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Bulletproof Business Podcast

Bulletproof Business Podcast

Written by: Simone Janssen
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 Welcome to the Bulletproof Startups Podcast, where we help business owners and CEOs become conscious leaders and build a power team so they can let go, get strategic, and know they are adding the most value possible to their company every single day. I am your host, Simone Janssen, and this podcast is about one thing only, becoming the real CEO of your business by building leveraged teams. You've built a great product or service, but although you have a team you are still in everything. Your time is spent in the weeds, and you are leaving money and opportunity on the table because you don't know how to establish clarity, shift responsibility, and create accountability. If you want to know how to change that, you are in the right place. All this information is 100% free, so please subscribe to and review our podcast.2023 Careers Economics Personal Success
Episodes
  • Episode 2 of 5: The Five Lies You Tell Yourself to Justify Keeping Mediocre Employees

    Episode 2 of 5: The Five Lies You Tell Yourself to Justify Keeping Mediocre Employees
    May 11 2026
    Last week: the tolerance tax and what mediocrity costs you. This week: why you keep paying it. You've convinced yourself of five lies. And every lie is masking a deeper problem: you're failing your internal customers. LIE #1: "At least they show up." The story: "They're not great, but they show up and do the work." Something is better than nothing." The truth: Showing up is the baseline, not a virtue. It's the minimum, not an achievement. And "something" isn't better than nothing if it's costing you $100K/year in lost revenue, 15 hours/week of your time, and driving A-players away. The internal customer failure: You have a 47-step onboarding process for clients. For employees? "Here's your desk. Figure it out." You're treating your team like an afterthought while bending over backwards for customers. LIE #2: "Replacing them would be worse." The story: "What if the new person is worse? At least I know what I'm getting with this person." The truth: You're choosing the certainty of mediocrity over the possibility of excellence. Keeping someone you know is mediocre is a guaranteed loss. A new hire walking into infrastructure ramps 10x faster than a new hire walking into chaos. The internal customer failure: You have customer journey maps. You know every touchpoint for clients. But for employees? You have no idea where they're struggling, checking out, or about to quit. You're flying blind on the internal customer experience. LIE #3: "I don't have time to replace them." The story: "I'm already working 70-hour weeks. I'll deal with this when things calm down." The truth: Things will never calm down because you're spending 10-20 hours/week managing mediocrity. If you replaced them, you'd get that time back. You could spend 40 hours hiring someone great and get 520 hours back every year. The internal customer failure: You respond to customer feedback in 24 hours. Employee concerns? You ignore them for months. You track customer NPS but have no idea if your team would recommend working here. You're measuring what matters externally and ignoring what matters internally. LIE #4: "They're not that bad." The story: "They're fine. They get some things done." The truth: "Fine" is failing. "Fine" costs you $100K+/year and kills your culture. A-players see you tolerate "fine" and either leave or become fine themselves. "Fine" is contagious. The internal customer failure: You personalize every client interaction. You customize proposals, tailor solutions, listen deeply. But your team? Generic, one-size-fits-all management. No personalization. No listening. No understanding of what they need to thrive. LIE #5: "I can't afford to lose them right now." The story: "We're in the middle of a project / busy season. I'll deal with this later." The truth: There will always be a reason to wait. And while you wait, the tolerance tax compounds. Every day you wait = more lost revenue, burned time, eroded standards. The "right time" is now. The internal customer failure: You would never tell a customer "not right now, I'm too busy." But you do it to your team constantly. Their growth? "Later." Their concerns? "Not now." Their development? "When things calm down." You're treating your most important customers like they don't matter. THE PATTERN: Every lie is rooted in the same problem: You're treating employees like an afterthought while obsessing over external customers. You're running a five-star hotel for clients and a chaotic warehouse for your team. And it's killing retention, performance, and growth. THE REAL PROBLEM: Your employees are your internal customers. And right now, their experience sucks. You don't have: - A clear onboarding journey (they're drinking from a fire hose) - Role clarity (they don't know what success looks like) - Growth paths (they hit a ceiling with no way forward) - Autonomy (they're micromanaged or abandoned, never empowered) - Recognition (their wins go unnoticed, their concerns unheard) You wouldn't treat an external customer this way. So why are you treating your team this way? Because you don't see them as customers. You see them as resources. As expenses. As problems to manage. But your employees are your most important customers. They're the ones delivering the experience to your external customers. They're the ones executing your vision. They're the ones building your business. If their experience sucks, your business suffers. MONEY QUOTE: "You're running a five-star hotel for clients and a chaotic warehouse for your team." THE SOLUTION: Fix the internal customer experience. Stop treating your team like an afterthought and start treating them like the most important customers you have. Next week: The internal customer crisis. We'll break down the five touchpoints where you're losing your best people and why fixing the employee experience is the key to ending the hostage situation. ACTION STEP: Ask yourself: If my employees were my customers, would they renew? Would they recommend working here? ...
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    20 mins
  • Episode 5 of 5 The Solution: How To Build A Business That Runs Without You.

    Episode 5 of 5 The Solution: How To Build A Business That Runs Without You.
    Apr 27 2026
    Everything we've talked about over the last four episodes comes down to one thing: infrastructure. Without it, you're the system. With it, your team has what they need to operate independently. THE 5 PIECES OF INFRASTRUCTURE EVERY BUSINESS NEEDS: 1. Role Clarity Every person needs to know exactly what success looks like in their role. Not a generic job description. Real clarity on what they're responsible for, how their work contributes, and what great performance looks like. Without it: Your team is guessing, trying to read your mind, doing what they think you want instead of what you actually need. 2. Decision Boundaries Your team needs to know what they can decide on their own versus what needs to come to you. Clear frameworks that say: if this situation comes up, here's how we handle it. Without it: Your team comes to you for everything because they don't know what they're allowed to handle. You become the bottleneck. 3. Documented Standards The things that live in your head. The way you want things done. The level of quality you expect. The non-negotiables. All captured in a way your team can reference and use. Without it: Quality is inconsistent because your team doesn't know what good looks like. 4. Weekly Operating Rhythm A simple, consistent cadence that keeps everyone aligned. A meeting structure that surfaces problems early, celebrates wins, and makes sure nothing falls through the cracks. Without it: You're operating in chaos. Priorities shift. Things get missed. People work in silos. 5. Onboarding Process So when you hire someone new, they don't spend six months trying to figure out how things work. They walk in on day one with clarity on what's expected, how to succeed, and how to contribute. Without it: Every new hire is a gamble. They're drinking from a fire hose. It takes forever for them to ramp up, if they ever do. THE PROBLEM: Building that infrastructure is hard. Not because it's complicated. But because it requires you, the busiest and most interrupted person in the company, to carve out time you don't have to document things that live in your head. So the binder sits on the shelf. The templates sit on your desktop. The consultant's report sits in a drawer. And nothing changes. Because the tools weren't built for how you actually operate. THE SOLUTION: You need infrastructure that builds itself from your voice. A system that asks the right questions, captures what you know, organizes it, and turns it into something your team can use. Without you having to write a single document. Without you having to fill out a single form. Without you having to add a single hour to your already packed week. **INTRODUCING BULLETPROOF COO:** The first AI system trained specifically on my methodology for turning owner-dependent businesses into self-running teams. How it works: 3-5 short guided conversations over 1-2 weeks. You just talk. The same way you'd explain things to a sharp new hire. The system listens, organizes, and builds your entire operating structure. If you can leave a voicemail, you can do this! WHAT MAKES BULLETPROOF COO DIFFERENT: 1. Built on proven methodology Two decades of walking into hundreds of businesses, diagnosing the exact patterns that keep owners stuck, and building the infrastructure that sets them free. The system knows what questions to ask, what to capture, and how to structure it so your team can actually use it. 2. Does the heavy lifting for you Every other tool required you to do all the work. Bulletproof COO flips that model. You talk. The system builds. The heavy lifting happens on the other side of your voice. 3. Tailored to your business Not a template. Not one size fits all. The system captures your language, your standards, your decision-making. It builds infrastructure that reflects how your business actually runs. 4. A living system Your business isn't static. You hire people. Roles change. You add services. Ongoing access keeps everything current as your business evolves. That's the difference between a system that grows with you and another binder collecting dust. 5. You're not doing this alone Founding members get the first 90 days of direct access to me. Monthly group calls to troubleshoot, refine, and make sure this is actually working. Plus a private community of the other 24 founding members. WHAT YOU GET: ✅ The full setup: 3-5 guided conversations that capture your standards, decision-making, and operating rhythm. The system builds your role clarity docs, decision frameworks, weekly meeting structure, and onboarding process. ✅ Ongoing access: Monthly tune-up sessions to keep everything current as your business evolves. ✅ Founding member bonus (first 90 days): Monthly group calls with me and a private community of the other 24 founding members. ✅ The guarantee: You go through the process, build the system, hand it to your team. If it doesn't fundamentally change how your business runs, my team works with you until it does...
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    24 mins
  • Episode 4 of 5: The A-Player Paradox: Why Hiring Great People Isn't Enough

    Episode 4 of 5: The A-Player Paradox: Why Hiring Great People Isn't Enough
    Apr 20 2026

    This is Episode 4 of our NEW 5-part series: The Leadership Crisis Killing Your Business (And What To Do About It)

    You can hire someone who's talented, motivated, aligned, and wired for excellence, and they can still fail. Not because they weren't good enough. Because you didn't set them up to win.

    THE 4 IT'S (WHAT MAKES AN A-PLAYER):

    All four must be present:

    1. Can DO IT - They have the capacity (skills, experience, intelligence, ability to learn)
    2. GET IT - They understand the mission, vision, culture. They fit your team and values.
    3. WANT IT - They want to grow and do a good job. They're motivated and engaged.
    4. NEED IT - On an identity level, they NEED to do great work or it's not working for them. They can't be okay with mediocrity because it violates their sense of self.

    Missing even one? They're not an A-player for you.

    THE 20-60-20 RULE:

    • Top 20%: Your A-players
    • Middle 60%: Solid, capable, not exceptional
    • Bottom 20%: Struggling or dragging the team down

    When you hire A-players and set them up to win, the middle 60% rises and the bottom 20% either steps up or self-selects out.

    Without systems? Your A-players leave, your middle stays stuck, your bottom stays comfortable in chaos.

    THE 6 UNSAFE CHARACTERISTICS (YOUR BOTTOM 20%):

    1. Minimum effort (just enough not to get fired)
    2. Uncooperative (siloed, resists collaboration)
    3. Hostile (negative, complaining, drains energy)
    4. Excuses (never their fault, never owns it)
    5. Complaining (vocal about problems, never brings solutions)
    6. Not investing in themselves (not learning or growing)

    2-3 of these? They're unsafe. Make the call: coach them out of it or let them go.

    WHAT A-PLAYERS NEED TO THRIVE:

    • Clarity: Know exactly what success looks like, their role, how they contribute, the metrics
    • Autonomy: Authority to make decisions and own their work
    • Feedback: Regular input on what's working, what's not, what to adjust
    • Growth: Challenges, learning, new skills, being stretched

    Give them all four? They lead, take ownership, solve problems, and elevate everyone.

    Missing even one? They disengage and leave.

    THE REVERSE VVMMOO (YOUR SECRET WEAPON):

    VVMMOO = Vision, Values, Methods, Measures, Obstacles, Opportunities

    Before you hire: Create a VVMMOO for the role spelling out what success looks like, how they show up, what they do, how you measure, what's hard, what's possible.

    In the interview: Walk them through it. If they can't engage, they're not the right person. If they light up and ask questions, you've got a winner.

    After they're hired: The VMO becomes their roadmap for onboarding, expectations, feedback, and performance.

    REAL STORIES:

    Robert (Digital agency, 25 people): Hired top talent, paid well, but turnover was through the roof. No onboarding, no role clarity, no metrics, no consistency. A-players left within 6-12 months. We rebuilt the system with structure, scorecards, weekly reviews, one-on-ones. Turnover dropped 60% in six months.

    Lisa (Healthcare, 30 people): Kept hiring people who looked great but didn't work out. Implemented reverse VMO. Candidates self-selected out if it wasn't a fit. The right hire was performing at a 6-12 month level within 90 days.

    THE FILTER:

    Temporary circumstance (divorce, sick parent, mental health)? Support them.

    Habitual behavior (coasting for months, negative for a year, excuses since day one)? That's who they are.

    Run them through the 4 IT's. Yes to all four? Invest. No to even one (especially "need it")? Liberate them to find a better fit.

    You can't coach someone into needing to do great work. That's either in them or it's not.

    THE HARD TRUTH:

    What you tolerate becomes your standard. Keep low performers and your A-players will leave. You can't build a high-performing team if you're tolerating low performance.

    **MONEY QUOTE:**

    "Your hardest job as a leader is to set them up to win. And when you do that, when you give them clarity, autonomy, feedback, and growth, and they still don't perform, then you know it's not a systems problem. It's a people problem."

    **COMING NEXT:**

    Episode 5: The Bulletproof Solution: How to Build a Business That Runs Without You. We're bringing it all together with the infrastructure that gives you clarity, systems, structure, and support.

    **THE TAKEAWAY:**

    Great people need great systems. And great systems need great leadership. Subscribe now for the finale.

    To get the solution: go to https://bulletproofbusinessgrowth.com/coo and grab your spot!
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    33 mins
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