those 5 major components, what if your key person in charge is unavailable (accident or illness, extended vacation, resignation, etc.)? Specifically:

• Lead/Opportunity - What happens to the discovery calls on the calendar? Can someone else run them or get them at least get them rescheduled?
• Quote/Proposal - What happens to quotes, proposals, and/or contracts that need to be created? Can someone else create them?
• Kick-off/Onboarding - What happens to the new customer onboarding calls and setup activities? Can someone else perform these activities?
• Delivery/Fulfillment - What happens to the key customer deliverables? Can someone else execute them?
• Billing/Payment - What happens to the invoices or POs that need to be submitted? Can someone else get them submitted?

Will the business continue without skipping a beat or will things grind to a halt?

Instead of trying to think in the abstract, run the Chaos Monkey exercise to find out what actually happens and how your team responses. Here's how to get started:

1. Pick an area to focus on - Let's pick Delivery/Fulfilment as an example.
2. Pick a date to run the Chaos Monkey exercise - Try to pick a date when the key person is going on vacation. Note, if you, as the owner, are also a key person, make sure you'll also be out-of-office that day.
3. Introduce Chaos ?? - For Delivery/Fulfilment, make a request for a common key customer deliverable, ex: replace a content/image on the website, send an urgent KPI or project status report to the leadership, run a customer project status meeting, etc. and see how the team responds.
4. Do a full debrief after - Where did the team get stuck? Who did they turn to for help? And, most importantly, where are the gaps?

This is why running the Chaos Monkey exercise regularly against your critical business process is so illuminating, because you find out exactly where your bottlenecks are.

And once you fix them, not only will your team feel much more confident, you can finally start to untether because you know your team can continue to execute while you're away watching Netflix.

?? Found this insightful? Give this article a ??or tag your teammates and peers to plan your next Chaos Monkey exercise!

??Event worth attending

How do you know if a networking event is going to be worth your time?

One way is to find out how the organizers are going to facilitate the networking, because there are 3 basic ways:

1. Random: This is where you just show up to the event and start talking to random people. A lot of business socials and mixers--even a lot of conferences and trade shows--are organized this way. There’s no structure or agenda to facilitate the networking, so, it's a little like going to your first middle-school dance.
2. Open Seating: This is where you grab a free seat at a random table. A lot of networking happy hours or lunch-and-learns are organized like this, because food and drinks are being served. Because you're sitting at a table, oftentimes, you’ll get to introduce yourself and give your elevator pitch to the table. BUT, finding the right connection is still very hit-or-miss, because when it’s open seating, the people that sit at your table are going to be random.
3. Matched: This is where the organizers have pre-matched you with specific people based on mutual interest. So, you'll either be sitting together at the same table or clustered together in the same break-out group. In addition, a really thoughtful organizer will plan specific questions for you to answer that will bring out your expertise, even if you don't have an earth-shattering elevator pitch.

?? Obviously, for the highest chance for success, you want to look for networking events where the organizers are going to match people beforehand.

This is why B2BSalesMagic networking events are curated this way. As organizers, both Catherine Brown and I think through who you should talk to and what you should say to make the most impact.

?? So, join us for our next networking event on Thu, Sep 19 @ 3-4pm CT (4-5pm ET, 1-2pm PT) and experience the difference! Click here to register ?

??Thought leader worth following

That's not a question you hear often.

Most sales leaders want to know about opportunities, pipeline, and quota.

Nurturing trust in their team is usually not top-of-mind.

But as my friend, Jen Halpern , says, "As a leader, you have to think bigger. You have to invest in people, because often times, leaders get so overly focused on the sales numbers that we forget it's our people that are producing the sales numbers."

And, the biggest consequence of this type of thinking if left unchecked will be a constant, revolving door of sales reps and sales leaders.

So, definitely follow or connect with Jen, because she regularly shares strategies for leaders on how to manage a sales team (in-person or remote), run daily sales huddles, coach sales reps, and more--all critical skills that sales leaders (especially NEWLY promoted sales leaders) must have to be successful.

?? AND, not only does she share insights on LinkedIn, Jen will also be a speaker at the Sell Well Conference in Houston, TX on Friday, Sep 6! I've already got my ticket, so grab yours and join us! ?

?? Btw, did you miss my article on how to use ChatGPT the RIGHT way for B2B sales? If so, read it here ?

About Brewing Insights

Brewing Insights is a monthly newsletter for small/medium business owners and executives who want to skip the fluff and get straight to the insights and answers. Subscribe to learn 3 insights every month as John shares what's top of mind for him and distills them into immediately, actionable next steps. Subscribe on LinkedIn here ?

About John Way

John Way is the Founder and Product Owner of Pipelineapp.io, a B2B SaaS platform that takes the idle leads in your CRM or email list and converts them into qualified sales conversations and paying customers. It does that through digital scorecards and automated onboarding.

John is also a LinkedIn Top Voice for Business Networking, and he shares his expertise as host for B2BSalesMagic, a B2B-only, networking mastermind community. Why? Because random acts of networking can lead to coffee conversations but they rarely land you customers.

?? Want to see what strategic networking is like? Register for the next B2BSalesMagic open networking event ?