Business Coach Near Me | The Business Builder Guide with Bruce Baker Episode 2
Broadcasting from the business capital of the world, this is the podcast Business News Network. Welcome back to the show. We are so excited to have the Chief Business Builder here of Workplaces—that’s right, from Edmonton, Alberta, in Canada—Bruce Baker joining us today to talk more about, well, you know, how Business Builders is all about helping owners like yourself, right? With complexity, boost profitability, find freedom in your day‑to‑day business operations, and so much more. Bruce, how are you doing today?
Not bad Jill, how about yourself? Thanks for having me.
Well, thank you for being here. It’s excited to get to know you, and, you know, I’ve done my own research on you—pretty fascinating—and I want our listeners and viewers, of course, to get to know you as well. We want to talk today about, you know, scaling businesses, financial growth, driving business, and all that your company does, but first and foremost, I want to get to know you. So tell us a little bit about yourself to begin.
Well, again, thanks for having me. It’s a little bit about myself. I’ve, you know, been working in this business for about 11 years now and, of course, have had the privilege to deal with multiple businesses—small to midsize businesses—and really focusing on something different. Throughout my career, both corporate and business ownership, it’s always been about, let’s call it, the small guy, right? It’s always been about, you know, we look at small business and we realize that it’s the backbone of our economy, regardless of country, regardless of region, and yet the information and the solutions are just not finding their way. So my background has always been a mission to ensure that small‑business owners are getting the information but being able to apply that information and get results. So that’s been pretty much my mission for many years.
Well, thank you for sharing that, and let me find out a little bit about yourself. You know, growing up I was reading, you know, about navigating challenges—kind of sparked you. Could you share a little bit about where you grew up and, you know, what profession were you in, and how did you end up in this? Thank you.
Business Builders Have a Diverse Background
Well, yeah, absolutely. So I grew up in South Africa, back in a country that was quite different in those days, and, you know, being privileged to be a part of the change in South Africa back in the early ’90s, when Nelson Mandela was our first black president, we moved to a democratic environment. But since then, you know, my life was, of course, as a child, filled with complexity and hardships, and with that came a lot of skill development in terms of understanding life in a little bit more simplistic manner. So the question, at least at my younger age, was always: Why does it have to be so complex? Why does it have to be so complex?
Oh yeah, right.
And, you know, moving and meandering through life, eventually, you know, growing up and moving into the big world, as we all call it, the same question lingered. So the challenges that I had to deal with—both personally and professionally—were profoundly complex in my mind, and a ton of failure in many respects, and things just weren’t moving in the right direction until I started, you know, trying to convince myself that maybe it’s time to put my money where my mouth is and actually start living what I’m questioning the whole time. A big part of that was: Why does this have to be complex? Because society says it’s complex, I need to be cautious, or why does it have to be this way? So I started moving against the grain and started interpreting my environment as a far more simplistic environment in everything I did, and started to realize that, really, the only complexity is me, and the person that was getting in my way was me. That change—that mindset—really saved me, for lack of a better term; it saved me at the end of the day and started to propel me professionally, academically, and, you know, in 2014, when I finally was laid off for the second time, I decided, you know what, it’s time to put my wealth of knowledge—my experience working in several countries, working in various disciplines throughout corporate industry—and it was time to actually help small business get what they needed.
Now, in terms of profession—where did I start? I did a master’s degree in industrial and organizational psychology, left and moved into the gold‑mining sector, deep‑level mining sector, in South Africa as an HR professional, and I was doing that for a couple of years, and then, you know, lucky for me, I got the opportunity to work in various areas and lead in various areas like financials, operations, logistics, that kind of stuff. So eventually, I grew into the consummate business geek, but this business geek wanted to do it a little differently and give back to the community.
The Ability to Constantly Learn Is Important
Thank you for sharing all that, my goodness. So I love getting to know you, obviously—about you—and it, you know, it definitely, you know, gives us more insight into who you are, what you do, and why you’re here to help so many people, because I know you’ve also mentioned you faced some highs and lows, right, in professional times, personal times, and, you know, a lot of people, you know, are not used to that, and when they do fall it’s like, oh my goodness, what do I do, what do I—you know, and you’ve been through, you’ve had your fair share of that, right?
Oh yeah, big time. Absolutely—Ely, yeah. No, and it’s—you know what, the problem, the problem we all face is, you know, we’re always told that failure, you know, is important. You’ve got to fail, and you’ve got to be okay with failure, but, you know, the larger scheme of things, a lot of people frown on failure, and we all—most of our behavior comes from a place of scarcity and a place where we are trying to avoid failure in every possible way, but it counteracts—it acts against us at the end of the day in terms of learning and being able to grow, and that’s a big part of it.
Great. Well, thank you so much for being here, and I want everyone to, you know, obviously, you know, get to know you. You’re working with people and companies, by the way, you know, all over the world. Is it United States and Canada, or are we worldwide at this point?
No, mostly United States and Canada for the large part. Canada still.
Great. Well, let’s talk a little bit about some of the work you do at Workplaces and what it entails.
Helping Businesses is an Intrinsic Need
Absolutely. Well, I think the best place to start is, you know, why—most businesses will say, well, the reason why we’re better is because we do it differently. And, you know, I was subject, obviously, throughout my corporate career, subject to, you know, the consultant or the coach, and, by no means am I speaking negatively about consultants and coaches. I have many friends and good colleagues that do the same thing, but what I was struggling with was, you know, we get people, we sell people books, we sell people courses, people go to universities or colleges or schools in business, and the big issue that I find is that it doesn’t land. And what I mean by “doesn’t land” is that we as people, you know, take in this information, very encouraged to apply the information, but don’t, and if that information was helping, then we wouldn’t—we wouldn’t see the failure rates of small business the way we see, not just in Canada and the US but across the globe.
So if this is a constant, continuous problem that we find, something needs to change. So the important part for me was certainly understanding, well, how can I leverage the coaching environment, and how can I leverage the consulting environment? When we think about the coaching discipline, it’s about doing it. Well, of course, it’s about, you know, sewing the field, for lack of a better word, for execution—getting someone ready emotionally to execute. What is consulting? Well, consulting is the subject‑matter expert—someone that comes in, technically like a doctor would do, diagnose based on symptoms and prescribe treatment, and come in, and then it’s done.
The problem with just isolating the coaching side is that it’s not hand‑holding in the field, so the application of knowledge doesn’t really translate into the field until the person actually has the confidence that they can actually do it. The drawback with just the consulting component is it is technical knowledge: I come in, prescribe a solution, probably design, build, and help implement that solution, but the continuity of that in the business is also a problem, and a lot of what we do as consultants, we build these grand solutions, but a lot of them end up dusty on the shelf, and that just doesn’t work either, because it’s a lot of—it’s a waste of time and a waste of money.
So the notion for me, or the model for me, was to combine both the strengths of coaching and the strengths of consulting, and being able to not just, you know, prepare the mind for execution emotionally, but also being able to hold hand in the field, provide that subject‑matter expertise—technical expertise—and help build and help implement in the field to see results. And with that implementation, and any good coach will tell you this, any part of that good implementation is to make sure that we don’t leave a business relying on us. We want to teach them to fish and strengthen them so they can continue to scale the business they worked so hard to build.
We Help Business Owners Hone Their Skills
Amazing. Thank you for this insight; thank you for being here. Excited to have you back, and again, you know, we’re talking to Bruce Baker, who is a real workplace‑transformation expert, and so much more with his coaching, his consulting, joining us here. It’s always a pleasure to have you, and what else, for today, did you want our listeners to know more about you and, you know, the Business Builders, in a sense, and what you do?
Absolutely. Yeah, thanks, Joel. I think the key component—funny enough, I was talking to one of my clients last—and the key is to understand that you are absolutely capable of building a business and, you know, getting the business going, scaling that business, regardless of where you’re at in your journey in business building. But the business building in itself is not complex. Businesses—and there’s copious amounts of research on this, and I’ve experienced it day in and day out—businesses in themselves, whether it’s for‑profit, non‑for‑profit, are all the same.
And what do I mean by that? It’s a system; it’s a system of what you put in is what you get out. Okay, that is not unique, and every single business, regardless of their stage of growth and where they’re in, have the exact same challenges, the exact same rules that need to be followed, and if they listen to those components—it is—business building is easy. What is complex is you. You, as the author of the business, is complex, and what I want people to know is that you, the person, are going to either make this great or the person that is not going to make it great—not because you’re incapable but because fear is in your way.
Got it. Well, thank you for that. And, you know, as a business consultant, it’s—you know, Bert McOwen says, “I’ve been working with Bruce and Nathan from Workplaces for over six months now. Found them—in Workplaces—to be truly value‑added company with the sole purpose is to serve and assist. I found them to go far above and beyond, meeting my initial expectations.” That’s just one of many positive reviews. Matthew Bir says he’s known you for approximately six years, and, “I’ve worked with you on several different ventures,” and looks like it went a little too quick for me—there it goes—“always provided incredible service, great advice. If you’re looking for a great business builder to help you strengthen the foundation of your business and strategically expand, Bruce, you’re an excellent choice.” Everyone agrees.
Did you want to piggyback on some of these, you know, comments and, of course, clients and testimonials of the work you’ve done to give people a little overview as to, you know, what you can do for them and their business as well?
We Help The Business Owner Troubleshoot Their Business
Yeah, absolutely. So words are important, but not as important as results, and the people that you read out there that have said such great things were obviously very good at what they do. The important part is results. So typically what we do with any business owner—whether it’s, you know, as we say internally, whether it’s a scale‑up, whether it’s a start‑up, or whether it’s a fix‑up—is we start off by essentially diagnosing—let’s use that word—going into the business, understanding where the business owner is at, what the business owner is really struggling with, or what they’re challenged with, and, most of the time, it’s not exactly the problem or the problem that they’re dealing with; it’s the symptoms of the problem.
So we get to truly understand that, and what’s really impactful is that we transition from, let’s call it, the outside external consultant, agent—whatever you want to call it—and transition into a partner, and not a partner in terms of a business partner legally, but a partner in terms of we are going to stick by you, we’re going to help you through this, and we’re going to ensure that the results are there at the end of the day, and we’re not going anywhere until the results are there, so you feel confident that you can take it on yourself.
Beautiful. Love it, love it, love it. Thank you again. If you are just tuning in, don’t forget Workplaces is joining us here live. Bruce Baker, who is the Chief Business Builder, and helping so many people drive their business, increase profitability, and so much more.
All right, Bruce, what else did you want to share with us for today’s show?
You know what, at this stage, I think it’s important for everyone to truly think: Why do I need a business builder, or why do I need a business coach or a business consultant? You don’t necessarily need a coach or business consultant. What you need is someone that is there as your accountability buddy—someone that is knowledgeable, someone that is persistent in terms of your success, and certainly someone that is going to be with you and take your business to the next level.
Don’t do business in isolation. No great business in the history of business has made their business great because they did it by themselves. They made their business great because they did it with other great people. You know, one of my favorite people, Mr. Tony Robbins, always talks about proximity, and proximity is essentially who you surround yourself with, and that’s where success comes from: not just you—success comes from the people that surround you.
Beautifully said. Thank you so much. And you’ve been doing this now for—how many years have you had the company? Approximately 11, just on 12 years?
Hire A Business Coach Who Has Been Successful For Years
Wow, wow, wow. Yeah, and it’s been an absolute roller‑coaster ride. We’ve—excuse me—we’ve only, you know, become better and better at what we do, and the way that we measure “better” is: Did, in this case, Matthew or did Bert actually get the results that they were looking for? And, you know, a business‑building session—which would be our sessions that we meet with our clients—you know, at the end of every session we’ll ask a very important question: Was this valuable? Are you getting what you need, and are you achieving the results? And, you know, people—some people are polite—said, yes, absolutely. We will go in further by saying, Please explain those results to us; tell us how it’s impacting you. And we use that, Joel, on a regular basis to measure our success, to measure our impact and our effectiveness, and only get better day in and day out.
Beautiful. And I know on the website you offer the profitability quiz, which is beneficial for anyone out there, right? To do that, take the quiz, and then you offer a free strategy session. Could you share a little bit about that?
Yeah, absolutely, and I’ll extend on that profitability quiz as well for you. But the free strategy session is that we provide two hours at no charge for any individual—in person or virtual—that just wants information on, you know, response on their problems, their challenges. We actually do a complete strategic‑planning session with you and for you, a financial analysis, should you wish to include that, and we also include, you know, assessments and evaluations in you as an individual. And what I mean by that is: What gets you up in the morning? What are the things that are creating great success for you that you’re not aware of? And what are the things, naturally, that are holding you back?
And really working that in to where your business is at right now. The ultimate gain is—or aim, I should say—is if that individual or individuals can leave with some seriously beautiful golden nuggets from that session and that’s enough for them and we never talk to them again, then mission accomplished, because it’s an opportunity to provide or give back. If they decide to work with us, great, right? But the free session, the free session is to show people—demonstrate to people—the depth, expertise that we have, but more importantly, to show people who we are and who you might be working with, to make sure that they’re comfortable in working with us.
Beautifully said. Thank you for that. And also, with your area of expertise, again, you’re helping with, you know, increasing profits; there’s also the people‑management aspect of it and the time management. Could you share a little bit about what common factor do all these businesses have in common with kind of what’s going wrong, what’s making them stuck where they are and not advancing? Is there a commonality there?
Increase Efficiencies In Your Business
Oh, for sure. I’m so glad you asked that question, so I’ll go on my soap dish a little bit. Just so—when it comes to time management, you know, where did time management come from? Time management comes from the onset of the Industrial Revolution and, you know, Taylor, who was known as the father of modern‑day business, and it was all about measuring increments, especially in assembly lines, and looking at different ways we could increase efficiencies in business.
So since then, the term “time management,” of course, had gained a ton of traction, and what has happened, you know, unintentionally, is that we manage our lives based on our 60 seconds or 60 minutes or whatever the case may be, which is understandable logically and rationally because we need a construct as humans to determine that, right? The problem is that people manage their 1,444 minutes a day. All right, we all have the same amount of time, yet a lot of us just are not very good, quote‑unquote, time managers. Why is this the case? Because the brain doesn’t manage this, you know, this high‑level abstract term called a second or a minute or an hour or a day. The brain manages tangible, actionable things.
So what we do in Workplace is we like to stir the pot a little bit and say, you know what, time management doesn’t exist; time management is a myth. And, of course, people give us the funny looks, and we say, well, it’s not about time management; it’s about action management, and action management is what is most important and most urgent, right? And the focus is on the actions that are most impactful and profitable for your business. What are those actions going to do?
Time Management Is A Myth
“Well, Bruce, I don’t have enough time to get to all my actions.” Well, then we have to start looking at other components and other techniques that actually take those away from you and allow you to still focus on what is going to give you the most amount of impact or return on investment in your business. And, Joel, we’ve been using this tool and this methodology for years right now, and it’s absolutely liberating when we start to focus and we start to change behavior in a way that actually makes a business more profitable.
And on top of that—you know, when I say profitability, there’s an automatic notion of cash piling up, right, or more money in my bank account—but it’s not the money that’s important. Money is an outcome of action, and this is what we get confused with. Money is an outcome of action, not the success in itself. The actions that you choose to take will produce the reward at the end of the day, and the reward is more money, or the reward—and/or—the reward is time that’s being utilized most effectively that’s giving you the best, greatest bang for your buck. That’s what it is: action management.
Amazing. Well, thank you for that, and, unfortunately, we are out of time, and it’s always a pleasure speaking with you. Thank you for, you know, your advice, your input, and for those of you out there, of course, needing your help, his name is Bruce Baker from Workplaces, our Chief Business Builder, hailing from beautiful Alberta, Canada—I’m still dying to get there, but I haven’t yet.
Workplaces Can Help Your Business
So, 4 Workplaces, again, the name of the company, and we want to thank you for being here today.
Thanks, Jill. Thanks, everybody.
Would you mind sharing your website and contact information?
Absolutely. Please feel free to go to our website: www.4workplaces.com. For your emails, I’d love to see them at info@workplaces.com.
Beautiful. Thank you so much. Pleasure having you here, and we’ll talk again soon.
Looking forward to it. Thanks, Jill. Take care.
Thank you so much. Bye‑bye.
Broadcasting from the business capital of the world, this is the podcast Business News Network.