#202 - The 12 Week System That Can Triple Your Productivity | Dan Mintz

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I believe the next three to five years in AI, it's gonna be the people that are most
valuable are the ones that are operating, engaging with the agents, because the agents are

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gonna be doing the work.

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Today's guest is Dan.

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Am I gonna say this right?

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Mintz?

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Right.

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He's found founder and CEO of 12 week breakthrough.

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He's a multi, multi-time operator with successful exits across SaaS and EdTech, including
a chess platform that was acquired by Platica.

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He's a Wharton grad, MIT trained data scientist, and started his career in strategy at
Deloitte.

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What makes Dan different is his focus on systems over hacks.

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He helps entrepreneurs and high performers build repeatable operating systems that turn
intention into execution.

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So in this conversation, I'm pumped about breaking down the 12-week year, why productivity
is one of the biggest competitive advantages in business, and how to close the gap between

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knowing what to do and actually doing it.

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Dan, welcome to the show.

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Thank you, thank you for having me.

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man.

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So hey, what about the twelve week year?

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Right.

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Just just to make it very clear, the twelve week year is a is a fairly famous productivity
system, with which there was a a book written about it.

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Okay, so it's not my system, but I l using it, I'm I'm I developed my own twelve week
breakthrough system which enhances that system.

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Because I found the twelve week year to be the one of the best, let's call it personal
productivity system, but also used for smaller teams.

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And then I with my research and my my own practice of using it, I enhance the system in
order because I I f I thought there were some gaps and there were just things I can

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improve and make it a extremely, extremely productive.

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So why is productivity, why is it the biggest competitive advantage, if not the let's just
call it one of the big ones?

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Why is it so substantial in winning in business?

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Okay, that that that that's that's the critical question.

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So really what I call the system performance system, okay?

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I if for me productivity, and a lot of people that I work with, because I get a lot of you
see, I work with Fortune one thousand companies, I work with smaller companies, I work

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with professionals, CEOs, so I I I get a lot of feedback about this stuff and I get a lot
of perspective.

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15 years doing that, if if not more, and with my own businesses as well.

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So when people think about productivity, they think about doing things faster or doing
things better or doing more of the same, okay, but faster.

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Kind of that's what I think about productivity.

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That's why I kind of like to position it as performance, meaning it's it's more about it's
it's much more than just doing things faster or better or doing more in a shorter time.

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Okay.

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That's kind of the

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the classical term of productivity.

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I I really talk about performance.

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So I it's from a more strategic level.

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How can you increase your performance not by ten, twenty percent?

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Okay, because that you can do without a system.

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But I can s I see people that increase their performance from one X to five X, okay, in
twelve months.

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And it means they're achieving five times more of the goals or they're tripling the
revenue and stuff like that by implementing a performance system.

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So back to your question.

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Why is it so strategic, for instance?

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So why is it such a critical factor?

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the thing is, I in a nutshell, ideas, I won't say extremely easy to come by, but everybody
can think about an idea.

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Okay, you just need pen and paper.

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The critical issue is the execution.

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That's a really difficult part.

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There's a huge gap between the thinking, the ideas, the strategy, and all that stuff,
which is also obviously very important.

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But the transition to make it actually executionable, okay, is very difficult.

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Okay, now I see it, I saw it in my businesses and all.

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And for obvious reasons, I mean when you have to do execution, you have to deal with the
real world.

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You have to deal with competition, you have to deal with deadlines, you have to deal with
clients, negotiations, shipping, problems, whatever.

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So the execution becomes really in many businesses the competitive advantage that you have
compared to others.

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So if you are able to combine the right strategy.

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Okay, and then break it into a real execution pan which d is tied directly to a strategy
and performs it.

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Okay, actually supports a strategy, that gives you an extremely strong competitive
advantage and I can say from experience that will put you in the top top top ten percent.

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Is this?

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Are we talking about, you know, I heard something, I don't know if it was Andreessen or
who it was, but might have even been Isaacson.

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But they were talking about what makes Elon Musk so different.

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So I'm gonna put him aside from all the political stuff and doge and all that, but just
him the human.

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These things he's built, he's just outbuilt everyone.

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And what what Andreessen said, because he sat on boards at PayPal and I think boards at
Tesla, and he's right next to him.

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And he said there's something about him that he saw.

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That he hasn't seen in even the other billionaires.

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It said he takes his like three most complex problems, the most fundamental, complex,
problematic issues in his business today, and he fixes them all in one week.

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That seems like that goes in line with some similarity of what we're talking about here
today.

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He he used to

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Obviously he's a genius, right?

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So it it's it's not it's not that you're just gonna copy a system and then all of a sudden
you're gonna become Elon Musk.

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That's not gonna happen.

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But I know for a fact that from all the interviews, he he really works on what is called
first principles.

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So he is able to take ideas, okay, that sound like industry standards and and and totally
shadow that in terms of wait a second, why are we doing this?

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Okay, why are we using these components?

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Or why are we using this process?

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Or why why this problem i is so his he is very contrarian but in a very realistic way.

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And you actually find that there are a lot of processes and things you can think about of
how things are done in an industry, and you start asking in a you know in a very root type

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of questions.

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Why why are we doing this?

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Why this problem is coming with that?

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Wait a second, maybe that process is that the problem?

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So he's a ba he has ability to identify the root causes and challenge them and find some
very creative solution.

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And s obviously, you know, that's how he came up with Tesla.

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So people did not have any idea how to do electric cars.

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Okay, at least profitably, or in a way that have enough mileage to get from the battery.

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And he asked he is a physician not a physician, a physicist, right?

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Yeah.

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yeah, we actually studied in the same university, University of Pennsylvania, same years
by third, but it never met her.

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So I I brought this up because we talk because you talked about strategy.

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And it just it just grabbed in my mind that's really what he's doing.

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Because when he breaks that down, isn't he really going to first principles?

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Once you establish that, you're like, okay, now I have clear strategy.

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That's right.

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You have two strategy, but now but he is also amazing in execution.

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He writes he he doesn't wait.

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He r right away he star he's starting the execution but with a very clear plan.

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So when he goes in build those extremely complex manufacturing lines, okay, these these
line he he is creating manufacture lines that nobody has, okay?

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That nobody used in the in the car industry that are completely different.

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Okay, and it's to order to create that, these are extremely complex projects.

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You must have a system, and that's the stuff that I'm talking about, tying the strategy
into the right execution system, okay, having rapid feedback and all that, and there's

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clear, clear evidence.

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And I actually wrote an article about this, it's gonna be published in the a in Harvard
Business Review, about the fact that when you're using a system, execution system,

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performance system, okay, there's a much, much bigger chance that we're talking about
three hundred percent, six hundred percent of actually achieving your hardest goal.

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Which are the goals that bring the most value?

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So can you take this system that you've really that you're building, this performance
system?

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You lay it over top of any business.

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Yes.

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Absolutely.

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And th that's that's a that's a a a very insightful question.

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I tell you why.

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Because some people think, wait a second, if I have a system, that means I can easily
measure my performance.

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So if let's say let's say you work in sales or in manufacturing, the measurement is pretty
straightforward.

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How much sales did I have last week, how much units did I produce, what's the level of
quality, all that.

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That's almost I won't say straightforward, but it's easier to see how you implement a
performance system.

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Because you can measure your progress pretty easily and then adjust yourself.

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And the the system gets a lot of feedback in order to self-correct and make the adjustment
and and and go according to plan.

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Now, if you go into the knowledge economy, okay, where most of us work there, okay, so you
need to create marketing strategies, you need to create consulting digital transformation

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product for your for your company, you need to be able to assess the the productivity
measures.

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Are basically gone.

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Okay.

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Most people don't know how to measure productivity in the knowledge economy.

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Okay?

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Because you cannot just measure units produced.

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How do you measure the creative of the creation of a marketing strategy?

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Very difficult.

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But the system has the ability to break apart how you actually work on these, let's call,
knowledge economy type of projects, create the right proxies.

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That are aligned with the progress you're actually making.

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And once you use those and you know how to use them, I'm not gonna go too deep on how to
do that, but I have a whole framework of how to actually measure your work and progress in

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the knowledge economy so that you will be able to implement this performance system.

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And what happens, knowledge knowledge workers today, they have very hard time tracking the
progress.

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And if they can be because the it's hard, it's very vague to to track and measure
progress.

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But if you are able to break it down to the components that really matter and implement a
system, it's actually gonna increase your effectiveness or your performance, however,

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however you wanna call it, sometimes, like I said, one hundred percent, two hundred
percent or three hundred percent.

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Yeah, the the people who use this system and something similar to it, it's gonna be the
ones who win in this AI world.

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Because a lot of people are talking about AI, but it's like, how do you measure whether or
not there's a product market fit for your AI system that you're trying to stand up?

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Like, how are you gonna become the Google in a world where there's thousands of search
engines that nobody heard about, but that might have even been better than Google in the

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nineties?

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That's that's absolutely right.

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So if we talk we if we if we go back to to the point I I talked about, so let's say i like
like you said, you want to win in this AI world.

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So everything is gonna be extremely competitive.

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Okay, so you need to be excellent in so many different things.

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Okay?

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And in order to track all that stuff, you definitely need to be very organized and use a
certain system.

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Okay.

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You need to, for instance, if you want to stand out and to win in this economy, okay?

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You you must have a very clear understanding what what is your vision, which this system
has, what are your goals, and how do you gonna choose your goals, all right?

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Because you cannot do everything.

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You need to focus on the vital few.

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Okay, so you cannot pursue ten, fifteen different goals because not all of them have the
same priority, right?

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You need to focus on the five, let's say the f for the next twelve weeks, which is also
part of the system.

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In the next twelve weeks, you need to figure out what are the what are your goals.

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Focus on those goals because they have the most impact.

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If you think about a lot of people choose the criteria of what is called SMART goals, S
M-A-R-T.

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Have you probably heard about that?

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Right?

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The missing letter in SMART goals is actually the most important one: the letter I,
impact.

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There's no letter I in SMART.

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What's the most important in terms of having a goal?

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Okay.

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Is the level of impact that goal is going to have.

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Okay, I don't care if it's very smart or it's very relevant.

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If it's moving the needle towards what you need to do in order to become the first in the
industry if you want, okay, is the level of impact.

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So you have to have a system which knows how to choose a goal, how to measure its impact.

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And once you do all that, you're going to be so laser focused.

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Okay, you're just increasing your it i is there's no guarantee obviously in this economy
because things are gonna shift.

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all the time.

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But if you wanna stay very close to understanding what the market is doing and how your
performance is doing, there's also built in rapid feedback cycles inside the system.

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So every week and every end of cycle, every 12 week, you're gonna take a look at your
metrics, you're gonna understand your progress, you're gonna understand where you stand

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against your goals and against your vision.

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You're gonna make the right adjustment and all that, obviously if you implement it right
and if you have a good guidance.

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Is this really human capital intensive or is this a SaaS model that businesses can pr can
engage with with you?

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Like where's the interaction from your business and the people that it's gonna help help
grow and and improve?

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Okay, that that's a great question.

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I'll tell you why.

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so one of the re one of the things that people ask me when they start to work with me,
other than the question of why do you need a system?

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So after they convince that, whoa, I understand why I need a system, that's that's gonna,
you know, take my business or myself to a totally different direction.

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What software am I going to use?

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I tell them, look, the the really the tool is not the significant thing here.

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Okay, is it's it's kind of a new mental model in a way.

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Okay, so it's much more human in terms of thinking, you can use any there's no

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Specific SAS tool that they're gonna say, okay, great.

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If you want to use a 12-week year, here is a product, you just sign up, create an account,
and just go and you'll be fine.

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No, no.

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It's it's more of a management personal system for yourself when you need to create with
yourself almost a new way of operating.

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Instead of working for on an annual basis, what a lot of people do, so a lot of people
create goals for the next year, okay?

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I I'll actually ask you, what do you think is the problem of creating goals for the next
twelve months?

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There

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Gonna be it's gonna be so inefficient.

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There's probably gonna be ninety percent downtime where you aren't even executing and
problem solving on a thing that's gonna move it forward.

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And that's and it's amazing, that's what I see.

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Okay, so I work with this insurance company, large insurance company on the East Coast.

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The the president is a friend of mine, so he brought me in and we talk about stuff.

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So yeah, we have annual goals and the team that they these these are they they work on a
quarterly basis, but we have this annual goals and then at the end of the year they need

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to reach a certain goal, sales, expansion, and so I launch five different products.

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What actually what we figure out after a couple of hours of discussion

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Is that these goals just kind of I I don't know how to call them, they kind of disappear
until April.

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And then they say, Well, we have enough time until October.

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wait a second, I'm not really sure about my progress.

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And and 50% of the goals don't don't even get advanced.

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So, what I did with them, I switched them.

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00:15:31,247 --> 00:15:35,110
Look, your year from now on is not gonna be 12 months.

203
00:15:35,110 --> 00:15:36,181
Forget the 12 months.

204
00:15:36,181 --> 00:15:40,569
12 months is i i maybe it's good for the 19th century, okay?

205
00:15:40,569 --> 00:15:42,710
Where the technology barely moved.

206
00:15:42,710 --> 00:15:52,474
Okay, but we you need to get quick feedback on how you're doing and not wait until October
and then say, Well, my God, I have a deadline and Christmas is in two months.

207
00:15:52,474 --> 00:15:53,735
I need to make my quota.

208
00:15:53,735 --> 00:15:54,715
No, no, no, no.

209
00:15:54,715 --> 00:15:58,597
We're going to change your year from twelve months to twelve weeks.

210
00:15:58,597 --> 00:16:04,099
Okay, so yeah, now your new year, lo and behold, is twelve weeks.

211
00:16:04,099 --> 00:16:06,980
And say, wait a second, this is a s it's like just a quarter cycle.

212
00:16:06,980 --> 00:16:07,980
I No, no, no, no, no.

213
00:16:07,980 --> 00:16:09,645
This is not a quarterly cycle.

214
00:16:09,645 --> 00:16:14,948
'Cause even if you're working a quarter cycle, you still open a re you're operating.

215
00:16:14,948 --> 00:16:18,230
Look, if I don't just use goal, I'll move it to the next photo.

216
00:16:18,230 --> 00:16:18,980
So no, no.

217
00:16:18,980 --> 00:16:19,910
No more excuses.

218
00:16:19,910 --> 00:16:21,813
Time is critical.

219
00:16:21,813 --> 00:16:23,934
You have only twelve weeks this year.

220
00:16:24,174 --> 00:16:25,475
Set up a gear goals.

221
00:16:25,475 --> 00:16:26,615
Okay, you can be realistic.

222
00:16:26,615 --> 00:16:30,407
If you can't do this goal this quarter and this cycle, okay, okay, do it during ten
cycles.

223
00:16:30,407 --> 00:16:31,437
Break it into two.

224
00:16:31,437 --> 00:16:32,319
No pro problem.

225
00:16:32,319 --> 00:16:37,889
Show us what are you gonna do this quarter on a weekly basis, measure your progress.

226
00:16:37,889 --> 00:16:40,360
Track your time, put everything in the calendar.

227
00:16:40,360 --> 00:16:43,452
Obviously, you're gonna put in some flexibility because stuff comes up.

228
00:16:43,452 --> 00:16:44,353
That's fine.

229
00:16:44,353 --> 00:16:47,414
But just organize yourself and don't give yourself excuses.

230
00:16:47,414 --> 00:16:49,996
Why not to achieve these stretch goals?

231
00:16:49,996 --> 00:16:57,880
And it also forces them to say: look, if you want to achieve a goal and you really want to
achieve it, you need to make it challenging.

232
00:16:57,880 --> 00:16:58,270
Okay.

233
00:16:58,270 --> 00:16:59,665
So it's not about smart goals.

234
00:16:59,665 --> 00:17:02,002
A lot of stuff are missing in the smart goals.

235
00:17:02,002 --> 00:17:03,343
Impact and challenging.

236
00:17:03,343 --> 00:17:03,733
Okay?

237
00:17:03,733 --> 00:17:06,683
You need to make it at least 15% challenging because.

238
00:17:06,683 --> 00:17:12,228
Then you you the juices, the creative juices come up, both for the team and the
individual.

239
00:17:12,248 --> 00:17:15,611
So you need to make it challenging or and you need to be very committed to it.

240
00:17:15,611 --> 00:17:21,247
And the 12-week year gives you a lot of energy and focus to try to achieve this goal.

241
00:17:21,247 --> 00:17:23,809
It's not too far, the 12 weeks, okay?

242
00:17:23,809 --> 00:17:30,785
But it's enough time to accomplish a substantial chunk of the goal that you want to do,
even if it's spread out for a whole year.

243
00:17:30,785 --> 00:17:33,357
And even doing this simple thing.

244
00:17:33,571 --> 00:17:40,816
I was able to bring teams who were maybe achieving twenty percent of the goals, serious
goals, to eighty percent.

245
00:17:40,816 --> 00:17:43,639
That's a four and I tell them, look, this is four X.

246
00:17:43,639 --> 00:17:44,199
Okay.

247
00:17:44,199 --> 00:17:48,082
What I care about is the really important goals, the hard to achieve one.

248
00:17:48,082 --> 00:17:52,165
That's the most value you're gonna have in the AI economy.

249
00:17:52,165 --> 00:17:52,926
Okay?

250
00:17:52,926 --> 00:17:55,447
In in such a you need to bring value.

251
00:17:55,488 --> 00:17:55,948
Okay?

252
00:17:55,948 --> 00:17:58,230
The the the the easy stuff everybody can do.

253
00:17:58,230 --> 00:18:00,631
But you you are here to do the hard stuff.

254
00:18:00,677 --> 00:18:05,785
So show me the hard stuff and show me how you're gonna do it and show me how you can do it
in twelve weeks.

255
00:18:05,785 --> 00:18:11,316
I think the brilliance of this is in my mind, we're just creating focus.

256
00:18:11,517 --> 00:18:12,797
That's what we're doing.

257
00:18:12,837 --> 00:18:15,898
We're saying you don't get 12 months to do this.

258
00:18:16,078 --> 00:18:22,179
We're gonna linearly focus and make sure that we set this metric because you achieve the
goals you set.

259
00:18:23,360 --> 00:18:27,471
And we're going to focus on making sure that we achieve this over a 12 week period.

260
00:18:27,471 --> 00:18:29,441
They already have the capability and ability.

261
00:18:29,441 --> 00:18:35,505
And correct me if I'm wrong, I'm almost taking, I'm saying your experience at Wharton,
probably getting an NBA there.

262
00:18:35,505 --> 00:18:36,446
or just engaging with it.

263
00:18:36,446 --> 00:18:48,130
But then your experience at MIT, it seems like you're taking probably the environments
that you were in there, and you're applying that same operating system for a human and

264
00:18:48,130 --> 00:18:52,575
applying it to business without us having to have all those degrees and be in those rooms.

265
00:18:52,815 --> 00:18:55,557
That's that's almost absolutely correct.

266
00:18:55,557 --> 00:18:57,398
But also from my experience.

267
00:18:57,398 --> 00:19:06,915
So for instance, I was a venture capitalist for a couple of years, working with a ver very
large, actually it was international slash European private equity company that invested

268
00:19:06,915 --> 00:19:09,308
in hundreds of companies around the world.

269
00:19:09,449 --> 00:19:13,263
And in Israel, where I worked for a couple of years, it was mostly in tech.

270
00:19:13,263 --> 00:19:13,783
Okay.

271
00:19:13,783 --> 00:19:19,537
So we invested in tech companies and I was I was involved in about five to ten companies
for a couple of years.

272
00:19:19,661 --> 00:19:24,805
And I would clearly see the difference between the people who were able to the who were
successful.

273
00:19:24,805 --> 00:19:28,807
Obviously i industry hasn't had an impact of if you're successful or not, right?

274
00:19:28,807 --> 00:19:32,049
If you had a horrible industry, you can do whatever you want, it's not gonna work.

275
00:19:32,049 --> 00:19:34,711
Yeah.

276
00:19:34,711 --> 00:19:42,899
But neutralizing this aside for a second, the the the best CEOs w were very like you said,
were extremely focused.

277
00:19:42,899 --> 00:19:45,320
And this focus also created

278
00:19:45,361 --> 00:19:51,995
a quick adjustment to what you need to do when you you when you're a startup in the tech
industry, you need to be extremely focused, you need to be very close to the ground and

279
00:19:51,995 --> 00:19:54,997
understand how to, you know, make the the adjustments.

280
00:19:54,997 --> 00:20:01,621
okay, you think your product is great, but the product, the the customer is already giving
you some feedback and you need to change it really, really quickly.

281
00:20:01,621 --> 00:20:08,324
And if you don't have that focus and a system in how to approach that type of stuff,
you're going to lose very quickly.

282
00:20:08,500 --> 00:20:09,122
Yeah.

283
00:20:09,122 --> 00:20:11,567
What do you think your best attributes are?

284
00:20:11,567 --> 00:20:17,552
All this experience, all the big degrees, being in the rooms with the big venture capital
people, being around the

285
00:20:17,552 --> 00:20:19,830
on a personal level or for the system?

286
00:20:19,830 --> 00:20:22,826
per personal level, like 'cause you're the guy who created the system.

287
00:20:22,826 --> 00:20:26,302
So what's your what's your one of your best attributes or two?

288
00:20:26,314 --> 00:20:27,807
Okay, that that's a great question.

289
00:20:27,807 --> 00:20:30,701
I I you I have to tell you a fact.

290
00:20:30,701 --> 00:20:31,871
I'm lazy.

291
00:20:32,392 --> 00:20:33,553
I'm a lazy person.

292
00:20:33,553 --> 00:20:38,598
I mean, if this stuff is boring or stuff that I I just find it hard to do.

293
00:20:38,598 --> 00:20:38,958
Okay?

294
00:20:38,958 --> 00:20:41,841
I mean, I'm I'm and I see for a lot of humans.

295
00:20:41,841 --> 00:20:44,505
I mean, we have a resistance of doing hard stuff.

296
00:20:44,505 --> 00:20:46,767
there's three billions of years of evolution, I guess.

297
00:20:46,767 --> 00:20:48,439
you want to conserve energy.

298
00:20:48,439 --> 00:20:50,280
So I'm a lazy person.

299
00:20:50,321 --> 00:20:50,989
So

300
00:20:50,989 --> 00:20:58,054
i i i I almost had to force myself to find okay, I need to find ways to make this hard
stuff because I you know, I want I want to succeed.

301
00:20:58,054 --> 00:21:02,676
I need I don't I just don't I don't want just to work hard and four hours.

302
00:21:02,676 --> 00:21:04,217
I want to be very effective.

303
00:21:04,217 --> 00:21:09,512
So I I guess the attribute is I like to learn new stuff, okay?

304
00:21:09,512 --> 00:21:10,682
But I'm very realistic.

305
00:21:10,682 --> 00:21:17,376
So I like to learn stu learn new stuff, always trying to improve, find the best way to do
some stuff.

306
00:21:17,376 --> 00:21:19,137
And once I see something, I stick with it.

307
00:21:19,137 --> 00:21:19,467
Okay.

308
00:21:19,467 --> 00:21:20,797
I don't overlearn stuff.

309
00:21:20,797 --> 00:21:22,678
I don't do analysis, paralysis.

310
00:21:22,678 --> 00:21:24,298
I like to be very practical.

311
00:21:24,298 --> 00:21:30,700
I like to learn stuff which I can apply to my professional life and my day day-to-day
life.

312
00:21:30,700 --> 00:21:37,283
So I was always on a look of experimenting stuff, okay, on almost a a regular interval.

313
00:21:37,283 --> 00:21:40,764
So I was, for instance, trying to be very effective and very productive.

314
00:21:40,764 --> 00:21:43,915
So that's why I did re a lot of research on productivity systems.

315
00:21:43,915 --> 00:21:53,629
And then that's why I realized that twelve week year, I thought was the the the the best
system to build upon because it has all the components that you need to work today in this

316
00:21:53,629 --> 00:21:54,919
fast economy.

317
00:21:54,919 --> 00:21:59,724
So I would say I I like to I feel very comfortable taking on projects.

318
00:21:59,724 --> 00:22:03,405
So I don't I I don't care about failing, right?

319
00:22:03,405 --> 00:22:03,955
So I fail.

320
00:22:03,955 --> 00:22:04,375
So what?

321
00:22:04,375 --> 00:22:05,636
It's it's a learning experience.

322
00:22:05,636 --> 00:22:06,706
We move on.

323
00:22:06,706 --> 00:22:07,926
We live once, right?

324
00:22:07,926 --> 00:22:10,232
So why not dare and take some

325
00:22:10,232 --> 00:22:11,344
calculated risks.

326
00:22:11,344 --> 00:22:12,136
I don't do risks.

327
00:22:12,136 --> 00:22:13,027
I invested money.

328
00:22:13,027 --> 00:22:14,269
I bought some companies as well.

329
00:22:14,269 --> 00:22:15,191
I sold companies.

330
00:22:15,191 --> 00:22:21,600
and most of the time I just do calculated risk, learn, try to learn as quickly as possible
and apply it as quickly as possible.

331
00:22:21,724 --> 00:22:26,768
What's calculated risk look like in this crazy fast moving world of technology though?

332
00:22:26,768 --> 00:22:29,140
It I mean, that's a it's a different calculation now.

333
00:22:29,140 --> 00:22:29,731
It has to be.

334
00:22:29,731 --> 00:22:36,516
Maybe maybe we don't even know the algorithm, but but right, it's there and it seems like
risk is more prevalent than ever.

335
00:22:37,030 --> 00:22:38,190
I I agree.

336
00:22:38,190 --> 00:22:40,341
but but you still need to calculate the risk.

337
00:22:40,341 --> 00:22:47,453
So we did even though it was a tech startup and you say, okay, you don't know anything,
you you you're not gonna know what's gonna happen in five years, we still did a lot of

338
00:22:47,453 --> 00:22:50,977
research, do what was called the due diligent process of the company.

339
00:22:50,977 --> 00:22:56,820
So we we looked at the industry, we look at the company, but the most important fact but
then the factors change.

340
00:22:56,820 --> 00:23:04,024
Okay, so you're still doing the going through the how is it called the effect of the
process of doing the due diligence, but there's

341
00:23:04,084 --> 00:23:06,426
separate weights now for different things.

342
00:23:06,426 --> 00:23:17,253
So what what you realize because it's such a volatile market, you know that you must have
the right management who will be able to handle all the different pivoting, the risks and

343
00:23:17,253 --> 00:23:18,599
the competition, all that.

344
00:23:18,599 --> 00:23:23,722
So you invest much more time in researching, do am I investing in the right people?

345
00:23:23,722 --> 00:23:24,383
Okay.

346
00:23:24,383 --> 00:23:31,678
Is that person be going to be capable to take this company the next five, ten years in in
such a difficult environment?

347
00:23:31,678 --> 00:23:37,919
But you still so the calculated risks just takes different factors in terms of the weight
factors you're gonna put in it.

348
00:23:37,919 --> 00:23:40,811
Think what's gonna happen what's gonna happen in AI.

349
00:23:42,072 --> 00:23:43,173
Elite thinkers.

350
00:23:43,173 --> 00:23:47,096
I'm not talking about how people were born where they started, who they turned themselves
into be.

351
00:23:47,096 --> 00:23:49,358
Elite thinkers, top performers.

352
00:23:49,358 --> 00:23:52,611
This economy, this AI world is gonna benefit them more.

353
00:23:52,611 --> 00:23:53,625
Not even the business owner.

354
00:23:53,625 --> 00:23:57,164
I mean, didn't Meta just pay some kid 600 million?

355
00:23:58,265 --> 00:23:59,786
It's crazy, right?

356
00:24:00,267 --> 00:24:08,093
I've been talking about it's gonna be the middle 60% of workers in every country in the
entire world.

357
00:24:08,118 --> 00:24:10,755
is going to be outsourced to AI systems.

358
00:24:12,218 --> 00:24:13,973
I I I I agree.

359
00:24:14,016 --> 00:24:15,985
So w what what's the question?

360
00:24:15,985 --> 00:24:18,209
So the key part is the people at the top.

361
00:24:18,209 --> 00:24:25,573
It's funny that we're talking about AI and technology, but still the most critical point
is gonna be those key human

362
00:24:25,573 --> 00:24:26,513
beans.

363
00:24:26,814 --> 00:24:27,715
I agree.

364
00:24:27,715 --> 00:24:31,651
And and the the way I I'll just give you an example with the way I work.

365
00:24:31,651 --> 00:24:34,333
So I have a t a pretty strong technology background.

366
00:24:34,333 --> 00:24:35,765
I understand technology.

367
00:24:35,765 --> 00:24:41,822
I even I have to say during my MIT years I had to program machine learning stuff, which is
now obsolete.

368
00:24:41,822 --> 00:24:44,625
Chat GPT made sure that this is obsolete right now.

369
00:24:44,625 --> 00:24:46,066
But I I understand this stuff.

370
00:24:46,066 --> 00:24:50,168
So I feel very comfortable tr using new tools.

371
00:24:50,168 --> 00:24:50,794
Okay.

372
00:24:50,794 --> 00:24:56,868
And one of the skills you're going to need in this new world, which is absolutely new
world.

373
00:24:56,868 --> 00:25:02,552
I mean, the pace is just unbelievable, is your ability to adapt quickly and learn quickly,
new tools.

374
00:25:02,552 --> 00:25:11,540
Because the person at the top, okay, he or she, if she will be able to use AI ten times
better than you, you're a toast.

375
00:25:11,540 --> 00:25:12,810
And that's exactly what I described.

376
00:25:12,810 --> 00:25:19,524
So you need to be very open minded and have the even sometimes there are a lot of people
who don't enjoy learning and

377
00:25:19,727 --> 00:25:23,441
Using technology, and I I I've seen it a lot, even with the AI.

378
00:25:23,441 --> 00:25:29,396
So the they might be using ChatGPT, but they're not using ChatGPT or Cloud or whatever to
its fullest extent.

379
00:25:29,396 --> 00:25:36,502
Okay, so if you can you can use projects, you can use agent AI agents, which are doing
transforming the work we do.

380
00:25:36,502 --> 00:25:40,285
You need to understand how it's being done and try to do it yourself.

381
00:25:40,285 --> 00:25:46,481
And sometimes I work with people who are ambitious professionals and say, I don't like
this, all this tech stuff, why am I gonna do the AI?

382
00:25:46,481 --> 00:25:47,301
So look.

383
00:25:47,333 --> 00:25:52,166
One of your goals in this 12-week year you're gonna do is learn AI.

384
00:25:52,166 --> 00:25:52,596
Okay.

385
00:25:52,596 --> 00:26:02,812
And the goal is, for instance, in the last for the last week in the in this cycle, you
will learn how to program an AI agent, even though maybe you're not gonna use it.

386
00:26:02,812 --> 00:26:11,577
But you need to be comfortable understanding what's the capacity of how to do it, ask the
right questions when you're gonna implement a project with it next time.

387
00:26:11,577 --> 00:26:15,199
Okay, so using a system will actually, like mine,

388
00:26:15,305 --> 00:26:23,901
or any other system that you're gonna choose will actually help you acquire those new
skills because you're gonna put that as an understanding that that's one of your biggest

389
00:26:23,901 --> 00:26:25,383
goals moving forward.

390
00:26:25,383 --> 00:26:26,489
And that's what I do with people.

391
00:26:26,489 --> 00:26:30,476
I I force I because I I I work with some of them very, very closely.

392
00:26:30,476 --> 00:26:38,792
I have sometimes I force them because I understand the technology and understand the shift
that's happening, I almost force them to say, I don't care.

393
00:26:38,792 --> 00:26:44,237
One of your five goals, okay, is to s become extremely comf comfortable

394
00:26:44,237 --> 00:26:46,643
with the technology you're going to use in the future.

395
00:26:46,703 --> 00:26:47,483
Absolutely.

396
00:26:47,483 --> 00:26:48,744
And so I think we'll wrap this.

397
00:26:48,744 --> 00:26:57,660
It's not just about this idea, but I believe the next three to five years in AI, it's
gonna be the people that are most valuable are the ones that are operating, engaging with

398
00:26:57,660 --> 00:26:59,990
the agents 'cause the agents are gonna be doing the work.

399
00:27:01,051 --> 00:27:01,401
Right?

400
00:27:01,401 --> 00:27:02,469
That but

401
00:27:02,469 --> 00:27:10,371
The strategy and and the mind and the thinking on how to use it, at least in the next five
years, I I might be totally mistaken, is still gonna be us.

402
00:27:10,371 --> 00:27:11,142
Okay.

403
00:27:11,142 --> 00:27:12,015
Yeah, the CEO.

404
00:27:12,015 --> 00:27:17,036
But these people are gonna need to these key employees are gonna be the new CEO of the
agents.

405
00:27:17,036 --> 00:27:18,038
Exac exactly.

406
00:27:18,038 --> 00:27:18,848
Absolutely exactly.

407
00:27:18,848 --> 00:27:24,723
That's why I force quote unquote force people, really push them to say you need to learn
this technology.

408
00:27:24,723 --> 00:27:24,964
Okay.

409
00:27:24,964 --> 00:27:25,150
Absolutely.

410
00:27:25,150 --> 00:27:30,508
Because don't don't look at that technology, look at that as almost invaluable skill that
you're gonna need for the next three and five years.

411
00:27:30,508 --> 00:27:34,172
And if you're not gonna know that, you're you you're gonna be out of the competition.

412
00:27:34,172 --> 00:27:34,520
What

413
00:27:34,520 --> 00:27:44,511
missing since we got a little bit how can we bring the clarity back for everybody
listening about the clarity and this the maybe the simplistic approach to this twelve week

414
00:27:44,511 --> 00:27:45,602
environment.

415
00:27:49,396 --> 00:28:01,926
Core thing, the two core things which bring clarity, focus in this environment is one that
the the system all it has all the necessary pillars you need in order to become a really

416
00:28:01,926 --> 00:28:04,927
high performer in this in this type of environment.

417
00:28:04,968 --> 00:28:10,331
It it builds on a really strong vision, okay, which is like a strategy for a company.

418
00:28:10,331 --> 00:28:13,093
Do you know of a c a successful company without a strategy?

419
00:28:13,093 --> 00:28:14,103
You don't.

420
00:28:15,809 --> 00:28:17,511
As a person, there's no real difference.

421
00:28:17,511 --> 00:28:18,742
You need to be also successful.

422
00:28:18,742 --> 00:28:19,892
You must have a vision.

423
00:28:19,892 --> 00:28:20,963
You can call it the strategy.

424
00:28:20,963 --> 00:28:22,214
You can call it whatever you want.

425
00:28:22,214 --> 00:28:26,616
So people I work with, I force them to think about where do you want to be in two, three
years?

426
00:28:26,616 --> 00:28:32,379
I know it's a bit vague, but you need to put some poll in the future to make sure you
understand where you're going.

427
00:28:32,379 --> 00:28:33,590
So that gives you direction.

428
00:28:33,590 --> 00:28:39,704
Then you're gonna execute that like we talked before in terms of how to tie strategy to
execution.

429
00:28:39,704 --> 00:28:43,946
And then then we're gonna break that vision very clearly into the different goals.

430
00:28:43,946 --> 00:28:48,620
inside cycles of twelve week year, which are gonna give you a lot of clarity.

431
00:28:48,620 --> 00:28:57,386
because you're gonna take the future, which is so far ahead and actually bring it to the
present and start executing on that future because you're gonna start to decide, what do I

432
00:28:57,386 --> 00:29:00,068
need to do in order to reach that future?

433
00:29:00,068 --> 00:29:08,765
And based on that, you gain a lot of clarity for the execution that you need to do and you
start you're gonna start achieving more goals.

434
00:29:08,765 --> 00:29:12,873
you're gonna get much better feedback because now you know what to measure and all that.

435
00:29:12,873 --> 00:29:19,305
So everything just wor is starts to, you know, be in place, work together and reinforce
one another.

436
00:29:19,326 --> 00:29:21,145
And that's the clarity that it brings.

437
00:29:21,145 --> 00:29:21,626
There you go.

438
00:29:21,626 --> 00:29:25,050
How's Dan's operator mindset different now?

439
00:29:25,432 --> 00:29:29,649
After all these years of experience, what's it evolved into versus what it used to be?

440
00:29:29,649 --> 00:29:30,860
And a lot of people are starting.

441
00:29:30,860 --> 00:29:34,165
Like, what do you see as the elite operator mindset now?

442
00:29:35,780 --> 00:29:36,922
great question.

443
00:29:36,922 --> 00:29:42,826
so for me it w it it was really it it wasn't like one day and it it's a gradual process,
right?

444
00:29:42,826 --> 00:29:48,671
I already have tw I already have twenty five years of at least of experience doing all
this stuff.

445
00:29:48,671 --> 00:29:55,326
So it took me years to you know to get to a level of understanding of why, for instance,
you need a system.

446
00:29:55,326 --> 00:30:00,631
Okay, so when you start your career, you don't you don't usually it's not it's not
something

447
00:30:00,631 --> 00:30:03,703
That you think about, okay, you just focus on the day to day.

448
00:30:03,703 --> 00:30:05,135
I I'll give you an example.

449
00:30:05,135 --> 00:30:13,137
most people today, and i i and there's a strong research on that, are being interrupted
two hundred and seventy five times a day.

450
00:30:13,137 --> 00:30:23,580
Okay, the average worker in a knowledge economy, not all not all of them, is being
interrupted two hundred seventy five times a day by emails, social media, pings, slack,

451
00:30:24,000 --> 00:30:25,741
calls, whatever you want to call it.

452
00:30:25,741 --> 00:30:27,797
Two hundred and seventy five times a day.

453
00:30:27,797 --> 00:30:28,318
Okay.

454
00:30:28,318 --> 00:30:38,551
And if you're not aware of the fact that you you are being torn and and pulled and your
attention in your intellect is being torn and pulled and and you lose the capacity to do

455
00:30:38,551 --> 00:30:48,349
real deep valuable work that's gonna move you forward and you're gonna put you in the top
five or ten percent, okay, without having a system, it like I said, you're gonna be toast.

456
00:30:48,349 --> 00:30:51,449
So that understanding

457
00:30:51,449 --> 00:30:53,130
Took me years to understand.

458
00:30:53,130 --> 00:30:59,092
I didn't have that, you know, that vision and understanding and a higher layer
understanding of how a corporation works.

459
00:30:59,092 --> 00:31:07,976
But once, you know, I th there was a point I was managing 100 people in a company and I I
saw how people work and I said, right, this is just extremely uneffective.

460
00:31:08,018 --> 00:31:18,043
so i i i if right from the start you understand and build this awareness that there's a
better way, okay, you will be quicker to reach that elite performance.

461
00:31:18,210 --> 00:31:20,052
level that you're talking about.

462
00:31:21,030 --> 00:31:22,563
How do we take these 12 weeks?

463
00:31:22,563 --> 00:31:30,597
What's it look like for this system, for a business owner, an entrepreneur, a startup,
somebody engages with you in the system?

464
00:31:30,919 --> 00:31:33,824
What's it look like on a weekly execution?

465
00:31:33,904 --> 00:31:35,504
You wait, I have to say something.

466
00:31:35,504 --> 00:31:37,185
You have amazing questions, okay?

467
00:31:37,185 --> 00:31:38,486
Now back to the question.

468
00:31:38,486 --> 00:31:43,628
In the twelfth week year, remember we're gonna start with the strategy or the vision.

469
00:31:43,628 --> 00:31:47,470
Vision for the company, vision for yourself, strategy of the company.

470
00:31:47,470 --> 00:31:51,512
So there's a lot of planning going on until you actually reach the cycle.

471
00:31:51,512 --> 00:31:58,474
Every minute you spend in good quality planning is gonna save you a lot in the execution
itself because you know what to do.

472
00:31:58,474 --> 00:32:00,425
You're not gonna waste the time if something happens.

473
00:32:00,425 --> 00:32:01,506
wait a second, what am I gonna do now?

474
00:32:01,506 --> 00:32:02,746
What's my goal?

475
00:32:03,250 --> 00:32:04,441
Well, what's my execution plan?

476
00:32:04,441 --> 00:32:05,661
How do I measure my stuff?

477
00:32:05,661 --> 00:32:10,763
There's a lot of planning going on before you start your first cycle.

478
00:32:10,763 --> 00:32:17,777
The vision, setting up the goals, how you're gonna measure your performance, how you're
gonna break down the tasks that you need to do.

479
00:32:17,777 --> 00:32:29,733
So after you s you set the vision, you set the goals for the next 12 weeks, the the
12-week year, each week is basically gonna break and then you're gonna identify the tasks

480
00:32:29,733 --> 00:32:31,055
associated.

481
00:32:31,055 --> 00:32:32,096
With each of these goals.

482
00:32:32,096 --> 00:32:33,307
We need to make it actionable.

483
00:32:33,307 --> 00:32:37,421
Okay, goal is a nice, but now I need to make to make it real.

484
00:32:37,421 --> 00:32:42,226
So I need to br I need to understand the tasks associated with each and every goal.

485
00:32:42,226 --> 00:32:49,252
So you also create a list of tasks, and now you're gonna start planning them when I'm
gonna do them actually during the different weeks.

486
00:32:49,252 --> 00:32:50,073
So think about it.

487
00:32:50,073 --> 00:32:54,907
So now you're gonna you you're coming to a first week, you have everything in front of
you.

488
00:32:54,907 --> 00:32:57,439
Okay, I know what goal I need to pursue.

489
00:32:57,503 --> 00:32:59,314
I know what tasks I need to do.

490
00:32:59,314 --> 00:33:00,835
I know when I need to do them.

491
00:33:00,835 --> 00:33:04,877
I'm actually bl doing strategic slots of time on my calendar.

492
00:33:04,877 --> 00:33:08,329
So you're blocking time to the most important goals you're working on.

493
00:33:08,329 --> 00:33:10,429
And you know why you're doing that.

494
00:33:10,429 --> 00:33:16,981
You know how to measure your performance because you've broken down what's the most
important proxies of lead and lag measures.

495
00:33:16,981 --> 00:33:22,273
We're not gonna talk about that too much, but there's a whole performance evaluation
system.

496
00:33:22,273 --> 00:33:23,818
And during the week you

497
00:33:23,818 --> 00:33:30,490
Instead think about it, instead of being reactive to your environment, you're becoming
totally proactive.

498
00:33:30,490 --> 00:33:35,383
You are taking control of your most important precious thing, which is time.

499
00:33:35,383 --> 00:33:36,294
Okay.

500
00:33:36,294 --> 00:33:38,715
You are in control of your time right now.

501
00:33:38,715 --> 00:33:44,921
So you know your goals, you know your tasks, you know when are you gonna do them, how are
you gonna do them, because you did all the planning.

502
00:33:44,921 --> 00:33:49,923
You're gonna do a weekly feedback cycle every week, you're gonna stop and say, Okay, how
did I do the week?

503
00:33:49,923 --> 00:33:51,845
You're gonna measure yourself.

504
00:33:51,845 --> 00:33:56,546
you you you you might need to make adjustments say, wait, I too I put too much weight on
this goal.

505
00:33:56,546 --> 00:33:57,277
Actually I need to move.

506
00:33:57,277 --> 00:33:58,087
Okay, make the adjustment.

507
00:33:58,087 --> 00:33:58,737
That's fine.

508
00:33:58,737 --> 00:34:01,738
We have the flexibility because you're going to do this weekly review.

509
00:34:01,738 --> 00:34:06,419
So as you can see, each week operates as almost its independent unit.

510
00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:15,502
Going in, you know exactly what you're going to do, what you're going to work on, what's
going to be your focus, how is it tied to your strategy, and then you move week to week

511
00:34:15,502 --> 00:34:17,653
until you finish the entire 12 weeks.

512
00:34:18,075 --> 00:34:21,749
This sounds like you can change a an entire company in twelve weeks.

513
00:34:23,349 --> 00:34:27,253
it takes a company can change in about a year.

514
00:34:27,253 --> 00:34:29,955
You need about four cycles, from my experience.

515
00:34:29,955 --> 00:34:33,998
I mean the the as on a personal level you can do it in two cycles.

516
00:34:34,039 --> 00:34:42,165
A company where it's a little bit more complicated because you have more teams and you
need to you need more people to cooperate and more people to be on the same page.

517
00:34:42,626 --> 00:34:45,650
S some people are slower, some people are not less expensive.

518
00:34:45,650 --> 00:34:51,444
It takes time to build the, you know, the this ritual, those habits, different way of
working.

519
00:34:51,988 --> 00:34:57,000
In the first cycle make might be making a lot of big mistakes because we haven't defined
the goals very well.

520
00:34:57,000 --> 00:35:01,683
A year, but after a year, the compounding effect of that.

521
00:35:01,683 --> 00:35:13,568
Think about if you're consistently executing this type of system, you're unlocking so much
potential that people are wasting today on all those fragmented tasks that we were talking

522
00:35:13,568 --> 00:35:21,271
about, the 270 interruptions are pulling you, tearing you apart in terms of your attention
and focus.

523
00:35:21,321 --> 00:35:23,592
Okay, think about the compounding effect.

524
00:35:23,693 --> 00:35:32,690
This is one of the most important stuff actually in those type of systems, because you're
consistently doing another cycle, another the same way, and you're building on the

525
00:35:32,690 --> 00:35:35,602
progress of the previous cycle, and so on and so forth.

526
00:35:35,602 --> 00:35:36,183
Okay?

527
00:35:36,183 --> 00:35:42,617
And you're starting to achieve really difficult hard goals that were very difficult to
achieve in a previous system.

528
00:35:43,199 --> 00:35:49,661
Do the cycles look the same, you just get better at or do you review the second one based
upon the first performance?

529
00:35:49,885 --> 00:35:50,815
Exactly.

530
00:35:50,815 --> 00:35:58,298
So it's at the end of the cycle, there's a much deeper review of how you did the f on the
previous cycle, right?

531
00:35:58,298 --> 00:36:02,119
So you take a really deep you actually take a whole week.

532
00:36:02,119 --> 00:36:07,721
Actually we encourage because it's pretty intense, you know, if you think about it, if you
have twelve weeks, right?

533
00:36:07,721 --> 00:36:14,663
You you you you if you waste a whole week, that's you just wasted a lot of time out of
your year, okay?

534
00:36:14,663 --> 00:36:17,584
And you almost feel like, okay, I cannot procrastinate, right?

535
00:36:17,584 --> 00:36:18,966
I cannot delay stuff.

536
00:36:18,966 --> 00:36:24,460
I have only 12 weeks to achieve my goals until the end of end of this year, the twelve
week year.

537
00:36:25,301 --> 00:36:34,917
There is a sense there's a sense of intensity and sense of urgency, which I think is is
great because we actually operate better when there's some intensity and some urgency and

538
00:36:34,917 --> 00:36:40,512
there's more commitment and there's more focus, there's more excitement and energy, and I
actually see it.

539
00:36:40,512 --> 00:36:45,045
And then we actually encourage people to take take some two, three days off.

540
00:36:45,045 --> 00:36:47,166
Okay, just relax, reflect.

541
00:36:47,484 --> 00:36:51,646
charge your batteries, take a whole week, go travel, I don't know.

542
00:36:51,787 --> 00:36:57,290
Between the two cycles, don't start one one cycle after the other, because then it's gonna
be a burnout.

543
00:36:57,290 --> 00:36:57,931
Okay.

544
00:36:57,931 --> 00:37:06,996
So we actually we actually encourage to take a couple days off, then a couple days of
reflection, of really understanding what happened in the last year.

545
00:37:06,996 --> 00:37:08,537
Okay, how how did I do?

546
00:37:08,537 --> 00:37:09,648
What should I correct?

547
00:37:09,648 --> 00:37:11,089
How should I change my goals?

548
00:37:11,089 --> 00:37:13,360
You need to make all those micro adjustments.

549
00:37:13,596 --> 00:37:16,839
Actually, this goal doesn't fit very well with how we work.

550
00:37:16,839 --> 00:37:17,648
We need to change it.

551
00:37:17,648 --> 00:37:25,334
Or maybe there's a t totally new goal because I don't know, we decided to launch a new
product and you're creating a whole new set of goals for that type of project.

552
00:37:25,334 --> 00:37:26,384
That's fine.

553
00:37:26,384 --> 00:37:31,707
So but you take a lot of insights in order to compound your progress.

554
00:37:31,707 --> 00:37:39,331
If you're just gonna operate totally separately between those two cycles, you're losing a
lot of the compounding effect, right?

555
00:37:39,331 --> 00:37:42,971
We the the most beautiful stuff about this is that after a year.

556
00:37:42,971 --> 00:37:47,063
You're gonna be the top 10% and you're just gonna start continue climbing.

557
00:37:47,063 --> 00:37:47,643
Okay?

558
00:37:47,643 --> 00:37:49,364
You you're just not gonna let go.

559
00:37:49,364 --> 00:37:51,625
Okay, because you'd be performing so well.

560
00:37:51,625 --> 00:37:54,576
The compounding effect is really one of the greatest things.

561
00:37:54,576 --> 00:37:56,367
And you're doing it faster.

562
00:37:56,367 --> 00:38:04,750
So instead of waiting the whole year to learn how I did with my gold, your compounding
effect now it happens four times a year.

563
00:38:04,810 --> 00:38:05,610
Okay?

564
00:38:05,610 --> 00:38:09,212
And there's this there's a clear structure of how to do that.

565
00:38:09,532 --> 00:38:11,433
Like we talked about learning from the stuff.

566
00:38:11,433 --> 00:38:12,453
Okay, actually.

567
00:38:12,453 --> 00:38:16,295
Actually, okay, the the the tracking system I use wasn't that good.

568
00:38:16,295 --> 00:38:22,817
We didn't reach our goal of implementing the tracking strategy because we didn't measure
exactly the right thing.

569
00:38:22,817 --> 00:38:23,958
Let's correct it.

570
00:38:23,958 --> 00:38:29,170
So now you have a clear system of how to correct the stuff and everybody is on the same
page.

571
00:38:29,170 --> 00:38:30,020
we understand.

572
00:38:30,020 --> 00:38:33,782
Okay, let's change the goal a little bit, let's change the measurement a little bit.

573
00:38:33,782 --> 00:38:41,126
And now all of a sudden the second cycle or look, we are much better with the tracking
software that we had to install.

574
00:38:41,236 --> 00:38:42,527
and now we actually achieved it.

575
00:38:42,527 --> 00:38:47,241
Okay, let's take the insights we gained from how we did that to the third cycle and so on.

576
00:38:47,241 --> 00:38:58,472
So there are great compounding effects and the it's very important that those cycles,
those years, will be extreme be very linked, especially with the learning process and the

577
00:38:58,472 --> 00:39:01,104
feedback process and gaining the insights process.

578
00:39:01,104 --> 00:39:02,716
So I I hope I answered your question.

579
00:39:02,716 --> 00:39:03,136
Yeah.

580
00:39:03,136 --> 00:39:03,486
you did.

581
00:39:03,486 --> 00:39:05,548
mean, I it's very detailed.

582
00:39:05,809 --> 00:39:11,072
But man, I'm thinking about this process of integrating into the companies that I operate
and I've run.

583
00:39:11,133 --> 00:39:13,675
And you have to really want to win.

584
00:39:14,796 --> 00:39:17,398
You have to really want to win to see this through.

585
00:39:17,459 --> 00:39:20,581
Because this is not going to be easy.

586
00:39:21,622 --> 00:39:29,469
And the reason why I say it's not going to be easy because most likely one of the most
difficult things, if not the most difficult that I see is the key players are going to

587
00:39:29,469 --> 00:39:31,428
have to be 100% on board.

588
00:39:33,192 --> 00:39:33,974
I see what you're saying.

589
00:39:33,974 --> 00:39:35,616
I and I experience that.

590
00:39:35,616 --> 00:39:40,871
it's it's definitely more challenging as the corporation.

591
00:39:40,871 --> 00:39:45,735
So what I suggest sometimes, there's no guarantee, right?

592
00:39:45,735 --> 00:39:48,257
But what I suggest is to do a pilot.

593
00:39:48,257 --> 00:39:48,837
Okay.

594
00:39:48,837 --> 00:39:52,300
So don't right away try to implement on the entire company.

595
00:39:52,300 --> 00:39:53,180
That's not gonna work.

596
00:39:53,180 --> 00:39:58,766
Like you said, there's challenges, there's gonna be pushbacks, people don't won't really
be sure w what are you talking about.

597
00:39:58,766 --> 00:40:01,223
This is a totally different way of the way I operate.

598
00:40:01,223 --> 00:40:04,085
some people have worked in the same way for twenty years.

599
00:40:04,085 --> 00:40:07,366
You're gonna you you in one quarter you're not gonna change them.

600
00:40:07,366 --> 00:40:08,643
uh

601
00:40:08,643 --> 00:40:08,873
though.

602
00:40:08,873 --> 00:40:13,018
If there's one thing that could be implemented in the system, like what would that thing
be?

603
00:40:13,018 --> 00:40:13,815
And then

604
00:40:13,815 --> 00:40:18,509
I I actually what I alluded to is that actually try to do a pilot with a team.

605
00:40:18,509 --> 00:40:24,054
Okay, take one team, not the entire company, take one department, one team, okay?

606
00:40:24,695 --> 00:40:28,767
And show the company, look, we're we're gonna try a new process, but you you're gonna give
the reason.

607
00:40:28,767 --> 00:40:31,199
Like you said, you really want to win, okay?

608
00:40:31,199 --> 00:40:33,831
I I'm telling you, I work with people who are ambitious.

609
00:40:33,831 --> 00:40:38,185
If I see people who are not ambitious and it's not gonna work out, look, it's not gonna
work out.

610
00:40:38,185 --> 00:40:40,696
Let's not waste our times, okay?

611
00:40:41,284 --> 00:40:45,435
Yeah, you you want to be the top five I work with people who want to be the top five
percent.

612
00:40:45,435 --> 00:40:47,096
That's that's how we define it.

613
00:40:47,096 --> 00:40:53,888
If you really want to implement the system, you want to have that burning desire that
yeah, you need to be a winner, right?

614
00:40:53,888 --> 00:40:55,549
You want to be the top five percent.

615
00:40:55,549 --> 00:40:57,340
that that's what we're talking about.

616
00:40:57,360 --> 00:41:01,741
My my belief is if you're not gonna be in the top ten percent, you're probably not gonna
survive in the long term.

617
00:41:01,741 --> 00:41:05,439
So it's almost because only the top especially in this industry.

618
00:41:05,439 --> 00:41:07,782
Yeah like you said, especially in this industry.

619
00:41:07,782 --> 00:41:14,998
But but here's why here's why in any industry, because there's gonna be a five percent of
people who are gonna be, and that's who you're gonna compete against.

620
00:41:14,998 --> 00:41:21,903
If you're not one of them, you're always gonna be chasing them and they're gonna be
outpacing, out compounding, out learning, outgrowing.

621
00:41:21,903 --> 00:41:24,024
That's just the facts of the system.

622
00:41:24,646 --> 00:41:25,456
Absolutely.

623
00:41:25,456 --> 00:41:33,100
And and it's even gonna be more transparent and more evident in the AI world because
everything is gonna move so fast, everything's gonna be so transparent, your competitive

624
00:41:33,100 --> 00:41:37,904
advantage is gonna be not so sustainable for the next year or two, it's gonna be pretty
fleeting.

625
00:41:37,904 --> 00:41:40,878
You need to move quickly as much as as much as you can.

626
00:41:40,878 --> 00:41:43,849
No no matter what industry you're gonna be you be at.

627
00:41:43,849 --> 00:41:48,502
if it's high tech or pharmaceuticals or even manufacturing or even insurance.

628
00:41:48,959 --> 00:41:59,300
i i for instance, I I worked with one of the reasons I worked with this big insurance
company is that because high tech excuse me, high-tech startups were starting to disrupt

629
00:41:59,621 --> 00:42:06,448
this old traditional fashion in insurance industry by providing amazing online services.

630
00:42:06,448 --> 00:42:09,200
Okay, the for instance, company that came out totally out of nowhere.

631
00:42:09,200 --> 00:42:12,313
There were high-tech people, it was insurance people called Lemonade.

632
00:42:12,313 --> 00:42:13,154
You probably heard about it.

633
00:42:13,154 --> 00:42:14,185
It's an Israeli company.

634
00:42:14,185 --> 00:42:16,256
So I I know the founder.

635
00:42:16,502 --> 00:42:20,235
not not very closely, but w we talked about how how he did it.

636
00:42:20,235 --> 00:42:21,496
It's all technology.

637
00:42:21,496 --> 00:42:21,847
Okay.

638
00:42:21,847 --> 00:42:26,801
So they're totally disrupting the the insurance the insurance industry.

639
00:42:26,801 --> 00:42:34,287
So if you're not gonna have a system that gives you this rapid feedback and rapid way of
learning and executing that, you you're not gonna last.

640
00:42:34,287 --> 00:42:34,677
Okay.

641
00:42:34,677 --> 00:42:40,152
And and then now they're surviv I mean, they're ba barely s barely making any profits, the
company that I'm working with.

642
00:42:40,152 --> 00:42:46,084
They're barely making any profits because there there's such there's such a there's so so
much competition.

643
00:42:46,084 --> 00:42:48,247
From the online services.

644
00:42:48,247 --> 00:42:54,915
Cause they're not they're selling auto insurance, home insurance, stuff like that, which
is pre kind of generic a little bit.

645
00:42:54,915 --> 00:42:57,498
And many people say, Wait, I ha I I don't need an agent.

646
00:42:57,498 --> 00:43:01,553
I can go and buy I I can bypass the agent, lower my fees and go buy directly.

647
00:43:01,553 --> 00:43:06,647
So there was a total disruption and and it's gonna happen in all the all industry, it's
already happening.

648
00:43:07,018 --> 00:43:08,908
So hey, we're all in sales.

649
00:43:08,908 --> 00:43:11,281
No matter what we do, it comes down to sales.

650
00:43:11,281 --> 00:43:12,064
I agree.

651
00:43:12,064 --> 00:43:13,959
So at the I totally agree.

652
00:43:13,959 --> 00:43:17,097
Yeah, I love technology, I like products, but we need revenue.

653
00:43:17,097 --> 00:43:24,399
So at the end of the day, what's what's your what's Dan Mintz's sales pitch here on this
business, on what you're doing, on the twelve week system?

654
00:43:24,399 --> 00:43:25,620
What's your pitch?

655
00:43:26,006 --> 00:43:35,045
My my my pitch is if you work with me and you implement a system, look it like you said,
yeah, you had a very interesting insight.

656
00:43:35,045 --> 00:43:40,280
I mean, it's good it's gonna be very difficult for a corporation, but also for people on
an individual basis.

657
00:43:40,280 --> 00:43:40,940
It's amazing.

658
00:43:40,940 --> 00:43:42,241
It's it it's not amazing.

659
00:43:42,241 --> 00:43:43,462
It it we're human.

660
00:43:43,462 --> 00:43:46,605
It's very difficult, okay, to implement it by yourself.

661
00:43:46,605 --> 00:43:48,226
Okay, I'm saying it seriously.

662
00:43:48,226 --> 00:43:53,147
So if you're gonna try most people who are gonna read the book and say it's interesting.

663
00:43:53,147 --> 00:43:56,259
98% of the people who read the book are not going to implement it.

664
00:43:56,259 --> 00:44:02,223
Or if they are going to implement it, they're going to stop implementing after they're
going to lose interest after four weeks.

665
00:44:03,264 --> 00:44:11,857
If you work with an expert and someone who's going to hold you accountable for the first
six months of implement, or four months, it doesn't matter.

666
00:44:11,857 --> 00:44:12,991
You need a couple of months.

667
00:44:12,991 --> 00:44:21,938
Someone who is an expert and going to give you tough love and not going to let you down
and we be a partner with your journey, okay, for the first six months.

668
00:44:21,948 --> 00:44:32,387
Your chances of actually implementing a performance system that are gonna boost your
performance by five X if you stay consistent for at least a year, okay, jumps from five,

669
00:44:32,387 --> 00:44:34,949
ten, twenty percent to eighty percent.

670
00:44:34,949 --> 00:44:35,929
Okay.

671
00:44:37,412 --> 00:44:47,200
one of the biggest ROIs you can think of in terms of how much money you're actually gonna
invest to this one-on-one consulting or working with me, to the actual benefit you're

672
00:44:47,200 --> 00:44:51,503
gonna get from consistently performing at the top five percent.

673
00:44:51,743 --> 00:44:52,815
Here's what I love about you, man.

674
00:44:52,815 --> 00:44:53,947
Us just getting to know each other.

675
00:44:53,947 --> 00:45:03,572
What I absolutely love is you're not saying that you have to work with you, but you gotta
work with someone like you that's helping them interact with these systems and implement

676
00:45:03,572 --> 00:45:04,843
them in our businesses.

677
00:45:05,387 --> 00:45:06,267
Almost a must.

678
00:45:06,267 --> 00:45:09,638
I mean, it's it's it's a it's a big change, it's a challenge.

679
00:45:09,638 --> 00:45:16,653
You need to be a winner, but you definitely need you need someone to guide you and and
stay with you because you're still running your business, right?

680
00:45:16,653 --> 00:45:22,015
Go to the pool in the afternoon, that's fine.

681
00:45:22,015 --> 00:45:25,737
You you still have to manage your stuff you you manage your stuff.

682
00:45:25,737 --> 00:45:30,370
So you need to spare a couple of hours and you must have that person with you, working
with you.

683
00:45:30,370 --> 00:45:33,151
So you can be very effective in implementing that.

684
00:45:33,295 --> 00:45:33,925
All right.

685
00:45:33,925 --> 00:45:36,746
Dan Mintz, CEO of twelve week breakthrough.

686
00:45:36,746 --> 00:45:40,047
There's so much more behind it than just twelve weeks.

687
00:45:40,047 --> 00:45:44,009
But if you listen to this conversation, I think you'll understand the power.

688
00:45:44,009 --> 00:45:51,691
If you have concentrated effort behind a strategic system, looking for productivity and
change to scale your business, this system will do it for you.

689
00:45:51,691 --> 00:45:56,693
So thank you for sharing your intelligence, your brilliance, and a little bit of time with
us here this year.

690
00:45:56,901 --> 00:45:59,584
It was it was a great pleasure being on the show.