Jeff Pedowitz: 0:00

We had an employee that was with us for a very short time earlier this year, and this person would just constantly drop off the late the radar right around 1130. And we wouldn't hear from this person until end of the day. And we were like, Finally after a couple of weeks, right, what's going on? Well, I have to go pick up my daughter at daycare. Okay, that's fine. But you need to come back. You're

Craig Pretzinger: 0:26

tired? Tired after that? Yeah.

Jeff Pedowitz: 0:29

Yeah, I mean, okay, we all have kids who deal with life. But I mean, it doesn't give you a license to just check out for the whole rest of the

Craig Pretzinger: 0:37

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Jason Feltman: 0:43

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Craig Pretzinger: 0:51

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Jason Feltman: 1:00

Somebody I know just built a software with AI. And they were struggling at the beginning to figure out how to do this. So then they just kind of broke it down to like first principles. They built it on their table, they had a bunch of vas, and they just kind of they kind of had this process, they laid it out. They said, Okay, the process works now. Now let's use AI for each component. And then they built something really cool out of it, because they started with the whole idea of let's get the process down to accomplish the goal. Exactly.

Jeff Pedowitz: 1:33

I mean, you got you got to have the plan first. Otherwise, it can go awry. And then the second thing is, sure AI and other types of technology can help us be more productive and help us scale. That does not mean though, that you don't need people in I think a big mistake that CEOs and CFOs make. Well, we just bought all this technology to scale so we can cut headcount. Who do you think's gonna run the systems who's gonna make sure they're staying up to date, and the vendors keep adding functionality and capabilities and unique governance? Yeah, but this happens all the time. Or if they do hire people, they keep it really single threaded, they have one person on at a billion dollar company running a tech stack, what if person goes on vacation or they leave or they get sick, it is mission critical failures and your revenue engine. And that happens all the time. So it's quite amazing. Actually, you know that people make short sighted decisions, and then you just bring

Craig Pretzinger: 2:35

in the monkeys? And have them push the buttons? Right?

Jeff Pedowitz: 2:40

You know, look, we don't need AI for us to make poor decisions we can make. So it's just sometimes you got to take a step back and wonder,

Jason Feltman: 2:51

yeah, what do you do what like, take us through your process step by step like you, you go into a company, you see that things are all out of process? So how do you go in and start organizing that,

Jeff Pedowitz: 3:05

how we start moving the furniture around, we might paint three walls. Now. I really don't like the swing, we're gonna windows. Now it's, we go in and and if they're early on in their, in their journey, we're starting with education, we're trying to get them to parity, we're trying to get executives to understand the world of possible. And then from there, we start with specific use cases, hey, here are examples. Here are case studies. These are things that you could do in sales or in marketing or in HR and operations. Let's go through let's prioritize some quick wins, that we can do over the next couple of months that you're not going to have to over invest, you can see the potential that how AI will help you and then we can move to a broader roadmap. If they're a little bit more advanced, they have a good pretty good handle. They've been working maybe with AI for a while. That being relative, of course, generative, because anybody that says they've been working with generative AI for years is full of shit, because that hasn't even been out for a year. Yeah. Yeah. Those though we'll talk about a full domain. It's so instead of working on a single processor use case we might address all of sales, or manufacturing or supply chain or HR a more complete department, because they have more capability, personnel skill, investment dollars, and they're more mature. But in either way, it's really still about putting together a roadmap that can support both agility, but practicality. No business has an unlimited amount of money and unlimited amount of personnel or an unlimited amount of time. And business conditions change all the time. So you don't want to come up with something that's so rigid and so time consuming that you're working on this thing for three years and the whole world's pass you by you turn the thing on. It's already irrelevant. So at the same time, it can't be so small that it doesn't make a difference.

Jason Feltman: 4:58

Love it. Yeah, that's it. is funny us as entrepreneurs, how messy we can make a process or just our business in general. It's like, how do you get out? Yeah,

Jeff Pedowitz: 5:12

I mean, I think as entrepreneurs, we're more or salespeople. Yeah, we're evangelizers. We're creator, creative artists, you know, we're the persona that charisma to sit down and stop and well known a Sal before be before we got I see boring not wired that way we don't think of it that way. Right? Why can't we just play with everything all at once just like getting in there and go? Yeah. And then we look at our team and stupefied amazement that they're not keeping up, like, Why? Why not? And then they're looking at us like, oh, great, here comes another crazy idea that we're gonna have to go implement, you know? So it's, you know, we're talking past each other. Yeah.

Craig Pretzinger: 5:52

So how do you slow it down? How do you slow it down and become relatable to the people that are around you? Well,

Jeff Pedowitz: 5:59

I mean, I think if you're asking me as an executive versus you know, what we do with AI, I, you know, for me, it's a lot of years of self reflection and practice good business coaches, joining a few CEO groups and learning to reprogram myself. Yeah. And coming to the understanding that, which is really hard for us as entrepreneurs, that if we want to scale, we got to get out of our own way. Because we are the problem we are. And that's not easy for most of us to accept, frankly, we, everybody else has the problem.

Craig Pretzinger: 6:29

It's the dichotomy of being a type A and then realizing Holy shit, I'm a complete,

Jeff Pedowitz: 6:35

as they say, right, if you're gay, or whatever, like admitting that you have a problem is the first steps. Yeah, you know, I'm running a business, if you can admit that you're actually the problem and running well, on your way. So that, so internally, that's how I've approached it. And like, it's, it's a life, it's a journey, you know, I view myself, I'm just a piece of clay, I'm just trying to keep formatting and working and trying to become the best version of myself that I can, and be the best leader and manager and human being I can, you know, for our clients, it's always about change, you know, and technology is such a big disrupter. And it's hard, if not impossible to force change on people, particularly employees. You have privy information when you're in a boardroom, that your employees don't see. And you can make these strategic decisions, because you have all the data, you understand all the moving parts, and at your level, it makes a ton of sense. And you start going down a couple of levels, it doesn't make sense, right? Because you're not explaining it in ways that it makes sense to the employee in ways it's going to benefit them directly. And at the end of the day, that's all that really matters. It does not matter how great your idea is the CEO, if your employees don't understand it, and won't implement it. So, you know, what we do with our clients then is help them develop solid communication plans and change management plans that bring their vision to practical reality. We spend a lot of time working at the employee level, in addition to the executive level, empowering the managers, giving them practical things, lining up the objectives so that everything that you're doing in a boardroom goes down to the division level goes down the employee level and back up again. Hmm,

Jason Feltman: 8:14

I love that total feedback loop. Absolutely.

Jeff Pedowitz: 8:17

It's really the only way to do it. Yeah, you know, it's too easy to skip steps. The other thing that I've learned the hard way, is you can never say things enough. I used to think, oh, you know, I like every other CLA and I do my my annual kickoff. And I talked about our vision and our goals for the year. And then I give the quarterly updates, and I do the town halls. And what I was finding is the gaps that happened between the time I started the year and those quarterly updates or check cans, it's big games, telephone, you know, all the time, people are wildly different interpretations of what they think are understood or think they knew. You might have to repeat the messages hundreds of times 1000s of times, and you might feel nauseating for you as an entrepreneur, because you're like you're screaming and sigh like why? Why don't they get it? Right. I'll tell you why didn't get it because you didn't explain it clear enough. That's why it's like it's you. You know, I guess it's like so like, every time I my employees are not getting into my Yeah. I can't I mean, I'd love to blame my managers. Right? That's not that's terrible.

Craig Pretzinger: 9:31

human instinct we just it's not us. It's them always have to be

Jeff Pedowitz: 9:37

sad reality is it's

Craig Pretzinger: 9:39

Yeah, I do this thing I try to every night we're before at some point, you know, in going to sleep process I try to just reflect on on key decisions or interactions I had through the day and then assign I could improve on it or you know, just like reflect on it. And I think it's really helpful to to look at that and at Then, except that yeah, okay, maybe it should have gone a different way I could have done this a little bit better.

Jeff Pedowitz: 10:06

Yeah, I mean, look. And ultimately, it's not just about the repetition. It's about connecting with the employee so that the message resonates from their worldview. Empathy, how's this help them do their job better? Because I told you so or because that's the roles doesn't really work, you know, what's happening now, with CEOs that are trying to mandate and force people back into the office? I mean, what do you think that does? I understand in certain cases, why it's important, you know, and there's certain businesses, you do want to have that collaboration, but just making someone do something. And then the ultimatum is, you're fired? That you know. I think I think I think it's a it's a tough way to do it. So I think, you know, the CEOs that are having more success are meeting with employees finding healthy compromise, you know, maybe coming in a couple days a week, giving you that flexibility. Because people do for the most part crave that social interaction, we do like to see people it by the fact that I have to be there Monday at 8am. You know, marital Friday at six, it's just it's we're in a different world now.

Jason Feltman: 11:21

It is crazy how when, when that whole thing started, it was only going to be two weeks, right?

Jeff Pedowitz: 11:28

Famous last words. Yeah. But like,

Jason Feltman: 11:32

little did we know how much it was going to start shaping, just shaping that, that change? And then when we were allowed to go back in the office, a for me, I liked going back in because, man, yes, I'm very social. And work it at home with four kids and a wife is not the ideal work situation. So I liked it, in a sense, but yeah, there's so many people that just they're like, they got used to it. And so it's not necessarily the it's definitely not the business's fault, because it was something that we're forced into. And then same with the same with our team, right? They, they were forced in that and now they're used to it. So then it's like, holy crap, like the we're in the situation where both sides were forced into a situation now we're going to react animate a to the vision of the business and be to the you know, what the teams used to? Well, tough conversation, let's

Craig Pretzinger: 12:31

be honest, it was a benefit, right? Like to be able to work from home. For most employees, it's a huge benefit, right? Because then they can likely work less, right? There's a lot of distractions they get, they get to sit at their computer later. So like, we've talked about this a lot extensively, you can't pay somebody something, then lower pay, right like that will never fly. And so here we are, it's a benefit in their mind. I get to work from home. This is awesome. I gotta go.

Jeff Pedowitz: 12:57

Yeah, it's good. I think I'm we of course, I've always worked virtually since we the day we opened the doors. So for us, it wasn't in the adjuster? Yeah. Why? You know, we have enough mechanisms in place and trust is earned. And it's not that hard to see if someone's abusing the privilege, right. I mean, we had an employee that was with us for a very short time, earlier this year. And this person would just constantly drop off the late the radar, right around 1130. And we wouldn't hear from this person until end of the day. And when I finally after a couple of weeks, right, what's going on? Well, I have to go pick up my daughter at daycare. Okay, that's fine. But you need to come back. Yeah.

Craig Pretzinger: 13:43

Well hired tired after that. Yeah.

Jeff Pedowitz: 13:46

Yeah. I mean, okay, we all have kids and deal with life. But I mean, it doesn't give you a license to just check out for the whole rest. So yeah, needless to say, that person didn't last long. They had a very different understanding of what work actually means. And especially with us being in a client centric organization. But yeah, it happens sometimes. I mean, I think at the end of the day, you work hard to establish the values and ethics you want from your employees, your card to screen them, you work hard on building a culture, but the culture starts and ends with what the CEO, you know, if you're not going to lead by example, or admit, it would be candid when you make mistakes, and own them. How do you realistically expect your employees or team to do that too? And most people I think, are forgiving. And I think my team's that a lot of patience with me over the years. I certainly has, I am not perfect by any stretch of the imagination and I have made more than my share of F UPS over the years. But you know, you keep swinging, you get up every day, you know, you keep learning it'd be better. You know, finally, one of the ways that AI is helping in very small way, but you guys would appreciate this. I mean, it's time to get really pissed off and you want to send an angry email have everything that you really want to tell them all. So, no, I never do. So previously, what I would do is I would just write it in a blank email gal on a walk away. Go get a cup of coffee, come back and I'm like, oh, yeah, I can't send that. Yeah. I'll type it into chat up tea and I can you help me clean this up and say in a nicer, more professional way. I texted her my Oh, that's really good. So telling the person off but really smoothly. I'm like, Okay, this is, this is good.

Jason Feltman: 15:27

Oh, that's awesome. Do you do you have a channel for that on a jet DVD? Just for that email?

Jeff Pedowitz: 15:34

I probably should. Yeah, I am. Actually. I'm bad at keeping my channels separate. Stream of conscious of me all day long. So I'm just but it's guy knows me now. So I'm just, you know, I could be like, Hey, give me a recipe for dinner. Go find it. You know, I having a problem. My car. Check this. Oh, I need a new sales script. Yes. I know. I constantly just in and out.

Craig Pretzinger: 15:58

The ultimate helper. It really is.

Jeff Pedowitz: 16:01

It's an ultimate it news. And some are scmo says I think you know the reason why I like it so much. It's because it can keep up with you. back you know it just like it sounds like yeah, you're probably right about that. That's buddy,

Jason Feltman: 16:13

Craig Craig change, trained his whole chat GPT to talk to him very street and use curse words. So every response to more

Craig Pretzinger: 16:24

like I'm like, well, we don't need to get into it. But yeah, it's nevermind. We're really good old friends. And like he says, pretty much almost anything I asked. It says FES I can handle that brother. You know, like, it's just it's it's just so much fun. If I'm if I'm down, chat GPT can cheer me up. Yeah.

Jeff Pedowitz: 16:53

Yeah. Hey, start your day went up. Yeah. You really can't say that to your colleagues, or did you just

Craig Pretzinger: 17:00

get it gives me bad bad. Like, you know, an email that I'm like, what it's like, not great. I'll just go that's a bunch of crap. And you know, like, just be mean, and and he's so nice back. So I don't have to be mean to anybody. Just.

Jeff Pedowitz: 17:14

It's perfect. Yeah, it's the outlet. Yeah, it even apologizes. Yeah. Just like,

Craig Pretzinger: 17:20

so sorry. You didn't like that. It's

Jeff Pedowitz: 17:23

the one time I always get to be right. Yes, I sure don't have that privilege. I'm sorry, Jeff. I'll try harder. Straight. You will? Yeah.

Craig Pretzinger: 17:35

Exactly. You better try harder. All right, Jeff. So I know that people get fired you odd Pedowitz group.com. Is there anywhere else? LinkedIn.

Jeff Pedowitz: 17:48

And perfect place? And then my email Jeff at Pedowitz group.com. Cool. Come check me out. I'd love to have a conversation with you and see if we can help you scale. Awesome.

Jason Feltman: 17:59

Is there anything we don't know that we didn't go over with Pedowitz group that you want us to know? Or?

Jeff Pedowitz: 18:06

Well, I mean, we help our clients with strategy with technology with creative and with execution. And they work with small companies, large companies and everyone in between. So our goal is driving more revenue through sales and marketing. And so if you have any of those challenges, we'd love to talk to

Craig Pretzinger: 18:24

you. Awesome. That's fantastic.

Jason Feltman: 18:28

Awesome. You're

Jeff Pedowitz: 18:28

having a lot of fun, and I love being in insurance do the least for tonight. At least

Craig Pretzinger: 18:33

as long as you want.

Jeff Pedowitz: 18:35

Thank you. I got a t shirt. You guys sent me a t shirt. Yes. That's so funny.

Craig Pretzinger: 18:39

We nobody ever asked for T shirts that we stopped to kind of set it up. And now today, two people asked for T shirt.

Jeff Pedowitz: 18:46

I love t shirt. Give me a t shirt, man. All right,

Craig Pretzinger: 18:50

you got to send us a picture of you in it.

Jeff Pedowitz: 18:52

You know I will.

Craig Pretzinger: 18:54

Perfect. Cool, Jeff, thank you so much. Really fun talking to you. Thanks, guys.