You Can't Lose‪!‬ Joe Rinaldi and Richard Banfield

There are no answers. No book that solves all your problems. No operating system to save you.



What will serve you is an ability to see through these remedies to the underlying lessons or principles they're built on. Apply what works. Be flexible about what doesn't. Evolve constantly and question everything. There are no golden eggs or skeleton keys. And when you accept all of that you're ready to win.

How do you grow your most valuable accounts? Is that the PM's job? Do you need account managers? What can we learn from an ad agency's account strategy playbook? This episode we go HARD into account leadership. We share recommendations and best practices.



Start here: Establishing process is an act of generosity, and when it comes to defining process first dog to the bowl wins.



To kick off the episode, with EightShapes closing doors, Richard and Joe discuss the life expectancy of agencies against the back drop of their 18 year run. Would owners be happier and make better decisions if they embrace the idea that client services are finite businesses that end? A services business is fulfilling, and exhausting. Ending an agency doesn't have to be a failure if owner's embrace a business lifespan attitude from the beginning. Let's get into it.

How can we apply what we know about client services sales to B2B sales? To SaaS sales? To small businesses? To traditional selling environments? It's easier than you think.



This episode is about applying base principles of agency and client services sales to ALL KINDS OF SALES. How can you punch above your weight? How can you break through the noise of your competitors? How can you employ Richard's "Oprah" strategy? What can we learn from Owner Camp and other experiential offerings?



How can you evolve and adapt? We get tactical this week baby!

On the topic of in-person teams and distributed teams a population of unintentionally hybrid teams are struggling with their identities. Teams that embraced a distributed approach during COVID, and are now left reconciling with the remnants of their in-person culture and the reality of their distributed staff.



In this episode we discuss the remedies for this existential friction, how to get started solving these problems, why they need to be addressed sooner than many leaders realize, and the myths we tell ourselves that cloud our judgement.



We're out here fixing things this week!

Building out from Richard's Extreme Agency Playbook we dive into the issue of co-located and distributed teams. More accurately we really dig into the current state of many teams: Unintentionally Hybrid.



COVID created an industry of unintentionally hybrid teams and we're only starting to deal with the aftermath. While enterprises are forcing a Return To Office policy agency owners can't convince, beg, or bribe staff to come back into the office.



The moral of the story is in-person interaction is worth fighting for. You may need to manufacture it more deliberately if you're a distributed team, but the value remains irreplaceable.



How can your remote team draw on the benefits of in-person interactions? What experiments can we conduct to test the viability of different team structures? What is the underlying danger teams that were once co-located, but now distributed need to be scared of? Let's do it.

How to run an agency? Richard has notes.

Colocation over distributed. 12 year strategies. Apprenticeships. No bonuses, no profit share, no exits. Suburban campuses over city offices.

This episode packs a lot of heat.



We're kicking off a miniseries within the podcast this week. Over the next few weeks Richard will share his playbook for the ideal agency, and how teams can make incremental progress towards his optimal state.



This week we're starting with the optimal, no-constraints, 10/10 agency playbook to have an idea our conversations are aimed at. Over the next few weeks we'll explore ways to map towards this optimal agency, but it starts here with Team, Business Models, and Incentives.