Philip Hicks 6:08

literally, it switched to 100% success rate, it was phenomenal. So we have a very structured engagement with our clients as to how we engage and go through that training program, we know that that is effectively the secret, secret sauce to our success is that you can have the best golf clubs in the world. But if you don’t know how to use it, and there’s so many things from a planning cycle perspective, but you think about strategic planning, I think you referenced around less than 40 hours a year is focused on that the organizations that we work with, you know, they’re spending hundreds, if not 1000s of hours in the large corporates focusing their attention to their planning needs and execution side of things. And that really helps to transform the organization where they’re consistently getting that feedback loop to how they’re performing against where they thought they were going to go.

Carl J. Cox 6:56

You had said something to me recently, one time about it. And I don’t know if you have a specific tour story where you can share about it where a city manager, your success rate with city managers and keeping their jobs is really high. Why does that happen? Why is all of a sudden the city manager who might have concerns about their effectiveness all of a sudden has more confidence about doing their job by deploying some of the methodologies that you do? Yeah, look,

Philip Hicks 7:24

it’s a really fascinating statistic. But so far that every city manager that we worked with, none have been released from their position or fired from their position. And the common thread there is I mean, they’re all using our local government framework. But if we strip it back, what are they truly embrace transparency and accountability. And from a public sector side of things, where you have elected officials, you’re spending the community’s money, those types of leaders that embrace that transparency and accountability tend to hang around, and they’re very successful in their roles. So they’re very like minded to what we’re trying to bring to the table. Yeah, there’s, in some respects, there’s nothing new in what we’re doing, per se, around transparency and accountability, what’s new is the technology that we’re bringing, and the training that goes with it. So when we find those right leaders, it’s been phenomenal the success rates that they’ve had, for them to be able to have that complete transparency and accountability across their organizations been phenomenal. And I think that’s been reflected in their longevity in their roles.

Carl J. Cox 8:24

The, it’s such a great story of helping literally provide, I think one of the biggest challenge, I mean, being a city manager is one of those kind of hardest jobs in the world, from my perspective, right, because you can’t keep everybody happy. There’s always half of the town that’s unhappy with something that you’re doing or building or, or trying to implement. And then on top of that, you have a city council that’s elected, that is has this kind of tendency to move you back and forth in different directions. So So how does your software help a city manager help keep a city council focused? Right, when when they’re they’re continuously bringing new ideas and thoughts of what they wanted kind of do the flavor of the day to move the city forward?

Philip Hicks 9:08

Yeah. Certainly the feedback that we’ve had from the the CIOs or city managers that we work with, is that our framework brings that level of trust to the table with the elected officials because they can see the structure and they have the visibility right across the organization. So not just focused on the strategic plan, but they can see full visibility across all of the departmental and operational projects, service levels, all of the governance activities that are going on. So that really helps to inform the elected officials as to Okay, we may want to change direction, but they can see what the impacts going to be on the administration as far as their capacity to deliver. And it really does help to bridge that trust where, in a lot of cases I’ve seen, there’s been a level of mistrust from the elected officials thinking that the administration might not be overly busy. They might be lazy. They’re not focused. They’re not executing as they’d hoped to. But our framework used to In that complete transparency and visibility across that, and many, it’s amazing the feedback that we get from elected officials, when they look at our framework is that one, they’re overwhelmed by how much actually goes on with the local municipality. But suddenly, there’s this overwhelming appreciation for all of the great work that actually goes on. And it really helps to bridge that trust between the administration and the elected officials.

Carl J. Cox 10:26

It was interesting when you’re talking about I mean, that’s a crazy statistic that you’ve said, You’ve gone from 15% success rate to 100. Effectively, you know, and what’s interesting about the 15, now, it didn’t feel successful from what you were doing selling and reselling software. But what’s interesting is most your plans are only like 3%. successful. So, so three to 15% is actually five times better than the normal success. But you’ve taken this to literally peak level what one of the things that I once again, I appreciate it You helped solve is, I remember when I was with a Fortune 50 company, and we were solving the top 15 executives problems. Yeah. So so we were working with them and help guiding towards that. But then I remember running into somebody else, and they had over 400 projects that they’re responsible for. And and they were upset because it wasn’t in Cascade, right? It wasn’t in a city planning software to do and they’re like, Well, how do I measure what I’m doing? And it’s it appears like what you’ve been able to do is take all of those things and put it into it. That seems like a really challenging burdensome. How does? How do you make it easier for the client. So it’s not a three year SAP implementation.

Philip Hicks 11:46

And having been and worked in that space, where you’re talking about, you know, three year implementation being there, done that got the T shirt, one of the things that we recognized early on is that, especially in local government, they’re they’re constantly busy moving in many different directions, they don’t have the time or resources to just drop everything, and focus on this. So our consulting team will actually pick up all of their planning documents, whether the data is structured or unstructured, we take that we bring it into our framework, pre populate all of the data into the framework to allow a speedy transition, where they can move away from the Word documents, PDF documents, legacy databases in their organization. And we aim to do that within a 30 day time frame to get that turned around. So they’re in a position where they can start to reward across their their plans in a very quick turnaround.

Carl J. Cox 12:34

So I have to imagine, people don’t believe that, right? I mean, that’s just not normal. That’s just another normal implementation. So how do you get literally how do you get cities to believe you? Right, that’s happening? I mean, what do you normally do to help provide a city manager like no, no way, there’s going to cost me millions of dollars and three years of the standard implementation for something to city, how do you get them convinced and show them that it actually is that fast?

Philip Hicks 13:05

Yeah. So it’s a great question. And as we keep going, as a company, we have fantastic references. So if I direct people to GovernmentFrameworks.com and have a look at our testimonials, and our clients on there, I tell prospective clients in local government that look, what we have is the best thing since sliced bread. But don’t believe me go and talk to our customers get feedback from them as to how seamless the transition was, what the support the implementation was, like through that process. And, you know, our customers are our biggest advocate and our biggest asset, so we point them in that direction. And that gives new prospective cities a lot of reassurance that what we say we we deliver, we follow through with,

Carl J. Cox 13:45

I can see this from from I Philip, and I have and we have a relationship, and I’m helping GovernmentFrameworks.com to expand in the United States. And I’ve been on multiple calls with Philip with city managers. And every single time they’re like, wow, experiences, wow, I need to learn more, and I need to get this in my budget to get it approved. It’s been fun to share. So awesome. It’s amazing what’s been happening and all the changes that are taking place. So what’s what’s top of mind for you right now.

Philip Hicks 14:19

So when we started off our business, we were very focused on planning and Performance Reporting, and helping organizations. And over the last year, we’ve been doing a bunch of research and and we saw that there was a big gap in the market from the planning side to the process and the automation and the Performance Reporting. So top of mind for me now is how can we help improve governance as a whole or local government where we can bring all four elements together. So from having a successful planning framework, then having all of the detailed processes mapped and documented and captured? And then how do we automate all that and COVID-19 has been a fantastic catalyst for this way. Let’s get rid of as many handheld pieces of paper and whiteboards and other things in offices and get that whole digital transformation. So, and what’s really cool is we can automate that now and the Performance Reporting as a consequence of that automation. So users don’t even have to put in their updates as to what they’re doing. Because the automation process from the documented processes that are tied back to the plans, all nicely comes together. So for us, we see that top of mind right now is how do we lead from a governance perspective in demonstrating that we can tie all four of these aspects together?

Carl J. Cox 15:33

So you have or you’re solving a big problem that that’s not often understood with implementing a tool like this? Unfortunately, the experience for people who are down on the second and third level if you’ve made from the executive leadership team, they feel it’s just a monitoring tool. Yeah. And they’re like, well, this isn’t. This isn’t really helping me. And and actually, in many cases, they actually have to do work twice. Yeah, they now it might be easier than they have done, instead of doing Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Google Docs, etc, they can put it in one spot. So it still saves them a little bit of time. But they’re probably stall. So tracking in some other project management tool. And what you’re saying now is that they can actually have the workflow, approve it, and then it’s automatically updating the strategic planning software. So the executive and leadership team already knows what’s taking place, is that correct?

Philip Hicks 16:23

Correct. So they just keep doing their normal day to day jobs. And they just as part of their normal day to day jobs, it’s informing the progress back against the strategic plan, or in the case of our local government framework, it might be updating the strategic plan, the capital plan, the individual team and department plans, the whole range of plans that it’s updating without any human intervention whatsoever.

Carl J. Cox 16:48

I just think the ability, you know, seeing hearing that, the amount of not only testimonials you’re gonna get from the city managers and the direct people that are responsible them, but then that layer two down of them being able to say, Wow, this was a great tool, and it saved me time. Yeah, you know, I think that’s going to be a real massive Win win on the implementations, and ultimately, the happiness of everybody, you know, in the process of these taking place. So that’s absolutely amazing what you’re doing and what’s taking place, I’m excited for everything that’s happening. So how do you you kind of measure you said already, you have two significant measures of success. One is retention of clients, and you have 100%, right, and that which is amazing, truly amazing. Secondly, city managers right there, they’re keeping their jobs, for lack of better, and they’re able to convey better to the account city councils, etc, that they’re doing well, what are the things are you doing to measure success? for your clients?

Philip Hicks 17:52

Yeah, look, it’s a really interesting one, that whole sort of broad discussion as to how do you how do you or how do I measure success within my own business or with clients? And I was thinking about this earlier. And I probably almost coined the phrase, not how do I measure success, but measuring success, because it’s a constantly evolving thing, especially for me anyway. So if I think back right to the very beginning, when I started this business, I had zero customers. So Success to me that startup phase of the business was getting my first customer, right. And then success after that, for me was hiring my first team member. Success after that was them getting their first client and bringing, then getting the first consultant to work full time in the team. So then we evolve over a journey over a number of years, and then we expand into Australia and New Zealand, the United States. So for me, success is always just setting those sort of short term, attainable, reachable goals, and then continually re evaluating. Once we reach that, then going to the next step, and the next step, and the next step after that. So like thinking back to that many discussions I’ve had, and someone says to me, hey, look, you know, you’re really successful you this or that, and that’s their short term perception judging me for maybe a 32nd interaction. For me, though, it really comes down to how do I measure my own success in a growing business or on a personal level, or whatever it may be. So for us and looking at clients in particular, you know, getting feedback from our consulting team when they’ve successfully been working with clients and training and mentoring their management team. And they can see that growth and maturity in the managers that we’re mentoring. That is a phenomenal turnaround where you’ve got, you know, someone that’s managing the fleet services that’s effectively being a mechanic for 20 to 30 years, where they’ve gone into a management position and had little to no exposure around business planning and execution and these types of areas where they’re actually up to date on their plans and their reporting. And they’re articulating and presenting to elected visuals, and seeing the growth of those individuals is phenomenal. And to me, that’s great success at an individual level within a client.

Carl J. Cox 20:09

That’s powerful. I mean, I love it that you care deep enough. And I think it’s a big reason why you’ve gone deep with these tools is when you can see an individual throughout an organization that might feel like they’re caught. And, you know, a lot of times with cities, there’s a lot of bureaucracy that takes place, and for them to gain knowledge gain experience, and actually have the ability to, you know, share, as you said, at the highest level, and gain exposure, and more importantly, not just getting exposure, but actually have traction, sharing their successes to something I think that’s super powerful. And I get to imagine their own personal engagement and their work must increase exponentially from that experience. Yep. All right. So Philip viewer would like one of the craziest hardest working people I know, you who regularly you’re Australia, and you live in Canada, now you have clients throughout the world. And in the travel days, you would have been traveling all about, of course, the current pandemic has, has had some challenges with you traveling about tell me how in the heck do you keep your energy going on a regular basis?

Philip Hicks 21:19

Look, it’s it’s a really interesting question, and how do you keep the energy levels up? How do you keep focused and driven? You know, it’s one of the things that I got into, I think, if I think back to when I finished high school, and between high school and university, I took a manufacturing job, and I was working on a manufacturing line, just literally assembling wheels for portable air conditioners at the time. And I realized very quickly that that wasn’t something that I wanted to do for a job. And to me, I still don’t know exactly what I want to do when I grow up. But I know what I don’t want to do. And having fallen into business information systems, and this whole world of technology and consulting. I’ve really enjoyed it. So it’s an interesting one, it doesn’t really feel like work to me, per se. You know, if you’re pulling a 1020 hour day, numerous days of the week to keep up with different time zones, and projects and clients. I just really enjoy what I do. And it’s funny, where money is not the objective. And it’s just doing something that truly makes you you know, from a business perspective happy. It seems really easy to keep motivated and keep things going. And certainly, the mental freedom that I gained from starting my own company was huge, not being bound by the bureaucracy, layers within other organizations, and maybe decisions that I may or may not agree with. Having that freedom running my own businesses, it really gives me the motivation to get up every day and keep things going.

Carl J. Cox 22:51

You know where you are, it was interesting, you were just sharing. I don’t know if you know, Philip, I’m a certified Gallup strengthsfinder. trainer. And you are just describing exactly when somebody is completely aligned with their natural strengths. You base you basically found when you are, you’re six times more likely to be engaged in your work. And you’re three times more likely to say that you’re enjoying your life and, and and what’s taking place. And that’s what you described, you’re like, this doesn’t feel like work to me. And so you’ve truly found all of your natural strengths, created your own business. And as a result, it feels normal, because you’re just doing what you love.

Philip Hicks 23:33

Yep. Yeah, absolutely.

Carl J. Cox 23:37

That’s awesome. So you don’t have any massive marathon plans or growth traveling around the world anymore.

Philip Hicks 23:45

Not Not yet. But having gained my Canadian citizenship. In the last year, I’ve taken up skiing. And I’d skied once or twice before, and I really struggled on the green runs. And this particular winter, not being able to travel overseas. We went up to the ski fields a number of times, and we have both myself and my fiance, we’ve successfully mastered the black runs. So we’re, which was, I remember when I first went up those dominoes looking down and I was scared like, no, tomorrow, I was like, you’d have to be the craziest person well, but for yourself down the edge of that mountain. So that felt like a huge achievement over the last winter, where now we can tackle the black runs and looking forward to next winter where maybe we’ll step up into the double Black Diamond runs, which is, you know, literally the cliff edge droppings. But having said that, I never thought it would be possible. But that whole repetition and going back and trying it time and time again has made a huge difference. And like with anything like when I was born, I didn’t know how to walk but I had to try many, many times all over many, many times until I could master walking. So no different to many different aspects in life that I actually have to commit to something and try Multiple times before I start to develop my skills in that area, and never, it never crossed my mind that I’d be able to ski down those backgrounds.

Carl J. Cox 25:10

I am really envious hearing or and and actually it gives me a little bit of hope that maybe my if my spouse is listening to this, you will laugh at me immensely, because I am the worst skier. I’ve tried very poorly twice on the slopes, which kinds of sounds a little bit where you were at. But you have now through effort and determination and willingness to to overcome the challenges right of falling down, you’ve actually become sounds like a pretty legitimate skier now, and congratulations to you that that is awesome. So one of my last questions I would like to ask Philip is what type of books or audio books? Would you recommend to people, our audience that, you know, this is something that really had an impact on you? And you’d recommend it for others?

Philip Hicks 25:56

That’s a great question, there was a couple of books that came to mind. I’ve got them here, actually. So the first one that I read a little while ago was Strategy Beyond the Hockey Stick. And I could relate to this book in the fact that we made some pretty significant changes in our business over the last five years or so. And we’ve taken some significant risk in doing that. And it’s really paid off and reading that book, it I could really relate to it, how so many businesses fall into this plateau, and they struggle to make those critical decisions or take those big risks to advance their organization. And that’s, it was quite reassuring to reinforce that actually, I’m on the right path. You know, if we want to keep growing and succeeding, we have to take those those calculated risks and, and part of that that I think back to is that one of the things that I have to be really careful of is managing my fear, and making sure that I don’t allow my fear to dictate my actions. And I think in my younger years, I would be fearful of something. And because I was fearful of it. And quite often it was irrational fears, I wouldn’t take that chance, or I wouldn’t take the first step. So reading books like that are really reassuring that I have to take that first step and take that leap of faith and make that happen. One that I’ve just recently read or just got through was The Simple Solution to Making Money in Canada by William A. Radvanyi, really interesting book, this one, I would highly recommend it to any individual that owns or runs a business. It’s an extremely reassuring book, really practical, not driven by any of the big hedge funds or anything like this. It’s just an individual that that managed to be very successful in a number of different areas and kept it very simple. And his key message in that book was coming up with repeatable ways to make money. So there’s opportunities that pop up within as an entrepreneur where you can make a quick dollar from time to time. But he really focused on his book about being able to come up with systems processes and methods to have repeatable ways to generate income and build growth from a financial perspective. So I found that was a particularly interesting read. And as a business owner, running multiple different companies was, for me was extremely reassuring.

Carl J. Cox 28:17

Great recommendations right there. And I have not actually read either one of those. Thank you. I’m going to be putting those on to my left for sure. And I appreciate your show that the audience. So with that, we’ve been talking with Philip Hicks, where can people learn about more about you and your company?

Philip Hicks 28:31

Great, thanks, go, you can jump on our website at GovernmentFrameworks.com. We’ve actually just launched interactive, local government framework and also a school district framework that you’ll see up on the website when you go there. So if you want to go through and see examples of plans and reports and processes and automation, all of those links will be available on there with a bunch of case studies as well. So jump on to the website, check it out. If you’d like to reach out to us, there is our online feature where you can chat directly with our team on the website and we’re more than happy to get back in touch with you.

Carl J. Cox 29:03

That’s perfect. All right, Philip. Thanks so much. And thank you to everyone else, listening to the Measure Success Podcast, wishing you the very best at measuring your success. Thank you, Philip.

Philip Hicks 29:14

Thanks, Carl.

Outro 29:18

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