Episode 99 Podcast Transcript
Speaker 1 (00:00):
If you are genuinely committing to making change this year and making it your best year yet, new year, new me, then you’ve got to get rubber meeting the road and it starts with you. It’s not the market. It’s not your employees. It’s not the government’s problem. It’s not the broader economic things that are going on around the world. It’s you. If you want it, it’s up to you. Gday everyone. Rob Kropp and Dan Stones here from Pravar Group, and welcome back to another episode of The Trade Den. Good to have you back, Dan. How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Always good to be back. Looking forward to today’s episode, Rob. Feeling really good. You feeling good?
Speaker 1 (00:41):
I am. I’m looking forward to it. Today’s an episode that isn’t really connected to the last two episodes. Those last two episodes are really around the whole planning and strategic side of things of goal setting, setting outcomes, 12 month roadmaps, really setting those strategic plays. And today we’re almost coupling that nicely with the whole mindset element of what it takes to set and achieve goals. And yeah, really looking forward to getting into today because this is … The last two episodes have really been the 20% of the equation. I like to think that the mindset element does all the heavy lifting. So yeah, it’s a big episode today.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Yeah. So I think, Rob, where we’ve been, absolutely. The last two episodes has been the strategy, setting up the goals, really walking through how to make your roadmap a reality. But today we’re going to be talking about probably one of the most important things that is a critical ingredient, and that’s making a genuine commitment to change. Beyond just what am I going to do? Who am I going to come? Who am I going to become? Because we get it, you’re busy, you’re working hard. The idea of changing yourself or what has to happen beyond all those things that you’ve now got listed to do. Beyond that, it starts to sound like just something else that’s not that important. But the truth is, the business that you’ve got right now is a direct reflection of you, who you are right now. It’s your leadership. It’s your systems that you’ve put in place.
(02:08):
It’s your standards that have carried through to your team. Your habits that you follow through on consistently. All of that, it wraps up into your decisions. So if you want to have a, let’s call it a $3 million business, but you’re operating like a one and a half million dollar business and you’ve been there for a while, that’s because that’s where you are. And you’ll stay there as long as you stay showing up as the same person. So what you need to do is really understand that the business will not change unless you do, especially when you’ve got these goals in place and you’ve done the work we’ve done over the last two episodes to set yourself up correctly. So really what we need to do is break down this idea, like we’ve said in the title, that for things to change first, you must change.
(02:49):
And most people start with the idea thinking that their year comes from all the external stuff that needs to be fixed or needs to be addressed, but it’s not that at all.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
You’re right. Most people, when it comes to goal setting and roadmapping, thinking, “Well, what do I have to do? These are the things I have to get done. These are the strategic plays of I’ve got to work on over the next 3, 6, 9, 12 months. But they forget this ingredient is, who do I have to be? There’s a big difference between what do I have to do to who do I have to be? Because if you don’t show up as the right person with the right mindset, a different mindset, show up with different habits, show up with different energy, different leadership, you won’t do the things you need to do to be able to get the results that you desire. And so that’s why it is. For things to change, first you must change. You’ve got to show up differently in terms of your mindset, the skillset, the strategy.
(03:49):
It’s not external. This is not an external conversation we’re having today. This is how you show up daily to be able to work on the things and do the things that matter to get the results.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Yeah. And when you talk about, it’s not an external thing. The external being things like what you look outwards to see, like, I need more staff. I need better clients. Both of those are external to you yourself, more leads even. Even the idea about the market and what the market’s doing. That’s what we mean by external drivers or factors that people tend to obsess over.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Yeah, you’re right. I think we have to remember, and we say this to clients all the time, is it comes back to that age or saying is that what got you here is not going to get you to where you want to go. And how you show up as a million dollar business owner is completely different to how you show up as a $2 million or a $3 million or a $5 million business owner. And I want you to think about that for a moment. Think about how you show up today. Maybe you are running a one to $2 billion business. And how you show up today, if you’re in that bracket, for example, you are managing the ground crew rather than being on the tools. You’re pricing different, you’re sales led, your sales focus, you’re starting to lead this business rather than be in the business.
(05:08):
So who you are and how you show up as a leader in your business is completely different to where you may have been doing three to 500 grand because back then it was get in, get the job done, scramble, think about running from supplier to job, job to supply, putting an apprentice on thinking, how could I ever get that far? And so even where you are today was completely different to when you were half the size in the business. So if that makes sense to you, then you’ve got to realise that if you want to go half or double the size over the next 12 to 24 months, who you are today is not going to get you to where you want to go in the future. And so that’s why we say what got you here is not what’s going to get you to where you want to go in the future.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, exactly. You can even go back to trades, right? When they were a tradesman, you start off as an apprentice. The skills, the strategies you had to learn to become a good qualified trade took time, it took things, but you showed up as a different person. You went from this first year apprentice, think of who you were back then to who you are now. That’s the sort of change we’re saying in going from that $1.5m, $1 mil up to $3mil, whatever it is. It’s the same journey. It’s the same process. It’s that different mindset, that different person that has to start up. At $1 mil, you can show up and do most of it yourself. You learn that. It becomes comfortable almost. It’s your sweet spot, as we talk about, but it’s a different world when you have to become someone who is owning and running a $2 to t$3 million dollar business.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
It is. And we heard that in recent client stories over the last sort of while, like our most recent one was Jerry Redman in episode 95. If you haven’t listened to that one, go back and listen to it. It was such a great episode of Jerry’s journey of change and transformation and what he achieved in such short period of time. But Jerry, we shared that story of Jerry around, he came into coaching doing $1.2 and after just over 12 months, started hitting a $2 million run rate. Yes, he had to work on strategies like estimation software and building out his ground crew and putting admin on and working on his pricing. They’re the strategic plays that we were talking about in the last two episodes around goal setting and roadmapping. But what today references is how Jerry had to show up as a different person.
(07:34):
He had to lose the mindset of, no one’s as good as me. It saves me time and energy and money if I do it myself. He had to lose that mindset and replace it with the power of delegation and accountability. So that’s what we mean about showing up. There’s an example of a mindset that Jerry had to change and showing up as a different person because unless he made that mindset shift and made that change, then he wouldn’t have enacted on the strategies in the first place. And that’s why we always say that mindset always precedes strategy every day of the week.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Yeah. And if you remember that, Jerry didn’t even realise when we were talking to him, he still hadn’t clicked in terms of what the mindset shift was or what he did for mindset. And that’s almost talking to the point that this mindset shift isn’t a strategic thing that you can think through. His big thing was at least having the recognition that he had to change. And I think that’s, if you’re listening today and anything you can take out of this is just the recognition that change is required personally. Change is required internally. You need to have that awareness that you need to change and then you start filling in those things. But if you try and strategically say to someone, “Here’s how you’re going to change your mindset, you do A, B, C, and D.” It never really holds. And we know that through coaching enough clients through it.
(08:56):
You’ve got to get that awareness, hold that space for those challenges to show up and then just saying, “Well, how would I show up as a $3 million business owner? How would I show up differently as a leader of this team that needs to act that way?”That’s sort of where Jerry got to. It wasn’t a conscious strategic mindset shift. It was literally having the awareness that he needed to change based on what he was listening and hearing and what challenges were coming at him at the time.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Correct. More examples around the Jerry one is that he had to change how he saw himself and where he saw himself in that business. It was not that he no longer saw himself as a great tradesman. He started changing his mindset and being committed to being manager of a trades business. He never longer saw himself. He made the choice to make a change around not being a mate, but start to turn into a manager. He changed, he’s made the change around flying blind around his pricing, but made the change to be committed to understand his numbers intimately, even though he didn’t know where to start. He made the choice to make a change around his leadership capabilities around, instead of doing it, to managing and leading and delegating and holding accountable. So that’s what we mean here around this whole, for things to change, for you must change, you’ve actually got to make a choice here.
(10:29):
You’ve got to make a genuine choice to be able to go, “You know what? I’m going to change. If I want to go from one to two to three million over the next six, 12, 18, 24 months, that’s up to me. I have to make this change happen. And yes, I’ve got to have the plans and the roadmaps and the strategies in place, but I’ve got to show up differently on a day-to-day basis to be able to make that goal and dream a reality.”
Speaker 2 (10:53):
And I think that’s the whole secret because you don’t necessarily … The strategies and the stuff you need to do in the levers in the business is one thing, but you don’t necessarily know how you have to change as a person at the time. You don’t know that until you say, “Well, I know I have to change. I’m going to do something different,” because change isn’t comfortable. It’s awkward. It’s where you get to that humbling piece in a sense. It’s where you get to that point where you’re like, “Well, I’m going to probably suck a bit at this and I might not get it right, but I know one thing for sure. I’m going to do it differently than what I have in the past.”
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Because change is, it’s hard, isn’t it?
Speaker 2 (11:28):
100% it is. And I think it’s just that it’s so mixed up with what is unknown. We don’t know what’s going to happen when we change or do something differently for the first time. So there’s the first level of awkwardness, if you like. We care about what the change is. We’re talking about changing our lives, our business, our relationships with families. There’s a lot on the line, so there’s a lot at stake. So automatically it’s hard because the stakes are high, the unknown factor’s high. And whenever we’re in that situation, things get really tricky for us mentally, just as human beings, we don’t like being in that position, but it’s exactly where we need to be. So we’ve got to have that experience of, well, I’m expecting it. I can anticipate that. If I can anticipate it, and you got to remember, guys have got great judgement already, right?
(12:14):
They’ve been in business three, five, six, seven years sometimes when we see them. It’s not like they’re poor decision makers. So they can have this, but they’ve got to understand that back yourself in to actually make this change and go through it all the way through just knowing that you’re going to probably make the right decisions.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
And I think if you haven’t picked up on it already, I’ve already said the words a few times, and I really want to hit this point home, is that you’ve actually got to make a choice to make a change.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
Change is happening around us regardless if we like it or not. And the speed in terms of which the world is changing is getting faster and faster and faster. But we’ve got to make a decision if we’re going to be in the driver’s seat or the passenger seat. And unfortunately, the majority of people, and I’m not even just … And I’m bundling in business owners here as well because people think, “Well, I run a business, therefore I’m open to change.” No, you’re not. Just because you run a business, you’re still a human being, most business owners and they’re in the passenger’s seat of their own business. They’re not in control. They’re not driving change. They’re allowing change to be dictated to them around what’s going on. If you want to make this your year, you got to make a genuine choice, like a stake in the ground moment to be able to go, “I’m going to make change here. I’m going to do something differently.” Because the reality is, is if you can have all the best plans in the world, you can sit down and follow the last two episodes around planning, goal setting, roadmapping, and set your year up, but unless you genuinely change and make a commitment to change throughout the whole year, you will naturally revert back to what’s easy, what’s comfortable, what’s safe, what’s secure, what worked back in 2025, and guess what? You are destined to repeat the same results that you achieved in 2025 for good or bad or other. And that’s why this episode comes after the goal setting conversations we’ve had because you can have all the plans of the world, but you’ve got to show up differently this year because if you don’t, you guarantee to repeat the same year from prior years.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Yeah. And this is where I think, Rob, that message is so true. And I think every episode we talk about the importance of booking in a strategy call to get clarity and doing that sort of stuff. And I want you to do that again in a minute. But at the same time, this is really this next step. This is the right time of when you’re listening to this if you’re in order in this time of the year, this is the time to go that extra step. This would be you showing up as someone different. So if you’re listening to this today and you think, well, this is the time to change, but I’m not sure what that means or how to do that. This is where the reach out has to happen. You don’t know what’s going to happen. It is the uncertain. It is the unknown.
(15:08):
There is a lot on the line, but really now’s the best time to reach out and have that strategy call.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
Correct, because it comes back to one of my other favourite sayings. I know I’ve got a million sayings and I’ve said it so many times on this podcast, but if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always gotten. You can have all the best plans in the world, but if you just keep showing up doing the same old thing over an extended period of time, you will keep getting the same old results. And this is, as you keep saying, Dan, that hopes and wishing is not a strategy, is it?
Speaker 2 (15:42):
No, hope’s not a strategy. It really isn’t. You open up a massive trap door. When you start to rile on hope and a decent plan, you really have to go that extra mile and make that shift. Otherwise, you build what we call a little crystal palace in your mind and a place where you can see it being better, but you never do anything about it. And literally what you were talking about there, my quote for that is basically you end up with the same shit different day. That’s what it becomes. And so many people we hear when you walk around and you hear people talking, they always say that, “How are you? ” Yeah, same shit different day. That’s because they know what they want, they know where they need to go, they know some of the strategies, they know what might work, but they’re not willing to make that investment to change themselves.
(16:20):
And that’s where it all begins.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Another great example of someone we’ve also recently had on this podcast, a great episode was Grant Hateley from Hateley Construct episode 91. If you haven’t listened to it, do yourself a favour and go back and listen to it where he’s probably added further down his journey in coaching because you might be thinking, “Yeah, but Jerry’s just new to coaching. It’s all exciting. It’s his first year of making real change.” But I love telling the Grant one because he’d been around coaching for a while. He had a good year, tough year, good year, tough year. There’s a real pattern of patterner results and pattern of behaviour and the results were actually mirroring Grant’s mindset and how he was showing up year on year.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
And his external world.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
And his external world. And it wasn’t until he tells it in the podcast episode around where he had that mirror moment where he said, “Enough’s enough, I’m going to show up differently, put his stake in the ground.” And he had three real breakthroughs. He had a mindset breakthrough, he had a leadership breakthrough, which resulted in a business breakthrough. And the reason why he had such a big shift over that 12 month period and has the ability to back it up and break that cycle of good, bad, good, bad, good, bad, is because he made the choice to make a change. He realised that I can’t just keep blaming and making excuses around all the things that are going on around me. For things to change, I have to change around how I was showing up. And that story is such proof again that the patterns will keep appearing until you make a real commitment to change, doesn’t it?
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Yeah. And you’re right, to go back to what you said before, he put himself back in the driver’s seat. He put himself in the driver’s seat, put his hands on the steering wheel and said, “This is going to be up to me. This is my change to make and this is where it all begins and basically where it all ends. If I show up as this person, I know what to do. It’s a foregone conclusion. This is done.” And he had that level of certainty around that when he committed to making that change within himself, which was what makes it so powerful. And as you said, it wasn’t like he was new to this and it was a fad or something he tried. He was years into his coaching journey before that realisation really took hold and he committed to making that shift once and for all.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
He committed to leading. He committed to showing up to his one-on-one team meetings. He committed to managing his team. He committed to showing up as a better partner and dad. He committed to understanding his numbers better. He committed to being sales led. He committed to selling to the market what the market was willing to pay. He was flirting around the edges with that, and that’s why he was getting subpar results. But the moment that he changed the dial a few percentage points and went from what was almost convenient to being committed, there’s a big difference between convenience and commitment or genuine intention around what you’re doing. That’s when things really changed for him and he jumped massively to a whole new level in 12 months.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Yeah. He became that person. None of that stuff that you just rattled off. None of that was who he was day by day by day. That was just something he aspired to be or something that he thought he needed to do as part of a to- do list. But when he really took it on board as that’s who he needed to become, that’s how he was going to show up, the world changed.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
The punchline out of today’s episode is that you can have all the best intentions of goals and roadmaps and strategic plays all mapped out in front of you, but unless you make a genuine commitment to change this year, nothing’s going to change. And this is something, this is your opportunity to have a face of the facts moment, like a good hard look in the mirror to be able to go, “What am I going to do differently this year? How am I going to show up differently this year? What’s the skills that I’ve got to develop? What’s the change in beliefs and mindsets that I’ve got to be able to have? ” Because you got to remember, what got you here is not what’s going to get you to where you want to go. And if you are genuinely committing to making change this year and making it your best year yet, new year, new me, then you’ve got to get rubber meeting the road and it starts with you.
(20:44):
It’s not the market. It’s not your employees. It’s not the government’s problem. It’s not the broader economic things that are going on around the world. It’s you. If you want it, it’s up to you. And this is your opportunity to make this year your year, but it starts with you today showing up as a different person, but not just doing it for the next month or two until your new year’s resolutions wind out. It’s showing up all the way through to the end of this year and seeing this year through. And I think that’s the punchline, isn’t it, Dan?
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Absolutely. 100%. It’s a commitment, not an intention anymore.That’s the difference.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
If you’ve enjoyed today’s episode and you’re like, “Yeah, I’m ready for genuine transformation, not just bit of motivational hit when I need it, but genuine transformational change and you’re ready and committed to that, then jump across to strategysession.com.au, fill out the application form, book in a discovery call that suits both of us. Let’s talk a bit about what happened last year, where you’re trying to go this year, what you really want to achieve over the next 12 months, and let’s talk through around how you can make that commitment to genuinely making this next year your best year yet. Until then, take care and looking forward to talking to you next week or next week episode. Take care.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
See you soon.