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Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Yes, welcome to the biz communication Show. I’m your host Bill Lampton the biz communication guy, bringing you tips and strategies that will boost your business and give you winning words and ways. Thanks for being with us on the video portion and the podcast portion. Our guest today is Robert Mallon, a nationally recognized speaker, author and leadership consultant, based in Gainesville, Georgia, which is my home operation based too. With over 30 years of business experience, Robert Malone has won numerous awards for his management, leadership and sales abilities. Robert has always had great passion for opening people and companies to their full potential. He has 20 years of coaching experience, and he excels at helping managers, entrepreneurs, and CEOs learn the tools they need to lead their business, and equally as important to enjoy both their business and their free time. At the age of 18, Robert had the opportunity to work alongside a master carpenter during that time, they had the same tools. But Master carpenters 30 years of experience on Robert showed spectacularly the carpenter would gracefully whip through his tools, one after the other for a project, and then slip them back into his belt as quickly as he pulled them out. Robert soon realized that the magic wasn’t in the tools. It was how this man use the tools as an extension of himself. And the end, this man handed Robert a fundamental lesson that has followed him throughout his entire career. Good tools aren’t enough if you don’t know how to fully embed them into your life. And they do next to nothing if you don’t know what you want to build, and how to build it property. We’re welcome now Robert Malin to the biz communication show. Hello, Robert.
Robert Mallon
Hey, Bill. So excited to be on today.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Delighted to have you with us. And that’s quite a story about that. Carpenter, did you have any anything to add to that? A life lesson
Robert Mallon
many years ago, but as you alluded to, in the introduction there, I started this business 20 years ago. So I coach and I speak and work with a lot of different types of people in a lot of different types of companies. But one thing I really did learn about that was, I do not like to give like theory stuff, when I’m working with my clients, I want to give them very, very specific tools that they can begin using like tomorrow, as soon as they get it. So you know, just like you were talking about that God told me he was we had the exact same tools in our tool belt way back when and that was back in the 70s. But he knew how to use the tools. And I did not know how to use the tools. And so I think part of my job is just to give people the right tools to grow their businesses to actually have lives that they’re very proud of. And to go through that. So I wanted to be very applicable.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
I’ll tell you what that reminded me of I started playing golf when I was 13 years old. I played for many, many years, I think I probably played golf longer than some people live. And during all that time, especially when I got to the place where I could afford it. I always had the best equipment. If something new and my came out and my pro said this would be good for my game might I’ve put forth those extra dollars and got it but you know what, Robert? I don’t think you ever saw my name on the PGA Tour list. Had I had the tools but that’s not all it takes. It’s it’s a great lesson. And speaking of lessons, one of the one of the great lessons we can learn from you is how your stellar career and business prepared you for what you are doing now. You’ve been coaching, business people, business leaders, business entrepreneurs, managers and supervisors for 20 years now, you didn’t get to that point just by taking the correspondence course are a weekend seminar somewhere. So talk to us please about your years and the restaurant business one of the toughest businesses in the world to survive and Talk to us about that. And tell us how I know you had at one point working with Chili’s restaurants you had 80 to 100 employees. Tell us please two or three of the key communication skills that helped you be extra productive? And also have a team bonded together? What What are your communication strategies for that?
Robert Mallon
Do that and I actually had about 25 years. So I started with a company called steak and Ale restaurants way back in the day back in the 70s. I remember them quite well. Yeah, great company. But actually, most of the big restaurant companies now are run by x steak and l people and I know most of them that are still doing that. But a couple of things that I learned, you know, with Brinker, which is Chili’s and Macaroni Grill, and on the board, have restaurants all over the southeast, a couple of things I used to give out, I was very good at giving feedback. And I taught people underneath me to give their people feedback, too. And there was a little tip that I use called lb slash in T, lb and t in if you could imagine, I don’t have one in front of me, but like a three, actually I do. Let’s pretend that you have like a three by five card like this. And you want your employees and when you see them do something, right, you put like an L be like best. And you just write out like two or three words of what that means, like, Hey, John, let me tell you what I really liked best about what I saw you do today. So you’re very, very specific about what it is. And then in T would be, hey, hey, John, next time, when you do that in T Next time, you might want to consider doing it this way. So the the way of saying that like best and next time, people didn’t get offended, because all you’re really doing is just giving them feedback on their, you know, their performance and their behaviors and things like that. Another big key though, was unexpressed expectations, always lead to problems always. Okay, that can be in marriage, that can be in business, it can be in anything, even with friends. And so I got really good early, and I’ve developed a system of telling people exactly what the expectations were. And what I found was before I did this, if my expectations were here, but I did not communicate them to them, well, they might come out here or there or here, okay. When I got super clear about exactly what the expectations were, they tended to get up to like there are even there in hit those expectations. And so I think one of the keys that you can do as a leader is is learn the right ways to give the expectations to your people, and then most importantly, to hold them accountable to the expectations that you give.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
I’m thinking of a couple of items there. One is that I applaud the fact that even when you’re correcting somebody, you’re doing it with a positive, affirmative, supportive approach. It’s it’s not a reprimand. The second thing that that I found during my 20 years of management was you’re talking about expectations and letting everyone know the expectations and reminding them of those expectations. I found early in my career, I was in professional fundraising for 20 years. And I know the first couple of years, Robert, I was a little hesitant about sending people reminders of when their pledges were due. I thought you know, this, this could be uncomfortable. This might might anger somebody, but no, I found out. People had a lot of other priorities. They had a lot of other deadlines. And so they appreciate it very much. These reminders, okay, our fiscal year ends June 30. You’ve got to pledge here’s what you’ve paid. So far. Here’s the remainder. I never in my entire fundraising career had anybody complained about that. Because one of the mistakes we make in communication, I don’t know you don’t make it. But one of the mistakes we make is we think we’ve said it once that got it, that’s not the case. It’s
Robert Mallon
it’s got to be reinforced through communication as much as you can. And you know, when you see people doing things, right, let them know, when you see people doing things not quite as right as they could be. Let them know. And that’s what people don’t like to do because I think the big problem is people I like to say it’s like a balance beam like a gymnast is on. And if they fall this way they want to be liked. If they follow this way, they want to be respected, but most pinion about holding people to account, most people tend to fall this way, and they want to be liked. So they keep their mouth shut, okay? I’ll just say this to you, if you do that, as a leader, they will not respect you. And they’ll talk behind your back because they know they’re getting away with things. But if you tend to lean towards this way, with holding people accountable to the expectations, they’re going to respect you. And by the way that they also like you, that’s the best of both worlds when you have the like, and the respect as a leader.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
This index card system that you came up with was that your original idea that those initials and what it meant was
Robert Mallon
that was probably built, I’m thinking, late 70s. So that was 40 years ago. And I don’t know if anybody ever told me that or if I’ll have to give credit to somebody, because I’m probably not smart enough to have done that. But I don’t remember the first time I did it actually.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
One of the points that brings to mind to me is I, I have a professional friend who quite a few years ago started working with companies trying to get them away from annual performance appraisals, as the only time that you let an employee know how he or she was doing. And what this consultant friend of mine said was, if somebody comes in, and you haven’t told them in a year, what’s going on, and you suddenly are, are throwing the book at them is such a shock. And it’s really unfair.
Robert Mallon
Totally, totally, totally in, I’m so glad you brought that up, because let’s go back to this little system. And obviously, you know, when we started getting more electronic stuff, I didn’t do three by five cards. But let’s pretend that once a month, you just watch one employee a little part of a day, you know, and just kind of listen to them and answer the phones or whatever it is that they’re doing, you know, and then you write down a number of lbs and N t’s on there, and then talk with them about them. Maybe it’s a five minute conversation, okay? They get used to the fact that you’re giving them feedback. But if you do that once a month, when performance appraisal time comes around once a year for most companies, it is once a year or twice a year, every six months or so. I’ll be straight up with a bill. I don’t remember what I was doing three weeks ago. All right. There’s no way I can tell what Susan was doing. Nine months ago, 10 months ago, there’s no way I can remember that. But if I haven’t written down, that performance appraisal becomes really, really easy. Because I can say, Hey, do you remember back in last October when you did this great job on that, you know, and I just want to reiterate awesome. And you also I noticed that when we had a conversation about this, you adjusted to that. And so thank you so much for so that way, you’re having a great positive conversation with them. Or they’re not meeting the expectations in you know, because you have written documentation that they’re not and then you can go whichever way you need to go with that, too.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Robert, we’re going to be back in just a few seconds. And I’m going to ask you about the virtual coaching that you do be back shortly.
Speaker 3
Do you wish you felt confident about giving speeches? Do you want to deal with difficult people constructively? And what about becoming more persuasive and sales, then keep listening now to Dr. Bill Lampton, he spent 20 years in management, so he knows the communication skills you need for success. I urge you to call the business communication guide today for a no call, but very valuable 30 minute discussion about your communication challenges. Call now. 678-316-4300 Again, that’s 678-316-4300.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Robert, you and I both spent a lot of years, getting onto airplanes, catching shuttle buses, staying in hotels, and speaking to groups directing, maybe a keynote speech one or two hour seminar, sometimes even an all day seminar the last time I talked with you when I was inviting you to be on the bass communication show you said that practically all of what you’re doing now, and you were doing this even before could sort of forced the others to look into the possibilities. Practically all of the the coaching and teaching that you’re doing is virtual, it’s online. Tell us how well that that works out for you.
Robert Mallon
best thing in the world. I started this business actually January 2003. So it was 20 years ago, a couple of months ago now. And what I did I traveled seemed like all the time I was gone 14 1516 days a month, and, you know, with with running and just like you said, you know, getting the rental cars and trying to find the place and going after that. It was just very, very hard on the body. But back in 2011, I was actually flying home after five days of being on the road. It was a Friday night, we were supposed to arrive in Atlanta about 930. And there was real bad storms, I will never forget this night. But we circled Atlanta, then went back up to Chattanooga and landed a refuel and then came back down. And I got home about three o’clock in the morning. But I remember being in that seat going, I’m not going to do this. If more. I’m stuck in six months, that was actually in July 2011. And I said as of 2012, I’m stop, and I’m just not going to do this stuff anymore. So I discovered Skype, I think it was Skype back in 2014. And I just moved all of my clients to that. And now I use Zoom have been using Zoom since 2014 2015. And like every day, five days a week, I’ve got about six or seven clients that I work with every day for about 55 minutes each time. They are all over the country. I’ve got a few people here who are local, but I’ve known more around the country, I’ve got people on the West Coast, you know, down in Florida, Mid Atlantic states, Midwest, all that type stuff. So it’s phenomenal, because I’m in my office right now. And when I get that apartment, and I walk right over there, and I walk up those steps, and I grabbed something and maybe a cup of coffee, and then come back down and do it again and do it again, the best thing I’ve ever done, but we did it early with the company. So when COVID came around, I didn’t know what was going to happen just like anybody else, I guess who was April, March, April of 2020. I was thinking, you know what’s going to happen. But all of my clients already knew how to do this. And as a matter of fact, the last three years have been the best business career years I’ve ever had, my whole life is just completely full, filled up because of the virtual.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
I’ll tell you what I was thinking yesterday, I looked at my car. And I thought of how long it would take me to get, say to a client in San Francisco. And then I looked at the mouse that I control the computer with. And I said mouse you are one heck of a lot faster than that car. You and I both welcome the these opportunities. I was a guy who came in in the technology age. I was I was kicking and screaming and you had to drag me into it. I’d always delegated that. But suddenly I had as an entrepreneur, I had nobody else had done it, delegate it. But I’ve embraced it. I loved it. I love it. I’m welcome what we’re doing, Robert,
Robert Mallon
interesting, if I could just like right now, I’m not aware that you are not in the room with me, right? It’s almost exactly like being in a restaurant just looking across the table at somebody and you have the conversation. And I’d say the vast majority of the people that I work with, I’ve never met them in person. And sometimes I’m shocked when I meet them. Like one guy, one guy true. Back in October, I met him down in Florida in Tampa and the guy’s like six foot five, and I thought he was like 510 I had no idea you know, and it’s like, whoa, what’s going on? Yes, it’s neat. It’s pretty cool.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
We’re very fortunate to live in a time when we can communicate with and in your case helps so many clients without without ever leaving on our doorstep. Robert, this has been fascinating, informative. And as always with you inspirational. I know that there are people who will want to contact you. So please give us your contact information.
Robert Mallon
Okay, my my contact information. The name of my company is elite coaching solutions, elite coaching solutions. So the website is elite or www dot elite coaching dot solutions. And that’s how you get in. My email address is Robert at elite coaching dot solutions. So there is no.com at the end of it, it’s just not solutions. And more importantly my assistant who’s been with me now for about six or seven years. Her email is Rebecca at elite coaching dot solutions. And she owns my calendar if you’d like to talk a little bit about coaching, get in touch with her and we can take 10 or 15 minutes and see if he might possibly be Good client or we could just see if we have a good fit together.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Thank you so much and and I encourage our viewers and our listeners to contact Robert Malin, because he not only builds businesses, he builds people as well. And since Robert has given his contact information, I’m happy to give mine I invite you to go to YouTube and in the search bar there type my YouTube moniker which is Bill Lampton PhD. And there’s a there’s a brief welcome video at the end of that, hit the subscribe button, you have access not only to this interview, but to many instructional videos that I’ve been posting since 2004. Also, naturally, I invite you to my website as the biz communication guide naturally, my website is biz bi Z biz communication guy.com. Certainly, I would welcome a phone call from you at no obligation just to explore your challenges and your problems with communication and discuss how possibly I can assist you with them. Robert Wood would you bring this all together with a closing thought forest, please,
Robert Mallon
I’ll just say this bill, you and I don’t get to see each other too often. But I love what you do. And I love being with you. And I’m just so excited to be on this call with you today. So thank you for inviting me to be on the show.
Bill Lampton Ph.D.
Thank you for being here. We’ll do that again down the road, as we say here in the Atlanta, Georgia area. Thanks to those of you who joined us on the biggest communication show on video and on the podcast. We know that you did learn valuable tips and strategies from Robert melon and certainly winning words and ways. Be with us again soon.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
