Wedding Business Solutions

Clint Pulver - I Love It Here!

• Alan Berg, CSP, Global Speaking Fellow

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Are you creating a place where your team loves to work… or just shows up for a paycheck? What moments of mentorship are you providing? What do your employees say about their jobs when you’re not around? In this episode, I share research and insights on how meaningful connection, advocacy, and purposeful recognition lead to loyal teams and lasting retention.

Listen to this new 38-minute episode for practical ways to create an environment your employees never want to leave, plus the simple questions and moments that make all the difference.

About Clint: 

Clint Pulver is an Emmy Award Winner, Hall of Fame Keynote Speaker, Author, Pro-

Drummer, Helicopter Pilot, Speaker Coach, and Workforce Expert. Known as the leading

authority on employee retention, Clint has transformed how corporations like the NBA,

Microsoft, Red Bull, and NASA create lasting loyalty through his work and research as the

Undercover Millennial. He is also the author of #1 bestselling book I Love It Here: How Great Leaders Create Organizations Their People Never Want to Leave. He has been featured

by Business Q Magazine as a “Top 40 Under 40,” and is the president and founder of Dream Machines, a youth foundation that gives children with disabilities the gift and magic of flight.


@ClintPulbver on LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube 


If you have any questions about anything in this, or any of my podcasts, or have a suggestion for a topic or guest, please reach out directly to me at Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com or visit my website Podcast.AlanBerg.com 

Please be sure to subscribe to this podcast and leave a review (thanks, it really does make a difference). If you want to get notifications of new episodes and upcoming workshops and webinars, you can sign up at www.ConnectWithAlanBerg.com  

View the full transcript on Alan’s site: https://alanberg.com/blog/


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Do you love it where you are? Does your team love it where they are? Listen to this episode. You're going to want to hear it. Hey, it's Alan Berg. Welcome back to another episode of the Wedding Business Solutions podcast. I am so excited to have my friend Clint Pulver on to talk about his book. I love it here. Clint, how you doing?

I'm doing great, Alan. Thanks for letting me be a part of the show.

Well, thank you for having a great book. I mentioned to you offline that I try to read the books of my speaker friends to know more about what they speak about. And if I think they resonate to my audience, I invite them on. I've had quite a few of our speaker friends on here and I'm glad to have you on as well. So talk to a little bit about the book. Right. I love it here. What is the synopsis for people? And then we'll get into some of the stuff that's in it.

Yeah. So for six and a half years, I've traveled the world as the undercover millennial. So I'm a millennial. That's the generation I was born in. And so at the time when we did the study, I was young enough to where I would go into or organizations, workplaces, as someone who was looking for a job. And I'd walk in and just say, hey, I'm just thinking about applying. I'm looking for work. Before I apply, I just wanted to ask what's it like to work here? And the employees, they always get kind of quiet.

You know, they start looking around. Feels like an illegal drug exchange. And then they tell me everything. They tell me everything. They tell me the good, they tell me the bad. They tell me who they love, who they don't love. And the reason they tell me is because I'm not an employee survey. I'm not a one on one manager meeting.

I was just a potential hire. So we have now done this with 497 organizations. And as of this year, I've interviewed over 11,000 employees undercover. And the magic of all of the research was when I would go in undercover and I would ask people, what's it like to work here? And they would respond with, I love it here, I love my job and why? And I'd go to the next employee and the next and they would say the same things. Why? What was, what was one customer service center or one mobile store doing or one hospital doing that six blocks down the street? The competing company was a complete nightmare. What were the differences and what were those leaders doing to create an organization that people never want to leave? And that's what the book's about.

And it's not just the competing companies. It's different locations of the same company. If you have a company in multiple locations, you talked about. Well, thanks for clarifying, because I thought you actually took these jobs like you were actually working these jobs. I'm like, oh, my gosh, he's working at a sporting goods stories, working at a pet stories, or all these different.

Things a lot harder. Yeah.

Yeah. One of the things that resonate is when you said, people quit bosses. They don't quit jobs.

Yeah, right.

And that's powerful because it's. It's so true. Your environment is not about your building. Your environment is how you feel when you come in and do you feel valued? Right, right. So when you said, you know, people that love their job, it's because of their immediate sup. Immediate supervisor. Is that it?

Yeah.

Well.

And the magic was because there's no incentive for an employee to walk up to a boss, especially when things aren't going well, and to walk up to him and say, hey, Doug, just so you know, every time we lose as a team, you blame everybody else. Or, hey, Doug, every time we win as a team, you take all the credit. We just wanted to tell you that, Doug, happy Tuesday. We hope you do better. Like employees don't. There's no incentive for an employee to say that. So instead, what do employees do? They just. They.

They leave, or worse, they mentally check out and then they stay. And there. There is a gap between the perception of leadership versus the reality of an employee's experience. And we saw when employees hated their jobs, they always described a manager. But when employees loved their jobs, they described that manager as what we call the mentor. Mentorship. Management mentorship over management. Mentorship is unique because mentorship has to be earned.

You cannot become the mentor until the mentee invites you into their heart. And it was so powerful to watch these mentors, these incredible individuals that understood the difference between developing an employee versus advocating for an employee, developing versus advocating. And those were the two variables, Alan. And all of the research that I could tell very quickly, going in undercover, whether or not that business was surviving or thriving based off of two things. Standards, which is the development side of a business, and then connection, which is the advocacy side of a business. So standards would be like, profitability, growth. Are we doing better today than we were yesterday? What are our core values? I need you to show up on time. Here are the responsibilities of the job.

Those are the tangible sides of the workplace, Right. The intangible side is making sure that people feel seen, they feel heard, they feel understood. It's when you as a manager, realize that your people have a life outside of work. And so those were the two variables that we were able to see. And depending upon how a leader used those two dynamics, determined what type of manager they got to be in the story.

Yeah, I remember when I first got into a supervisory position, you know, it just happened. It was one, you know, one of those things that just happens. And I would think back about the bosses that I had, you know, the good bosses, the bad bosses. And you don't always see it, right? You don't always see it when you're in the moment, but you can look back at it and remember when I graduated college and got a job in advertising, the job I want, largest ad agency in the country. And I kind of remember I was chained to a desk in the basement somewhere, you know, one of those jobs. And, you know, magna cum laude, a college degree, making minimum wage, wearing a suit and tie to come into Manhattan every day, brown bagging lunch. So I had money to take my girlfriend out for, you know, for. For a dinner maybe.

And not learning anything, right? Like, just do this job. Just. Just do this job over here. And I, I applied for a job in retail. Right? You do a lot with retail. And you know how retail pays so well, right?

Yes.

When the, when the district manager asked me, why do you want this job as an assistant manager, like, you've never worked in a store before, why do you want this job? And I said, because it pays 50% more than I'm making now.

Yeah, right.

Now imagine that retail paid 50% more than advertising. That's bad. That's bad. What I realized is she didn't hire my resume, she hired me, right? And fast forward to when I'm at the knot and a vice president of sales or regional sales director get to hire people. The resume is what someone has given you a chance to do. It's not what you're capable of because we don't know what you're capable of. And I tried to pay that forward when I realized, oh, my gosh. Because when she left and went to a different district and the other guy came in and he was one of these, you do it this way because we told you to do it this way and because I said so.

And that's when I left.

Yeah, totally.

Because I left him. I would have stayed for her, sure. But I Left him perfect. So you talk about a status interview, right? And usually you do that as an exit interview. Somebody's leaving, and it's like, hey, what was going on here? But you say to do this on a regular basis. But so. So what is it? I think it was three questions, right? So what are the three questions? And when should somebody do this?

Yeah, I think with new employees, at least twice a year, and with continuing employees that are beyond a year in your business, at least annually. And this is not a performance review. This is not a moment for you to check in and to say, hey, these are the things that need to be better or be done better. This is a chance for you to become the advocate, the mentor in the story. And so we found that great leaders, in a variation, when they did this, when people talked about how they were seen again, they were seen in a way that you get what I need. You get what I'm trying to do here. You're not just here to push me in the job. You're not here to pull me.

You're here to walk with me. And because I work here, I get to live a better story. And so that was established in a variation of these three core questions. Number one, I think every leader should ask this of their employees. First of all, if you're not the mentor in the story, this is hard to make work in an authentic way. But if you've achieved that, congrats. You would sit down and you'd create a moment with an employee, and you would start with vocal praise. So, Alan, if you were my employee, I would sit on this zoom call, and I'd say, hey, listen, I just wanted to jump on because, Alan, we need you.

I need to tell you how much we need you. I need to show you that who you are and what you do in our business, it matters. We can't do this without you. And literally, I'm calling this meeting because I got to make sure that you're taken care of. We need you. So then I would ask you these three questions. I would say, allen, I just need to know, as your boss, what can we be doing to keep you here? What can we do to keep you here? That's the first question. Second question is, what is getting in the way of your success at work? Is it other employees? Is it the product? Is it the process? Is it communication? Is it the pay? Is it the schedule? What is it at work that's not allowing you to be successful in your life? And then the third question is, what can I do to Help you get there.

What can I do personally as the person that has been placed in your. As a leader, in your story, as the mentor? What can I do to help you get there? Those three questions. And the wild thing is, most people are never asked those three questions unless it's in the exit interview.

Yeah, I wish I had your book. Back when I was VP of sales and sales director, I did something similar, but it was when someone wasn't performing to their ability, I would go and I'd say, listen, Clinton, first of all, I would never walk up to somebody or call them and say, listen, your numbers suck because you got the report. I got the report. Like, this is not a secret.

Yeah, they know that.

It's like when you were talking about with drums, with your mom, you know, your report card was not a secret. It was not a secret.

Right.

Whether she was going to bring it up is another story. But it wasn't a secret. So I would say, listen, Clint, I know that you're capable of more than this. What do you need from me to get there?

Yeah.

Right. And it was a variation of that. But the whole what you said was. Was deeper than that. But that's what I would do, because I put the. I thought I put the right people in the right seats, and I thought I gave them everything. I said, what do you need from me? Because you're not getting where I know you could be.

Yeah.

And that's the way that I would approach it. Because if I didn't think they were capable, why were they on the team?

Totally. Totally.

Right. And you also talked about, you know, putting the right people in the right seats. I had people. We had to move within the company. We love you. This isn't the place for you. Like, you don't. You don't belong there.

That's not your thing. I do need to shift gears just a little bit. You told a great story. And I'm gonna let people read the book about how you ended up becoming a drummer. Right, Mr. Jensen. Becoming a drummer. So you had a teacher who saw something in you.

You're moving one hand one way, one hand the other way, and your feet and, you know, all these things that drummers have to do. What is it called? 4 by. Or what is it where you. Each hand. Foot is doing something different.

Yeah, we're just ambidextrous independence of our limbs. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Something like that. And this teacher sees this and is, like, blown away that you can do this stuff. But he pulls a set of drumsticks out of his drawer. Why did Mr. Jensen have drumsticks in his drawer? That's what I wanted to know.

Yeah. Well, it was a designed moment. It was planned. It was something that he had observed is something that he watched. And he went out on his own and he bought those sticks and created a moment. Yeah. All by itself.

Yeah. That makes the story even better because I'm thinking Mr. Jensen was a drummer and just saw another drummer, but he went out and got drumsticks for you. That's amazing. You look back and you think about that in life and say, you know, that he saw that potential. Not a problem. Or the principal was like, but you got sent to my office for tapping your fingers. Like, go back to class.

Go back to class and sit on your hands is what he said to you. But that's another story. The Iron Cowboy tell people who the Iron Cowboy is.

Yes, the Iron Cowboy. His name is James Lawrence. He ran 50 Ironmans in 50 days in 50 different states. And then he just recently did what's called the Conquer 100 where he ran 100 full distance triathlons in 100 consecutive days. Yeah.

Think about that. The first time he did 50 triathlons. So what is that? That's how many miles of swimming? Two point something.

Yeah, I don't know this.

It's over. It's over two miles of swimming. It's like a hundred miles of biking and it's running a marathon.

Right.

And he did that 50 days in a row in 50 different states. Like, like doing one is a huge thing. Right. So you asked him and people ask him all the time. Right. I'm sure he's interviewed all the time. How do you do that now? 100 and 100 days. Right.

And his answer is, yeah, I.

He did the impossible by doing small things consistently over a long period of time. Yeah. Get really good at doing small things consistently over a long period of time.

I put a post up yesterday on my social because I'm on dualingo doing French and it was seven, seventeen hundred days. Yesterday was seventeen hundred days in a row. And when I heard you say that in the book, that's what it is, right? Some days it's, it's one like the one lesson. Some days like I kind of keep my streak. I'm going to keep the Green Owl happy. I'm going to do that. And other days it's 10 lessons, 15 lessons, hours worth of lessons or whatever. But I heard that and my post I put up there and I said, listen, I know it's just A number, but it's a reflection of that.

Right. Small things consistently over a long period of time. And it doesn't matter what you want to get better at in life. Right. If you just, like I always say to people, if you did anything 1700 days in a row, like, if I drummed for 1700 days in a row, I'd be better.

Yes.

Wouldn't be you, but I would be better, right?

100%. Yeah.

Right. Yeah. But then there's also purposeful practice, because what he's doing, the Iron Cowboy is doing, he's not just doing this. Right. He's purposefully doing these things to get him there. And I think that's the important underlying messages. You know, whatever you do in your job, you know, you want to be better at it. You have to be purposeful about what you want to be better at.

And I think, as a mentor. Right. You need to see that in someone. Right?

Yeah. And I think that's what great mentors do, is they spark the possibilities. Right. They communicate the potential and the worth of an individual to the point that they see it within themselves. And that's what Mr. Jensen did for me. He saw something that I didn't see, other people didn't see, and he turned it into a possibility. And I'll never forget him for that.

Yeah.

I saw a post on LinkedIn which reminded me of your book there, and I think. I think it was the Nancy story also. It was somebody who said that the difference between this particular manager in this department versus the other people in whatever this company was was her notebook. And I apologize to whoever posted it, because I forget who posted it. But the idea was that this person every week on Friday would talk to their people that were working, you know, in that. In their department, and, you know, hey, what do you got going on this weekend? What's going on? But they would make notes. And they would make notes, right? This one's got his kid's soccer game, and this one's going kayaking, and this goes, whatever. And then on Monday, it was like, hey, Clint, how was the kayaking? Hey, you know, how'd your daughter do in the soccer game? Or whatever.

And that's that connection, which is, these are people. They're not just employees. They're not cogs. Unless you treat them that way. Right?

Yeah, yeah. Which won't last very long.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you. If you treat them like they're not worth anything. They're not. I hear people with, like, sales training. I do sales training. And people like. Yeah, but if we give them sales training, they're just going to leave and go somewhere else.

And your comment is, what if you don't?

Yeah. What if you don't and then they stay? Yeah, yeah. Or even then. Yeah, it's, it's a. And it's just that, like, that idea of like, mentally checking out. Right. And staying, like, what's, what's, what's worse? And again, if you're, if there are certain industries where there is higher amounts of turnover, where retention is more difficult than others, but my goodness, if you can retain an employee for, you know, two years versus two months in many industries, that is a massive win. And it comes down to, again, that advocacy and you're helping people to be better humans.

And when you do that, that is the new currency in the world of retention. It's not just the benefits, it's not the perks, it's not just the Bing bag chairs and the ping pong tables and the free food that you give at work. It's about, I work here, I get to go home and be a better mom. It's because I work here, I go home and I'm a better dad and I'm creating a better family. And when, when, oh my goodness, if you. I don't just love the job, but I actually love who I am while I'm at the job. If we can create that dynamic, you win, you win. And it might not be forever, but you win in the game of just helping people to live a better story.

And it's a massive part of employee retention.

I remember when I was regional sales director, I'd have my direct reports and somebody like, oh, you know, my daughter's got a soccer game today. You know, is it okay if I stop at 3 and these are all remote workers? And I was like, yeah, but only, only if you tell me how she did.

Right?

Yeah, that's. I want to know. Yeah, because this. Where people. There's a list comes out every year. Best companies to work for. Right. And I was.

When I was at the knot, I didn't work in New York City office. I worked from home. But I would go in once a month or so, and I was driving in one day and listening to the radio and there was the 10 best companies to work for. I remember walking into the CEO's office and saying, what are we doing to get on that list?

Yeah.

And he said, absolutely nothing.

Yeah.

And I said, why? He said, well, you know, people come work for us for a year, year and a half, put us on their resume and go someplace else. I said, that might work in editorial. Right. That doesn't work for me in sales. I said, I want my people here a long time. And the very first person that I hired, I think he left the company last year after 22 years.

Right. So cool.

And I think of all the other people that I worked with there, I was there for 11 years. That I worked with for 11 years. Some of whom are still there.

Yeah.

There before me or whatever. When I was in advertising, I found out that the only way to get ahead was to leave the company and go to another company.

Yeah.

And I said, wait a minute, like I can't stay here and just work my way up. And they said, no, that's not how it works in this industry. You go to the other company, you kind of lie about how much you're making, you get a raise.

Right.

And you do this zigzag thing. I said, wait, my dad worked for an accounting firm for 17 years, went to another one for 10 years, became a partner there, then went out on his own. Right. I said, so that, that, that doesn't happen. They said, no, not in this industry. And I said, then it's not my industry.

Totally.

That was it. I, I left. And then the other thing is, I'm in this industry because I was in a job I hated. But I did it really well because my parents always instilled in me, if you took the job, you do the best you can at that job.

Yes.

If you don't like the job, you don't do a bad job, you don't check out like you said, because that's what you leave. And all they could do was show me how much money I was making. I was, I was a little bit younger. A little bit younger than you at the time. Yeah, probably. Yeah, A little bit younger than you at the time. And I said, it's not the money. And I had an epiphany because I know you, you know, you're talking about incentivizing people and, you know, money matters to a point, but it didn't matter when I wasn't home for my pregnant wife.

It didn't matter when I wasn't there for my three year old son. It didn't matter when I was working a half a day, you know, 9:00am to 9:00pm, you know, 12 hours. That's a half a day, right? It's a half a day, right?

Yeah, yeah.

And I said the words out loud, it's not the money. And I was like, wow. I actually Meant that.

Yeah.

And if it wasn't for that, I wouldn't be in this industry and created this life over, you know, three decades where I love what I do. I. I can't wait to do what I do. I love doing this, you know.

Yeah.

But I've created this for myself. But I even had that at the, you know, when I was working for a company. I love doing what I did, and if I didn't, I wouldn't have been there.

You know, you nailed, Alan. Three key factors that great. And I talk about at the very end of the book. It's passion, purpose, and the ability to provide. Like, again, there's the advocacy. There's becoming the mentor in the story. But ultimately, are we creating a dynamic where people can just truly, first of all, play to their passions? They love what they do. They love.

They love the job. They love. It fills their cup of. It's very intrinsically motivating. They enjoy it. But then there's a sense of what I call purpose. But it's significance. Right.

There's success in business, and then there's significance. And that is the ability to do something bigger than yourself, where you feel like you're actually contributing to the world. There's a sense of fulfillment. It's not just about you, but it's about what you're doing for the world. And then that third component is the ability to provide in a way that's financially sufficient for you. Right. Right. I could have all the passion and joy and fulfillment in the world, but if I'm every month stressed out and I can't pay my bills and I can't feed my family, like, I don't care how fun it is, like, that's not total fulfillment.

That's not total significance. And so those three things, you know, that was an overarching, beautiful theme to see how great leaders were also fulfilling those 3Ps in the lives of their people. And you demonstrated it perfectly in what you were talking about.

And the money matters, but to a point, you know, once you've satisfied that you're paying all the bills, more money might not help. Like, when I had my sales reps, I had. I think the most I ever had was maybe two or three men on the team. It was out of 50, 60 people. It was mostly women. I had single women. I married women. I had divorced women.

I mean, you died moms. I had. You name it, I had one of everything, right?

Yep.

If I gave them a bonus in dollars, it went into the household funds. But if I gave him A gift card for a spa day or if I gave him a gift card to Petco because they love their dog.

Yep.

That felt even though the dollar amount could be lower, that felt more important because it was about them, because I understood them. And yeah, money's nice, but it's gone. You know, there it is, it's gone. Um, so again, it is just so many things here now. Thinking about my industry, you mentioned some industries are harder. The venues and the caterers. Right. They have a lot of people that are working, you know, working events.

Right. And again, you, you know it, you worked at hotel yourself. I remember you had, you had a great mentor over there as well.

Yeah.

But you know, you have these people that are going to be somewhat cyclical. How do you keep those people when you know it's not that you're working with them nine to five, five days a week. Right. You're going to have these people that are servers and you know, kitchen staff and stuff like that. How, how do you do that? How could you mentor those people when you're not in the same environment as like an office environment?

Yeah. I think it's all about moments. Right. People don't remember days in their lives. They remember moments and their power. Just like what we talked about with James. Right. Doing small things consistently over a long period of time.

Sometimes some managers feel like I got to be with that person every day, I got to see them every day, they got to be in the office. I would say it's not so much again about the consistent. I'm with you every day as much as I'm consistently creating moments when we are together. That quality, that significance of. I look back on Mr. Jensen, for example, I don't remember his curriculum, I don't remember what his lesson plans. I don't remember the day to day. All I remember really is the drumsticks.

And so I think it's a good reminder for every leader that you're doing better than you think you are. And, and sometimes less is more, but making sure that even what you are doing, again, it has a sense of personal investment attached with it. I love what you said if someone has a dog, like getting them a gift card to Petco versus a thank you. No. Or maybe somebody wants the thank you. No. And they, they don't really care about doing an off site excursion with the team. Right.

Because every employee is asking the question, let me know when it gets to the part about me. Right. And some bosses hear that and they think, well, you know, those entitled little shining stars in my life, everybody's asking, let me know when it gets to the part about me. It's not so much about entitlement as it is about just good leadership. And I think when leaders try to create a moment, little by little, over time, that gets to the part about the individual. That. That's the power, that's the magic. And so in an environment where, again, everybody's not always around each other, it's when you are together and when you're with them.

And again, you're designing it, you're thinking about, okay, what does this individual need? What matters to them? How do I get to the part about them and design it, create it? I mean, my goodness, in your world, it all revolves around designing moments. Like that is what they do. And so taking that same approach to your people, those little moments, man, they. They matter. That's what people remember.

You know, in personal life, I think it's the same thing. My wife and I have stopped celebrating the Hallmark holidays.

Yeah.

Mother's Day, Valentine's Day, whatever. Because it's an outside force saying, you should be doing something today.

Correct? Yes. Yes.

And if I do something on Tuesday, just because I thought of my wife or my son or my grandson or whatever, that has more impact, because nobody said, you need to do this. And. And it's. Again, it's not about the money. It's about the moment. I remember a bunch of years ago, I started to say out loud the things I would think, like, my wife. Your hair looks really nice today, right?

Yeah.

Whereas before, it might be just like, her hair looks nice, right?

Yeah. You're vocalizing it.

And. And she wasn't used to that necessarily. You know, I. Not that I wouldn't say nice things, but I was doing it more. But you know how people do it. Like, oh, that's. That's a. That's pretty blouse.

Oh, this old thing. You know, this.

Yeah, yeah, Right here. Oh.

I couldn't get it right. So one thing I said, you know, if you throw them away, the compliments will stop coming. So the best thing to say is thank you.

Totally.

And you don't have to reciprocate. That's another thing I've learned in my life. Somebody says something nice, you don't have to reciprocate. You have to give them an acceptance of the gift by saying, thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. That makes me feel good. Thank you.

Right. Just accept it. Take it. When I was VP of sales, if I get a bonus. When I get a bonus, it gave Me pleasure to buy something for my wife and buy something for my sons, because I had what I needed, and if I needed it, I had it. If I wanted, I probably had it. So I didn't wait for a bonus to get it. But, man, okay, what can I buy them? Like, I wanted to get my son a guitar, but I wanted to know what color he wanted and all this kind of stuff.

So I planned this ruse for how to find out, right? And we're sitting, we're at an Allman Brothers concert in New York City at the Beekman Theater, and one of the guys is playing a Les Paul. And his guitar teacher had this really great knockoff of a Les Paul. So I knew where he got it, but I'm like, gee, is it the sunburst? Is it the blue? Like, what color does he want? So we're watching this concert. I was like, oh, that's a beautiful guitar. He goes, yeah. I said, man, if you ever got one of those, what color do you think you'd get? You think you'd get that color? He goes, no, the blue one. Blue one is really. Oh, yeah, blue one's really nice.

And then I go and I buy him that blue guitar, right?

Yeah, yeah.

Just blown away. It's like, what does it matter? I'll give you one last story on this because I know you're a happily married man. I've seen your wife and family there. And you talk so lovingly about him as well. My. When my mom passed, she had this little paring knife. It was a little tiny knife, and who knows how old it was. Like, we could barely read the brand on it, it was so worn.

When she passed, my wife said to my dad, you know, can I have that? Because mom used that for everything. Like, she didn't have a whole. She might. She had a whole set of knives, but she used this little tiny knife for everything, right? It was a surgeon with this knife. And my dad didn't cook. He's like, sure, sure, take it, right? So my wife's got this, and she loved this little knife. So I'm looking one day, I wonder if I can find her more from this company. So I.

Magnifying glass. No, no joke. I'm like, trying to figure. And sure enough, yeah, they still make them. And of course, you sell them on Amazon, right? So I go and I order a set of three knives, right? Like these three. And they were like aluminum handle, little pairing knives. It was $25 for these knives. And we all share an Amazon account.

So I Was hoping this was going to show up and I could surprise her.

But sure.

She goes in to look for something. When did they get shipped? And she's like, you. You got me the knives? And we never talked about it. And I said, yeah, but it was supposed to be. She goes, you. You found me the knives, right? You thought I gave her diamonds then. But the funniest part of the story is, fast forward about a month. We're at the dinner with friends, and she's telling them about these knives.

She goes, and you would not believe it, these knives never go dull. And I looked at her and said, you do know that I sharpen them. These were magic knives that never went up. They never went. But it was not the cost. It was the thought, I think that she'd really like this. And again, it was better than diamonds. Better than diamonds.

And whether it's people that you work with, people that, you know, you live with, or whatever, that thought in there of, let me make it about you, it's not about the money, it's about you. That. That's. That's great. And he also. Last thing you talk about, keeping it simple.

Yeah, that was what I was just gonna. I was gonna segue off of just what you said. Because here's the big problem is, first of all, sometimes we get managers that are put into a management position because they excelled at their job, right? They were great in sales. And so the next step to advance you, let's throw you into leadership. And they don't love people. They're really good at performing, they're really good at sales. But then they're thrown in because they want more money. And then we have this dynamic where we have.

That don't understand that. That's. That's the job is to advocate. That's. The job is to love and to guide and support and connect and create moments. So that whole dynamic is. Is a foundational issue. The second issue is managers are burnt out, they're tired, they're so busy.

There's something to be said for financial affluence in a business. There is something equally to be said for time affluence, where you have time. Like, I talk about a status interview. I talk about, you know, going out and buying a gift card. And some managers, like, dude, I don't have the time. Like, the thought of doing that. Like, just doing it for maybe two or three employees, let alone 304. Like, I don't have the time.

And so there's something to be said for, you know, getting things Done. We found that most leaders, the great mentors, they were masterful at the. At the to don't list. Not a to do list, but the to don't list the things that they needed to stop doing so that they could actually focus on the things that really mattered. And Da Vinci says it better than I ever could. But simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. And if every leader took some time to really understand, okay, what, what's taking my time, what is not allowing me to be present and to walk the halls and to be with an employee, to take an employee to lunch, just do a status interview, like, what are the things that are eliminating that? And I think that more companies are learning. They're hiring what I call employee engagement specialists.

These are people that are day makers. These are people that literally work hand in hand with that manager, with that CEO, with that leader in helping them to create moments and helping them to be a little bit more present again. A secretary, a va. Other people that can help to eliminate just some of the business. Because, man, if you are so busy with the to do list, you'll never find the time for the to don'ts. And it's in the to don'ts that most of the time you're able to create those moments. You've said no to a few things so that you could go out and buy the pairing knives. That, that, that, that's a, that's a part of it.

You've got to simplify your life.

You know, it's. I used to say to my team, if I'm doing it right, if I hired the right people, put them in the right seats, trained them well, supported them, gave them everything they need to succeed. It should look like I'm doing nothing. Yeah, I should have the time to do that because I did that. I put the. I had one sales rep would, you know, always call me up about her mom and complain about her mom. And I'd say, listen, if you're making your numbers, Dr. Berg's couch is open.

Yeah.

If you're not making your numbers, then we're going to talk about work before we talk about your mom. We're not going to talk about your mom, but if you're making your numbers, we could talk about your mom all day long if you're making your numbers, I am happy to talk about your mom, but I'm not happy to talk about your mom all day if you're not making your numbers. But I understood the dynamic going on there because again, it is people I love when you Said in the book, nobody's got 100% retention because you don't control moving, marriage, divorce, babies, sickness. We don't control that stuff. We can't control that. But I'm always impressed when I brought in for sales training and I say, hey, how long are you working here? 5 years. How long are you here? 7 years. How long are you here'? 12 years.

I'm like, that tells me a lot about the management.

Yeah. And I'll ask employees, never in all of the 11,000 plus interviews that I have done now, not once did an employee say undercover. When I would ask what's it like to work here? And they'd say, I love it here. And then I'd ask why never did they ever say, you know, I just, we're so good at time management here. I'll just never, I'll never leave, you know, or like we, we run the best meetings. Our P and L statement is unreal. Like our quotas are, are getting better. And like nobody talks about that.

Right.

What they talk about are usually they're the moments, but it's a moment when a leader said no to something so that they could say yes to them. Yeah they, they, they like I don't know. And I think that's important to think about. And I just. Employees spell mentorship. T, I, M, E. Granted they can't spell that well, but that's how they spell it as. That sounds.

Time, time. It's a huge part of retention. How can you, how can you advocate and be with like without giving that, without giving that time?

And so have you familiar with the book why Work Sucks?

I have not ever read that book. No.

So, so why Work Sucks was created by two people who worked in the Best Buy corporate offices back in the early 2000s.

Okay.

And they were charged with finding out why there was so much voluntary turnover in the corporate office. And what they came up with was a row R O W E A results only work environment. We don't own your time, we own your results. I hired you to get results. And you talked in the book about a guy who quit work, stop working at 4:30 every day to walk his dog and to go fishing. Right. And that's. We understand you, we love you and we're okay with that.

He was okay with making a little less money and they're okay with him doing that. Just like I was okay with a rep going to soccer game or dance recital or whatever. It's okay. But yeah. So why work sucks? And they talked about, you know, if somebody can get the work done in less time only.

Good. Yeah, wonderful.

Good, good. Right. But then that. So that again, it's called why Work sucks, but it was all about time, is that we don't own your time. We're hiring you to do a job. Right. So I gotta pay my virtual assistant. This is what I need you to do in the month.

This is what I'm gonna pay you for the month. I don't care when you do it as long as the deadlines are met. But, yeah, you wanna do it way ahead of time. Cool. You wanna do it the night before. I don't care, as long as it got done. And that's the way it is. But.

And then, you know, the praise thing as well is like, hey, that was good. Can we can go on forever? I keep saying one more thing. There was one project where I was going to say, listen, I need you to do this and do it this way. And instead I said, hey, I need this done. You want to take a crack at it? And she's like, sure, and came back with something I could never have come up with. Right. Because I gave the freedom to. I need a result.

It doesn't have to be my result. Right. I need the result. And that's. I think people feel more valued when it's like, you want to know what I think? I would do the same thing. If somebody came to me, said, I have a problem with the customer, I'd say, no, you don't. They say, yeah, I do. I said, no.

Would you like to talk about your customer?

Yeah, sure.

What's going on? This is what's going on. I said, okay, what do you think we should do? You want to know what I think? Yeah. It's your customer, like, what's going to make them happy? And that's what. Two things happen. One is it empowered them. And the second is they stopped coming to me every time because they knew they could come up with the answer for their customer.

And it's a good example, right. Of that. Standards and connection. Right? You're connecting with them. You're getting to the part about them, but you're also upholding high standards. They still need results. We still need to get things done. But I also understand that you're a person to be loved, and I've got to.

I've got to get to the part about you. That's why those two things are right.

And what if some people value said flexible schedule? I had a rep I know was in the gym every morning, and it wasn't on the phone at 9 o'. Clock. My number two rep in the country. Do you think I cared?

Yeah. Yeah. Like. Yep.

Please go work out.

Please.

It's working. Gotta be that flexibility.

There's got to be. Because if you're not too many other organizations are learning how to do that really well and that's where people are choosing to go.

Yeah, that's it. All right. So you need to get a copy of I love it here. How great leaders create organizations. Their employees never want to leave. Clint, I'm going to put it in the show notes, but if they want to find out more about you, it's.

Yeah. Clintpulver.com, all the socials. Yeah, you can find me all those places.

There you go. Well, thank you, my friend. I look forward to next time we're together. And thank you for joining me. Thanks, everybody for listening. And catch us on the next episode.

Thanks, Alan.

I’m Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you’d like to suggest other topics for “The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast” please let me know. My email is Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com or you can  text, use the short form on this page, or call +1.732.422.6362, international 001 732 422 6362. I look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.

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Alan Berg, CSP, Global Speaking Fellow

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