A quick ad before we jump in:
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I’ve hired 30 employees outside of the USA with the help of Shepherd and it has been an absolute game changer for my business.
Underwriters in Colombia for $1,500 per month full time. Customer service reps with perfect english in the Philippines for $1,100 per month. Executive assistants for my construction team for $1,000 per month.
If you haven’t hired an employee abroad, doing so will change your business and your life. I recommend setting up a call with Shepherd and getting the process started.
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The sad truth:
The majority of companies don’t want ideas or innovation out of their employees.
They’ll talk about new ideas and changes at meetings and in mission statements to attract employees, but when the rubber meets the road they don’t actually want any of it.
Most companies are like the public school system. Sit down, follow the rules, read the text, look up the answers a few pages back and DO NOT think for yourself.
Big companies want employees to sit down, follow the rules and do as they are told.
The public school system trained up and prepared a workforce to enter the industrial revolution and take jobs in factories and at big corporations with bomb-proof systems and processes.
The truth:
Nothing moves slower than process changes at a company with a few thousand employees.
They don’t need innovation. The machine is built. It works at scale.
What does a big publicly traded company with a 15% profit margin to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars have to gain by mixing stuff up constantly?
A new idea is simply stress on the system and a headache for management.
They don’t need A players – they need butts in seats logging time.
A few questions you should ask before taking a job:
What gets rewarded here?
Is it seniority, loyalty and time or is it competence and ability?
At a fortune 500 company or a government position, people get promoted when others step aside. It’s largely about following directions for as long as possible.
At a smaller company with a motivated owner you’re more likely to get promoted for solving problems, managing people effectively and making good decisions.
If you don’t want to solve problems and do hard things with no direction, a fortune 500 company might be for you. If you do, go smaller.
Is the company growing or is the market changing?
If the company is experiencing growth or is it the same size as it was 36 months ago?
Change is good for people who are competent decision makers and great leaders. The cream rises to the top when a wrench gets thrown into the machine and chaos breaks out.
What do you see inside the organization?
Do you see a clear hierarchy with the long tenured employees in the corner offices? Are the systems created and are the employees simply filing in to sit in seats and do their jobs?
Or do you see newish employees in leadership roles? Do you see an environment that has changed a lot and added headcount over the last years? Is the owner making things happen quickly or is the business largely in the same situation it was in 5 years ago?
Will they let me delegate and build my own team?
Are the employees here encouraged to grind themselves to the bone (like a law firm or consulting firm) where they are billing hours?
Or will they let me hire my own employee in the Philippines for $5 an hour through Shepherd to take away some of the workload when things get crazy?
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A fact that can’t be overlooked:
A lot of people who have owned businesses for a long time are wealthy and lazy.
Motivation wanes when you have an 8 figure net worth and never “have” to take risks or work hard again.
Is the owner of the company you work for wealthy and lazy?
If they are, why would they get after it if an opportunity arises? Why would they risk mixing things up to go after something new? Why would they risk messing up the cash printing machine?
A really competent friend of mine worked for a very large insurance consulting firm in southern California after college.
He got in and constantly brought ideas to the management team to improve the business, bring in new business and get more efficient.
But the owner of his company was one guy and he had a Yacht parked off Santa Monica beach he spent most of his time on. He didn’t work much, was worth $100 million +, and his company of about 75 employees put over $500k a month into his pocket.
Why would he change anything? Why get new systems? Why make things better at the risk of messing up a cash printing machine?
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
My buddy realized he’d never make it to the corner office to replace the highly paid 55 year olds and that there wasn’t much mobility inside the company. He also realized they didn’t want or need his ideas. His ideas meant stress and risk for the management team.
He quit and went to work for a smaller shop and is CRUSHING it today.
Do some critical thinking before you take an opportunity – is this going to be a stepping stone to something bigger and I can put up with the bureaucracy for now?
My friend got a job at Bain consulting for a few years after college. It turned him into a killer. A great communicator and an insanely hard worker with an impressive resume.
He went on to join a smaller company after that where his earning potential was higher.
Look past the next few years at what the future holds and figure out if its the move for you.
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Onward and upward,
Nick