Strong businesses do not become healthy by accident. They are built through trust, clear leadership, accountability, and a willingness to face problems together. Will Watrous joins me to explore what makes leadership teams work and why so many companies struggle even when good people are involved. Will shares how his own entrepreneurial journey led him from marketing into helping leadership teams use the Entrepreneurial Operating System, or EOS, to create greater vision, traction, and team health. We discuss vulnerability-based trust, productive conflict, accountability, business complexity, data-driven decisions, and why leaders must take responsibility for both what works and what does not. Will also explains why simplicity matters as companies grow, how weekly meetings can keep teams focused, and why leaders need quiet thinking time to gain clarity. You will find practical leadership lessons here for building stronger teams, making better decisions, and creating a healthier business. Highlights: 05:22 How helping one business owner launched Will’s entrepreneurial journey. 11:42 Why strong leadership creates accountability. 15:29 How trust becomes the foundation of healthy teams. 26:20 Why productive conflict leads to better decisions. 40:44 How leaders can reduce complexity as a business grows. 54:04 Why clarity breaks help leaders think and lead better. . About the Guest: Will Watrous is a business owner, EOS Implementer, and advisor to growth-minded leaders in the Tulsa and Broken Arrow area. He works primarily with founders and leadership teams of companies with 10 to 250 employees who want more clarity, discipline, and traction in their organizations. His work centers on helping leaders simplify complexity, make better decisions, and consistently execute on what matters most. As a Certified EOS Implementer, Will guides leadership teams through the Entrepreneurial Operating System, focusing on vision, accountability, data, and healthy team dynamics. He is known for being practical, direct, and grounded in real-world business experience. Clients value his ability to ask hard questions, create focus, and turn strategy into clear priorities that actually get done. Beyond EOS, Will owns and advises multiple businesses, including a marketing company and commercial real estate investments. This firsthand ownership experience shapes how he works with clients. He understands cash flow, hiring decisions, sales challenges, and the pressure leaders face when growth creates complexity. His approach blends structured systems with sound judgment and financial awareness. Will is deeply interested in finance, long-term wealth building, and disciplined execution, both personally and professionally. He values tools, scorecards, and measurable outcomes, but believes strong businesses are ultimately built by healthy, aligned leaders. His Christian worldview influences how he thinks about stewardship, integrity, and responsibility. He lives in the Tulsa area with his wife Jenny and their two children, Eli and Ellie. Outside of work, Will enjoys fitness, hiking, travel, learning, and time with his family. He is driven by helping leaders build organizations that are not only successful, but sustainable and well-run for the long term. Ways to connect with Will**:** LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/willwatrous/ Website: https://implementer.eosworldwide.com/will-watrous/ About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog. Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT\&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children’s Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association’s 2012 Hero Dog Awards. https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/ Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below! Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset . Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. Transcription Notes: Michael Hingson 00:04 What if the biggest thing holding you back isn't what's in front of you, but rather what you believe? Welcome to Unstoppable Mindset, where inclusion, diversity, and the unexpected meet. I'm your host, Michael Hingson, speaker, author, and advocate for inclusion and possibilities. This podcast explores how the beliefs we carry shape the way we live, lead, and connect with others. Each week, I talk with people who challenge assumptions, face adversity head-on, and show what's possible when we choose curiosity over fear. Together, we focus on mindset, resilience, and the small shifts that lead to meaningful change. Let's get started. Well, greetings, everyone, wherever you may be today, I am your host Mike Hingson, and you are listening and/or watching Unstoppable Mindset. Our guest today is Will Watrous, and Will has a I think a lot of interesting things to talk with us about regarding organizations, team building, teamwork, and other such things, and I'm not going to give it away because it's his job to really talk about that, which is a lot more fun. Although I will say that he and I share a like of a particular book on teamwork, which we'll talk about, I'm sure, as we go forward. But anyway, Will, I want to welcome you to Unstoppable Mindset. We're really glad you're here. Will Watrous 01:40 Thank you, Mike. What a pleasure to be on your podcast today. Michael Hingson 01:43 Well, well, I've been looking forward to it for a while, so we're we're glad we're doing it, and we'll we'll take about an hour, and then you can go off to dinner unless you've already had dinner. Speaker 1 01:53 Sounds like a plan. Michael Hingson 01:56 Yeah, Will is in Oklahoma, so I think he's having warmer temperatures today than we are. Anyway, so let's let's go ahead and move forward. Why don't you tell us kind of maybe a little bit about the early will growing up and all that? Speaker 1 02:10 Sure. So I grew up in a little coastal town, Mystic, Connecticut, which is on the shore, northeastern Connecticut. Michael Hingson 02:19 Did you ever have pizza there? I had to ask. Speaker 1 02:21 I did. I did have Mystic Pizza before it was made famous by Julia Roberts' right movie, and that was that was my hometown. Yeah. So the Mystic Drawbridge there, and the old Mystic Village, or the Mystic Seaport. It's a very touristy, but also a great place to grow up. Yeah, on the water, and yeah, the youngest of six kids, five boys, one girl, but don't feel sorry for her because she is probably could still beat me up. She's a strong, strong woman, and yes, pretty, pretty average in in many ways, childhood graduated from high school and went off to college here in Oklahoma. Spent about six years out here going to school, and then went back to the East Coast. This time to Washington D.C. area. I was working in a large nonprofit organization just outside the Beltway, and then wound up going to Boston. Taught at a school in Brookline, Massachusetts, just outside of Boston. And then my wife decided she wanted to go to college out here in Oklahoma, so we moved back out here in around around 2010, and I started a business, and that started my entrepreneurial journey, which was very intensive. Let's say learned a lot, a lot of it the hard way, and really developed an affinity, appreciation for business, for entrepreneurship, for ultimately serving people, which is what most businesses should be designed to do. And through all of that, took some really powerful principles, insights, truths away, and now have the privilege of helping a lot of other business leadership teams run stronger, better, healthier companies. Michael Hingson 04:28 What got you to go to college in Oklahoma? Coming from Mystic, Speaker 1 04:33 well, being the youngest of six, two of my brothers had come to school out here, and so I was following in their footsteps. Michael Hingson 04:41 Where did you go to school? Speaker 1 04:43 So I went to Oral Oral Roberts University. Yep, and I went to a college called Raymo Bible Training College, which is a Christian two-year Christian school out here. Michael Hingson 04:56 And eventually, you came back. And why did your wife want to come? And go to college in Oklahoma, kind of same concepts. Speaker 1 05:03 Yeah, she wanted just so she wanted to go to the Rayma Bible Training College to get a foundation in her faith, and just you know early on in in life wanted to lay that framework, that groundwork, so that she she felt for the rest of her life, and she had met a lot of other graduates from that particular school, which is an amazing
