Adi Klevit 7:42
That would be maybe that would be one aspect of it really. And that’s what attracted me to study industrial engineering, is when I was looking at what industrial engineering is, it basically was a combination of science, and understanding how people take what makes them tick and how they behave, etc. So it was a combination of those two aspects that really got me interested because I was very good at science. But I also really liked people. And I like helping people and like understanding people and figuring out ways that to help and to make things easier and better. So that combination of the science and the human aspect of it together really brought me to explore that path. And, you know, what I’m doing today will be a continuation of that it just, you know, my career had different aspects to it in terms of working for an international consulting company and managing a Big, Grow their or bigger team, and two different aspects to finally, really starting my own company and realizing that I just love creating processes for people, I love putting order in, I like to go into a chaos of successful companies, because my clients, one of the prerequisites to become a client is that you have to be successful, you have to have a vision, you have to be driven, you want to do better, more, and you want to produce more, right? So I want to help people like that by introducing order and systems especially when they feel like they cannot do it themselves. So I can be that arm of the business that does that and organizes the business in such a way that it’s easy and repeatable and you can there is repetition and consistency so they can get to the products that they really know how to do.
David Melamed 9:44
Very interesting. So over the course of your career, has there been any tough lessons you’ve learned or epiphanies lightbulb moments where? Because like I think systems and processes you mentioned order a sound So, like, you know, paint by numbers structured from the outset. But I mean, I’ve been working with you now. And I see clearly that it’s a dynamic, um, you know, even the process of working together, and you’re curious in general, like, if someone does very custom work for every client. Um, so I guess in theory, you could systematize invoicing or things like that. But how would you? I mean, are there are there things you’ve learned along the way about either you mentioned, what makes people tick, which is really what this podcast is about fixing your understanding the incentives of human behavior? I just like to do it through marketing versus through internal processes. Um, but I mean, are there any, any things misunderstood or tough lessons you’ve learned over the years that that really changed how you think about, you know, putting order into businesses?
Adi Klevit 10:58
Sure. So I think that it’s a great question. And I think the, the main one is that I learned that not everyone is the same, that we are all have, we’re all different. But we’re all important. And we all our differences is what makes us make life more interesting, right? And it’s really embracing those differences, and not try to change people, you know, I’m not in a business of changing people. Because if somebody is not going to now operate just, you know, have like a strict slps and work by them, because they’re very creative, and not into changing them. Okay, now, you’re going to do that, what it’s intriguing for me is to figure out how can I take who they are, and work with them. So we can adjust the system to the person and not the person to the system. And that’s really, that’s the thing, the toughest lesson in terms of not trying to mold the people into a system, because that doesn’t work. Especially if you’re an entrepreneur, maybe if you work in a big corporation, and that’s the way it is, you know, that’s what is expected from you, you know, you either do it or you go, you know, or you get fired, that’s a whole different approach, right. But when you’re an entrepreneur, and majority of my clients are entrepreneurs, they are business owners, they are I work with their staff, you know, but it is still has that, you know, you’re there you have, you have that entrepreneurial spirit, and you can’t all of a sudden change it and be strict or be something that you are not. So that’s why it’s very important to work with the person in front of you to really adapt to their voice. So like, for instance, I have a client that I was just working with him this morning, and I looked at the processes that we were writing, and I go, you know what, he doesn’t have enough of your voice, let’s add some because they’re very light, they’re very young, fun, light kind of company. But as you start documenting, you know, sometimes when you write things, it doesn’t come across, necessarily, it can cause more stern and serious I got this is too serious, let’s let nap, you know, let’s use maybe you some of the slang that you use, or let’s use some, you know, some pictures or some emojis things that you communicate anyway, that way, and will communicate better. So people will actually want to listen to you. So that’s really the art of the communication here is communicating something that others would want to read, and it’s not boring, or now I have to read it, etc. So it’s really adapting the system to the person and not the other way around.
David Melamed 13:35
Very interesting. Yeah, I have so many questions about this. But I’m going to ask a personal one, because it’s in the back of my mind always anyway, but you’re going into chaotic situations, and you’re putting order into them. Does that get really frustrating for you? Because I would imagine it, like every single entrepreneur you deal with has their own quirks and their own. You know who they are. And you mentioned, you’re not trying to change them. But does does it get frustrating for you? Especially if you’re so you know, process driven to, I guess, to deal with that kind of almost neurotic behavior sometimes.
Adi Klevit 14:15
Yeah, it’s a very good question. So I am really not because I am not neurotic in terms of the process driven. Okay, so now we’re only going to do it this way. And that’s it, right? I mean, I have my ability to adapt and change. And I enjoy talking to different personalities. I mean, that’s what I love doing. So, as I said, You know, I had different things that I was doing throughout my career, but I found something that I really feel like I’m passionate about, and I enjoy what I’m doing. And I also enjoy working with my clients. And when I say I don’t take anyone as a client, it is true. I do the interview. Now when you and I talk, you know I do to begin working together. You know, I do my interview as much as I’m being interviewed by my clients because I Want to work with entrepreneurs that have a vision and really want to make it better? And, but there is there are there are running into blocks for some reason or other, but it’s not like they are not willing to overcome. I don’t want to work with clients that don’t want to overcome the roadblocks, right? They just put the roadblocks there in order to prove you that there are roadblocks and look at them beautiful roadblocks, and I’m not going to do anything about it. That’s where it becomes frustrating. And that’s where, you know, it does, it just won’t work, you know, the relationship is not going to work. But so long as we identify the vision, and we keep the eye on the mountain, and we have the agreement that we communicate, you know, so like, let’s say when we work together, and I suggest something, because you know, I can’t read your mind. So I think, okay, David, how about if we do this, this and that and go know what? I try that I hate it, I don’t want to do it. So at that point, I would either say, okay, because I think that we have an alternative. Or if I feel strongly about something because I’ve seen it work before, then I will get your willingness and agreement by asking questions. Oh, tell me like, what happened? Did you try before What happened? let’s identify the different parts of what happened before and then maybe we’ll identify that you did it this way. But I go, Okay, yeah, that’s the problem right here. Maybe we can do it this way. And then you go, oh, okay, well, let’s try it. And then we kind of like building this puzzle together. So it’s really a collaborative approach. It’s not the tactic. It’s not me telling you, oh, no, we’re gonna do it this way, in that way. And that way, it’s really a collaboration. And that is, I think, what makes a really strong relationship business relationship. Because I want to be a trusted advisor, you know, I want you to trust me that I’m advising you correctly. And I want to be the person that you will, if something is not going right, or that you found another problem that you call me, so we can resolve it together. But also not be the person that you know, you look to me to be the solver of every single problem, because I do not have the solution for everything, right. I have tools, I have experience. I have knowledge. But like anything else, it’s something with marketing, because I work with many marketing agencies. So I know it to be true that it’s not a science. I mean, yeah, you have things that are for sure. You mean you have to do certain things for it to work. But some of it is trial and error. That’s all we have a be testing, right, or we test this ad and it didn’t work on this one worked. But then the fun is the fun part is why did it work? let’s identify let’s see what we can actually replicate and do again. So it’s actually successful. Interesting.
David Melamed 17:40
You mentioned you have the tools, or, you know, some one thing I was thinking about, is, I wonder if a lot of the problems that I’ve tried to solve in my business or other agency owners entrepreneurs have tried to solve, they tried to solve it with another subscription for another SaaS tool, that without understanding that the problem is actually in their systems and processes or in their you know, clarifying their vision or other you know, earlier pieces that are you know, not letting them that basically they’re there they’re putting band aids on symptoms without realizing it along the way. You know, I I’m a little addicted to SaaS tools and stuff and I’m paying a lot of money, a lot of different subscriptions. But I one question I see come up nonstop, all over the place all the time. And I’ve textbook answer I get which is which CRM is better. I do HubSpot. I do Salesforce? Should I use something else should I use you know Active Campaign or MailChimp for you know that they confuse the email marketing with that, or or Zoho or something open source? And then along those lines, they’ll also ask that same question about project management tools. What should I use? Should I use Basecamp? Should I use Asana? Should I use ClickUp? Should I use Trello? Should I use Monday. And you know, everybody’s got the recommendation about what they use. And I know people go really deep into these things. And I’ve used every project management tool because different clients are in different things. And almost all of them ended up just being another login and another yo 20 loot notifications in my inbox a day and distractions and almost none of them move projects forward the way they used to before. And I always thought it was just because I needed the right person driving project management. But I think it was because I didn’t understand what systems and processes really were for. And how they’re supposed to, you know, like you should feel when you have it in place like we work together on on inbox zero and so a work in progress. But one thing I discovered is, it’s very easy for you to procrastinate on an email, oh, this is an important email, I think I want to look at this later. I’m not sure why maybe this afternoon, maybe tomorrow, maybe next week, it’s not really urgent. And my inbox kept getting cluttered. And you know, every newsletter coming in from companies, and, you know, I want to read them, but I don’t have time this minute. And I didn’t understand that what I was creating was a bunch of things out, I love doing deep work. And I was creating a whole bunch of distractions that make it very difficult to go deep. Because there’s constantly just stimuli coming at me. I almost need to unplug that yo for everything in order to even have a break from that. So I’m curious, do you see the same? And when you make tool recommendations? Is it Do you think that the in decisiveness and debate between different schools as people, you know, just, it’s an excuse, or they’re trying to solve the wrong problem? Like, what do you think’s going on there that everybody seems to constantly have this debate about which project management tool to use? Or which CRM to use?
Adi Klevit 21:11
That’s excellent. I mean, it’s, uh, you mentioned several things. And I think it’s an excellent topic. So first of all, you know, I’ll tell you a story of my experience, when I just started as an industrial engineer, fresh out of college, I was doing a project was working for a consulting company, and we were doing a project for one of the big, big, big companies, Fortune 100 companies. And, you know, one of my responsibilities at the time was to document the process, because that’s what industry engineering also does, like, you know, make process more efficient and documenting the process. So then the software engineer will follow and create a solution with with software. So that’s where I learned my first lesson is that you have to have your house in order, you have to have your processes the actual, real life, physical universe that we can touch and see, in order for them to then be duplicated by a software. So that’s First of all, you don’t use software as a solution. Because that is like you said, it’s a symptom, it’s a patch up, it’s a bandaid, you have to figure out the root cause if something is not working, it’s because there is something in the way you’re doing it the way you’re thinking the way the sequence is. That’s what you have to solve first, and then bring the software tool, because otherwise, you’re just kind of like stuck with that software tool. And it’s rigid, and you can change, right? So I always like to ask, how do you do it in real life? You know, because we are so used to the virtual and software, but how do you do it in real life? Walk me through it. Okay, so this is what you do. Alright, this is how we’re going to mimic it with the software. Once we solve the problem, and we’ve seen it, it actually works. So that’s one aspect of it, in terms of being addicted to SaaS tools. And the same way, you know, because I’m right now, onboarding a virtual assistant, a new one. And I got, I was like, a typing up, like all the systems she needs to learn, like, Wow, I can’t believe I have so many, just because I enjoy them. I just like it’s it’s something I enjoy, but I don’t feel that it’s a burden for me, because I enjoy it, you know, so I understand that. And I like automation. I like new tools. I like to explore, I like to see, well, maybe this is better, or that one is better. So I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. So long as you know what you’re doing and it’s under control. So it’s not really an addiction. it’s it’s a it’s a moderate use, like anything in life. You know, if you do it moderately, it’s okay. When you start going obsessive or it’s out of control. That’s what we have the problem. So that’s on the, the, you know, they’re being SaaS happy and having all these logins etc. That’s what we have LastPass, where we can keep all the logins and it’s not a problem. So in terms of the in decisiveness, what I would say to that is, figure out what your process is. So let’s say for instance, this sales process, okay? Figure out what is your sales process before you go into a CRM, because then it will be so because it will be so much easier than to create the sequence in the CRM. Like I have a client right now we’re working on documenting the sales process, and we documented it first. And then once they had it a very clear vision of what it is, they were able to see that their current CRM is not doing what they need to be doing. So they were able to change to a more sophisticated one, but they already had the process defined. So then it was easy to figure out the steps in the new CRM as an example. So define the process and in terms of being indecisive. Just be just choose one that will be my answer. Don’t go into let’s compare all The features in clicker versus Monday versus Asana, you know, it’s okay to do that if you’re really, really good at it. Like, for instance, for me, because I live that I do it, I just switched from one to another, I still like both. But I had a feature in one that I preferred, but I already was really good at it. I was using the board’s I, my team and I communicate via the project management system. I had it set up, I had all the tags and everything. And I listened to somebody’s blog, and I go, oh, wow, this sounds interesting. Let’s try it because I want it to be proficient at that as well. So that was me, because I’m an expert at that. But if you are not an expert, and you’re just starting, just choose one, or when you starting, they’re all very much similar. And they are very much similar. They just have a little bit of you know, maybe this automation is better, or that they have this feature, or you know, the subtasks show in a different view differently. If you’re just beginning, it doesn’t matter if you’re an expert already, then you will be able to make the decision because you’ll be able to see, but don’t make it too complicated. Make a decision. And that’s what I help my clients to because I with because I know all those systems, that’s what I do is I keep myself up today. So then I can ask a few questions. And I know which one I would recommend Asana which one I recommend Monday in which one I would recommend ClickUp. Because I can see the differences. But if you’re not there, just choose one, start with it. Commit. And then after two years, when you are like a master of that one, and you decide No, you know, I outgrew that one, I have to move to something better, then take a look at it.
David Melamed 26:40
Right now, I have two questions. And I know we don’t have much time left. But when you’re working with clients, do you know this? Do they often have blind spots about what they need to solve? Or where their problems are? Or do they pretty much know what the problems are? And they’ve just struggled to actually find a solution that doesn’t require changing themselves?
Adi Klevit 27:08
It’s an interesting question, because I think that if they already had a solution to wouldn’t contact me, they wouldn’t be my clients. I mean, why hire? Why, you know, why would they? But of course, I mean, I have I have to, you know, I learn every day. I mean, it’s one of my core values is, you know, lifelong learning, right? I mean, you know, I, I am curious, I like to learn, I like to find out. That’s why I like those tools. Because I find different things that I learned about it. I didn’t know that they exist, like, you know, I was doing I was recording a podcast with somebody, and they use fireflies.ai. And I go, what is that? And then he told me, and then I went to look at it. And it’s basically like an automatic notetaking app. And it’s changed the way that I operate, because instead of me writing to make taking notes all the time, I can just record it, and then use it and it’s just so much easier. So it’s it’s really a matter of, you know, do you want to improve? Do you want to learn? And do you? Do you have the mindset of let me stay in my lane because I’m doing what I’m doing and then hire other people to do the things that I’m not as good at, right? You know, you can use the Eisenhower matrix for those of you that you’re familiar with it what’s urgent and important for you. Right? What can you delegate that is important but not urgent, and somebody else can do you know, so it’s well, that’s the planning but if it’s not urgent, I think it’s like urgent, not, I don’t remember it now. But you know, you have basically a place there where it is, you can delegate right? If it is when it is not important that you do it yourself or it’s urgent or not urgent, not urgent, not important, you don’t do it. But the other ones that you know, you feel like for yourself that it is important. It needs to be done, but it’s not urgent, I do it myself delegate that.
David Melamed 29:00
Very interesting. I am the Fireflies example. It’s very interesting because I so I use something called Otter. So as my Zoom calls go straight into, into otter other which, you know, is a transcription tool as well, I tested a bunch of different solutions. All of these were because sometimes I’ll have a client call and we’ll discuss some sort of action item. And I don’t want to forget it and don’t want to fall through the cracks. And I don’t want to sit there typing agenda notes during a call every single call. But one thing I discovered is through our discussions is that different types of communication really belongs in different places and different formats. And I wonder if the solution there was your action items should be submitted to the project management tool. I No, I was just gonna say like, like, if a client emails me a task right now, like I already have it set up in a way that it’s just too quick for me to afford that straight into ClickUp into that clients thing. And I wouldn’t have done that, if not for like, there’s a step in there, that would never occurred to me that you had me do, which is save the email address for the ClickUp list with a name that is easy to recognize as ClickUp and easily recognized as a client. So I have them saved in my contacts as cu for ClickUp and then the client name. So every time it has comes in, I just, I either see, see the email, if I’m reply, BCC, if I’m replying, or another thing was You haven’t changed the subject line affording the email because that creates the task name. These are like small things that wouldn’t occur to me that make a huge difference. So I think a lot of times, like with the, you know, the transcriptions, I assume they’re trying to solve a problem of just like better, you know, making sure things don’t fall through the cracks without realizing that the problem was in my communication chaos, not in my meetings to take notes during a call.
Adi Klevit 31:15
Right. But then then what you’re using what you’re using the artificial intelligence to take calls, it just makes it easy, because now you have a system, and the system is that you’re going to put in ClickUp your action items. So then when you’re recording, you can actually what I do, when I talk to a client, and I’m recording it, I say action item, before I actually give them the action item, because then I can create a little tag in Fireflies or a little whatever they call it, and label and then I then immediately find all the places where said action items and I my VA my virtual assistant, she takes it and puts it as notes in ClickUp. So that is but I build that system because I already had the communication system build up. Right? That’s all I’m saying it’s like, you know, you really need to build the systems first and figuring out and what you and I did together, it’s so important to have good communication systems because the communication can be just jammed, become jammed, and then you you just like it paralyzes you, because yeah, it’s easier to just sit in front of the emails and just look at emails, as opposed to going and doing the deep work, right, like start thinking and those that are that do request creativity, etc. And it’s kind of like, you know, you get distracted by everything. So yeah.
David Melamed 32:34
Yeah, that’s great. And I always thought Fireflies had those keyword, I guess.
Adi Klevit 32:41
You can search it too, you can search that energy, it shows up or you can, you can label it. So on the side on the left side, when you open fireflies, you will see the different bubbles, I think they call it labels or whatever it’s called.
David Melamed 32:53
Very cool. This is very interesting. You know, I’m working with you, it’s going great so far, you know, I’ve already reached Inbox Zero things are unblocked. For me, I’m very excited for what I’m going to be able to do. As I, as I have more or they’re brought into, into how I you know, run the work I do. Um, so so I do what would be the best way for people to get a hold of you if to see if you’re a good fit, or to even just learn, you know, learn from you. I know you have a podcast as well. What would you recommend the best way for someone to, to either connect with you or learn more from you?
Adi Klevit 33:33
Sure. So the best way would be to go to my website. So it’s biz success cg dot com. So biz, the word success spelled out CG for consulting group. So biz success cg dot com and go to my articles and blog tab, I have a lot of articles there about productivity about what I find successful when working with businesses. So there’s definitely a lot of information there. And you can also sign up for my newsletter. So you can get that article to your inbox or to the box or to the folder where you set up to to get your newsletters. And you can also email me there was contact us in the website. And if you want to listen to my podcast, it’s called the Systems Simplified podcast and you can find it if you listen to this podcast. You can also go in the same, probably the same place Spotify or Apple Podcast, Google Podcast and look for the Systems Simplified podcast and you can hear different episodes about systematizing your business and ideas and tips about that.
David Melamed 34:34
Awesome. Thank you so much. I really appreciate you joining us today.
Adi Klevit 34:39
Thank you, David.
Outro 34:41
Thanks for listening to the Fixing Incentives podcast. We’ll see you again next time and be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes.
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