John Jennings With Inspired Business Concepts

Intro: [00:00:02] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Coach the Coach radio brought to you by the Business RadioX Ambassador Program, the no cost business development strategy for coaches who want to spend more time serving local business clients and less time selling them. Go to brxambassador.com to learn more. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:33] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Coach the Coach Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today we have with us John Jennings with inspired business concepts. Welcome, John.

John Jennings: [00:00:44] Hey, lady, how are you?

Lee Kantor: [00:00:46] I am doing great, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about inspired business concepts. How are you serving, folks?

John Jennings: [00:00:53] Well, you know, I’ve been I’ve formed this company three and a half years ago after doing coaching inside corporations for for many years. And you know, I work with just a whole variety of folks, from executives to an executive coaching to small and medium sized business owners, mostly in the tech sector and health care sectors, but also do a little bit of everything else as well. Like most folks. So I’m just, you know, right now I’d say what I’m doing is helping people navigate this, this new normal that we’re in and figure out how to scale their business, restart their business, get over some of the hurdles they were facing. And, you know, working on mindset. I’ve got a lot of a lot of burnout, people who who are kind of frustrated. And so I always say I try to help business owners experience the joy and satisfaction that they should be experiencing as business owners.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:52] Now let’s talk a little bit about your corporate background. Was coaching something that was part of the culture at the organization that you were part of? Was that something that only like the high level executives got to experience? Or was it something that kind of trickled throughout the organization?

John Jennings: [00:02:11] You know, at two of the organizations I was at, which both Fortune 500 companies coaching was it, you know, we didn’t necessarily use the term coaching, but called it mentoring or or whatever. We’re very much part of. In fact, I 20 20 years ago dating myself here, but 20 years ago or so I was at a company that that really felt like, you know, we weren’t doing a great job of bringing those high, high performing high potential individual contributors into leadership and management roles very effectively. And so I actually created a a coaching and mentoring program targeted at that group. So that was kind of one of my first, you know, adventures into this kind of concept.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:59] So now are you seeing more and more organizations kind of take advantage of this modality and helping more people using this kind of whether it’s like kind of that mentoring, as you mentioned or a more formal coaching program, are you seeing that is more accepted and more prevalent?

John Jennings: [00:03:18] You know, I think it is. You know, I’ve just recently signed on a client that’s with a, you know, a major medical national medical company. And you know, she was she just found me locally and is, you know? You know, funding this through her, you know, her company is going to pay, reimburse her for it, that she’s at an exec, at an executive level, so that is maybe easier to do. But yeah, I’m certainly seeing that in some cases.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:48] Now, when you left the corporate world and decided to go kind of into your own practice like this, was that a difficult transition?

John Jennings: [00:03:56] Well, it wasn’t a one step. So I left Big Corporate in 2010, you know, during the kind of I survived the first couple of years of the economic downturn there, but finally got caught in that went in, went in in January 2010, went in for my performance review for what I thought was an outstanding year and it really was. And Salt found an HR sitting in the room instead of my boss and went, Hmmm, I know what this is about. I found myself unemployed for the first time since since college and actually went home. I tell people I went home and slept like a baby because that that those handcuffs that, you know, the corporate opportunities tend to kind of put on. You were gone. And so I went into small business and worked and served in small businesses for the next seven or eight years. It helped build build some new business units, and one case helped a startup get off the ground and another created some new product. It’s a product development, just different things, all kind of along my line of of being a turnaround business builder kind of guy. And so did that for several entrepreneurial kind of endeavors over seven or eight years and then finally decided it was time to to launch out on my own. And did that in, you know, I guess it was twenty eighteen.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:28] Now, any advice for the folks coming from corporate that are kind of exploring a coaching, transitioning into being a coach, is there kind of some dos and don’ts that you would recommend?

John Jennings: [00:05:40] Well, you know, so it’s a personal decision, and I think everybody has to make their own their own mind up. I would do a lot of due diligence and talk to people who are doing the type of work you want to do. That’s that’s kind of critical. And also, you know, don’t believe the hype. This isn’t an easy. This isn’t necessarily the easy way of making a buck. I’d say the first 18 months was extraordinarily stressful, getting getting things off the ground and then just as everything was clicking and humming along. We had a global pandemic that’s that set things back for for several months. So, you know, it was a it was. Pretty challenging start, but you know, I look back now. Man, I’m so, so grateful that I did it and glad I did it when I did before the pandemic. One thing I would say is when I was thinking of doing this, I went out and and part of my due diligence was to talk to a number of people from my past people that felt respected me and knew me. And some of those people were from corporate world, and some of them were more entrepreneurial, and I got frustrated by several of the people in the corporate world I talked to who would say, You know, you’re nuts, why are you going to do that? You know, they were just they were just really shooting, shooting the whole idea down, just telling me I was crazy to even think about doing something like this.

John Jennings: [00:07:08] And it really, you know, kind of caused me to take a little pause. And I was talking to a friend of mine who was in a similar kind of business and and just mentioned this to me. And he said, John, let me tell you something. You know, somebody told me years ago when when I was facing this decision, he said, Don’t ever ask for directions from someone who from someone who hasn’t been where you’re going. And I thought that was brilliant. You know, don’t ever ask for directions from someone who hasn’t been where you’re going. You know, you wouldn’t do that around anything else in life. So why do you do that about striking off on an entrepreneurial endeavor? If a person has spent their life in corporate it or or whatever, you know, they’re not going to understand why even the mindset behind why you would even think about doing something like this. And so once I kind of had that in mind, I realized that that the people from my past that were in the more the corporate sector, you know, they’re they’re good people and I don’t not take anything away from them, but they don’t understand this idea of being an entrepreneur. And and literally building a business from the ground up is something that’s completely foreign to them.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:28] Right? Well, it’s a different skill set to kind of manage an existing entity and being a cog in a machine and then starting something from a blank sheet of paper. Those aren’t the same skills.

John Jennings: [00:08:40] Yeah. Yeah. And I was just fortunate that I did enough in the corporate world. I was always kind of the create a new team or turn around a failing team or take a project that was failing and figure it out. So I kind of had that entrepreneurial kind of mindset in a in a corporate setting. But it was the entrepreneurial mindset also that kept getting me in trouble.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:02] And I know exactly that. That’s not always as valued as you would think it is.

John Jennings: [00:09:09] Yeah, I use that. It’s easier to get forgiveness than permission. One too many times

Lee Kantor: [00:09:16] I lived that to, I am right there with you now in your work. What is typically the pain that your client is having or your perspective client is having where John is the right guy to call?

John Jennings: [00:09:29] Well, you know, so on the on the business side, a lot of my business coaching the business owners, you know, they’re frustrated, they’re they’re stressed over what COVID has done to them. They’re still trying to figure things out. You know, they may have survived last year because of PPP and other things, but they’re worn out and they’re just exhausted and their sales are still going slow. And a lot of areas in a lot of my clients are in the B2B space and health care space in those spaces just don’t move fast. And they’re moving even slower right now because of because of COVID and things like that. And so they’re just frustrated and tired on the executive side. My executive coaching clients are typically people who have just recently elevated into an executive role over the last year, over the last year or two. And they’re working on things like, you know, what’s my leadership style? Do I have an executive presence? Do do people respect me the way I need to respect me and things like that? And I’m just helping them build their personal brand, build their style, develop their relationship with their teams and peers, and that sort of thing. So kind of different to different sets of needs and kind of different approaches as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:52] So now when you’re working with the business owner, how do you kind of or do you stay in the lane of OK coaching? Is me asking questions helping you kind of be the best you you can be versus consultant who is kind of rolling up my sleeves and kind of getting in there and helping?

John Jennings: [00:11:09] Yeah, so I do some consulting as well. In fact, I’m sitting right now, you’re in an office I have at a client where I’m doing some product development consulting, but I’m doing less and less of that, the more coaching I do. I just define it up front. You know that that’s that’s not my role. And if there’s a if there is a consulting role that needs to be filled, a lot of times I’ll try to bring bring in somebody I know that might fill those roles. But but I don’t try to fill them myself unless it’s truly a short term thing. There’s there’s occasionally I might take a short term thing, but yeah, I just, you know, I think we just define it up front what it’s about.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:54] Now, how do you kind of help that person who maybe is new to coaching? Kind of be vulnerable enough to share the important stuff and and be accepting of maybe the hard truths that that’s your job to share?

John Jennings: [00:12:15] Can you ask that again, I want to make sure

Lee Kantor: [00:12:18] So and for some people, coaching sounds good until you tell them something they don’t want to hear. And then, you know, they might take it personally. They might get defensive. They’re not as kind of vulnerable in the right kind of vulnerable mindset they have to be in order to really get the most out of this.

John Jennings: [00:12:40] Yeah, yeah, that’s actually those blind spots happen all the time. In fact, that’s that’s kind of a personal interest of mine. And actually, I’m writing a book on that kind of idea that business owners don’t know what they don’t know. And a lot of times they don’t know it because people won’t tell them or in other cases, it’s because they don’t hear it when people do tell because they don’t want to hear it. And and so, you know, I have been in that situation where the coaching through the conversation, it’s become clear that there’s a problem. I find that if if I’m the one that has to tell them it’s a problem, then it doesn’t go over so well. So as coaches, I think we really have to be careful to avoid prescribing the solution. One of the painstaking tasks we have to do sometimes as coaches, is to continue to ask the questions until the client gets to the point where they realize on their own that they’ve got a problem, something that they need to deal with. And whether that’s, you know, I tell you that one of the most common ones I run into is these entrepreneurial business owners who constantly have a new idea constantly trying something different, constantly want to try something new and different, which is, you know, that’s part of the beauty of an entrepreneur, right? I love having entrepreneurs that are creative and innovative and everything else. But the flip side is they don’t sometimes stay in their lane where they’re good and grow in a smart way. So I’ll give it an example. I had a head of manufacturing client that was really, really solid in one area, and they were they were toying with going into some completely different product lines and and we said, why do you want to do that? You’re going to have to.

John Jennings: [00:14:43] Bring in completely different salespeople, different management people. You know, it’s a completely different way of thinking. Let’s let’s look at what your business is today and why, why it’s so good they dominate their market. They’re not the cheapest price in town or in the country. They’re not the cheapest in town. But yet people continue to come to them. And so we set back and step back and looked at that and realized that there was a certain value add component that they were doing in their services for their clients, that those those appliances were those clients were willing to pay a premium for and somebody took that step back. They realized that that was really their market was clients who would pay extra for this higher level of service. And so we we evaluated the market and found a couple of parallel markets, if you will, that have the same kind of mindset, same kind of clientele, same kind of approach to how they did business and what they found was they could expand into parallel markets much more easily and stay really still within their wheelhouse. All they’re doing is widening their lanes instead of going into a completely different direction. And, you know, once they came to that conclusion, you know, we in the first year, they added 10, 10, 15 percent to their bottom line. I’m sorry to their top line with very little effort. And you know, that’s that’s smart growth versus just just trying anything that will come along.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:28] Now, do you find that folks that go through those exercises and you really kind of poking at their idea and you’re, you know, playing devil’s advocate, you’re really kind of making them defend the choices? Is it something that when someone self-select to be a coaching client that they’re already of the mindset of, OK, this is part of what I get and then I’m good with that? Or do they still kind of put up a defensive front when you’re, you know, asking some hard questions?

John Jennings: [00:17:01] Oh yeah, they still put up a defensive front because it’s their it’s their baby, you’re you’re criticizing. And so when they when they feel you’re doubting their their vision, then some will take it personally. Hopefully, they’ll get over that and I’ll remind them if they start to that, this is why you hired a coach. You know, you didn’t hire me to be your your yes man to know that you got you have those right. Most business owners have plenty of people who will sit there and nod and and agree with them, you know, because they don’t want to rock the boat. What they don’t have is someone who will be still kind and friendly and everything else, but we’ll ask them honest, sincere questions. I had a have a client who is in the IT space, has a great, great company specific niche doing quite well, and was just convinced that there’s something she could do with a drone license. And I kept asking her, What what are you going to do with it? You know, specifically, what are you going to do with this? And she kept coming back going. I don’t know. I don’t know. I just I just think it sounds interesting. And we kept pursuing that, kept talking about it. And eventually, after about six months or so, she she realizes that that was just kind of a temporary dream she had. She was just trying to justify some other interest. And I think he’s moved off that finally. But yeah, sometimes an owner will keep those ideas going because they’re committed to it. They’ve convinced themselves that that they’ve got a brilliant idea no one else has thought of. And if and if they can convince me, I’ll I’ll be right on there with them. But if, if they can’t, I’ll continue to question them about it.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:54] Now you mentioned you’re writing a book. How did that kind of book idea come about? Is it for your own kind of thought, leadership and marketing for your own firm? Was it something that you’ve always wanted to kind of dig deeper in? What was the kind of genesis of the idea of writing a book?

John Jennings: [00:19:11] Well, you know, I’ve always kind of had an interest in writing. I write a new blog. I don’t blog as much as I used to, but I wrote a lot of blogs. I’ve always kind of had a creative writing kind of mindset, not fiction, but, you know, business related. I’ve always been a good writer in business as far as writing proposals and contracts and all that kind of stuff. Not not legalistic contracts, but, you know, just, you know, user manuals and you name it, you know, just through the years. And so my wife and others have told me several times, you ought to write, you ought to write. And I never just it was just one of those things where one, you know, I think imposter syndrome start coaching myself. You’re probably imposter syndrome comes in. Oh, I’m not worthy news. Who’s going to buy a book from me? That sort of thing. And then the others is just over the past several years, as I’ve been in this coaching role and the roles leading up to it, I realize that I’ve had just tons of good experiences that when I share them with people, they’re always feel like they’re very insightful.

John Jennings: [00:20:16] And so, you know, I’ve always just been told I’m a good storyteller and that sort of thing. And so, you know, talking about blind spots, talking about things that business owners need to need to know about, need to hear about has kind of led down this path of of writing something that hopefully a business owner that would read it would would recognize maybe some some gaps, some blind spots in their own mind. And if you’re a coach or a, you know, a team member in a company, you might read it and get some ideas on how to approach your leadership on gaps and blind spots that you’re seeing. And so that’s it’s going to it’s going to be interesting. It’s it’s taking shape. It’s probably 25 30 percent through drafting the first manuscript, working with an editor and that sort of thing. So still early, write a few months down the road for. I have a whole lot to say about it, but it’s going to be exciting.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:20] Well, before we wrap, can you share a story, maybe of a you mentioned a few kind of anecdotes before, but maybe. A story where somebody did have a blind spot, you were able to kind of insert yourself and help them, maybe kind of revisit it or kind of spin it a different way so that they can reach a new level.

John Jennings: [00:21:42] Yeah, well, they kind of the one that that kind of. It’s really kind of stimulated the book writing thing was a client that I work with quite a bit. I’ve been doing some coaching strategic, advising some other things with them. And about just pre-COVID, I was hired to buy them first to develop a strategic plan, which we did. And then then I was retained for ongoing strategic strategic plan accountability. You know, kind of ongoing traction, kind of not traction. I don’t want to get in trouble with the EOS people, not attraction coach, but along that line of the ongoing accountability and that sort of thing. And so they hired me to do that. And then one of the things they asked me to do because I have a background in process re-engineering and improving, you know, improving processes and such. They asked me to take a look at some key areas of their business. And so we went through that. And then there was one area of the business that was kind of the CEO’s pet area. It’s kind of an area that he felt very passionate about. He felt it was a differentiator for them. But I got the feeling when I was talking to other folks in the company that nobody wanted anything to do with it. And so the CEO actually went on vacation and went on a cruise, and I was supposed to, when he came back, have have an update for him.

John Jennings: [00:23:17] And so while he was gone, I met with a consultant that was running that area and really found out that it was a it was a complete mess. There was there was no way this process, as it was designed, was going to make money. In fact, it was losing money and was just going to keep losing money. And it was one of those things where the more you, you know, the more customers that came on, the more money they were going to lose. And it was just it was just wasn’t a good, good situation for anybody. And so when the business owner comes back and we sit down and I won’t go into all the details around how it unfolded, but when when we told him that basically wasn’t going to work, he was he was kind of shocked. It was like we had told him his baby was ugly. And I actually thought for a moment he was going to fire me. But as it turned out, you know, COVID hit right after that, it kind of took a backseat. About six months later, still, they’re still doing some coaching and other things in the company. And he said, You know, John, I want to I want to relaunch that, that service.

John Jennings: [00:24:26] I still believe in it. I said, OK. And he goes, You know, would you would you consider it designing it, building it? I said. Yeah, I think I would, and so I’ve worked with them over the past nine months to essentially build a from a ground up, a new a new product based on better, better assumptions, better logic. And now we’ve got a a product that will not only sell but also is profitable for the company. And so, you know, I’ve I’ve kind of earned that reputation here with them and can do a lot of different things with them. Now moving probably be moving away from the consulting piece of that, but still still doing a lot of the coaching and everything that I’ve been doing. So I know that was still kind of vague a little bit because confidentiality stuff. But you know, the idea of signing a a business. And if you just took this as a business within itself, a business that is broken and is not as profitable or in this case was actually losing money and coming up with a new fresh way of doing it. Working with the team here, helping them figure that out and relaunching, it’s very rewarding to get to do those types of things.

Lee Kantor: [00:25:52] Yeah, absolutely. Well, if somebody wanted to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on your team, what’s the website

John Jennings: [00:26:01] So inspired business concepts? Is my my my personal business website. My my handle on almost every platform is John K Jennings. There’s a couple of exceptions, but LinkedIn and Facebook and those you know, John K. Jennings. And you know, I love to love to talk to folks always open for a conversation, always open for contacts if anybody wants to, to learn more or talk about how we could work together.

Lee Kantor: [00:26:28] Good stuff. And that’s inspired with a D business concepts with a NASSCOM. That’s it. Well, John, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you rightly.

John Jennings: [00:26:41] I appreciate the opportunity to talk to your folks and hopefully we’ll we’ll have future conversations as I get my book ready to launch.

Lee Kantor: [00:26:49] Absolutely. Well, thank you again.

John Jennings: [00:26:51] All right, buddy. Thanks a lot.

Lee Kantor: [00:26:52] All right, this is Lee Kantor. We’ll see, y’all next time on Coach the Coach radio.