Finding the Best Fit Therapist for Your Practice with Mike Michalowicz | WP41
Introduction
Welcome back to The Wise Practice Podcast! In this episode, we have the pleasure of chatting with entrepreneur and author Mike Michalowicz about finding the best-fit therapist for your practice. Mike is the brilliant mind behind several multimillion-dollar companies and the author of popular business books like Profit First and Clockwork.
Mike Michalowicz (mi-CAL-oh-witz) is the entrepreneur behind three multimillion-dollar companies and is the author of several business books, including Profit First, Clockwork, The Pumpkin Plan and his newest book, All In. Mike is a former small business columnist for The Wall Street Journal and business makeover expert for MSNBC. He regularly travels the globe as an entrepreneurial advocate.
Discovering the Money Bunnies
Did you know that Mike Michalowicz also wrote a children's book? Yes, it's true! Mike explained that he created "The Money Bunnies" to teach kids the concept of budgeting in a fun and straightforward way. The goal was to help the next generation learn about money management early on. It's an idea that resonates with many readers, making it a hit with kids and parents alike.
The Importance of Fit for Therapists
In his newest book, "All In," Mike explores the critical topic of finding the right fit for therapists in a group practice. He shares a powerful model called FASO, which stands for Fit, Ability, Safety, and Ownership. Fit, he explains, is about recognizing that everyone is extraordinary, but not everyone is the right fit for your practice. It's essential to match talent to tasks instead of fixating on titles.
Run Therapy Workshops to Find New Employees
Mike mentions that running educational workshops can be beneficial for both the participants and the company's hiring process. When a company hosts workshops, it allows potential candidates to interact with the company's team and get hands-on experience with the work they would be doing if hired. This practical experience helps the candidates get a better understanding of the company's culture, work environment, and expectations.
On the other hand, the company's hiring team can observe the candidates during the workshop and assess their skills, problem-solving abilities, and how well they collaborate with others. This direct observation provides valuable insights into the candidates' potential and whether they align with the company's values and requirements.
By running educational workshops, the company can go beyond just looking at resumes and conducting interviews. They can effectively evaluate the candidates in action and make more informed decisions about whether they are the right fit for the organization. This approach increases the chances of hiring people who not only have the necessary qualifications but also possess the right attitude and aptitude to contribute positively to the company's success.
Finding the Right Fit for Your Therapy Office
Mike Michalowicz emphasizes the importance of finding the best-fit therapist for your practice and shares a four-step model called F.A.S.O.:
Fit: He mentions that not everyone is an "A player" for your business, and it's essential to be clear on the roles and tasks needed for the therapist. Rather than focusing on titles, he recommends identifying specific tasks and then matching the talent to those tasks.
Ability: He discusses the importance of exploring the potential in candidates and the value of looking beyond just experiential ability to include innate abilities and potential in determining the right fit.
Safety: Safety is crucial for employees to feel free to express themselves fully and give their best performance. Employers should create an environment where employees can be their natural selves and feel safe to do so.
Ownership: Mike stresses the significance of giving employees psychological ownership, where they feel something is theirs, and they have control over its outcome, direction, and personalization. This sense of ownership empowers employees to perform at a higher level.
Fostering Psychological Ownership
When it comes to creating a thriving team, fostering psychological ownership is key. It's not about giving legal ownership but empowering employees to take control and personalize their responsibilities. Mike shares the story of Joel, an employee who transformed from a one-star performer to a standout by providing him with increasing levels of ownership and responsibility. Creating a sense of ownership in your team can lead to unprecedented loyalty and productivity.
Empowering the Backbone of the Economy
As a parting thought, Mike highlights the significance of small businesses in the global economy. Every major corporation started as a small business at some point. Small businesses are the backbone of the economy, and their success is vital to our collective prosperity. So, as a therapist and small business owner, you have a responsibility to thrive, as your success contributes to the well-being of us all.
Conclusion
Finding the best-fit therapist for your practice is a significant challenge, but with the FASO model, you can simplify the process and create a thriving team. Use simulations to assess candidates' abilities and foster psychological ownership to empower your employees. Remember, as a small business owner, you play a crucial role in the economy. Let's all be extraordinary and make a difference together!
Action Steps
Consider running educational workshops to recruit therapists, allowing you to observe their interests and fit for your practice.
Use simulations or scenarios to assess candidates' abilities, especially in areas that are challenging to observe directly.
Foster psychological ownership among your team by giving them control, direction, and personalization of their responsibilities.
Remember that small businesses are the backbone of the economy, and your success contributes to the greater well-being of society. So be extraordinary!
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WP 41 | Finding the Best Fit Therapist for Your Practice with Mike Michalowitz
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Whitney Owens: Welcome back to The Wise Practice Podcast. So glad you're here, and I'm excited to be interviewing my friend Mike Mitz for the show today. So lemme tell you a little bit about Mike and then we're gonna jump into talking about how to find the best. Fit Therapist for your practice. So Mike Michalowicz is an entrepreneur behind a three multimillion dollar companies and is the author of several business books, including Profit First Clockwork, the Pumpkin Plant, and his newest book All in.
Whitney Owens: Mike is a former small business columnist for the Wall Street Journal and Business Makeover expert for M S N B C. He regularly travels the globe as an entrepreneur advocate. Thanks for coming on the show.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh my gosh, Whitney, it's a joy to be with you and it's good to see you again too.
Whitney Owens: Yeah, you too. So I always like to say interesting things at the beginning and so I actually was just looking at all your books on your website and I didn't know you had a children's
Mike Michalowicz: book.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh yeah. Surprise. I, uh, told my money bunnies and I've been contacted enough times by readers of Profit first saying, I wish my children had this, that I was like, oh, I, uh, I should write a children's book to get the next generation started on the concept and. The concept isn't anything new. It's not like I invented something crazy here.
Mike Michalowicz: It's the envelope system where you take money, you carve it up to its different intended use before you spend it. My goal was just to simplify it and make it fun. So, uh, it's taught like at grade schools. I actually had the privilege of speaking at my first grade school to second graders, and we went through the process and deployed it and, uh, we
Mike Michalowicz: what town it was in, but it's, it's outside of, uh, where I live. They're gonna be teaching it to 50, I think it's like third or fourth graders.
Whitney Owens: Oh, that's cool. Well I've got a kid going into fifth grade, so I might be buying that book. She needs to, oh, there you go. Talk about money there. I loved the title.
Whitney Owens: Alright, so we have so many great books we could talk about today. Profit First. Something I use in my practice all the time. Oh, I love it. Clockwork right there. You know, we have this common connection with the banana so people get those books. Um, But Savannah Bananas, by the way. Yeah. All right. But I wanna talk about fit for therapists 'cause this is your new book All in, and I heard you speak about this in Kentucky and the topic is so important.
Whitney Owens: And as business owners and private practice owners, finding the best fit therapist for a group practice is a challenge. Oh my. So we'd love to kind of dive into
Mike Michalowicz: that. Yeah. You know, I'll start right off the gate. Let, let's go with massive value right away. Uh, there's a model I use called Faso, f a s o, fit, ability, safety, ownership.
Mike Michalowicz: Um, and we can, we can go into that, but here's a tactical thing you can do right away. Most businesses do recruiting by running an ad, whatever the ad platform may be. Saying, we're looking for a therapist. The chances of finding someone's very low, it, it's all about timing. You run an ad, who happens to be looking at that moment?
Mike Michalowicz: God forbid the adds a day late and the great candidate was looking a day prior, you'll never meet them. Also, it requires a huge burden of. Of interview processing. So we gotta go and interview people and think they're a fit and this feels good or not. Many small businesses are exhausted after just a handful of interviews.
Mike Michalowicz: So now we're picking our best candidate who happen to find these ads out of three and they may not even be the best. It's also a losing proposition for anyone you don't hire. 'cause they're like, I applied but I didn't get the opportunity. I don't know what's wrong with me. So here's a alternative technique I call 'em workshops.
Mike Michalowicz: And this is something I derived from the sports industry, which has a, you know, a multi-billions dollars of revenue using this methodology. And I rarely see it applied in private enterprise, but it is, and it, it's being uptaken much faster. So the technique is to run educational workshops, but they did in sports.
Mike Michalowicz: I played, uh, lacrosse back in college. When I was in high school though, I was invited to go to a camp at Hobart, which is in the northeast, is a big lacrosse school. I went with probably 300 other student athletes and we practiced different skills. Everyone got better during that camp, and some of the students, I was not one, but some of the students got tapped in the shoulder.
Mike Michalowicz: I. Saying, Hey, you're demonstrating extraordinary talent here. We wanna bring you to a more advanced field and help you play at a higher level. And some of those students were tapped on the shoulder and said, you ever consider playing at Hobart? I didn't realize it then, but it was a recruiting platform.
Mike Michalowicz: Everyone got better. No one got left behind. Everyone got better and the best fit people were selected. So we can apply this in business now. I'll give an example first of, of how some corporate enterprise does this, and then we can talk about how we can do it with therapist. The, the quick summary is, uh, home Depot's a great example.
Mike Michalowicz: You may not even know this. The next time you see one of those bird house, you know, build a bird house, uh, workshops, they invite you in and you'll notice there's multiple work work, uh, multiple employees there from Home Depot observing, teaching the process. Now there's multiple goals. One is to ingratiate the consumer with Home Depot.
Mike Michalowicz: I put on this workshop, this is fun. Maybe you'll buy some more products from that company. But they're also observing who is the most. People that show an interest often builds into a desire, ultimately thirst to do things. So people who are highly interested will be talking with other people. They'll be asking the most questions.
Mike Michalowicz: They may even be guiding other people. Those individuals get a tap on the shoulder from the Home Depot employee saying, Hey, you're wonderful at this. You ever consider working at Home Depot? We appreciate how you're helping others. It's a recruiting platform. So just go through this long answer real quick.
Mike Michalowicz: Here's how we do it in our own businesses. Run workshops. So you could run therapy workshops. You could run for your special skills. When we were at that conference together that Casey Compton put on, I was talking to some therapists and there's definitely many vertical paths that therapists can take. I.
Mike Michalowicz: Uh, and I don't recall what they were now, but, um, one, a therapist said, I can teach this and bring in other therapists and, and teach 'em this process. Like a workshop. You can do it virtually or in person, doesn't matter. But what you do is you have people participate, like they're building the the bird house.
Mike Michalowicz: They learn the process. At the end, they can get a certificate of accomplishment, so they have something. During the process, you can cherry pick who are the most ative, who shows the most thirst and interest, tap 'em on the shoulder and say, Hey, we actually have an opportunity at our therapy, uh, location for this specific ability, and you're demonstrating such great interest.
Mike Michalowicz: Would you be interested? Last thing I wanna share in this, this big loquacious answer is this. That it's not just for entry level people. It's not just for bringing in people who are entry level, first time therapists, albeit you can use this process for that. It's also for advanced people. And when you do advanced people, ask yourself, what's the next level of advancement?
Mike Michalowicz: Teach that class. Have the prerequisite be the core level you need from people. Mm-hmm. The advanced level they already have. And bring those people in. What's so amazing is you're no longer looking at people who just happen to be looking for a job. These are people that can be gainfully employed and are looking to improve themselves.
Mike Michalowicz: They're, these are people that are looking for education elsewhere regardless of their employment status. So it opens up a massive swath of opportunity in candidates. I.
Whitney Owens: Yeah. Well, I love this idea. You were saying nobody's really left. It's like you're taking someone and elevating them instead of them applying for something and feeling rejection.
Whitney Owens: And when we do that, when we invite people in, they're more likely to say yes, for sure,
Mike Michalowicz: for sure. And here's the interesting thing, you can, and I would argue, should charge for this. It is an educational opportunity, and when people make an investment, it can be small, whatever the size is appropriate, but when people make an investment, they're vested in the outcome.
Mike Michalowicz: One of my favorite stories, and I I put this in the book, is, uh, a woman named Tuesday p Brooks. She has a bookkeeping, an accounting practice, and, uh, she was struggling just like many professions are to find people with these expertise. Well, what she did, she teamed up with a university specifically in Ethiopia, where she's, she's native for the Ethiopia, she moves to the United States decades ago.
Mike Michalowicz: She has a, a love for her home country. She reached out to one of the universities there and said, I will establish a bookkeeping course. We'll use a local professor, adjunct professor to oversee and monitor the class. And Tuesday we'll do all of the training remotely. And it was a, I think it was over 12 weeks, uh, maybe three times a week.
Mike Michalowicz: So, you know, it's a real college course. All the students went through, got credit. They had 12 students apply to get in. I should say for the first class. And the story is amazing. By the end of it, Tuesday was having regular dialogue with the professor there. They identified, uh, three of the candidates that were just excelling.
Mike Michalowicz: Really thirsty, really learning, really loving the experience. Tuesday offered a job for all of them. They represent extraordinary employees now, 'cause this was years ago. Are still gainfully employed with her and she loves them. But my favorite part was not that the other nine people all got jobs with large and small corporations, but all are gainfully employed.
Mike Michalowicz: For this new, uh, for, for being bookkeepers. What I love is we're elevating everybody. We're giving opportunity for everybody, and we as a provider of this, get to pick people who are the ideal fit for our own organization. I love
Whitney Owens: it. I love thinking about it differently. And even since the conference when you spoke on this, I've been talking to other therapists about this idea and one of 'em, um, just to give an example for how we can do this clinically, was a D B T therapist and she's a D B T based practice, dialectical behavior therapy.
Whitney Owens: And so she wants all of her therapists to go through a training to become D B T certified. So she will start doing trainings in her town. To help therapists get D B T training. Right. Love it. And then watch the ones, like you said, asking all the questions invested, doing the work, and then tap them on the shoulder.
Whitney Owens: I thought that was a great idea. And also another one had an idea of an intern training. So we're always looking for interns to bring in. Well, let's talk to interns about the internship process and do a training on this, and then we can find our favorite
Mike Michalowicz: interns. I love it. You know what was so interesting at that event we were at is I was explaining the differences between.
Mike Michalowicz: Or the types of, uh, abilities that exist. Most employers look for what's called experiential ability. What's on your resume? A few and more are good, and it's a good thing, are looking at innate ability, and that is through Myers-Brigg or Idio, ideogram, whatever, all these Enneagrams, Enneagram, yeah, not e Enneagram.
Mike Michalowicz: All these different tools to identify. Personality traits, but there is this massive layer and represents, represents the 80% of ability that's currently ignored and it's potential. Hmm. The, the analogy I used, imagine Whitney, you and I would decide we're gonna start a a band and we want the best guitarist in the world, and we pick Eddie Van Halen, although I know he's passed, but say he was still alive at the time and we're like, Eddie, we want you to join our band.
Mike Michalowicz: He would say that's absurd. He's already gainfully employed. He, he has his own band. He's making tons of money. He would laugh us away, but if we rewound in time, there is a day we could have had him interested. And when he first started discovering guitar, he was about 12 years old, started performing guitar.
Mike Michalowicz: Imagine we said, Hey, Eddie and other students, uh, we have guitar workshops. Would you be interested? I suspect he would be. And now we start seeing the thirst and desire. He was playing 12 hours a day when he was practicing someone that's demonstrating that has the most potential to be extraordinary. We could have tapped him on the shoulder at age 12, 13, or 14 if we were providing those services of training him, workshopping him and said, Hey, would you wanna be in our band?
Mike Michalowicz: And the chances of us scoring Eddie Van Halen skyrockets? Mm-hmm. Yeah, we just wanna get people early on. I think with the, the problem is we're looking for people that have experience and they already have their career path in front of us. We wanna look for people who are developing to the next level and give them a platform to experience that then cherry pick from that platform.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah.
Whitney Owens: I think one thing that's challenging, I'd love to hear what you think about this for therapists specifically, is it's hard for us to know their ability. Right, because we can't sit in a session with them and be their client.
Mike Michalowicz: That's correct. So we would do simulations, uh, kind of what ifs and so forth.
Mike Michalowicz: There's a, um, uh, example I put in the book all in of the University of Chicago, their medical center. And what they were doing is they were looking for people to be on their administrative staff and. They couldn't observe. It's very similar. They couldn't observe an administrator working with real patients to see, uh, how they would work.
Mike Michalowicz: So instead, they ran up a, they ran a skill workshop with different workstations. And the most interesting workstation to me, this one facilitator emulated like she had cerebral palsy and she knew this well 'cause that's what her roommate had. And, um, you know, these very specific movements are hard with, with your hand.
Mike Michalowicz: And what they wanted to see is the patience that these administrators had when checking someone in. So they had people come through and say, uh, you have to ask for a license and ID and medical cards. And she, the, uh, the facilitator would take good minute to get the license out. What she observed is some people got highly frustrated and, and, and, and one person actually even ripped the card outta her hand and said, let me just do it.
Mike Michalowicz: Other people offered assistance. They were patients said, please take your time. Mm-hmm. And what they were demonstrating, even though it was a staged environment, they were demonstrating their innate. Uh, potential in how they behave in those scenarios, and she was able to cherry pick 'em out. So maybe as therapists, we can do the same, we can do some simulations to see how the behaviors present themselves.
Mike Michalowicz: Mm-hmm.
Whitney Owens: I like that. Yeah. And I'd be curious what you think about this, but I have always been of the mindset of I can teach clinical skills. We can go through trainings, we can learn those things. I wanna hire therapists that are just good people, like empathy. I can't teach empathy. Yeah. I can't teach people how to listen, but the way they interact with me when I sit with them will say a lot about who they're gonna be with their
Mike Michalowicz: clients.
Mike Michalowicz: That's correct. And I invite you to, to do that through simulations also. Not only interviews, 'cause interviews where we, the job applicant are, are told, present yourself a certain way. Um, and it's easy. I shouldn't say it's easy, but it's easier to fake the way we really are when it comes to an interview.
Mike Michalowicz: 'cause we know there's a specific protocol, but mm-hmm. But few people are trained for simulations and you can do online experiences, uh, you can use tools like Angiogram or Myers-Brigg to look at this, but you can also just put people in different environments, maybe talk with your staff and stuff. And, and see those behaviors.
Mike Michalowicz: There's a saying, what people do in one instance is what they do in all instances. So we wanna look for those micro instances of empathy, as an example, present themselves multiple times, and you highly likely have an empathetic person. I.
Whitney Owens: I'm laughing 'cause this sounds like a fun thing to do. Like come up with funny scenarios in front of the new person and see what they do.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah, yeah. And you can do it maybe even through email communications and stuff and say, Hey, we got this email from, uh, a patient, you know, you rip out their name and stuff. You, you, you provide absolute confidentiality. But say, how'd you respond to this? And maybe have some emails that are hostile and they could be staged, but, you know, see how they manage different scenarios.
Mike Michalowicz: And that may be very revealing.
Whitney Owens: Yes, I had someone show up for an interview and she went to the wrong door and we were like, no, no, it's this door over here. 'cause we have two buildings. And she was like, well, that's not what you told me. Oh,
Mike Michalowicz: we were like, what? Very reveal. Right? Very revealing. She's putting the responsibility right back on you.
Mike Michalowicz: That to me that that's a red flag for this type of job here. Here's the irony though, and I said this at the conference, everyone, we talk about a players. Everyone has a potential, meaning everyone can be an A player, put in the right scenario. So someone who's that direct and blunt may be perfect as a traffic control cop or somewhere where, where there is no time, maybe in, in the military role where, you know, instructions have to be very explicit or, or lives are lost.
Mike Michalowicz: I don't know if there's a right for her, but. We also have to acknowledge that not everyone's gonna be a right fit for us. And, and I think many small business owners try to kind of fit in a a jigsaw puzzle, puzzle piece that doesn't fit. So it's a round hole with a square peg, and then we're just jamming and cramming in.
Mike Michalowicz: So look for those indicators and realize if someone's not a fit for you, it doesn't mean they're bad people, they're just a fit elsewhere. And let's keep our search going, ideally through workshops.
Whitney Owens: Mm-hmm. Oh gosh. I'm so glad you said that. 'cause I think specifically therapists, we wanna help everybody.
Whitney Owens: Oh, this person needs a job. I can make it work. Oh, it becomes
Mike Michalowicz: a bad thing. It's costly for the business. Yeah.
Whitney Owens: Mm-hmm. So the rest of your, it's F A S O, correct? Mm-hmm. Fit ability.
Mike Michalowicz: What was the next one? Uh, safety and and ownership. Okay. So fit is that kind of, we call the five star fit. Realizing everyone is extraordinary, but not everyone's extraordinary for you.
Mike Michalowicz: So we have to be very clear on the roles. And what I invite you to do, our listeners here, is don't identify titles, identify tasks, then match the talent to tasks. The big mistake that I made, I would say, Hey, I need a. Marketing executive, but that included a lot of different things communicating with, uh, with existing customers, maybe coming up with design work and so forth.
Mike Michalowicz: And I found that just communication and design work are really two different competencies for many people. It's almost impossible to find someone that does both. So when we look at the individual tasks, we are able to match up talent. We do that. It doesn't mean we have that. It's massive organization of tons of people.
Mike Michalowicz: We just find that a talent in design work also is someone that's really good at putting on our events or something like that because there's a lot of, uh, you know, structural elements and design elements there. And so what we do is we've actually removed titles. Very few people here at the office have even anything close to a title except for the president of our company.
Mike Michalowicz: You, you need a president. But, um, everyone else, including myself, doesn't really have a title. I'm an author guy, um, and I'm an employee of our company and so is everyone else here. So that's the fit part, ability to be talked about. It's exploring that potential Safety is a big thing. Safety allows people to give a full expression of themselves, but if we curtail safety, they start to compress who they are and it weakens their performance tremendously.
Mike Michalowicz: The most obvious form of safety is physical. Meaning if someone's in harm's way, if, if, if, if every time you sit down you're gonna get electrocuted, uh, you, you can't perform at all because your body is at risk. So we have to remove any kind of risk or reduce as much as possible so people feel safe. But there's more than just physical safety.
Mike Michalowicz: There's emotional safety, there's relational safety people. We as leaders, need to set an environment where people can be a full expression of their natural selves, and when they can, they'll perform the highest. Last letter O is ownership. And perhaps my most favorite concept because I often hear, gosh, I wish my employees would act like me.
Mike Michalowicz: I, I own the business and I wish they'd perform at my level. How do you make people act like an owner? Well, it's real simple. Give them ownership. And now I'm not saying legal ownership, and that's where we're gonna be very clear. That can actually be dangerous. So I'll go through examples. Um, I own stock at Ford, so I'm a legal owner in the company of Ford.
Mike Michalowicz: A very small portion, but I own it. When I drive by the Ford factory, I don't look at it and say, oh, that little corner of the building is mine. No, I actually feel entitled. I say, Ford, you better send me a distribution check for taking the risk of investing in you. Mm-hmm. But there's another form of ownership.
Mike Michalowicz: Not legal ownership, but psychological ownership. And that's what we wanna invoke. Psychological ownership is where we feel something is ours, it's mine, it's mine. What we wanna do is give people that. And how you do that is by giving people intimate knowledge on the subject, uh, the ability to control its outcome, to give it direction, and the ability to personalize it, to develop in a way that feels natural to them.
Mike Michalowicz: Well, the example I used is there was a smokehouse in Texas, there's this fellow named Joel, who by the traditional standards, is a one star. One star employee showed up late, uh, was, was not engaged, uh, presented himself very poorly. And so this employer, instead of saying You're fired, started giving Joel small amounts of ownership.
Mike Michalowicz: And the first piece of ownership the owner gave him, Joel, was this straw box, and he said, you now own this. Whatever you want, um, to do with it. I was just gonna ask you that. You keep it to the highest standard. It always presents well, when people pull straws out, they explode everywhere. Always have it look perfect.
Mike Michalowicz: That's yours, Joel. And sure enough, Joel started taking care of it. Now, this is a little but important difference between responsibility. Yeah. Joel's responsible for it, but he had control over it. He could do it the way he wanted as long as the outcome was achieved. He could personalize it. He could, he could, uh, write Joel's.
Mike Michalowicz: Straws on there, or he could put 'em into different containers, which he ultimately did, taking out the cardboard box and putting in more attractive display containers. But what was interesting is that started this, uh, this process of psychological ownership, he started taking responsibility for the soda machine or the cooler where you're gonna open up and pull out the sodas.
Mike Michalowicz: And, uh, the owner simply said, you, you own, uh, the soda machine. Do it how you want it, and let's sell soda. And Joel said, great. He personalized it by, or took control by always making sure the labels were facing perfectly out. It was somebody that he was passionate about and soda sales increased, and Joel was recognized for his ownership over that.
Mike Michalowicz: Hmm. After a year or two later, I think after first being employed, Joel now runs the front. Store operations, which is a huge uptick. And when I talked to the owner, whose name is Steve, he said Joel is one of my best employees I've ever had. Joel, interestingly, 'cause I interviewed him for the book, said, uh, He goes, he grew up in a very difficult life, uh, was abused and so forth, and he said he was told once by his parents or one of his parents, you're, you're worth nothing.
Mike Michalowicz: You'll never own anything. He said, this is the first experience he had where he had ownership. I didn't have legal ownership. He had psychological ownership. He said, when we wrapped up, he goes, this is my restaurant, which is an indicator of psychological ownership. So what we need to do as employers is where can we allow people to express their personal, uh, Approach to things, give them control over that in some direction and um, and learn intimately about it.
Mike Michalowicz: And those elements will trigger a sense of ownership and belonging. So that's what we wanna do.
Whitney Owens: Hmm. I love this. And this is what I do in my practice too. It's like they're picking out their own furniture for their
Mike Michalowicz: office space. Oh my God. That's amazing.
Whitney Owens: Yep. Yeah. Yeah. And I do think a lot of business owners struggle with this 'cause they don't wanna give away, give away anything, but you're really actually creating more by giving.
Mike Michalowicz: It, it's a hundred percent right, Whitney. It becomes ours. Uh, so the, the founding father, if you will on this concept is a fellow named John Pierce. He was a professor, I wanna say in Wisconsin. I can't remember the university at the moment. When I interviewed him. He had just retired, uh, prior, uh, maybe a year prior.
Mike Michalowicz: And I said, uh, what does it feel like to be retired? He's like, He goes, I, I, I'm doing a lot of things in my personal life, but he goes, I keep going back to my office at the university. And then he caught himself and said, my gosh, psychological ownership. He, he had his spaces, uh, there, he personalized it and there's a sense of ownership.
Mike Michalowicz: And even though he never owned it, it's the universities, he was just occupying it. He returns that space, he said about once a week and just checks in how, see how his office is doing. That's how psychological ownership works. We with a sense of, um, of, of connection that what is mine is also me. Mm-hmm. And that's the goal.
Whitney Owens: Yeah. Yeah. Well, tell us, when will your new book come out?
Mike Michalowicz: So, all In and the subtitles, how Great Leaders Build Unstoppable Teams releases on January 2nd, 2024. So it's still quite a few months away from this recording. It is available for pre-order on Amazon. Admittedly all in is I'm not the first person I'm all in.
Mike Michalowicz: There's other books with that title for different subjects. So type an All in Leaders, uh, or All in Mike, and you'll find the book and you can get a pre-order right
Whitney Owens: now. Yes. I actually did that before we got on and Oh, thank you so
Mike Michalowicz: much. I did,
Whitney Owens: I did ask you link, yes. I'm gonna put the link in the show notes so people can pre-order the book.
Whitney Owens: Um, anything else we haven't covered that you wanna make sure to
Mike Michalowicz: mention? I just wanna mention one word of encouragement or one idea is, uh, I think I shared at the conference too is I've been researching out this concept that small business is the backbone of the economy and it's actually something I parrot.
Mike Michalowicz: I had a lot saying small business therapists, we are the backbone of the economy. And then I did the data research. And it is not the truth. Small business is not the backbone of the economy. Small business is the economy. Every single business I investigated, big or small, all started off small. These mega companies started out in a garage or where it's a simple, small concept and investors came in to grow it.
Mike Michalowicz: Many small businesses choose to stay their size. The li, the owners achieve a lifestyle of comfort, but we. As, as a global society are so dependent on small business success because it is our economy. Without small business, we're all in trouble. So I just encourage everyone, you have a responsibility to have a successful business.
Mike Michalowicz: It isn't selfish you, yes, I wish you extraordinary wealth and for you to achieve all your dreams, but honestly, that will bring more wealth and more dreams to all of us in the on the globe. So crush it. Please crush it. Mm-hmm.
Whitney Owens: Ugh. I love that. And especially for therapists. We're helping all the people with their
Mike Michalowicz: mental health.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh my gosh. A better place. Oh my gosh. Your clients are benefiting, your employees are benefiting, society's benefiting. So go out there and do it. Be profitable, sustainable. Grow, grow, grow. Well,
Whitney Owens: it's been an honor interviewing you and having you on the show, and I appreciate
Mike Michalowicz: your time, Whitney. Thank you.
Podcast Production and Show Notes by James Marland at Course Creation Studio
