Michael Bice
MEMBER NAME
Michael Bice
COMPANY
Vortex Engineering
INDUSTRIES
Precision Fabrication
Michael Bice, President of Vortex Engineering
THE CHALLENGE
After 23 years of proudly serving in the Navy, Michael was looking for his next adventure when the opportunity to run Vortex Engineering presented itself. Michael was thriled for this next step since his new position at Vortex would be overseeing operations that closely support the Navy—modernizing ships and submarines using metal fabrication and welding.
“I had no idea what I was doing at first. I knew that I wanted this opportunity. And running a company was just an outstanding opportunity to do something more than I was doing and to really stretch myself, stretch my capabilities, all the things I've been doing.”
Michael knew that focusing on family after so many deployments in the Navy was going to be an important part of his new chapter.
So he needed to get really good at leading a company AND prioritizing family—all at the same time. When Michael discovered The Lions Pride, he was intrigued by the 0.01% Journey—Mastery of Business, Life & Self. He decided to join the Cohort and hit the ground running.
Keep reading to learn more about Michael’s successful family and career journey .
THE JOURNEY TO tHE 0.01%
According to Michael Bice
Family First
The Lions Pride allowed me to understand the importance of working with family, being with family, and prioritizing family. We talk about that, but we're really doing it with the tools and the things that we have at The Lions Pride. You know, I have one kid in college now. Another one, senior in high school. Other kid’s in elementary school and another one in high school. So there are a lot of demands for time to go to a kid's soccer, coaching their teams, watching them run track, do all those kind of things. Knowing that those priorities matter and I can't drop them is important. Also, the relationship with my wife is, that's everything, right. Without my wife and my family, I lose a big identity of who I am as a person. I could have a great career but without my family, I don't really have much.
Making it to a meeting. Making it to work on time. Getting to whatever outside of the house is important, whatever obligations those are, if you'd asked me ten years ago, 15 years ago, even five years ago—Hey, these work things are important. I got to. I can't be late. I got to do these things. But, when my son grabbed me and asked me a question, I realized this is an opportunity I can't miss. It doesn't matter what the question was. It doesn't matter how trivial it was. I knew that he was asking a question and that I needed to be present for that question because I may never get this opportunity ever again.
And being caught in the whirlwing of fatherhood, we forget that the kids, they grow, right? And the moment today is not the same as tomorrow. And those times are gone and we'll never have those moments again. I never thought of it that way before The Lions Pride. Now I do try to make those moments count.
The Power of Tactical Advances
I attended my first (Tactical Advance) virtually. And well, I got good information out of the speakers and the Zoom meeting, and I could see people attending and hear all the things that were happening. I knew I was missing a lot. When I attended my first Tactical Advance, I realized there's a lot more there than than just a bunch of lectures. The interaction with the Cohort members and hearing things on the side, what they've been doing, what they've been going through and connecting on a personal level, I realized I missed the interaction with people who are driven to succeed.
That's one thing that that makes makes The Lions Pride really exciting is that I'm surrounding myself with people who are either very successful in their own right or going to be very successful or working to be very successful. So I have the opportunity to learn from those people. But also, when people are rising at a different level, I have the opportunity to help them. Which, you know as anyone knows, when you when teach somebody something, you're learning yourself or confirming that you know something. And there's a lot you can learn by doing that. So that interaction is golden, right? You can't get that by just sitting behind a screen and hearing people and talking and putting a couple of questions on chat.
Michael Bice’s Tools For Success
The One Page Business Plan is certainly the core tool that makes everything work. I thought I had a lot of it dialed in. We did a lot of work in 2015 when we first started—looking at the core, looking at beliefs and things like that. But then I realized there's a lot more that we didn't do, a lot of parts of the One Page Business Plan that offers things like the X-Factor, the hedgehog strategy, the brand.
What really resonated with me is that there's a lot more that we could be doing to get our strategy focused, to get the company focused. That's the fun stuff of the business—the culture, the beliefs, the vision and that's what was was offered with the One Page Business Plan.
Also focusing on where to go, how to focus the company, how to start looking at where we're going and where we need to go. This One Page Business Plan just brought all that into one document and made it very clear and focused.
The One Page Personal Plan focuses on all the personal goals. That's the secret sauce of The Lions Pride, in my opinion. You can talk about business all you want, and everyone has their ways of how to run a business. But focusing on the personal side, I realize there's more than just work to make me more effective at work.
I use that kind of mentality to really personalize and humanize the workplace and get employees to talk about their priorities. We've instituted the Monday morning share out. Everyone shares about what they've done over the weekend or something special that they want to share. It gets us to connect on a better level so that we are doing more than just work. We're working as people.
If you don't have the right people, you're not going to do well in the company or you're going to struggle with one another. Creating a program or a process around hiring A-players is something I was really looking for.
From a Navy perspective or from military perspective, the one thing that we are good at is a process. Follow this. I can follow the recipe. There's a lot to the recipe, obviously, and a lot of things that have to happen around it. But all that structure, all that learning, I think that is one of the things that was vital for me to to understand. Again, I was looking for that, I didn't realize that I couldn't find it. And once I found it through the program, it was really, really helpful.
I think that's really important to the whole process and of all the modules that we've been doing. A-player hiring is the one that people gravitate to and really, really enjoy the most.
Michael Bice at Vortex Engineering.
WHY I JOINED THE COHORT
I'd been working with the company (Vortex) since 2015 and so we were in the sixth year. We had a tough 2020 with Covid, and I realized something needed to change.
I had a business coach but I wasn't really getting out of it what I thought was going to accelerate me. I knew there was something missing and the people I was surrounded by weren't challenging me, weren't making me better. So I started getting these emails from The Lions Pride.
When I got those emails, I said, well, let's take a look at these tools. And I started looking at the free tools. Then I went to one of the free events, an OPBP workshop. And I was like, Yes, there's something here. There's more than just talk. There's something here. And then I said, well, you know, let's get a meeting scheduled with Bill.
My philosophy all along has been I'm humble enough to know I don't know everything. I'm constantly looking for ways to grow and to seek out more information. The Lions Pride was an opportunity and I said, this looks right. Why wait? There's no reason to wait. I need to get in. I need to start learning about this. This is an opportunity to accelerate the company and in a way that we should be going.
I always had this philosophy that I have to give everything an opportunity that looks promising. Otherwise, I'll be in this this sense of regret. Oh, should I have? Should I not have? Why wait? Why not get it done and just act on it?
Watch Michael talk about his acceleration journey with Bill Watkins below.
“The type of people that gravitate to The Lions Pride are extremely talented and driven people that want to succeed. Surrounding yourself with these kinds of people will only make you better. There’s a a unknown, unwritten ethos of hard work, integrity and doing the right thing. And being surrounded by people who are doing those kind of things is exciting, is refreshing, and is encouraging. It’s fun. It’s exciting. It’s inspiring. But it’s a lot of work, right? It’s not a free ride. And it’s not easy, but it’s worth it. ”
“Not only do you not have to do it all, you shouldn’t do it all. There’s no human on the planet that can scale a business and do it all. Somewhere, there’s going to be a sacrifice, and it usually ends up to be either you, your health, or your relationships.”
