[00:00:46] Zach Hammer: Welcome [00:01:00] back to the Real Estate Growth Hackers Show.

[00:01:01] On today’s episode, we’re gonna talk about How You Could Systematically Replace Yourself And Build A Business That Maximizes Your Time Leverage. Right?

[00:01:10] Ultimately, I think most of us are on some sort of path of trying to focus as much as possible on the things that we actually want to do, that we enjoy doing while still getting as big of a result as possible out of our business itself.

[00:01:24] I bet if you step back and look through day by day, whether you’re spending your time solely doing the things that you enjoy doing that produce a lot of value versus how many of the things that you do because you have to, you’ll probably find more of those things that you have to do than you want.

[00:01:39] We’re on this path of trying to remove as many of them as possible, leaving behind only the things that we actually enjoy doing. Does that sound fair, Charlie?

[00:01:46] Charlie Madison: That is the entrepreneur’s dream, right?-

[00:01:48] Zach Hammer: There you go. So, we’ll talk about how I think through systematically doing this, I’m gonna give you a bit of a process for how you could do this, how you could think about this and hopefully find more of these things that you could decide to take [00:02:00] on as a project.

[00:02:00] And ultimately, either get it off your plate or figure out the right ways to help somebody else or software to do some of these core tasks that are required to do business. How’s that sound?

[00:02:10] Charlie Madison: Let’s do it.

[00:02:11] Zach Hammer: Awesome. So again, joining me, Charlie Madison here, the man, the myth, the legend black eye, make him tap Jujitsu champion. We are glad to have you back. Real quick, please touch on the black eye and tell me the story of what happened to get you a shiner in your quest for jujitsu dominance.

[00:02:33] Charlie Madison: We were, the good news is that I won the match. So that’s what matters. And I went for a move and this guy, you know, you don’t punch, you don’t kick and he fool around like he was swinging a baseball bat, but it was his elbow right here. And he was afraid, he knocked it out. And,

[00:02:55] Zach Hammer: Oh, it was your eye.

[00:02:57] Charlie Madison: Yeah, the whole eye. He was afraid he [00:03:00] knocked it out. So I sat there for a little bit, he said, take as much time as you want, took a few seconds and then I came to and I put a lot of pressure on him and he tapped with a little bit of time left, so,

[00:03:12] Zach Hammer: Nice. Well, there you go. That’s what matters, that’s one of those things that’s been interesting to me. I mean, I’m only minorly familiar with jujitsu, but that’s my understanding as well. Jujitsu isn’t like punching and kicking. It’s largely grappling and that sort of thing. Right.

[00:03:26] So, when you come back with the damage and the wounds from it. It really is, it’s those typically happen when something happened accidentally rather,

[00:03:35] Charlie Madison: Not on purpose.

[00:03:36] Zach Hammer: Right. Yeah.

[00:03:37] Charlie Madison: Yeah. I came home and the wife said, you look like a real fighter.

[00:03:44] Zach Hammer: Good call.

[00:03:45] Charlie Madison: Yeah.

[00:03:46] Zach Hammer: Nice. Well, yeah, so let’s go ahead and dive into the topic today. So, really the reason why I wanted to talk about this, I think foundationally, a lot of people inherently want this already, right? Like, this isn’t something that I’m [00:04:00] talking about that people aren’t aware of, wanting the end result.

[00:04:03] I think most of the people listening will already be in the process of trying to solve this problem in some way. And so what I wanted to do is I wanted to dive into how I think through this and some actual steps that you can do that get you closer I. to the end result of finding those places where you can remove yourself from the processes in your business and replace yourself either with software automation or people in order to build a business built on systems rather than built on yourself and your time.

[00:04:32] And so, this isn’t designed to be the end all, be all solution for this. It’s my thoughts and kind of some action steps that people could take. So, does that make sense? Does that sound fair?

[00:04:42] Charlie Madison: Yeah, I want to hear it.

[00:04:44] Zach Hammer: Awesome. So, I feel like on something like this tends to be a big process that people are going through. It could feel overwhelming, it could feel monumental in terms of where do I start? How do I actually even figure out how to do this? And so typically what happens is either [00:05:00] people do nothing and just end up in the same place where they are or the thing that they do is they just shoot wildly and blindly and solve whatever they can think of that’s right in front of them.

[00:05:09] And so, what I’m about to share is a process of maybe thinking through it a little bit more strategically, where you could be a little bit more conscious of all the opportunities in front of you, and then narrowing in on the ones that are likely to get you the bigger results.

[00:05:22] And so in terms of where to start, I recommend literally setting a timer for about 15 minutes and just brain dump all of the big processes that you can think of that have to happen in order for your business to exist, for it to move forward, for it to actually operate. And there’s some big buckets that I believe basically everything that your business does could fit in.

[00:05:49] Those buckets are as follows: One, is your create business bucket, okay? And your create business bucket is everything that leads to somebody becoming a customer or [00:06:00] client, right? So, at whatever point somebody moves from this is a potential opportunity into this person is somebody that I consider, somebody that I am directly helping, that it’s my job to get them some sort of successful end result. Right?

[00:06:13] Anything that leads up to that point is your create business bucket. So that could be things like lead generation marketing, your follow up systems, your nurture systems, listing presentations, buyer presentations, anything that ultimately creates that result where somebody is now your client. Right?

[00:06:30] Does that make sense?

[00:06:31] Charlie Madison: Yeah.

[00:06:32] Zach Hammer: Perfect. The next bucket is what I call the service business bucket, right? And that’s everything that happens after the create business bucket in terms of all the things that you do in order to deliver on the promises that you made in order to get them to be your client or your customer. Right?

[00:06:48] So that’s gonna be showing homes, marketing listings, submitting and writing offers, negotiating, managing a transaction from contract to close. Right? All of those things that ultimately end up [00:07:00] for sellers with their homes successfully sold or for buyers with them successfully acquiring a property that meets their needs. Right?

[00:07:08] So, whatever those processes are that you have that are directly responsible for those outcomes, after they become a client, those are your service business bucket, right? Whatever you do in that process to create that result.

[00:07:19] The next bucket is probably one of our, least favorite buckets. Typically as entrepreneurs and business owners it’s our managed business bucket. And so these are all the things that are neither responsible for creating business nor responsible for actually servicing your clients or customers, but they’re the things that are still necessary for your business to exist, right?

[00:07:42] And so these are gonna be things like your bookkeeping, your taxes, payroll, employee onboarding, servicing, training, all of that kind of stuff, right? The things that they’re part of making sure your organization runs, but they aren’t directly involved in the deliverables of creating [00:08:00] opportunities or servicing those opportunities.

[00:08:02] Does that make sense?

[00:08:03] Charlie Madison: Yep. So CEU’s paying your realtor dues, all of those kinda like, changing the oil on your car. It is that kind of stuff for your business.

[00:08:11] Zach Hammer: Exactly, right. Whereas, if the other processes are more equivalent to putting fuel in your tank is like the equivalent of create business, right? It’s the thing that lets you go and then knowing where you’re going and the process of how to navigate there is closer to like your service business.

[00:08:27] All of the other stuff that keeps your car running as your managed business. Right?

[00:08:31] And then the last bucket, and this is one that people may or may not even have systems for. They may not think about what they’re doing and how it fits in this bucket, but it’s one of my favorite buckets and it’s improved business.

[00:08:43] So these are all the things that you do to systematically look at manage business, service business, create business, and make them better, to iterate, improve, and optimize them, right? You should have some level of systems in place to say, what do I do to grow? [00:09:00] What do I do to improve? What do I do to learn from my stakes and improve, right?

[00:09:04] And so there could be all sorts of things in this. It could be that you have specific events that you regularly attend, or maybe your system is that you know that you want to attend X number of events per year, and your goal is to figure out which of the most ideal to attend because you learn the most or you make the best connections or whatever, right?

[00:09:20] Maybe your systems are you know, being part of a mastermind. Maybe your systems are how you look at how you’re creating business and figuring out how you check in weekly to optimize that process and dial it in and improve on it. Right?

[00:09:35] Does that make sense in terms of what our improved business processes might look like?

[00:09:39] Charlie Madison: Yeah. And would this be something like, you know, there’s different systems you can follow, like you are gonna run EOS with traction, or there’s a bunch of different things like that. How are you that kind of encompasses all of that? Is that one of those things?

[00:09:53] Zach Hammer: Exactly. So, to me, the other way to look at it is, improve business to me is when in the [00:10:00] EMF, when we talk about the difference between work in your business versus work on your business. Improve businesses all the ways that you work on your business rather than in your business.

[00:10:09] Create business, service business and manage business are all processes that are necessary just for your business to exist, but improve businesses all the ways that you make those things better and you improve them over time. Does that make sense?

[00:10:20] Charlie Madison: Yep.

[00:10:21] Zach Hammer: Perfect. And so again, those are just the different buckets.

[00:10:25] Again, create business, service business, manage business, improve business. What you’re going to do tactically is you’re gonna spend 15 minutes thinking through your different processes that exist in those different buckets, and you’re just gonna write ’em out. And these are big processes, big buckets, right?

[00:10:41] Like, maybe we’re writing Facebook ads to generate leads. Maybe we’re writing down you know, writing emails to this style of person in order to create opportunities. Maybe it’s prospecting, maybe it’s writing offers, right? Like as a bigger bucket.

[00:10:58] Okay, so you’re gonna write out [00:11:00] the high level concepts. We’re not looking to be super detailed in terms of the making those processes happen. We’re just looking for the big buckets of what are we actually doing in order for our business to exist. Okay, so you’re gonna do that for about 15 minutes.

[00:11:15] And the goal is not necessarily to be exhaustive, but chances are the things that come top of mind in that time are going to be some of the more pressing, the more necessary things typically and just setting it to a specific time, gives you a timeframe to actually accomplish this, right?

[00:11:30] Because this can be the kind of thing that could go on forever. Or if you feel like you have unlimited time to do it then you may not even write much. Right? Whereas if you know, I’m gonna sit here for 15 minutes, I’m gonna write about this, you might get to, you know. Minute 10 and feel like you’ve run out, but you know, you’ve got five more minutes.

[00:11:47] So you keep thinking, you keep trying and you keep going. Your goal here isn’t to edit, right? This is a brainstorm kind of thing, you’re writing everything out. It’s okay. Maybe you go too narrow on part of it and you get too detailed, that’s [00:12:00] okay, but your goal is to just keep writing for the 15 minutes.

[00:12:04] Does that make sense?

[00:12:05] Charlie Madison: Yep. Keep writing.

[00:12:06] Zach Hammer: Perfect. So, then after you’ve done that process for 15 minutes, then you’re going to do another round where you look at one of those big processes and you’re gonna spend another 15 minutes trying to detail out all of the steps that it takes to run that process. Right? And what I would recommend is maybe we actually break this into two, right?

[00:12:30] We’re gonna spend five minutes at max, and we’re gonna look through the list that we created in our first segment. And we’re gonna ask ourselves the question, which of these do I actually, this is a good way to think through this. Which of these takes the most of my time that I like doing the least? Right?

[00:12:48] Because that is our highest priority of what we could remove if possible. Right? If you are doing something or if something is happening in your business that takes it at a time that you hate doing, that is great to get off. Yeah, that’s great to [00:13:00] get off your plate right.

[00:13:01] So, go through and ask yourself that question. What do I like doing? What do I not like doing? Where do I feel most necessary? Where do I not feel necessary? Those sorts of things and pick a task that feels like if you could get it off your plate, that would be very meaningful for you and your business in terms of feeling better about the way that your business works, right?

[00:13:19] So spend at most five minutes just looking through your tasks and pick one, okay? Once you’ve picked it, now you go through and you do a second round of 15 minutes, and I want you to write out every step in that process, right? What does it take to run that bigger system? What does it look like to run your followup sequence? What are the steps involved?

[00:13:38] And think about it in terms of actions that somebody has to take, right? It’s upload list, filter lists for these things, write this email, edit this email, whatever it is, right? Like, think about it step by step, try and go as detailed as possible, thinking through it in intricacy.

[00:13:56] Think through very specifically the steps and actions that need to happen. It [00:14:00] should be tied to a verb, right? What is the action that somebody takes or that something has to happen in order to move it through that sequence further. Does that make sense?

[00:14:09] Charlie Madison: Yep. So could one of these be like, one of ’em that I had a lot of help with this. Like, could it be working with a buyer, would that be too big or would it be showing a home? How detailed would we get here?

[00:14:22] Zach Hammer: That’s a good question. I think on this one we could be a little bit loose and that’s okay. Right? So like, working with a buyer could be a great place to start if you’re not sure, like maybe this is your first time starting this process and you’re just trying to figure out where to start. Right?

[00:14:35] And you’re like, I know that I spend a ton of time working with buyers. I don’t enjoy how much time I spend working with buyers. I’d like to remove some portion of this process, right? So for that, working with a buyer could be fine to start with. And then you go through and you start detailing out everything that you do in the process of working with a buyer.

[00:14:54] But maybe you’ve been down this road a little bit and you’re just looking for your next thing to work on, and [00:15:00] you’ve already automated a lot of the aspects of working with a buyer. So you’re kind of doing this a little bit iteratively, and you’re thinking through, you know what? I spend a lot of time in my buyer process.

[00:15:11] Just with the, getting the opportunity to show homes, right? And that process of what does the showing homes process look like? Right? And so maybe you drill into that and you think through all the steps of how do I come up with the listings that we’re ultimately gonna see? How do I plan the route? How do I coordinate around who’s driving and where we’re meeting up and what that process looks like? How do I schedule it in my day? Right?

[00:15:34] Like, all of these things that sort of add up to the sub process, that could be where you drill into if maybe you’ve automated a lot of things or you’ve delegated a lot and you’re trying to zero in.

[00:15:44] So, there isn’t an exact right or wrong to this. It’s more a matter of where are you and where do you see the biggest opportunity to start. Does that make

[00:15:51] Charlie Madison: Nice. Yep. I love that.

[00:15:53] Zach Hammer: Perfect. And so, if on this one, I feel a little bit less strict on, [00:16:00] you have to spend the whole 15 minutes on that one task, right?

[00:16:04] To me, this is the kind where get as detailed as you feel like you could do readily without trying to force yourself. And then if you feel like you completed it, pick a secondary task and start detailing that one, right? Still do the full 15 minutes, but you could try and detail out multiple tasks if you need to.

[00:16:20] And so, like you go to a second, maybe a third, if you feel like you, you got through in as far a level of detail as you could think through right now, right? But that’s the idea, so 15 minutes, at the end of 15 minutes, then what you’re gonna do is you’re gonna go through each step in that process. And you’re gonna ask yourself a series of questions. And we were actually talking about this before. I would love, so you mentioned that these questions come from strategic coach. Right?

[00:16:45] Charlie Madison: All right.

[00:16:46] Zach Hammer: Can you go ahead and walk me through what the questions are that we’re gonna ask of each step that we’re doing in our process?

[00:16:53] Charlie Madison: Yeah. And so the first one is looking at it. Can I delete it?

[00:16:57] Zach Hammer: Right.

[00:16:58] Charlie Madison: No. Step one, can I just [00:17:00] completely remove it?

[00:17:01] Zach Hammer: And that’s really important, right? Because we are often doing things that if you really step back and ask yourself, is this necessary for me to get this result? Maybe it’s not right, like maybe I don’t need to be doing this. Why am I doing this? Maybe this is me taking time because I feel like I need to but it doesn’t actually help.

[00:17:18] And do note as you’re going through these questions. This isn’t an exact, like you start at the beginning and you need a clear, exact yes or no on this as you go through. But these are the kinds of questions that you wanna be thinking through as you’re going through and looking at the list, right?

[00:17:32] So you may not start thinking, can this be deleted? But then you get to a later step and you’re like, you know what? I kind of solve this thing down here. Maybe I don’t need to do it then, or maybe I only need to do it the once, or maybe if I did it earlier, then it would solve it for all the rest of these. Right?

[00:17:46] Anyway, so

[00:17:47] Charlie Madison: Right?

[00:17:47] Zach Hammer: Go ahead and continue. So, can this be deleted?

[00:17:50] Charlie Madison: And the answer could be yes, no, or maybe. Right?

[00:17:53] And then if it can’t be deleted, the next question is, can I automate it?

[00:17:57] Zach Hammer: Right, and that one to me is really [00:18:00] powerful and it’s good that’s the next one that we start with, right? Because if ever possible, typically this may not be 100% of the case, but typically if something could be automated with software, tools or machinery, when you’re playing a long enough game, that’s almost always the right answer.

[00:18:17] Charlie Madison: All right.

[00:18:17] Zach Hammer: Right? That if it can be done and done at the level that you need it to be by software or some sort of tool. Even if it might like, hurt upfront in terms of the cost or whatever in a long enough time horizon, that typically pays for itself pretty quickly, pretty effectively when you’re looking at reliability, when you’re looking at consistency, when you’re looking at those sorts of things.

[00:18:41] So, I love that that’s the next question, because you wanna automate as much as you can, and while there might be times where it’s not worth the cost. Those are more rare than they are common. It’s typically worth whatever the cost looks like because those costs are typically in line with, you know, [00:19:00] what would make sense financially compared to having a person do it.

[00:19:02] Charlie Madison: Right. Yeah. You know, software can be improved on quicker than updating your training manual. Computers are getting faster, so if it takes five minutes now, it may take two and a half minutes and six months. There’s yeah, so makes a lot of sense. Can you automate it? And now with AI, what you’ve been talking about is how you can change a lot of that.

[00:19:23] If it can’t be automated, oh, go ahead.

[00:19:25] Zach Hammer: Yeah. So, and that’s the key. So, go ahead and say what the next question is, and we’ll talk about how these are blending a little bit. Go ahead and say what the next question is, and we’ll talk about that a little bit more.

[00:19:35] Charlie Madison: So if you can’t automate it, then can you delegate it?

[00:19:39] Zach Hammer: Right, or what parts could be delegated. Right? So maybe when you’re thinking through the system, parts of it can be delegated, but other parts you feel like they can’t be. So, typically when we say delegated, we’re meaning, so if automated is software or machinery. Right?

[00:19:53] Like, that’s more often we’re dealing with software at this point, but occasionally something could be automated literally with like a tool, like a [00:20:00] physical, something that exists in the world, right? Delegated, we’re typically meaning a person, right? We’re saying some person is going to handle this, or maybe a team even some humans are gonna actually handle this.

[00:20:11] So, what’s interesting and this is part of what we’re exploring in our AI Mastermind right now is, all of the ways that more and more is shifting from what previously required a person into now being able to be done by software via AI. Right?

[00:20:28] And so, we’re diving in and we’re figuring out what are the things that are now possible via AI that previously we used to have a person do? But understanding, there are still things that need to be done by a person. And not everything can be automated at this point, right?

[00:20:46] Like, even things that were maybe on the horizon of it being able to be done by software, by a tool, it’s not there yet. Right? And the tools aren’t there yet, but we’re staying aware of what can be.

[00:20:57] So, we’re asking ourselves the question and we’re gaining enough [00:21:00] awareness of what these tools are capable of in order to be able to start to see what aspects of this system can potentially be leveraged by AI, where previously, we had to have a person do this. And the reason for that is largely, like, shoot.

[00:21:16] The goal here isn’t to like eliminate jobs, but in business we do constantly need to figure out how to put everything to its highest and best use. If something can be done by a machine and done at the same level as was being done by a human, we need to typically have it be done by the machine so that humans can be put to work in the ways where they serve the best value. Right.?

[00:21:40] Where they bring the most to the table. Because, go ahead.

[00:21:43] Charlie Madison: Humans can do what only humans can do.

[00:21:45] Zach Hammer: Exactly. Because if you don’t, your competition will and they’re gonna beat you, right? And then nobody has a job at your business because you’re out of business. Right? So, we don’t get to do this stuff in a vacuum. We are constantly in this world of iterating, [00:22:00] right? Like, we don’t wanna be the people that decide, you know, we are not gonna use the internet ’cause it’s gonna put libraries out of business. Right? That doesn’t make any sense.

[00:22:09] We continue to move forward, we continue to progress and is there still a place for the, you know, for the library? Well, sure, right? Physical books, there’s still some power at holding a book. People enjoy that experience of further, like libraries have shifted to be like community centers in a lot of cases, they do more than just offer books to read.

[00:22:26] So things shift to change over time. And our goal isn’t to put people outta work, but our goal is to make sure that when we are expending capital in order to create a result, we’re doing so as efficiently as possible and maximizing the human capital to its full potential, rather than just keeping people in employed when they could be doing bigger, better things. Right.?

[00:22:47] Anyway, so I, go ahead.

[00:22:48] Charlie Madison: It makes me think of Jeff Bezos, you know, he does his annual letter for Amazon. And you know, years ago, one of his, he said is we always ask, like, there’s lots of [00:23:00] things that change in business.

[00:23:01] Zach Hammer: Right.

[00:23:02] Charlie Madison: But there’s a few things that are always gonna stay the same. So what is it that the customer’s always going to want?

[00:23:08] And they’re always going to want it cheaper, faster, and better. And I don’t know if he said better or not. And then if a machine can do that, but then you have the machine do it, and then it frees up the humans to do, because the goal is to provide the most value, right? Profitably, you know? And so if you can provide more value, then if you don’t, like you said, your competitors will, because the consumer wants the fastest, cheapest, best.

[00:23:37] Zach Hammer: Right. And there is a place for differentiation as well, right? So like, this isn’t to say that everything needs to move to AI and just because it can be automated means that it should like as for instance, I think customer service is one of those examples where doing that in the right way makes a really big difference.

[00:23:56] I’m sure all of us have had experience of being on the other end of this [00:24:00] is different than customer service as an example, you’ve been on the other end where you call in to get support and what you get on the other end is robot phone tree hell of press one for this, press and we just sit there pounding zero trying to get to talk to a human because we know that like the automated system won’t answer the question because we’ve already either been through the automated system, we’ve looked it up online or whatever.

[00:24:25] It’s like, no, I need to talk to a human, let me talk to a human. Anyway, and then maybe a little bit in between, the further extreme of full custom support would be maybe where it’s outsourced to another country that maybe the language isn’t exactly the same. Maybe there’s a difference in accent that makes it harder to understand.

[00:24:41] But it’s being done so that it’s not, the labor is cheaper while still trying to do the service, right? Like that would be like an in-between, as a potential solution. And then to the far end of you pick up the phone and it’s somebody who they speak the language in a way that sounds the same as you. They live their life in a similar way to you, so they understand your context [00:25:00] more. So they’re able to provide that level of service at a level that just feels like it fits better. Right?

[00:25:03] Zach Hammer: And what’s interesting is that none of those are fully right or wrong. Part of it depends on what your offering is, how you’re trying to stand apart all of that sort of thing. So, there is potentially a right mix for you in that vein. But the key is like, as for instance, if you’re trying to be the cost efficient provider and you’re providing complete custom boutique service, something doesn’t make sense there, right? Like something’s not adding up.

[00:25:30] And so try to figure out that right mix where can automation be deployed tactically to do things that really you could get somebody the same result without the human in place, versus really understandings like, no humans necessary here because of these reasons. And not just choosing to believe that, but actually experiencing that, seeing it, testing it out and learning where those lines are, right?

[00:25:51] Because it keeps changing and that’s sort of the point of this right now is that we’re seeing there’s a lot more opportunities for what required a human before that maybe [00:26:00] don’t anymore.

[00:26:01] And being aware of those, seeing where those opportunities are, but seeing where humans really are still necessary, I think is important right now to stay competitive. Right?

[00:26:08] Charlie Madison: Yeah. And you know, I’ve got another Amazon example of really great customer support. You know, over the holiday season I ordered a phone and the phone was not in the box, just the charger. Yeah, I don’t know how that happens? Yeah, the charger was there, not the phone. So I hop on customer support.

[00:26:26] I’m expecting it’s gonna be terrible. Right? And it starts out, there’s a little chat box. They say, hold on one second. I tell someone and they immediately say, can I give you a call?

[00:26:36] Zach Hammer: Right,

[00:26:36] Charlie Madison: And they gave me a call, they said, great, here’s exactly what to do. And like they just ship me another phone like.

[00:26:43] Zach Hammer: Right.

[00:26:43] Charlie Madison: And like that was a great, they’ve used, Amazon’s, used so much technology that they can deliver.

[00:26:51] I mean, when have you ever, you know, when have I talked about a huge store that delivered great customer service right now? Because it was [00:27:00] unbelievable, it was so simple.

[00:27:01] Zach Hammer: Right. Yeah, absolutely. And I think the key is that you focus on the end result. You focus on what do we need to deliver and what’s the path, best path to do that the most efficiently, rather than focusing on what is our normal delivery path and just continuing to do it. Right?

[00:27:20] That’s the key of making sure that you have consistency on that and focus on the outcomes rather than the process itself in order to figure out what’s the ideal way to do it. And you mentioned another one that I actually, I really like as well. ’cause it shows the transition we’re in right now of something that previously required a human that no longer requires a human, but or the email example that you were sharing with me earlier, can you go into that about how it used to be a delegate, but now it’s mostly an automate with a little bit of a work that only you can do kind of process.

[00:27:55] Charlie Madison: Yeah, I’ve got a friend and he used to have an admin that would read [00:28:00] all of his emails and any of ’em that needed to be sent, she would actually type up the responses and leave it in his draft folder and he would go through edit it if needed, and hit send. And so all of his email was just done really well, really quickly.

[00:28:16] Now what he’s got is he’s actually hooked up ChatGPT API to his email and he’s got a custom prompt that says, you know, your MBA customer assistant trained in Dale Carnegie support. And, you know, he knows his voice and says, respond to this email.

[00:28:37] So, whereas it used to be a human that would compose the drafts. Now ChatGPT drafts the email and leaves it in the inbox. So he does the exact same thing, but now the person that works for him can actually spend time on other stuff. And that’s a really great example of what’s possible now.

[00:28:54] Zach Hammer: Yeah, exactly. And so what’s really cool about that is that shows you, it used to [00:29:00] require a human to draft the email. But a lot of tasks like that, of getting your initial draft, whether it’s blog posts, social posts, emails, scripts for videos, titles, maybe even things like documentation, SOP’s, processes, those sorts of things.

[00:29:15] It used to require a human to go from idea through to draft. Now it might only require the human to say, here’s the thing, do all the in between. And then like, human has final editing need, but otherwise the computer could do most of the in between. Right? To get you 80 to 90% of the way done without having to have a person write every single word. Right? And that’s the key is like right now, learning where that line is learning.

[00:29:43] I. Learning that art of where do we still need the human? Where can we automate? ’cause it’s changing and it’s shifting a lot. And so, that’s what we’re seeing in the world right now and that’s part of why I wanted to create this episode to talk about this process so that you could see where some of those opportunities might be.

[00:29:58] And even if you’ve gone through and you’ve [00:30:00] automated a lot of your systems, maybe it’s time to go through it again and to start thinking through where am I delegating that maybe I should be leveraging AI to equip that person to do more, to be able to step up to produce at a higher quantity or a higher quality ,those sorts of ideas for sure.

[00:30:17] And then, so you know, we went through those three questions. Can it be deleted? Can it be automated? Can it be delegated? And essentially if the answer is no to all of those, then what you’re left with is you’re left with the work that only you can do. And those are the steps in the process that are required of you.

[00:30:34] One thing to note, I wanna mention the difference. You may not be able to delegate something right now, but you know, it could be delegated, right? Maybe your business doesn’t have the revenue to support bringing somebody on to do a portion of work, but as for instance, you probably aren’t needed to build your websites or write every single one of your emails or like, those sorts of ideas.

[00:30:58] Maybe you still are the person who [00:31:00] steps in and does those, but you know, I am running a process that in the long run of my business, I could have somebody else do. And I’m really only necessary at this point of thinking through what is the email that needs to be written? Or what are the topics that we’re actually gonna create videos on? Or whatever, right?

[00:31:16] And so in understanding that, you can at least understand where are you choosing currently to operate in your business because of where your business is rather than you know, sort of taking it as a given, I have to be the one to do this. Does that make sense?

[00:31:32] Charlie Madison: Yeah.

[00:31:33] Zach Hammer: Perfect, ’cause when you have clarity on that, then as your business continues to grow, then you might just already be armed and ready to say, man, I know that I could get somebody into this role that I’m doing and I’m running it more like a system rather than, you know, honestly diluting myself into thinking I’m necessary here. It’s like, no, I’m not necessary here, but I am choosing to do this process because that’s what’s needed right now.

[00:31:54] But as we grow, as our team grows, as the opportunities grow, maybe it starts to make sense to [00:32:00] step out of roles that you’re currently running because it’s not the best use of your time anymore.

[00:32:04] And so you continue to iterate over that and figure out more and more places that you could step out of. And so, there you go. I mean, that’s the process. Over time, you’ll be able to find more and more processes that you can leverage either software tools or delegation in order to step outta the process and do that.

[00:32:20] And then once you find those processes, then the work is, well, how do you systemize it, right? Like, what do you actually do? And that’s gonna be a combination of documenting the process step by step, putting together SOP’s on how it’s done, because there is likely humans involved somewhere, right?

[00:32:35] Either in teeing up the process or dealing with the end results of what automation does. So you gotta document, you know, what do those processes look like? But yeah that’s ultimately what you do in order to build out a process that you could step away from.

[00:32:47] So, again, what that looks like is you’re gonna brain dump all of your high level processes, you’re gonna think about them in these buckets, create business, service business, manage business, improve business. After you’ve gone through and you’ve done that for 15 minutes, you’re gonna take, [00:33:00] at most five minutes, you’re gonna look for the processes in there, the key things that you’re doing in your business.

[00:33:06] And you’re gonna look for your top 1, 2, 3, that you think, I spend a lot of time here and I like it the least. Right?

[00:33:15] Charlie Madison: All right.

[00:33:16] Zach Hammer: And those are your high priority things to get off your plate, and so then for those, you’re gonna pick your top one of those and you’re gonna spend another 15 minutes. You’re gonna detail out what all has to happen in order for that thing to be accomplished, right?

[00:33:28] What are the step-by-step processes as detailed as you could make it, that has to happen in order for that to be accomplished. And then you go through each step after that 15 minutes, and you ask yourself these questions, can it be deleted? Can this be automated? Can it be delegated? And then if the answer is no to all of those, that’s what you’re left to do. If the answer is yes, then your work is to start figuring out how to systemize it, how to document it, how to turn it into a process that you can get it off your plate.

[00:33:56] And that’s the process there. So, does that make sense? Is there anywhere that’s [00:34:00] left unclear or that you feel like you wouldn’t be able to run with that process and find things that you could get off your plate?

[00:34:06] Charlie Madison: Yeah, I think that makes sense. One thing that I like that Dan Sullivan kind of ends with is he does break down stuff into stuff that’s irritating that I’m okay with and that are fascinating. And as I go through this, his goal is to end up with stuff that’s only fascinating to him, or things as Naval says, it looks like work to others, but it feels play to me, and I like that as kind of a overarching, like, when am I done with this? You know, for me it’s when I’m doing what fascinates me and brings in the money, you know?

[00:34:42] Zach Hammer: Exactly. The goal for all of us, if you’re building a business, you want to keep those things that are fascinating and that you provide a lot of value in and you wanna find people who, their thing that they’re fascinated in, that they bring a ton of value is the things that you don’t like doing. Right?

[00:34:58] Because they exist, right? [00:35:00] Like the things that are necessary, somebody else is fascinated by them and likely can do ’em better than you, right? And so you find those people and you start surrounding yourself with a unique team that can accomplish those things.

[00:35:10] And you do a combination of automations and delegations in order to figure out how to put together that right mix of people and systems that creates the ideal outcomes that you’re looking to create through your business.

[00:35:21] And so yeah, that’s the process. Hopefully that makes it easier for people to find those key things that they could start working on automating and removing themselves from. And and yeah, if you’re looking for more clarity on where AI fits into that mix, that’s the work that we’re doing in our AI Mastermind.

[00:35:36] I mentioned that earlier, we’re getting together, we’re talking through very specifically and tactically how can we replace systems with AI? What are the ways that’s working? Everything from marketing, follow up, sales, back office stuff, right? We’re diving into everything that we can, building out SOP’s, learning how these AI tools can be deployed right now, and how we can really maximize our output in a high quality [00:36:00] way while still creating those key outcomes that we need to for our businesses.

[00:36:04] So, if that sounds interesting to you check out what we’re up to. Reach out to us at RealEstateGrowthHackers.com/Contact. We don’t have a public page, this is a small group of people that we’re getting together doing this.

[00:36:15] So reach out to us on that contact page. Let us know you’re interested and we’ll get you the details of what we’re doing, how it works, all of that and see if it’s a good fit. And if it is, then we’ll invite you to it and you can come and join us. Be part of that fun. Otherwise, if you’re looking for some great places to start automating things and seeing some of the ways that AI could be deployed, we have a really cool thing that we put together called the Vault.

[00:36:35] The vault is a set of prompts and training and AI stuff that we’ve put together really packs lot of power behind it. We just recently did an episode on the Vault. If you want to get that, you can go to RealEstateGrowthHackers.com/TheVault. It’s completely free, at least currently.

[00:36:49] I know maybe some point I’ll start charging for it, but it isn’t the same cookie cutter set of prompts and stuff that you may have seen from other places. It isn’t regurgitated garbage that I’m putting in front of [00:37:00] you to just have an opportunity to generate leads and emails. Right?

[00:37:03] This is actual stuff that I’ve used and developed in my business on behalf of clients that I’ve put into practice in the real world. You know, Charlie, can you speak to for a second just the difference in what you find in the vault, maybe compared to what people might find normally around AI and prompting and all that?

[00:37:19] Charlie Madison: In two words, it works. I mean, like, it’s actual stuff. Like, I mean, I literally go back like at least five times a week. I go back to the prompts and the vault. And now, like it’s just gotten to be like, it’s the foundation, it’s the building blocks. Because like the more context we give AI, the better it works and you’ve iterated and you know, like the context to give it without it being overwhelming.

[00:37:49] And these are the tools that, I mean, literally no matter what prompt I’m, what I’m trying to get AI to do, in your building blocks, you’ve got one of them there that I can use. So I can [00:38:00] get, I mean, the perfect prompt within like five minutes. And compared to, you know, I was looking, I downloaded this Excel of 1500 prompts and they were all one-liners, you know, like, give me five listicle items, like that’s not helpful for me.

[00:38:16] So I mean, it is, I mean it really is the meat and potatoes of. And you don’t even have to learn anything. Like it’s really a copy and paste, and it works like if only everything that I signed up for worked this well.

[00:38:31] Zach Hammer: Indeed. Well, there you go. So, thank you for the kind words, Charlie. So yeah, if you want that, you can go to RealEstateGrowthHackers.com/TheVault. Again, it’s free to access. We keep it updated, it’s not everything that we’ve put together. If you want everything that we put together, you gotta join the AI Mastermind in order to get everything.

[00:38:49] But we put together some of our top prompts. Again, it’s not just the bottom of the barrel stuff. It’s stuff that literally I’m pointing to the stuff at the vault when we’re working with our AI Mastermind as well. So [00:39:00] it’s good stuff, it’s powerful stuff that I reference every day.

[00:39:03] People that are part of our mastermind are referencing as well. So definitely check that out. Yeah. So hopefully this was a helpful episode for you wanna make sure that we’re helping get you to the finish line on Maximizing The Value That Your Business Outputs Compared To The Amount Of Effort that it takes to get there.

[00:39:19] This is all part of that process of figuring out how you can find those areas to automate, to delegate, and to really systemize your business more and more over time as we continue to iterate and improve on our businesses.

[00:39:31] So, there we go. Until next time, this has been Real Estate Growth Hackers, and we’ll catch you on the next one.

[00:39:36] Charlie Madison: Bye.

[00:39:37] ​[00:40:00]