A viewpoint in business says hire slowly, fire quickly. The concept of that is take your time for strategic hires into your business. Take your time to figure out the right fit and the right thing fit into the culture. The fine line between the power of working alone and the time to hire, you may be facing this challenge right now with your own business as your schedule gets fuller and fuller and the time tighter. You may be thinking how you’re limiting your business’ growth by your management of it. The questions is not really should you hire or should you not hire; it’s when it’s time to hire. It’s time to bring someone on to help and produce. However, just because you hire someone doesn’t guarantee that your life will be easier. In fact, sometimes it can get much harder, especially in the short term as they onboard and learn how to work with you. Rob discusses his long history of hiring, firing and all the things in-between.
It’s amazing to do this and I want to admit something. I don’t prepare a lot for all the shows. I don’t know if you’ve noticed or felt the difference. On some shows I’ve got the statistics, I’ve got the ideas, I’ve got ascript. When I have a guest, I want to prepare that much just to make sure I know who they are. There are some shows like this one where I don’t prepare at all on purpose because I can feel something inside of me when I work on the topic. There’s all this information in my brain. I don’t prepare so the raw truth will come out, which for some would terrify to do a live show not prepared but for me, it’s who I am. The reason I tell you this is because this is one of my favorite episodes I’ve done to date because it comes straight from the heart and straight from my experience. I think it’s one of the most relevant topics that hopefully will add value to you because it’s about you waking up, taking it and seeing that it’s time to hire for your next evolution. I’m a little tricky. You’ll figure that out by the end and hopefully add some value. Any questions, please feel free to contact me via my new website RobertKandell.com,if I can be of any service. Let’s join the show in progress.
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We’re going to talk about the issues, the places we get stuck, the truth that needs to get told, the concepts that need to be explored and a lot of stories about my life, the trials and tribulations I’ve gone through, so you don’t have to do it. I am happily your crash test dummy. I am the control in the experiments. I am the one willing to bang my head in order so you don’t have to. Though I’ve seen most people like to bang their head because that’s the only way they perceive the value to put your foot in the bear trap, to see if the stove is hot, if the grill is ready. You can ignore all my work if you want to make sure that it’s painful, but you don’t have to if that’s what you want. I’m excited to be here back. There are major epic changes going on in my life at the moment. I’m very thrilled to be living, but most people aren’t.
I just had a coaching session with someone who was happy not living. Really happy in the dark, “I’m going to fuck up, things are going to shit,” modality. That’s not me. I am in the epic, thrilled to be living state and it’s gotten a lot of work to get here. I want to diverge off the show and just reflect on some things that are happening for me. The main thing is I’ve been struggling with this concept of“I don’t deserve to be big,“ which Ithink I’ve talked about a few times on the show. We did have an epic journey previously where I dug into this concept. I saw how I was manufacturing, creating and hiring Morgan to play the role of stopping me from being big.This may sound like this is somewhat her fault,it’s not. It’s all mine.
That’s what this show is about. It’s about how to discover what you’re doing and how you’re doing it to grow your capacity, to be the fullest person you can be and find out where your foot is on the brake, the proverbial brake or the realistic brake. The concept of the show is called, “When it’s time to hire.“ It’s not like, “Should I hire or should I not hire?“ It’s when it’s time to hire, which I took the title deliberately. In this journey, I just saw the depth of my brilliance in ways to keep myself small. I have a PhD in my skills of how to turn the volume down in my life, turn the heat down so I can stay at this somewhat comfortable status quo.My status quo is probably very uncomfortable for most people, in terms of how I work, how I love and how I think but I still see this greater size of me.I’m imagining and dreaming this bigger person I want to be.
Time To Hire: Keep working on how to break through that glass ceiling.
When it comes down to it, it’s always me holding back myself and it’s a trick. It’s a trick of the mind to keep that self-talk, that self-awareness so I don’t keep repeating the same thing over and over again.To stay in that loop of coming close to breaking through that self-created glass ceiling and then coming back down to status quo. Up to the glass ceiling, feel the glass press against my nose and then come back down to the status quo. Again and again, it’s time to keep working on how to break through that glass ceiling because I guarantee you, once you get through that glass ceiling, there’s another one you’ve probably created somewhere in your childhood waiting for you.You’ve got to get through the first one to see the second one.
I set the stage. This is about the concept of when to hire and when it’s time to hire. There’s a viewpoint in business and it says hire slowly, fire quickly. The concept of that is to take your time for those strategic hires into your business. Take your time to figure out if you’re the right fit. If the right thing fits into the culture. There are all these concepts and ideas around it. I have a client, she once told me, “I actually believein the opposite. I believe in hiring quickly and firing slowly,” which I thought was interesting. What she explained was, “You can spend a lot of time in the testing, the theoretical aspect of this person, how they would fit into your business, but you won’t know until they’re in it.”People have amazing résumés and CVs and amazing ways to talk themselves into a job, but you won’t know until the thick of the fire if they’re the right person. Then once you hire them, give them the benefit of the doubt.
If they’re stealing from your company, if they’re pissing off the customers, if they’re causing damage, get rid of them immediately.If they’re just not fitting into the culture, if they’re just not the right fit, give them the time to evolve into the position. Which I thought was interesting because it was a nice little twist on something I always assumed to be true. There are pros and cons to this concept but I want to be able to offer both sides of it in order for you to understand that there isn’t just one way to hire and fire. I had an experience where I hired a firm that did an amazing job for me. When I say amazing, that is no small platitude. They went way beyond the scope of their contract to help me. Basically, my website got hacked and then my hosting site deleted my website. This company worked their butts off to try to figure out how to fix it. They didn’t fix it at the end and they didn’t charge me for the extra time. I was like, “These are quality people. You’ve got me for life.” When I was in the final stages of my new website, RobertKandell.com, I wanted to host with them because of the exceptional job they had done for me in the past.
I called them and they said, “Fine, we can do the job. Here’s the price.” I’m like, “Great.” Then I paid the bill a couple days later and then they ignored me and because they had done so much good for me in the past, I was willing to have the lowest stakes for them. I was constantly on them and I was on email asking and what they did in the first week was they destroyed my email. The things they did to change, stopped my email from appearing. I was like, “My email’s not working.” They were like, “We’ll fix it.” This guy who had been so welcoming in the past basically ignored me. Then I got him on the phone and I started off the phone with tough love and he was like, “How are you doing?” which I hate when you’re using that levity to cover your fucked-upniche. It is annoying and graving and I hope I don’t do that.
When you know you’re messed up, here’s how you do it. You say, “I know I fucked up. I’m sorry. Here’s how I’m going to fix it.” You do not do, “I am going to manipulate you with my good, nice guy,don’t-hit-me attitude and con you into liking me, so I can somehow escape and avoid the problem.” That’s what this guy did. On the phone, I’m like, “I’m not happy.” He’s like, “Yeah.“ The words don’t matter, it’s the tone of voice that’s grated. Let’s call him Z. “Z,stop playing nice guy with me. If you want my reflection of all the things you’re doing wrong, I’m willing to tell you,“ which shut him up. It was really a sucker punch to the gut and then he woke up. He’s like, “Okay, I’ll fix it.”Did he fix it? No. Did he offer service? No.
Here I was at the end of the week, my email is fixed because I’m the one who fixed it. I’m communicating without Z to his consultant who was a nice guy. Then at one point I was like, “Why am I torturing myself? What part of me is staying in this relationship with Z even though I know it’s toxic just because he did well with me?“ I saw deeply how my loyalty to this guy and more the hope, the prayer that his inadequacy and nice guy voice was somehow going to fix it. I was stuck in the level of fantasy that I was manufacturing.I was like, “Got it.” I basically fired him on the spot. I found another solution and it’s working now.
Look At Internal Patterns
The idea would be if you want to look at your patterns in terms of hiring and firing for people, the first thing is to really look internal because like everything else in the world, it’s an inside game. We keep looking externally at the people we’re hiring and getting mad at them before we sit down and say, “They are a reflection of how I’m treating myself, the expectations for setting, the level of requirements I have and basically, it’s a representation.“They are a representation of my own internal game.If you wanted to look at something that’s not working for you with someone you’ve hired, then the first thing is to look inside.
Don’t Do It For The Wrong Reasons
I want to give you a history of how I’ve hired for my firm. I’ve had my consulting firm and it’s going on four years. I had an assistant when I first started, she was a friend of mine from OneTaste. I basically hired her because I had hopes that she was going to be something she wasn’t. I was doing penance for OneTaste and the way I behaved at OneTaste, I was doing penance, hiring her, payinga lot of money and carrying her.She did a good job. What it was is that I was doing it for the wrong reasons. About six months into my working with her, I let her go.I moved to the valley. I started my own firm and I went into this isolation mode. I was the lone wolf of my business. I was handling everything and it was good at the time because what I had was I had enough business to pay me a good amount. I couldn’t sustain another person. At the same time, I wasn’t ready to take on more responsibility.
Here’s something a lot of people don’t know. When you hire someone, it’s a pain in the ass. When you hire someone, it is a royal pain in the ass because you need to direct them. You need to hold them. You have to pay them and deal with their energy. They could be the most amazing worker in the world and you still have to carry them inside your system.I wasn’t ready to hold someone. I wasn’t ready to direct someone. I wasn’t ready for someone to say, “Rob, what do you need me to do?” so they can feel good about the money I’m paying them. Meanwhile, I’m stuck in my own cycles. I can’t get my head out of the water. I knew I wasn’t ready to bring someone up. After sometime, I then advertised and found an intern. I put the word out. I think I put it on a couple of sites and schools. I’ve got 30 responses and then resulted to hire the best guy. He was freaking amazing on paper. He was a mini-me. I don’t know if this guy was a psychopath or something, but he tapped into my system and I was seeing Rob Kandell inmy intern.
Time To Hire: When you hire someone, it is a royal pain in the ass because you need to direct them.
I was like, “Have I found my clone? Have I found some with the same belief systems, the same power and the same dedication to work?” I have. I am a master worker. I’m an entrepreneur. I have mad skills in manifesting the mini-me. I am so excited and I hired him. It wasn’t a lot of money. It was $500 a month. It wasn’t big. I gave him some discreet tasks and he did absolutely none of them. He must have worked hard to then piss me off because he missed meetings. He forgot meetings. He didn’t call. He didn’t accomplish the simplest of tasks like sign up for Asana, which is a project management software which I recommend. It was a two-click thing he had to do and he didn’t freaking do it.
I’m like, “What was going on?“ I was infuriated mostly because I was so infuriated with him and he was doing some editing for podcasts. I didn’t like probably what he was doing and it was taking forever. It was like I can edit for my podcasts out on a bad day in about 40 minutes. I don’t make a lot of mistakes or miscues or embarrass myself too much on the podcast, so I don’t have to go back and edit. When I do make mistakes, I write the time down so I know I can go to this spot. It’s very easy. It was taking himthree fucking hours to edit up a 40-minute podcast. What the fuck is wrong? He was like, “Why are you complaining?” Hewas picking music that was horrible.
After a month of total frustration, I said, “Why is this not working out? Thank you for your time but your services are no longer needed,” which basically I wanted to give him all the feedback. He had done so poorly with me that I didn’t feel the energy to give him the feedback. Do I have a charge on this? You might have noticed, I surely do. That was my intern. Then I felt little burns because of why I had messed up. I had nervousness about my own ability to hire. I felt doubt. I don’t like to feel doubt. I don’t mind making mistakes, miscues or apologizing. That’s no problem. That’s part of the game of living a large empowered life.To have doubt in myself, which is a reflection of powerless as my therapist like to say, my kryptonite,the doubt was really bad.
I had to take months to get back into alignment of having someone. Then something shifted. This is the core of what this podcast is about, what I want to communicate. I then decidedthat I was ready to build a team. More importantly, I saw that I almost had to. If I wanted to accomplish in 2018 these humongous goals of what I wanted, I knew that if I try to do it by myself, I would fail. Not just maybe fail. I don’t say definitive things for many things but I can for this. I was going to fail because there was way too much for me to handle it by myself. Also, I saw that my economics, my budget had increased. I tweaked my business well enough to hit my goals that I could afford to hire people.
These are two main points. One, I knew if I wanted to set my goals, I would need to hire. I could change my goals in order to not need them, but I didn’t want to change my goals. I saw the path of the importance of having someone to hire. Second, I had the economic budget where hiring people was not going to be a burden. Would I like to take that money home for myself and invested it or pay off some taxes? Yes. I knew the opportunity cost. The cost of me not hiring them was greater than the budget I was going to spend on them. The opportunity costs for those who don’t know is when you have many paths in business.When you pick path A and don’t do pathB,the opportunity cost is what you don’t do on path B.
Not Investing In A Team Is Going To Cost You
Me not investing in the team was going to cost me my whole business going down. That were two important things. I also felt this psychological openness so then I started hiring. I went from one person, a part-time podcast agent to seven people in a month. I don’t know if I’d necessarily recommend that, but they’re all part-time. Very specific, very niche, very cornered but contained in their jobs. They have very specific scopes. You can do this opposite. You could hire someone to be your guy or gal Friday or personal assistant. There are benefits to that. I knew for me, the main thing I wanted to do was be able to say, “You do this, you do that, you’re in your control of it.“If you have questions, fine. If you want to boss me around, fine. I want this handled.
The people I hired and the people I magnetized are freaking magnificent. They are awesome. Summer, I don’t want to call her my assistant. I don’t want to call her partner either because that’s not really who she is but an associate. She’s like part of my brain that handles stuff for me. I’m so blessed to have her, so skilled and so powerful. I hired a social media coordinator, Sarah, to schedule all the posts I should be doing. Totally handled up my brain,my podcast agents. It’s been rocking. It got me the best podcast evercalled Gender Knot.I hired a web designer that was a little slow, not great but definitely sped up at the end. I have of course of bookkeeper helping me. Then I hired a book coach and she’s the one that I wanted to talk about the most. I’ve never written a book before. I’ve never sold a book before. I’ve never done all these things. It was clear to me that in an areaof expertise, having someone who’s done it before was going to be beneficial.
When I looked for my associate, she showed up and said, “I want to be your associate.” I’m like, “You’re too skilled to be my associate.” Then we talked about her being in my book. Her price went up quite a bit but what she’s holding for me, what she’s mirroring me, how much better she’s making me, how much better she’s making the book is epic because she is challenging me constantly. I’m letting go of my ego to make the book better and better. She’s like, “I don’t understand this work. I don’t understand this sentence. This paragraph is great. What if you added this to make it better?” Every step of the way she’s knighting me to make this book better and better and I’m so grateful. She’s also editing my articles. She’s going to help me with setting up on Amazon and all these things. There’s a tour in there. There are all these things that she’s assisting me.
Hire Someone With The Skill Set You Don’t Have
All of my hires are great. This has been great because it’s enabled me to be better. The greatest thing you can do is to hire someone with the skillset you don’t have in order to bring your greatness out. That has been the greatest gift. The reason the show popped up for me is I’m looking up for two more people to add to my team. One is a podcast producer. I’ve done a good job with Tuff Love. I don’t think I’ve done a great job, not so much in terms of quality. I think that I produce content that’s of quality. I am consistent but there’s this level of holding that we could take it to the next level. I say we, you my audience,because you’re a part of the process.I don’t have a lot of people show up for the live show. My numbers have decreased a little bit. I’m not having guests on here the way I wanted. I’m a little bit late. I need someone else to see this taken to the next level is what I see for the show. I also want to hire someone to help me with the publicity of the book because I frankly don’t know what I’m doing.
All of this is background and the foundation for the real sneaky point of the show because this show isn’t about business. This show is about you in your personal life. When is it time for you to hire someone in your life that’s going to take it to the next level? Is it now? If it’s not now, when is itgoing to be? Where do you need to have it? I often say we hire our partners to explore, expand and grow different parts of ourselves. I know for a fact that I hired Morgan to be a mirror for me, to be such a strong, powerful person in my life to consistently improve my skills. I’ve been doing self-development work now and I am still stepping in my own bullshit time and time again. I rushed something. I was too much of my ego. I was too much on my masculine. I stepped in my own bullshit and I hurt the feelings of Morgan. Instead of me saying, “Morgan, you’re bad for your feelings,” though that option was definitely in my mind. What she said was, “This is the impact you’ve had on me.”
Time To Hire: Hiring people for specific scopes allows you to be in control of it.
It’s a reflection for me to keep getting better and better as a man. What she needs to feel safe is very different from what I need to feel safe. It’s important for me to know that so I can become a better person. This isn’t just a romantic hire. This isn’t just looking for a partner, a mate, a husband or a wife. This is about the friends in your life. This is about the teachers in your life. This is about the coaches in your life because living at the status quo is akin to mediocrity and for some, death. For those of you who enjoy mediocrity, and sure enjoy the slow degrade of your life, then don’t read this part. If you’ve subscribed and listened to a show called Tuff Love,there is some part of you that want to up-level. There’s a part of you that want to grow and expand. Like me with my process of waiting until the right time to hire my team, I do want to offer you that you don’t have to rush out and find that coach or find that friend or find that book or find that spiritual teacher, that YouTuber, another podcaster or this podcast. I’m not saying you have to immediately. I think it’s important for you to open up your mind and your sight to see if this might be the next thing in your life.
Think Strategically And Energetically About What You Need To Level Up
Are you willing to clear away your bullshit to step into your power to say, “Yes, I deserve it. Yes, I have the emotional bandwidth, the emotional budget to have it. Yes, it’s time for me to go to the next level to break through that glass ceiling so I can make my life better and better.” Here’s the thing, if you don’t do this with yourself, it’s not going to come or it’s going to come in the form of the intern. It’s going to come in some shitty well-packaged, handsome version of what you don’t need. The moral of the show, the time to hire might not be now, it might be tomorrow.If you do want your life to expand, you have to start thinking strategically and energetically about what you need to get to the next level. It can be as simple as turning to a friend and saying, “I need some help. I’ve been in this rot. Would you be able to talk to me for half an hour every week about my progress? Would you act as my accountability partner?”
Mama Gena and her crew have something called Spring Cleaning, which basically all the Sister Goddesses have the option to say, “Do you have time to Spring Clean?“They’ll just rant for ten or fifteen minutes on their shitand then they’ll feel better.The point is you might already have this person in your life. It could be your best friend, it could be a romantic partner, it could be a coach, it could be a therapist. You can start using your therapist a little better. You could start up-leveling with your coach. You could find a men’s group, you could find a women’s group and you can find different gender group. You can do a twelve-step program. I’m not saying you have to spend money to do this.My belief system, if you want to get to that next level of your evolution, it’s very difficult to do by yourself and very important to recruit, to magnetize and to hire that next person or your life extension.
Thank you as always for coming on the show. For any questions, feel free to email me. Please checkout my website, RobertKandell.com. We’re still fine tuning little details but you’ll actually can pre-order the book. You can sign up for my communication courses. I’m coming to Los Angeles, New York. Hopefully coming to Ireland or Londonor a world tour coming up. I wanted to teach this communication course all over the world. Thank you again for being here. Go forth, find your bliss, believe in yourself and remember, I love you.
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