Blog
Answering the Questions: Who is Axiom and What Do We Do?
This blog post recounts a meeting with a second-generation business owner named Rick. His story involves working for his father for 17 years, buying and selling businesses, facing challenges, and taking risks. Joey highlights a pivotal moment when Rick committed to change, leading to significant challenges and transformations in the company. The narrative emphasizes the importance of faith but clarifies that the purpose is not to spotlight faith in business. Instead, it describes the mission of Axiom, to help businesses build a purposeful, lasting legacy. The key elements for successful businesses outlined include a healthy culture, defined roles, servant leadership, clear systems, market distinction, high profitability, and positive influence in communities.
Why we are busier than ever, and our goals keep escaping us
What if, in our quest for being most efficient, we have lost track of considering whether our daily work effectively accomplishes our goals? Considering the importance of being effective in our work by distinguishing between essential and non-essential work, this article outlines the need for a productivity toolkit to help accomplish goals in the new year.
How We Work With You
At Axiom, we all believe that our mission is to walk alongside small-medium sized companies as they learn the art and science of growth through strategic planning, execution, and coaching so they can be what God has called business to be in the world. All of our consultants have to ask themselves if they believe in this, and if they can pursue it well. They are also faced with answering if you’re called to do this work, and specifically if you’re called to do it at Axiom. We believe that we can be most effective when we recognize our calling to serve our clients and commit to holding each other accountable according to our core values. This is how we work with you - by choosing each day to pursue our mission statement and remember that we’ve been called to serve you.
Am I Acting Like a Leader?
Leadership extends beyond work: Lead by example when alone, at home, or with friends. Embrace humility, empower others, and be consistent.
Developing a Strong Team
Building a strong and cohesive team is vital for any organization's success. It requires effective leadership, clear communication, and a shared sense of purpose. “Extreme Ownership” by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin provides profound insights into the principles of leadership and accountability. In this blog post, we will explore how the principles of extreme ownership can help you develop a strong team that thrives in any situation.
A Simple framework For Deciding When It’s Time To Fire
If you’ve been wondering when to fire an employee, then read our latest blogpost on the simple framework for deciding whether it’s time to move on… or not.
Creating a Culture of Accountability - 4 Simple Steps
If you’ve been a business owner for a considerable amount of time, has the thought, “Should I look into hiring a consultant?” crossed your mind, and you’re wondering, where do we start? Then read our latest blogpost on when you should hire a consultant.
When Should You Hire A Business Consultant?
If you’ve been a business owner for a considerable amount of time, has the thought, “Should I look into hiring a consultant?” crossed your mind, and you’re wondering, where do we start? Then read our latest blogpost on when you should hire a consultant.
Be a Person, Not a Salesperson
What comes to mind when you think of a salesperson? Do you picture someone going door to door with a vacuum in hand, nudging their foot into the open space of the doorway of the poor soul who was unlucky enough to answer? While this strategy may have its time and place, it is often an outmoded sales tactic that leaves customers more dissatisfied than they were before the sale.
Company Culture is Like a Mushroom
Here at Axiom, we focus much of our attention with clients on company culture because it is the underlying foundation that all businesses stand on. Culture is to business as mycelia are to mushrooms (for all my biology buffs out there). For those of you who remember that “Mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell” and not much else, mycelia are the expansive underground network of filaments that carries nutrients not only to the mushroom but also to the surrounding environment.
What Business Can Learn From Sports
In honor of Super Bowl LV this upcoming Sunday, we wanted to take a moment to explore and explain the dynamic relationship of teams and what makes teams like the Chiefs and the Buccaneers so successful. Group dynamics and the ability of athletes to function as a unit is just as important as the actual skill and athleticism of individual athletes. Without a strong understanding of the team goals and commitment to those goals, these organizations would not prosper. So while you sit at home, with your football-shaped pizza and team-colored utensils, screaming “DEFENSE” at your T.V., remember that the systems and conduct of the teams on the field are not unlike the ones that are happening at your own place of work.
Performance Compensation: Building Plans That are Simple, Sustainable and Strategic
Most business owners want some kind of performance compensation plan, even if they have no idea what one looks like. In this recording of a live training we go over a framework for categorizing and understanding the plethora of performance comp plan types. We talk about the advantages and disadvantages as well as the mechanics of how to put one together.
How Many Direct Reports Should I Have?
This is a question relevant to any business leader. But it is particularly important for business owners. Why?
Because more times than not we see teams where the business owner has 4 or 5 direct reports and each one of those people have a handful of direct reports…except one. Invariably there is one poor soul charged with personally overseeing the activities of 12, 13, 16, 20 people.
Customers Come Second
About 80% of businesses will say that they believe their team should come first, ahead of customers. But in practice painfully few actually do it. If your business is ever going to grow beyond your own personal abilities to service customers putting your team first is the only way to do it.
Getting Your Team to Get Things Done
How do you get your team to have a bias toward action? It is a series of habits, tools and disciplines you bring to the team as their leader.
PPP Loan Forgiveness Tool (Free Download)
We have completed version 9 of our PPP loan forgiveness calculation tool. A video walkthrough is available below as is the download.
We encourage you to provide an email address so that we can apprise you of updates and future resources as they are added to the Excel spreadsheet. As mentioned already, we are in version 9 and it definitely won’t be the last update.
Unlike previous versions the formulas are not locked. The sheets are protected to maintain the attribution row at the top of each tab.
How to Build a Culture of Accountability
This is a recording of a live training that was part of our ongoing Monday series for small business owners and key players. We cover the four foundational pillars that must be in place to begin developing an accountable culture. Then we speak to the specific tendencies of managers and the tools you can implement to overcome your struggles in holding others accountable as a leader.
Innovation: How to Engage Your Team and Bring Big Ideas to Life
In this weeks clients and friends of the firm broadcast we talk about innovation and break down a method for bringing big ideas to life inside your company.