Host: Beau Billington Guest: Dr. Yishai Barkhordari Beau 00:07 Hello, everybody! Beau Billington, welcome back to another episode of “Finding That NextGear”, got Dr. Yishai back in the seat yet again. How are you, sir? Dr. Yishai 00:16 I’m doing so great and also challenged in a lot of ways. So you know, the two can sit in the same space. And I’m really excited to be back here for really long chats. Beau 00:27 I’m excited about today’s topic in particular, because I feel like both you and I are kind of experiencing the same thing, which is interesting. Not doing that you’ve had a change recently, and you’ve opened your own practice. How long have you been doing this now? Dr. Yishai 00:39 Great question. So a little over two months, it’s, in a way, very new. At the same time, I worked in private practice for four years beforehand. And so, I really had a very strong sense of the ropes before I got started. You may know this, and I know when we were chatting beforehand, I’m really the kind of person who likes to set up systems and line everything up. And so that’s something that I was very intentional about in setting up my practice. So while it’s new, on the other hand, it’s running in some ways, like a really well-oiled machine. Beau 01:07 Already. That’s impressive. I kind of have had the opposite problem. I’ve been in business for almost five years. And I have some systems but now I’m laser-focused on the systems and support all the work that I’ve done. If I was a clairvoyant individual, I would probably have added a few more systems in the front end, but that’s a topic for another day. Dr. Yishai 01:26 Live and learn. Beau 01:27 Exactly. So jumping in today’s topic, I think it’s extremely topical. Proactive versus Reactive mindset. And I probably like a lot of entrepreneurs and sound like yourself as well have been running very, very hard since January 1st. My business in particular, somewhat seasonal, and come Thanksgiving, Christmas holidays, what have you there is dip inactivity, there’s a dip in work, and then come January 1st, we’re back at it. And I literally, I’ve been typically a poster on LinkedIn, I haven’t posted anything in the last month and a half, I also haven’t been able to get into the mindset and find the flow to actually start writing, and really be creative, which is a problem for me and gives me anxiety. So you know, today, I really want to talk about how entrepreneurs can be more proactive in their business versus reactive. And as mentioned just a couple of days ago, I literally found myself just so tactically working, that I’ve kind of like raised up from my desk, I was thinking, Man, I’m not thinking about my business strategically, what am I doing the next 369 12 months, years, so worried about the here and now. And that’s a problem. And that’s a big problem for entrepreneurs, especially when your job is to deliver but also drive revenue for your organization. So that being mind I mean, that in mind is that something you’ve said like maybe you’ve struggled a little bit as well, the last couple of months, and granted, you put systems in place. But it’s really easy to get into that tactical space, and kind of continue to stay heads down. Dr. Yishai 03:02 It’s something that I’m also encountering at this point. My practice has been growing at, I would say, kind of an alarming rate, a very challenging rate, even though it’s running like a well-oiled machine. It is also sometimes really challenging to keep up with it, whether it’s growth or the work that I’m doing. I mean, there’s the therapy work, the technical work, and it’s easy to sometimes kind of get our head down in the ground. And on that, it actually reminds me as you were talking about it, of the image of an ostrich stitching, sticking their head in the sand, which I know kind of characteristically is when someone’s trying to avoid something. As it turns out, though, in the wild ostriches don’t do that, because they’re trying to avoid something. It’s not an avoidance tactic. It’s not a defense mechanism in that way, when ostriches do that, they’re actually more often looking for food, or they’re doing something active, they’re engaging in something that they need, they’re trying to meet a need of theirs. So it’s a different kind of sticking our head in the sand that we’re doing when we’re really kind of nose to the grindstone. Right? And that’s something that I’ve experienced as my practice, in a way kind of exploded in, I would say, maybe five or six weeks, I went from having only a handful of patients to being almost completely full. Beau 04:18 Sure. Dr. Yishai 04:20 And that’s a lot of new patients to onboard. And regardless of the number of systems it’s a lot of new people to get to know it’s a lot of people to get started with. And I like to keep track of and kind of think about and have time and intention with that. Not just in the time that I’m with them but outside of that and so there’s a lot of work that goes into that even outside of the time that I’m with. Beau 04:42 Absolutely lot of work but also what always concerns me when I’m in that mindset, which I’m in currently is like what/how’s the quality of my work? You know I mean?have I kind of over-rotated with the amount of clients that I can bring on? Am I delivering a high quality product? Yes or no? If I want to do this, delivering them what’s happening down the road, 369 months out in regards to customer acquisition, because of those two components here in business. And I’m sure it’s like how different, you’ve got a service you’re delivering, you also need to bring in new clients, because ultimately, there will be some turnover. And that’s what gives me that probably the biggest point of angst within my business is when I get so caught up, heads down, that I don’t feel that I’m worried about my business growing. And then I start worrying as well, it’s like, am I spending my time the best way that I should be spending it. A lot of times when I look up from these, these very, these weeks, two weeks, three weeks sessions, where I’m just so busy, I realized that, I probably could have done things a little bit differently, and been a little bit smarter and more strategic with my time. And somehow, maybe kind of offset a little bit of that sheer tactical work with a little bit of injury. Summary build it. Dr. Yishai 05:58 It’s a really good point. And to the point of as a psychologist, or as the owner of a practice, it’s really no different. In fact, my goal is to get people out. I like to say this, “My goal is not to keep people in therapy, my goal is to get people out of therapy”, which means client acquisition is a big part of it. And so during work. Beau 06:16 Same thing if you’re doing a good job, at some point, you need to let them fly. Dr. Yishai 06:21 Right, the goal is to get them to a place where they can fly on their own, and you want to do that, in a way that’s effective. You also want to do it in a way that’s efficient. And that means that sometimes, that’s going to be faster, sometimes it can be slower, depending on the kind of change and what they want, and what continues to crop up or pop up for them. All that being said I think it’s important to recognize, as you were saying that there are different seasons. And it’s also important to be intentional, with the work that we’re doing the bandwidth and how much of our bandwidth we are dedicating to that work, to do what needs to be done to the tactical, right? And being also equally intentional about what my bandwidth currently is, how much of it am I engaging or using, to think more long term? Have I done that? Am I in line with that? If I’ve already been doing it, let’s say, as you were saying, in December, towards the end of the year, if there’s a bit of downtime, and perhaps even prior to that, if there are other doubt downtimes, to start planning for the new year. And to then be intentional, when it hits January and February and the time is really busy. That’s a moment where there may not be quite as much bandwidth, because you’re doing the technical work. And because you really have your nose to the grindstone there might not be as much bandwidth in that moment, to think strategically. However, it may be important in those moments to make sure you are sticking to the plan, or the strategy, or the way in which you kind of thought ahead for those weeks, and months. And there are times where it’s important to adjust or readjust on those things. And so one of the major questions is when we are already feeling kind of thin on our own bandwidth, because we’re so busy. How can we still ensure that we’re not losing track of that? so that come 1235 or six months later, we’re not finding ourselves at the end of q3 or facing the beginning of q4, having just had our nose so hard to the grindstone, that we may actually struggle at some point along the way, or in the next year. Beau 08:30 No, I think that’s a great point. And one question I have is, how do you adjust on the fly? Because I literally didn’t kind of come to realize what I was doing until about two days ago, I was like, man, I’ve been so concerned with the work I have to deliver that I blocked out all the strategery in my business, and it’s a disservice. And I needed to kind of put myself in a position to reevaluate, reassess, take an audit of the work that I’m doing and ensure that I’m doing the right things at the right time. But I mean, is there any kind of tips and tricks that folks can look at to maybe kind of remind themselves like, “Hey, are you doing the right stuff?” And then, if so, great, keep it up. If not, how could you potentially adjust that on the fly? I mean, imagine you’re gonna tell me to bring out a T chart or something. But literally what can be done? Because I know this two days ago, and I’ve been doing this for the cycle for two months, Dr. Yishai 09:23 Right. So it’s a great question. I’m going to actually shift the question over slightly and talk about the importance of adaptability. Part of what I’m hearing when you talk about this, when you’re asking the question is, how do I adapt on the fly? Beau 09:38 Yes. Dr. Yishai 09:39 And one thing I heard you pointing out is there are moments where we come into a realization and we come into that realization, and the realization might be that I am not focused on the things that are really moving the needle for me, or I am nose to the grindstone so hard that my nose is raw, and also I can’t pay attention to it. don’t have the bandwidth to and I’m not really paying attention to all of the things that really necessitate attention for my business to be successful, Beau 10:08 Which makes you feel exposed 100%. Dr. Yishai 10:10 Right, and that’s the moment where you get that you can be in a panic, it can be a moment of anxiety, it can be a feeling of overwhelm, it can be a feeling of stress, it can be any or all of those things, it can be multiple of them. And more, it can be frustrating, right? The way I like to think about it and talk about it is that we have two processes constantly at work or at play in our brain. And this is kind of a metaphor, we have what I like to call our habit brain, our automating brain, are kind of stick with what we’re doing, keep doing it getting to do it better, do it in a way that’s more effective or more efficient, learn how to do it faster, spend less time thinking about or making decisions. And that’s where for some people, and I think for all people, at some time, when we are really zeroed in on that there can be a zone of genius, there can be an incredible amount of productivity, there could be a lot of things that get done, some of which are really necessary, or many of which are really necessary to get done at the same time, they can put blinders on. And there are times where we need the blinders on, or we need to hyper-focus. However, if we have the blinders on, and there’s no way no system, no process, no other way in which our brain or us as the leaders, or the owners, the runners of our company, can take those blinders off, so that we can make a turn if or when we need to. That’s where it can get us into trouble. So the one side of that is what I like to call our habit brain, which is kind of designed to put blinders on to get us to be more effective to develop systems or habits to have less and put in less energy and get more output. And that means less decisional energy, less analysis, less slowing down, it’s really about speeding up. What we really need to do, if we don’t want to get caught up in what we’re stuck in, is to actually exercise and actively engage the other side. The other system in our brain, which I like to call our adaptive brain. Our adaptive brain is there to generate new awareness, new analysis and new action. And we talked a little bit before about how the way that adaptability works is the system in our brain gives us the data, the direction and drive. In fact, that system is at its core, our emotional system, remember the emotions I was talking about earlier? Things like worry, concern, panic, stress, overwhelm frustration, that awareness that you had two days ago, was your adaptive brain kind of poking and prodding you and saying, “Hey, there’s something that you are not paying attention to, you’ve got your blinders on. And if you don’t pay attention, you may fail to make that turn. And that can cost you a lot.” I’m gonna say something, and this is gonna be a really, really tough thing to take in. It’s not an easy one. However, I think you can change everything. And we’ll give you some tactics and how to do this well. Chances are two days ago, you had multiple moments of feeling, or having an inkling or something that didn’t quite feel like everything was running as smoothly as you want it. Beau 13:18 Correct. Dr. Yishai 13:20 Moments of concern or worry, moments of exhaustion, or burnout, or stress and moments of feeling depleted or empty moments of feeling frustrated means we can name a whole gamut of feelings, I’m sure there are plenty more, right? Beau 13:39 Well, I think your temper is currently. Dr. Yishai 13:42 And I often like to say, the human brain and body is capable of experiencing not only but more than 10 emotions at a time. Because it’s our adaptive system. I like to think about them as firefighters, they come knocking when there’s a little smoke coming out the window. Beau 13:57 Nice. Dr. Yishai 13:58 Right? And the thing is, if you ignore that, if you leave the door closed, or if you bolt the door, is there a firefighter just going to go away? Beau 14:05 No. Dr. Yishai 14:06 No, because their job is to knock harder, they’re gonna bust the door down eventually, if they have to. because their job is to protect and to save you. This is reactive, by the way. But we don’t open that door when we don’t hear or see it coming. And you can learn to hear and see it coming a mile away. And you can be so attuned that you respond sooner. And when you’re doing that you’re more proactive in adapting. Again, we’ll get to that moment. I want to stick with a firefighter analogy, though. Because when our brains and bodies give us those reactions, most of us hear what we hear and I hear this a lot in coaching. I hear it in consulting. I hear it in the culture of entrepreneurship in the hustle culture. There’s so many ways in which we hear 1001 messages that tell us to ignore. To deny. To suppress. Beau 14:06 No. His writing phrase from 2019. Dr. Yishai 15:06 To keep grinding. And all of that tells us to not pay attention. In fact, it is telling us to actively neglect. And push away and devalue. Literally the way in which our brain and our body is designed to help us adapt and pivot. Now, that doesn’t mean that when we feel it, at first, we’re supposed to throw our hands up and go on vacation. Right? The goal here is not to just let the emotion make the decision for you. Because that’s not what emotions are for. That’s not the totality of what their job is. Beau 15:44 It’s interesting, but I found that when I ignore that little voice in my head, the emotions, you mentioned, do continue to rise, and I guess they fever pitch at some point, and you’re like, crap, what’s going on? And maybe that happened to me two weeks ago, two days ago, rather. But as you’re talking it’s one thing to kind of become more in tune with those emotions. And that’s something I can work on actively challenging everybody who’s listening to do the same. But would it be beneficial maybe to just kind of create a calendar, reminder every week, every two weeks. Once a month. Just to say, hey, you know, look up, take an inventory of what you’re doing on a daily basis, really kind of determine if it’s adding to your business, detracting from your business, something along those lines. Dr. Yishai 16:32 So two points I wanted to touch base on one is you talked about not just the emotions, but this voice in your head. And I want to acknowledge that it’s not just emotions, our thoughts are also designed to try to do that for us. Yeah, they’re trying to do that. The second thing is, you’re talking about kind of putting in place a system of checking in with yourself. Checking in not just with yourself, but also with your business with your strategy with where you currently are and where you want to go. In general, it’s a great idea to put together a consistent, and whether that’s weekly or monthly, or quarterly, and it can be at different levels, having a timeframe or a time in which you are intentionally setting it aside. Right? Just check-in. Right? Ultimately, actually, that’s the set of skills that you want to cultivate: checking in with you the voice in your head, checking in with the feelings, the emotions whose job it is to help you generate that new awareness, new analysis and new action, and to intentionally set up timeframes. Beau 17:33 Sure. Dr. Yishai 17:34 Without having to wait for the thoughts or the emotions to push you to intentionally ask yourself, What can I be more aware of? How do I generate new awareness at this moment? What analysis can I do? What important pieces of data? What are the most important pieces of data? What are the benchmarks? For my business? For what I’m working on? For my goals? What do I need to analyze? And how do I engage in that analysis? Based on new data that I’ve been accumulating over the past, whatever timeframe it is, since you last checked in. And then to ask yourself, is there any new action? Do I need to make a turn or pivot? Absolutely. setting that up. I want to say setting up a system like that is often way easier said than done, especially when we find ourselves in a season or a time where there’s so much work to do, in fact, I know, one of the things I often talk about is overwhelm. We may have touched on this, I think previously, and when we feel overloaded, we have more on our plate than we currently have the capacity to handle. We often borrow time, we borrow capacity from other places. One of the first places we often borrow capacity from is our lunch hour. Yes, our evenings, our weekends, we just start to borrow time from all kinds of other places. In addition to that, we often borrow time from ourselves even if it’s regularly scheduled, intentional planning, and I like to call it adapting in advance adaptation time. So instead of asking ourselves, Well, how do I ensure and protect the time that’s for me to generate new awareness, conduct an analysis and ask myself if there is new action I need to take, instead it’s, well, I’ve got so much work to do. I don’t have these 15 minutes that I already had in my calendar, I just need to keep doing and that’s where as I talked before, that’s when the blinders are on. And that habit brain that automatic brain is pushing us to keep doing in order to try to accomplish or achieve something, being able to recognize when our blinders are on. In such a way that’s getting in the way is another very important piece of this and by the way, like firefighters, your thoughts, and your feelings are actually they are designed to take the blinders off even when they’re on and being more aware of that can help you even in the reactive moment to set up more proactive moments. Beau 20:08 No, it’s super, super helpful. And you know, it’s funny, as you’re talking, I’m thinking that when I am being extremely reactive and tactical, that’s when my anxiety is usually the highest, because I know that I’m not doing what’s best for my business, and enjoy doing as well, is doing podcast being creative, you know, kind of face and name of my organization, versus the delivery mechanism behind the scenes. And an exercise that I did about three weeks ago, which I think may be beneficial to the folks listening, that literally and this was at the urging of what I mentors, basically, I took an Excel spreadsheet, and I mapped out my daily tasks, and I had some different columns, I forgot exactly precisely what they were but does it add value does not add value. Do I like doing it, can I outsource it? I kind of mapped out my day. And it really kind of changed my perspective on what I do when I do it, and am I adding value to an organization, it also helped me kind of alleviate some anxiety and uncover some of my gaps. And as such, and this is not a plug for my business, but I think it’s what other folks should really kind of pay attention to, I’ve hired a COO that’s going to work on a fractional basis, really kind of try to take some of those items that aren’t adding value. But it’s busy work off of my plate. So I can focus more on the strategic side of the house. And so you’re actively trying to kind of change not only my mindset, but my day to day work in hopes of kind of freeing up my mind. So I can kind of get back to being creative and doing the things that I really enjoy. And what I sought out to do when I started my business in the first place. Dr. Yishai 21:47 It’s such a great point. And if it’s okay for me to jump in and kind of add a piece or maybe even reframe a slight piece, there are some things you do that you don’t have to do that are still necessary to be done. Right? So there, it sounds to me like hiring a fractional COO is a way of shifting some operational work. Beau 22:08 Yes. Dr. Yishai 22:08 That the COO is going to have a lot of expertise in and be able perhaps to get done in a quicker, faster and even more streamlined way to 100%. What that means is it takes a giant chunk off your plate, it also puts into place a system, and a person who can handle that in a way that is far more expert. And so while it’s not a value add for you to do. In fact, it takes away from you doing the things that are in your zone of genius, or that you can add increasing or greater value to your business. Being aware of and shifting that over. Right is not about getting rid of something because it’s generally useless if something is generally useless, delegate it to the floor, get rid of it. Beau 22:53 Yes. Dr. Yishai 22:55 However, there are some things that are necessary to get done, and you’re not gonna be the most efficient person to do them. And that’s where what I’m hearing is, and I feel like the exercise you just outlined is the kind of thing that I often recommend as well. In getting that data, you got the data and you generated the data, and you intentionally created new awareness around what are the things that have to get done? Are you the most efficient or effective at doing it? Might it be even more efficient to hire someone else on a fractional basis to take care of that there’s a lot of analysis that needs to be done. I mean, there’s a lot of calculation that needs to be done, because there are times and ways in which doing that may still be a greater cost that you can afford, or that your business can afford, right. And that’s not the case right now for you. Beau 23:42 I feel like a lot of entrepreneurs get into that trap. It’s like, well, if I hire a COO or an executive assistant, and I’ve got an executive assistant as well, who’s been in godson, had them for over a year and a half the same exercise a year and a half ago and realize I need help. I feel far too many people get caught up in the dollars and cents, but it’s a lot of times, penny wise are foolish and there will be a cash outlay of course for the COO and the executive assistant, but then I’m able to kind of add more value to my business, which ultimately should equate to more dollars in a cycle over. Dr. Yishai 24:16 Right. It frees you up to create more growth for the business, your value add is growing the business greater in a way that admin work and operational work will not be able to do it needs to get done. That doesn’t mean that you doing it is going to help your business grow. In fact, what I’m hearing and what I think is often the case, when we get our nose to the grindstone so hard is that we are missing out that some of that work is work that entails we need to increase the capacity to do that. Because if we’re the only person that can do it, and we have to do it and there’s that much to do, and it’s really eating up all of our bandwidth then that is throttling the growth of the business? Beau 25:01 Hunter said there’s a significant opportunity cost. And that’s kind of what I was thinking about. It’s like, Man, I’m doing this work. But is it really adding value to the business? And candidly, I think there’s other things I should be doing that would add more value. So that’s kind of this, this where I woke up, and it’s like, what am I what am I doing? You know, I need to have a conversation with Dr. Yishai. get this worked out. Dr. Yishai 25:22 Right. And that’s where again, that kind of triple A treatment, as I like to call it, there is a new awareness. And then it entailed a new kind of analysis. Yeah. And that analysis, and I think we can get a little more into the nitty gritty, I think you shared, and it’s really helpful to share that nitty gritty, being very nuanced in that analysis being very clear, and honest and straightforward. And looking at as many of the details as you can, especially the relevant details are critical there. And when you do that analysis, well, it can actually help you to plan and take the most effective action that will help. And in this case, it’s helped to expand to increase your capacity to increase your bandwidth, offload things that take you far more of your time, energy, effort, and capacity than it would for someone else. And what that means is you’ve just doubled or tripled or more the opportunity to grow the business. Beau 26:22 Yeah, and also to what I the way I look at this, as well, as I’m trying to put myself in a better mindset. And positive mindset, I’m a big believer, a big proponent of it. Your optimism is phenomenal, so long as you’re grounded, right? But if I can kind of put myself in a better headspace, then that’s ultimately going to add to the top line. Right? Dr. Yishai 26:43 So it’s interesting, I often think that if we just think about trying to get out of the negative headspace, we’re not recognizing that the negative headspace, what I like to call uncomfortable is trying to help you adapt or adjust something, whether reactively or even proactively, so that you can create more of what you want, so that you can accomplish or achieve your goals so that you’re not constantly feeling throttled on your bandwidth, or that you’re not getting burned out that you’re not constantly in a state of stress and overwhelm. And I think a lot of people many times we think about those uncomfortable emotions as themselves being the problem. Rather than saying, they are not the problem. They’re the messenger. And they’re also there to help you find your way to a solution. And so if you can leverage those things, not only do you get out of them, right, it’s kind of like, let’s say, a firefighter is knocking on the door, and there’s smoke coming out your window. Well, the most effective thing you can do at that moment is open the door, invite the firefighter in, point them to wherever that window is, and together to figure out what is the cause of the smoke, is it dangerous, and if it is what needs to be done. And being able to do that sooner rather than later, instead of pushing it away because something’s undesirable or negative, can actually help you create growth. And from where I said, you don’t need to try to create a positive mentality or a positive mindset or a positive feeling. It will come when you address what needs to be addressed when you’re accomplishing and working towards your goals and dreams, which you can do by harnessing the uncomfortable. And again, that’s the adaptive brain trying to direct you to get you that data, that direction, that drive. Beau 28:31 No, I feel like ultimately, that’s kind of what led me here and led me to bring on the COOs. That was kind of the negative feeling that I was experiencing, because it’s like I can’t go like this for 1520 years. I mean, let alone another month. I’ve got to address it and figure it out. Dr. Yishai 28:49 Do you know one better? If you never felt those negative emotions. You may never have hired the COO up. Beau 28:57 I’ll just be doing the same thing over and over. So we’ll also be able, I really appreciate this Dr. Yishai I mean, the takeaway for me is to try to do a better job of acknowledging when I’m, my anxiety is rising, and I’m questioning whether or not I’m doing the right stuff. Ultimately, maybe even kind of put that on an Excel spreadsheet or T chart of sorts. I try to document my day. And candidly, I’m going to set up reminders, either two week increments, or maybe it’s three weeks just to kind of check back 15-minute exercise. Am I doing the right things? And so this has been very, very helpful, and I appreciate you, you taking the time. Dr. Yishai 29:36 My pleasure is a great recap. And again, I think highlighting it, it doesn’t have to be, it doesn’t have to take a long time. It can even be for as short as 15 minutes. Yeah. As long as it’s structured, as long as you’re collecting data as long as you’re paying attention to and recognizing that there’s a part of you that’s designed to help you get that awareness, and then you’re intentionally engaging in analysis to move yourself out of that place to move yourself towards where you want or need to be out of a place where you’re stuck or potentially getting towards getting stuck? That’s really going to be the key. Beau 30:08 Agree. Awesome man! I really appreciate you taking the time as always, where can people find you? Dr. Yishai 30:14 Great question. So you can find me on my website, DrYishai.com you’re also welcomed to look me up on LinkedIn and reach out. And of course, I know that we talked in some ways that were tactical at the same time, not every situation is gonna be the same. And all the details can be different. And sometimes you may need a little bit more help with some of those details. And if you’re interested in that, you’re of course welcome to reach out, either through my website or LinkedIn. Beau 30:37 Awesome man, I really appreciate the time and I think it’s almost time for you to start writing the book if you haven’t started yet. Dr. Yishai 30:42 I’m on it. Beau 30:44 Of course, you are. Awesome. Thanks for joining. Dr. Yishai 30:46 All right. Beau 30:47 Take care. Dr. Yishai 30:48 You too.