In episode 57 of Everything is Up, Tammera Hollerich interviews Jacky Fischer, the CEO of 3 Men Movers and author of "The Growth Paradox." Jacky shares her journey of taking over the family business and growing it from $3 million to $40 million annually. They discuss the importance of trust in team dynamics, the challenges of scaling a business, and the impact of effective communication in the workplace.
Tune in to gain valuable insights and inspiration for your own business journey!
TIMESTAMPS
[00:01:18] Taking Over the Family Business.
[00:04:51] The Importance of Trust.
[00:09:15] The Growth Paradox.
[00:12:29] Listening and Leadership Skills.
[00:19:23] Balancing Work and Family Life.
[00:23:41] Fun Trivia about Clowns.
QUOTES
SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS
Tammera Hollerich
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TammeraHollerich
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tammerahollerich/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thollerich/
Jacky Fischer
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jacky.noons
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackynoons/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/3menmovers/
Email: jacky@jackyfischer.com
WEBSITES
Everything Is Up: https://everything-is-up.simplecast.com/
Tammera Hollerich: https://tammerahollerich.com/
3 Men Movers: https://www.3menmovers.com/
AVAIL THE BOOK HERE!
The Growth Paradox
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Growth-Paradox-Rethinking-Accountability-Business/dp/1637744080
Audible: https://www.audible.com/pd/The-Growth-Paradox-Audiobook/B0CM4J1VTT
Welcome to everything is up a podcast about the real life stories of people who have created extraordinary levels of success These are conversations with people who are constantly striving to take things to the next level And now here's your host
Welcome to Everything is Up with Tamara. And joining me today and very excited to have this exceptional woman out of the Houston area is Jackie Fisher, the CEO of Three Men Movers. Welcome, Jackie. And I'm so excited that you and I get a chance to sit and chat. How are you today?
Tammera Hollerich
I'm excited to be here. Thanks for having me. Well, OK.
Jacky Fischer
So CEO. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you took over the family business. Yes.
Tammera Hollerich
Yes, I did. Actually, I bought the business from my father. So it's kind of a weird situation. My father. Well, I grew up in the family business. He started the company when I was 12. So I was answering phones and working in the family business when I was young. And then in 2002, he had a massive stroke. So in 2003, he asked if I'd come in and help him. And I came in and after, you know, it was supposed to be for a few weeks, and it ended up being for a year. And at the end of the year, I learned two things about business. Number one, I absolutely loved business. I felt like I was a natural at it. I just kind of innately understood it. And number two, I absolutely did not like working for my dad. And if you know people who work in family businesses, this is not an uncommon theme. And so when I went to give my resignation, about a week later, the drivers got together. They found out I had left our movers out in the field. And they all signed a petition and gave it to my dad and they said they wanted me to come back and run the company. And so from. My dad tried to get me to come back and I said, well, if you let me buy the company from you and he made his money late in life and he didn't have enough money to retire. And so it just it just worked out really perfectly. I think I appreciated something because I paid for it and he was able to retire with the money that he made from the company. So it worked out really well.
Jacky Fischer
Yeah, that's interesting. So after you took over the business, from the statistics that I've seen, you grew this business from 3 million to 40 million annually. Yes. Yeah. Okay. So what's the secret? So what did you do that had such exponential growth?
I think, and I hate to be cliche about it, but I think it's really about getting the right people on board because, I mean, I don't think I'm that great of a CEO. I mean, I'm good at what I do, but it's not me. It's not all me. It's building the right people around you that are expertise in their fields. And, you know, when we were a small company, there was only six of us and everybody did a little bit of everything and I couldn't afford people with college degrees and highly educated people and now I have a PhD working for me in technology and I have just really smart people on my team that are able to to take the ball and run with it so I think and trusting them because you get to a point, what I've seen and this reason I wrote my book is people kind of stagnate when they get to having about anywhere from nine to 12 employees. And then from about 1.5 to about $3 million, they stagnate and they can't get any bigger. And that's about the maximum number of people you can manage effectively. But once you get beyond that, you have to trust other people to manage people. And then, you know, it really, If you're one of those people that like it when everybody comes to you and asks you questions and that makes you feel good about yourself, you probably aren't going to let go. There's a lot of people out there that say they want to grow their company, but they're not willing to let go of that control and power, and that creates a bottleneck and stifles their growth.
Yeah, 100%. I love that you use the word trust because one of your quotes is the killer of team dynamics is a lack of trust.
Yes, and it's not what you think it is. I think sometimes people think like they understand what trust is like and we use that term when we're talking about a romantic relationship or something like that. But it's trusting to be able to talk directly with somebody and say, hey, Tamara, your numbers aren't looking good what's going on and and know that you're not going to get mad at me that i'm not trying to hurt your feelings or embarrass you in front of the team that we have that mutual relationship where you can call me out next week and we can have this this open dialogue but when everybody's playing nice on a team because they don't trust each other because they don't want to embarrass each other because they don't want to be honest and truthful the company again it doesn't grow so that that being vulnerable, being open to feedback and critical feedback, that's super important.
Yeah, and I think that, you know, the Gen Xers, I was just having this conversation this morning with a client over coffee and, you know, the different dynamics with us having five different generations in the workforce right now and knowing how to approach each one, that was part of our conversation how do you communicate effectively so that you can get things done, right? My team gets so frustrated with me, I think sometimes, because I'm like, I can't coddle everybody. I can't, right? And I can't just sugarcoat everything, or we don't go anywhere, right? We get stuck. But that doesn't mean I'm being rude. It doesn't mean that I'm trying to hurt your feelings. you don't get up and come to work every day because you just love Tamara Hallrich, right? You get up because you have a family to take care of. And so it's getting that communication with everybody. And just that whole statement, the killer of a team dynamic, so many companies talk about a team, is the lack of trust. And I just sat and pondered that thought when I saw it from you and I was just like,
She had a point. And we get some young people in who they're a part of our leadership team. And when they first sit in there, they kind of get a little freaked out because we come at each other, but in a trusting and a loving way where we challenge each other. Or if somebody has an idea, we say, well, I don't think that's going to work. And then we talk it through. And regardless of whether we move forward or we don't move forward, that friction, that engagement makes the company better. Because even if we move forward on an idea that somebody doesn't like, we've at least talked about all the different issues why that person didn't like it. And then there's also frictions between the department. And sometimes my company, they get a little grouchy with each other, because maybe one department will say, we need more money for this. And then we have accounting pushing back on, hey, you know, We're at our budget with here. We don't want to give you any more money for this, and it creates this little friction in between the two departments. But I explained to him this is like really good friction because if you have an accounting team that is your controllers in charge of budget and they just say yes to everything, you're going to spend too much. Or if they just say no to everything and the other team gets their way and they don't spend enough and maybe we don't have quality headsets or something like that. So you want that friction and that friction is really good for growth. But you want it to be healthy and happy friction where people aren't thinking that you're trying to personally get at them. And that's where the trust comes in.
So before we talk about growth, because this is going to segue us right into your newest venture with the book, you were 2018 Enterprising Woman of the Year and named Top Female Business Owner by the Houston Business Journal. So there is a lot of credibility here. When you start talking about growth and anybody that you take a $3 million company and grow it exponentially into a $40 million company, there's a lot of credibility there. So you have just written and now you're out on the public tour promoting the book, The Growth Paradox. What had you sit down and write this book?
Well, I was members of this business mentoring group, and I noticed that some of the companies were growing and some of the companies were stagnant. It didn't make a lot of sense to me why the ones that were growing, the heads of those companies, they would come in and they'd be able to sit there for a day and work on their business. But the smaller companies, they're texting on their phone all the time. They would have to run out of the room and do something with an employee or a vendor or something. And they were always really preoccupied. And so I was thinking like, I heard this joke that if you didn't have employees or customers, business would be a lot easier. And it's so true, because the more employees you have and the more customers you have, a lot of times the more issues you have. So the bigger the company is, the more that person should be preoccupied with his business because he's got more issues. But it wasn't that case. And that was because of scalability and how he grew, he or she grew the processes and put the processes in place and the people in place so that they can sit back and enjoy this meeting and work on their business and learn where the smaller guy was like running in and out of the room, freaking out. And I think, I was thinking, I could sit down and write everything I wish somebody would have taught me about business that I wouldn't have to learn by making mistakes. And I sat down and I did that. And then I did exercises at the end of each chapter so that you could go through, read about it, and then apply these ideas and these concepts to your own company. So it's a book, but it's almost like a little bit like a workbook.
Nice. OK. So of everything that you sat down, and actually put on paper. What is that big number one thing? Because I'm sure this book is probably full of some of probably the best tips any of us as business owners could probably ever want to know. But you're right. You've got a lot of people that have smaller companies that also don't think that it's necessary to have a business coach and things along those lines. And so out of all of them, What is the probably the biggest one you wish somebody had told you earlier on?
Oh, man. So you sound like my publisher. He was like, you need to have one big thing. And I'm like, business is so complex that if it was just one thing, we'd all be doing it, right? I mean, if it was really one big, big thing. I mean, there's One big thing, mentorship is important. I think that's important. And I think whether you have a business coach or a business mentor, a business group or whatever, you need some sort of business mentorship because you can either make mistakes and that's the way you learn it. Or you can listen to somebody else coach you through it and not make those mistakes. And some of those mistakes can be very costly if you have to make them on your own. Exactly. I think that's a big one. I also think just as a CEO, and I hate to be so blunt, but just shut up sometimes. Just shut up. And I find that I always thought I was a good listener until I met my husband and then I realized he's a really good listener and I'm not as good of a listener because I listen in and while somebody is talking a lot of times I'm formulating my answers instead of really listening to understand. The more I talk, the more I don't learn. If I shut my mouth and listen to what people say, a lot of times I'm a lot better off. And listening to your people, because we move close to 40,000 people a year. And when we're moving all those people, I really don't engage with the customers, the people on the front line do. So if I really want to understand my customers or the guys out in the field, I have to shut up and listen to what's going on. And I think a lot of times when CEOs, especially of small companies, they kind of get that kind of power swagger and they talk a lot. And I think sometimes we just need, as CEOs, we can do better by just being quiet and listening.
Yeah, I have to agree with you. I did a recently, an active listening exercise and I learned from myself in this active listening exercise that I, like you, don't listen as well as I could and I learned a lot from my husband who doesn't talk much, right? So it's interesting that there's, like you said, business is complex and there's a lot of moving parts that are going all of the time. And I love that you have put this growth paradox. So give me a little bit of... So as you were putting this book together, maybe reform this question a little bit differently. As you were sitting down to go, okay, I'm gonna write this book, what was the end goal?
you know, the end goal was to help business owners grow their business. And I didn't do it for the money because unless you're like some amazing writer with a huge following, you don't make a ton of money writing books. Um, I mean, I've, I've sold, um, over a thousand copies. Um, and that's, that's pretty good for a first time writer and it's, it hasn't been out yet a year, but, um, But I did it to really help business owners and also to help their employees. Because if you have a dysfunctional CEO, it can create a very unhealthy work environment. And I think people like to work autonomously. I think it makes them happy to understand what the job is and to be able to work on their own to work towards that goal. And I think that If we can grow healthy business owners, we can grow healthy work environments. My parents always worked for businesses until my dad. My dad was a serial entrepreneur, but in a sense, he started businesses and they failed a lot. And he started another one and another one. But when he was younger, he worked in construction and he worked in factories and different things. And my mother always had like very low paying minimum wage jobs, both were not college educated. And they were in work environments that were not healthy, and they didn't feel valued or appreciated. And I think that most employees They want enough money to take care of their families. So yes, it's about the money and that's okay. And it should be. And they also want to feel valued and respected. And I think that's important. I think COVID was kind of a wake up. The year of the great resignation about two years back where everybody was just like moving around and leaving their jobs. And it was showing you how to retain your employees when they're getting ready to walk out the door. But wouldn't it be better if we could Think about that before they had one foot out the door.
So, yeah, you know, I, I tell my team fairly regularly. I'm not going to hold you hostage. If you are not happy, we need to fix it before you're ready to leave, not as you are leaving, because I don't want you to feel like you're being held hostage to the paycheck or to the money. You're here, right? More waking hours than you are at home. And when you are at home, you're a mom, you're a spouse, you're trying to hustle a second job, whatever that looks like in your life. And it would be so much better if you actually didn't resent getting up and going to do this job to make this money. You know, it's like, what do we have to do before that happens? And, you know, there are some that don't want to tell you when it's not going well and they just, you know, maybe it's they're non-confrontational or they feel that it would be a confrontation. But it doesn't ever even have to be that. It can be a straight up conversation that what is it that you need? Because if it is attainable, I don't know many CEOs that don't want to help those employees attain that. I mean, they just don't know how.
And I think sometimes it's a trust thing. A lot of times people take baggage from previous jobs. And so maybe in a previous job they spoke up and then they got reprimanded or they got terminated or something and it makes them less likely to speak up. So I think people carry a lot of that baggage with them.
I think that's a fair assessment because it's not like we can't unlearn some of that stuff as it's happening to us anyway. One of the other things that you said when you were talking, you know, your parents weren't college educated. I love that you say that your undergrad came from the School of Hard Knocks. Yeah. And that your parents probably broke a lot of child labor laws. Like, I think that that's fun.
Yeah. I say I got my PhD. Poor, hungry, and driven.
Poor, hungry, and driven. You know, there's a lot that do that too, right? So, yeah. Now let's talk a little bit of personal and then we'll come back and we'll close out and you're married and so running a $40 million company with a family. How does that how does that dynamic work for you?
I am very lucky because I'm married to an entrepreneur and he gets it and I get it. And so if I'm at dinner and something goes down, I'm like, hey, I got to get this call. And I think if I was married to a nine to fiver, they might be less likely to be empathetic to my woes at times. But I get it as well with him. We never have to explain to each other about anything because we just get it. I'm like, I need to be there at this time and we just get it. With the kids, it was great because I was able to drive them to school in the morning, go to work, and leave early and pick them up. And I had really good people around me. And so for all that they knew, it was like mom was gone during the day. Occasionally I had to break open my laptop at night. But we tried to always have dinner on the table. I like to cook. Nice. So I think it was, and they got to learn a lot about how business works and how people work and work in the business. My son was out on moving trucks. My daughter was in the office selling moves and she jokes around still. I mean, it's a true story as I told her when she first came in, I don't know how old she was. She was really young. She was probably maybe fifth grade or something. And I had her, this was back in the day where we had to, prepare the checks to take them to the bank. Nobody uses checks anymore. But I said, you know, there's two ways this can go. You can do really well and you can get a raise or you can do poorly and you can get fired. And she got a raise. She did well. So nice.
You know, it's there are some advantages and you hit on one of them, and that is that they learn a lot. They learn a lot of what real life is, not just the academia that is taught in school that doesn't always run parallel with what happens in actually in a business. So they grow up really understanding a completely different dynamic than kids that don't get exposed to it at all.
I agree. My daughter is working for a company right now. and there's changes um at her office and she can see it from an ownership perspective where a lot of the employees are kind of like well that's not fair and she she gets it at a different level like well you know but ownership is worried about profitability and this and that so she sees it a lot differently than I think most people do.
Yeah and that's very um what a great What a great back story for her as she is growing and building her own career and having that other side to be able to bounce it off of. She'll do well in leadership because she also can see that side of it. Do you anticipate. either of the kids taking over the business someday?
No, they absolutely don't want to do that. And I think that's great that they are not feeling compelled to do it. I think I felt a little compelled to do it, even though once I started doing it, I enjoyed what I was doing. But I always felt kind of pressured, like if your parents ask you to do something, you just do it. But I never pushed them in that respect. And they're allowed to explore their own things in their own dreams and do what they want to do. So no, they're not taking over. I wish one of them would have came around, but both of them are like, yeah, that's too much for us.
It's interesting, but somebody will step up, whether it's an employee that steps up into a leadership role that someday says, hey, I really love this. And when you're ready to step down, It always happens that way, right? So, or or you end up selling the business and that's not a bad idea either. Right? Because sometimes you can have good, a good transition into new ownership as well. So, Jackie. One of the things that I love to do before I let my, um, my guests go is I love to do, um, so we're big game people here. And so we love to play games and we love trivial pursuit. So we love this fun question. We have all these fun questions that we love to just randomly throw out there. And so we're like, okay, so today, and I am not the pop culture girl, not at all. I'm an eighties girl, but I was not a pop culture girl is an eighties girl. So, But I always find some of these questions just a lot of fun as we are kind of doing some just quick little fun stuff before we go here. So I have got a quick question for you. And just maybe, okay, clowns. This will just be fun, because it's just fun, because clowns are fun, right? So it says, OK, so the waiting list to be in the studio audience of Chicago's Bozo the Clown show. So this is a good show, my age here, OK, was 10 years long. So I didn't know that either. I was like, OK, so Bozo the Clown's in your waiting list. So crazy. And it's who once performed as Bozo the Clown and became the first Ronald McDonald? This will blow your mind. Was it Al Roker? Willard Scott, Regis Feldman, or Bob Hope?
Now I can guarantee. Okay, it's not going to be Bob Hope. He's too old. Al Roker? I don't think so. Regis is kind of short. Who was the other one? Willard Scott.
Maybe Willard Scott? Yes. And that's who it was. And that's so it was Willard Scott said after clowning, he worked as a weather presenter on the Today Show. But prior to being on the Today Show, Willard Scott was both of the clowns and the first Ronald McDonald.
and then that was just deductive reasoning i had no idea but i was like regis is kind of short and i don't think they would pick him for that right yeah oh you're right did you did you ever watch romper room do you remember romper room yes that was an old one that's an old one too well jackie everybody this is jackie fisher um owner of three men mover ceo
and the author of The Growth Paradox. Jackie, what is the best way for everyone in our audience if they want to reach out to you?
I put my email address, it's Jackie, J-A-C-K-Y, at JackieFisher.com. And if they want to get the book, you can get it off Amazon. And it's also on Audible, too, if you want it to be read to you. So you can get it on Amazon or on Audible.
All right, everybody. It is the growth paradox. on Amazon or in Audibles with Jackie Fisher and she does spell it J-A-C-K-Y. I am so grateful. This has been so much fun, Jackie. Thank you for playing along with me this afternoon and being able to promote the book. All right, everybody, this is Everything is Up with Tamara and Miss Jackie Fisher. Everyone have a great day. Thanks, Jackie. Thank you. Bye-bye.
Bye.
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