EPISODE 236 WITH MARIANNA KINNEE: THRIVING IN CORPORATE AND ENTREPRENEURIAL WORLDS

Ready Yet?! Podcast with Marianna Kinnee: Thriving in Corporate and Entrepreneurial Worlds

Transcribed with Descript

Erin Marcus: All right. Hello, hello, and welcome to this episode of the Ready Yet podcast with my guest today, Mariana Kinney. I’m excited about this because you’re one of the few people I come into contact, I can’t, you know, I might be exaggerating a little, but no, I’m going to say it, you’re one of the more few people that I come in contact with in my world that has a similar experience than me, where you like, Like your corporate job and you’re doing good at your corporate job, right?

Erin Marcus: So many people leave corporate and going into entrepreneurship because they’re disenfranchised and unhappy in some way. And. Much like me, you’re, you’re, you currently have a foot in both worlds, but you’re on the, you’re on the path of creation, not get me out of here. So I can’t wait to have this conversation with you.

Erin Marcus: So before we get into that, why don’t you tell everybody. Who you are, what you do, what your world looks like, any of the things.

Marianna L Kinnee: Oh, that sounds great. So I am Mariana Kinney. I am the founder of Might in Motion. And you may ask, wow, what is Might in Motion? There’s a lot of alliteration. There’s a lot of Ms.

Marianna L Kinnee: Yes, there is. I like that part of it, you know, good for

Erin Marcus: marketing.

Marianna L Kinnee: And for me, Might in Motion is. Being able to rally around what I call four pillars. So it’s your motivation. How do you maintain momentum towards what motivates you, right? Your mindfulness, which is for me, more of a spiritual aspect and your might, which is that physical side.

Marianna L Kinnee: And some people go, wow, what does that really have to do with either with being in corporate America? Like that doesn’t make any sense. I’ve always looked at things as, as a stool kind of image, like a stool you sit on, not when you poop on the toilet, an actual stool you sit on, right? And I can say that with you, Erin, because I, you know, poop jokes.

Marianna L Kinnee: It’s

Erin Marcus: great. Everybody poops. I

Marianna L Kinnee: tell my kids that all the time. So let’s say you have a stool and that stool has four legs. And each one of those is your, you know, your motivation, your momentum, your mindfulness, your might. One of them can be really short and you can still sit. But as soon as they all start getting way out of whack or two of them are completely gone, you don’t have a seat at the table anymore.

Marianna L Kinnee: And when you think of people who are in a corporate America space, it’s all about having a seat at the table. If you cannot show up with your full authenticity, with your full excitement and like just fervor for what you’re doing, then you end up failing. And the people that are, propelling themselves upward are the ones that are really finding that well rounded mist.

Erin Marcus: So I’m going to ask you this question. I have my own experiences and opinions about this. One of the things that I’ve said is there’s several things that coming out of corporate has helped me as an entrepreneur and there’s all sorts of things that I had to let go of because they were killing my business.

Erin Marcus: What are, since you’re, since you’re in both of these worlds, what are some of the similarities that you’re watching if people in small business and entrepreneurial land would just do what biz, big business already does, they’d be so much better off.

Marianna L Kinnee: I think the first one is your metrics. Are you consistently tracking towards what your metrics are for success?

Marianna L Kinnee: So you know, in the corporate space, you’re having meetings at least once a week to talk nothing about metrics, right? Your service, your sales, whatever. If you’re in a small business scenario, it’s sometimes easier to just be like, Oh, well, I cashed a check this week. That’s a win. But what were all the costs that went into that?

Marianna L Kinnee: Are you really winning like you think you’re winning? And are you generating that repeat business that, that circular that you want? Right?

Erin Marcus: I love that

Marianna L Kinnee: you

Erin Marcus: said that because I think There’s so much messaging out there about know your numbers, know your numbers, but they stopped there. And what you mentioned, what, what was in there, they’re meeting every week about your metrics.

Erin Marcus: It’s not enough to know your numbers in arrears. Correct. You gotta be looking ahead. Right! It’s, okay, now that you have that data, what are we doing every week to effectively

Marianna L Kinnee: impact that data? Yes. Or make up for a miss. Because they’re gonna be, we all are gonna have weeks that are a miss. Right? And so it’s starting to track your, your W’s and your L’s, your wins and your losses.

Marianna L Kinnee: And are your wins outnumbering your losses? That’s the only way you can win your month. Yes. You know, your quarter, your year, right? So the metrics to me is one of the big things that I think a lot of new business owners Just forget even like solopreneurs forget well,

Erin Marcus: and i’m a big fan. So one of the things I Saw in the beginning and for people are just beginning It’s hard to use numbers to drive behavior if all you’re measuring is outcomes.

Erin Marcus: Because once you get too far away from your goal, you give up entirely. So I’m a big fan, and this is something we did back in corporate for me, I’m a big fan of activity metrics. I like that idea. Right, like, are you measuring the amount of activity so that to your point you can make up for a loss? Yes.

Erin Marcus: Way before you’re getting the outcomes. Yes.

Marianna L Kinnee: Yes. Yeah, because it’s just like anything else, right? You always hear people talk about, Oh, you go to the bar and you’re single and you’re hitting on people, right? You’re going to get a lot of no’s, but it’s a numbers game, right? If you

Erin Marcus: ask enough people,

Marianna L Kinnee: you can say yes to a drink.

Erin Marcus: Even

Marianna L Kinnee: a blind

Erin Marcus: squirrel gets a nut sometimes. Every once in a while, right?

Marianna L Kinnee: So it’s, there is that numbers game aspect to it. That sometimes I think people do forget, and I love your idea, your thoughts on. You know, tracking the activity and how many people are you meeting with each week? Or, you know, are you getting out there for people to know what you do?

Marianna L Kinnee: Are you on podcasts? Are you publishing articles? You know, what are you doing to make sure there’s a continued buzz, if you will, about what you’re doing? The second thing I think that small businesses, that medium, small to medium, where you start actually having teams, it’s no longer a solopreneur, is creating team environments where everybody can rally around your vision.

Marianna L Kinnee: You can’t do it all anymore. That’s why you have a team, but you can’t do it to all to begin with. Trust me. No, I mean, you know, that’s 100%.

Erin Marcus: Right. And

Marianna L Kinnee: so being able to create a team environment where the people on the team match your excitement about what you want them to be motivated about. Right. So that everybody is enabled to make decisions, even what, so Aaron, your team, even if you’re not there, your team knows what Aaron wants, the goals of the organization, what your metrics are so that they can make those decisions.

Marianna L Kinnee: And if you create a safe enough environment, even if somebody makes a mistake, they’re going to come to you and say, Ooh, Aaron. I made a mistake. There was a situation with this treadmill, or with whatever, right? Like, there was a situation. Help me figure it out. Then people are like, oh, well, I can come to her.

Marianna L Kinnee: I, not only am I able to do things, but if I make a mistake, it’s a safe environment for us to work together, learn, grow, and move past it. Still,

Erin Marcus: there’s so much coverage. Social media, news media. There is such a monumental, massive amount of coverage saying that big business doesn’t understand that that corporate is horrible to humans like you.

Erin Marcus: You can’t throw a rock and not hit some kind of negative story. And for someone who, well, for me, who didn’t have that experience to anywhere near that extent, and for someone who’s in leadership, what are the What are they getting wrong? Like what, what is the messaging getting wrong? What are you seeing as a positive being done for people?

Marianna L Kinnee: Yeah. I mean, a lot of times it depends on your leader. I mean, you could have an overall corporate culture that everybody loves. Right. And the inside the company outside of the company that are just iconic brands that you look to and you go, wow, they must really treat their people well because they always seem like they’re in a good mood or whatever.

Marianna L Kinnee: You even mentioned being in a big box retail store this weekend and everybody was asking you, Oh my God, they

Erin Marcus: were so happy.

Marianna L Kinnee: Everyone and that store manager might be a new store manager. A month ago you went to that store and they were fine,

Erin Marcus: but you could tell there was something different. They could care

Marianna L Kinnee: less, right?

Marianna L Kinnee: It all comes down to that local leader. It’s so true. If you are in a corporate space without big brick and mortar, It’s that individual leader of that team.

Erin Marcus: So,

Marianna L Kinnee: And if you’re in a, if you were in a business where you have a ton of brick and mortars, each of those individual storefronts has the opportunity to win or lose.

Marianna L Kinnee: So what as an organization are people doing to say, I am going to really support and encourage to create that environment.

Erin Marcus: Right. Pour into the management. Yes. Pour into the management. So that, right. I mean, I heard this long time ago. People don’t quit jobs. They quit managers. That’s exactly right. Equip bosses, 100%, right?

Erin Marcus: And pouring into a management team. Absolutely, I absolutely agree with you. Because people, you know, I saw this happen over and over again. You do great at your job so you get promoted. You do great at your job so you get promoted. And I know there’s an official name for it. Where, like, you get promoted to your, to your point of failure.

Erin Marcus: Yes. And great, I’ll give you, like, great, great, great salespeople are not usually great sales managers. Correct. It’s a completely different skill set. I laugh, so my ex husband, who I’m very friendly with, is an unbelievable salesperson. Monumentally unbelievable salesperson. We’ve been divorced for decades.

Erin Marcus: We still keep in touch, right? And every now and then he calls me to tell me they’re trying to get him to go into management. Yeah. They want to promote them to manage a branch. And all I keep saying is, do they, you’ve been there for 30 years. Have they not met you? Like you don’t like people

Erin Marcus: bad idea, right? But they promote people cause they’re good at their job into managerial roles without teaching them how to be. Unbelievable manager.

Marianna L Kinnee: Yeah. And it’s sometimes there are some companies that don’t encourage that. Right? And that’s unfortunate. I have been really lucky in my 20, almost 24 years within multiple corporate America spaces that I’ve had some really great leaders, and I’ve had the benefit of even taking over teams that maybe had some toxicity, right?

Marianna L Kinnee: Weren’t always. Easy to look good, right? I’ve had a few of those

Erin Marcus: myself where it’s easy to look good when you take over a room. Right,

Marianna L Kinnee: but then you have to, it takes time to unlearn that toxicity. It takes time. Yeah, to really help help the team come together and kind of forget the old, the pain, the, you know, whatever, and start moving forward as a unit.

Marianna L Kinnee: And thank God I’ve had the ability to do that multiple times. And so I love helping new leaders. In that situation, because to your point, you get promoted from being a fantastic individual contributor. And now you’re over people and you’re like, I don’t really like the HR aspects. I don’t really like people.

Marianna L Kinnee: Wait, they’re not doing everything that exactly the same way I used to do it. Well,

Erin Marcus: and because people who get promoted, not always, but you know, we’re not talking about the, you know, I know where all the skeletons are buried in the body. They’re buried. So I’m getting promoted, but people get promoted because of their, Drive in their ambition and it’s hard to look at the rest of the team and not judge them if they don’t have that same level of oomph, which is by the way, perfectly fine.

Erin Marcus: We don’t all need to be in charge of everything.

Marianna L Kinnee: That’s correct. And, and there’s, there’s opportunities for people to learn from each other. And when you create that kind of environment where people really do realize they’re not just a cog, they add value. There’s the human aspect of. I had this crisis, this emergency in my personal life.

Marianna L Kinnee: And guess what? Everybody around me rallied. So the last thing I had to worry about was my day job, right? I worry about my sister, my brother, my dad, my house, my dog. Right. And when you can create a team that operates like that, it’s. Amazing. It’s really, it’s really cool. And it doesn’t happen by

Erin Marcus: accident.

Erin Marcus: No, it’s intent. That’s my, that’s my big word for this year is intention. And, and I did a whole live show this morning about how things get complicated seemingly by accident and everything you want, whether it’s a well performing team, whether it’s a great corporate career, whether it’s a great business owner career, you have to create with intention.

Erin Marcus: Yes. I think that’s where a lot of people miss the they think things should just happen. No,

Marianna L Kinnee: it never just happens. Never just happens. We were talking about this earlier today. And people were giving their ideas on how they create team environments. And, you know, one guy was like, I love, I have lunches and we’re all remote.

Marianna L Kinnee: So we have remote lunches. And so instead of us talking about the numbers and this, that, and the other, it’s 30 to 45 minutes of everybody being, bring your own bag lunch and let’s just get to know each other.

Erin Marcus: That’s so true, right? Because the, and I’m, by the way, I’m a big fan for work from home. There’s, I’ve been working from home since what, 2012.

Erin Marcus: But there are certain things that you miss when you’re not together. There’s the rapport that gets built while you’re in line for coffee. There’s the rapport that gets built in the bathroom wash, you know, putting make, you know, all the things. And that’s a great, you know, as much as people complain about not wanting one more zoom meeting, you have to have a way.

Erin Marcus: Yes. You have to have a, people ask me all the time, why do I attract a good team? Why do I have such great team? And it’s because, cause I love the people. And

Marianna L Kinnee: you engage with them, right? So even if it’s a one, a weekly one on one or a team meeting or whatever, there are opportunities to create that engagement that can literally be as simple as.

Marianna L Kinnee: knowing that the person on your team plays trivia and you ask them how they did that weekend, right? And that’s little things like that go a long, long. It

Erin Marcus: reminds us that we’re all human. It reminds, you know, both sides of that equation. It reminds the manager that your team is human, treat them that way.

Erin Marcus: And it reminds the team member That your manager is human and sees you as, you know.

Marianna L Kinnee: Yeah, because then you, once again, you’re creating an environment where your team can call you out if need be. So, for example, if I’m going into the office and I’m really grumpy and I’m not in my normal kind of happy self, peppy self, whatever you want to call it.

Marianna L Kinnee: I’ve had, I have people that are in my world that will pull me aside and be like, Mariana, is everything okay? Cause you’re not, you’re normal. Yeah. Something’s off. I have people that I only talk to virtually that can do the same exact thing in a one on one because of the way I’m coming to the table.

Marianna L Kinnee: They’ve learned, Ooh, something’s off. And I’ve been like, Oh, you know what? You’re so right. I just, I think I probably need to take a vacation or this happened. So. that has nothing to do with you, has to do with this, you know, appreciate your understanding, and let’s move on, right? But that’s, when you create that kind of team dynamic, it’s huge, not only for your team, but for you, because now I can have grace with myself.

Marianna L Kinnee: I mean, it

Erin Marcus: just

Marianna L Kinnee: makes

Erin Marcus: it all so much easier. Yeah, it makes it all so much easier. How do you feel? And just because I saw this today, how do you feel about this trend? of Gen Z videotaping themselves getting fired and laid off. Have you seen this? I’ve seen a lot of this on TikTok and it’s, it’s intriguing to me.

Erin Marcus: They’re not being jerks about it by the way. They’re not showing the faces. They’re not doing, they’re not, there’s no privacy being. Remote, you know, they’re not breaking any rules as far as that, but they’re recording the conversation and then sharing them because that generation just shared everything for feedback.

Erin Marcus: I mean, that’s how they get their information is feedback from each other. But I think to me, my first thought is that’s fantastic because there should be transparency. Yes, it’s your company and they’re not, they’re not being unfair. They’re not saying you shouldn’t fire me. You should. Right. They’re saying I’ve been here for six months.

Erin Marcus: I’ve been given all the wonderful reviews. I’ve done everything you’ve asked. I’ve exceeded expectations. I’ve been told time and time again, I’ve been exceeding expectations. And now you’re laying me off. It’s not my manager doing it. It’s somebody else. I’ve never met and you can’t tell me why I’m actually being.

Erin Marcus: Yeah, go. Yeah. I don’t have a problem with the transparency of that. It, to me, it takes me back to like, small town USA. You didn’t do anything wrong because everyone knew everyone, then they’re gonna tell your mother. Yeah. Well, your mom already knew by

Marianna L Kinnee: the time you got home. Exactly. I mean, I’m just curious, you know, as team leader, like, it’s very I think people are afraid as, as leaders to actually give radical candor.

Marianna L Kinnee: Yeah. That kind of feedback, right? And it is hard. But most of the time, what I have found is that people know they’re not performing. So why sugarcoat it? Look, if you missed your sales goal, if you missed your other metrics, if you missed, you, you know, whatever it might be, customer satisfaction, et cetera, as a leader, that’s.

Marianna L Kinnee: There should be, there’s no emotion to that. It’s, it’s one or the other. You either hit it or you didn’t. Right? And so now let’s flip the script. Economy is not great. That’s a different conversation. That’s a different conversation. You know what? You have performed really, really well. And we’re sorry.

Marianna L Kinnee: You’re sorry. You were the last one hired. Right. And therefore, you’re the first one cut. That goes back to radical candor. Yes.

Erin Marcus: And honesty, right? I think it creates distrust. Yes. It’s, you know, can you deliver bad news? I would rather get honest bad news than blow smoke up my ass and lie to me and then there’s a problem.

Erin Marcus: Correct.

Marianna L Kinnee: Correct. And once again, we talk about metrics, right? So it all goes back to the number one thing, right? If you take it back to metrics, everybody should really know where they stand. Right? It shouldn’t be a shock. Nope. It should never be a shock because everybody has some sort of job that is quantifiable.

Marianna L Kinnee: No matter what you do, there’s some sort of quantifiable metric that can be associated with what you do.

Erin Marcus: I’m going to flip this a little bit for you because we’ve really been talking about leaders. What can a team member do? So say you’re not the leader. Yeah. What can team members do to enforce the type of environment you’ve been talking about?

Erin Marcus: Engage, encourage, pick whatever E word you

Marianna L Kinnee: want to fill in.

Erin Marcus: I

Marianna L Kinnee: mean, think about if you’re on a sports team, right? And let’s say it’s a baseball team. I’m not a huge baseball expert, but let’s just pretend like I know what I’m talking about. And if everybody goes out onto the field, but they don’t want to actually throw the ball to each other, you’re never going to get anybody out.

Marianna L Kinnee: You’re never going to like, none of that. It’s just going to be a never ending inning where the other team just continues to score because you’re like, yeah, I caught the ball, but I’m not going to throw it to first base because it’s my ball. So helping a team think about what they do, how that impacts somebody else.

Marianna L Kinnee: And we can all level up. That’s the kind of mindset that you want to encourage. It isn’t a, let me go tattletale on somebody, right? It’s more of how can you be encouraging and helpful to others? And so you, you lean on, at least for me, I lean on there’s, there’s always going to be somebody on my team that knows way more than me.

Marianna L Kinnee: That’s been doing it. Actually, everybody on my team knows way more than me. And they, they have years and decades or of experience. To be able to go to one of them and say, Hey, you know, I really see you as an expert in this. I’d really love for you to take the lead on helping. This other associate who may be brand new to it or somebody that has come into the team, or you know what, out of five people, I think you do it the best.

Marianna L Kinnee: So let’s follow your process, document it, train us, get us all on the same page.

Erin Marcus: And it’s such a great You’re putting the

Marianna L Kinnee: ownership on that person.

Erin Marcus: Well,

Erin Marcus: yes, a hundred percent, a million percent, yes. And I think, unfortunately, because we’re led by fear and insecurity. And we think we need to know all the answers in that, you know, if I go to somebody on my team and ask them how to do something or tell them they’re good at it, then what do they need me for?

Erin Marcus: Yeah. And that fear, just like in small businesses, you know, it shows up, it shows up everywhere. That is the fear that stops us.

Marianna L Kinnee: Yeah. That makes, that makes sense. But if you don’t start taking steps, To get through the fear, you’re, you yourself are not going to be successful. You’re going to be miserable anyway.

Marianna L Kinnee: Then you’re going to try another team, but another team is not going to make any difference. If you haven’t resolved that within yourself, it’s just like, if you don’t resolve issues from the first marriage, they’re not going to be resolved in the second marriage.

Erin Marcus: I saw that back in the 90s, I think it was, you know, those motivational posters that everybody put on their walls.

Erin Marcus: The back, I think it was in the 90s, there was demotivational posters, which was my favorite thing in the universe. The best Generation X thing ever. So fantastic, we need to bring those back. And one of them was said, the only consistent thing in all of your failed relationships is you. It’s just, it’s true.

Erin Marcus: So true. So true.

Marianna L Kinnee: You know, it’s the same thing in a career. I’m going to just change jobs again. I’m going to change jobs again. I’m going to change jobs again, or I’m going to start this new entrepreneur endeavor because this other one didn’t work. All right. Well, did put forth the effort to resolve the issues you had the first time.

Erin Marcus: I said that, you know, I, in my consulting career back when I was coaching during my world in the franchise world that I had, I, it became very obvious very quickly People who went, whether it’s another job or a management role or open their own business, if they were doing those things in a drive to create more, they did great.

Erin Marcus: If they were doing those things with a chip on their shoulder to get away from some perceived problem, they never made it. Never made it.

Marianna L Kinnee: Never, you know, and then sometimes too, it’s also about What, what’s your real goal?

Erin Marcus: Right. Is

Marianna L Kinnee: your real goal to get promoted or is your goal to continue to learn? Is your real goal to be the best ever at what you do?

Marianna L Kinnee: Like you’re talking about your ex husband, the best sales person ever. Right. If that’s what brings you joy, satisfaction meets your needs. Hell yeah. Nobody needs him in charge. Why, why do you want to take on the mantle of somebody else’s dream?

Erin Marcus: 100%, 100%. So I know you have your podcast out there. In addition to that, if people want to continue to learn from you and continue this conversation, what is the best way for them to find you?

Marianna L Kinnee: Well, there’s two ways you can go to mightinmotion. com. All the socials are out there. Great way to just I’m also really active on LinkedIn, so I’m sure in the show notes there’ll be a link to that. And I, it’s a real, I’m a real person. I respond to direct messages. That’s probably the best way if you want to have a two way conversation.

Marianna L Kinnee: And then follow the podcast. It’s Might in Motion. We just, I just keep repeating the same thing over and over again. Which is fine, but follow the podcast as well. Thank you.

Erin Marcus: Awesome. Thank you for spending time with me today. You know I love you. Love your insights, love your energy. So excited to have you here.

Erin Marcus: Thank you. Thank you for having me.