Hi Reader,
Do you have a smoker?
If you’re a barbecue enthusiast, you know the joy of uniting meat, fire, and steel.
And if you’re like the outdoor chefs in my world, you have a very strong opinion about why your smoker is the best one to have.
Personally, I’ve got a sentimental attachment to my Weber Smokey Mountain I’ve been using for over 25 years.
But if I ever buy a new one, I’m going to check out a brand I hadn’t heard of until last week.
Oddly enough, I discovered Chiasson Smoke through this LinkedIn post.
That led me to listen to Jason Chiasson’s conversation on The Fabricator podcast where I learned that Jason and Miranda have well over a million followers on social media.
I had no clue.
I don’t know if Jason and Miranda build the best smokers, but I love their story.
There’s a long list of things I have in common with them and what they’re doing:
A background in welding
Moving back to the family farm
Building a business doing what they love
Continually being faced with new challenges as their business grows
All of these are very familiar to me, as was the conversation about all that’s involved with a manufacturing business.
Jason talked about his learning curve with packaging and shipping. He didn’t realize just how much is involved with this part of the process.
I’ve learned those lessons the hard way too.
But what really stood out to me was Jason’s humility and transparency as he described how he’s growing as a business leader.
He admitted that he was holding the business back.
Like so many of the clients I get to support, Jason was the bottleneck.
As he was talking about his challenges, he identified his mindset and explained the difficulty he had with letting go of production work:
“I had a very hard time letting go … of the welding part of it or operating the … laser part of it because I was the one that was … doing everything.”
Like so many small business owners, all the work was still going through him.
Over time, he began to understand how that was a problem and took personal responsibility for addressing it.
I really appreciated how he held himself accountable.
Jason said, “I personally was holding Chiasson Smoke back.”
He acknowledges that part of the problem was wanting to continue to be the expert:
“I didn’t want the guy next to me to know more than me.”
He described some “friendly bickering” about the quality of a weld, then acknowledged how small that thinking was when he looked at the bigger picture.
“I’m worried about a single weld on a rocket stove, but yet I need to get 150 out.”
For him, the change came when he accepted that he needed to surround himself with stronger people:
“Okay. I need guys better than me.”
As those people joined their team, Jason noticed the pressure coming off his shoulders and, as he put it:
Maybe you already have capable people on your team, but you’re still doing work they’re ready to own. You realize you might need to make a change in your mindset so your business can grow.
How did Jason change the way he thought about his role in the business?
He points to two things.
One is experience.
Jason and Miranda learned by doing.
They didn’t know what they didn’t know, but they took action and figured things out as they did the work.
The second factor that he said was important for mindset change was hiring a business coach.
He initially expected a coach to inspect the business and simply tell him what to do.
What he discovered was that the actual work was more personal:
“My mindset had to change so much. And he had to help me get out of that.”
Jason calls his old approach an “employee mentality.”
He described it like this:
“You’re never looking to the future. You’re always trying to just sell your time.”
He also said he valued the coach’s experience with other small businesses and having someone to discuss difficult decisions with:
“Sometimes it’s just having conversations with a guy that can have reasonable answers. So, I call him my business shrink.”
I’ve heard similar things from my coaching clients who tell me they feel like they’ve been in a good therapy session after we’ve talked.
And like my clients, Jason wanted a coach who understood what he was going through and could work within the practical realities of a manufacturing environment.
He didn’t just want theory. He wanted practical help.
And he appreciated one specific technique that helped him:
“The business coach would just ask you the right questions.”
I don’t know the business coach Jason and Miranda hired, but based on my personal experience I’m confident that he would consider this statement to be a huge compliment.
When my clients tell me, “You ask really good questions,” I’m encouraged and know I’m doing what they hired me to do.
So, if you’re like Jason and feel like you’re the bottleneck for your business, you might want to consider hiring a business coach who will ask you the questions that will help you be a better leader.
Let’s have a conversation to see if I might be a good fit to help you with that in your business.
Just reply and tell me you’re interested, and I’ll be in touch.
And if you’re in the market for a smoker, you might want to check out Chiasson Smoke.
They’ve got some pretty cool products on their website!
Helping you lead with kindness and confidence,
Greg
