Your agency doesn't have a sales problem. It has a people problem. I spent 15+ years building teams, from scrappy startups, to scaling tech companies, to huge agencies like GroupM and WPP. Now, I give small agency owners the SOPs, frameworks, and hard truths they need to build high-performance cultures that run without them.
The TL;DR, Learning How To Avoid Getting Burned
May 28 - June 10
How I Avoid Sunburns
I was on my honeymoon for the past two weeks and it was too sunny.
My partner and I travelled to Aruba where the UV Index between 10am and 4pm is classified as "Extreme" and a beach during those hours is a white sand hellscape.
While lounging under a palapa for those six hours a day, I daydreamed about what I want to do for work, life, health, etc. and wrote in my journal, jotting down ideas.
One of those ideas was around helping business owners assess how their business learns. As a learning nerd, I care a lot about how individuals, teams, and organizations evolve and share knowledge.
Under an umbrella, I dreamed up a diagnostic that looks at the different places where a business could have some kind of workflow, system, approach, method, etc. to test and iterate.
Poolside, I whipped up a quick Google Form to translate the jottings into an actual diagnostic tool and started to populate the tool with recommended things-to-do for areas where a business is missing a process or workflow.
Clearly I'm not very good at the "just relax" part of vacations.
I have some ideas of where this diagnostic tool could go/do, but I think it's way more fun to share what's been built so far. It's not perfect, but it's done enough to get some initial feedback.
If you take this MVP Business Learning Assessment, I'm offering to sit down with you to discuss your results if you'd be willing to share what you think of the tool. I'll share models and systems that could help you solve some real business roadblocks if you tell me what sucks with my two minute survey.
Got two minutes?
| Take the Learning Assessment |
A TL;DR from the CRO
Let it hang out: summer heat helps you unwind assumptions.
-Roman Noodles, Chief Ruff Officer
A TL;DR from the COO
Growing up, my favorite gifts to receive were always Legos. Whenever I got birthday money it was always straight to Toys R Us (RIP) to get the new Lego set (preferably Star Wars).
Now that I’m an adult child and have a little more spending money, one of my favorite hobbies is still putting together Lego sets. Most recently, I built a massive replica of the Millennium Falcon with 7500 pieces and an instruction manual that was almost 500 pages long.
It took me a couple weeks but was so much fun. There is something soothing about following a list of instructions and quite literally seeing all of the pieces come together.
I think that’s what I enjoy so much about designing and implementing systems for businesses. There’s the list of instructions from the client, the building pieces that must be put together in a particular order, and the end result of a process that drives efficiency and makes everything work better.
While it isn’t quite as meditative as putting together a Lego set, I still feel as though system implementations activate the same part of my brain.
Is there anything in your day to day work that reminds you of your childhood? Let me know!
- Jeremy
The Learn to Scale Sales and Systems Assessment
Overwhelmed, lost, or spinning in circles? Get an expert assessment on your sales and business operations to remove noise, move your business forward, and grow your own ability to make strategic decisions.
| Learn more about the Assessment |
Last TL;DR, I pledged to read two chapters of my book on the beach, spend five minutes reflecting, and making one frivolous purchase every day while on my honeymoon.
- Instead of reading on the beach, I read under an umbrella.
- Instead of spending five minutes reflecting, I Designed My Life.
- Instead of making a daily frivolous purchase, I extended the honeymoon five days with a COVID quarantine (don't worry, I'm fine).
It was glorious.
Hope you achieve 100% of your vacation goals,
Dan from Learn to Scale
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Dan Newman
Your agency doesn't have a sales problem. It has a people problem. I spent 15+ years building teams, from scrappy startups, to scaling tech companies, to huge agencies like GroupM and WPP. Now, I give small agency owners the SOPs, frameworks, and hard truths they need to build high-performance cultures that run without them.
A bi-weekly roundup of everything TL;DR from the past year December 13 - December 26 A Brief Year In Review Don't forget to enter my end-of-year holiday Cliftonstrengths & 1-1 Giveaway! Contest ends on Monday the 29th. Enter now! The end of the year always puts me into a reflective mood, and out of all my content channels, this newsletter has always been the place I feel most present. The ritual of waking up early on a Friday, putting on vibe-y instrumental music, and setting the lights to...
A bi-weekly roundup of ways to make EOY reviews a little less awkward November 29 - December 12 What Wrapping Paper Do You Use For Tough Love? It’s December 12th. You can practically smell the holiday break. But there is one thing standing between you and that final "Out of Office" auto-reply: The End-of-Year Review. If you are like most small agency owners I know, you are probably trying to find a way to wiggle out of it. You might be telling yourself: "We’re a small team, we talk every day....
A bi-weekly roundup of why now is the best time to measure the worst emotions November 15 - November 28 Burnout, On Sale Now While the rest of the world is obsessing over doorbusters and discount codes today, someone- either you or one of your team members- is sweating. If you have ecommerce clients, your team has been sprinting for weeks to get assets approved, campaigns loaded, and fires put out. Even if you don’t do ecomm, the sheer gravitational pull of Q4 deadlines has likely pushed your...