Scaling a Global People-First Business with Bob Funk Jr.

0:01John Lee Dumas:Light that spark fire nation JLD here and welcome to entrepreneurs on fire brought to you by high level the all in one sales and marketing platform and today we'll be breaking down scaling a global people first business. To drop these value bonds I brought Bob Funk Jr. into EO fire studios. Bob serves as president of Express Employment International promoted to the role in March of 2025. After decades with the company, he began his career with Express Employment professionals at the franchise level in 96 and joined Express International in 2013. And today we'll talk about scaling service businesses, culture-driven leadership, workforce shifts, and oh, so much more.

0:36John Lee Dumas:And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Bob and our sponsors. Sleep impacts everything. Your energy, focus, and performance. FitNexa Somnipods 3 are ultra-comfortable sleep airbags that block distractions, track your sleep, and deliver personalized insights to help you rest and recover. If better sleep is a priority for you, Visit fitnexa.com and use code EOFire10 to save$10 on Somnipods 3 today. If you are building a real business, you need real infrastructure. High Level gives you website hosting, funnels, email marketing, automation, calendar booking, payments, and course hosting all on one platform, plus award-winning 24-7 support.

1:14John Lee Dumas:Get a 30-day free trial and my full bonus stack that includes a 15-minute private call with me and much more at highlevelfire.com. Highlevelfire.com. Bob, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with. All right. Well, first of all, thank you for the opportunity. I appreciate it very much. So it's hello to all. And, you know, that's such an interesting question. And I've thought a lot about it. And I think there are any number of things about being successful that really dive into leadership. But one of the things that I really settled on was, I think, the notion that you always have to believe in yourself as a prerequisite for success.

2:08I think there is a little bit of luck that goes into anybody being successful. Actually, I think it's a lot. I think very much the axiom of where opportunity and preparedness meet, there's a lot of luck in that. And when those opportunities comes along. But I think you have to be, in order to be successful, you have to have some really definite leadership qualities. And I think the ability to always assess, you know, where you're at as an individual and as a leader. And I don't think anybody can be successful without the support of a team around them. And I think in some respects, so in some respects, you can't always just always believe in yourself and rely on that.

3:04I think you have to have confidence in your abilities. but you always have to be able to do a, have some self-awareness, some introspection, because that's the only way you get better at being a leader at improving process or being able to innovate in and around anything that you do. And so I think that there's that fundamental notion, you know, you hear it time and time again, it's like, you just have to believe in yourself. You just have to believe in yourself. It's like, I don't think that's always true. I think there has to be a quality of humility in this where you're constantly trying to get better and be sharper.

3:44And you can't do that without questioning yourself in a lot of respects. So that's kind of my answer to that question.

3:52John Lee Dumas:Well, Fire Nation, we're talking about scaling a global people first business, which, of course, is easier said than done. So I want to talk about just that and how entrepreneurs successively build and scale service-based businesses in today's market, which you and I both know, Bob, is highly competitive. It's all about differentiation. Even in a franchise business where you're essentially buying a process or especially a service-based business, you're buying a process, you're buying, you know, process plus support, plus a brand. And, you know, we tell our franchisees follow the system all the time.

4:27Well, I think 80 % and 90 % of the time, that's true. I would say you follow the system, you're going to be successful. What I think really puts you over the top and makes you very successful in a service-based business, especially when you've got competition, is how you tweak that system to be different on behalf of your clients and the community that you serve in any given framework. So I think that that differentiation is important. It's what can really make you more attractive than your competitors in that market. And it's, I mean, it can be any, it can be a small thing. It can be one large thing or a collection of small things, but make yourself different.

5:10And that helps you get, I think that should be successful and can help you scale.

5:15John Lee Dumas:So let's talk about culture driven leadership, because I mean, the leadership lessons that we learned and you specifically from growing a global organization that's rooted in people, performance and culture. I mean, that's deep. That's meaningful. That's powerful. Can you pass that learning, that knowledge along to Fire Nation? How you develop your culture, especially as you're growing, as you're scaling is incredibly important. Now, I will say I have the benefit of stepping into a position. Both of our founders passed within the last year. They created a culture around people, teamwork, integrity, and built to last.

5:59Those are our core values and people's first for a reason. And we are in the people business and we must always consider people first, whether it's the associates that we're employing, you know, the four hundred twenty seven thousand we employ on a yearly basis, the 11 million people we put to work and over 40 years of being in business. We have to always consider people first and it's part of our it's part of our culture and that's what makes us different. and we've been able to stay anchored in that in those in these core values and it's given us the ability to continue to evolve our business but it is you have to be incredibly disciplined to maintain that and it what it's what's made us different it's what's made us successful and it is kind of, I would say, the fundamentals of who we are and how we choose franchisees.

6:59We have a pretty good process that allows us to see those who are going to have a commitment to our culture. We treat our franchisees like family because people come first. And that translates into real practical decisions when they deal with their clients and the service level of how they deal with their clients, but also makes us more attractive to our associates that we employ on a day-to-day basis because they know that they're going to be treated like a person, not treated like a commodity, and that we have their best interests and who we are putting, which client we are putting them to work with, that it's going to be an effective match.

7:40And we have hundreds of thousands of success stories around this, where we've been able to really make an impact in people's lives through employment. And so I would say that when you're establishing your culture, you know, I always will tell everybody that your people have to come first. Your process, all the processes can change as you evolve and to be better. But really, It's about the team you build, the culture you promote, and it's all about the people that you bring on board and how you treat them.

8:14John Lee Dumas:So let's move into workforce shifts. What do today's labor and employment trends mean for founders and business owners who are trying to both grow and retain talent? We are looking at the most interesting moment in the world economy today, especially in the developed and overall largely developed nations, sophisticated economies, and that you're now facing labor shortages. We've been past the birth rate replacement for a number of years. We are already at a deficit of probably about a million and a half workers in the United States today. And that problem is only going to be exacerbated over a period of time.

9:02So what that means for labor force shortages is not only the number of people that have the ability to go to work, but also the quality of those individuals has begun to decline. And so in order to be successful, in order to grow your business, you have to be as attractive as possible as an employer. And whether that's through your culture, your offering, through your benefits, all of those, all the things come into play. And you are really going to have to focus on how attractive you are to potential employees. And so it will be all about the people, barring being able to figure out some other economic solution around immigration, automation or otherwise.

9:48In the near term, that I would say is what people are really going to have to focus on is what is your offering? What makes you better than other employers in your market in order to attract the best talent? We counsel our clients on this all the time. We're a workforce consultant more so than just a staffing provider. And we can accurately assess any organization from top to bottom as to how they treat their employees and give them advice on here's what you can do to be more attractive in that individual market. And so I think in the near term, that's what we're going to, without some radical solutions politically, I think that's the problem that we're going to face is that labor scarcity over time.

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13:40John Lee Dumas:Visit highlevelfire.com and start building your something today. Bob, we're back and I want to talk about resilience and disruption. So how? How can business owners stay resilient and adaptable through these economic cycles and these ongoing workforce disruptions that seem to be happening over and over again? When you're talking about resilience, I think there's an interesting opportunity, I think, for anybody who's in a, especially in a service-based business is trying to diversify your portfolio as much as you can. Give yourself the best opportunity to be successful by the numbers and types of clients that you are able to service in your portfolio.

14:27I think you diversify your business. It provides a better cushion because what we see out in the marketplace, We deal with a wide diversity of clients on the staffing side, is that even in a down economy, there are certain segments of the economy that can be successful and that we will see that we'll hire even in a down economy. Actually, they'll do better in a down economy. And so we try and diversify our interests as much as possible in order to cushion ourselves for those times when there are those disruptions. It's the best thing about being a franchise business is that for us and what we do from a entrepreneurship standpoint is we give our franchisees the tools to be successful.

15:16We provide a lot of back end support for payroll and benefits and other things for our associates that takes the weight off of the franchisee. And that's where this is key from a from a resilience standpoint and being adaptable is that. So when those disruptions come, it frees up the entrepreneur, our franchise owner to go out and look for better opportunities inside their market or new opportunities somewhere. Maybe they haven't thought of of an opportunity to pursuing. We had we've had franchisees that have provided in a down economy substitute teachers. because it was a good opportunity for a short time framework to help supplement their business during a time when we saw a lot of layoffs out in the community.

16:10And we were able to absorb some of those layoffs and put them to work in the educational system for a time. And so those opportunities exist, even no matter what business owner you are. And it's just simply a matter of being able to be as flexible and adaptable as possible. And I think the only way you can do that is being able to diversify your business as much as possible.

16:34John Lee Dumas:I want to move into the franchise growth model because I think a lot of people listening are like, okay, well, what does that actually look like on the ground? So Bob, how do franchise systems create repeatable growth models that will allow the local owners, the people that are actually there in person in the brick and mortars to scale without losing operational consistency. This is an area we've learned a lot of lessons over time on this that has over our 40 years of really honing the way our model works. And it's been through a lot of trial and error and repetition. The more you can, we've discovered that the more that you can create as a franchisor can take on some of the back-end responsibilities, things that are repeatable every day.

17:26And we're working with a lot of artificial intelligence initiatives now to take on even more of those responsibilities for the franchisees. The more you can do that and take off a franchisee's plate and make that repeatable, that to me is the fundamental component of your brand consistency. As I said before, when it comes to our adaptation and what you want to promote in the individual market, taking that operational consistency and taking those activities off their plate gives them the ability to be as creative as they can in terms of driving new business. And there's some rules to that. There are some rules for us in that we're a sales-driven culture.

18:15So it's all about sales for us. That means you've got to be out talking to your clients. You've got to be out trying to solve their problems and talking to new clients on a pretty much regular cadence. So we try and take as much off of that and supply as much process on behalf of our franchisees in order to guarantee the brand consistency so that they can be out solving our franchisees' problems. And I think that's the, for any business that you want to take to scale, whether it's our franchisees or the individual entrepreneur, I think that the same lesson exists. You really need to, if you can get your internal processes down into almost a fully automated cadence, but a cadence that is consistent and repeatable over time, that makes your life so much easier as the entrepreneur to go bring in new clients, bring new business, and provide more opportunity for you to succeed in front of a client because you have that flexibility.

19:17you know and have the consistency that you know, whoever's back in the office is taking care of your deliverables. And so that every promise you make to a client can be fulfilled. And I think that that's all, to me, that's all about your brand consistency.

19:34John Lee Dumas:Okay, let's end with a bang. And that's all about building high performance teams. Because Bob, in a tight labor market, what strategies are actually working right now to identify, to develop and to retain who? High-performing teams. I'll go back to what we talked about before in terms of your culture. Your culture is what will attract high-performing individuals. I think there's some very simple rules around this. I think you have to have transparency and communication throughout the organization. Your organization needs to be clear on the mission, the vision of what you're trying to accomplish.

20:15For us, it's putting a million people to work. That is what we promote inside and outside the company. That's our primary goal, a million people to work annually. And we're, you know, as I stated before, we put 427 ,000 people to work last year. So we're not there yet, but that is our primary goal. But you have to have that committed consistency to transparency and communication of your goal inside the organization and what your aspirations are. After that, I think it follows you have to do what you say you're going to do. Your actions must meet your words, and that is at a very granular level of everything you do every day.

21:00I think those organizations that where you can see, you can see what they're trying to accomplish, that they're following through with what they say their goals are, that in the beginning attracts the individuals. And then, you know, the rest of it's blocking and tackling, making sure you're competitive in the labor market, you're delivering, an attractive package to your different employees. But more than anything, what I find is your reputation precedes itself. And whether it's the owner or whether it's a leadership team, when they know, I think, in the marketplace what you stand for and that you follow through on those things, it makes you very, very attractive as an employer.

21:52There are so many, we've interviewed probably five different leaders over the last six to eight months. And I've asked every one of them the question, what, before we hire you, what attracted you to us in the first place? And their consistent answer back has been, you have an outstanding reputation in the staffing industry. Everybody talks about how Express lives its values and the culture here. Everybody I've talked to that has worked for you has been super complimentary about how you treat the business and how you treat people. And that's the reason we want to come to work here. So I think that is probably key and foremost in this.

22:38And then I think from our standpoint, how we encourage that internally and we retain those individuals is not only living by those words, but the way I see this from a leadership standpoint is it's not, and I quote Jamie Dimon in this, it's not the leader's responsibility to make the decision. It's the leader's responsibility to make sure the right decision gets made. And you can only really, the way I see doing that, you can only really do that by having the right people in the room, around the table, to make the decisions. And so we have a really disciplined, collaborative leadership model that we abide by.

23:20And that takes constant communication on pretty much a daily basis within our leadership teams. And we are modeling that internally. And over time, that has trickled down through the organization and provided a leadership framework and a teamwork framework that gives us, I think, a competitive edge. Because the entire organization is clear about its mission, clear about its objectives, clear about all the decisions that are being made and why they're being made and are really moving all in the same direction. You don't have the traditional silos under this type of collaborative model. And it has really provided a massive benefit internally for us and has led to a lot of retention where people have said, some leaders that have come back and said, you know, I bought into what Express was because of what I heard about Express.

24:19but it really is true on so many levels and even more so than I realized when you onboarded me and really how special a place express is to work. So I think for any other entrepreneur, I think you build that into your culture from the ground up. You just buy an interesting pull or kind of that you become a magnet for good people because that's where they want to be. They want to be where they feel like they're valued, that they're contributing, and that they're grown as leaders and as individuals inside the company. And that's what we're trying to provide.

25:05John Lee Dumas:I mean, that's what I call a mini masterclass on building high-performance teams. So Bob, if Fire Nation, they're just in love with this content and they want to learn more, they want to connect with you, what is your directive for our listeners? today. Reach out to any one of our franchisees. We have nine over 900 locations. I mean, if you want to connect with Express and get to know who we are and get to know me as the organization, you can reach out to us at Express at any level, expresspros.com or in any local markets. We have franchises all over the United States. So if there's an opportunity, you're looking for express and for an opportunity from a staffing standpoint.

25:48We're always here to help and we want to help grow your business.

25:51John Lee Dumas:Fire Nation, you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with. You've been hanging out with BF and JLD today, so keep up the heat. And to link to everything we talked about, visit eofire.com, type Bob, B-O-B in the search bar, and the show notes page will pop right up. Bob, thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value for Fire Nation today. For that, we salute you and we will catch you on the flip side. Hey, Fire Nation. A huge thank you to our sponsors and Bob for sponsoring today's episode. And Fire Nation, are you an entrepreneur on fire who's looking to share your amazing message with the world?

26:22John Lee Dumas:If yes, we're now accepting applications for EO Fire. So to learn more about becoming a guest, visit EOFire.com slash guest, and I'll catch you there or I'll catch you on the flip side. Sleep impacts everything. Your energy, focus, and performance. FitNexus Somnipods 3 are ultra comfortable sleep airbags that block distractions, track your sleep, and deliver personalized insights to help you rest and recover. If better sleep is a priority for you, visit fitnexa.com and use code EOFire10 to save$10 on Somnipods 3 today. If you are building a real business, you need real infrastructure. High Level gives you website hosting, funnels, email marketing, automation, calendar booking, payments, and course hosting all on one platform, plus award-winning 24-7 support.