0:00:00 - Betsy Jordyn
Do you ever feel that gap between knowing that your consulting or coaching adds tremendous value to your clients and being able to articulate that value, let alone quantify it? Well, you won't be after you tune into today's episode of the Consulting Matters Podcast. And welcome to the Consulting Matters Podcast. This is the show for purpose-driven consultants and coaches who are ready to own the power of what they do and position themselves for the clients, the impact, the income they're ready for. I'm your host, Betsy Jordyn, and I am both a business mentor and a brand messaging and positioning strategist. So you can find out all the different ways that I help my clients make more money through making a bigger difference on my website at www.BetsyJordyn.www. And don't forget Jordyn with a Y.
So today on the show we're not just talking about getting clear on the value of what you do. We're getting into quantifying that value and making that value clear, credible and compelling to the clients you're trying to land. And for this reason, I am super excited to have on the show Jack Phillips. So Jack is literally the leading expert on this. He is the author of a ton of books literally a ton of books. He's the founder of the ROI Institute and his methodology is a proven approach for showing the value of what we do and the return our clients get from working with us. So I met Jack back in 1999 when he taught the ROI workshop to my organization development team at Disney, and this framework, this perspective, this mindset has had a profound impact on what I did to position myself more strategically as a consultant and what I do now to help other consultants and coaches position themselves more strategically in the market and with their clients. So in this episode, you're going to learn how to use the ROI framework to connect the dots between the work you do, which may feel at first glance soft, to the hard and tangible outcomes that your clients care about. And if you're trying to learn how to speak the language of business, this is a very quick, practical hack, so it's powerful in so many different ways.
So before we dive in, I just want to give you a really quick heads up. I am launching a brand new group coaching program. It's called the Impact and Income Accelerator. I'm super excited about it. It's an eight-week group coaching program where you're going to learn how to take the ROI mindset and the skills that you're going to learn more about in this episode straight into your client conversation so that you can land bigger and higher paying engagements with greater ease, starting with your very next client opportunity. So there's early bird pricing. Now there's lots of deals, so head on over to my website at BetsyJordyn.com/accelerator to learn more. So now let's get into the show. Welcome, welcome, welcome, Jack. I am so excited to have you on the show.
0:02:46 - Jack Phillips
My pleasure. Good to be here, thank you.
0:02:56 - Betsy Jordyn
Okay, so I know your work from back in what, 1999, when you came into my organization development team and introduced me to the ROI model, which has been transformational in my approach to consulting and really the foundation of a lot of what I do. But I know there's a lot of people who are listening, who aren't familiar 100% with all of your work and I was wondering if we could just start off with a little bit about your background and how you became a measurement of projects and programs.
0:03:18 - Jack Phillips
Okay, good, started off as an engineer and I joined a company called Lockheed Now it's called Lockheed Martin but I had an opportunity quickly to move into the learning and development space and I did that. So I was an electrical engineer and I got into learning. What I liked about that is that you really had a chance to influence more people there In a big company. We had a building, if you can imagine, with 15,000 engineers and we're all in cubicles. We're doing a small part to a big project and your sphere of communication and influence is pretty small. And so I like the idea of teaching others and teaching other engineers. And so I made that switch and then worked around the different areas in the learning area and I had this particular interesting challenge. I was driving there. I was managing their co-op program.
This is a cooperative education program. This is where you alternate college and work. You know a semester at campus, a semester at work. So we had these co-op students like 350 a year. I mean that is any given time 350 co-op students. Half of them were at work and the other half were on campus.
That's a lot of people and, by the way, we paid for them in my salary as a co-op director, because the department where they were working didn't want to absorb this program cost because in their mind that's kind of welfare for the students, not work for the department. So you can imagine I had a pretty big budget and what I did was transfer that budget to our chief engineer. My whole expense for the department, for all those salaries, my salary and my assistant and my travel to 16 universities to recruit these people all of that transferred to the chief engineer. So one day he called me and says so, jack, I noticed that we get a pretty big bill from you every month and I know it's for the co-op program and I know it's a great program, but can you show me the value that delivers for us?
Because you know there's a and right now we're not really recruiting very much, we're actually cutting budgets and and maybe we don't need this so much. Can you show me the value for this? Could you actually show me the ROI for us having this? Because I got I've got the cost in front of me right now I'm looking at that. That's a big cost. So can you tell me the money to our benefits we're getting out of this? Show me the ROI.
0:06:02 - Betsy Jordyn
I never had that request.
0:06:04 - Jack Phillips
Now fortunately, I was working on a master's degree in statistics at the time and I needed a master's thesis. You know how that is. Yes, and I'm thinking just as he's telling me that. I said you know, I think I could probably show you the value of this program. Could you give me about six months? He says no. No, I mean, why do you need six months? I said I got to do some analysis. Well, you don't take six months quick. I mean I've got some decisions to make on budget. Sure, I bet you do it next week. I said no. I said how about give me a month, maybe? He said okay, so that's not much time. But to him that was a lot of time.
And so I went to my thesis advisor and said look, I got a project here. What do you think? He said sounds great to me. We did it Now fast forward. It showed we did add value. It was our. The people who came to that program had much higher tenure. That is, it's a way to keep people. They progress in the organization more than others and they contribute more. So they stay with us, they perform, and when you put all that together, it's worth it.
0:07:21 - Betsy Jordyn
Fascinating. So it's like you. You just responded to the actual question, but then the question came at an opportune time because you were at school and you were getting your master's degree and on all of these it was like a perfect storm of situations that came together for you my results to the chief engineer and the division, his division engineers and I was, you know, in my early twenties at that point and still still so young and frightened just the notion of what I'm doing.
0:07:54 - Jack Phillips
And so when I got through with that presentation, I showed them some things that wasn't working as well Process opportunity. Like you know, when they get into a senior year you should put them on some projects that that can show their contribution and help you contribute. Quit having them make copies and coffee for you, you know, all the time like this. So, and so he turned to his group and says so, uh, he turned to his division engineers and said I think we'll keep this program. Now he hadn't said that very bluntly like that. And he says Jack, just talk to us about how we can make this thing better. Let's make this even a better program and let's consider Jack a business partner to us, because welcome him into your division and let's work with him. He just got some great data for us here. So I left that meeting and said you know, this is pretty good. I've got my budget, I've got a better program now and I got some people who are great contacts for me. By the way. It wasn't.
Much later I was a director of the advanced technology training for that company and I needed these people and they, they, they knew me. So those partners turned out quite well for me and so I said, hey, this is good, we've got to do more of this. And so we began to put structure around this. How do you make it work? And and look in the, we had a large training function. We had 300 facilitators, if you can imagine. And we had a large training function. We had 300 facilitators, if you can imagine, and had a whole big place where we conducted all of this training. And I kept complaining. I said we don't measure anything beyond the learning they absorb while they're here. We never follow up. And I kept complaining about that. And the head of the training says, okay, why don't you create an evaluation system for us? We'll put you in charge of a corporate-wide task force. You know that's what happens to you when you complain sometimes.
0:10:00 - Betsy Jordyn
Yeah, yeah, you solve it.
0:10:02 - Jack Phillips
Make it better then.
0:10:04 - Betsy Jordyn
Yeah.
0:10:04 - Jack Phillips
And so I did. And so we reached out to a guy named Kirkpatrick. I had published some articles and we thought this is our resource. But he says you know, I don't really work in that area. I just did some work for my PhD dissertation. I even got that concept from someone else and I said so you have no standards, no case studies, no more detail than you've got in those four articles. He says I don't. He says I'm counting on people like you to make a difference. And so we did. And so we put structure around it and we got into working in the learning and development space. Quite well, we published the first book on this in 1983. You were not born yet.
0:10:47 - Betsy Jordyn
Yes, I was. I was definitely, but thanks for the compliment.
0:10:54 - Jack Phillips
Yes, and it became the first book on training evaluation ever and it was called Handbook, with Training Evaluation and Measurement Methods. Hey, that took off and meanwhile I'm already moving into head of HR first head of learning and then head of HR and then move some different companies and I wound up my career as president of a banking system. But along the way I used this methodology with our own teams and it made a difference. It made a difference in getting budgets approved. It made a difference in keeping your budgets. It made a difference in making them better, making your projects better, because it's process improvement and it makes a difference to get the support that you need. But it made a difference in my career and I got to tell you one more study, one more story about when I was head of HR for a banking group.
I was employed as executive vice president for HR and that banking system was growing and growing and they acquired a lot of other banks. From an HR perspective, it was absolute mess because you've got benefit structures that need to be integrated and pension plans that were of all kinds and you had problems with retaining those people you're acquiring. And they hired me to fix that and I fixed it and we followed our process, showing the ROI of every project we put in place. My partner in crime here was the chief financial officer. So we present this to the board saying here's the problem, here's our solution, here's how it worked, here's the ROI. And they said, oh my God, this is amazing, showing the ROI from HR efforts.
Showing the ROI from HR efforts the previous HR director talked about in jargon that we didn't even understand and it says you're doing nothing but talking to business with us. And so it helped me. I got promoted and went along to division president and then later on became president of the group. But my point is it helped me in my career All of my roles. Moving from training manager to HR is not easy.
But, moving from HR to CEO is even more difficult. But, if you can show your business contribution, your business alignment and your business language and your business mentality, you've got it. That's all it takes and that's what we do with this methodology.
0:13:31 - Betsy Jordyn
So it seems like in terms of the value of this methodology. So in terms of, like, your background it seems like you have the engineer background anyway. You were studying this type of data and statistics. You got the question at the very opportune moment when you were working on your master's thesis, took those things together. Kirkpatrick came around and was like, okay, well, maybe you can formalize some of this stuff. And then it's just as you continue to refine this methodology. It opened so many doors to you for your career, from training to HR to becoming the president of a bank. That sounds to be like from yours. Is that? Did I capture your story accurately?
0:14:11 - Jack Phillips
Yes, very good yes.
0:14:12 - Betsy Jordyn
So you started to address. One of the questions I have for you is like what's the value for consultants and coaches? Particularly on both, I would say a lot of my clients and the people I work with are external consultants and it like why is it important for them? It's almost like let's talk about the ROI for them and use the methodology to talk about like what's the value for them to enhance their ability to measure the results of what they do okay, great, see, as we started working with this, we saw it.
0:14:44 - Jack Phillips
This not only works in a learning and training environment, but it works with whatever you're doing. And OD was something that popped up quickly the OD function, and that's usually a lot of consultants. We started working with consultants. They were attracted to our methodology. We teach people this process through certification. They come to want to be certified in this, so consultants begin to come and it to be certified in this. So consultants begin to come and it works so well in their space. So just imagine, if you're a consultant, you're bringing something in, you're putting in a system or process or something, and you leave something there normally for them to pick up and go with. So let's just follow the chain of value here and go with. So let's just follow the chain of value here. The first is how they react to what you're doing. You've got to have people to buy into what you want. You want them to see it as relevant, important. It's something that they are willing to implement and maybe recommend to others. And then they're learning something from you and what you're doing. That's the learning. They take away some things and they're actually doing some things different now because of what you're doing. That's the learning. They take away some things and they're actually doing some things different now because of what you're doing. That's level three. So we go reaction learning, application.
Doing something is application, but it's all for a purpose. You're delivering something that's affecting the business On the broad terms. Your output, quality, cost and time are what you're influencing. That's at the top of any organization. Output is the work you do. The quality is the mistakes, errors, waste and rework. And then you've got time is getting things done quicker. That's a lot of consulting. Efficient, like Lean, for example, does that. And then there's cost. You're sometimes looking at ways to reduce costs. So you're perfect for this as a consultant and then convert that to money compared to the cost and you show your client now the ROI of using you If that's done in a credible way. So it's not only believable but you can defend it. You just got your best strategic marketing advantage because others won't be doing that.
So just imagine when you go into a project you know you've got your approach now but say I want to show you the impact of what I'm doing. Is that what you'd like to see? Well, of course they would. Now I'm going to show you the ROI of what I'm doing. That is what is costing you, not just what you're paying me, but I'm costing you some money internally because I'm going to have people tied up with me. I'm going to put all of that cost in there. I'm going to show you the monetary value of getting out of this. I'm going to show you the ROI doing that. Are you okay with that? Are you okay with that? You can imagine what the answer would be. Well, yes, no one else does that.
And so take it a step further. We now have some that said I want to guarantee an ROI, I want to guarantee that we'll deliver this ROI, otherwise you'll get your money back. Now we've got a chapter in one of our books. It's about guaranteeing ROI. Our inspiration for that was SAP, and we work with them to help guarantee one of their implementations of a system-wide enterprise systems, one of those like 5 million, 10 million implementation for a system they now would guarantee the ROI. Now, that sets them apart from others. You know they're the largest business software company in the world and they get there by delivering value.
0:18:19 - Betsy Jordyn
So, in terms of the difference, like the value, like I want to make sure I'm capturing everything that I heard you say because there's a lot in here. So it seems like from the beginning of the difference, like the value, like I want to make sure I'm capturing everything that I heard you say because there's a lot in here. So it seems like from the beginning of your career, it was it started off with being able to justify, you know, the budget that people are investing in you. It seems like that's one of the big benefits. A second benefit, based on your career and your experience, and probably now what you help tons of people do is it really is a fast track to learning how to speak the language of business you know, not the language of like HR jargon, that type of thing and it sounds also like it opens other kind of career opportunities for internal people that they might not have considered.
But I'm hearing something even more powerful in what you're saying here is that it adds a different layer of credibility that your clients would not naturally get from any other. Consultant is like I'm somebody who delivers results sounds like a risk reversal concern that a potential client might have is, you know, I'm not just going to propose a solution, I'm going to set it up in a way that will, you know for sure, give you an ROI Like. Those seem to be pretty, pretty solid benefits of investing in this type of methodology. Did I get that right or is there anything I'm missing?
0:19:40 - Jack Phillips
No, that's right. I would add this because we're collecting data along this value chain, we see where things are working and not working. So it's process improvement. But by evaluating at these different levels, all the way through the value chain, we deliver a better product at the end. In fact, there may be some things that I'm learning this time that I'm going to use now next time that it's process improvement for my next project. So I would say one of the big reasons for doing this is to make your project better. Yes, it does help you for strategic marketing better than anyone else. It does help you gain support and get a sponsor. You'll be a consultant for life of that organization because they love what you do and you make it risk-free for them, because they know they're going to get something from you worth a lot more than they're paying you.
0:20:43 - Betsy Jordyn
So at the workshop you did at Disney. I still remember this example, so obviously it must have been really powerful. But the case study that you used with us tell me if I'm wrong, maybe I just am remembering it this otherwise, but I remember it was being something along sexual harassment and what you had taught us around the different levels was really getting to the outcome which is like not, it wasn't even just not getting reducing the number of sexual harassment incidences, but it was about the employer brand and the you know a bunch of other things. Can you walk us through very clearly, like the different levels, using that particular example, like level one is if you are brought in? I just, am I right? Did you use that case study?
0:21:28 - Jack Phillips
Yes, okay, all right, yes, so here's the issue. It was a healthcare system, hospital system, and they were having too many sexual harassment complaints. Some of those complaints turned into EEOC charges and some of those turned into lawsuits. So it was costing this system some money, but, worse than that, it was creating a hostile working environment, at least for some people. So you're getting turnover was quite high, people were leaving and some of it was not. They're not meant to. Some of it was just harassment that's not aggressive, purposeful, but unintentional, and so and it's really a lot of, in this case, a lot of physicians not understanding what sexual harassment, really what it meant by sexual harassment.
0:22:34 - Betsy Jordyn
It's only harassment if it feels that way with the victim.
0:22:38 - Jack Phillips
So that's the level. Two is the understanding, the knowledge, exactly so level one is the intervention.
0:22:43 - Betsy Jordyn
Level one was the intervention that you used, correct?
0:22:46 - Jack Phillips
Now reactions. Level one how did they see this? So the program was to prevent sexual harassment. That's what we're evaluating. Is this relevant? Yes, Is this needed? Yes, is this important to us? Yes, is this something I'm willing to make work? Yes, they knew that because there'd been some high-profile cases that cost the hospital some money. But it also is tarnishing their image in the community. Hey, this is the Baptist hospital system. Baptists are not supposed to be doing this, and so you can imagine this is something they needed to stop. So this program was there. So reaction was making sure they saw value in what we're doing.
Second is learning what can constitute sexual harassment activity and what's our policy around this. Some are not following the policy because they didn't even know it, and so learning. But then the big measure here is, I think, the next one, that's, are you eliminating the actions, the activities, the things that cause the complaint? Is it behavior change? And that's the big one. They're changing your approach. And so, yes, that that that the best data there was. They did a, an anonymous survey with a 25% sample of the employees, basically asking them is this happening in the workplace? Is this happening in the workplace? And what it showed and divided it both in sexual harassment activity and policy, and what they showed is that they both have improved. That's the best set of data, I think, in terms of, hey, it's going away, but now from a business perspective is it worth it? Let's keep going with it.
One is did it affect turnover? It did in a big way. People without this kind of process going on, I'm not leaving. So you've affected turnover. But then the complaints. The complaints almost went away and those were costing you a lot of money. So that level four is the turnover and complaints.
But then this HR executive there says let's show executives that this is a good business decision here. This is really compliance, to be in compliance with the laws. But compliance pays off. So let's do the ROI, so the very high ROI. This is one of our published case studies, published by the American Society for Talent I mean the Association for Talent Development used to be American Society for Training and Development and it has over a thousand percent ROI. You probably, when you saw that in that case study, you're wondering God, how can it be so high? But you've got a very expensive problem and a very inexpensive solution and that's what happens. So that was telling the executives.
Not only is this a good thing from an image perspective, by the way that image now is, we put in a category of intangibles. We're not going to convert the image in the community to money. We're not going to convert their satisfaction for work now. We won't convert that to money, but those are two important impacts that we'll put in the intangibles. So now you've got reaction, learning, application impact, roi and intangible Profile of six types, five levels of outcomes plus intangible. Intangible is our fourth level, but not converted to money. You always have that Things that are not easy to convert to money. So it's a marvelous study to tell you what can be done and the power of what can be done.
0:26:36 - Betsy Jordyn
What I loved about that story, too, is that for me, it was the simplicity of understanding what goes at what level, like the difference between the reaction learning.
And then the other thing that I thought was very interesting and new for me is I had I learned the Kirkpatrick model in my previous life as a an HR development person before I became an OD person, and it's just adding that extra perspective around the money, and it's like it really changed my perspective as a brand new OD consultant is like, hey, wait a minute, I'm here and I'm not an expense that is to be managed, like I'm an investment and I need to show my investment, and it changed my perception on, you know, the value that I was bringing to the table, so I really appreciated that.
When I work with my clients, though, what I find interesting is, if I ask them the different levels like, ok, so when it comes to this project or when you're pitching work with a client, can you talk at those different levels? They can define level one and level two all day long. They might be able to step into level three, but they really struggle with, or even from themselves, or even to try to get the client to even articulate what even their level four goals might be, what the impact is, before they could even consider the ROI. Why is that such a sticking point? Why is that so hard for us to talk about the level three, four or five and it's so easy for us to talk about the level one and two?
0:28:02 - Jack Phillips
Well, that's a big dilemma here, because it's not that difficult to see that but it seems such a mystery to so many people. This is why we have the very first step in our model is to start with. Why as a model behind my head if you're looking in my studio here start with, why Get clear with the impact in the beginning. See, in that sexual harassment it was clear we had those sexual harassment complaints and again you had the first level of complaint was a complaint filed with the HR director and then if it wasn't resolved to this person's satisfaction, they obviously have the right to go to EEOC and that becomes a complaint that gets investigated. Even then, if it's not resolved to their satisfaction, they still have a right to go to the federal court and sue. Those are the court cases, the actual charges that are filed. I mean the complaints that are filed. So you've got those are three different types, but all impacts. It's the complaints. So, getting that was clear there. But see, when you put in things like culture, you know you think, well, what's our level three? Well, it's your behavior. See, culture is nothing but what people know, think and do.
The do is the critical part. What do you want them to do? How do you want them to act and react? The actions you want to take? Clearly define that you need to find it. They need you to to take. Clearly define that you need to find it. They need you to find it. So when you have a program you're teaching them. You mentioned they can do level one and two, but two is learning something. Level three is just an extension of that. Say, now we want you to use that. Okay, just put a goal around that, put an objective around that you want to do with every customer or with every colleague. You want them to do it every day. And what is that particular skill? So, put some very clarity around that, letting them know what you expect out of them with that level three. But then we think and what happens when we do that? See, I like to look at level three and four together. You want them to be together because we're doing that level three for a consequence.
Why are we doing that? And you know, some people say well, I'm not sure you don't know why you're doing this. Well, we're doing it because we want that behavior. But why is that behavior important? Keep thinking, because does it make things better? Am I getting more productivity? Am I saving time? Is it making me decide to stay with this organization? Think about those impacts. Get clear on those. Get clear on those up front, because that's why you're doing it now. If you put it up front, then you can say now, this is why we're doing this. We're not doing culture because we want you to behave different. We're doing culture because we need to be more productive, we need more sales, we need more whatever or we need less of whatever. You got to get clear. That's the business connection. So we're uncomfortable sometimes in learning to go down that path. This makes us think like a business person and we prefer not to.
We prefer to think the way we always think and that gets us into trouble. I've got to put my mind in the. I've got to put my body in the shoes of that person. Who's going to pay for this?
0:31:40 - Betsy Jordyn
And understand why they want it. I think is the only way that you're going to be able to be that investment Like. I'm going to give you a situation and I'd love for you to speak into it. So one of the clients I was working with, she wanted my help because she was trying to land a conflict resolution training for a company that was like a government organization. They sold sauna buoys and there were conflicts on the production floor. And so she's like, okay, how do I get this like up to 10,000 or something like that. And I'm like, but why are they doing it? They're like it doesn't really matter, I just want to do this. That's a two day thing.
And her, her natural way of wanting to go in to land this client was to talk about you know like how many people, what do you want the learning objectives to be and all that kind of stuff. And what I told her to do is go in and don't talk about that. Talk about the why are they doing this? Like what's what's going on in the organization, like what's it affecting and what it? What we uncovered through before she landed the work is that there were these conflicts on the production floor and what was happening is it was leading to all these product defects, which was leading to their biggest customer about ready to cancel their contract and go to another company you know, go to their competitor and that put the entire business at risk.
It was a completely different if it was a completely different ballgame. And so I struggle sometimes, like trying to help my clients see, like don't just say yes to the request, get to the why behind the request, because otherwise you don't even know if you're solving the right problem. Like, and you don't even know if these people are having conflicts because they just don't have the knowledge and skills. Like going to the maker model, like you don't even know if that's the problem you know. So how would you speak into this? Like, how would you like what tips would you give me? Or directly to my clients, because they have a chance to listen to you directly on how they could handle these initial conversations. Think like a business owner or the clients that are talking to them, and have the courage to push to these outcomes.
0:33:36 - Jack Phillips
Yes, I'll give you an example on that Leadership development. It's always a good one to look at. There's a couple of ladies who wrote a book. They were in the Marine Corps as leaders and they wrote a book called Spark and it's about the leadership approach of the Marine Corps. They loved it, they worked it while they were in the Marines and they wrote a book about it and they created a company around it. Now they wanted to make sure they delivered business value. They went through our certification and they changed their whole approach.
It says we used to talk about having great leaders and leadership skills that are so critical and so important. So our conversation now is what is it about your business that's not doing as well as you'd like? What bothers you? Or, if it's doing well, what are you going to do to make sure it continues to do well? Or take it maybe to even a higher level? When you get clear on those and say do you think their leadership capability of your team is can get there? Do they need some help in getting there? And they almost always say, well, they might need some help. What do you got in mind? Well, maybe if we look at these kinds of skill sets that can drive some of these measures, particularly if this measure is involving other people and most of them are. And so what they tell me? The CEO of that company says we're really not a leadership development company anymore. We're a business improvement company that just happens to have a leadership development tool, but it's so flexible that most of the conversation we have wind up with leadership is a solution, because leadership is so powerful, so versatile. So we want to take that mindset change, just as your colleague would say let's get in there and talk about what their problems are and see if we can solve or change or improve those issues with what we're offering to them or what we can offer to them, and see, but also be prepared to say I don't think we can change that, but I know someone else who can, because you need another solution. That's hard for them to do, but that's going to be rare.
Probably, and even you know we'll have people say, well, we offer open enrollment programs out there. You know we've got leaders coming to our program. How do we do that? We say, well, tell them, when they come to this program, bring two KPIs, key performance indicators that you want to change, that you'd like to change you'd like to improve, but only if you can improve them using these competencies that we're going to be exploring with you. And they do that. If you think you can't change one of those, get another measure, because we want you to have two measures here that you can improve using our competency. When you've done that, you've customized the program to them and their needs. At the business level. They come with a business problem they want to tackle. They're not there to learn leader behavior anymore, they want to solve the problem. Leader behavior is the way we're going to get there. So it's transforming that dialogue, that conversation.
0:37:06 - Betsy Jordyn
I'm starting to see something from what you're saying and tell me if I've got this right. But it seems like there's this positive flywheel that happens and it's all around the idea of business acumen. You know that in order to demonstrate that. So it seems like business acumen is the goal and by learning the ROI methodology it's almost like a hack to accelerate your ability to develop the business acumen. But then the more you develop your business acumen enhances your ability to implement the ROI methodology. So it's almost like this reinforcing type of thing all around the whole concept of business acumen. And the only way that you're going to be able to show you're an investment versus an expense is to have clarity on, to be able to speak the language of the business and participate in that. So I learned measurement and that grows my business acumen. I grow my business acumen and enhances my ability to do measurement, and then, as I go about doing that, then I could like I could see how do I improve this business, how do I improve the project, how do I improve the results?
0:38:12 - Jack Phillips
Yes, exactly that's right, that's fascinating.
I have to tell you, on Monday, two days ago, patty and I were meeting with the prison system in Georgia. It's the Georgia Department of Corrections. They're implementing a major culture project there and it's from a company called Culture Partners and they know how to do this well. They know our methodology. So when they met and started this program, they got to the key results they wanted from the culture. And so you got a message that was I was watching a program for the employees being trained with the culture. And so you got a message that was I was watching a program for the employees being trained with the culture and he puts up and says the commissioner for the Department of Corrections there had this video and says you know, welcome to our culture alignment workshop.
Says we're doing, we're taking this on to tackle three very important areas that we all probably can agree that we need to improve. One of them is retention. We've got a goal of improving our turnover rate. Move it 10 percentage points down from where it is now. You know we have a high turnover. You know that we're going to create a great place to work. That's really intangible, but that's going to affect that turnover rate. We're going to also reduce incidents. We've got lots of incidents that happen here and we're going to work to make sure we do the right things to get there and reduce those. We're going to reduce those by 10%. That's our goal.
And then we're teaching you to think different, be creative and make a difference in the organization. Look at different ways of doing things. Bring that creativity to make us a better place and show us where we can save money, and we're going to reinvest that. When you show us something we can save money and we're going to reinvest that. When you show us something we can save, we're not going to say, great, we're going to give that to someone else. We're going to reinvest it in something we need to in the system here, and so they call that reinvestment of savings that's generated through this process.
So he starts off with the end in mind. That's why we're here, and I thought that this is the way it's got to be done. It's not saying, hey, we're working on culture. It's so great, you're going to love this culture. It's going to make you feel good about it, you're going to feel good about coming to work and you're going to feel good about going home. Yes, yes, but here's why we're doing it and it takes off. No one left that meeting saying why are we doing this? But if you didn't do that, you could easily have people saying why are we doing this?
0:41:04 - Betsy Jordyn
So you're addressing an objection that a lot of my clients might have around the measurement. It's like, hey, I just want to drive meaningful impact, like you know, even if I can't prove it. Like I just want to drive meaningful impact, like you know, even if I can't prove it. Like I just want to drive meaningful impact Like some of the lean consultants I work with is because lean has gotten so associated with cost savings that they kind of shy away from it. Because it's like I just want to create these people-centered organizations, these people-centered learning organizations. You know how would you address that objection around? Like I don't want to talk about the cost savings, I want to talk about the people and creating this positive culture. I'd just rather drive this impact, even if I can't prove it.
0:41:41 - Jack Phillips
Yeah, lean is a good way to do that, because you're teaching people how to find a faster, quicker way to do something normally, so you're saving money. Just imagine if you've got a lot of little procedures here. It may be a procedure, it takes 15 minutes and I just shaved three minutes out of that. And if I've done that and I've got literally hundreds of people doing that all day long, you know you add that up for a whole year, uh, and you look at the hourly wage rate, that's a lot of money and you should thank me for being here, because that's look what I'm doing for you and that's the person saying this that you're talking about.
0:42:28 - Betsy Jordyn
Now let's go up to the yeah. But they're going to say I don't want to be associated with that. I want to be associated with how I create this respect for people, this culture. Like they don't want to be associated with that. I want to be associated with how I create this respect for people, this culture, like they don't want to be associated with that.
0:42:40 - Jack Phillips
So they kind of push back on that one to say I just want to drive this meaningful culture. Their culture can make a difference. What culture you want, you know, if you say I want to make people to work together and appreciate each other and to form a team, and why? Why would that make a difference? How would that help? And if you keep thinking they, they know well, they probably going to stay in this organization. Yes, we just affected retention.
So turnover, let's take that and let's see if there's a turnover problem. Now. If there's no turnover problem, then they don't need this. They're staying there for other reasons, so you're not going to affect turnover. But what else would it do? Well, maybe they get more work done. Productivity Is this a problem? And you can look at the top of the organization what is your key productivity and you can see is that a problem? And what you typically do is find something there that's going to say this is a problem here that we can address, or it's okay, but we can get a lot more. We can make you better than the average out there.
So we're just trying to get that conversation. If you want to work in soft skills, that's fine.
0:44:13 - Betsy Jordyn
Let's just look at the value that delivers and make sure that they need them. So it sounds like the clarity. So there's a whole thing here that seems like is like, move away from the aspirational values and bring it down. If you could bring it down to the behavior, like what's the behavior you want to change and then what's the impact of the behavior, you can create this, that you can create more, more clarity around what the impact is supposed to be in the why, so that you can create this. That you can create more, um, more clarity around what the impact is supposed to be in the why, so that you can figure out the what, when you can get beyond the aspirational, like I just want to create this type of human-centric organization. It's like, well, what are the behaviors that people do in a human-centric organization, you know? And then if the and whose behaviors are we really trying to change? And if, if those behaviors change, then you can connect it to the business.
0:44:57 - Jack Phillips
Yeah.
And I'd say and what if you have a human centric organization? How does that affect things like retention of productivity, of errors, ways to rework, timeliness, efficiency? You know those kinds of measures. What we should be able to do is to show having a human-centric organization makes you more productive, makes you deliver better quality services and makes you do more efficient work. That is, you can do it in a shorter period of time, and those are all measurable values that are out there in the system and you can convert those to money so you can have an impact on that. Now you always have to show the impact that you're having from other influences.
That's a part of our process is that when you have an effect on productivity or retention, you want to sort out what effect that you had with your program. That's a critical credibility issue. So otherwise you can see. You wonder well, did this cause this? And give an example In the prison system, they told us about one project that saved itself a million dollars and they started explaining how they're doing that and I said is there a chance that that would have been done anyway? And they thought it could have been. I said so we've got to sort out the effects of this.
0:46:30 - Betsy Jordyn
Right.
0:46:31 - Jack Phillips
You've got to have people telling us to what extent did this culture program cause us to do that? Give us a percent. A hundred percent means it was the total reason and zero means it had no effect. Where are you with that percentage? That's called isolation by estimates, and then we're going to adjust that for even just for the error of that estimation. That's part of the weeds process that we get into to make it credible. My point is if it's something worth doing, more than likely there's a business measure connected to it. The credible part is to connect to it in a credible way. And then when you convert to money, you also do that in a credible way. And right next you convert to money, you also do that in a credible way, and right next to my head. If you were looking at the video, you see that. Make it credible. Make it credible, that's what we mean. There is that you've got, when you get to impact, you've got the attention of your leaders, your top leaders, that they, they, latch in on that, the top leaders.
0:47:32 - Betsy Jordyn
It's essential. You know, maybe other people like I just want to have a happier workplace, but you still can quantify that. I think what you're also bringing up is the difference between measuring the day-to-day results and measuring projects and the benefits of projects and you're very clear on your website is you are about measuring projects in this, measuring projects in this, and rather than like what finance might do and other regular KPIs, it's measuring the impact of projects on those day-to-day metrics, and I think that's another way to look at it as well as yes, we want to create this culture, no matter what we'll be looking at these measures, but it's like how, when I put this intervention into play, what difference did it make?
0:48:11 - Jack Phillips
Exactly A good way to see that is with a balanced scorecard. You know people have a balanced scorecard tracking their key measures, and we're often asked how do you relate to that? Well, we work with projects that's going to improve the measures that are on your scorecard. If you've got a measure not doing well, you always say, okay, what can we do? That leads to a project, and now you're going to evaluate your project based on how well you've improved that measure. Maybe it's a measure that's doing okay, but you might could tackle it to do better. So what we're doing is measuring those, we're influencing those measures that are on your scorecard. We're not putting a scorecard in place although we could do that but that's not our core business. Others are doing that and doing it quite well, and so what we tackle is projects to improve the measures that are on your scorecard, already on your dashboard.
0:49:07 - Betsy Jordyn
And the benefit of even looking at it through the scorecard that could be another hack into the business acumen is, if it's a business scorecard, it will show the leading to the lagging metrics like and to understand the difference, and connecting the dots Like everything makes a difference. I just want to bring up one point before I move to the other objection that people might have around measurement. And I think when it comes to the work that we do, there is a revenue generating side. You know, it's not just always the cost, like when I think about you know, if I reduce hassles in the workflow, like this is my Disney background we really focus. We had a lot of efforts reducing hassles in the workflow and the whole purpose was to impact guest satisfaction.
And there's, and specifically the metric around intent to repeat and recommend. You know, because there is the research to show if you could hit the intent to repeat and recommend, that directly translates to revenue. And so there is something too about even like a process improvement, like with you know, where lean has concerns, you know, or is that they don't want to just be on the cost side, they want to be on the value creation side. But it's like you think about all the innovations that come out as this other whole thing. So I want to balance that out. Is it's not just cost, cost? Cost is where the money is, but it's also revenue. You know, by you know, if I help break down silos, that's going to lead to new synergistic ideas, that could lead to a new product line. That could lead to additional revenue, found revenue.
0:50:36 - Jack Phillips
Yes, you're right. So in businesses where we have sales and revenue, we have a lot of projects in that area and so there the value add is the profit from that. If you get a new account, it's a lifetime value of that new account and you usually have that number already calculated somewhere. If it's just sales, it's the margin on the sale, the value that we've added there. But even there sometimes we can reduce the sales cycle time. That's going to help us to get more sales. Or we can improve the profit per sale. Or sometimes customer complaints, and that's going to be a cost avoidance now, because we're avoiding the cost of having to deal with that complaint. So, yes, you get to the monetary value that we put in the calculation. You're getting to the point here. It's going to either be profit or cost of audits. It's as simple as that. That's what goes into this. We work a lot in government, just like that prison system on Monday. Most of our work now is in non-business.
And that's interesting how it's evolved over the years. In a non-business they don't have profits but they do have lots of cost. Cost of goods. Profit-making is where you have sales and even there still the majority of our projects are in the cost savings, like retention is a big thing for a lot of projects, you know that's the cost of our projects are in the cost savings, like retention is a big thing for a lot of projects. You know that's the cost avoidance. We're avoiding the cost of turnover or complaints or delays or bottlenecks, rework. So all your quality measures are cost avoidance. We're trying to avoid that. Your time savings we're avoiding the cost of taking so long to do this. So yes, so you're working both. If you've got revenue generating as a Disney, you've got a lot of things to make those customers happy so that they do promote you and repeat and recommend, as you say. That's the two things you want there.
0:52:53 - Betsy Jordyn
So I think I kind of know how you're going to answer this objection, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Some people might say but Jack, I don't want to measure an ROI because it might reveal that my program or service didn't work. What would you say to that person?
0:53:09 - Jack Phillips
That's our number one barrier, by the way, that keeps people from going down this path. Hey, that's our number one barrier, by the way, that keeps people from going down this path. So I first would say well, the key is being proactive with this. Let's just think you're delivering a service now and you haven't been asked for ROIi, and so should you go down that path, and I'd say to the my client hey, uh, I'd like to show you the roi for this. We think it's adding value more than it's costing you, and you think it does too. But let's see if it is and and if not, what's keeping it from working.
And now I'm proactive if I find out hey, this is not adding the value and it's breaking down in a couple points. It's usually not what you have to offer, it's not the content that's causing the problem, but the implementation of it. And that's an important point, because if you're selling something that inherently doesn't add value, then you're, you're fraudulent because you know it doesn't add value, you're trying to sell it. That happens all the time, I think. But if you think it adds value and you know it adds value, but you're afraid it might not add value here, but you'll know, and it usually breaks down with something. That's not you, it's not your reflection of what you've done. Something wasn't done that they were supposed to do and now you can correct it. See, but now if you have to report, this is negative because of this is happening. We're going to fix it, correct it and go forward Now as a purchaser of services. I think I would hug your neck and say, my gosh, no one's ever done this. You come in and show the value of what you have. You find it's not working. You're going to correct it. Most don't want to do that. You're not going to get fired by revealing hey, it's not working and here's what we can do to correct it. You just help them get something much better.
So the danger is waiting for them to ask. If you wait for them to ask for it and you hadn't planned it, you've got three things that happen to you. One is they want it quickly. You remember my very first one. I wanted it to take six months and he said, no, I wound up having to do it in a month. You're going to have a short timeline. I was lucky to get a month for this person, so you won't have enough time to get the data. And that request usually comes after you're done with your project and you didn't plan to deliver this value. So if you didn't plan for it, you say, oh, I didn't start with the business in mind measure, so shame on you, but we didn't do it. We didn't know this, so that's why you don't want to do it.
So whatever you do is going to probably not be your best. That is, you're going to have to deliver something or you can't deliver anything at all. That's working against you. The second thing that happens is that you're now being defensive. You're defending something. You want to be on the offense. You want to drive this yourself. You want to bring up the ROI. Don want to drive this yourself. You want to bring up the ROI. Don't wait for them to bring it up. And the third thing happens is that you let ROI get on their agenda and you need to keep it on your agenda. You don't want it on their agenda. Keep it on yours. You want to drive this bus yourself.
0:56:51 - Betsy Jordyn
And.
0:56:51 - Jack Phillips
I'll give you a quote that comes from Patty. Patty is my partner in crime here. She's the smart one, she's our CEO and she says when it comes to delivering results, hope is not a strategy, luck is not a factor and doing nothing is not an option. Things have changed in terms of our accountability requirement. Change is inevitable. Progress we make is optional. It's up to you.
0:57:21 - Betsy Jordyn
So if I'm going to like kind of wrap up, a lot of the stuff we talked about is it seems like there is the ROI methodology and then it seems like there's the ROI mindset. Roi mindset, you know, and I feel like what I got away from my experience in working with you all of those years ago is it's not that I have to do like level five measurements, like in all my projects, like at Disney I was on the hook for two. But the thing is is how I approach my work is I want to approach my work as if I could like that I will be able to do this, and I think about, like the approach I do for my discovery meetings. Now, it's really all about beginning with the why, like what's the intent, what's the goal and what's the ROI you're looking for? Like I do that all the time. This is what I teach my clients all the time.
But it's also it, it, it, it, for it's how I think about the brand positioning, like when you talk about what you do, you know, you talk about it is like I don't say I wouldn't encourage my clients to say stuff like oh, I help, you know, leaders improve, you know, like what does that mean, you know, like I help companies scale to their next level by building their first leadership bench or something that you lead with the outcome? And it seems like. It seems like the mindset is as important as the methodology. I don't know if I'm hearing that right, but that's what I'm gathering it is.
0:58:36 - Jack Phillips
You're exactly right. I remember the first time I heard that comment was I had a group of graduate students at a university in Montreal and I had one day with them, and so at the end of that this person said you're not really teaching us to do an ROR study, you just want us to think ROI. I said you're not really teaching us to do an ROR study, you just want us to think ROI. I said that's it.
0:58:59 - Betsy Jordyn
Think of that mindset.
0:59:01 - Jack Phillips
Now, our biggest project we've probably ever had and we've had some big projects is right now, based on what you're just talking about, the leader in Saudi Arabia, the crown prince there, mbs they call him Mohammed bin Salman and he says I want everyone in government to think ROI and what he's thinking is our methodology. He's seen a slide of ours that's got our value chain in it and he says I want everyone in government, that's 1.5 million people. I want them to think ROI on everything they do A new project, new procedure, new regulation, new, whatever you're doing we want you to ultimately think the benefits versus the costs, but think how you get there with this whole value chain here. So we've got to educate 1.5 million people on changing their mindsets. That's our big project there and through our partner in Saudi Arabia.
We're doing that. I was there with them mapping out the strategy for that and we're hearing from that because they're now saying, as they go out for, put an RFP for projects. It says by the way, we want you to show the ROI of this, we want you to use the methodology from the ROI Institute. You can imagine that's driving us crazy here because we're having to respond through our partners there in the Middle East with all these things. But it's all about changing your mindset and that's what we're doing ROI thinking. When we work with small businesses, you know they're not going to spend a lot of time on ROI studies, but if I can get them to think ROI and everything you do you buy. You have a marketing tool, marketing campaign. Think ROI, some new technology you're buying, you're buying something for your office. You know, think that. Go through that mindset. That's what we want.
1:00:59 - Betsy Jordyn
That's powerful. So if people are listening and saying I'm inspired, I want to take some first steps, like what are some of the first steps and how can the ROI Institute support them on those first steps?
1:01:11 - Jack Phillips
Well, you know, we could just say if you want to reference, we could take something like that consultant scorecard. That's one of our books and we'd be happy to give your clients a copy of one of those books.
1:01:26 - Betsy Jordyn
If they reference, if we do, if we come up with a reference code that they listen to the Consulting Matters podcast, they can get that book for free.
1:01:33 - Jack Phillips
Yes, and just send us your shipping address. We ship it to you, hard copy I mean, or we can send it e-copy. Hey, that gives you some detail. But we have one day workshops we call those boot counts. You can go there If you really want to get into it, if you're a consultant and you're committed. Hey, I want to go down this path. I want to learn how to do this. We have ROI certification. This is teaching you how to do this. We've got blended learning versions. We've got on-demand versions. We've got all kinds of ways to learn this. I'll be teaching one in the Washington DC area next week, and it's three days of blended learning. I'll be teaching one in the Washington DC area next week and it's three days of blended learning. They have to take the one-day on-demand overview and we go through three days there with them Are you coming to Florida anytime soon, by any chance.
Where.
1:02:28 - Betsy Jordyn
Florida or Orlando.
1:02:29 - Jack Phillips
Yes, orlando. Next. Two weeks from now, we're in Orlando on the campus of the University of Central Florida. We make it to a lot of campuses. The one next week is the University of Maryland At UCF in Florida. They've got a lot of their faculty and a lot of their graduate students into this program. They're and it's a lot of it from the Florida school system. The Florida school system has been a huge user of this methodology. We've had five internal certifications just for the K-12 school system there in Florida. So a lot of great success to our height and really makes a difference. So we're in Orlando. That's the 21st, 22nd, 23rd. That's Monday, tuesday, wednesday. This is a blended learning version as well. We do some online after the program with you and then you've got an on-demand one day. So we'll be there in.
1:03:31 - Betsy Jordyn
Orlando and people can find out about all of these programs at your website. I assume it's ROIinstitutecom.
1:03:38 - Jack Phillips
Not that Excuse me.
1:03:41 - Betsy Jordyn
Not com net, net okay.
1:03:45 - Jack Phillips
Someone is waiting to sell the com to us. They've had it for 20 to 30 years. I guess they keep reminding us that we can sell this to you. It's too late now. We've got so much branding around NET I can imagine we may buy it someday. Just to take the confusion out, Because you go there. They basically got some of our stuff up and I don't know what it does, but anyway it's NET.
1:04:12 - Betsy Jordyn
Perfect Okay, thank you for the clarification. Yes, what it does, but anyway, it's NET, perfect Okay. Thank you for the clarification. So we talked about a lot of different things as it relates to your background and how you fell into the ROI methodology. We got into what the methodology is, the benefits, we overcame the objections and we talked about so many different things that people can do to get started. Is there anything else that you want to tell me and I'm just not asking the right questions? Is there anything else that you want to tell me and I'm just not?
1:04:34 - Jack Phillips
asking the right questions. Well, first, you can do this. We try to make some people say this is complex. You know, this has got numbers and it's got steps and methodology and it's a lot of work, Not really. We keep the math. We try to keep it to fourth grade math.
Fourth grade math was tough. You remember that I can have an ROI study here that will be accepted by your chief financial officer and never go beyond fourth grade math. Now that hurts when you you know I got a master's degree in statistics and an undergraduate in math, along with my engineering degree. So I love math. But you don't need to love math to do this. You don't need to be in finance and accounting to do this. We take a formula out of that field and we use it. It's easy to work with and it's step by step. It's like a drop down menu. So some people say, my God, it looks too complex, I need something a little simpler. Well, but to get it credible, you're going to have to work at it a little bit.
And so be patient, but it'd be one of the best investments you've ever had. If not, you come through our process, you don't think it's worth it. We give you a complete refund.
1:05:51 - Betsy Jordyn
Wow.
1:05:52 - Jack Phillips
Anything you pay us.
1:05:54 - Betsy Jordyn
You are so generous, like this time has been so meaningful to me as you've just you've influenced so many different things but I do feel, like you're that training that you did almost 30 years ago, like I know for sure it's like infused my approach and I know I passed it on to other people and you know you've been a big part of like what I would say like this, like chain of impact that's going on that I really appreciate. So thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you so much for your generous offer of the book giveaway, which I'll get more information from you separately and I'll put it all in the show notes and your link to your website. And I think that's it. So anything else before we wrap up?
1:06:38 - Jack Phillips
I don't mind having a phone conversation. You've got an issue, you've got a problem, you've got something you want to talk about. We'll do that all the time. So we'd love to, and I want to thank you for taking something that happened so long ago and using it and making it work. You know, when you teach a group of people, you didn't sometimes and you and you don't follow up to see if they've done what they're supposed to, you wonder if you did, if you did have an impact.
But in your case we certainly did and so um, I remember when you write a book and we've written over 100 of them you wonder if people read it, and you know the stats are just amazing about how people don't read the books. They're right, the book sales is no indication at all, hardly of what people read, let alone what they actually do with what they read. So it's I'm. I applaud you for taking something and running with it and making it work in your world, because that's really what we want to do and that's what disney wanted you to do. So thank you for taking something and running with it and making it work in your world, because that's really what we want to do and that's what Disney wanted you to do. So thank you for doing that.
1:07:40 - Betsy Jordyn
Thank you. Thank you so much for your time and thank you for being here.
1:07:43 - Jack Phillips
Good, my pleasure.
1:07:45 - Betsy Jordyn
Oh my gosh, oh my gosh. It was so meaningful for me to have Jack on the show. So, as I mentioned, he is one of my grounding influences behind the positioning work that I do with my clients, and it was so special for me to be able to honor his contribution. So if I played any role in helping you find the strategic frame for what you do, you can absolutely thank Jack. So, in terms of next steps, I've got three for you. Definitely, head on over to the ROI Institutenet. I'm going to give the links in the show notes below. But when you get there, you're going to see a ton of free resources. And don't forget, if you go to the contact form on their site and let them know you heard Jack on my show he's going to send you his book, the Consultant Scorecard, for free. So definitely head on over there. You're going to definitely learn exactly how you can start mastering this ROI methodology. And number two what I really want you to do is keep in mind the real power of the ROI methodology is the ROI mindset, and there's ways that you can start cultivating it now. So I got a reflection challenge for you. So I want you to look at the work that you've already done with your clients, either formally or informally. You know either formally or informally and I want you to pull the lens back beyond the tactics or the methods that you use, and I want you to see the journey of transformations your clients go through. So look at the recommendations and the rave reviews you've gotten and I want you to see past the compliments like, oh, you're so easy to work with or you gave such great advice, and start to see the real outcomes your clients get only because they work with you.
And finally, if you want to implement a partnership-based, roi-infused approach to landing clients, enrollment is officially open for my Impact and Income Accelerator. So this is a live group coaching program. It runs through October 14th to December 2nd. You're going to get a ton of things in the group. You're going to get live group coaching sessions, one-on-one coaching with me. You're going to get a ton of things in the group. You're going to get live group coaching sessions, one-on-one coaching with me. You're going to get templates, tools, all kinds of things, and I'm going to give you all of this so you can master your ROI mindset and apply it directly to how you land clients. So this is the secret to making more money through making a bigger difference.
So here's the urgency Definitely get in on the early bird discounts and the best thing is, if you're one of my private clients, this program is free for you. So if you've been on the fence thinking maybe you wanna work with me one-on-one, now is the time to jump in. So head on over to my website at Jordyn. You could either learn more about the accelerator or book a call with me. That's the easiest way. So that's it for today's episode, if way. So that's it for today's episode. If you enjoyed it, be sure to hit subscribe so you don't miss my future episodes. If you found it helpful, please send it to a colleague who will also find it helpful, and until next time. Thanks so much for listening.
