114 | Keeping the Human Element in Productivity | with Theresa Ward

Theresa Ward

Everyone's worried about losing their job. But the things that we cannot reproduce in AI are things like empathy and humility.

Chase Clymer

Welcome to Honest Ecommerce, where we're dedicated to cutting through the BS and finding actionable advice for online store owners. 

I'm your host, Chase Clymer. And I believe running an online business does not have to be complicated or a guessing game. 

If you're struggling with scaling your sales, Electric Eye is here to help. To apply to work with us visit electriceye.io/connect to learn more. Now let's get on with the show.

Hey, everybody, welcome back to another episode of honest ecommerce. I'm your host, Chase Clymer. 

And today we're gonna talk about an amazing topic, one that I feel I'm gonna learn a lot from it. Especially [since] this is being recorded, we're coming back from the break. 

I feel a lot of people did a lot of nothing which you'd argue deserved. But now that we're getting back into things, that's how to stay productive ways to think about that. 

And so today, we're welcoming into the show. She is a culturally focused productivity consultant whose mission is to help teams get things done, and enjoy the journey. 

Theresa Ward, welcome to the show. 

Theresa Ward

Thanks for having me Chase. Happy New Year. 

Chase Clymer

Oh, Happy New Year to you as well. The people that listen to this in two months, when it comes out are gonna be, “Wow, that was a while ago.” 

But what's your journey? How did you end up here in this niche? Helping people with productivity? 

Theresa Ward

Oh, gosh, yeah, it's been a meandering path. For sure. I grew up in Ohio. So I'm a fellow Midwestern like you. That Midwestern work ethic is definitely part of my original story, right? 

So it was kind of just like graduate college, get a job, work hard. Don't think about much else. I initially got out of school after getting a communications degree. Got it, like just a cold calling sales job for financial technology, cybersecurity software. [I] enjoyed it, because it was something that allowed me to be ambitious. I learned new things. It was interesting, and I got to talk to a lot of different people-- all ecommerce merchants-- and it was a small company. 

So they let me wear a lot of different hats and do a lot of different things. I ended up doing some sales, training, sales management, helping them with the revamp of the website, helping with some advisory boards. Then [I] moved down to Atlanta, Georgia, to work for a much bigger company, in financial technology. [I] did everything from product management and product innovation to product training. 

So I got a lot of different exposure, but it was all within this financial services and financial technology space, and just got realized it was really deep and not very wide. I knew all the acronyms right and all the technical jargon, but I was really interested to see what else was out there. 

So in 2017, I left to diversify my portfolio. [I] went out on my own and started doing some projects with... gosh... everything from healthcare, hospitality, utilities, creative agencies. 

What was so interesting, as I just worked on some random projects with these relatively random clients, is I saw all of these patterns from both small and large businesses, regardless of industry, regardless of the type of team that I was working with, whether it was a creative team or a technical team.

They're just these human patterns that hold true for all of us. So from a sociological or anthropological perspective, I was really fascinated. 

So what I'm working on now as a productivity consultant, is how to help all these different teams. Regardless of... if you're a small business leader, or you work for a big organization, whatever industry you might be coming from, or going into, there are just things that help us be more productive, be more impactful. And that second part of my mantra, right, enjoy the journey, have better relationships, collaborate, communicate better. 

So it's everything from, little lunch and learn workshops on [things] like, how to color code, your calendar, all the way to some in-depth projects where I will help build standard operating procedures for a healthcare organization. 

Chase Clymer

Awesome. 

Theresa Ward

So that's... that's quick and dirty. (laughs) 

Chase Clymer

Oh, yeah. (laughs) Well, I just want to go all the way back to the beginning of that, being from Ohio, you're not a Midwesterner. You're a Buckeye…

Theresa Ward

(laughs)

Chase Clymer

 So don't forget. You're one of the lucky ones... 

Theresa Ward

(laughs)

Chase Clymer

...that can talk about that. 

But yeah, I think productivity is an amazing part of the journey of entrepreneurship...

Theresa Ward

Mmm Hmm

...And it's something that really... it gets in your head. So I'm excited to kind of break down into it.

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Chase Cylmer

So the first thing I want to ask you is... what I guess would be... how would you approach the difference between productivity and efficiency? How should I as an entrepreneur think about those terms? 

Theresa Ward

Yeah, I realized that when I tell people I'm a productivity consultant, they get a little worried. They think I'm going to be analyzing every minute of every day, or they think I am focused on efficiency, which is a very factory sounding term, right? It's not a very human sounding term. 

Chase Clymer

Yeah. I mean, last night, I just watched a Modern Marvels episode. By the way, all Modern Marvels are on Youtube now. So that's how I've been spending my time. 

Theresa Ward

(laughs)

Chase Clymer

But I watched one on Ford's assembly line…

Theresa Ward

Oh yeah!

Chase Clymer

...and how the efficiencies of it and it was, it was insane to me. 

But I'll let you get back into it. But I'm sure there'll be some parallels I can draw from that. 

Theresa Ward

Sure. Sure. Yeah. So that's all about mass amounts of output. It's certainly not about thriving or relationships or joy. So the root right... of productivity produce… hmmm… Like when you think about produce... right? It's fruit, it's bearing fruit. 

Chase Clymer

Mmm hmm

Theresa Ward

So when I think about productivity, I think about your, your impact in the world, and where, how are you bearing fruit for the world, whatever your personal purposes, or whatever your personal mission might be. 

As opposed to efficiency is really about mass output, a lot of sameness. Not a lot of room for diversity. And again, not a lot of room for relationships. 

Chase Clymer

Yep.

Theresa Ward

So I think there are times right, there are times for efficiency, there are times when we can streamline operational procedures to minimize friction. And that's great. And I love that part. And that comes very natural to me as a left-brained person. 

But along the way, if you're not incorporating concepts like self awareness, and personality types, and collaboration techniques, with your colleagues and your co workers, then you can have very efficient output and also be very miserable. 

Chase Clymer

Yeah, so I will give you a quick summary of what happened at Ford factories. They got so efficient, and they were producing so much product, they're producing, obviously, the Model T, factory workers were actually quitting...

Theresa Ward

(laughs)

Chase Clymer

...because they were just a cog in the machine... 

Theresa Ward

(laughs) Yeah.

Chase Clymer

… and they had absolutely no enjoyment from their job. Then fast forward a couple years to what happened in Japan and Toyota's concept of lean manufacturing where…

Theresa Ward

Yep.

Chase Clymer

... they gave ownership to the team members. They… because what Ford did was... so into the process... every little thing so dialed down was so…

Theresa Ward

Mm hmm

Chase Clymer

...just processed and so paid out within that process….

Theresa Ward

Mm hmm

Chase Clymer

Whereas with lean manufacturing, it was, “Alright, well, you're gonna do this part of it. But you're also gonna learn everything else.” The goal is to do it better and more efficient. They gave ownership to the team. It was just the morale is so much higher. 

Theresa Ward

Mmm Hmm

Chase Clymer

Nowadays, lean manufacturing facilities are actually out producing the older concepts of the assembly line that GM and Ford had. 

Theresa Ward

That's, that's fascinating. Thank you so much for sharing that it really is all about finding that balance. 

Chase Clymer

Yeah.

Theresa Ward

Especially now, right, with technological advances, AI. You can get so efficient that everyone's worried about losing their job. But the things that we cannot reproduce in AI are things like empathy, and humility. 

I think those are skills that can make us actually more productive, meaning it can make us more impactful in the world. And once you get that process down, then what else do you want to pay attention to? Where else do you want to spend your energy? 

Chase Clymer

Yeah.

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Chase Clymer

I think that being an entrepreneur and the agencies now going on six years, I think in and after year two or three [years], we realize what this concept of an SLP was. And I think what most people when they hear about that they get overwhelmed by trying to document their processes. 

Theresa Ward

Hmm

Chase Clymer

And I think that there's a fine line in in process documentation as well to where you can over document ...

Theresa Ward

Mmm Hmm

Chase Clymer

...and you're now you're working yourself into a box.

Theresa Ward

Mmm Hmm

Chase Clymer

 And it's not something that you really need to like. You don't need to go that granular. I think it's one of those things where you're usually unless you're automating it. You're gonna be giving this to a human being that has knowledge, and they have experiences that are gonna bring to the table and they might have opinions on how things are happening. 

They might make it more efficient, or whatever is produced might be more valuable at the end of the day, and, giving them some level of autonomy to get things done. I like to believe in delegating outcomes and not necessarily tasks. 

Theresa Ward

Mmm Hmm. Exactly. It's... I think some of the problems that we run into when we over document or box ourselves in too much is we didn't really identify the true nature of the problem, nor did we identify the purpose or the end goal, right. So if you can get to the outcome without a process, that's okay. (laughs)

If you can... what's most important about documenting is where you start. Right? So what's going on? What's the current state situation? What do we think the problem is, and then doing some relatively low fidelity prototyping of solutions, just again, kind of that quick and dirty approach and then seeing if it works, if it gets you to the outcome, before you try and make everything to perfect and to clean and, have this, 700 step process. 

Keeping, again, that human element in it really, really important. 

Chase Clymer

Yeah, I think that that just becomes... nobody wants to learn a 700 step process. That's a little overwhelming.

Thersa Ward

Maybe NASA? (laughs) Yeah. We’ll let them have their really thick manuals and detailed processes. But as we say, in the rest of the world, it's not rocket science, right?

Chase Clymer

No, not at all.

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Chase Clymer

So most of the listeners are our younger... small to medium sized businesses. Shout out to any enterprise brands listening to this, email me. I want to know why you're listening. Not entirely, but... (laughs)

Theresa Ward

(laughs)

Chase Clymer

So it's mostly a younger audience. What would be your advice to a solopreneur that's building a new brand? And they're essentially wearing every hat and they can feel overwhelmed by just their to do list.

Theresa Ward 

Man, I know the feeling. If I use the term Eisenhower Matrix, does that ring a bell for you, Chase? 

Chase Clymer

No, I'm ready to learn. 

Theresa Ward

Okay, so because this is just an audio medium (laughs) Google it, right. And if you google Eisenhower matrix, you will.

See this two by two grid. And the myth or the legend goes that this is how President Eisenhower sort of framed his day and decided what to get done on any given day and what to delay or delegate or just take off his To Do List altogether. 

As you can imagine, it's [a] very overwhelming position for both a military person and executive leader to deal with. 

So in the top left quadrant are things that are both important and urgent. Important means it's going to actually help you get towards your goals, your goal may be to launch your brand to hit a certain revenue target, whatever that is, right. So it's important because it's on the way to actually hitting your goals. And it's urgent, because there is some kind of deadline or time frame around it. 

Then the items on your to do list that are important, but not urgent, you put in the top right quadrant. So those are things that you are going to decide to delay, you're going to either do it tomorrow, do it next week, do it next month. 

So when I say things that are important, but not urgent, oftentimes, that's call your grandma or build your retirement plan. It's things that are important for relationships, or it's important for a long term strategy. But if you don't do it today, there's not really going to be a negative impact. Or if you don't do it this week, there's not really going to be in. 

The bottom left quadrant, you put things on your to do list that you can delegate. So these are things that are urgent, but not important. So these are things that definitely have a timeframe around them, but they aren't necessarily aligned with your goals. 

So Chase, that might be something like picking up your clothes from the dry cleaner, or going to the bank or you and I were talking about tax forms earlier, right things that have a deadline, but sometimes they can get in the way of us using our best brain I love Instacart for example, I delegate my grocery shopping to somebody else, because it saves me time. But I need new milk in the fridge. Does that make sense? 

Chase

Oh. Yeah, it absolutely does make sense.

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Theresa Ward

And then in the bottom right hand quadrant are the things that you really just need to delete. That can be because they are neither important nor urgent, like zoning out on puppy videos on YouTube. (laughs)

Social media is a big one that usually I encourage people to put in the bottom right hand quadrant. But it can also be things that we just think we're supposed to be doing that we have to take a fresh look at. It's like Why? Why do I feel like... again, another social media example... Why do I feel like I have to be posting on Instagram Stories six times a day, is that really important for my business goals? 

Is that really something that has any kind of urgency around it? Maybe that's just something that I feel everyone else is doing. So I should be doing [it too]. But if you give yourself a week of a digital detox, right, you might get a lot of other things done. So that's much easier to understand visually than it is just me rattling off a bunch of those words. 

But hopefully, you can get a bit of a picture in your head about the Eisenhower matrix. So that's my best favorite tool for helping you figure out what to do with your to do list. 

Chase Clymer

Oh, yeah, I think that's amazing. And my favorite of those quadrants is definitely the lower right, where you're deleting stuff. Because, there's some other ones out there where it's like, it's like a document delegate, and delete was another one that's kind of similar that I've heard before. 

And it's that it's that deletion, and that termination of things that you don't need to do, which I think is probably the number one thing that can help you out because it frees up time to focus on things that are actually important. I think what I find a lot with small brands is they're struggling not because they have a bad idea or because they don't have [a] product market fit yet. It's just because they are doing too much at once. 

And they need to be focusing 80% of their time on that one or two things that are actually moving the needle for the brand just because competitors or other people, like you said are posting on Insta.

Stories are doing YouTube videos, they're writing two blogs a week they're doing X, Y and Z. That's cool for them because they have grown to that place. You need to figure out what you can do now. What effort can I put in that tangibly will return a positive result out? And most of the time in e commerce, it's okay, what's a marketing channel that will guarantee me sales? Right? Once you figure that out, you can get to the next level. 

Theresa Ward

Mmm hmm. I think what's hardest about that is... that often, we as entrepreneurs and small business owners, we rely on our gut feeling, or, one or two somewhat unreliable data points to measure, Hey, is this working or not working? Right? 

So like, you post something on social media, and it gets a bunch of likes, and you're like, yeah, this is working, as opposed to really documenting on a weekly basis. This week, I did X, Y, and Z. And this was the return that I was getting. So there's a book that I would recommend for your audience called Essentialism. 

Chase Clymer

Do you know it? Have you heard of that book, I haven't, it's gonna go on my never ending to read list. 

Theresa Ward

(laughs) It's pretty short. You gotta read it on a short flight, or listen to it on a short road trip. It's by Greg McKeown. And he talks about basically saying “No” to 90% of things so that you can really prioritize what's gonna move the needle. So it's exactly what you're talking about. It gives some great concrete examples. 

So having one or two or three goals that you are laser focused on for the year, the quarter, the month, whatever, that's really all that a business can handle. That's really all that our brains can handle too. 

So that's a resource that I would recommend. And then there's a framework called OKRs. I didn't obviously come up with any of this stuff. This is all just my sort of second hand research compiled and, and processed for your audience. But OKRs stands for objectives and key results. 

And again, if you Google that, it will give you some great frameworks for tracking your goals with measurable metrics that really indicate am I spending my time where I need to be? Am I being productive? Am I bearing the fruit that I want to bear? 

Chase Clymer

Oh. Yeah. 

Theresa Ward

I learned this the hard way, right? Because I was like, “Yeah, I'm gonna start a blog,” right. And people are telling me, “Oh, you need to put content out there.” 

But the amount of time that it takes me to come up with the idea to write the blog, to proofread it, to put it up on WordPress, to market it. And then it's, well, yeah, even if there's a certain number of people reading it. Is it really worth all that time when I consider what a billable hour is worth? 

So those are things that I'm constantly evaluating, and constantly shuffling around that Eisenhower matrix between like, “Oh, I'm gonna do this today. But next week, I'm gonna delay it. And then I might even just delete it altogether.” 

Chase Clymer

Yeah, that OKRs that kind of reminds me of the EOS system. Detractions system. That's kind of what we run at the agency. But we took the frame, because that's definitely built for an enterprise level company. 

We've dumbed that framework down, made it work for us. That's usually what we do with most systems out there. There's a cheat sheet, read books about whatever you're thinking about your financial system, your operational system for your business, even marketing. There's usually frameworks in there that you can just modify and make it work for your business. 

Theresa Ward

I agree.

Chase Clymer

That's probably my favorite productivity hack is just “cheat”. Someone else has already done it, re-inventing the wheel here, ever. 

Theresa Ward

Well, you said you said dumbed down and cheat, which sounds so negative, but really, you're simplifying and streamlining. (laughs)

Chase Clymer

I guess I just have a (laughs) personality that uses the wrong words. Yeah, it's just you don't need to reinvent the wheel ever. That's the hardest way to get started. There are courses out there. There are books out there, there are consultants that you can talk to better, it's like, yeah, here's a framework... 

Theresa Ward

Mmm Hmm

Chase Clymer

...make this work for your use case. 

Theresa Ward

Yeah. And communities, right. That you don't have to necessarily pay for but that are out there. 

Chase Clymer

Oh, yeah, absolutely. 

So many of the processes that are going on within our business, we're given to us by other agencies that we're friends with that we're just, “We're like, we're struggling with this.” They're like, “Oh, that's easy, because we do this” and we're like, “Well, thank you.” 

Theresa Ward

It's not so nice. That generosity mentality instead of this scarcity mentality of like, “Oh, this is my system, and you can't copy off of my paper.” I love the win-win mentality, right? The pie is big enough for all of us. 

Chase Clymer

Oh, yeah. I mean, I was. I had the scarcity mentality a long time ago. Right when the agency got started, I was still struggling with it. And actually Kurt Elster from The Unofficial Shopify Podcast. He's been here before. He's a great mentor and friend of mine, and he liked to just beat it into my head. He was like, ‘Your best partner is who you think is your competition right now”. He's like, get that out of your mind. There's enough fish in the sea. 

Like you said, that abundance mentality. I worked towards that, and it was. That changed the trajectory of my life. 

Theresa Ward

I absolutely agree. I have had that personal experience. And I continue to share that wisdom with others. That's really, really great advice. 

Chase Clymer

Awesome. Alright, so just taking from that, I guess my advice to anyone listening would be, go find some other young brands that are out there hustling, trying to figure it out, and form a little mastermind around it, or just a group where you guys are getting coffee once a week, or getting on zoom or Skype or whatever. 

And just talking through like, “Hey ,these [are[ issues I'm working on.” I guarantee you, two or three other people in that group are like, “All right I solved that. This is how I did it.” 

Theresa Ward

Mm hmm. 

Chase Clymer

So what's kind of that in mind? What advice would you like to leave? For our audience, people that are out there trying to kind of do that zero to one get things off the ground? Or maybe they're already off the ground, they're trying to get to that next level, try to hire some team members, how can they stay productive? What should they be thinking about? 

Theresa Ward

Oh, gosh, so many good options (laughs). Here's where I would start, I would start by investing in self awareness. And so that can be anything from a personality quiz. (laughs) Not the kind of BuzzFeed, but you know, finding your own tendencies. 

My favorite... one of my favorites is from Gretchen Rubin. She has a quiz called The 4 Tendencies. And it's all about how you respond to expectations, how you make and break habits. You're either let's see, I can remember the four... if you're an obliger, a rebel, a questioner or an upholder. 

It'll take 10 minutes online and this one's actually free. So it's, it's very accessible. And when you find out more about yourself... you I think, are able to... whether you're solopreneur, trying to do it all yourself, or you are a member of a leader of a small team or a member of a team, you're able to identify your tendencies, and how you can work better together with your own brain or with other people on your team. 

So if you understand self awareness and spend some time in that, you'll realize, Oh, this really bothers me because I'm an introvert, or because I'm an extrovert, or because I love spontaneity, or because I love routine. 

And if we understand that about ourselves, and we can invest in our relationships, then I think that helps us just get over some of those interpersonal hurdles that prevent us from being productive. 

Chase Clymer

That's amazing. You've shared so many golden little nuggets of extra resources, the checkout or , taking this test, but you just said, we're gonna make sure we can add all that stuff into the show notes. 

I'll send you the links. Awesome. And now if people are interested in learning more about you, how do they get a hold of you? 

Theresa Ward

So probably the best way would be to follow along with me on LinkedIn. So you can follow either the Fiery Feather as a company, that's where I put most of my updates, share advice, helpful articles, books, things like that, or feel free to connect with me directly. 

I do also post some things on Instagram, depending on where that lands on my Eisenhower Matrix on any given day at the Fiery Feather. 

Chase Clymer

Awesome, Theresa, thank you so much for coming on the show. 

Theresa Ward

Thanks for having me, Chase. Best of luck, take care.

Chase Clymer  

I cannot thank our guests enough for coming on the show and sharing their journey and knowledge with us today. We've got a lot to think about and potentially add to our businesses. Links and more information will be available in the show notes as well. 

If anything in this podcast resonated with you and your business, feel free to reach out and learn more at electriceye.io/connect. Also, make sure you subscribe and leave an amazing review. Thank you!