Tips to Build a Winning Team With Robert Hudgens
He used to be an out of work, drowning in debt, actor. Who was so broke he passed out chocolates as a job in New York Times Square. Now, he is a financially fit husband and dad living a kick ass life of travel and fun, and will never have to punch a time clock again. Delivering only the best business tips to the pros. Buckle your chin strap, you just stepped into training camp with Coach Jimmy.
Jimmy: On this episode of training camp with Coach Jimmy, I bring in my good friend Robert Hudgens. He has a huge organization and he’s going to teach you how to get one for yourself.
Jimmy: Robert, we’ve known each other for a while and what I’ve always admired about what you and your wife do is that you manage such a large team and what do you attribute to, what are some steps to building that team and once it’s that big, how do you manage something like that?
It’s teaching the birds how to fly and then kicking their butts out of the nest and creating leaders so our team could literally grow without us.
Robert: You know that’s a great question Jimmy because one thing with when you start to build a large team you never really know how large it’s going to get, but the number one thing that Melissa and I decided that we were going to do early is that we were going to build leaders. We were going do what we could to lift people up, empower them, trust them, and help them build their teams up because we’ve always felt that, you know, if we wanted to be momma and papa bird we could keep everybody in the nest, but that’s not the way they’re going to grow. It’s teaching the birds how to fly and then kicking their butts out of the nest and creating leaders so our team could literally grow without us, but more importantly, grow away from us. Once we started doing that and empowering leaders and people such as yourself have stepped up and grown teams of your own, it’s really helped the team explode exponentially and, of course, numbers wise.
Jimmy: Yeah, and that’s the magic of this business model, right? I’ve been guilty of this before where people want everything to run through them because there’s a bit of an ego stroke there, right? It’s easy to do that part and how do you fight against that?
Once you become a Diamond coach in this business, it is no longer about you anymore.
Robert: You know, there are sometimes as you’re coming up through that and you kind of start seeing the numbers of people on your calls dwindle down and whatnot. At first, you’re kind of like, “What? Oh, people just don’t like me anymore,” but at the same time when you get to sit, whether it be at Summit or at Leadership, and you’re seeing people that you have worked with, the people on your team, or you see your team’s names on those lists that’s the satisfaction, that’s when you sit back and go, “We’ve done something good,” and that’s where the relevance, or at least the internal relevance, is, but the one thing we have to learn as leaders is the best type of leader that you can be is the quiet leader. I mean, if I always have to be the one up on stage it’s still about me and that’s not really what it is.
I’ve always said that once you become a Diamond coach in this business, it is no longer about you anymore. Your job is then to go and grow other Diamonds, go and grow other coaches and so you have to learn that quickly and swallow that pride of always having to have and be in control of everything and release some of that, trust that people are going to make the right decision, be there for back up if they ever need you, but really help them. It was really a maturity thing with me too. I had to mature and learn that I didn’t always have to be on the forefront and everything. Let other people take the mantle.
Let other people take the mantle.
Jimmy: So, this is so good and wrapping this up, what’s the tip in building leaders? I know for me for the longest time, I felt like it was me rallying the troops and dragging people along. So, what is it that you’ve done so well, you and Melissa together, that you have so many amazing leaders on your team. What do you feel like has been a key to that part of it?
Robert: Well, the key to building leaders is first of all, people want a one, two, three, kick the can or a recipe for building a leader and there’s really nothing like that. It definitely has to come from within, but the biggest thing that people have to have is they have to have a vision and a purpose. Figure out what those are, draw those out of those people, and then stoke those, not manipulate them, stoke those things and keep them driving towards that. That keeps moving in the right direction.
I think a lot of it is just empowering. One of the best things somebody said to me, person whom I saw as a mentor, they said, “Robert, I see you as leading one of the biggest organizations in the company. I envision you as a fifteen star Diamond. I envision you making a million dollars a year. I envision, I see this…” so they spoke that vision into me and so because of that, even when I couldn’t see it myself, they were able to see it for me. And so, I fed off of that vision and soon it became mine.
I don’t believe in micromanaging. If I have to sit there and put a foot in your butt for you to succeed, then you don’t want to succeed!
So being able to speak vision, being able to speak like that, encouragement into other people’s lives it’s amazing what it can do and then just being there to support them. Being there to empower them. I don’t believe in micromanaging. I don’t believe, if I have to sit there and put a foot in your butt for you to succeed then you don’t want to succeed too much, but empowering them so that they can do it and giving them the tools that they need. Then other than that man, I’ve just been blessed to be able to see them run with it, you know?
Jimmy: That’s awesome. Thank you so much.
Robert: You bet.