John Hamon
MEMBER NAME
John Hamon
COMPANY
Fortimize
INDUSTRY
Fintech
THE CHALLENGE
In the fall of 2017, after a few years of decent growth, John found his company at an impasse. With a ragtag team and everyone doing their absolute best, John realized that his company was personality-driven instead of process-driven, with obvious leadership gaps and a lack of operating rhythms and structures.
Like most visionary entrepreneurs, John struggled with implementation and execution, so he set out to find a coach and a framework that could help bring his big ideas to life.
THE JOURNEY TO tHE 0.01%
According to John Hamon
PUT A PLAN IN WRITING
What you write down, the commitments that you make—they carry psychic weight and power. The One Page Business Plan is tremendous because it says, “Here’s what we’re all about” one critical column at a time.
Then you work from there—what does that mean for this quarter? And the next and the next? You still eat the elephant but in sashimi-sized bites.
It’s amazing what you can get done when you aren’t overwhelmed—and you know exactly where to start.
IDENTIFY AND HARNESS YOUR X-FACTOR
Fortimize is a professional services company. We don’t have any intellectual property or pharmaceutical patents. All we have is our people and the knowledge they possess.
We created the BOK—Book of Knowledge—as a framework to capture, distill, template, and accelerate this experience. All we had to do was build it and make it available—our team fills and adds and improves it as we go.
Now it’s our X-factor, our ability to replicate what makes us successful.
John Hamon with fellow Cohort Members
CHOOSE WHO ADDS TO YOUR LEGACY
When you get started, you kind of have to take who comes along—both with clients and contributors. This is the dating phase that is hard to avoid—and it’s critical to discovering who you are, what you want, and where you are willing to commit.
Once you get to a certain level of success, you get to choose who gets to be part of the experience. This is how you build a legacy.
A high-functioning team is capable of protecting itself just like an animal in survival mode. We can respond to threats that no one can forecast. Mike Tyson says, “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”
Don’t just build a team based on the skills you currently need—build a team based on natural behaviors, aptitudes, and chemical fit. A-Players will rise to any occasion. You won’t have to wait for disaster to strike to learn what you’re made of—success will tell you, too.
“It’s really important to differentiate between activity and progress. You can be busy doing a LOT of stuff, but if it’s not helping try to get where you want to go, it’s not progress.
Be a laser beam, not a light bulb.”
Live Event, July 2019, Watkins Ranch
WHY I JOINED THE COHORT
Two friends already participating in the Cohort told me that Bill was the real deal, so I met with him.
This wasn’t just “talk” or “attaboys”. I didn’t need a pat on the head and encouragement to get back out on the field.
What I needed were plays to execute. Bill had all the tools in the toolbox. They were concrete. They were actionable. That’s all it took for me to jump in.
Watch John Hamon's full interview with Bill Watkins.
“It’s possible that you’ll get where you want to go doing what you’ve always done. But what if you could get there 5 years earlier and without as much gray hair? What if you did things smart instead of hard?
That’s what you do with The Lions Pride.
”
“I want to lead powerful people from wild places so they can achieve big, clear, and impactful outcomes. It’s hard to make an impact from three feet off the ground—our goal is to pull Founder CEOs out from the tangle and above it so they can widen their blast radius.”
