From Gut Instinct to Predictable Growth with Brittany Toler

E#57: From Gut Instinct to Predictable Growth with Brittany Toler

What separates companies that consistently grow from those that struggle to gain traction? In this episode, Scott Geller talks with Brittany Toler about building a business with intentional execution through EOS and the Outgrow framework. They discuss creating alignment around company priorities, building consistent sales processes, improving revenue forecasting, and helping leadership teams move from gut instinct to measurable, repeatable growth. Whether you're leading a small team or a growing organization, this conversation offers practical ideas for creating focus, accountability, and sustainable revenue growth.

Book Recommendation: 10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy

Find out more about Brittany Toler: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brittany-toler/ 

Find more episodes on Apple podcast, Spotify, Amazon Music and here: https://budgetyourbusinesspodcast.buzzsprout.com/

Transcript

Mirror First Then Growth Plan

SPEAKER_02 0:00

My goal is not to give advice, but it's often just to hold up a mirror. Right? And to go, okay, let's say we're gonna plan for another year of 5% growth. Are we planning for 5% growth because we really think that's the entire opportunity in which we have, or because we don't think we have a plan or people to execute the larger opportunity that's

Welcome And Meet Brittany Toller

SPEAKER_02 0:21

out there?

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Welcome to the budget your business podcast, where small business owners go to learn how to financially plan for every aspect of their business. Let's get started with your host, Scott Geller.

Scott 0:32

Hello, and welcome back to Budget Your Business. Today I have Brittany Toller with me, who Brittany and I actually worked together on a on a mutual client uh in the past around the EOS, and as I mean as a fractional CFO, and she's doing something a little bit different these days, and glad to have her on. Hello, Brittany. Hey Scott, it's great to be here. Absolutely. Thanks for coming on board. So, Brittany, we we've known each other for a little bit. I know that something new that you're doing. You've been an EOS implementer for some time. You're not doing another structure called Outgrow. But why don't you tell our the folks who are listening a little bit about you that may not know much about you?

SPEAKER_02 1:16

Yeah, thanks. I appreciate what you mentioned, right? So right now I get to work with leadership teams both on scale and growth and helping build really healthy teams that focus on execution. And so you could kind of say, I do all that now because it's some of the largest struggles and challenges I consistently saw as a leader, right? So I've been in the Richmond community now for over 20 years. I was the CEO of a direct-to-consumer children's toy company and had a lot of fun and have just learned a lot through the pains of leading and managing businesses and teams. And now I dedicate all of my time at helping other leaders learn from what all of my personal learning was, as well as all the great information put out there by Gina Wickman and Alex Goldfein in their traction and outgrow books and really helping leaders take that kind of black and white principles, right? Written in a business book. We've all read numerous of them and figure out how to make it work in the gray of their unique, dynamic business. And so I have a ton of fun working across a ton of

What EOS Really Means

SPEAKER_02 2:22

different teams in different industries. So I get to always still be learning while sharing my experience and knowledge with others.

Scott 2:28

So sounds like it's a little, you probably get a little bit of everything each day, then I see a little bit of everything each day for sure.

SPEAKER_02 2:36

The great part about my work is when I pull together with leaders, and I understand how rare this is. We come together and we work together for a whole day on the business, right? Whether we're focusing on strategic changes that we need to make or how we're going to grow revenue more consistently or some version of that. And I just find leaders have so little time and space to just come and work on the business. They're often so engaged in the business and the day-to-day management and the putting out the fires. And so while my days can be very dynamic, the interesting part is just getting to pull together a team and dedicating six, seven, eight solid hours together on kind of deep work, right? It makes such a big impact.

Scott 3:22

I see businesses that and it's hard to step away. You you've got one demand after another, you're running the business, one problem after another, opportunity here, an opportunity there. It's it's really hard to stop, to force yourself to stop, step back and think about the business and work on it. It it's a common problem, and and I like how the the EOS kind of goes about that. But let me maybe this is too broad of a question, but can you give us your perspective, your definition of what traction/slash EOS is sure.

SPEAKER_02 3:58

Uh so I'll start with the book traction written by Gina Wickman 20 years ago now, right? And the principles build out what we call the entrepreneurial operating system. So that's why you hear everybody use the words EOS, right? And so its entire focus is how do you make it more clear, especially in small to mid-sized businesses, right, exactly where we're gonna go with our vision. Like these are exactly our revenue and profitability targets. This is what success, these are the three to five to seven things we need to accomplish or achieve by the end of the year. And this is exactly quarter after quarter the steps we'll need to take to reach that, right? So getting really clear on the vision, exactly where we're gonna go. It is amazing, even in really small organizations with four or five people, let alone the teams I serve that have 500 or a thousand employees, getting everybody on the same page about where the company is trying to grow, right? And then it's about working towards that vision with traction. Gino has a great quote in the book vision without traction is just hallucination. And this is where I find most of the founders or leaders that I support feel the most frustration. They have an idea in their mind about where this company could go and what kind of culture we could be building, the impact we could be making in the community. They just feel like they can't get everybody going in the same direction with them. So we bring in this set of tools to help gain real traction week in and week out, quarter in and quarter out, towards that shared vision. And then the third key principle of EOS is in a healthy team. So we use a set of tools and disciplines and approaches to have everybody be able to do the hard work and still enjoy working together. Have the tough conversations without taking it personally. Um, and you know, one of the biggest things, and hopefully this will be a takeaway for some people, one of the key ways that we do that is having a shared language, right? Shared words and agreeing what they mean so that when somebody can just raise their hand and go, hey, this is a person issue, we all know what that means. Hey, we've hit the ceiling. We all at the leadership team know what that means. And there's a ton of content, you've probably seen some of this, Scott, right? Related to this is why professional sports teams can run so much better than businesses. Because when you join a team, you all play out of the same playbook, right? And that's how you can have healthy calls. You can agree on what the game tape, what went wrong, and what went right because you had a shared plan in place. And so the goal is to help teams build a shared business plan and business playbook so that they can work together in a really healthy way, doing the hard things that move the business forward. So go ahead, Ted. Is that a good answer on the EOS?

Scott 6:42

What do you think? Yeah, yeah, I think that's great on the EOS. And I I was gonna I'm curious about the outgrow as well.

Outgrow And Predictable Sales

SPEAKER_02 6:48

Yeah. So, you know, in most of my career, a lot of my career, I led sales. And even when I was CEO, I led one of our sales divisions personally because I had a lot of experience there and knowledge, and it was fun for me. I've always enjoyed selling in my career. And what I found was a lot of the teams that I know or other leaders that I know through uh Virginia Council of CEOs or YPO, or you name it, right, were really struggling with consistent, relatively predictable sales. And often that was showing up like, oh, maybe I have the wrong sales leader, maybe I have the wrong sales process, maybe I have the wrong sales script, right? And I'm not saying that they were excuses, but it was always a kind of this amorphous, I can't figure out why this isn't working as well as I'd like it to. And a couple of years ago, I had the opportunity to work directly with Alex Goldfang. And I love some of the coaching and approaches and things that he was bringing to life. And when he said to me, Brittany, I'm gonna write this book, I'll grow, right? Uh and launch it as an opportunity. Would you be interested? I was like, absolutely, because this is so core to who I was as a salesperson in how do we work together in a healthy, positive, coactive way to consistently grow sales. And a big part of that is just about deepening our relationship across the organization with our clients and being there to help more. I have never liked the huge pressure of a quota or a do or die, beat your sales goal or you're out, right? I've always understood this at pain points and sales leaders, right? Especially if you're commission-based, right? Because a tough couple quarters can really have a tough impact. And then for leaders, you know, onboarding a new rock star can be really tricky if we don't have a good process in our team. Losing somebody can make a huge impact if we don't have a good process in our team. And so outgrow really comes in and creates a cultural shift in a really positive way within the organization on how to proactively reach out to our customers and help them more. And in doing that, right, we grow as well. And so I've been loving that part because it is about taking sales can feel very high pressure, right? It can also feel very vague. We say on my teams, we always know it's working when story time has ended, right? And I'm not explaining why all these deals haven't closed. Instead, I'm coming in with the deal or the new client or the new opportunity or the new contract, whatever it is. And so outgrow is really about proactive, consistent communication. And what I find most people, they just their biggest challenge is they just don't have a good, consistent process. It varies too much day by day or week by week, right? Or what did you say when we started, Scott? Right? Like all the things that can come up and the emails and the putting out the fires and that type of thing. And so that erodes the time that they put into proactive behaviors. And so outgrow is really about going, if we put the first things first, everything else will fall in place after that.

Scott 9:42

I

Outgrow Versus EOS In Practice

Scott 9:43

I like that structure. Now, speaking of structures, do you put these two, do you put the traction and the outgrow together? Or do you look at these as two different initiatives within an or within a business?

SPEAKER_02 9:58

Yes, they're really two different things. Outgrow is for the company who wants consistent, predictable growth, right? Revenue growth of 15 to 30%. We know we've got that opportunity, we've got that capacity to grow in support and services, inventory, you name it, to grow. And we really want to create a healthy, strong, forward way that we're gonna do this year after year after year after year. So if that's what a team needs, that's outcrow. EOS is really for a leadership team or maybe even a leader, when they've hit a ceiling, right? And what does that look like for them? It's I I'm maybe I'm having a sales problem, maybe I'm having a marketing problem, maybe I'm not hiring or finding enough right people. That's always a challenge, right, Scott? Maybe just holding them accountable enough. If everybody was just more accountable, all these problems would go away. If those are the things keeping you up at night, that's what EOS is for. It's about creating a clear culture of accountability and bringing the right people into the room with the discipline to go, where are we gonna go? How are we gonna get there? And what part am I gonna own on this?

unknown 11:05

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 11:05

They're both great in that they have great structures and they run on data. Because, you know, if you're not measuring it, Scott, it doesn't matter. I know you know this. I know you feel this more than most, right? Yes, if you're not measuring it, it doesn't matter. So they have a similarity there and that they really create a culture of accountability and running on data. But outgrow was really focused on that revenue growth opportunity.

Scott 11:28

Everybody wants recurring revenue. This isn't necessarily recurring revenue, it sounds like this is more of a continuous revenue stream. Is that am I thinking about that the right way?

SPEAKER_02 11:40

That's an interesting way. I'd say it could be both, right? So it is about creating a continuous and consistent way in which we as a company grow our revenue year over year. But for a lot of the teams that I serve, recurring revenue is actually an aspect of that, right? So how do we bring more teams on to the recurring revenue model, as well as adding on new clients to either the recurring revenue model, a time and materials model, or some other version, whatever that looks like in your organization? So it's really meant for all aspects of revenue growth. Yes, it is a very popular term right now, that kind of recurring revenue conversation, and it can definitely help with growing that as well.

Forecasting Revenue Without Wishful Thinking

Scott 12:19

As a fractional CFO, forecasting is a huge part of what I do, and especially uh in the revenue space. How does outgrow tie into that forecasting revenue for the business?

SPEAKER_02 12:33

Yeah, you know, it's so funny. I was smiling just as you said that, Scott, because I used to call a really amazing CFO and his job was to be the dark cloud, and my job was to be the silver lining, right? He's gonna be like, these are realistically where we could be based on all the trends that I'm seeing. It's largely data driven, right? And my job was to come in the silver lining to go, okay, what are the one, two, or three levers we can pull to improve this outlook, right? Where else are we gonna do? So we made a great partnership and team that way because you need a little bit of those in both. And it's so funny that you asked that question because it's a perfect example, right? What happens in a normal business? Well, the sales leader gets up there and goes, we say, Hey, we need you to grow by at least 10% for 2026 because we've got increased cost and we want to do this kind of thing and we just need that kind of growth. And the salesperson goes, Okay, I'll do my best, right? Like, okay, we'll work on that. And then everything else after that feels like a little bit of hope, right? And what's that expression? Hope is not a strategy. And so that I often see the CFOs that I work with, right, or are the fractional Scott like you that I work with, go, well, this is what's making me uncomfortable because I can't tell how you're gonna get this growth that we've budgeted for. And so outgrow is makes it so crystal clear on exactly what we're gonna do on a weekly basis. The data is that clear to grow the revenue, and we can track the more actions we take, the revenue growth will follow. And if we have a couple of weeks where we don't take as many of the actions, we know we're going to see a dip. Right. And so it allows for some forecasting, right? Some forward looking, but it's also just that clear, consistent system where it moves that rub. I can't even imagine some of the ways you've probably seen this show up, right? But it removes that tension from the leader and the sales lead or the the finance lead and the sales lead when sales is going, don't worry, we're working on it, right? And we're not really seeing it come. Or worse, what are some of the worst things we hear? Like, I'm not sure the market, what the market will still spare. It's global trends. And we have the ability to make a positive impact and we have to focus on what we can control. I cannot control what war we're in, right? But we also can't control that because that conflict's going on, we think we're gonna miss our revenue number. We need to find the new way around it. That's a real conversation that I've had with teams year to date, as you can imagine. And so it is really about aligning the plan with actions so we can predict and we're more accurate.

Scott 14:59

I love data, especially when I'm trying to forecast revenue and helping a business owner understand where their business is going. Can you talk to specific data points that you see working with businesses that that that help this process?

The Few Metrics That Matter

SPEAKER_03 15:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:17

I know I have a t-shirt that I wear sometimes and it says no data, no clue. Right? Because if we don't have the data, we don't know what the real root issue is. Or worse, or you've probably seen some of this too, right? Where somebody came in with some data and somebody else came up with some data. They started from the same point, but they're each using the data to show what they want to be seen, right? And so somehow they have different answers, but they use the same data set. And so for my teams, we really focus on a very core few things. What are the one, two, to three levers that we need to move the needle on, right? Then what are the weekly actions that we're gonna take? In outgrow, we're really gonna be so prescriptive. So it's gonna, you know, let's say we're gonna start with five. Every person in this initiative, let's say we have 10 people, is gonna take make five proactive phone calls this week. That's 50 calls, right? On those calls, sure, sometimes they're gonna get a voicemail. So they're gonna leave a message and send a quick text, right? To increase the likelihood that person will answer you back. These are the topics that we want to be talking to them about. And we're watching that data. So we did 50 calls and then another week of 50 calls and then another week of 50 calls, and we start tracking, we track quotes opened, right? And we track quotes closed. So the number of actions I took, how much opportunity they let me talk to them about, and then how much I closed. Those are the three big variables. And so we're just creating data structures around that in really simple ways. Every team I serve has some type of CRM. We're using something much simpler than that, because everybody goes, it it takes longer to get to the right field in the CRM than it does to enter the information, right? Those are the pain points, no matter what tool they're using, I feel like from all the teams that I'm serving. But we're really focusing on let's look at that high-level data. And as a team, we look at it every Monday morning for 15 minutes. This was the goal we had for last week. This is where we got. What is the success or win from the week? And now let's focus on what are we gonna do? And maybe this week we're gonna make 60 calls. Maybe this week we're gonna make 70 calls, right? What are the quotes that we're gonna follow up on this week? And so it's just about clear, consistent data related to actions, the opportunity we opened and the opportunity we closed.

Scott 17:23

From your description, it sounds like this is more of a support structure, not necessarily a replacing structure for a sales team.

SPEAKER_02 17:32

You're right. Any type of team can bring it in because it's just about building proactive consistency related to, you know, the products, tools, or services that they're selling. So I have teams where we have a huge sales team and well-established sales leaders, and we're bringing this in as the next core focus and tool to impact our culture for the next three to five years. I'm you serving teams where they don't have a sales lead in place, and they're like, we can't wait for the, you know, the magical unicorn of hiring that's gonna fix all of our problems that we haven't been able to fix. We're gonna create this kind of clear structure and process. And for most of the teams that I serve, they have a way that they're doing this some or ad hoc, or the best sales guy, he'll go, Oh, that's kind of what I do. And I go, Yeah, but only you're doing it that way, right? And not everybody else. And so we just are it's really often a refinement to some of the best parts about their work, but with a structure and accountability that just drives a level of consistency. And that's how the sales can become more predictable, right? Because it's the consistency is usually the gap. It's not a strategy gap, right? It's just a consistency gap.

Where Forecasts Go Wrong

Scott 18:40

Yeah, consistency is is key. And I I can imagine seeing and you're you're gonna see that the impact of that in in the actual revenue and as well as the the revenue forecasting. And I I'm curious where do you see revenue forecasting kind of quote going wrong in some of these businesses?

SPEAKER_02 19:01

So sometimes I see teams under not under forecasting, but underestimating the amount of revenue or increase that they could do. And partly it's because the sales leads might what I know, so us as sales leaders, sometimes we get a bad rap, right? So you mean like I'd rather underpromise and overdeliver. So and we used to call it sandbagging, right? I'm gonna give you a number that I'm pretty darn sure I'm gonna hit. So that way I won't fall short of it and I won't be yelled at if I do, right? So there's that aspect. And then I have a lot of leaders who will throw up a growth number. And as a team, if I go, okay, somebody tell me the two things that are gonna make this number happen, it's crickets. Right. Or sometimes it's well, we'll hire someone, and I'm like, if we haven't figured out how to do it and we've been here for years, are we sure a new person that we've never met and we don't know can do this for us?

unknown 19:51

Right.

SPEAKER_02 19:52

And so sometimes that's that challenge of going, that's the number we want. Maybe that's a little bit of that hope, not a strategy. So I can see it go both ways.

Scott 20:01

And do you when I when I come across a similar situation, I feel like I'm trying to put a gut feeling on paper with parameters around it. Is that kind of what you see as well?

SPEAKER_02 20:15

Yeah, I but I mean, especially for small to mid-sized business owners, you know, these leaders are having to run this business a ton of it's gut instinct. For a lot of the founders or entrepreneurs that I serve, like it was their gut instinct that started this business and then got it to two people and then five people and then 50 people, right? Uh so they have a lot of that deep knowledge and it starts with that gut instinct. The challenge is when we're trying to move from gut instinct for a three to five person team to now a 50, 250 person team, and we've got to move beyond gut, right? Gut's probably still making an impact in there for sure, but we've got to move to a clearer plan and clear accountability in being consistent to moving towards that plan.

Scott 20:55

And how much should a owner be willing to commit for this work to get away from that gut to a more consistent process and plan?

SPEAKER_02 21:05

It really varies by the team and the number of people that we're going to engage and their size of their revenue, right? Because the opportunity is growing 15 to 30% off of whatever your current plan is. I think the bigger part is always it's not really the dollar sometimes, right, Scott? It's the ROI. So I'm sure when people are coming to you, right, the relief that they're getting from having somebody with your experience do the work for them that is not their natural skill set, probably. That's why they're coming to you,

Getting The Whole Company Involved

SPEAKER_02 21:35

right? And giving them a level of comfort and confidence that that's taken care of. That part's almost, you know, invaluable. You can't even put a number on it, that sense of relief. I know when I had the right director of finance in for my role, like I literally could sleep better because there was an aspect that I did not have to be worried about. Somebody had my back and was taking care of that and crystal clear understood what our business was trying to do. So that's huge. And in outgrow, we're trying to do that from a revenue forecast window specifically, because that's the largest challenge. You know, I know it's an old joke, but you know, money can solve most problems. It can.

Scott 22:14

Unless it's a uh unprofitable business or certain or service for goods that then eventually that catches up to you. But you're right. Sales solves a lot of problems. Speaking of sales, we we've really focused on how this impacts the sales group, how this impacts the owner. What other functions or are there other functions of the business that need to be on board or involved in this process?

SPEAKER_02 22:38

You know, again, from my smallest companies to the largest companies that I've been able to serve, right? One is if it's an initiative, a culture impact like we're trying to do in this work, I go, first of all, let's tell everybody and communicate really consistently. For most teams, that's a quarterly, for some teams that's monthly, how it's going. Because we want everybody to understand what we're trying to do here, right? We want them to feel a part of it. And then in the outgrow work, I think one of the magics of outgrow is that we focus beyond the sales team. So for the clients that I serve, we're also bringing in whoever else is customer facing. So for some teams, that's like a customer support function. For some teams, that's the techs and engineers that are out in the field, right? Because these are the people who see the customer the most. They got there and solved their problem or installed the item that they needed. That's where the relationship is, right? Even the guy who comes to my house and does the heating repair for me. He's like, Hey, did you know we started doing electrical work? And I'm like, that's amazing, right? He he was outgrowing me, right? Asking another proactive question. Do you ever need electrical work? Of course. Of course I do. Right. And so it's really about getting everybody that's customer facing, engaging with our customer, opening up a conversation for his company, right? He solved a problem for me. And now I'm like, God, I love that team, right? I'm gonna tell my friends and neighbors, like, oh my God, they came in to fix one thing and solved me with another issue. I which I would have never called my HVAC guy again. Hey, do you guys also hang on to fixtures and do electrical work? Right. I didn't know to ask him that question, but because his company has this proactive approach, they got more opportunity and it took them 45 seconds.

Scott 24:44

Yeah, that that that that's where it comes down to is if the if everybody's in the right dire in the same direction, a lot of times it comes out to to multiple wins. It does. You're you're right. And uh to just not knowing which direction you're rowing sometimes can can be detriment even if you don't intend

Practical Takeaways And Closing

Scott 25:03

to. Well, Brittany, I I like to wrap up all of our shows with one to three immediate takeaways that our listeners could literally put into action as they turn off the podcast. This might be something you've already shared, it might be something from your days as the CEO of the business. What can you share with us today?

SPEAKER_02 25:22

Well, I'd say from working across leaders and myself, I go, you know, hey one, pick the priority, right? Prior, we can't have priorities, pick the most important thing and make sure that you're focused on that. I'd say align the team around that, make sure that they're crystal clear on what that looks like. I love teams at keeping a scorecard, right? So making it visible to everybody. And just have a consistent process and structure to keep that plan on track. Right. We all might be surprised by a few things, but if you have that clear process and structure, your learning gets a lot faster throughout the window of time.

Scott 25:59

Yeah, and I feel like I see where companies get started with something, but if they don't have something set in stone or they don't know when or how often they should review it, it kind of gets lost in the day-to-day hustle.

SPEAKER_02 26:15

Absolutely. And if you don't have a plan where you're visibly making it a priority week in and week out, no one else is either.

Scott 26:23

Right. Because nobody's going to come to you and say, hey, remember, unless they work for something like you, Brittany, where they're like, hey, you come in and tell them, remember, this is what we're doing. This is the direction we're going.

SPEAKER_02 26:32

That's right.

Scott 26:33

Well, Brittany, you know, we're coming up on our time here, but we also ask our guests of uh if they have a favorite podcast or book. What do you have for us?

SPEAKER_02 26:43

Something I read recently that I really enjoyed is the book 10X is easier than 2X. It's by Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy. And I think it can really help leaders and leadership teams really rethink the way that they're looking at a problem, a challenge, or opportunity and give them a brand new lens to see it with a fresh perspective. It's a good read.

Scott 27:03

Thank you. I think I've I've heard that one before. I'm trying to remember if it's through the podcast or somebody else, but I have heard that one. It's a good one. Well, this has been great. Where can people find out more about you online?

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Probably the easiest is to find me and connect with me through LinkedIn. So I'm Brittany Toller, based in Richmond, Virginia on LinkedIn, and I look forward to connecting.

Scott 27:22

Well, Brittany, thank you so much for coming on. I know we could have talked a lot longer about forecasting, and maybe we might after we we turn the mic off. But thank you again for for coming on the show. Thanks so much, Scott. Appreciate it. All right, folks, that's it for today. Thanks for listening, and I hope you join us for the next show.

SPEAKER_00 27:40

If you like the show or found something useful, text someone right now and say, I have a podcast recommendation to check out, budget your business. You can also like the show or find more at your favorite podcast locations Apple Podcast, Spotify, and Amazon. Thank you for listening. And we hope you join us for our next guest on Budget Your Business.