Will EOS Work for My Business?

What has to be true for EOS to work?

The deciding factor sits with the owner and the leadership team, not with the business model.

They have to be open-minded. They have to be dissatisfied with the status quo. They have to be more afraid of stagnation than they are of the pain of change. And there has to be a degree of humility.

That last one carries most of the weight. If the primary power center in the company has to be the smartest people in the room, and believes it can always find a way to improve on something and put its own thumbprint on everything in its domain, then it will want to change the system, inject other tools, and outthink a process that has already been proven. EOS in its purest form has worked over and over and over again. Tinkering with it only dilutes the value it drives.

So the question I am really asking, when an owner asks me whether this will work, is whether they are willing to run it as designed.

When is it the wrong time to start EOS?

It can be the wrong time when a company has not yet reached the point of admitting it needs help. And not every company does. These tools are not new. Some owners run their companies very well using tools similar to the ones we use.

But when an owner is frustrated, they have to be prepared to change. It is simple. It is not easy. It takes time, effort, and money if you are working with a Professional EOS Implementer®.

The time to wait is when you cannot commit to doing the work, or when a monumental structural shift is right on top of you. If you are in the middle of a merger, you should probably wait. If a merger or a major hire is simply on the horizon, that is different. In that case this is a good way to make better decisions and support a higher valuation while you go through it.

How many employees do you need for EOS to make sense?

The typical client is growth-oriented and has between 10 and 250 employees. That range gets quoted a lot, and it is accurate as a description of who typically shows up.

It is not a rule. Companies with fewer than 10 employees use this with great success. So do companies with more than a thousand. Headcount is a rough proxy for something more useful, which is whether you have a real leadership team, or at least the beginnings of one, and whether that team is willing to be accountable to each other.

What kind of company does EOS not work for?

The hardest fit is a company structured as a conventional services partnership. I do not mean from an ownership perspective. I mean operationally. Picture the traditional law firm. A group of attorneys acts as the executive leadership and makes sure the support mechanisms are in place, covering administration, research, and infrastructure. The rest of the attorneys are partners who find and service their own clients.

In that setup, the attitude is often, "Look, I let you take part of my fees for overhead and support. Outside of that, I will operate as I see fit."

That is not a team ready for the rigors of real accountability.

What does it actually mean to be running on EOS?

A company is running on EOS when it has mastered the tools and those tools are in place at every level of the organization. Not the leadership team alone. Every level.

That distinction is where most disappointment comes from. I do not hear many misconceptions about what this system will deliver. What I hear far more often is from people who self-implemented and did not get the results they wanted. When we dig in, the reality is almost always the same. They implemented a couple of the tools and thought of themselves as running on EOS. It could not have been further from the truth.

This is a comprehensive, integrated system. Install all of it and you get everything it promises. Install part of it and you get a few good habits and a lot of unmet expectations.

Can I implement EOS myself?

It is possible to implement this on your own. A Professional EOS Implementer® usually proves to be the better path, for a few straightforward reasons.

Implementers are trained to install the system the right way. They see the bigger picture. They are unbiased and do not carry the internal baggage the leadership team carries. And you, the owner, already have a full time job. Adding implementation to it can be overwhelming.

Self-implementers who eventually decide to bring someone in reach that point at different times. The common thread is humility, and a willingness to admit they misread the landscape. It is like the do-it-yourself project where the homeowner finally steps back and realizes the vision is still beautiful, but they are not going to be the one to make it come together in any reasonable period of time.

If you have read the book, started strong, and stalled somewhere between the plan and the follow-through, that is the point where outside help pays for itself.

Why I became a Professional EOS Implementer®

I did not come to this as a consultant looking for a framework. I ran my own company for over twelve years, and spent more than thirty years building, leading, and scaling businesses before that chapter closed. Wins, losses, growth spurts, and plenty of bumps along the way. The '08 financial crisis, anyone? To say nothing of the constant pressure and lack of sleep.

Two separate friends, both EOS clients, raved about what happened in their companies. One ran an architectural firm that had been stuck for years and finally broke through. The other was part of an industrial group with several thousand member companies, and he went on about it for nine full innings of an Atlanta Braves baseball game.

It grabbed my attention. It dovetailed with my skills and experience. And it gave me a way to help owners get what they want from their businesses and lead more fulfilling lives.

How do I know if my business is ready?

If you have a viable business, a leadership team that is tired of the status quo, and enough humility to run a proven system as it was designed, this will work for you. If you cannot commit the time or the effort right now, wait until you can. I would rather tell you that than take your money.

The way to find out is a conversation, not a sales pitch. If you feel the session was not of value, you don't pay me.

Schedule a Call to talk through where your business actually is.