This past Friday, we facilitated our quarterly business planning session, the BIQ (Business Improvement Quarterly). For most meetings, I’m the lead facilitator, spokesperson, and general quarterback. From a scale perspective, this is not a good plan. Therefore, I’ve begun to allow other very capable coaches to do the heavy lifting.
For example, Michael Rampolla is the main BIQ coordinator. He makes sure we have sponsors, food, and the event in order. As for the lead, Sandy Rice was the woman (as in he’s the man, but different for obvious reasons). The team crushed it, but delegating was totally uncomfortable.
The first quarter BIQ is our showcase event where we get to celebrate our exemplary clients. We chose an Executive of the Year, Partner of the Year, Business of the Year, and Certified Company to highlight. The previous day, SPEARity received The Business Council’s Business of the Year award. As you know from the previous blog, it was a very uncomfortable week leading up to the event. After surviving the award reception, I tortured our clients with their individual awards. It was so awesome seeing the faces of the recipients.
Executive of the year
As her business coach, Sherri Samuels-Fuerst from Sargento is a rock star so she received our Executive of the Year award. Totally making her day, her boss Doug made the trip from Plymouth to celebrate with her team. In true Sherri fashion, she shared the praise with her team, boss and her coach. Sherri set such a high bar with her work ethic, determination, and willingness to accept the behaviors that needed to change for her to achieve her desired promotion. She’s now the VP of Human Resources Total Rewards.
Partner of the Year
Our Partner of the Year went to Ascend Talent Strategies of Milwaukee, WI. This newly founded partnership of Bob Young (partner and representative of Ascend), Julie Unite, Russ Barcelona, and Rick Bauman was a well deserved honor given our mutual commitment to furthering leadership development. All partners our SPEARity certified which shows their commitment to our process.
Business of the Year
Business of the year went to Artery Ink. Owners Mara Natkin and Gloria Ramirez have more than doubled their revenue since becoming SPEARity clients. Most importantly from a business perspective, they were coached by Michael Rampolla (that’s a non-Darren crushing it client). It’s so awesome to hear how great Michael is doing from a business coaching perspective from our client’s mouths.
BIQ Training
For the training portion of the program, Sandy Rice trained on levels of want. In a nutshell, everyone talks about how much they want something. However, there are really four different ways to “want” it- indifference, hope, pursuit, and relentless. She talked about her dog’s relentless pursuit of treats (as in, I’m going to keep barking, whining, whimpering, howling and annoying you until I get a treat MOM). It was such a well-received presentation. And all the while, I was so uncomfortable watching it unfold.
The unsolicited feedback from the attendees was totally positive. That’s great. The internal feedback from my gut and nerves was totally UNCOMFORTABLE. I would’ve totally prepared differently, used different examples, timed it all differently, chosen different food, blah blah blah. All overrated in my own head. The SPEARity team crushed it and I was uncomfortable. I take that as a win.
Leadership is about being uncomfortable
For our executive coaching, business coaching and leadership development business to scale, I can’t do all of the work. To be honest, we won’t even present the best product or be able to do what’s in the best interest of our clients if I do all of the work. So an uncomfortable Darren is a more comfortable prospective business for the next owner. That’s the principle we teach our clients, so it must be the principle upon which we build SPEArity.
What do you need to uncomfortably delegate to bring out the best in your team and benefit your customers?
If you’re ready to explore how your business can benefit from working with SPEARity, give us a call. We are SPEARity, a local Milwaukee leadership coaching firm that specializes in business coaching, executive coaching, and leadership development training.
