Culture Is the Strategy: How Talent Drives Business Growth

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Woodstock, Georgia. It’s time for Cherokee Business Radio. Now, here’s your host.

Joshua Kornitsky: Welcome back to Cherokee Business Radio. I’m professional EOS implementer Joshua Kornitsky and your host. I’m so excited with the guest that I have here in the studio today. She’s incredibly forgiving and gracious because I messed up the last time she was on and didn’t get a good recording. But before I get started, let me begin by saying that today’s episode is brought to you in part by the Community Partner Program, the Business RadioX Main Street Warriors defending capitalism, promoting small business, and supporting our local community. For more information, go to Mainstreet warriors.org and a special note of thanks to our title sponsor for the Cherokee chapter of the Main Street Warriors, Diesel David, Inc.. Please go check them out at diesel david.com. And if you’re interested in becoming a Main Street Warrior, please reach out to me. Joshua Kornitsky. And I’m going to be happy to tell you how to get there. But now let me introduce my wonderful guest, Ms. Jamie Petter. Jamie is a fractional HR advisor with Culture Grid HR. She’s supporting growing organizations as they navigate people structure and leadership. She works with business owners and leadership teams to build clarity around how work gets done, how and how teams develop. Her focus centers on helping companies create environments where people can contribute, grow, and stay engaged. Through her work, she partners closely with leaders who strengthen alignment, accountability, and execution. You can see why, as an EOS implementer, I am thrilled to have her on. Jamie, welcome. Welcome back.

Jamie Petter: Thank you. Thank you for having me, Joshua.

Joshua Kornitsky: I’m so glad you’re here. And one of the things that I just want to absolutely hit on right out of the gate is I want to understand how you got to where you are kind of your origin story, because I remember how it speaks to where you are now.

Jamie Petter: Yeah, I my story is I started my career in retail, running boutiques and running stores and, um, quickly learned the value of people’s systems and processes. So the store was always well run and people didn’t even know if I was there or not. And that’s a compliment. Um, well ran well and it also performed in a way that I then got other stores and bigger stores and multiple unit stores. Um, and so while I was doing multiple leadership and running a district, I would train, um, new store managers that would come into the business. I worked for Chico’s FAS at the time. We only had one brand, right? Um, and I was a part of, I just developed a training tool. It was a, it was a, it was like a flower pot that had tools in it. And I attached each value of the organization to each tool. So it helped with the mission and of the organization, which was to deliver the most amazing personal service. So how do you do that? How do you make sure that every store is operating that way? And so that training tool created a way to discuss how those values and behaviors lived every day, how they played out in service, how they lived out. And so that training tool changed my whole career trajectory and they brought me into learning and development. Really.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay. So just from something you organically created to help your own store move forward.

Jamie Petter: Yes. Wow. And my own team. So the. So you were.

Joshua Kornitsky: You were an entrepreneur within an already existing business.

Jamie Petter: I sort of was. And I, you know, the CEO and the CEO just tapped me and said, you need to be in learning and development, and I didn’t. What does that look like? And they moved me to across the country to really be in Florida. So yeah, so that’s where I started and the importance of building leadership and sales content and training across multiple. We had 1600 stores, uh, locations. And so that just took my career into, um, multiple areas of HR. So I did internal corporate communications, engagement, culture, talent strategy, leadership development, and work for some big organizations.

Joshua Kornitsky: In working on that type of content has to be pretty, uh, a pretty solid education because you have to work with the subject matter experts to make it intelligible. And by default, you’re learning it so that when you’re on the culture or the HR side of it, you now have a deeper understanding. So that was a fantastic exposure, really cross discipline, wasn’t it?

Jamie Petter: Yeah. It was. And, and you know, that understanding how the business operates has been also a critical key to success. Because when you’re working with businesses, I mean, they’re driving their sales, making their plan, you know, building new customer base. And the more familiar you are with not just HR, but how HR impacts the total business is where the real value is.

Joshua Kornitsky: Well, in any solid leader has to understand outside of their silo. And you’ve got this ability now thanks to your your path to where you are, which we aren’t even at culture grid yet, thanks to your path. You’ve got this very comprehensive view of the landscape all the way across the business. So how did you get from there to here, where you now have a company that we’re going to talk about next, but how did you get there?

Jamie Petter: Yeah. Well, just getting that exposure to all the different areas of the talent. I spent over 20 years with Chico’s FASO. And then then I went and did global learning. I work for Coca-Cola.

Joshua Kornitsky: Company.

Jamie Petter: And Compass Group with the Food at Google program that was global, and I ran global learning and development for that organization. So I’ve spent some time doing that and then ran full HR and ran full scope HR and led the HR area. So, um, what brought me here is I, what I love most was the interconnectedness of being able to really impact a whole talent strategy. If it’s really narrow, then you really can’t make as much of an impact. And so I love being able to take what I’ve learned in big business and create really simple tools for small, medium sized businesses so that they can make people their advantage.

Joshua Kornitsky: So you used a phrase that I want to ask you to explain talent strategy, because depending on the size of the organization you’re with, right? Hr either means, uh, where payroll happens, where I go when I’m in trouble and or who I send the email to when I want, when I want a day off or a vacation. So for anyone that doesn’t understand the concept, would you explain a talent strategy?

Jamie Petter: Sure. I like to think of it as a three legged stool, and it seems very obvious you have a financial plan, you have a product and business marketing plan.

Joshua Kornitsky: Ideally.

Jamie Petter: And that’s two legs of a three legged stool. So without a people talent strategy, that stool is not it’s going to be pretty wobbly. It’s not going to stand up. And people, people grow businesses. Business doesn’t grow by itself 100%. And so it’s not just about, um, the fire alarms or dealing with the repercussion of impact or issues that happen. It’s about being proactive, having a seat at the table with the team and the foresight to say, how is that going to affect our people? Is it going to motivate and engage them? Are we going to be able to win with this compensation plan? Are we going to be able to incentivize our team to want to stay and attract more talent into our business, or are we just not even thinking about people?

Joshua Kornitsky: And so I it certainly makes sense the way you explain it. The the first thought that I have in thinking back to some of the global scale work you did, right. Um, working with the size organizations that I’m with, usually 250 employees or less, call it 50, $60 million or less as far as revenue goes. Um, on the higher side of those organizations, size or revenue wise, I think they’re probably more familiar with this. But for your average small business somewhere from, you know, ten to to 30 people, are you, are you suggesting people actually think through their long term plans as to how they will apply to people?

Jamie Petter: Wouldn’t that be a great thought?

Joshua Kornitsky: Well, as silly as it sounds, um, I don’t need to tell you because you already know a lot of businesses towards that smaller side of of number of employees or revenue. They’re not accustomed to that. So that leads me to the question of who do you help and how do you help them?

Jamie Petter: Yeah. And I think it’s great because as I’m talking and working with small, medium sized businesses, they might be handling HR on their own, right? They’re like, we’re fine. We’ve got in compliance. I’m doing the onboarding. Um, but what, what is helpful is to work as a fractional head of HR. That’s like a coach. So I can go in and work with those founders and leaders and help guide them in those daily decisions. How do I have that conversation with with that individual? Do we need to document it? Do we not? What do we need? Are you thinking about how how you’re engaging the. Or how your talent is going to be incentivized to bring in more new hires that you need or you’re looking for when you’re attracting talent? So being a fractional HR Cha executive and going in and being their partner. They don’t need full time. They couldn’t afford I mean.

Joshua Kornitsky: Depending on the size. Sure.

Jamie Petter: That they need a full time HR executive that has strategy, not just tactical. And that’s how I help. That’s one way I help.

Joshua Kornitsky: So what about the other side of that coin? Because I’ve, I’ve, I have encountered what I’m about to say. I suspect you have as well. No, we don’t have HR. It’s too expensive. And we’ll just pay for the lawsuit when it comes because it’s cheaper than having an HR department. Now I wish I was making that up. You know, I’m not making that up. And I’m not going to ask you what you would say to those people, because what you would probably say to those people may not be fit for broadcast. No, in reality, it’s that’s the wrong mindset. But but what about the other side of the coin of I have this problem that just manifested today and I don’t know how to handle that. While that is typically a. Technically, that would be advice. Knowing whether or not that’s an HR thing is, is that something you or your team help them with?

Jamie Petter: Yeah. Anything that works with people really. I mean.

Joshua Kornitsky: Just across the.

Jamie Petter: Board, I mean, there’s about 35 things an HR department does for people, talent. And it’s, it’s not just making sure the I-9 is right or we’re coding. But while that’s important and that’s really top of mind. So one of the services, one of like the second way I work with, with companies is to actually be their HR department. So some of the small businesses are using a PEO or they’re using, you know, a payroll service, but we can be a liaison and, and work with their people and actually deliver an HR space with them still using a technology. Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: So what if they’re in multiple states? Do you? Oh yeah. Really. So you’re able to keep up with the HR rules and laws that that that must change far too frequently, I imagine.

Jamie Petter: Yes. Well, I also have a support team. I’m also aligned with a company called serve HR out of Indianapolis, and they’re a great organization. I licensed with them, so I have a full gamut of tools and resources to leverage.

Joshua Kornitsky: Excuse me. Okay, so you don’t have to know Indiana’s laws. You have a resource that you can ensure. Okay. That makes a lot more sense because.

Jamie Petter: I can build a handbook, I can build a handbook for any state. I can help do any of those core HR services that they might feel like they don’t have partnership with, or they’d have to go with a bigger PEO to do. So I can handle the core HR services.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay, so now I’m going to ask you a hard question. Why do I need your guidance when ChatGPT can tell me what to do? Yeah. I mean, isn’t isn’t automation the solution and AI the solution to all of our problems? And I say that with a little bit of tongue in cheek. Why is AI perhaps not the best solution for HR?

Jamie Petter: Well, There are aspects of HR that AI is helping with tremendously, and I think I would say the same thing for marketing. I would say the same thing for architects. I would say for any field is that AI or a genetic like we’re working with a new workforce that is now human and AI, right? So how do we how do we work together in servicing the, the customer or a client or a business? So with HR space, why do they not need what you asked? Right. Why do they they could just, they could just.

Joshua Kornitsky: Put it in the chat. It’ll tell me what to do.

Jamie Petter: Well it, it’s kind of use this analogy. It’s kind of like an an intern, right. With a whole lot of information. So would you, would you hand over your your skilled like workforce or would you hand over a very complex decision that is not always black and white to an intern that has no life experience? They have knowledge or Your information, but they don’t have life lived experience to fact check that, to look at that and say, is that the right angle? And so what I like about what I think I can help most with in my experience is it’s not just a narrow lane of.

Joshua Kornitsky: Hr.

Jamie Petter: Generalist. It is complex matrixed organizations that I’ve worked with to understand all the turns and outcomes of whether you onboard this person, right, or you do this comp plan with this, or you incentivize with this, that an AI tool can give you some guidance too, but it definitely needs, um, you know, further experience to go in and help businesses.

Joshua Kornitsky: Human supervision, human.

Jamie Petter: Supervision and the information because it’s going to come up vanilla.

Joshua Kornitsky: Well, so as you look towards the future based on, on your experience and in the past, because it’s a great segue, where do you think AI is going to take us from an HR perspective? And I know it’s a it there’s a lot of avenues off of that. But when you think about the future and how AI is going to impact it. Yeah. What do you think.

Jamie Petter: It’s going to help me? Right now, we’re using AI called a process coach. And so we’re integrating AI into our processes with HR. So we can help a client. We can integrate with their with their systems. And we can make HR simple and using an AI tool. So what that does is it frees up time to do the real work in talent, which is having and guiding leaders on how to have those conversations. How do I set up a strategy where I’m developing and giving a recognition where I need to, how do I engage my workforce? So it’s going to take the mundane compliance area of HR, and it’s going to enable me, myself to grow a business that is going to be get that done right, and then really impact talent to help them drive results for this.

Joshua Kornitsky: There that really that aligns with Isadore Sharp’s view. The founder of the Four Seasons Hotel said that you systemize the predictable so that you can humanize the exceptional. So you get the onboarding stuff streamlined and fast, so that you then can do and focus on really adding value. It makes perfect sense to me. The other thing that that the, the little IT guy that lives in the back of my head, because that was my background before, uh, iOS will tell you that, um, you know, PII, personally identifiable information, medical records, a lot of the things that HR in, in the broadest filing cabinet bucket, you can call it, um, you may or may not be aware and you being the listener, I know you’re aware, Jamie ChatGPT, even the paid version, if you’re putting PII in there, you’re likely violating the law because that is not protected in private, even in the paid version, unless you are running a siloed version yourself that belongs strictly to your organization. And while it sounds like an outlier, someone’s going to get made an example of and it’s going to be an expensive example. Uh, so that’s just, that’s the little IT guy in the back of my head putting a warning out there. Careful what you share or what you query because it is not as private as you think it is. And it is going to teach that that large language model. Yet another important lesson in in its long million million checklist, long thing.

Jamie Petter: Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: So one of the other things that I got to ask you about is the name of the company culture grid. We’ve talked about culture grid, HR, we’ve talked about the, the HR part. Let’s talk about the culture part.

Jamie Petter: Yeah. I’d love to. Um, and I have HR in the name, so you know what I do. Sure. Because the culture piece is what fuels your business. It fuels your growth. If you have culture, right or culture wrong. Right. That Peter Drucker, uh, famous quote that culture eats strategy for breakfast. Absolutely. Which is absolutely the reality. So the culture that you, you have, you want to protect it. Are we living day to day? What we believe is the culture and culture is really hard for people to explain, like, what is culture? And it’s, it’s so soft. It’s just culture. But culture just simply means it’s, it’s the daily decisions, actions and behaviors we take every day to either move our business forward or take our business backwards. And, and that’s what we’re doing in the HR talent space is to help really take awesome culture forward and move it, move it forward or define it, or better define it so that the outcomes are seen every day. Values aren’t just hung on the wall, right? We we we’re proud. That’s nice that we can remember what they are. But when teams laugh at oh yeah, you know that you’ve got an issue because they’re not lived and they’re not believed in.

Joshua Kornitsky: You are 100% speaking my language. Um, we in iOS, we teach our clients. The good news is that everything great in your company is because of you. The bad news is, is everything that’s a mess in your company is also because of you. And that speaks to core values. We teach our clients that core values are, you recognize, reward, promote your employees. And the people that align to those core values are the people that are going to resonate best in the organization. And that culture becomes evident.

Jamie Petter: Yep.

Joshua Kornitsky: Um, now, because I have to ask because I brought it up anyhow. So when I say core values from from my learnings, uh, core values are a simple set of guiding principles, right? It’s, it’s how you view the world and, and you and I don’t have to have the same core values. We can absolutely get along with complementary core values. Um, occasionally you can work just fine with someone who has a completely different set of core values as long as they align. But do you see core values as part of the decision making process in healthy companies?

Jamie Petter: Yeah, absolutely. I’m glad you brought that up because, um, you know, there’s that dilemma where here’s the competencies or the skills that we need to see, but those companies that aren’t paying attention to that, plus the culture fit are, are really going to experience the turnover because the culture fit and some roles are way more about culture fit than they are skills because you can train that skill. It might be something that is, you know, we want everyone to do this a certain way. We understand the, the process and the method, and this is what we teach. So we need more culture piece than skills fit because we’ll train them. So it’s really important that those two factors come together. And so what, what I think is one of the best tools out there that can really help a small, medium or large size company is what’s called a success profile. And it’s really being clear on what are the values and how do they show up in this role, what are the competencies? And then what is how is it measured? What’s the impact.

Joshua Kornitsky: That aligns to my universe? And I get it. Yeah, no, I’m 100% on.

Jamie Petter: Board is super important. And then once you have that clarity, it’s how do I ask the right questions around that in my interviews? How do I attract the talent that’s going to represent that success profile? Because now I have a picture of what right looks like. And then how do I recognize reward? How do I have quarterly monthly conversations around that performance? And how do I keep it alive in my business is what really determines the success of a company.

Joshua Kornitsky: One of the things that we teach our clients that’s a critical part of iOS is once you know what your core values are, and we have a whole discovery exercise that we go through, and we don’t get caught up in the marketing side of that. You know, the wordsmithing is a separate skill set. We want to identify it at a high level. But once we know what those core values are and the company has made them, the right verbiage to align with them is we tell leadership, first of all, everybody has to know them. They can’t be those mousepad core values. They can’t be just a poster behind the front desk or in the break room. Everybody has to know them. But we take it a step further. And every quarter we want leadership talking to the entire organization about not just these are our core values. But here’s an example of them. Here’s a here’s an anti example. Here’s where they weren’t used. Because where things often get confused is if I just say honesty is one of our core values. You have your definition of honesty. I have my definition of honesty. And while to both of us it seems silly that we would need to define honesty, honesty to the person who founded the company means something very specific, and it serves all of us to be aligned with that definition in this context, because then there’s never a question about what we mean about honesty.

Jamie Petter: Yeah, it’s the storytelling. It’s the examples sharing. It’s when leaders are taking a moment to really celebrate a value in action, I would say. Right. And they’re, they’re giving a very simple, you know, here’s the situation, here’s the behavior. And it demonstrates that value and then how it tied into that performance. Then you’ve got that little mini recipe on how to take your culture and how to get traction with it. And that’s, that’s what you.

Joshua Kornitsky: Do. It doesn’t have and it’s really important. I stress this with my clients. Calling out core values doesn’t require you to pay anybody. It’s just acknowledging, hey, you’re representing the best of what we want to be. You don’t have to tip 20 bucks in their pocket for them being a good person. You just call it out because it is its own reward among peers. There’s a right and a wrong time for incentive. Core values can’t be incentivized. Either you have them or you don’t.

Jamie Petter: Well, I might think a little differently incentivize because, you know, rolling out a big recognition program that illuminates and lights and recognizes individuals that really exemplify values in your, in your organization or your behavior because you’ve defined what it looks like in your in your service or how it shows up on the job. You can tie values to recognition. Um, 100%, 100%.

Joshua Kornitsky: It works great. I just always try to, I always want to make it clear that not every recognition requires a dollar. Oh, right. That’s all I’m driving towards.

Jamie Petter: It just feels good.

Joshua Kornitsky: I mean, 100%.

Jamie Petter: But most of what.

Joshua Kornitsky: People get very sensitive. If I’m paying for them to march to the beat, well, then maybe they’re not really marching.

Jamie Petter: I know. Um, and what you’re saying with pay and.

Joshua Kornitsky: Yeah, that’s all I meant was.

Jamie Petter: Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: You can’t pay somebody to adhere to core values. Either they have them or they don’t.

Jamie Petter: Exactly. And you can’t pay them to stay in a working for a bad leader or a bad company.

Joshua Kornitsky: Well, what do they say people.

Jamie Petter: Because it’s not about pay.

Joshua Kornitsky: People don’t leave companies, they leave managers. Um, so I want to ask you a core values focused question that that is a bit of a litmus test that I just want. There is no wrong answer, right? But what do you do when you have somebody who is the right person, skill set wise? And I’m going to pick on the easiest target. I’m going to pick on sales. Great sales person crushes it.

Jamie Petter: Mhm.

Joshua Kornitsky: But they don’t align to the core values. And when I say don’t align there, perhaps they, uh, aren’t always honest. Perhaps they cut corners in ways that are not approved. Yeah. You know, what do you do with somebody like that in an organization? Or what guidance do you offer about that?

Jamie Petter: You don’t have them in your organization, but that is hands down the reason why being very clear on the values that you have as an organization and how they show up in each role that you have. So it’s a great example because we like to keep successful people or successful leaders.

Joshua Kornitsky: It’s hard to cut that revenue though.

Jamie Petter: It is. And that is the balance between how we reward. So it’s really critical because as we look at talent, they might get there, but how do they get there? So it’s really important when you’re building performance appraisal and processes. When I work with organizations is that culture is a part of it. And how you do your job is just as important. So there’s a percentage of results in there and how you get results, because at the end of the day, it might look like you’re getting a quick win right now in sales, right? But it’s going to mean the reputation of your business later if you keep somebody around, right?

Joshua Kornitsky: Because, uh, I, I, I grew up in the car business, so I have seen both the best of the best and the worst of the worst. And I have absolutely seen salespeople in my life in all industries, not just the car business, who will intentionally undermine other salespeople to get a sale for themselves. It is not kind. It is not ethical, it is not good, but it does get them paid. And and from my perspective, the longer you allow that to, to fester in your organization, all of that individual’s peers learn quickly that that is their behavior.

Jamie Petter: Yep.

Joshua Kornitsky: And how dangerous is that for the organization?

Jamie Petter: And I would say that’s where leadership comes in, like strong leadership, um, developing leaders that know how to handle those situations. Um, because everyone else on the team is watching and everyone else in the team is waiting for that leader to not make that acceptable and not allow that type of behavior because it’s very, it’s very detrimental to the team.

Joshua Kornitsky: So you said something very, very interesting and very important. What if the leader isn’t that strong? Are you able to help them?

Jamie Petter: Of course.

Joshua Kornitsky: Because that that’s a people would rather just die than be on stage. Right. And and having a difficult right. Having a difficult conversation like that or owning that decision doesn’t come naturally to everybody, right? In my universe, that’s not something I can tell you that that conversation needs to happen. But I am not the type of coach. I’m an iOS coach. I am not there to coach them on that type of. I guess you’d call that a that a soft skill of how to how to have hard conversations.

Jamie Petter: I call it power skill. Okay, so I like, I like calling anything with emotional intelligence and anything with having to deal with conflict as power skills versus soft skills. And of course, the term soft skills is everywhere, but it’s not soft. They’re hard.

Joshua Kornitsky: They are. Well, and I imagine you’re very good at them.

Jamie Petter: They’re hard to do. And um, and that’s why they’re powerful. Like the number one leadership in the future skill will be empathy. Empathy is critical. A leader that can understand, empathize, and then say, here’s the way is who we follow. And so power skills like that in emotional intelligence helps us to do. And other, you know, learnings and strategies can really help. Ai is a great tool to help navigate conversations. So when we’re, we’re teaching coaching and teaching a strategy, you have to practice. But AI is a great tool for soft or power skills. You can say, I have to have this difficult conversation. Here’s what I’m facing. Help me give, you know, some ways to get into that conversation and coaching right now, using a partnership with AI is a tremendous benefit for leaders out there that they can use. Also, doing some development programs to understand how people tick and how to approach people in conversations is really critical in leadership development.

Joshua Kornitsky: And that comes back right to to your experience, because no amount of AI, even with role play, no amount of AI is going to give me the guidance that you would give me and the perspective that your experience has taught you because you. I can use AI to coach me through a conversation, but someone has to help you build the skills to make that how you manage and how you lead. Yes, yes, because those are not inherent. And the most common flaw that I see across all industries is when a strong individual contributor is kicked upstairs, right? No matter what the role is, I’m great at doing X. Well, then you should be a leader. But here’s no leadership training at all. And now I expect you to succeed.

Jamie Petter: So scary right? It’s like the average data is is alarming. It’s like ten years. A manager might be placed in that role without any leadership training or development. It’s really scary out there and it’s become it’s going to become even more important because of AI, the automation of those routine tasks. What what needs to happen is that the human needs to be able to do all, build the trust, use EQ, do all the elevated things that we do in the workplace as a leader. So it’s going to be even more critical to develop leadership skills in the future as, as we in the workplace.

Joshua Kornitsky: And those are things you help.

Jamie Petter: That’s absolutely what I help with.

Joshua Kornitsky: So what other services do you, broadly speaking, you know, without going down the the I’m sure there is some weird things you’ve been able to offer in the past to help unique situations. So obviously you do leadership training. You’ve talked about how you can help with the mechanics of HR. You can help with the mechanics of culture. Yeah. What other types of things do you offer to your clients and is there a specific size client you like to work with?

Jamie Petter: Um, I like to work with a small medium size, about 20 employees to 150 employees from a fractional.

Joshua Kornitsky: So the majority of the, of the employers in the country kind of fall into that.

Jamie Petter: Yes, yes, yes. And I’m really excited about this demographic because I feel like with doing fractional work, instead of if you were going to put your money out there and what you could afford for HR, you, you’d be getting a tactical junior person. Right. And you can have a strategic leader to come in and help. So the third way that I can help is really as a problem solver for people challenges. So because of the, the breadth of my experience, I can walk in and we can diagnose what that might be that we need to work on and do it by project base. So it might be developing a really robust coaching program for their team, or it might be, how do I put in a better non box so I can build succession and build my bench? I think one of the, one of the interesting things right now are our founders out there that are preparing or thinking about, you know, exiting and selling their business. Well, the number one thing besides your financials is that bench talent and how often is my is the bench talent is what’s going to sell and be there in the business. And it allows the founder to exit the business because it’s not just the founder needing.

Joshua Kornitsky: Right. That’s your. So I think.

Jamie Petter: That’s a really great.

Joshua Kornitsky: I encounter this all the time because the founder is the single point of failure in most places. And when that individual is out of the picture, the value of the organization drops through the floor. So you’ve got to have those processes documented. You’ve got to have that bench strength there that can run the company. Excuse me, whether the founders there or not.

Jamie Petter: Yeah. And building a business is very different than building talent. And it needs to be approached differently. And we don’t we don’t just know how to do it. There are individuals that are really good at building talent and really good at building businesses. And so it takes a very planful, intentional approach. It’s not hard, but it takes an approach that I use, and I work with my my leadership team to build the bench talent. I need to be able to now grow my business and scale and be able to say, now you’re going to work with Susie Q or recur. And they the customer doesn’t say, oh, I only work with you. That enabled. That doesn’t enable them to grow. But if their talent is strong, they can grow their business.

Joshua Kornitsky: Which brings us back full circle to why you have to have a strategy. Yeah. Right. Um, that I think that was, uh, an incredible piece of information for people to think about. And now we’ve contextualized it because it having that strategy builds your bench. It builds your culture, it ultimately builds your organization to be a stronger, more capable organization that can ultimately survive past you transitioning out if that’s your goal.

Jamie Petter: Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: Wow. It’s kind of like you planned this. That’s a strategy in in in action. Um, Jamie, what’s the best way for people to get Ahold of you if they want to learn more?

Jamie Petter: Yeah, they can find me on LinkedIn. It’s the easiest way. There’s only one Jamie, Peter and only one culture grit HR.

Joshua Kornitsky: So and we’ll post the links to everything as well when we, when we publish the interview. Um, I really, I can’t thank you enough.

Jamie Petter: Yeah, it was great. My guest.

Joshua Kornitsky: My guest today has been Jamie Peters. She’s a fractional HR advisor with culture grit HR, supporting growing organizations as they navigate people structure and leadership. She works with business owners and leadership teams to build clarity around how work gets done and how teams develop. Her focus centers on helping companies create environments where people can contribute, grow, and stay engaged. Through her work, she partners closely with leaders to strengthen alignment, accountability and execution. It was a genuine pleasure, Jamie.

Jamie Petter: Thank you, thank you. It’s a pleasure.

Joshua Kornitsky: I also want to thank today the Community Partner Program. Today’s episode was brought to you by the Business RadioX Community Partner Program, specifically the Business RadioX Main Street Warriors defending capitalism, promoting small business, and supporting our local community. For more information, please go to Mainstreet warriors.org. And a special note of thanks to our title sponsor for the Cherokee chapter of Main Street Warriors Diesel David, Inc.. Please go check them out at diesel. David.com. I am Joshua Kornitsky. I’m a professional implementer of the entrepreneurial operating system and your host here on Cherokee Business Radio. Thanks so much for joining us. We’ll see you next time.