In this strategic episode, Jesse Gilmore, Founder of Niche in Control, shares how to escape the founder-as-bottleneck trap by shifting your identity from doer to leader and building real systems so you stop owning a job and start owning a business. If you’re still the single point of failure and every client or fire runs through you, you won’t want to miss it.
You will discover:
– How to complete a 7-day time log to identify tasks for eliminate, automate, delegate, and time-block so you can shift from doer to trainer to manager to visionary
– Why succeeding as the best doer in stage two can make you the bottleneck that prevents scaling into higher stages
– What signs reveal you’ve built yourself a job instead of a business, such as inability to take a week off without everything stalling
Episode Transcript
Scott Ritzheimer
Hello, hello and welcome. Welcome once again to the start, scale and succeed podcast, the only podcast that grows with you through all seven stages of your journey. As a founder, I’m your host, Scott Ritzheimer, and there’s a trap that nobody warns you about. The very skill set that made you good enough to go out on your own can actually become the very thing that keeps you from ever building a business. And when you’re the best at whatever it is that you do, and you’re the best at the work that you’ve started, you can also become the bottleneck very quickly, because every deliverable, every client, every fire runs through you. It makes the work harder and harder, and the better it gets, the bigger you get, the deeper you fall into this trap. And fortunately, it doesn’t have to stay that way, because my guest today, Mr. Jesse P Gilmore, is going to help us figure out the exact way to get out of it and what you can do next. And he’s well qualified to do so, because Jesse is a transformational business coach and the founder of niche in control, where he helps agency owners to scale their businesses while reclaiming their time and peace of mind. He’s a creator of the leverage for growth method. He’s host of the leverage for growth podcast. He’s also author of the agency owner’s guide to freedom. And there it is. Jesse has helped over 100 marketing agencies to break through plateaus and systematize sustainable growth. Keyword there his mission to help business owners to scale, not just their profits but their freedom. And he’s here with us today. Jesse, welcome to the show. Glad to have you here. One of the things that just jumped off the pages of the book as I was reading through it was this idea of a distinction between owning a job and owning a business. And I think a lot of founders, especially in this stage two that we’re talking about, have a job, you know, it might have a little bit more freedom, but probably, if they’re honest, it has a lot more responsibility than it does freedom. And so what’s going on here? Maybe, what are some of the signs that somebody has built themselves a job instead of a business?
Jesse Gilmore
Yeah, that’s a great way of starting off our conversation. And in my first businesses, everything kind of funneled through me. If I had worked didn’t work, work didn’t get done. That is very similar to that people are kind of feeling trapped. So if you took off a week, would the business even sustain or grow without you? That is a big kind of like indicator or self assessment type of question. Also, as you take on more clients, does it increase your personal hours? These are very simple ways of being able to determine whether or not you are actually the bottleneck, or what I would consider to be what’s called a single point of failure, where everything relies upon a single person, and it’s a certain stage, like you talked about how this is stage two in your model, where there is kind of, like a reason why it’s there, but doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to stay there and leverage for growth methods all based around freeing them up and kind of moving through the different stages. But I would say, anybody that’s listening to this, those two questions, if you can answer them, they’ll determine if you’re in this stage right now.
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, I love that you brought that point there at the end, because it, to some extent, succeeding in stage two is about being the answer to all those questions, because somebody has to do it, and there’s nobody else around. So if you don’t answer it, it doesn’t move. That’s That’s by design, not just by default. However, if we get stuck in that, I think that’s where it becomes really problematic. How do you help folks to recognize when it’s time to start addressing that? Like, how does someone know if, if building the business is to the degree that they have is just a necessary part of the game, or that they are stuck in a pattern that’s not serving them well anymore.
Jesse Gilmore
Yeah, what I’ve found is that there’s certain kind of growth plateaus that happen right right around the 20,000 a month, where you’re about to hire the first person that’s like one of the kind of plateaus. And a lot of times those types of people that are like solopreneurs, that’s like the first stage of being like, okay, something’s wrong. Something is happening within the business, and I need to make a decision if I’m going to stay small or start to grow a team. Okay? And I think that that is one of the biggest kind of steps. Another step is where you start to realize that what you’re doing in the business might necessarily be the thing that you had signed up for. You know, as you start to take on more team members, and maybe you don’t find the right talent, you’re positioning yourself based around kind of more of a default type of role, as opposed to being very specific about this is my unique ability in the business. This is where I need to focus, or stay as a visionary, and start building a business around them. And I think one of the biggest kind of unlocks, and I might be jumping into a further question you’re going to ask, but is you have to make a decision on whether or not you want a business to kind of stay all about you kind. Like a centralized business model, right? And there’s benefits to that.
Some people are like fractional coos or different types of fractional types of roles. Can make a lot of money doing that solo. But if you’re starting to think about what me and Scott focus on, which is scale, you have to kind of switch your identity, and you have to start looking at, maybe I was the doer for a period of time, and now I need to start thinking about, let’s just be the world’s greatest trainer. Can I train people better than what I am currently? And if I can train them, can I move into management, kind of be the world’s greatest manager, and then start moving through these different identity shifts. But I think that one of the biggest things is, is if you get to a place where you can start to understand that you could hire somebody and that could take, you know, things off of your plate, what is that kind of the first step I always tell people to do, like a seven day time log, and to get to understand that your use of time within the business, and immediately that gives you the raw inputs to figure out, should I be Doing this, or should I not be doing this? If I hired somebody, what would they do? You know, that’s kind of a foundational step.
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, yeah. There’s so much to unpack in there. I want to start with a statement you made earlier about the choice that we’re really having to make, and that is, do I stay small or grow a team? And I think for a lot of folks, the there’s, like, a right answer to that and a wrong option, right? Is it one of those is good and one is bad? Is that true? Is it bad to stay small, or is it better to grow a team? What have you found to be true?
Jesse Gilmore
It really depends on what your vision is. So a lot of times, when I ask agency owners that I work with, or even before starting to work together, I’m like, What’s your end game? Like, what are you trying to accomplish within this business? And what I find that the ones that are wanting to grow and are wanting to grow a team and build systems and kind of switch those roles, like we’re talking about, usually have three End Games. One of them is, is that they either scale it to the moon as much as they possibly can, eventually sell it, or work in the business whenever they want to. If any one of those three End Games are kind of like, you’re listening to me and Scott, and you’re like, Hey, I’m one of those three, then you do actually need to make the switch from small to larger. And it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to go, like, to the nth degree when it comes to growth. You can actually achieve your goals a lot faster than a lot of people think. A lot of times people have that kind of like, have do be model where it’s like, once I have this, then I do this, and I become this. It’s actually the reverse. And so I would say, anybody that’s listening that has one of those end games, you do have to make a choice to be bigger and start growing a team. For those that are kind of like, maybe that’s not one of my End Games. And maybe my end game is just to have complete control over what I’m doing, and I only grow to a certain amount and My impact is smaller. Totally fine, but that’s that’s it’s dependent upon what their definition of success really is.
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, that’s so true. Really making that decision based on the vision you have for the organization is wise. One of the things that you said, so let’s say someone’s deciding to move forward, and they do want to grow a team. You use the phrase, becoming the world’s greatest trainer and then moving on to becoming a manager. And you talked about this identity shift that has to happen. And one of the things that I’ve found, and this is, I would say, very true in the agency space in particular, is their identity, is marketer, right, or agency owner, or some, you know, SEO expert, or something, whatever their their thing is. And there aren’t a whole lot of entrepreneurs that start out saying, hey, I want to be the best trainer in the world. How do folks make that identity shift? And can anyone do it? Or is it like for an elite few?
Jesse Gilmore
I would like to say, with the right method, you can that anybody can do it. But I think that when you when you come out as a marketing agency owner, typically, you’re like a freelancer in the way beginning, you start working on by the hour, you generate enough demand, then you leave your job and you start making the choices. And a lot of the business in the way beginning is based around your skills, but they get to a certain point where there’s only so many hours you’re going to be able to work. There’s only so much of an impact you can do if it’s just based around you. And I think that one of the biggest things that I can get clients to do is a lot of mindset work, getting understand where you are and what do you want to be remembered for when you die, like really intense types of questions, and then based around where you are right now, what habits are actually holding you back from achieving that end game that you’re trying to accomplish.
And I think that once people start to make that mental shift, that right now, the best value that I can give to the business is not by doing the SEO type of work, but actually finding people that can do it better than I can, or at least, as Dan Martell would say, 80% by somebody else is 100% awesome, like that same kind of idea where you have other people starting to do a lot of that quote, unquote, grunt work. So you. Can actually focus on what you are the world’s greatest at, and the trainer is not necessarily the end game. In our model, we think of a lot about these identity shifts, going from the doer to the trainer to the manager to the leader, and then eventually to the visionary, very similar to your stages, where you talk about the chief executive at stage five. And I think that the best thing that we can do is build businesses to support the founder in that transition. And it kind of gives a path out of just constantly grinding.
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, I love the stage approach. I’m somewhat partial to it. There is you mentioned this before, and I want to come back to it, because I have found it to be exceptionally helpful and also exceptionally repulsive to a lot of people. But this idea of sitting down is actually tracking what you do. Tell us a little bit about how that I think you use a one week log, if I remember correctly. How do you do that? Does it take? Like, hours a day? What does it look like, and why is it helpful?
Jesse Gilmore
Yeah, totally. So the weekly time log is one of the first things I do with every single client, specifically one on one, clients will do a deep dive into their time log and give them actionable things from it. But it’s very simple. For seven days, just log your time every half an hour. For seven days, you can sleep and then cover it all so you don’t have to do it while sleeping. But what it does is it captures the both personal and professional, and you get a snapshot of kind of raw data if you’re a marketer right now, and you understand that if you’re going to take over somebody’s ad campaign, you look at past campaigns before you do anything else, right? Same exact idea when it comes to time use and those identity shifts, right? Your use of time is going to shift when you start to move from Doer to trainer to manager and so forth. So what we do is, for seven days, every half an hour, as much detail as you possibly can. So you can’t just say client work, right? You got to kind of dive in. And this is what I’m doing. Okay? Now I started binge watching Netflix. I’m kind of bored, or I’m not going to sleep because I’m checking my phone like anything that gets you to be so raw and aware of what, where your time is going, it gives you so much data, and we run them through the eliminate, automate, delegate, time block methodology, which, If there’s something that you’re doing that you can eliminate, just do it.
There’s no reason to automate or delegate or time block something that’s not even worth it. Automation right now, especially in the land of AI and and where we’re at right now, it can take over large amounts of the things that you’re doing right now to free you up to delegate effectively. And delegation does not necessarily mean that you just immediately, just give them everything you can focus on low risk tasks or things that are totally not worth your pay grade, and be able to focus mostly on time block. Now time blocking, a lot of people always just think about allotting a certain amount of time towards a certain activity, which is part of it. It’s actually the minimization of task switching. So if you’re working on something technical, keep all technical stuff together. If you are working working with clients, group them together, right? If you’re working with a team, group them together, and what happens is, is that you have make better decisions, you have less fatigue, and you can get more done. So that’s what we do. And it starts up the whole process.
Scott Ritzheimer
It’s so it’s such a great first step for someone looking for a practical way out of this job that they created for themselves. It really is step one. I love that you do it that way. Jesse, there is a question that I have for you before we make sure folks know how they can get in touch with you, and that is, what is the biggest secret that you wish wasn’t a secret at all. What’s that one thing you wish everybody watching or listening today knew?
Jesse Gilmore
And it might be because we just talked about the time log, but what I want to say is, is that for if you are starting to realize that the things that you want in your life and business, you, quote, unquote, don’t have time for, I’m just going to say that’s BS, keep it as that, because you have a lot more control over your life and business than you think. And I think that if you go through a seven day, even if it’s like a seven day time log that feels like it’s like nails on a chalkboard, to get through those seven days, it’s gonna set you up so much for success if you just go through the seven days of roughness to get to a place where you can realize that it’s all based around prioritization and mindset. I think that’s that’s my takeaway.
Scott Ritzheimer
I love it. I love it. For those of you, for those who are listening, who are saying, Hey, I’d love to know more. Where’s this book? Where can I get a copy of it? How can they reach out to you directly, especially those who are in that agency owner space, where can folks find you and reach out for more?
Jesse Gilmore
Sure, so we’re going through a rebrand right now, but you’ll find my website nicheincontrol. So niche, N, I, C, H, E, in control.com. If you want a copy of my book that Scott was reading right. Before this to prepare I can go to niche in control.com/book, and then I’m very active on LinkedIn. So you can go to LinkedIn, and it’s just my my name, Jesse P Gilmore, and just let me know that you listen to me and Scott, so that way I can understand a bit more of the context. And I’d love to chat with you.
Scott Ritzheimer
Fantastic, highly recommend it. For those of you who listen to the show, you probably like stage based advice, and Jesse does a great job at that. This is an excellent resource. Jesse, thanks for being on the show. It was just a privilege, awesome conversation. I really enjoyed it, and I appreciate your time. And for those of you watching and listening, you know that your time and attention mean the world to us. I hope you got as much out of this conversation as I know I did, and I cannot wait to see you next time. Take care.
Contact Jesse P. Gilmore
Jesse P. Gilmore is a transformational business coach and the founder of Niche in Control, where he helps agency owners scale their businesses while reclaiming their time and peace of mind. Creator of the Leverage for Growth® method, host of the Leverage for Growth Podcast, and author of The Agency Owner’s Guide to Freedom, Jesse has helped over 100 marketing agencies break through plateaus and systematize sustainable growth. His mission: to help business owners scale not just their profits—but their freedom.
Want to learn more about Jesse Gilmore ‘s work at Niche in Control? Check out his website at https://www.nicheincontrol.com/
Connect with Jesse through his LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessepgilmore/
Get a FREE copy of his book The Agency Owner’s Guide to Freedom at https://go.nicheincontrol.com/resources/get-the-book