#219: How Giving Up More Control Can 2x Enterprise Value with Allie Taylor, PhD & Business Psychologist

There is a direct correlation between the size of a company and how tight of a grip the owner has on it, and it's not in the way you might think. Listen to this incredibly important episode to learn how to double your company's enterprise value by giving up a bit of control—and why this is the best scary thing you can do for yourself and your business.

What You Will Learn In Today's Podcast Interview

• How separating governance from management roles is vital to success.
• The five personality attributes business owners should know about: High-innovativeness; higher tolerance for ambiguity; high need for goal achievement; internal locus of control; and a higher propensity for prudent risk-taking.
• Why your identity can be either your superpower or kryptonite, which you can tell based on how you respond to being challenged.
• What generations get wrong in communication and how it leads to misunderstanding.
• How self-identity is often fused to role-identity and what to do about it.
• You can align your strategy and culture to improve your bottom line by 50%.
• How private equity destroys culture.
• That if you’re struggling today in your business, the next step is to make no decision except to start being curious.
• The sunk-cost fallacy and how to recognize the mindset.
• If you’re a dissenting voice, you need to have data to support your opinions before someone is going to be open to listening to you.
• How to capitalize on 2020's challenges to get the future you want.

Podcast Summary

If you’re having trouble loosening your control on your business, you’ll need no more convincing than this episode with Allie Taylor. 

She has an actual PhD in business psychology which she applies to her business every day to help her clients achieve greater financial and personal freedom. Her tips on how to increase your enterprise value by 50% are powerful and simple, though require a bit of self-reflection and hard work. 

She also tackles common issues plaguing business owners like the sunk-cost fallacy and miscommunication issues at the workplace that result in decreased efficiencies. We need to learn how to leverage the people around us to achieve this, and that’s unnatural for most. As she says, you must seek to understand before you can be understood. 

That said, the first person you should seek to understand is yourself. Knowing if your identity (and your relationship with your business) is serving you or harming you cements the next steps you need to take for personal and business growth. 

As a business gets bigger, it becomes more complex. One person can't give all the disparate parts the attention they deserve, so it's necessary to learn how to give up control for growth. 

If you find yourself feeling defensive when questioned with a fresh perspective, your ego isn’t serving you. Separating your identity from your role in the business lets you see things more clearly to pivot both into stronger positions.

About Allie Taylor

Allie Taylor has a PhD in business psychology and is the co-founder of Orange Kiwi, which helps low-to-mid market business owners achieve successful transitions and consults with advisors, senior leaders, boards and business family members.

With a background in biology and chemistry, Allie’s insights into the psyche of a business owner are based on patterns and behavior and the consequences that follow. Sharing how identity impacts our decisions personally and professionally gives her clients a keen edge in transition planning.

Quotes:

02:28 - “Owners who relinquish control can over double the value of their business over time because of their ability to continue to grow the company.” - Ryan Tansom

10:17 - “What’s required to grow and scale a business are certain personality attributes. The literature is super clear about that.” - Allie Taylor

13:39 - “This need that we have as business owners to compete, not just with the world and our marketplace but with ourselves. And to be better this year than we were last year.” - Allie Taylor

21:36 - “And our identity is either going to be our superpower or our kryptonite at every phase of the business life-cycle.” - Allie Taylor

59:10 - “The first thing you can do is do something. Talk to one person that’s been through it or take a step out just to find one path that you could take to exit. Don’t make any decisions. Just start to be curious.” - Allie Taylor

Links and Resources:

Orange Kiwi

Allie Taylor, LinkedIn

Mastering Your Cash Flow Digital Course

ARKONA Boot Camp

Reach out to me if you have questions about the boot camp!

You can also reach out to me via email at [email protected], on my LinkedIn.