This conversation’s going to be really helpful to you. If you are a business owner, I can promise you there’s gonna be tons of tips, tricks and strategies shared today. So with me is Mr. Brad. Tomberg Brad. Welcome to the Mitch gray show
Brad: Thanks Mitch. It’s great to be here. I love it
Mitch: We had a great pre-show conversation and I just love connecting with people from around the world. And you’re on the east coast in America. So you’re a few hours ahead of me. So we joked we’re gonna get at in and out of this thing and give people a ton of value and have fun with it.
What do you say?
Brad: Sounds like a plan to me, man.
Mitch: I love it. I love it. Hey Brad, you are the founder of E three consulting, the author of business fitness revolution. And you recently launched business fitness university, a program design for business owners, C-suite executives and managers. And a little bit about your book, business fitness revolution.
Number one, it’s available on Amazon. So everyone can go out and order that that is the businesses like the human body. It’s the first statement in the summary. It’s made up of many parts that have to work together to remain healthy, vibrant, and growing. Wow. I love that analogy. So my first big question to you, which is how I like to start the show.
It’s actually not a question. I just wanna give you an opportunity to really dive off into this idea. How does a business really reflect the human body and what are some connective points that you’ve made over the years? From that example?
Brad: I usually like to start out with the story of how this came to be, and I think you may get a better understanding then recently, or.
Few years ago, I was at a client. And as soon as I walked through the door, I noticed that this client, it was in the middle of winter, he was sweating profusely. He was extremely out of shape. He was sitting there on his desk, eating fried foods, and he was yelling at all of the people that were around him.
And all of the people that were around him were absolutely miserable. Wow. And I started thinking to myself, the business owner is he’s the brain of the business. And if he doesn’t communicate effectively to his employees, it’s like having a blockage. So if he communicates effectively, then the central nervous system of the business is operating efficiently.
So I started to think about the human body as it relates to the business body. And then from that. I actually wrote a blog article talking about it. And then I took it another step further. We started talking about the circulatory system right in the human body. It’s the heart and how things move around from the blood point of view, but in the business body, it’s how cash management moves through the business.
How liquid is the company. And then we got onto other things too, like parts of the body, like stomach. How much we digest information, right? Social media all day long comes in at us. How do we get rid of the garbage or filter through the garbage and keep the important pieces? Because we need that nutrients for our body.
So after doing about 13 of those, it turned into the book and then the book is now turned into an online course wow. Yeah, it’s been an evolutionary road that I’ve been going down. And most recently it has turned into a lot of the hospitals in the area have their own gyms and their own fitness centers as a wellness program.
And we’re even thinking about maybe approaching companies like blue cross blue shield and Humana and saying, Hey, this is something you can offer to the executives in. Of your clients. And we’re getting a lot of positive feedback because obviously if the business owner is healthy and wellbeing, his business can flourish.
His people are happy and more importantly, we’re reducing the cost of medical care by making their health better. And I love that’s that part
Mitch: I love that partnership with medical groups specifically, it’s a great partnership with many things, but that, it just makes all the sense in the world that since you’re using that example of the body and business, Kind of coinciding to actually take that into function in partnering with a medical group or a hospital that just makes all the sense in the world to me.
So have you actually had the opportunity to do some of those? Is that something in the future? What does that look like?
Brad: We started to pilot the program and then this thing hit called COVID . So that’s so when, so when COVID hit, I decided what am I gonna do? That was when I did the online course, I flew out to San Francisco with a mask on, of course, and then I shot the course out there over three days. I figured if I can’t do it. Person, I might all start to do it online. And now the online will probably become a lot of the marketing material and stuff like that, or the coursework that we give away to people so that they can learn about us as we go forward with it.
It’s funny because some of the greatest inventions and those things that happen, weren’t what they set out to be. This is a good example of what this never set out to be. We brought in a personal trainer, I went out and got my personal training certification, just so when I talk to people.
Just be somewhat credible, and associate ourselves with a couple of good orthopedic doctors for those of us that, are a little older and have, aches and pains. Yeah. So it’s been this growing ecosystem of people that feel that it’s a really great idea and it’s something that they want to be a part of.
Mitch: What’s coming to mind. Brad, and this isn’t something you’ve mentioned, but it’s really just an epiphany that I’m having currently. It’s very symbolic that you’re randomly growing all of these partnerships to spread this message, which is much like a body of a community of people, but the more support you have and the more partnerships that are created, and oftentimes those just happen by evolution and by opportunity, it’s not something we force.
And so that’s kinda just popping in my mind about how beautiful that is for what you’re building. In a way by happenstance you’re building all these partnerships that are just gonna add to the body of the work that you’re doing.
Brad: Yeah. And the only mistake I made was not doing it 30 years earlier.
Mitch: We know what we know when we know it. Absolutely. When we know it in right people, right place, right time. Wow. That’s incredible.
Brad: I, when people always ask me what is it that you really do? I always my tagline has always been, we help. Business owners, senior managers, sea level executives, chief peak performance for both themselves and for their company and their organizations.
Because if you think about it if I’m yawning in the afternoon in a meeting and I, haven’t the right amount of nutrition in my body, and am I really operating in a hundred percent efficiency? No, I’m not. I meant. And. because I get up in the morning and I work out very early. I notice one thing, a lot of the people who I’m with when they leave the gym in the morning, they’re basically ready to rip the face off the world.
So they’re already ahead of everybody else because they’ve gotta jump on the day and they, their energy level is higher and that energy level can carry ’em through. There’s no dips. There’s no things like that. By working on the individual and getting him to optimize himself first, then we turned to the business and.
Get the business optimized as well.
Mitch: I love that picture. You just painted and you alluded to something that was kind of Haring in the back of my mind, and that is most people understand the way the human body works is your input becomes your output now. Most people don’t take that understanding and actually put it into practice.
We often input junk and expect greater output. But I think if you took the average person walking the street and said, Hey, if you sodas all day, how are you at? Say not great. Versus if I drink water all day. What are some kind of correlations to the business that you could say these are the input types of things that you need in your business with your team to really begin seeing the result of positive output?
Brad: I always look at everything in terms of a triangle it’s really, three-sided, there’s, it’s either a people issue. It’s a process issue, or it’s a technology issue. And. If any of those three, the human body, like you can again go back to the human body business. Body’s like the human body.
One of the business systems is weak or broken. Then it affects the entire body itself. And hopefully, if you’re, if the business body is healthy, when those things occur, the other systems in the business surround it, make it healthy. Yeah. It, it’s a lot of that. It’s all, it’s also understanding that.
The impact of one, one system in your business can greatly impact another part of your business. If you have an unhealthy me, then you’re not gonna be a good runner, right? It’s gonna affect potentially your way. It’s the same kind of concept. You could draw a million parallels between the two of them, but at the end of the day, the idea is both are equally important and both of them need to be on a hundred percent to be.
At peak efficiency, everyone talks about peak efficiency. You always hear that you read articles, peak efficiency. What is peak efficiency? Peak efficiency is you’re doing as much as you can in the time that you have to do it. And there’s nothing that’s stopping you or there’s nothing that’s holding you back.
Same thing with businesses, bus, I talk about nearsightedness and farsighted. This businesses are notorious for that, right? They’re so consumed with what’s in the future that they’re not paying attention to what’s in front of them. And. They go outta business, they’re or it’s the other way around.
They’re so concentrated on the near term that they fail you to see any kind of shifts or changes that are happening in the industry. Yeah. So again, what we try to do is as we’re working on something with the human body is then. Work on something at the same time for the business body so that people can say, oh yeah, I get it.
It makes sense to me, and these are the things that I need to work on because of cause and effect because of impact on others, the same thing with people. If my people are not happy, what’s your root causes? What are the things that you need to do to fix that? Because guess what? Your business isn’t gonna be a hun, you could be in a hundred percent physical.
But your people are so measurable. Guess what? They’re not right. and that’s, and again, that’s not a hundred percent efficiency or a hundred percent health. So you have to consider that are your processes in your business optimized, if people are doing things different ways, everybody, there’s no systematization of it.
If you read Michael Gerber’s book on emo , he talks about why McDonald’s is so successful. They have a book. Yes. And it says you put the bun on the left side and you put the burger on the right side and don’t put the tomato on the burger cuz on the bun cuz it makes it soggy. And then you apply the mustard.
It’s a process, it’s a system. So I, one of the areas when I’m looking at a business is do they have systems? Do they have processes because. A lot of times I get called up and they say, Hey Brad, we have a problem. Our people, we don’t have the right people in the right roles. Okay. You have a people issue, but maybe it’s because of your processes or because you’re a lack of technology or they say we have a technology problem.
And I’m like no, you don’t, your computers are fine. The problem is you have no processes and you never taught your people. So you can only, that triangle. Everything impacts and the same thing with business fitness, anything that happens to the business body has an impact on other parts of that business.
Mitch: Yeah. I love that. And I can testify right there with you in working with business owners, especially small business owners. They’re, it’s almost like the smaller, the business, the lack, the more lack of vision. Because they’re so busy putting out fires on a day to day basis that they forget to lift their eyes and look forward.
And that becomes of great barriers of their development and their success. And it causes them to become incredibly overwhelmed because they’re dealing with things that really they shouldn’t be dealing with.
Brad: How can they grow a business when they’re working in it instead on it. That’s right.
So I had someone make a statement to me the other day, a few weeks ago.
They said, when you’re $200 an hour employees doing 20 an hour task, you have a problem. And I thought that was a great statement.
Brad: Dan Sullivan, I took the Dan Sullivan course years ago. And from a fundamentals point of view, he really nails it. He talks about, free days, focus days and buffer days.
One of the things. That help your business make the most money. Those three things are what you should be doing all day long. Everything else. Delegated a girl, I know calls it the bucket or the effort list. One side is the bucket list. The other side is the effort list.
And anything that’s in your bucket list are the things that are gonna make you successful and help your business grow and anything, everything else goes into the effort lists. You really have to, as a business owner and as a principal in a business, you, the one that needs to remain steadfastly focused on.
Driving that business forward. And that means getting rid of the things that are stopping you from moving forward, getting rid of the, learning here. What I learned about myself in building a business, which is some things I’m really good at. And there’s some things that I could, there’s some things I could spend the rest of my life hoping to become adequate with.
So I’d rather get rid of those things and focus on the things. Really are my unique differentiator. And I think if business owners can get that mindset, I think that’s part of where their problem is because you’re right. Especially when they’re smaller and they’re trying to be the chief cook and the bottle washer, they don’t understand that frees them up to make more money over a period of time, instead of doing it themselves.
You always look at, I always look at everything as here’s my hourly rate. So when someone asks me to do something, I say to myself, is it worth that? Cause it’s gonna take me an hour to do. And I’m not gaining anything by it. And that’s what it’s costing me, cuz it’s a cost. It’s an opportunity.
What motivates someone in that situation to begin taking a reflection, because we know that real great leadership starts internally. Yes. And so what really motivates someone to, to look at that reflection and go. And again, I want to compare it because I love your analogy about comparing it to the human body.
And that is for many people, they wake up one day in their mind and they’re 150 pounds overweight, and they’re not the high school athlete that they were. And they got that from a doctor’s visit. And the doctor said, your heart’s in bad shape. You better do something about it. So it’s like that jolt and then it motivates them.
Is that what in many business leaders? And if so, What could a business leader do to be more proactive, to begin creating that change?
Brad: When I tell people what I do and people say, I really need to be doing that, or they wanna engage. What I notice in that situation is that it’s like going on a diet, if you just, all of a sudden cut out sugar, how long are you gonna last on that diet?
Right? so really what it’s about. It’s about I preach moderation. I mean with everything. If you want to get in shape quick, then you figure out the things that you need to do to get in shape quick, but you don’t want to get in. You don’t want to try to go at it too hard because then you become discouraged.
Mitch: So, It’s not sustainable.
Brad: It’s not sustainable. It’s the same thing with your business. So the first thing the business has to do is they have to look in the mirror themselves, right? You have to do an audit of everything that’s going on in your business. And you need to say, this is what’s good about my business, and this is.
And that usually comes at a time when a business owner says I’m stressed out and I’ve now hit a ceiling of complexity. I can’t work any harder because the harder I work, I’m not making anymore. In fact, if anything, I’m actually going backwards. So how do I break through that? Ceiling, that ceiling of complexity as it’s called.
And that’s when you start to recognize the concept of, I need to delegate, I need to trust people more, or I need to hire the right people because maybe I don’t have the right people. And that’s where. An outside influence, like someone like me would come in and say, you have the, let’s build an org chart.
I don’t need an or chart. You do need an or chart because when you’re 10 times this size, you’re gonna have specific roles that people are gonna have to grow into. And having that vision say, creating that vision right up front gives you something to look for and starts to. Lay out the pieces and how you need to plug them into grow.
Because usually when people come to me, it’s because we’re not growing, I’m not growing and physically I’m a wreck. I’ve got stress and I can’t do, how do I reduce stress? How do I do this? So sometimes it’s, the business is unhealthy and they’re coming to you and you just say, Hey, by the way, would you like to, again, to shape?
And other times it’s the other way around. And all of a sudden they start to see the improvement in the business. And they’re like how can this play in my business? A lot of times it’s together. Sometimes it’s separate, but the goal is the same. And that’s to hit maximum efficiency in either one of them, the business or the individual.
Mitch: All of this is making me wonder about my next question. And that is, was there an experience in your life or multiple experiences that kind of brought you to this idea of. Approach that you now take, was there maybe a beater that you experienced or something you went through?
What kind of helped you arrive at where you are with this approach?
Brad: I think a lot of it it was self served. I decided I wanted to get into shape and I noticed that when I got into shape, I was much more focused. And then I stood focusing my energies in the business and. I saw the improvement and I saw the growth.
And then I also noticed that a lot of people who I was dealing with were talking to me about either one of these versions. It’s you say I’ve heard it five or six times, but if you wanna know where I drew my experiences from, it comes from 350 different business owners who were.
All over the type of spectrum that you could imagine in people who are very well articulated, very well organized and people that when you walk in, you were, you felt like you were bothering them. Like the guy would say to me, I got two minutes, what are you gotta say to me? And I’m like, okay, here’s a guy who’s stressed out.
So you start to see the different personalities. Then you start to draw inference. I started to draw inferences from, and I said, okay, this is a type a. There’s Colby profile and there’s these profiles, but after a while, you don’t need to test to know no, DC or right.
So when you start to when, so I started to do a lot of reading in terms of personality types and Interpersonal relationships. Because as a business owner, there were guys who were empirically based who hated my guts because I was a sales guy and I was like, Hey here, this is what we’re gonna do for you.
And then the guy who’s receptive to me was like, yeah, that’s great. Let’s go do it now. But the empirical guy, you had to address him very differently. You had to point to numbers and you had to point to ROI. And I realized that there’s. The same reason why when I was traveling all over the country, dealing with people in Texas is very different than dealing with people in New York, it’s and if you know how to play into both of them, and you could adjust to that makes you even more successful.
So I guess what it comes from is all of the years of. Between getting beaten up and being successful in FA it’s like they say failures to stepping stones to success. I’ve had enough failures I’m finally successful now but it’s. Everything is a learning experience and that’s the way I go into every situation.
I am well read. I like, all the motivational speakers and stuff. And I look for guys like Michael port who are powerful public speakers and how they present, I mentioned to you Dan Sullivan who really teaches you how to he, it’s funny that he focuses in insurance, but really any business owner it’s applicable.
So I’ve taken a lot of what I’ve seen in other programs that are out there and gotten rid of the duh. This is obvious stuff and try to focus it in on where people can really gain some immediate. And long term improvements.
Mitch: I love that. I love that. Brad, as we begin wrapping up, if you were able to sit with any of our listeners right now who might be a business owner, what are maybe three tips that you would give them, but they could begin this journey today.
The obvious one is they could contact you. But before that, to really help them build that. What are maybe three tips or strategies you could give them to begin that reflective?
Brad: I think the first thing that you need to do is you need to. Analyze each of the aspects of your business. In other words, take inventory. Yeah. Say, take inventory of each of the processes that you have in the business or that the processes that you don’t have. And the most important thing is to identify where your holes are, where are your gaps?
And you’ve gotta be very open and honest, which means as Brene brown would say, we’ve gotta lean in. You’re gonna you’ve gotta, you’ve gotta Ru. She uses the term rumbling, which means as a business owner, you need to pull your people into a room and you need to say no judgment, no nothing here.
I want to hear the good, the bad and the ugly about our business, right? And the best feedback that you get is from your own employees and your own customers. But. Too many people are afraid to ask them a question, cuz they might tell ’em something that they don’t want to hear. Sure. I want to hear that because I want to change that and I wanna improve that.
So the first thing is take stock. That’s the most important thing. The second thing is yourself. You should take stock if you’re not a member of a gym or you’re not doing anything physical, if. Get out there, even if it’s just walking your dog or just walking, you gotta start somewhere and you should write down what you do because every day you should start to see improvement.
I’m not telling you to go out and lift 5,000 pounds. I’m telling you to start slow and you should speak with your doctor. Make sure you’re okay. Physically, if you have any restrictions, then choose things that are gonna work around. Do not hurt yourself. Never hurt yourself cuz that’s a setback.
So that’s the second thing. And then the third thing, which is the most important thing, which is the thing that we all hate, including me, is whether you like it or not. And I don’t want to be your mother people, you’ve gotta start eating. And I’m the biggest, I’m the biggest offender I lo I’ve never met a carbohydrate.
I didn’t like I, you put one in front of me and I’ll leave it and I’ve. I keep cursing at my wife when she brings home stuff. because she has food allergies and can eat. And I keep saying to her, why does you buy that? She goes I know you like it. I said, but that’s the problem. I like it.
you should be buying me those, right? Yeah. So my third tip is nutrition is important. Balance is important. And visiting your doctor is important because guess what? Business owner, if you’re not here, you don’t have a business, right?
Mitch: I love that. I love that. And I wanna add another freebie, just like you added to the physical activity, track what you’re eating.
Because you can think you are eating what you need to eat and when you begin tracking it, you will be very surprised at what you’re missing and what you’re eating too much of. It’s pretty miraculous, to be honest, ,
Brad: it’s actually, it’s, to give you a good example of that. I was lose I’m in good shape, but I’m losing weight. Yeah. And I had myself tested and I realized that I’m not eating enough protein. So I’m like drinking those inure drinks now. Yeah, because I have to get pro I go to the shake place a lot, but I’ve realized that I can’t possibly eat enough protein. I’m supposed to be eating 150 to 200 grams of protein.
I’m lucky if I get 30. Talk to your doctor and here’s another piece of advice real quickly. If you don’t know what to do, get a nutritionist. Yes. And you can go to a lot of these medical centers and hospitals, and they even offer some of them for free for counseling. So that’s the best advice.
Get your business healthy, get you healthy and get your people healthy.
Mitch:. I love it. Brad, tell everyone where they can stay in contact with you.
Brad: Sure. My website is. E three help letter E number three, H E L P.com or E three business consultants.com. And you could reach me at B Brad Tornberg, T O R N B E R G.
That’s B thornberg@ethreebusinessconsultants.com and my cell number, which I’ve had since I’m 21. So I’m not running from antibody is USO 1 7 30. 7 3 5, 6, 4 2 9. And I’d be glad to help any of your listeners out with any problems or any issues that they might be dealing with or any questions that they may have.
Mitch: I love it, Brad, and make sure you go over Brad’s book, the business fitness revolution it’s available on Amazon. Now, Brad, this has been amazing. Thank you so much for giving us. A great analogy of how to look at your business and your body as a cohesive unit. I love that analogy and I love your example.
Hey, continue. The great work brother. This has been amazing,
Brad: Mitch. Thanks for having me look forward to engaging with you in the future. And everybody should listen to Mitch’s podcast. They’re excellent.
Mitch: Yes, please do. Thank you, brothers and sisters for listening to the Mitch gray show again, make sure he subscribe and leave us a review that does help us move up the listening list and just helps us spread the word of positivity and how we can help empower others to lead.
Make sure you go older my book as well, how to hire and keep great people available anywhere and our new course, how to hire and keep great peoples available as well. You can check out our website, recruit great people.com to find that we will talk to you soon.