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#514 – Doing More by Design: David Kolbe on Instinctive Strengths, Team Fit, and the Entrepreneurial Journey
Introduction
Hey, everybody. If you’re in a role of leadership, you’re probably being asked to do more. Well, how do you do more? More. Naturally, that happens to be the title of a book that my guest has written. His name is David Kolbe. We’ll talk about the book as we get going. David, welcome to the show.
Doug, thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it.
Meet the Guest: Three Generations in Psychometric Testing
Yeah. As we were just chatting in the green room, you you gave me an interesting tour of your DNA and your your generational journey into business. Share that with the audience, please.
Sure. Well, my current role, I’m the CEO of Kolbe Corp. And since it’s got my last name, most of the time, I assume people assume. Oh, well, you started the company. No, actually, I was there at the beginning, but my mom started the company almost 51 years ago.
So. 1976 not a lot of women were starting companies then. didn’t start doing exactly what we’re doing now. Actually, now our focus is on helping people understand their instinctive strengths around the way they take action. What’s called your cognitive strengths. So think of it as human assessment, you know, kind of psychological assessment instrument that we have the Kolbe index. And then going back another generation, my grandfather, Eldon Wonderlich created something called the Wonderlich Personnel test, which was most people who know it these days know it because the NFL used it for years and years and years, and the draft combine teams still use it. It’s not required in the draft combine anymore.
But so so yeah, she was kind of inspired to think about the way our mind works and the way people work and how we apply those strengths, frankly, in all kinds of areas, but certainly in our work life. That’s really what my grandfather’s assessment was about. So yeah, it’s kind of I’m the third generation in psychometric testing, which is unusual.
Key Discussion Point 1: The Five-Generation Workforce Myth
truly, that and, I, was attracted to your work because in, in the narrative I was given, there is a mention of talking about the five generations that are now in the workforce. And as most people know, if if you’re dealing with that at your company or in your situation, you know, that’s a challenge. And I I’ll be on record as a bit of a contrarian. I don’t think it’s the problem it should be or it it’s not the problem people are making it out to be. I call it a convenient excuse to say, they’re just that generation and, and and that cuts both ways. and I say the same thing. So Like I said, I call myself a contrarian. I think the the idea that we generationally try to divide people into camps is one of the worst ideas that happened a long time ago, and it’s been going on for a while. But from a leadership standpoint, it doesn’t help to bracket or bucket people that way. And and I’ll get off my soapbox.
Tell me tell me your view of some of that.
You know, I think I generally agree with you. I think it is a convenient, almost lazy excuse for like, oh, well, you know, it’s tough, but it’s tough because of them, you know, and in this case, oh, that generation. And yeah, if it’s a younger person, it’s oh, you know, those old people or, you know, pick the generation. You know, a lot of people want to pick on boomers. well, yeah, they there are some things that are true about age cohorts, you know, shared experiences that people went through that then aren’t shared with younger people.
They just, you know, times history is never exactly the same. So, you know, we have a different set of things. But I think where I agree with you is we overplay how much that means. I mean, human beings are still human beings. I it’s pretty funny. And I’m sure you’ve done this.
You go back and read a quote about, you know, an older person talking about the problems of the younger generation. And you read it, it’s like, yeah, that is spot on. And then you look at the date and it says, you know, 1928 and you’re thinking, oh, so in a hundred years, really not much has changed. The older folks were saying the same things about the younger folks and vice versa. You know, the young folks say, oh, well, those old people, you know, they’re stuck in their ways or whatever the criticism is.
So, yeah, I agree with that. I think there are some things that, as I said, some shared experiences and then maybe approaches and some general outlooks that in a very big way change. But even that. Okay. So in a macro sense they change. But you’re dealing with individual people. You know, you’re not hiring a generation. You’re hiring Doug or David or Sarah or whoever. And they don’t necessarily fit in that neat little box of Gen X or millennials or whatever.
Yeah.
Just a quick sidebar. One of the things I found interesting as as some of this started to percolate when the whole millennial tag came out and was being espoused and talked about and studied and reviewed and contemplated every millennial I ever met, I mean, that is, that is demographically in that bracket. Okay. Every one of them that I’ve ever met, and I’ve got a couple in my family, they deny the stereotype. When you read the definition that that’s one category they share. They, they, they say that’s not me. And and it’s interesting that that’s one of the things that I have put on the list. And I say that in a loving way. They don’t identify with the bracket.
Yeah, yeah. Very true. I’ve seen that too.
Key Discussion Point 2: What the Kolbe Index Actually Measures
But enough of that. So let’s talk a little bit more about the, the Kolbe index and, and how it, how can it help a leader in a company, you know, an entrepreneur founder that’s out there trying to build a team? How can it help them?
So let me explain what it is, kind of what it measures and gives people insight into.
And then that’ll lead us into how it helps. So. Let me start oddly, maybe with what it doesn’t measure, because what it doesn’t measure are the things that we’re more familiar with. So, you know, I mentioned my grandfather created something called the Wonderlic. That’s an intelligence test. So broadly speaking, very broadly speaking, there are three parts of the human mind the affect of the cognitive and the cognitive. So the intelligence part is the cognitive part.
What we you know, how smart we are, what we’ve learned, what we can apply in that thinking smarts, context. So IQ, SAT test, fourth grade spelling test. There are all kinds of measurements of your cognitive ability. The next one affective your preferences, your desires, your interests. There are all kinds of measurements and tests that measure this. So some of the better known ones the Myers-Briggs or mBTI disc Predictive Index, Strengths Finder, and then more clinical ones. Also, lots of those are all the ones I mentioned. Been around a long time.
Very solid. There are some that are just fun that are not necessarily valid. You know the kind of quiz you can get online that tell, oh, what kind of dog are you? That generally is an affective instrument. That last one probably not super valid, but maybe fun to look at. So that’s how you think and how you feel. The Kolbe index measures the way you take action. It’s called the cognitive part of the mind that this concept, by the way of three parts of the mind, goes back literally to Plato.
We didn’t invent this and come up with it. What we did was we figured out how to identify it in people. So the Kolbe index looks at four traits within this cognitive part of the mind, what we call for action modes and identifies the way each of us approach a certain thing. So let me quickly give you those four, because I think that’s the best context. And then I’ll take a breath and we can talk about, you know, how they get applied.
Action Mode 1: Fact Finder
But the four, our first fact finder, which is how we deal with gathering and sharing information. So it ranges all of these kind of go in a spectrum from initiating to counteracting or preventing almost. So in fact finder, if you initiate Action with your fact finder strengths. You do research, you get information, you become an expert. If people ask you a question, you give them a detailed response. If you don’t know the answer, you take time to go find it, but you push back about guessing.
The other end of the spectrum is somebody who really looks at the big picture that, you know, they look at the forest rather than the trees. They’ll focus in on one or 2 or 3 key points, rather than doing more and more research to get all the information, you ask them a question, you know, what’s the weather like out today? it’s beautiful, I loved it, I stepped outside, it was wonderful. Okay, you ask me, I happen to be the other end of the spectrum.
What’s the weather like today? Oh, you know, it’s going to be it’s going to be pretty hot. It’s going to be about 102, which is a little under average for Phoenix this time of year. But actually we’re kind of you know, I give tons and I could keep going, believe me. And I’m not making that up. So neither is better or worse. They just describe the way we take action. So that’s fact finder.
Action Mode 2: Follow Through
The next one is follow through. It’s how we deal with systems structure organization. So I’ll start at the other end of the spectrum, the kind of counteract or resist part. Some people find shortcuts. They they don’t drive everything to closure. They they push back against systems. And what they would see is bureaucracy. So they’re very open ended and adaptable. The other end of the spectrum is somebody who creates systems and structure and lives within it. You know, they stepped into a chaotic environment and they find patterns and create systems from that. By the way, most people fall kind of in the mid range in all of these for.
So I’m describing the extremes because it’s easier to understand what we’re talking about. But most people kind of bridge that gap. They don’t really push one way or the other most of the time. So it’s important to keep that in mind, as I describe the extremes that, hey, we all do this. Here’s another thing that’s important to keep in mind. What we are talking about is not what you can or can’t do. It’s what you will or won’t do. So, you know, I mentioned myself in In Fact Finder, so I become an expert, I do research, I get information, and then I share it. I give a lot of that. That doesn’t mean I can’t simplify or just focus on a couple things. It means I don’t. Naturally, if you just leave me to my own devices or throw me in a situation where I don’t really have the opportunity to kind of use the thinking part of my brain to figure out what’s the best way to do something, I just will look for information.
I’ll try to find it, but I can operate the other way, so everybody should keep that in mind so that one’s follow through.
Action Mode 3: Quick Start
The next one is quick start. It’s the way we deal with risk the unknown. So initiating quick starts experiment. They try things out. They do things differently just to do things differently. You’ll often see them as in classic entrepreneurs. I say classic because it’s really the startup kind of entrepreneur. There are lots of people who are called entrepreneurs because they may create a business, but if they did it by being an apprentice and learning the business under somebody else, and then after ten years starting their own business, they they may not be an initiating quick start because to them, it’s not an experiment. It’s like, okay, I learned I learned the ropes here, and now I’m ready to go out on my own. But it’s more of a process and more of a okay, this is the time. The other end of Quick start is somebody who stabilizes, who sees what works well.
Sticks with it. So it’s more incremental improvement rather than bolt from the blue experimental brainstorm kind of stuff.
Action Mode 4: Implementer
And then the last one of the four is implementer, the name. If I could go back in time and change the name, I probably would. But we’ve been using it for a long time, so I’m not going to do that. It comes from the notion of the use of tools and implements, and it’s all about the the way we deal with tactile, tangible, three dimensional problem solving or action taking. So an initiating implementer physically puts things together, builds, constructs. Somebody on the other end of the spectrum imagines and visions. They they don’t necessarily build a solution, a physical solution. They will put together a conceptual solution. And conceptual might mean, you know, on a spreadsheet with words rather than physically building it. So those are the four. So as I said, I’ll take a breath and you can ask me questions. And I’m happy to delve into okay. But because it kind of didn’t answer your question, how does it help leaders?
Key Discussion Point 3: Putting the Right Person in the Right Seat
Well, know that was helpful to have that backdrop because what what was going through my mind as you were describing that two things.
A I was scoring myself just on the fly there. Yeah. Which is probably most human nature, but B, I was thinking in terms of how leaders can use this. And what comes to my mind is the idea that if you’re trying to to run a business or build a team, you know you’ve got certain functions, certain abilities, certain skill sets that you need to deploy. And I take a page out of the iOS book, entrepreneur operating system. The book called traction, where, you know, you design your organization, you draw the boxes of what you need and the optimum value they need to contribute for the greater good of the business. Then you start putting names and faces in those boxes. And the optimum way to do that is to match the person with the with the need that you just described in the box, not the other way around. A lot of entrepreneurs build companies by taking who they can get and making it work to have them contributing. But the truth is, you know, if you hired uncle Bob to help you in your shop.
Uncle Bob may not be the best guy anywhere on your org chart. He was just handy and available and maybe low cost when you brought him in. He was he was a willing participant. But as the business really starts to scale, you’ve got to refine that selection. And using some tests like this, some assessments to help inform what I always tell people, none of these instruments are the final answer, and nor should they be, but they can sure help inform the situation and create some data points for you to think about in hopefully optimizing your staffing ideas.
Yeah, it’s interesting you mentioned the US interaction. So Gino Wickman, who’s the author of that book, has been using Kolbe since before he created iOS and wrote traction. So we’re one of the tools that he recommends you should always use in your business. And there really are a few reasons, but I think the couple key ones that he talks about. The first one you just talked about, it is understanding that seat, that role that you’ve got.
And yeah, you don’t just put any old smart person in it or any old, you know, committed person or any person who just happens to be available. You really do need to figure out is the person you’re putting in that role, do they have what it takes? And you should definitely analyze that by skills. So you know, you’re hiring an accountant. You better hire somebody who understands how to keep your books. that’s it. That’s more the cognitive side of things that we were talking about before. Similarly with Kolbe. So if you’re hiring for a role that is really all about creating systems and structure and making sure that they run smoothly and they are followed by everybody you, I’m describing an initiating follow through kind of person, you know, so we actually have tools that help you figure that out for the role. So we talk about the Kolbe a index, which is really looking at the person themselves. What do they look like. And by the way, we’ve done test retest reliability studies.
Your results on the Kolbe index don’t seem to change much at all over time. I mean, they you know, there’s a margin of error and there are exceptions. But in general, it’s a it’s quite a stable trait. So you find that out about the person. But you’ve really got to fit them in the right seat. And the Kolbe is a piece of that. Just the putting them in. And so we’ve got something that helps companies figure that out ahead of time, so they don’t have to put them in the role, figure it out and then go, oh. So that’s one way we help leaders, is we give insight and vision into who are the people that you are, in this case, going to be working with. The other major thing is giving people insight. And Gino has talked about this. And, you know, it definitely helps leaders. You already have people that you’re working with and they might be, you know, the right person for that role for lots of reasons.
But it’s helpful to know, okay, what can I count on with Doug or with David? You know, so I mention my my fact finder. I’ll throw in another thing with my follow through. My strength there is to be open ended adaptable. I prevent bureaucracy from forming. I keep things from getting too kind of too much monotonous and just a routine. We have to follow the routine just to follow the routine. Now that’s not better or worse. That’s just who I am. But when people who work with me understand that, they know, number one don’t. I shouldn’t be in a position where that’s what I’m supposed to do all the time. Then if you think about a leader, the leaders got this balancing act. They need to look at the entire organization and figure out how does this organization need to run, what are the right seats to have? And then you’ve got to fit the people in. And there’s always a little bit of a dance. I mean, you absolutely need to figure out what the role, the responsibilities of the role are before you just put anyone in it and you don’t take like, oh, this person’s in the role.
So it should be something totally different. But we’ll make it this role just to suit the person. That’s a, you know, that’s a bad idea. It’s not going to end well. But there are some softer points in there. Well you’ve got somebody there in a role. They’ve generally been really good, but things are going a little sideways. And yeah, you can tweak the role a little bit. So it works better for them because you’ve got a great person and you want it to work. You just can’t let the entire organization get out of balance because of that. And so leaders need to do that. They also need to figure out how to get the most out of the people they have. So one of the ways you do that is to set people up for success. Give them the freedom to be themselves to the greatest extent possible. Again, within this framework of well, yeah, I still have to run a business. This is not some, you know, Pollyanna or, you know, some nirvana where everybody just magically is doing whatever they want and it’ll just come together like, no, a leader needs to make it come together.
And then the other thing the leader needs to do that we really help with is you’ve got these different people. And again, our research has shown if you get everybody in your organization who looks just the same, let’s say you hire a bunch of people who look like you from a Kolbe index perspective, their cognitive strengths, that might feel good for a while because they do it the way I do it. And this is so it’s natural. We’re in a meeting and we have the same kinds of questions that we push back on the same things. But our research shows that teams, the most successful teams, most often have a mix of cognitive talents. That’s a nice way of putting it. Here’s the more difficult way of putting it. They have conflict. They don’t just approach every problem the same way. And you need that because otherwise you have these huge blind spots. Either they’re blind spots like you just don’t even see that there’s a problem or it’s not necessarily blind. It’s, oh, we need somebody.
So let’s take it if me and follow through. If you have a whole bunch of people who are open ended and adaptable and more unstructured and pushed back against systems and structure, well, how does anything get done consistently? You know, how do you make sure taxes get filed on time? And sure, I can do that, but it takes more energy for me. It is not as natural. So I need people around me and including at leadership levels, who will do things differently and push back on me when I’m maybe pulling out too many of the systems they need to say, whoa, hold on a second. David, is that really the right thing to do? So but that that feels harder. But good leaders understand that that’s necessary.
Behind the Scenes: The Contrarian on the Team
Having that diversity of thought at the table, as you were describing that. I’ve told this story before, but I was doing some team level coaching at a large global brand, and this particular team had just fairly recently been constituted as part of a reorg.
So they were still in the early stages of getting to know each other and do things. And that was one of the reasons I was called in to work with them and talked to them. And we we did a survey asking the team some questions about their observations of the team dynamics so far, you know, and it ended up one of the panels in the output was a classic four blocker, and all the dots were clustered in the upper right, which is kind of where you’re supposed to be. You know, you would think that was a good score, but there was one little dot over in the bottom left. And and when we got to the day of the debrief, everybody had been given their copies in advance. And, and when we convened the meeting, one guy raised his hand. He goes, I’m going to self declare, I’m the DoD out of here in the out in left field. And he got real somber. And he said, you know, this just proves something I’ve been thinking about for a while.
I don’t think I’m a fit on this team. I, I feel like most of my ideas are very contrary. They’re certainly frequently shot down. And I’m probably just holding you guys back. I think I need to ask for a transfer and reposition. And in unison, about half of the team said, no, do not do that. We value your ideas because we are too guilty of groupthink, and you always bring us back to where we need to be. Whether it’s a kind of reality or something we forgot. And a couple of them said, if we’ve made you feel bad about that, that’s on us. We need to figure out how to do that more productively. Because trust me, we do value what you’re doing for us. And please do not leave. You know, let’s let’s let’s keep working together and figure this out. And that was part of the whole point of what I was trying to help them get to, is, is establishing their own team culture so they could have psychological safety and trust and, and more productive engagement with each other.
And now that we’re talking about this, I, I wish I had had access to the Kolbe for these guys because I think a lot of the dynamic that did emerge would, would have probably been understood with your instrument there.
Yeah, yeah, that’s the kind of insight we give pretty often we will see that and have the same kind of conversation. And I think the great news for that team is there were enough people there who realized, yeah, you probably are. They didn’t push back and say, oh no, you’re really up here with us. They acknowledged you’re right. You are different and we need you, and we’ll be better at letting you know that some teams really do kind of shun or marginalize that person. And they’re like, yeah, they’re a pain in the neck. And we just. And look, there are some of those people. They’re a pain in the neck for nonproductive reasons. And they, you know, maybe should be gotten rid of. But that’s a different thing than we’re talking about.
Yeah.
Well, the good news was this guy proved to be pretty entertaining. I mean, he was he had his own very unique personality. And just in the short period I got to work with him, I really had a natural affinity to the guy. I thought, well, he might be contrarian, but he’s not hard to talk to. You know, he’s he’s a good guy, you know? Yeah. And we ought to talk to it. He he he was in no way arrogant or off putting in the way he tried to present his ideas. They weren’t just I didn’t even. I didn’t know enough of the detail of the industry. I mean, I knew it at a high level, but there were some very nuanced issues they were dealing with that I had no idea how they really impacted, but you could tell whatever he had to say about it was really out there.
Yeah.
But it did. It was a win win in the end. And the, the they ended up.
We borrowed a page out of Patrick Lynch Jones. We, we wrote a team charter and a team contract during my work there. And they really got into the spirit of that and really agreed that that’s what they needed to do to really set a direction for what they could do as a team. And again, I stressed they were a newly constituted some functions that had formerly been separate, had been brought together, and there was a need to collaborate and coordinate and do some things so well.
And that’s one of the times I found, and I wonder what you think to those newer teams are often the ones where you can help the most because like with us, they’re newer. They don’t necessarily know this about each other yet. They haven’t figured it out. And we can come in, give them insight and just speed up the process of them working well together as opposed to, oh, there’s this one outlier. Okay. Why is he now? Is he somebody we shouldn’t trust? Like, is that the issue? Is he working cross purposes to us.
And we can quickly go and show no, he’s not working at cross-purposes. You guys all align in terms of where you see the, you know, the company or the project, the team going, but he just has this other approach. And here’s why that’s helpful to you. And here are ways that you should tap into that and leverage it versus, you know, instead of marginalizing it. But yeah, it’s fun with those newer teams a lot of times.
Personal Stories: From Lawyer to CEO of a Family Business
Well, David, let me shift gears, if I may, and ask you personally, as CEO of the company, and you stepped in and took over from your mom and her creation there. What’s your journey been like from a personal viewpoint, if you don’t mind sharing?
Yeah, of course. You know, at the risk of starting back too far, it is relevant because, you know, I did start with the company when it was founded. I was nine. So it’s not like I was running things. But, you know, I started the company actually was created as an educational publishing company.
So it collected other people’s books and, and sold them via mail order. Then it started creating its own, you know, hiring authors and, and having internal authors that wrote their own stuff. So they put out it, put out. We put out, games, books, kits, educational stuff. So I was proofreading manuscripts. I was for years, my summer job was working in the shipping room and packing boxes and sending them off. And, you know, eventually it was like junior bookkeeper when I was a little older. So I kind of did everything in the company. But as I was doing everything in the company, I wanted to be a lawyer when I grew up. So I went off to college, got an undergraduate business degree, promptly, didn’t use that, but went into moved to Washington, D.C. and worked in policy. I, I used to say politics, but it was really not about the running for office or that side of things. I worked for a congressman from Texas on his legislative staff.
So it really was more of a policy job, which I like more, but I’ve always found that more interesting. So did that for a little while and then went to law school and did become a lawyer and, you know, I wasn’t in either of those things. Those were not pointing me toward working in the business. And it really wasn’t a family business. It was, you know, it was my mom started it, but there weren’t other family members in it. became a lawyer, moved back home to Phoenix, where I had grown up to practice law, and my mom recruited me basically. And this was in the late 90s. I really enjoyed being a lawyer. I’m not one of those former lawyers who, you know, hated it and got out because it was terrible. I enjoyed it. I only did it for three years. So, you know, I wasn’t there very long. But basically she was able to recruit me for two reasons. One, well, maybe three. I did see that there were lots of successful lawyers who I respected who were kind of burnt out on the practice of law.
You know, they were in it for 20 years and didn’t love it. So that was a cautionary tale. Like, you know, there were some who did, but there were others who, you know, I looked at their practice and thought, well, gosh, you’re kind of. You’ve got a great practice and yet you don’t love it. So again, cautionary tale. the company, Kolbe Corp, had a fair amount of legal work going on at the time. We’re an intellectual property business, and unfortunately there were people who were infringing on our intellectual property, so we were having to defend that. so I actually she recruited me to be general counsel. So I was still doing legal stuff in the company and the things that small businesses have to do, contract reviews and, you know, kind of regular legal stuff in addition to the intellectual property, which was more interesting. And then the third thing was really the a timing piece. Late 90s, the company were a software company as well, and we were going into delivering stuff on the internet.
And this was in the, you know, pre-internet dotcom bubble bursting. So it was very attractive to say, hey, you know, come work for us. We’re kind of an internet company, so. Recruited me in. And then there was, you know, there’s another part of the journey that’s all about stepping into what then became a family business. My mom had founded it, I came in, my stepsister had come into the company a little before me. She had a successful career in the sales field, sales and sales management and came into the company and started doing that for us. So that was also another interesting part of my professional journey.
Yeah, yeah. You know, as as most of my listeners know, I’ve told the story, I was the only son of a single mom. And also in the 70s, she quit her day job and started a business. And I was had had just, gotten ready. I actually it was the early, early 70s because I was still in, in school and, my summer jobs were she was an interior designer.
So it wasn’t that I was necessarily going to go that route, but my summer jobs were painting walls and hanging pictures and hanging drapes and installing things and moving furniture and all of that sort of work. So I was her kind of chief gofer and everything. And, the one big takeaway that I’d talk about is that she showed me what a powerful entrepreneurial spirit can do before I understood anything about what that really meant, and ultimately kind of planted the seed in me. I was I’ve never been a good permanent employee anywhere. I’ve I’ve always been kind of an independent thinker. And, although I’ve had a couple of long term stints on W-2 with people, but for the most part, I’ve been pretty independent and fairly entrepreneurial. Five startups and five exits and, you know.
Yeah.
All that going on. So.
Practical Advice: Ego Out the Window, “That’s Not My Job” Doesn’t Last
Yeah. I mean, I think another thing that you’ll learn when you start, you know, kind of like we did and not it doesn’t even have to literally be at that young of an age.
But when you see a company start that way small and you realize, in our case, our moms, they have to do everything. Like as a when you’re a small business owner. Oh yeah. Actually founder. you don’t get to say, well, that’s not my job. Like, if you need to paint walls, you need to paint walls. You know, if you need to get in a car and deliver something to a client, you get in a car and deliver something to the client because you’re it. And I think ego goes out the window. And I think that when people learn that lesson the right way, they keep that for the rest of their lives. And, you know, that’s one of the things that is kind of a bedrock value for us. And what we’ve learned is if people come into our company with more of an attitude of, well, hey, I’m a professional and I do the things that I’m supposed to do, and it’s beneath me to do, you know, something that’s not my job.
And I put that in quotes. If somebody has a that’s not my job mentality, they don’t last here because it’s just not it rubs too much the wrong way. And look, I’ve seen enough companies to know there are companies with very different attitudes about that that thrive and are super successful. So I’m not saying ours is the only way to do it. I’m saying what works really well for us and it’s because of that history is, you know, I remember times. Yeah, well, I remember times where literally the toilet overflowed. We owned our own building and we didn’t have a property maintenance company because it wasn’t that big of a building. And I was there early. I’m going to clean it up like you just do that. And it’s not like, oh, look at me, I’m some hero. It’s just, that’s what you have to do. and see that carries through. Of course you need to be smart about it. If, as the CEO visionary, the company, I’m spending all my time on property maintenance.
That’s a not a well-run business. But if I’m the kind of person who says I won’t lift a finger to do it, I’m going to make somebody else do that. Even though I’m there, I’m present, like, yeah, not us.
Well, and that points out the difference between, you know, there’s a crisis or is that the norm? You know, and there’s part of that in there too. But I also thinking about what you described as talking about the entrepreneurial journey. There’s definitely phases you should be going through. You know, the startup phase. Yeah. It’s all hands on deck. Founder is chief everything. Officer does everything. My wife and I, one of the companies we started, we joke now about it, but we regularly were running by Sam’s or Costco on the way home to get toilet paper for the bathrooms in our building. You know.
There you go.
And or snacks for the snack bar, you know, or whatever it was we were doing, you know? That was that was just kind of part of the deal in the early stages.
Now as you progress and your companies start scaling, you can get a little more specific in the division of effort and labor to to get back to your dedicated high value contributions to the business and hopefully not be the Chief Everything officer. And you get a little more specific. But what we’re saying here is, you know, in the early going, it’s it’s everything.
Yeah. And some founders have a hard time making that switch. You know, they.
Absolutely.
Spend so many years being the chief everything officer. They continue doing that and they are stuck. Yeah, they get stuck. And then their business is hard to scale because they’ve got to have their fingers and everything, and they never learn how to step back from that.
Absolutely true.
Closing Thoughts: Where to Find David Kolbe
Well, David, I tell you what. We’re about up on time for today, sir. I really appreciate you sitting in. Tell people the best way to get in touch with you if they’re interested in knowing more.
Yeah. Best places to go to Kolbe. Com. And all kinds of stuff there about what we do. And we’ve talked mostly about the business applications, but you know, your instinctive strengths are with you no matter what you’re doing. So one of a couple of my personal favorite things are the the parenting and relationship applications that we have on the personal side. So look at look at that stuff too. Actually, I guess I should mention the relationship one that’s takes two takes twitter.com that helps existing couples. It’s not a matching, it’s not a dating or anything like that, but it’s hey, you and your partner, your spouse, how do you guys fit together and what’s what are some tips on how you can make that work better?
Oh that’s interesting. Very good. Well, as always, folks, we’re going to have those links in the show notes. And one last time, David, thank you for joining us here. Really appreciate you.
Thanks for having me, Doug. Appreciate it.
You bet. Well, folks, this is a part of the show.
I’d like to remind you, we have a video version of this episode over on YouTube, a channel by the same name. Leadership powered by common sense. Hop over there, check out our archives. We have eclipse to show 500. We’re marching on and moving ahead. If you would join our channel, we would definitely appreciate it. Would love to have you. We’d love to hear your comments and suggestions for other topics or shows that you haven’t heard yet. But with that, we’re going to sign off. Say goodbye. Go out there.
Make it a great day.
Meet Our Guest – David Kolbe
I’m all about transforming how we understand human performance. As a third-generation leader in psychometric testing and the CEO of Kolbe Corp, I’m passionate about helping people achieve what matters most to them. I’ve been immersed in the Kolbe Concept® for years and even helped create the original algorithm for the Kolbe A™ Index—the only tool out there proven to unlock your instinctive strengths.
What really drives me is helping others discover their true strengths, cut down on stress, and find more joy in both work and life. I’m fortunate to work with top companies looking to spark innovation and build strong, thriving teams.
With a background in law and business, I’ve got a unique take on turning innovative ideas into successful ventures. Before Kolbe Corp, I worked as an attorney at a leading Arizona law firm and served as a Legislative Director in Congress. I also earned a degree in economics from the Wharton School of Business.
When I’m not working, you’ll find me skiing, playing poker, or listening to – both old AND new – music. I’m based in Arizona, where I work to make what Kolbe does for people more understandable, more approachable, and more effective.
Take your Kolbe A Index today: https://kolbe.com/takea
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