Automate Your Agency
Are you a founder dreaming of breaking free from the day-to-day grind?
Or perhaps you're looking to scale your company without burning out?
Welcome to Automate Your Agency with Alane Boyd and Micah Johnson, a podcast dedicated to helping you systemize and automate your business for more efficient, scalable operations that can run without you.
Join our hosts as they share battle-tested strategies and cutting-edge tools that take the guesswork out of systemizing your business. Drawing from their experience of growing their agency to 600+ active clients before their exit, Alane and Micah offer actionable insights on:
✅ Implementing effective software solutions
✅ Leveraging automation and AI to do more with less
✅ Creating workflows and systems that allow your business to run without you
✅ Preparing your company for a potential sale or exit
Each week, they take a deep dive into real-world operational challenges and showcase solutions they've implemented. Whether you want to double revenue without doubling headcount or build a business that runs smoothly in your absence, this podcast is your roadmap to success.
Subscribe to Automate Your Agency with Alane Boyd and Micah Johnson now on your favorite podcast platform and join other forward-thinking entrepreneurs as they transform their businesses into well-oiled machines that are primed for growth and ready for whatever the future holds!
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Automate Your Agency
How do I improve my employee onboarding by 800%?
Did you know researchers found that a well-defined employee onboarding process improves new hire retention by 82% and their productivity by more than 70%? 🤩
Employee onboarding doesn't have to be elaborate, but it should be leveraged to make your new hire feel prepared, welcomed, and seen. Expending a little extra effort to master your first impression will go a long way!
In this episode of Automate Your Agency, Alane and Micah unpack how a successful team building exercise became a valuable cornerstone in their employee onboarding process. Tune-in to learn how their unique personality playbooks have helped them build a more tight-knit, engaged global team and how you can enjoy the same benefits in your business! 🎉
Why Listen? 👇
- (1:56) Uncover the Inception of the Personality Playbook
- (3:05) Learn How to Implement Personality Playbooks into your Onboarding Process
- (5:28) Understand the Benefits of the Personality Playbook
- (7:01) Hear the Importance of Welcoming New Hires Properly
Feel free to review Alane's Personality Playbook to see it in action and check out 16 Personalities to take your free personality test today!
Are you interested in building a personality playbook of your own? Create Your Free Arvo account to leverage the personality playbook template that Alane and Micah use with their team!
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For more information, visit our website at biggestgoal.ai.
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0:00:00 - (Alane): Welcome to automate your agency. Every week we bring you expert insights, practical tips, and success stories that will help you streamline your business operations and boost your growth. Let's get started on your journey to more efficient and scalable operations.
0:00:18 - (Alane): All right, Micah, I want to talk about new hires that we have, but a very specific piece of something that we do that I think is kind of unique.
0:00:29 - (Micah): Okay, I'm all ears.
0:00:32 - (Alane): Our personality playbooks that we've created for ourselves and each new hire creates.
0:00:38 - (Micah): Yes. Can I tell you a secret about this that I probably have never told you until this podcast?
0:00:44 - (Alane): I don't know.
0:00:45 - (Micah): But yes, I totally did not believe these things would work.
0:00:51 - (Alane): That's not a secret. Your attitude tells me that. I know. I think I made yours for you because you were like stomping your feet about it. Not really stomping your feet feet, but you were not getting motivated to do it. So I did yours for you.
0:01:04 - (Micah): I wasn't motivated, and I can say why. It's because I thought about that concept and I felt like this is a bunch of extra work and nobody's going to read this and why are we doing this and all of those kind of extra things. But I tell you what, I became a true believer in this concept that you came up with and the idea that, well, I'll say the reason that I became a true believer is because the very first time we did it and the very first time we shared it and the very first time we hired somebody using this process, it was incredible.
0:01:44 - (Micah): So I'm going to, because you experienced it firsthand with implementing that and hiring somebody. So I'm just going to be quiet and let you tell the story.
0:01:56 - (Alane): So I'll explain what we're talking about first. So it actually stemmed from team building exercise that we did. So our team members are all over the world, and so a lot of times we've never met them in person. So getting to know somebody outside of work, it takes a long time. And so we did this team building exercise where it was with our whole team and we all did our personality tests and we did hobbies outside of work and things we enjoy.
0:02:25 - (Alane): And I thought, wow, that was a lot of fun. And you find out things that you never come up in conversation. Oh, you play tennis, too? I play tennis. You know, things like that. And then people become human. They're not just somebody 12 hours away from you that you talk to maybe ten minutes a day. No, you have real things in common with that person. So that's where the idea came from. So I thought, what if we each made our own personality playbooks, and so we have Arvo our software, and I thought we could each create our own.
0:02:59 - (Micah): And so maybe for the listeners, describe what's in a personality playbook so that they can mentally picture.
0:03:05 - (Alane): Yeah, so, great. So it's got a picture of you, you know, like a header image, so you get to pick your picture. It's got your name. And then some people will put their role within our organization. Or sometimes they come up with something really cute, like process diva or something completely unrelated to work. But just, like, a quick little description.
0:03:27 - (Micah): I mean, you don't have to call me out like that.
0:03:29 - (Alane): You are process diva. So it's got your name, and it's got your role, whether formal or informal, and then some highlights. So we'll have we all do the 16 personalities test whenever we're onboarding. So you put your personality in there. And some people really like Enneagram. So they'll have their enneagram number in there, too, bit about it. And that's what's really important, is that we have these templates that they can work from, too. So they're not building it from scratch, but that with their personality, it also has the description, because I don't have it all memorized and nobody else does. So if you're an Enneagram six, okay, well, what does that mean?
0:04:08 - (Alane): Then you can really start understanding, you know, what it's like to work with that person. So, that's the next part of the playbook. And then the next part is, how do you like to be communicated with? And this is really important because do not send me a novel. It will not be read. My brain shuts down. So I put that in my personality playbook. Other people put things that they like for communication and how they work. So things that are important.
0:04:35 - (Alane): And then the next part, people get to have fun with. And they put in three to five things that are hobbies, things they like, things they're passionate about. I'm very surprised at this, but a lot of people put their education in there, but they can have fun with it. They can add whatever. And this is my favorite part, because this is the human element that connects us. You get to see, there was a lady that worked for us, and her favorite thing was to go hiking on top of mountains with her husband and drink wine.
0:05:06 - (Alane): I'm like, you know what? I would do that in a heartbeat with you. And then she had two sons. You know, a lot of times, we don't talk about our personal lives like, you have a son. I have a son. They're the same age. So that's what our basic template looks like. And each person can then go and customize it during the hiring process. And their first day, that's what they get to do, is build their own.
0:05:28 - (Micah): Yeah. And so I remember we were hiring somebody for marketing. We just started this.
0:05:35 - (Alane): She was the very first one.
0:05:36 - (Micah): Very first one. And it made the hiring process. But if I remember correctly, and correct me if I'm wrong, she was so impressed with us having this in place that she showed her friends her personality playbook, your personality playbook. And her friends called us up and was like, do you have any other positions? Because, you know, I want to work at a place that cares about people like we do. I think the whole point behind this that really sold me on this Washington, by treating your new employees, your new team members, like humans and learning about them and caring about them and showing that you're also human, too.
0:06:20 - (Micah): Like, how do I like being communicated with? Or what are some of my, you know, personal things that I like doing? All of a sudden that brings a completely dynamic, a new dynamic to the hiring process, to the onboarding process, to being introduced to a new team. And all of this was happening before their first day.
0:06:40 - (Alane): Yes. So before her first day, this is part of our hiring process now. She was the first one that we implemented the personality playbook. But we always send a welcome email a couple of days before their first day listing what to expect. We can't wait to have you. And this is something that most companies do not do.
0:07:01 - (Micah): That's true.
0:07:02 - (Alane): Unless they work with us and we help them put it in place. They receive this email with expectations and that we know they're starting. Do you know how many times, like, people show up to work on their first day and the team forgets that they were coming that day? It's actually the stat is 75% of the time, the company is not ready for the new hire.
0:07:23 - (Micah): Yeah. And think of how that makes the new person.
0:07:26 - (Alane): They're new in this organization that's been operating without them, and you just told them that they don't matter, essentially.
0:07:33 - (Micah): Yep.
0:07:34 - (Alane): So that's not a great first impression, but it's so common that people just let it go. Okay, so our system, we send this welcome note, and I, this first time I linked my personality playbook and your personality playbook in it and said, we cannot wait to work.
0:07:50 - (Micah): The one you made for me.
0:07:51 - (Alane): Yes.
0:07:51 - (Micah): Yeah.
0:07:52 - (Alane): That's right. And I said, we cannot wait for you to come on board. You know, here's a little bit about more about myself and my business partner, Micah. And don't worry, you get to create your very own personality playbook on your first day so we can learn more about you. I was not expecting the reaction either, Micah. I just thought it was going to be, like, kind of cool and. And help, you know, it can be a little intimidating, especially with. With me, where I'm just, like, focused all day, and I don't tend to always be warm, even though I like being warm. It's just like, there's only so much time, so I can.
0:08:30 - (Micah): Yeah, let's get down to business.
0:08:31 - (Alane): Yeah, let's just do this. And so that instantly, she said she was at the hairdresser that day, and she showed her hairstylist, our personality playbooks and was like, this is the company I'm going to work for. How cool is this? Then she did. She sent it to all of her friends, and she was like, this is the kind of company I'm going to work for. How awesome. And they were like, man, do they have any other open jobs? Like, I want to go work for a company like that.
0:08:55 - (Alane): It was so simple. So after they received that their first day during their training, they get trained on how to make their own personality playbook. We have a template that they work from everything, and then they get to put that into our Slack when we welcome them to the team, then whoever the team is that they're working with now gets to know them. And our personality playbooks are saved in our Slack profiles.
0:09:20 - (Alane): So anytime somebody can't remember something about them, or maybe they get moved to a new team, or they start working with a new team member they hadn't worked before, bam. Click on it. It pulls it up, and now they can see top highlights of it.
0:09:34 - (Micah): I'm sold. It's one of my favorite parts of the onboarding process, a new hire process that we do now. So I definitely became a believer after that first one. And if we put this in a business sense, there's just the concept of how costly it is to find good quality people to hire them, to onboard them, only to let that onboarding process be painful for them or crappy in any way so that they second guess their choice in working with you as a business or as business owners.
0:10:10 - (Micah): No way. This is such a simple solution. You can put in place tomorrow. It doesn't even have to be fancy. Just like Alane outlined personality profile. Rewind this episode and go through the steps. But it's very, very easy to just put a template in place. Start implementing this into your onboarding process and mitigate all that risk with hiring and even getting referrals immediately from your existing hiring process. You didn't have to run additional ads. You didn't have to get additional references or resources or referrals or anything else that can be so costly, let alone turnover, right?
0:10:49 - (Alane): I mean, people want to come work for you. That's exactly what you want to have happen.
0:10:54 - (Micah): Totally.
0:10:55 - (Alane): And you know what we can do too. Micah maybe I'll link to my personality playbook in the show notes so people can see a template that they can work from.
0:11:04 - (Micah): Wow. Can't ask for more than that.
0:11:06 - (Alane): Then you'll all know my personality, know all about me.
0:11:10 - (Micah): Just remember, no novels, bulleted lists. That's how she likes being communicated to. So if you follow up with Alane after this episode, send a nice keep.
0:11:18 - (Alane): It short and simple. I don't need to know everything.
0:11:20 - (Micah): Alright, thanks everybody for listening. We really enjoyed recording this podcast. This is one of our favorite topics. If you have ideas or questions or want us to focus on any other topics, feel free to contact us. You can find us on workdayninja.com. we're on Workday Ninja on YouTube. You can find us on all the major podcast platforms.
0:11:43 - (Alane): Yeah.
0:11:44 - (Alane): Thanks for listening to this episode of Automate your agency. We hope you're inspired to take your business to the next level. We have free content and tools for automating your business at our website, workdayninja.com.
0:11:55 - (Micah): Dot, and join us next week as we dive into more ways to automate and scale your business.
0:12:00 - (Alane): Bye for now.
