IAM2516 – Founder Helps Professionals Establish Profitable and Rewarding Businesses

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Dennis Schooley Teaser 00:00

I think it's getting close to 160 people now actually working here. And more than half of them are analysts that specialize in each of our different 18 cost categories.

So that the franchisees out there obtaining clients, building relationships, presenting the reports when they're done with our support, working with the clients to get referrals and to get renewals.

All those things that are the fun activity, interactive things that a business person would do, but not sitting in the back room, crunching numbers and, being on hold for three hours with Verizon. We're doing all that.

Intro 00:32

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview?

If so, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

Gresham Harkless 00:59

Hello, hello, hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast, and I have an awesome guest on the show today. I have Dennis Schooley. Dennis, excited to have you on the show.

Dennis Schooley 01:06

Well, thanks so much for having me. I'm very pleased to be here.

Gresham Harkless 01:09

Yes, I'm super excited to have you on and Dennis is doing so many awesome things.

So, of course, before we jump in and have that phenomenal conversation, I want to read a little bit more about Dennis so you can hear about some of those awesome things.

And a chartered accountant by trade, Dennis founded Schooley Mitchell 25 years ago.

He has years of franchise experience helping to establish profitable and rewarding businesses for professionals of all types throughout North America.

He is directly responsible for providing franchise candidates with information throughout the qualification process, allowing each candidate to make an informed business decision about joining Schooley-Mitchell.

Dennis also has a passion for sales and marketing and has led the development of Schooley-Mitchell's initial training for new franchisees as well.

Dennis loves baseball, spending time with his children and grandchildren when he's not assisting in the management of Schooley Mitchell.

And one of the things I absolutely loved before preparing and jumping into this interview is I read and heard a little bit more on how and why Dennis started Schooley Mitchell and realizing that that entrepreneurial spirit was in him as much as it is in the franchisees I'm sure that you ultimately kind of work with.

And I was reading some numbers that says the concept that led to Schooley Mitchell in the early 2000s, which now has served over 26,000 clients and has saved over $380 million for these businesses.

So, Dennis, excited to have you on the show. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

Dennis Schooley 02:29

I am, except it's now 320 franchises and over a billion dollars in savings.

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Gresham Harkless 02:37

Wow, you gotta love that. You gotta put a B on that. That changes everything, right?

Dennis Schooley 02:41

Yep, it does.

Gresham Harkless 02:42

Absolutely. Well, to kind of kick everything off, I know I touched on it a little bit, but let's rewind the clock, hear a little bit more on how you got started, what I call your CEO story.

Dennis Schooley 02:50

Yeah, maybe before I say how we started this, I should talk about what the business is. That might provide a little more clarity for the listeners, if that's okay.

What we do here at Schooley Mitchell is we're cost reduction consultants. And when I say we, I mean each of our consultants, each of our franchisees is helping businesses reduce their costs.

All those sort of things that are below the gross margin line, you know. Things that really cause death by a thousand cuts for most businesses because they're very difficult to pay attention to and have expertise in.

So that's what we do. And so the reason I thought that would be relevant before I talk about how did we get started, maybe that gives a little grounding in that.

So as you mentioned, Gresh, I'm an accountant, a CPA, hopefully my personality doesn't apply that. But anyway, that's my background.

But I started my own accounting firm when I was 28. Because as you said, I did have an entrepreneurial spirit and left Pricewaterhouse to do that at that age, because I just wanted to make my own decisions.

But as we developed, I've always been a business development sort of guy. So we got into things like computer consulting and management consulting, even sports consulting, and as a result, our own costs started going up.

Well, we knew we were growing, we were traveling more, and of course that's gonna cause, at the time, it was just telecom that we were looking at, and of course we knew why, but we didn't really know why.

So we asked one of our programming people to write some fairly rudimentary script at the time to sort of help us identify why did our costs go up.

So when we looked at it, we realized we were paying 30% more than we should. And we thought, well, aren't we stupid?

And then we went, wait a minute here. If we're stupid, probably our 700 accounting clients are stupid too.

I say that tongue in cheek, of course, but what I'm saying? We figured everybody was overpaying for these expenses that were very confusing.

In fact, as we've dubbed it Confuseology, which is perpetrated by the telecom companies on the rest of the world.

But at any rate, that's really how we started. And one of our big clients at the time was a franchise company and we learned a lot about franchising through that relationship.

So it really all kind of came together through Providence. That's how we got started from doing debits and credits to doing what we're doing today.

Gresham Harkless 05:04

Yeah, absolutely. I appreciate you giving that context and explaining exactly what you do because that does kind of explain everything as far as like why you're doing it.

Because I imagine there's so many people that listen to this that probably have maybe signed a contract or set up some type of agreement.

And probably have never looked at or evaluated that and maybe since it was actually signed.

Dennis Schooley 05:26

Well, and it's very difficult. I mean, a lot of these costs, we now do 18 different cost categories.

We started with one 25 years ago, but we now do 18. And mostly because they're confusing.

They're not as simple as they look like they should be. And there's a lot of criteria that goes into actually getting them to be priced right and to be used right.

That's what we do is, and like I mentioned before, all those things below the gross margin line, companies themselves are good at managing their sales, managing their direct inputs.

We're the ones that are going to look at all that stuff that really isn't important in its own right, any one of them.

But when you add them all together, like I said, it's death by a thousand cuts if you don't manage it properly.

Gresham Harkless 06:04

Yeah, absolutely. And so I know we talked a little bit around the client standpoint, but I would also love to hear from a franchisee's perspective, like, how does it work for those franchisees?

Do they have to know, the 18 costs categories, the opportunities, like how does it work for them if they might be interested in something like this?

Dennis Schooley 06:21

No, absolutely not. And, hen we first started, we did teach our franchisees how to do the telecom analysis, but it was quite a mess within about three months. Some people were good at it.

Some people weren't. Some people hated it. And, consistency is really important. So we centralize all the analysis. And that's, we have, I think it's getting close to 160 people now actually working here.

And more than half of them are analysts that specialize in each of our different 18 cost categories so that the franchisees out there obtaining clients, building relationships, presenting the reports when they're done with our support, working with the clients to get referrals and to get renewals.

All those things that are the fun activity, interactive things that a business person would do, but not sitting in the back room crunching numbers and being on hold for three hours with Verizon.

We're doing all that. Now, we do teach them the basics of each cost category so they can talk about it.

With their prospects and their clients, but they do not have to have a degree of knowledge beyond just cursory.

Gresham Harkless 07:21

Yeah, that ends up being such a huge thing because again, you get to be your superpower, your secret sauce when you're able to kind of lean into that.

And I imagine that ends up being something that's good in a great economy and a not so great economy and everything in between where you always are looking for an opportunity to be able to kind of cut costs or create savings.

Dennis Schooley 07:36

Well, you make a good point there. I mean, in a bad economy, we're actually even more valuable to our clients.

You think of inflation or pandemic or recession or the tariffs and all the effects that they're having. Our franchisees are more valuable to their clients because what do you have to do in a time like that? You've got to cut costs.

Well, that's what we do. And we don't charge money to do it. So we're sort of a savior in a sense in those bad environments.

Gresham Harkless 08:00

Yeah, absolutely. I would definitely add that to the secret sauce as well as who ends up being such a huge thing to be able to kind of provide and be that savior to these entrepreneurs and business owners.

Dennis Schooley 08:09

Yep.

Gresham Harkless 08:10

Absolutely. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack.

So this could be like an app, a book, or even a habit that you have, but what's something you lean on that makes you more effective and efficient?

Dennis Schooley 08:22

Well, I guess it wouldn't be a book. It would be reading and acquiring knowledge. I mean, I don't want to sound luxury here, but I have been a reader my entire life.

I say in our own training classes, I say to everybody, if you're going to be in business for yourself, I think you should read a business book every single month.

And I certainly have usually three or four of them on the go at any one time because I get so far and then I compliment it with something else.

I really think that yearn for lifelong learning is really, I think what I would say would be the hack. If you become too comfortable and you stayed in your position, you're not going to grow.

So I guess you're asking me for a hack, it would be to continue to read and not just business books either, maybe personal improvement books and things like that as well.

I think, being a healthy and smart and happy person helps you in business as well. So all that's important too.

Gresham Harkless 09:18

Yeah. And so being such a huge thing. So what would you consider to be a little bit more of what I like to call a CEO nugget?

So this could be a word of wisdom or piece of advice. I like to say it might be something you would tell your favorite client, or if you hopped into a time machine, you might tell your younger business self.

Dennis Schooley 09:33

Well, if we're talking about running a business, I mean, business makes the world go round, right?

I mean, it really does. There's whatever values business creates, it allows for all the other things out there, like the arts and the sciences and things. I mean, if business is not there, those things cannot exist.

I remember in my last year of university that I had a prof say that to me, and it's stuck with me ever since because business makes the world go round.

And I guess the thing that I would say is to, if you're going to be in business, do it with passion and do it with compassion. It's really about that.

And if you can bring those two things together, I think you'll be successful because that keeps you driving forward. I don't know if that's really a nugget or not, but it's what I've got.

Gresham Harkless 10:17

Yeah. I mean, it's a huge thing. And I think when, sometimes when you're trying to figure out, because there's always ups and downs, there's ebbs and flows to the businesses.

And I think when you don't have anything, it feels like left in the tank. Sometimes it's the passion. that is the thing that kind of keeps you going.

And I feel like that compassion is also such a big part because I think it's being aware of what's happening outside of you, what's happening outside of your organization.

And I think having that compassion, that awareness of self, but also of others ends up being such a huge thing to kind of fuel the business, but also fuel the innovation as we kind of talked about as well.

Dennis Schooley 10:51

You're right. I mean, understanding what your clients need, understanding what your franchisees need, understanding what your employees need.

Really, we've even established a sustainability initiative here where we just started about eight months ago, planting trees for every client we get.

Well, in every new franchisee we get, in every referral we get, we've planted more than 2,000 trees in the last six months. And I don't know, I never thought about that before.

We're proud of that. We're proud of what we've created business-wise for our franchisees, for our employees, and even for that. That's what I mean, passion and compassion.

Gresham Harkless 11:27

Yeah, absolutely. And I love what you said around that business makes the world go around because I think so many times we forget about what fuels those things.

I remember even during the recession, one of the big reasons that happened is because it affected so many small businesses and they were hit the hardest.

And because they were hit the hardest, it hit the economy the hardest. So I love what you said.

And of course, everything you all are doing, because you're helping to empower, be the superheroes for these businesses, for these organizations so that they can Like you said, so we'll make the world go around.

Dennis Schooley 11:56

No, you're right. And I mean, in a time like that, where there is a recessionary pressure, it tends to get multiplied by our own beliefs, our confirmation bias, and our group bias, and all those things come into play.

And we then act differently, which doesn't mitigate it propagates the problem. And so we're the ones that are trying to be the anti-propagators, if that makes any sense.

So we're trying to get to them, we can give them some more resources, maybe save a job, maybe get that new software you need, or have a Christmas party, whatever it is. That's what we want to do for that client. That's the value we bring.

Gresham Harkless 12:29

Yeah. And that's such a powerful thing because I think that, you always hear about starting the business.

You want to make sure, the accounting, the marketing, all those things are done.

But I always say we forget about the human part, the people part of business. So is that how or how would you look at defining like being a CEO from your perspective?

Dennis Schooley 12:48

Well, I think, first of all, there's a tremendous amount of pride that both Beth and I have in what we've built here, because 25 years ago was just dust.

It was just an idea that came from, as I described earlier, and now it's become, this 32,000 clients that we've saved a billion dollars, and they've used that money for their purposes.

It's become 340 franchises, roughly, that are building a business out there because of what we've created. And 150 employees, 160 employees, earning a living, supporting all of that. It's just a really cool thing.

So when you take that much pride in something that you've been creating, I think that's really the definition of what a CEO should be.

And I guess we're co-CEOs, the two of us, but we both have the same level of pride in terms of what this has become. And we have bigger visions yet too.

Gresham Harkless 13:37

Yeah, absolutely. Well, we definitely love hearing about those big visions. And again, like you talked around, it was just dust, just the idea of what this could end up being and how it just snowballs from there.

But you said so well, that impact that it has, by having another franchisee, what that impact does, by having another business that you're able to create those segments, what that does.

And it just creates that that, I guess, cyclical impact where, you know, people continue to kind of see the benefit and impact of everything that you're doing.

Dennis Schooley 14:07

Yeah. I mean, there's a tremendous amount of pride when you see someone that becomes a franchise and they change their life and not just their life, maybe their entire family's life.

Not everybody does that because you got to work at the business to make it work. But when we see that happen, wow, that's a pretty cool thing to know that you were a party to that.

Couldn't happen without them. but maybe it couldn't happen without us either.

Gresham Harkless 14:28

Yeah, it takes that symbiotic relationship for everything to definitely go to that next level. So truly appreciate that definition, Dennis.

And of course, I appreciate your time even more. So what I wanted to do now was pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know.

And of course, how best people can get ahold of you, find out about all the awesome things you and your team are working on.

Dennis Schooley 14:49

In terms of getting a hold of us, www.schooleymitchell.com is really how you're going to get a hold of us through the website.

Certainly, we've got an 800 number, we've got everything. So if somebody's interested in a franchise opportunity, it would be just fd@schoolymitchell.com and then we will follow up right away to determine, is there a match and what are you looking for and do we have that?

So that's about all I've got. Although I can talk forever if you've got more questions.

Gresham Harkless 15:20

Hey, we definitely have to have you back on as you start to crush those ambitious goals that you have again and again and again.

We'll have to have you back again and again and again on the show to see how that growth has happened.

But Dennis, truly appreciate your time. Of course, I appreciate all the awesome things that you're doing.

Of course, we'll have the links and information in the show notes as well, too, so that everybody can follow up with you.

But I think so many times it can just become fodder. It doesn't become real where you say, hey, I want to be win-win and I want to create opportunities.

But I love what you're doing because it's embedded in everything that you're doing. You can hear it, and the work that you guys have been able to accomplish and the things that you've been able to do.

And I think when you start to really not think lose-win or win-win, you get to have that abundant mentality and really great innovations can kind of come from there. So thank you so much for doing that.

Thank you even more for what that represents. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Dennis Schooley 16:10

Well, thank you so much. And again, thanks so much for having me.

Outro 16:13

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by CB Nation and Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co. I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community.

Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and everywhere you listen to podcasts. Subscribe and leave us a five-star rating. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

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