Many CEOs reach a stage where the business appears to be working. Revenue has grown. The team is in place. Operations continue when they step away—for a period of time.
But the underlying dependency remains.
Decisions still route back to the CEO. Sales relies disproportionately on their involvement. Time away introduces friction that becomes visible the longer they are absent. Growth begins to feel less reliable than the numbers suggest.
Kirin’s focus is this gap between appearance and reality. A business can grow without becoming independent of the founder.
The confusion is structural. Growth is easy to measure; dependence is not.
Revenue and headcount signal progress, but they say little about how decisions are made or how value is consistently created. If those mechanisms still originate with the CEO, the business has not transitioned to a scalable model—it has expanded around a central constraint.
That constraint is difficult to diagnose from inside the system. As Kirin notes, “when you're in the bottle, you can't read the label.”
The consequences accumulate over time:
The business may be successful, but it is not stable at scale. It cannot grow beyond the capacity of the person it depends on.
Kirin structures her approach around three pillars: automation, systemization, and hiring. The sequence is deliberate.
Automation is often the entry point. It is visible and increasingly accessible. In her definition, “automation is technology doing work for you while you sleep.”
But automation does not create scale. It assumes the existence of a coherent system. Without that, it amplifies inconsistency and introduces new points of failure.
Hiring presents a similar issue. Additional capacity without defined processes distributes ambiguity across more people.
Systemization sits between the two and determines whether either works.
Systemization is the extraction of how the business actually operates—how decisions are made, how clients are acquired, how work is executed—and converting that into something repeatable and transferable.
Kirin describes it directly: “we need to extract the business generation knowledge from you and systemize it.”
This is where most scaling efforts break down. It requires the CEO to make implicit judgment explicit, and to accept that what feels intuitive can be taught.
The difference between perceived scale and actual scale becomes visible under one condition: absence.
A business may continue operating when the CEO steps away. The question is how long it sustains itself. Kirin’s framing is direct: “the wheel can't turn for very long while you're gone. It will eventually starve.”
The issue is not operational continuity. It is whether the drivers of growth—particularly new client generation and key decision-making—continue without the CEO.
If those functions pause, the system is incomplete.
This is most pronounced in sales. Many CEOs remain the primary source of new business well into later stages of growth. The rationale often sounds reasonable: relationships are personal, judgment is nuanced, outcomes are sensitive.
From a systems perspective, it signals that the core mechanism of value creation has not been externalized.
Until that knowledge is defined and transferred, the business cannot scale beyond the founder’s direct involvement.
The structural problem is visible. The constraint that sustains it is behavioral.
Kirin points to a recurring pattern: CEOs often assume their judgment cannot be replicated. She refers to it as a form of “special snowflake syndrome,” where founders believe their capability is inherently non-transferable.
This assumption shapes how they operate:
The organization adapts accordingly. Teams learn to escalate rather than decide. Over time, autonomy diminishes—not because capability is absent, but because the system never required it.
In one example, a CEO running a multi-million-dollar business found that “everyone was coming to him for answers… there was not autonomy on the teams.”
The business had grown in size. It had not changed how it operated.
Systemization extends beyond process into culture.
Culture determines how decisions are made when the CEO is not present. It governs standards, behavior, and the degree of independence the organization exercises.
Kirin treats culture as something designed, not something that emerges. “Culture is a system just as everything else.”
Without that design, inconsistency develops. Different parts of the organization operate under different assumptions. The CEO becomes the point of reconciliation.
At that point, culture reinforces dependency rather than reducing it.
Kirin’s framework requires a shift in how the CEO defines their role.
First, knowledge extraction becomes a primary responsibility. The CEO must identify where their judgment drives outcomes and convert that into explicit, teachable systems.
Second, the instinct to answer must be replaced with the discipline to define. Each answered question that is not codified preserves dependency.
Third, sequencing matters. Automation follows system clarity. Hiring reinforces defined processes. Reversing that order compounds inefficiency.
Finally, the CEO must confront the idea of indispensability. A business that depends on the CEO is not scaled, regardless of its size.
The distinction is not subtle. Scaling is not the same as growth, and it is not achieved through delegation alone.
A business that relies on the CEO for sales, decisions, or alignment remains structurally constrained. It may perform well, but it cannot operate independently.
Systemization is the point where that changes. It forces the CEO to externalize how the business works and to build mechanisms that hold without their direct involvement.
From inside the business, this gap is easy to overlook. The system functions, the team performs, and progress appears steady.
The test is straightforward.
If the business slows when the CEO steps away, the work of scaling is not finished.
Veronica Kirin is an advisor to scaling CEOs, focused on systems, automation, and culture design. She works with founder-led businesses to remove operational dependency on the CEO and build structures that support sustained growth without constant founder involvement.
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Jeff Holman is a CEO advisor, legal strategist, and founder of Intellectual Strategies. With years of experience guiding leaders through complex business and legal challenges, Jeff equips CEOs to scale with confidence by blending legal expertise with strategic foresight. Connect with him on LinkedIn.
Intellectual Strategies provides innovative legal solutions for CEOs and founders through its fractional legal team model. By offering proactive, integrated legal support at predictable costs, the firm helps leaders protect their businesses, manage risk, and focus on growth with confidence.
__________
The Breakout CEO podcast brings you inside the pivotal moments of scaling leaders. Each week, host Jeff Holman spotlights breakout stories of scaling CEOs—showing how resilience, insight, and strategy create pivotal inflection points and lasting growth.
Listen and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform:
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Want to be a guest—or know a scaling CEO with a breakout story to share? Apply directly at go.intellectualstrategies.com.
TRANSCRIPT SUMMARY:
00:00 – Intro & Technical Difficulties
00:32 – Veronica’s SEO Business Exit & GEO Explained
02:17 – The “Selling CEO” Problem
03:08 – Moving from the U.S. to Berlin
05:15 – Testing Business Systems Through Travel
06:34 – Running a Business Remotely
08:33 – Why CEOs Become Bottlenecks
10:02 – Automation, Systems & Scaling
12:19 – Jeff’s Everest & Kilimanjaro Experiences
13:16 – The Danger of Founder Dependency
16:13 – Fractional Teams & Scaling Smarter
17:27 – Special Snowflake Syndrome in CEOs
19:07 – Culture vs. Control
20:46 – Company Culture as a System
23:26 – Why Teams Keep Going Back to the CEO
24:44 – Micromanagement & Decision-Making Habits
27:36 – Creating Systems That Remove the Founder
31:26 – Why CEOs Need a Mindset Reset
34:22 – Building a Business That Survives Without You
35:58 – First Steps to Scaling Beyond Yourself
37:25 – Veronica’s 3 Pillars of Scaling
39:32 – “When You’re in the Bottle, You Can’t Read the Label”
41:23 – Signs a CEO Is Burning Out
43:15 – The Real Transformation After Letting Go
45:20 – Work-Life Balance & Entrepreneur Culture
47:22 – Final Thoughts on Leadership, Freedom & Sustainability
FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Jeff Holman, Host (02:17.409)
Welcome back everybody to the breakout CEO podcast. I'm your host, Jeff Holman, and I am here with Veronica Kieran. Veronica, it's so good to have you here on the show for two reasons. First, we get to share your insights with all of our audience. But as I mentioned before, I might be your guinea pig. I might be the person that your frameworks would literally help get out of the selling CEO seat at some point. So welcome to the show.
Veronica Zora Kirin (02:44.14)
Yes, yes, yes. Hey, I'm happy to have a guinea pig, always. Now thanks for having me.
Jeff Holman, Host (02:50.285)
I'm a pretty good guinea pig. Well, yeah, it's great to have you. You're joining us from Berlin. So, pardon me there. We were talking and you mentioned you used to live in Salt Lake City where I'm located. What took you to Berlin? I'm curious what that path is.
Veronica Zora Kirin (02:54.68)
Good to know.
Veronica Zora Kirin (03:08.606)
Yeah, mean, what the path is, just sheer gumption. I I knew I wanted to live outside the United States from a pretty young age as a teenager, invested into the United States, as I was telling you, that was through the National Civilian Community Corps, which I enlisted in for two years. And so I was deployed to Katrina and doing disaster relief for the tsunami in American Samoa. I was flown in on a C-16.
Jeff Holman, Host (03:16.151)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (03:38.764)
you know, military plane because they weren't letting civilian planes land on an island that had just been hit. Yeah, cargo, like when you think of like the cargo military planes with the ropes in the middle with the boxes and all, like they're not insulated. You should know that those planes are not insulated. I was inside my sleeping bag for six hours. It was so cold. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, I really invested into the United States before I left as part of my value system to really be aware of what I'm leaving and also to leave, leave things well.
Jeff Holman, Host (03:38.94)
wow.
Jeff Holman, Host (03:43.105)
The C16 is one of the really big ones, right? Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (03:50.763)
Yeah, yeah.
wow. Wow.
Veronica Zora Kirin (04:08.183)
But also within my value system, my core values of freedom and peace, and it made more sense for me to be over here. We did it during the pandemic. Everything was closed anyway, so it was very easy to cut ties. And my partner got a job. Now I'm a dual citizen, so we're here to stay. But at the time, it was just a matter of getting a work visa and going. It's a lot easier than most people in the United States think. And that is a...
Jeff Holman, Host (04:28.23)
wow.
Veronica Zora Kirin (04:37.121)
That is a drum I like to beat.
Jeff Holman, Host (04:39.597)
Well, I've certainly enjoyed traveling internationally with my family lately. Spent a month in Europe last year and we didn't... Oh, we went from... We kind of traveled everywhere. was maybe a little bit too busy. We went from Paris to Greece to Spain to London and then back into the Normandy area for kind of finished with a slow week, we'll call it. So, yeah, it was a lot of...
Veronica Zora Kirin (04:46.573)
We're about.
Veronica Zora Kirin (05:02.797)
Brilliant. All in one week? Holy.
Jeff Holman, Host (05:07.969)
Well, this was all in one month, but we spent four to seven days in each place.
Veronica Zora Kirin (05:15.201)
Yeah, perfect. good. Love it. Yeah, that's actually, you know, we're talking about like selling businesses. Part of my story when I keynote about exiting and selling a business is that to test my systems, to make sure that the business was sellable and ready to go, I went away for three weeks, backpacked Europe, but I was in each city for only two to three days. So this was a three week, eight city whirlwind.
Jeff Holman, Host (05:18.221)
Yeah, it was a lot of fun.
Jeff Holman, Host (05:30.381)
you
Jeff Holman, Host (05:37.174)
wow.
Wow, that's faster than what we did.
Veronica Zora Kirin (05:40.462)
in which I also almost got blown off a mountain in Iceland. you know, just like wrapping it up. But I did actually lose an employee at the time. Not like, you know, they're still alive. But one of the employees I had at the time kind of ghosted us while I was away. And so that was a really interesting test of the systems. Like, did I have the systems and the strategies in place to cope without me being the bottleneck?
Jeff Holman, Host (05:53.132)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (06:00.835)
really?
Veronica Zora Kirin (06:09.581)
Right. So like we talk about the CEOs always, especially founder led businesses get very bottlenecky. And I was able to immediately just like, yeah, I want to say snap my fingers. Obviously there was more stress. Like I spent maybe an hour in a coffee shop going, ah, and then, you know, here we go. Okay. Everything's back in order. It will be fine until I'm back on the ground and I can do something a little bit more permanent. The clients didn't even know what happened. So there you go.
Jeff Holman, Host (06:34.305)
Well, well then this is perfect. is and so I will admit that so my wife and I run our business and not this is not about me, but maybe there's some other business founders who can relate to what my situation is or what your situation was and they can they can learn some insights from that. My wife helps run the businesses essentially our CEO CFO. She's the she's the responsible one right? I tell everybody and I think a lot of our clients know that but.
But we left and of course we worked at a lot of places. In fact, when we went to Normandy, we were on this very beautiful, like a horse ranch. We don't ride, but it happened to be just in this valley, just beautiful old apple cider mill and tons of fun. But what we learned when we got there was there's no internet and we're pretty plugged in even when we're traveling. And so, you know, we got there like maybe 10 o'clock one night.
Veronica Zora Kirin (07:15.319)
Mm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (07:22.454)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (07:30.566)
and realized, okay, we're, we got a week here to finish our vacation. And the next morning I got up and I drove to three different cities nearby to find somewhere I could purchase a, what's it called? a star link. And I, and I got the star link and I brought it back and we worked off the star link for a week and it was totally fine. So I wouldn't say that we were set up to work, you know, completely on completely offline and have the business run itself, but we were worked.
Veronica Zora Kirin (07:44.641)
Like the little tether. Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (07:51.981)
Hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (07:59.95)
We are set up to run remotely very well. so I'm really curious to get into your learnings, your teachings that we can share with the audience about how to go from perhaps untethered to more automated or really put the systems in place to step for any CEO to step out of the selling role, out of the operating role, whatever role they're kind of tied to right now.
Veronica Zora Kirin (08:23.277)
Hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (08:29.171)
and see how to make progress in that area.
Veronica Zora Kirin (08:29.73)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (08:33.931)
Yeah, thousand percent. I mean, there's a reason I call myself a chaos coach. So I tend to get in there usually when the hair is already on fire, which is unfortunate because I try to put as many resources out there as I can to help folks get ahead of it so that they have more freedom, they have more time. Like I said, one of my core values is freedom. So I definitely had gotten the business to a position where I could work remotely.
That was one of my major like extractions that I did. I think I started doing that around 2015. So like the business was a couple of years old at that point. And I was like, okay, I'm hyper local right now. I'm not able to move around like I want to. And so around 2015 was when I was kind of like starting to pull myself out of the locality aspect to start to get more clients nationally and internationally. But even with the local clients saying, we're going to use this thing called Zoom, it's kind of new.
Jeff Holman, Host (09:32.045)
2015, very new.
Veronica Zora Kirin (09:33.134)
But we're to like, seriously, honest to God, so much of my consulting and coaching in the pandemic was just helping people sort this out. Whereas I had been fully online for five years at that point. And so like it is sort of crisis planning and crisis insulating to make sure that you aren't the bottleneck. So for you, like you're able to go abroad, perfect. But
Jeff Holman, Host (10:00.813)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (10:02.079)
If you find yourself with no internet, like you had a surprise when you were abroad and so you had to test your systems and find the business actually can't survive without me for that long. And so now you know that now you have something that you can address. And that's what I really love. Those are the moments where you can get in there and say, okay, we've learned something about the business that we maybe want to scale a little further. Just for anyone listening, who's like, what are these resources Veronica has? My scaling course is free.
You can go find it on my website, says the Academy right there. Go take it. Go take the course. VeronicaKieran.com. Nobody can spell it. Actually, if you've had Kieran beer, the Japanese beer, that's my last name. The Kieran is a dragon. It's in Chinese, Chinese pride, predominantly Japan and Korea a little bit. It's a mythological creature that appears to stages when they're about to die. But it's also a Croatian last name. I'm Croatian, so I don't.
Jeff Holman, Host (10:35.361)
And what's your website? Let's get that on there a couple times.
Jeff Holman, Host (10:44.461)
Okay. Okay.
Jeff Holman, Host (10:57.403)
Fantastic.
Veronica Zora Kirin (11:01.001)
We don't know what happened here. But so go over to my website, veronicakieran.com. Click the button in the menu. It says Academy. Go over there. Take the free course because it will walk you through thinking about how to automate. In this day and age, there's no reason that you should not be automating. Like you have no excuses anymore. With AI as good as I was, please. Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (11:21.643)
Well, let's go ahead. I was just saying, let's dive in a little bit because, because here's, here's, as you're saying this, I want to, I don't want to turn this into a coaching session for me, but if, if you can use me as a guinea pig, feel free. Yeah, why not? Right. So, because let me add, let me add one more detail about our business only that, so last year we spent a month abroad, my wife, me and my daughter, who we brought on board as our, our client.
Veronica Zora Kirin (11:34.431)
Why not? Why not? Yeah!
Jeff Holman, Host (11:50.765)
client relations, I can't even remember the name of it right now, client relations specialist. She interfaces with all our clients and she's the non-attorney point of contact. It's been a wonderful addition to our team. She's really good at it. So we're not totally a family business because we've got four other attorneys and a couple of staff members. But when the three of us and our other family members are all gone, work has to get done, right? I will say though, the year before that,
Veronica Zora Kirin (12:03.565)
Mm.
Jeff Holman, Host (12:19.308)
in 2024 and then also in 2023. I personally was able to go do Everest Base Camp for two weeks and then I was able to go to Mount Kilimanjaro for two weeks. And so I have as the CEO, founder, whatever you want to call me, you know, in a law firm, I am in charge of a lot of stuff. I help clients with stuff. I and I'm the one bringing in most of the work. We have probably 95 % of work to our business. So I have been able to
Veronica Zora Kirin (12:29.165)
Stop it.
out.
Veronica Zora Kirin (12:39.405)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (12:43.617)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (12:48.534)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (12:50.122)
you know, unplug myself to some degree, as long as I have the other people in place. I think what you're talking about is maybe partly that, but probably a lot also automating the systems and building out the SOPs to be even more automated than what we probably are. So with that context, does that help at all?
Veronica Zora Kirin (12:53.943)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (12:57.74)
Yes?
Veronica Zora Kirin (13:05.953)
Yeah.
Probably. Yeah, because I heard a bottleneck. You just said you bring in about 95 % of the clientele. Is that correct? Okay. Huge bottleneck. Insane. So if you decide to retire...
Jeff Holman, Host (13:16.824)
yeah, that's correct, yes. I am as good of a bottleneck as I am an attorney. I tell everybody that, which is why we've built what we've built in the team environment.
Veronica Zora Kirin (13:28.523)
No, but that's brilliant. So like, it's really good that you have a team already. So that at least the wheel doesn't have to stop turning when you are gone, but the wheel can't turn for very long while you're gone. It will eventually starve. Yeah, right. Okay. So that's important. What happens when you go away, when you did your base camp trips, like what happened inside of the business? What did you return to as far as even just small hiccups?
Jeff Holman, Host (13:38.868)
Not being fed forever. Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (13:54.142)
Well, I will say pleasantly almost everything was not a problem and and and my team was way more worried about it than I probably was but they they handled everything just fine and and we're probably even you know two years later even more so prepared for that type of Situation because we've you know made progress, but what happened? I mean, there's a couple times clients are saying hey, you know, I want to get a hold of Jeff I want Jeff's opinion specifically because
As a lawyer, know, a lot of clients feel like, Hey, I hired you. I want you. So there's, there's this conditioning that we've done with a lot of our clients, even more so now to say, Hey, you get the team. Like, like I'm a good attorney, but we've got a lot of good attorneys on our team. And if you can't get ahold of me, the benefit, one of the benefits of a team, you know, we're a fractional legal team. So we kind of sit like an in-house legal team for startups and scaling companies that is it. And you can call whoever you need on our team whenever you need.
Veronica Zora Kirin (14:32.813)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (14:40.141)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (14:49.089)
Yeah. Perfect.
Jeff Holman, Host (14:53.109)
I specifically don't want to be a gatekeeper, i.e. bottleneck in the company for people getting legal work done. So hiccups that I return to, you know, there are probably one or two emails where people are saying, hey, I really want Jeff's opinion on this. And I was able to check in on email, call it every third day while I was in Everest Base Camp, you know, at one of the teahouses, they'd have internet and I'd check in.
Veronica Zora Kirin (14:58.817)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (15:10.061)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (15:15.287)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (15:21.035)
So there was a couple of those, what else? I don't think we had any like real critical business level decisions that had to be made while I was gone. So there weren't really that many hiccups that I recall. There was nothing major that I came back to and it still sticks in my mind two years later.
Veronica Zora Kirin (15:39.128)
Yeah, I mean fair. Well, so that's good. So you've got at least a great team and you've got at least some systems that are working for you. But if you were gone longer, I'm hearing that clients would start to feel a little bit left behind and the new clients wouldn't be coming. So that's where I would zoom in and say, look, you've been in business how many years?
Jeff Holman, Host (15:54.989)
Probably.
Jeff Holman, Host (16:01.245)
we'll call it eight for this last iteration. So I kind of been doing this for 20 years, but since I really rebuilt the law firm around a fractional legal team model, it's been about eight years.
Veronica Zora Kirin (16:05.311)
Okay, all right, so eight years.
Veronica Zora Kirin (16:13.131)
Yeah, which great model, by the way. This is a really good model. Fractional, like if you are a coach or consultant and you're considering your model, the fractional is brilliant. So you've got eight years of evidence before you as to what works and what doesn't, which is exactly a great time to really rethink your systems because you don't have to guess.
Jeff Holman, Host (16:15.585)
I love it.
Jeff Holman, Host (16:27.437)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (16:36.523)
When it's a brand new business, it's a lot of hypothesis and that can be very uncomfortable for everybody, including myself when I'm like, okay, I'm guiding the hypothesis. I'm not really, you know, like we don't have evidence yet. We have to go test it. It's a lot more laborious. So if I were you, what I would be looking at is yes, automation, but it sounds like you have a fair amount covered. I would be looking at
Jeff Holman, Host (16:44.479)
Right, right.
Veronica Zora Kirin (17:02.439)
systems and then using automation into the systems where it makes sense. like just to step back, automation is technology doing work for you while you sleep, including generating leads. We love that. We want more of that all the time. I remember I had, Calendly was brand new when I was running my company, by the way. I'm older than I look.
Jeff Holman, Host (17:14.701)
Okay.
Veronica Zora Kirin (17:27.265)
So I had to convince a lot of business owners, you need to be using an automated scheduler. They're like, what is that? Because there's a little bit of like special snowflake syndrome that happens to CEOs where we say, nobody can do it as well as I can. That's why I founded the business, which is cute and probably a little true, but it can be taught. If things couldn't be taught to others, we wouldn't have universities, right? So for you, it's the system.
Jeff Holman, Host (17:27.67)
You
Jeff Holman, Host (17:33.644)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (17:42.806)
Mm.
Jeff Holman, Host (17:50.719)
Right, right.
Veronica Zora Kirin (17:56.088)
that sounds like needs to come first, we need to extract the business generation knowledge from you and systemize it so that other teammates can start doing it. Because it's already in there, you already know what you're doing to generate the clientele. So we need to extract it, systematize it, make it thus teachable, so well-documented and teachable for the other teammates, train them in on that.
and use automation as much as possible within that system so that it doesn't take over people's lives. It should be making money in your sleep. And then same...
Jeff Holman, Host (18:30.381)
That makes, yeah, that makes a ton of sense. I'm going to pause there because it makes so much sense. And I think what maybe, you know, one of my clients or your clients might say at this point is I totally get it. And I've got a wonderful team. And as I sit and think about it, I say to myself, okay, maybe I haven't really made that their role. Like they're really good at their roles in the firm, but maybe
I've I don't know. I'm just rethinking this a little bit. Maybe I'm hoarding the role more than I think I am. Does that make sense?
Veronica Zora Kirin (19:07.851)
Yeah, this is common. Yeah. So I had one of my clients, he was doing two million in business a year when he brought me on and he was going insane because he thought he had scaled, but he's like, everyone keeps coming to me for answers and it's driving me crazy. And I'm like, that's a great number.
Jeff Holman, Host (19:16.012)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (19:24.535)
But two million's a good number, right? Like to get to, for a small company to get to two million, that's great achievement. A lot of people don't get there, but he was still the bottleneck. Is that what you're saying?
Veronica Zora Kirin (19:34.072)
But when, people, everyone was coming to him for answers within the company. There was not autonomy on the teams. And so that's where, like we said, we had to figure out the truth, which was he was bottlenecking. He didn't mean to be, because he thought he had scaled. So we worked together for six months and then he went up to five million, because now there was time back on his plate. We were able to get the team out of the way.
Jeff Holman, Host (19:42.529)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (19:57.293)
Hmm. Well, well, so, so is it an excuse then potentially if someone like me would say to themselves, I don't know if it's quite our culture, like, like we have really good people and they're in other roles, but it like, culturally we need to get aligned or something. Does culture become maybe a substitute for the underlying issue where a CEO say, I want my, I want my like,
Veronica Zora Kirin (20:18.029)
Hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (20:26.424)
Does that make sense? I have really good people and we're not, we're operating well, but maybe if I shift the culture or something, then we can get to the point where everybody operates in more alignment or whatever. I feel like I'm throwing buzzwords in and it sounds like an excuse as I say it.
Veronica Zora Kirin (20:27.884)
Yes.
Veronica Zora Kirin (20:41.474)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (20:46.251)
No, no. I mean, you're speaking to an anthropologist who helps shift company culture through systems and people. So you're barking up the right tree here, sir. But no, you're 100 % right. But the thing that a lot of CEOs miss is that they set the company culture. Especially, I work in tech. So I meet a whole lot of people who are really, truly brilliant.
Jeff Holman, Host (20:55.425)
Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (20:59.192)
Good, good.
Veronica Zora Kirin (21:13.965)
but they don't have the people skills and they don't realize that every action that they make within the organization sets the tone for the organization. Literally, they build the culture. I always make this analogy that do we really think that the CEO of Amazon decided that he was going to have one of the most toxic company cultures in the warehouses? Do you think that's what he set out to do when he founded Amazon in the 90s? I don't think so. No.
Jeff Holman, Host (21:37.283)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (21:41.432)
Surely not, but he also wasn't detached from it, I'm sure. Right?
Veronica Zora Kirin (21:46.988)
I think eventually he was. I think eventually he was quite detached. So my point is when we scale, if we're not so intent on enshrining culture as a system, then it gets out of hand and it spins totally out of control. And all of a sudden you're in a business that you don't recognize. like culture is a system just as everything else. Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (21:49.313)
eventually but
Jeff Holman, Host (22:06.69)
Yeah, like...
Jeff Holman, Host (22:10.848)
And I guess what I'm getting at is, is at some level, sure, at the level of company they are today, he's detached from a lot of stuff, although he, he, you know, does everything. But, but...
Veronica Zora Kirin (22:18.539)
of now, yeah, absolutely. But he also didn't set, he certainly did not enshrine the culture as a system.
Jeff Holman, Host (22:28.108)
Well, by that, do you mean the culture that developed, let's say a company has a toxic culture in some part of it, that in the absence of the CEO setting a better culture, those things can develop. So it's not that the CEO is setting, purposefully setting toxic culture, although some might. I think I've worked with a few of those. But, but in the absence of them proactively setting the culture the right way, subcultures are going to evolve and emerge on their own, right?
Veronica Zora Kirin (22:57.057)
Right, right. That's the intentionality behind it. That this is another system and a lot, a lot of business owners don't realize how important culture is as a system. And that if it's not thought about as you begin to scale, then yes, it can spin out of control, toxicity can emerge, and there's no system for managing the toxicity. That's that key point. Of course, yeah, you get some bad apples sometimes. You do the best you can in your hiring process, which is also a system.
Jeff Holman, Host (23:01.058)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (23:09.581)
Okay.
Veronica Zora Kirin (23:26.903)
But if something happens or somebody goes through a tough time and so they start acting out and they don't mean to be, all this stuff. But there should be enshrined within the company culture as a system, a way to manage it. So to come back to you and how your team kind of looks to you for answers, there's like a letting this happen where the clients are saying, I really wanna talk to Jeff.
I'll wait just a little bit. There's not, there's like not a, I don't know if it's empowerment or if it's the system itself or you know, whatever it is, we'd have to go deeper on that. But there's something there where the team isn't pushing back. And there's also something that you're probably holding that you don't realize you're holding. I'm not saying it's intentional, but there's probably something there.
Jeff Holman, Host (24:05.368)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (24:15.756)
I probably am because no, I think a lot of times, because I have this struggle and I say to myself, man, I want my teeth, like just go ahead and make the decision. I'm pretty, I call it chill. I'm pretty chill a lot of times when people take, take, yeah, they take, they take decisions, they take action. Like I love it. However, if someone does come to me and say, Hey, what do you think? I have a hard time not telling them exactly what I think. And I think that gets interpreted as
Veronica Zora Kirin (24:26.317)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, you seem so.
Veronica Zora Kirin (24:42.519)
Hehehe.
Jeff Holman, Host (24:44.898)
Well, Jeff has a way he'd like it done. And so I should ask Jeff how to do it so that it, and you know, a lot of CEOs might feel this way about themselves. I think the decisions that I make in the perspective they have are pretty good, but you know, is it the only way to do it? I'm certain it's not, but if someone asks me, it's that thing, and I've told this to a lot of attorneys that I've trained them over the years. I'm like, listen, if you write a good document and I read it and it, you know, doesn't have glaring errors and it's consistent and.
Veronica Zora Kirin (24:48.246)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (25:14.114)
then I'm going to probably let it go. If it comes back though, and I have to change a lot of like grammar, grammar is the entry point to me then probably rewriting the whole thing structurally too. And so I, you know, I have a hard time not doing that. And so, you know, if I've got to spend the time on all your grammar, I'm going to, I'm not going to overlook the other teaching moments that I have. So I end up, you know, doing the work. So there's maybe that model. Well, I'm really curious.
You know, this client that you said went from two to five probably had similar types of things. There's probably some more or less universal, you know, levers that you're pulling with people. What are the types of things that you start with for somebody like me or somebody like that, that client that you mentioned?
Veronica Zora Kirin (25:57.527)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, because he kept, as you're saying, so he was doing some like government analysis and things like that. And so his analysts were constantly coming to him and saying, you know, is this good enough? I mean, it's true. He had a very rigorous process and a very, I mean, he's a very smart man, a thousand percent. But again, I just said the word process. so like if that's his process,
Jeff Holman, Host (26:27.663)
Sure.
Veronica Zora Kirin (26:32.941)
It does need to be enshrined somehow. And then taught to the team, no, don't come to me on this. Don't come to me on this. I'm not available for that. With enough oversight, so that's part of the kind of like letting go system that your nervous system is going to go, whoa, wait a second. I'm going cold turkey away from my team. And the team's going to go, So there has to be this intermediary period of learning what they need.
to feel confident enough to move forward, understanding what is it that you keep, like if there's these teachable moments, as you said in the documentation, what is it that you see repeated? Because then that's something that's not being communicated. So now we can enshrine that as part of the Holman way of doing it, right? And then do that off-boarding process. I just see it as another layer of training, but then at scale,
They've already been working under a certain way, so it takes some time to shift. can't do it all at once.
Jeff Holman, Host (27:36.484)
Yeah. Well, it sounds so counterintuitive when you, I don't remember the exact phrase you use, but you, basically said you've got to create a process to undo the process, right? Like what is the process to tell people that I'm not part of your process. And that sounds so counterintuitive as you know, as the founder of the firm or the CEO of the, of the company or whatever it might be, right? I'm going to now
Veronica Zora Kirin (27:47.127)
Yes.
Veronica Zora Kirin (27:55.799)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (27:59.308)
implement a formal process so that I'm no longer part of your process to the, to the extent that everyone's trained and ready to do that.
Veronica Zora Kirin (28:07.083)
Right? I mean, you know, like the large firms, you told...
Jeff Holman, Host (28:09.923)
Did I just hedge my whole, I think I just hedged the whole thing of like, to the extent they're ready to do that. Like that's the classic problem right there, isn't it? Like I said, we gotta have a system to take me out of the thing if they're ready.
Veronica Zora Kirin (28:20.429)
Cause you're gonna, you're, you're issuing doubt. Yeah. But, but so like, I know, you know, that like the large seniors at the largest firms in New York city, they are not looking at what the associates are, are developing in their documentation, right? Like there's, there's, they so aren't there, but there is, so it's, it's that training process of like the way we do things, which is a major aspect of culture. So it's not just, this is the way we do it.
Jeff Holman, Host (28:25.911)
I just did.
Jeff Holman, Host (28:37.119)
Yeah, we know that.
Veronica Zora Kirin (28:50.573)
you know, file the green folders in this bin, you know, like it's not just that, it's also this is the way we talk about this law. This is the way we approach these types of businesses. And it becomes that ethos, which is an important part of culture. So yeah, I'm like, I'm gonna come back to it and just say it is possible to systematize and then hand over, but.
Jeff Holman, Host (28:56.537)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (29:18.561)
Yeah, I think it's interesting that you said when they're ready because I think that's coming from you.
Jeff Holman, Host (29:19.991)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (29:24.527)
I'm certain it is. I'm certain it is. without this setting with you and me talking, you know, even if I think if we were talking about your two to $5 million, you know, client example, I probably wouldn't have even had the introspection to say, well, it's probably me. I think this is feeling really personal right now. I'm trying to deflect it a little bit. How do I not be on the hot seat? But no, I totally get it. You're making it sound like, I'm...
Veronica Zora Kirin (29:27.574)
Eheheh
Veronica Zora Kirin (29:47.277)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (29:53.168)
taking away from what you're saying that culture is really the underlying thing that you're addressing, but you're doing it often through systems. Is that a fair way to say it?
Veronica Zora Kirin (30:02.829)
Yeah, I would say that. So culture is a system in and of itself. Like I walk on the right hand side of the sidewalk because the system in Germany is that we drive on the right hand side of the street, right? So that's an enshrined legal system, yet also a cultural system that keeps us organized, although we have a lot of tourists and so sometimes I'm running into people. You've been to the UK, so you know what it's like in London.
Jeff Holman, Host (30:15.469)
Yes.
Jeff Holman, Host (30:25.848)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (30:28.233)
idea where to walk and how to handle it. I you're going to get hit by a car in three seconds because you're also right. Your culture, literally you're getting culture shock because you're trying to look the opposite direction to cross the street from what's safe. so the systems feed culture and culture feed system. They're talking to each other all the time. And so it's our job as the founders and CEOs to integrate ourselves, insert ourselves into that process rather than letting it just go.
Jeff Holman, Host (30:30.063)
You
Jeff Holman, Host (30:34.136)
Right, right.
Jeff Holman, Host (30:38.02)
Yes.
Veronica Zora Kirin (30:58.135)
So yeah, it's very simple. I've been working with a CEO right now who's very much in the process and it's driving me crazy, but there's no systems there. So I watched the onboarding of a new teammate and it was like, here's some Google docs, good luck. And I was like, I just, was flabbergasted because that's causing confusion, which is encouraging the cyclone around the CEO, you know?
Jeff Holman, Host (31:08.079)
you
Jeff Holman, Host (31:18.582)
Okay, yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (31:26.273)
Yes. Is this a common problem because CEOs are often straddling multiple, I mean, I guess getting back to the whole theme here, right? Scaling beyond the selling CEO. CEOs are so enshrined in each part of the business because they've been there oftentimes from the beginning. They've built the systems or they've built the culture despite the lack of systems, maybe we should say. And so,
Veronica Zora Kirin (31:27.149)
So yes, it does come from systems. Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (31:53.644)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (31:55.994)
they either have done it before or they are the ones who decide how to do it today if there's a new thing. And so they're just filling in the gaps everywhere in the business. When you start with a CEO, do you have to retrain them? Boy, what's the word? Do you have to reset their mental framework before you can even get into culture and process and systems?
Veronica Zora Kirin (32:23.317)
Yeah, yeah, more often than not, there's a gremlin that they're holding onto that's gnawing on them that isn't letting them.
Jeff Holman, Host (32:29.294)
Yeah. Well, there's some past experience or some employee they had that they had a fire one time and they're like, I am never doing that again. And so now, you know, consciously or not, when that type of situation comes up, somebody like me might say, I remember this and I'm just like last time I've tried it once or twice and it's just easier for me to do it. But now I can't, but the, but the problem is I can't necessarily
I don't see a pathway out of the roles that I've created for myself because I've put the walls up around that role.
Veronica Zora Kirin (33:05.099)
Right. You've right. And now there's this groove that says deep as a Grand Canyon that you're in. Yeah. Yeah. So it is a little bit of that like mindset shifting of like, are you in this situation in the first place? So kind of doing some digging that can be sometimes a little bit uncomfortable and then saying, okay, I can see over the edge of the canyon, even though you can't because I've been in so many businesses, my own and others.
that I know what that path looks like forward. So let's first figure out why are you in the canyon in the first place, and then let's build you a ladder out.
Jeff Holman, Host (33:33.113)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (33:42.097)
That makes sense. And I'm going to add one more thing. I know we're going over what you and I plan. I hope your time is OK for this, but it's so valuable. But the added perspective that I may be gaining in the moment here is that while I look back on my absence from the business to go to Everest Base Camp or Kilimanjaro or being away for an extended period of time working,
Veronica Zora Kirin (33:49.709)
All
Jeff Holman, Host (34:05.904)
I think what I've created is successful enough that I can pause my role for a time, but it's not necessarily that's probably very different from creating the systems that allow the business to run without me. Even the roles that I fulfill, right?
Veronica Zora Kirin (34:22.689)
Yeah.
Yes, I don't take this the wrong way, but I want you to be able to get hit by a bus and your company to keep going. So that's the mindset to start getting into. And that was the mindset shift that I had to make as well, because I also had special snowflake syndrome. I was the only anthropologist I knew who was running an SEO company in the world. So I knew I could, I might've been correct about it.
Jeff Holman, Host (34:33.744)
Totally understand. Totally understand.
Jeff Holman, Host (34:44.496)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (34:51.568)
And you might have been correct about that.
Veronica Zora Kirin (34:56.449)
But the truth of the matter is I learned everything that I know because I can tell you I wasn't an anthropologist when I was born. I might've had some sort of, know, nature versus nurture. There might've been something inherent or innate, or it might just all be nurture. I know it can be taught. And so I got off my dang high horse and said, I'm miserable. I was burning out. I'm miserable. I don't want to live this way. My company's not doing as well as it should. So I need to find a different way forward.
Jeff Holman, Host (35:03.887)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (35:25.037)
And the next way forward is extracting myself. And so that, like, if I just do the 180 and say, I'm not a special snowflake, this is all teachable. If I get hit by a bus tomorrow, I want my company to be able to survive without me. How do I get there? And then you traveling is the perfect test because it shows you very clearly, like, where are the cracks? Where are the weak spots still? And I would
Jeff Holman, Host (35:40.782)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (35:51.849)
actually be using that as your experiment. So do a little bit of systematizing, then go on another vacation and see what happens.
Jeff Holman, Host (35:54.457)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (35:58.993)
Certainly better than testing by getting hit by a bus, no doubt. So where should somebody start with this? And I know we've circled around this issue and the topic quite a bit. What's the first two or three steps they would start with? How do you begin that conversation with somebody who is, they see themselves as successful, they are hiring you probably more often because
Veronica Zora Kirin (36:02.42)
Yes.
Veronica Zora Kirin (36:17.132)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (36:28.698)
They're saying, I've achieved some success and I want to get to the next level rather than, hey, I'm in total chaos. My business is failing and now I'm going to go spend more money on somebody. Like those people, they might be, some people might be too far down that spiral, but the people that come to you, I suspect are often saying, okay, I freed up some cash, I freed up some time, but I can't quite unlock the next level. Veronica, do I, like, where do I start?
Veronica Zora Kirin (36:53.975)
Yeah.
Yeah, unfortunately, like I said, most of the time they're coming to me in burnout. They're learning the lesson the hard way. Yeah, they're coming to me from, God, I want them. So everyone listening, please, for the love of God, okay? It's a free course, take the course. Go to my academy and just take it. But when I work with them, I follow very similar principles as to what's in the course, obviously customized. I want to get into your life and really understand what are you doing and why.
Jeff Holman, Host (37:01.233)
they're coming the other situation. Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (37:24.602)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (37:25.101)
And then I'm going to be gentle but firm and say, don't need to be doing this. don't need to be doing it. 90 % of what you are doing, if not more, you're going to be doing it. No. So then we start to go through the stages, what I call my three pillars of scaling, starting with automation, because especially if they're in burnout, their hair's on fire. We need a free time now. So we automate what we can to get the plate starting to clear.
Then we take that extra time to start to build out the systems because I can tell you there's a lot of business owners who say to me, I don't have time to build a system. Okay, hold your horses. We're going to automate first. Whoa. You know, they're in such fight, fight, freeze, appease mode. Their nervous system is so intense. They're like, I can't do this. Yes, you can. We're going to do it. It's fine. Systemize and then eventually hire. Because again, if you really are alone,
Jeff Holman, Host (38:03.311)
Right.
Jeff Holman, Host (38:10.744)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (38:22.509)
then if you get hit by a bus, the whole thing falls apart. So we do some hiring, but we can do it across all kinds of different methods and spectrums these days. I mean, we can go on Fiverr and grab somebody and just build a team of ad hoc personnel all the way to full-time employees. It depends where your business is in its growth as well. So we develop all of that and we make it so that...
Jeff Holman, Host (38:36.504)
Right.
Veronica Zora Kirin (38:45.877)
You can go on vacation and you can go chill, drink Mai Tais or whatever you prefer to do with your free time. That's the end goal. I just want you, you don't have to leave the business. I want you to be able to leave the business.
Jeff Holman, Host (38:59.108)
back to freedom. And I don't want to shortchange the fact that some people, you know, I'm looking at it from where I sit now, right? And I say to myself, or admit, I feel like I'm admitting on this call today that, you know, I'm not as far along as I think I probably could be.
But at the same time, for somebody who is coming to you with hair on fire, businesses, you know, they're drowning in chaos or whatever it might be, to get to the point where I currently sit would be a huge win for them to be able to say, Hey, I took a week off. I took a weekend off maybe even as a, as a big win. So I don't want to shortchange that part of the conversation. There's everything is in steps, right?
Veronica Zora Kirin (39:25.869)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (39:32.512)
No, no, no, no. You absolutely get all the gold stars. The fact that you can go away on vacation is an enormous tell to the work that you've done already in the company. And honestly, I think you knew most of this already. It's just one of my favorite phrases I learned from the person who trained me over at the Y Institute. So I'm a Y certified coach, as in like Simon Sinek's Start With Y. It's the Y Institute.
Jeff Holman, Host (39:59.228)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (40:00.206)
He likes to say, when you're in the bottle, you can't read the label. It's a similar idea to the Cobbler's Children always being barefoot, to me, it's much more profound. I know what to do, you know what to do. But when it's our own thing, we usually can't see whatever the heck it is that's holding us individually back. And so that's where podcasts like this.
Jeff Holman, Host (40:09.478)
Yes.
Jeff Holman, Host (40:24.272)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (40:25.037)
courses like mine or even then engaging with a coach, they kind of gently beat you up and say, okay, let's, we're going to shake the gremlins out of you and we're going to get you on your
Jeff Holman, Host (40:33.041)
Well, let's yeah, this is fantastic. I want to I want to kind of head towards wrapping this up with two things. One is what are the what are the signals that people see when they are resisting this type of change? Like when you because you again, somebody like me or another business owner being inside the bottle, maybe they know the signals are there, but they can't read the label. They can't like or they're not willing to
step outside the bottle perhaps just extract themselves from the bottle for a moment to read the label before they get back in. I don't know maybe it's that easy sometimes. What are the signals that you see where people are caught in that loop and then what is the one or two top transformations that you see when someone finally does flip that switch?
Veronica Zora Kirin (41:13.495)
Mm-hmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (41:23.595)
Yeah. A couple of things as far as signals go. First of all, I can tell you, I'm a nice person. I don't do this on purpose, I'd say at least two thirds of the initial calls that I have with potential clients, I ask them what would happen to your business if you want a vacation, they start crying. So that's a strong signal. Literally, I have people crying on their initial calls because there's somebody who's finally
Jeff Holman, Host (41:44.975)
Literally, literally crying. Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (41:53.036)
going to take care of what they don't know what to take care of, including them, right? The second signal, especially within those calls, but even I have plenty of friends who are entrepreneurs, you we find each other and they're telling me, I can't hang out today or I can't go to the pub this evening or whatever, I've got to work. And I've got a pal right now who's doing this, he's working nights and weekends and I keep saying, hey buddy, what are you doing? Because you always have the choice.
But, and this is a whole different episode, but many entrepreneurs don't realize that society, before they became entrepreneurs, society set the boundaries for them. So your workplace was closed by five or six PM. You couldn't work late. People were off. People were with their families. You have to set those boundaries. And the thing is, when you're the founder, I promise there will always be more work and it will always feel like there's something else to do. There's always more.
Jeff Holman, Host (42:40.963)
Mm-hmm, I see.
Veronica Zora Kirin (42:52.159)
always. And so you have to say no. It's only you who can say no. And so when I see folks who are just like, yeah, I've got more to do. Yeah, I know. I do too. But work-life balance is critical to the just success of your business over the long term. And then transformation was the flip side, right? Was what you asked.
Jeff Holman, Host (42:52.377)
Yeah, 100%.
Jeff Holman, Host (43:09.883)
That makes sense.
Jeff Holman, Host (43:15.279)
Yeah, what do you see? What are the one or two things that you see, biggest changes you see when somebody finally accepts this and implements it correctly?
Veronica Zora Kirin (43:24.077)
Mm-hmm. I mean, just patent relief, time with family, definitely time for vacation. But you can see it in their bodies and in their demeanor that there's a relaxation because the world isn't going to end tomorrow if something breaks. So there's that anxiety release that happens. That's just the baseline. And then yes, we see the numbers go up too. Like I said, we increased the sales of one of my clients.
by more than half. But, honestly, like I, I love making you money. If I could make you money, let's do it. but I'm going to make you money because I've made your life better and I've released your time so your team can do a better job. You know what I mean? That's what, that's why I'm in, in this game. and that's what I love to see is the CEO go, I can live. I have a life. Cause we didn't get into this to just like grind.
Jeff Holman, Host (44:06.757)
freedom.
Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (44:20.09)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (44:23.703)
That's not why we're here. You're here to serve your clients well and have a life.
Jeff Holman, Host (44:24.227)
No, as glamorous as we've make that sound sometimes, right? We make it sound so glamorous to just work all the time, but and different cultures like you mentioned, you know, I love the idea of some cultures and this happens maybe across countries, but also just across industries more where I see people, I take August off. I don't work as much in August or I don't work at all in August. Yeah, yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (44:35.244)
Mmm.
Veronica Zora Kirin (44:46.413)
Oh yeah, I can't go to my doctor in August here in Europe. Everyone's gone. The work-life balance is great here. But it's a good reminder to me as well that yeah, there's always something more I could get done. And half of the world, especially half of my clients, I've got tons of clients still in the States. They're all working. But Friday is Labor Day here. The city of Berlin explodes on Labor Day. Like actually sometimes literally there's like car fires, but I digress.
Jeff Holman, Host (45:05.392)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (45:14.501)
you
Veronica Zora Kirin (45:15.501)
So I could work. I could absolutely be taking meetings. Nope. It's a holiday. Not doing it. I want a life.
Jeff Holman, Host (45:20.345)
Yeah, yeah. Well, and even subcultures, right? Like, like I look at, I look at, I think of the kind of the prototypical immigrant families that come to the United States, even though they're in the United States, and there's a culture of working hard, I'm pretty sure they work much more hard and consistently than a lot of Americans do. And so there's these subcultures. But I just want to, I want to emphasize because I think this is really aligned with the
Veronica Zora Kirin (45:41.421)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (45:47.355)
with the philosophy of the show itself and that is a lot of CEOs find themselves caught in these situations. They don't know what to do. They may even break down when somebody verbalizes for them the situation they're in because there's a lot of stress, there's a lot of tension, there's a lot of...
you know, a lot of reliance on a lot of our CEOs and they have to accomplish a lot of stuff or not only them, their families, but their employees and their client, like they feel that feel that pressure. And so what, what better gift, right? Could somebody in that situation give themselves than to say, Hey, it's
Veronica Zora Kirin (46:11.871)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Jeff Holman, Host (46:29.08)
I'm worth it. Not only is my business worth it for the value of the business or the financial freedom or whatever, like not only is that worth it, but for myself, individually, personally, like we all deserve to not live in just the chaos of stress. Or as you put it so eloquently before, the feeling of drowning in a business. I've
Veronica Zora Kirin (46:31.287)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (46:54.774)
I have not drowned before, but I was a lifeguard at a local water park as a teenager and had to jump in and, you know, I don't know that I saved anybody's life, like in a really, you know, vile, you know, any, anybody was really drowning, but, you to jump in and, and pull somebody just from the panic of not touching the bottom of not feeling like their heads out of the water.
Veronica Zora Kirin (47:10.604)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (47:17.516)
Yes.
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Holman, Host (47:22.204)
pull somebody out of that situation. mean, that's a that's a whole event in and of itself and to and to put put that imagery to what a lot of CEOs are probably going through and how they feel at a minimum like like that's I think there's a power in that.
Veronica Zora Kirin (47:35.168)
Yeah.
Veronica Zora Kirin (47:39.083)
Yeah, yeah, I agree. And I just want to underscore one thing that you said, I think is a perfect analogy as we sign off. Yes, people are relying on you. And so it can feel like it's hard to let go of the reins. But don't you think they would prefer to work for somebody who's happy instead of stressed?
Jeff Holman, Host (47:58.832)
Yeah, probably. I think so. Well, Veronica, this is fantastic. I feel like the time has flown by and at the same time there's so much more we could probably talk to. So we might need to do a round two on this at some point. But yeah, thank you so much for coming out and joining us today. Yeah, I enjoyed it. And thanks to our audience for joining us again on another episode of The Breakout CEO.
