Welcome And Why This Topic

Rob 0:00

Welcome to the Van Rien Compliance Podcast with Rob and Don. We help growing teams reduce risks, build trust, and stay audit ready without the overwhelming. Hello and welcome back to the Van Rien Compliance Podcast. I'm Rob. And I'm Don. And Don, we have a special episode today, right? We do. Um it's a big week here for the Van Buster X here, or the Van Rines, whatever we've been called both. We want to talk about what sending our son to college means for us this week and what that has taught us about leadership. Correct.

Dawn 0:32

Yes.

Rob 0:33

The big one. You sound excited.

Dawn 0:38

It seems very surreal. That's why. Yes.

Rob 0:41

It's very surreal. It's uh Ethan is 18 and he is heading off to Baylor up in Waco. And we're very proud of him and very excited. Uh, and when we were putting together our our podcast script for the week, Don and I are like, well, why don't we just have a little more of a personal note, a little bit more of a personal podcast, and really kind

The College Transition Feels Surreal

Rob 1:00

of dive into what you know in the last 18 years has meant to us, but also um talk about what how has this taught us about leadership uh and not just about compliance, but at leadership and business and leadership in personal life and what that really looks like. But um boy, it has gone quick in 18 years, huh?

Dawn 1:17

It has gone very quick, right before our eyes. But I will tell you the days leading up to him leaving from the minute he graduated high school to now, which has been he graduated May 24th, I think. Yeah. So these last few months, you can see we can see the progression of ready to go. He's ready to go. Um and the other cool part of that is it is also prepared us too, but is watching him preparing and making his decisions. And this is when you start to see what you've taught your kid and what they've taken to heart, basically. So you you watch your kid, he either does things that you taught him to do or he does the opposite. In our case, so far today, he's actually doing things that he learned from us or watched us doing, or you know, he's making decisions that he he's making good choices and good decisions. And so it's really fun watching this transition, if you will, um, in the last couple months.

Rob 2:31

Yep. Yeah, and it's it's been well, it's a whole year for for listeners that other kiddos go to school, uh, you know, go to college, it's it's uh or university, depends where you are in the world. Um, it's like a whole year transition, but the last few months have been been monumental. You know, there's so much documentation and you know, all the applications, and then you got to stay on track with the timing and stuff. And that's part of the test too. They're like, if you can manage this, then like, okay, you can manage your schedule. But it's really neat to see that transition and watching the kids become independent and uh everything that we've learned and that that from him, and then what um what we've taught him about how to be a young man uh in today's world and give him the guardrails of what to do and what not to do, but also give him the grace to fail and fail forward, which is really important. And that's kind of one of the leadership skills that we've always, you know, really looked at and we're we're really have done ourselves. You know, we failed multiple times, um, but you fail forward and you learn from that and you get better and you fine-tune the process or you fine-tune the business or fine-tune the relationships, anything like that, and really making sure that you know how to how to do that. Um, and it's be exciting for him to fail multiple times between now and Thanksgiving, because that's like the first big chunk, right? Just get to Thanksgiving, get to November.

Dawn 3:46

Well, and it's fun to watch him take on leadership isms, I guess. Um he he's learned from us watching us build a business and with him being involved in band um and having leaders around him, being involved in 4-H, um, being around and knowing how to uh correspond with adults and that type of thing. It is seeing him through all this and watching him become be become a young man and be a man, young man in front of us. And it's like, wow, it it just it feels like it's overnight, it happens. But uh, I mean, this is what you do, you know, and then you say, Okay, it looks like I've equipped you with what you need, and now it's time for you to go out and make mistakes. It's because you will make mistakes. I mean, he will make mistakes. We all made mistakes, but that's how you learn. But uh, yeah, it it's fun to watch. It's fun to watch. Um, he's very organized like me. So he has his lists, he has his reminders of this and that, and I need this, whatever for his dorm room. And he he's very good at it. So he's uh now it just feels like it's a waiting game because we've kind of got everything done, but it's it's pretty exciting. It's pretty exciting.

Rob 5:02

So do you have to pack though? I keep telling him you gotta pack.

Dawn 5:06

It there's piles. There, there's a few piles, and and yes, it needs to get all together and then needs to get in the

Guardrails Beat Micromanagement

Dawn 5:12

car.

Rob 5:12

So and and you know, watching him make his own decisions, yeah. You think about leadership and business and in life, right? I think about how we equipped our team to be able to make decisions. You give them the tools uh and you give them the knowledge, you give them the guardrails. Yes, we don't have to rely on the SOPs and all those massive manuals that we're all told to do. We found you hire the right people, they already come equipped knowing the guidelines. Uh, when you hire the wrong people, that's when you need all the policies and all the dark different SOPs and all this. Now, some people will probably disagree with me, but we've seen both sides of that. And you get the right people there, and then you're able to say, okay, here's the guardrail. This is what you do, go, go do it. Um, and then off they go. And it's just a such a better, pleasant environment when you get the right people in. Because I think we've can also say we've had the wrong people, but you want the people that can make their own decisions and doesn't need to go looking for mom and dad, right? Look for ro Rob and Don on every little thing and make sure that uh that they can make the decisions and empower the people to do that. You know, if, like, for example, empower your empower your people to send gifts if there's a say if there's a wedding or there's a birth or there's a death in the in a family of a of a client. Um, you know, empower your team to say, take care of them, nurture them, live on them, and then make sure that they're set. Um, a lot of leaders don't don't relinquish that control. Um, you have to let go to grow and be able to um build yourself and build a business, which is really key and important.

Dawn 6:44

Which is in line with um when we went to orientation is the professors saying you need to let your kid do their thing. And if they call home and want to come home, you say no. You need to stay, and this is why. And you know, and um you you give them the tools, you give them, you have that conversation with them that's gonna be hard. You're gonna fail a test probably. Yeah, um, you're gonna have to make a decision. Do you drop a class? But if you prepare your kid and and you they know what to do and who to go to, um and these colleges nowadays are they have so many resources. It's amazing actually. But it's kind of funny. I was we were sitting in a big room with hundreds of parents because they split the parents up and the kids up in these orientation sessions, if you will. And the funny part about it is I was like, I feel like it's kindergarten. Remember the the don't cry. What was it?

Rob 7:37

The boohoo breakfast or something like that.

Dawn 7:40

I think it was like it was, yeah, to get you prepared for watching your, you know, for your kid to go to kinder. And I was like, it it seems like the same thing, but obviously years later. Uh, what is that 15 years later, th whatever, 13 years later. Um, but that's what I felt like. So it's like, okay, now we're at another season. So it's it is just another season, such as business. Business runs into hit its seasons as well. You have busy seasons, you have seasons of, oh goodness, uh, we nothing's coming in. Um, you have seasons of kind of retooling, um, all different seasons. And I I think that's you know, that's what college is too. You, you'll, you know, different seasons he'll he'll run into of of different things. I want to do this, oh, I thought I wanted to do this, maybe I don't want to do this, or you know, whatever. But again, it's it's all about empowering them with the right tools. And again, it's whether it's your child or it's your team, that is really the key, is just empowering them.

Rob 8:41

Yep. Yep. And l and listening, you know, but also trusting, trusting in, and in how you raise the kiddo, right? Or trusting how you've guided the team. Uh, and and I think that's where that real leadership connection really is, is you know, we've talked about the mistakes, um, but the roles are going to change from, you know, really saying you could do this or that to saying, you know what, you go do that and see what happens. Go go ha, you know, go do that, you know, um, drive yourself to school, park your car there, take care of that. You need to go to you need to go run an error, run an error. You and you have your schedule and you have you're responsible to be in class and banned, you know, which is which is helpful because it's very structured. It has to be just like a sport, music, sport, uh, arts, any of that is very structured. And I think that's really helped. Helped a lot. Um, but it's it's really about, you know, leadership really isn't about making every decision. I think it's really about guiding um the team towards the top of that mountain where they know the right decision, they know what to do and how to get there. And and and the decisions they need to make. Um, it's not everything coming you know across our data desk. It's really about making sure that we have built independence for them and that they feel independent, they can go do do what they need to do and and empower, like you said. Yeah.

Dawn 10:03

And and let them make mistakes. We're all human. Even bots make mistakes, honestly. No. We're talking about AI bots.

Rob 10:12

All correct.

Dawn 10:13

Yeah, no, they do. Um, make them let them make mistakes. I I I believe that we learn the most when we've failed or made a mistake. That's where the learning comes in. And we have to. We have to, we have to have those happen. So, but again, you can empower your people, your child with, okay, you're gonna make mistakes, but if you do, you need it's how you really react. How are you gonna react to it? What what solutions do you have? Ask, you know, we always ask our team, okay, if this isn't working, what's your solution? Come back with some solutions. Um bring a problem, I'll bring me a solution. We don't want to fix things for people unless we we know maybe there's a fix, uh, you know, oh wait, this is the fix. Uh unless we know for sure it's like a this widget fixes this or whatever. But honestly, you want you want even your kid, what's your solution? What do you what do you think you should do? Um, empowering them. Again, help, you know, you don't make the decision for them, you don't make their bed for them, you don't do your laundry for them. They need to do it and figure it out. So it's not the way you do it. That's okay. Let them figure out their way. Within the guardrails, obviously, there's certain things you have to have to do a certain way. Uh, you know, laundry can be done many different ways, but um, but you have to wash the laundry before you dry the laundry. So, yes, you have to tell them that.

Mistakes Plus Solutions Build Leaders

Rob 11:32

It doesn't work the other way.

Dawn 11:33

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Rob 11:34

Um, and there's that difference between, you know, being in being available and being in control. Um you don't need to control everything. You just need to be available. Yeah, and so examples of that is like we meet every Monday and and the team goes through the top three, you know, items that go through their rocks for the week and make sure everybody's dialed in and we meet and and uh team meetings are great. I like them Monday mornings, 10 a.m. and off we go, and we know what we're working on the week. And as we go through the week, you know, there's there's Slack, there's huddles, there's quick conversations to make sure everybody's uh on track. But when you have that cadence um and you know what's expected on the first of the week, that's uh really to me it's about being available, you know, being available for that hour and a half every week, knowing that everything is exactly what it needs to be and everybody's doing exactly what they need to do, and getting people, letting people make those mistakes without that judgment piece. You know, I always try to it's hard. Um, I think as humans really want to always blame the person. Well, what you and I have learned is let's blame the process or the problem first, right? You know, is there a process issue? Is there a is there an information issue? And then it's like, oh, okay, you know, if it happens repeatedly, then yes, it could be an HR-related issue, but we need to first take a look at the process of the problem and try to resolve that and dive

Compliance Depends On Daily Decisions

Rob 12:54

in. Yeah.

Dawn 12:54

And Rob, what's the what's the compliance parallel to this kind of in talking about? Compliance parallel? Yes, I know. I know.

Rob 13:04

Well, you can't just throw the old compliance officer behind every employee, right? You you need to educate your team. You need from a compliance perspective, you know, be it HIPAA compliance or maybe it's SOC or it's ISO, it's Hitrust, it's it's anything, GDPR, um, any of those platforms, any of those environments, any of those structures, you need to make sure that people can make the right decision. Um, because employees make hundreds of decisions a day. But then make sure when you make that decision, are you sending that decision through a compliance framework? You know, are you sending it through with that compliance security at the forefront of your mind? Because it's important to ensure that that the decision you make, be it a maybe it's a technical decision, maybe it's an HR decision or whatever it is, that you know what, I'm gonna make this and I already have my compliance hat on. But if I don't have all the details, I know to go to the compliance officer or to that CISO on board or to Van Rien right here. Um, we do a lot of consulting from not just the auditing, but just giving guidance on technology and and what they need to do. So that's kind of that parallels because really the policies and training, that's not enough. You know, I think we know that. It's just you can write down the speed limit, but not everybody's gonna follow it. Yep. So what are you gonna do?

Dawn 14:20

Yep. Or my favorite one is doing the right thing is are you gonna put the grocery cart back in the grocery cart bin or are you just gonna leave it out there on the curb for the little kids to come out and get because you're too lazy and you think it's not your job. That drives me crazy.

Rob 14:40

Make good decisions when nobody is watching. There you go. That is actually one of our interview questions. And that's what we've taught our son. And um, if you're on the Van Rien team, if you don't put the buggy back, you're not gonna be on the Van Rien team.

Dawn 14:52

Yeah.

Rob 14:53

That tells so much about the character of the person that you're interviewing. Um, so I would say is that compliance parallel and leadership takeaway is like, hey, in your next interviews, say, what do you do with the grocery cart when you're done?

Dawn 15:05

Tell me.

Rob 15:06

You know, where does it go?

Dawn 15:07

Or if they're yeah, yeah. Would you pick up that piece of trash? Yeah. Simple.

Rob 15:12

Have some have some integrity and take that extra step. Because if you're going to do that in your personal life, then you're definitely doing your professional life.

Dawn 15:18

And and this too, talking about compliance, policies and training aren't enough. You know, you can someone can read training pol can read policies, someone can read a book about this or that, someone could train, take a training module, but are they implementing it? Are they doing it? So, you know, that that's a thing too, is what if you you tell your kid 12 times a day to do something, he never does it. Well, you probably should maybe change the way you're telling him. And, you know, um, or you know, maybe the task isn't the right task for him, kind of like an employee. So, you know, it it's really just having those conversations and and really just this is what I need, this is what I need you to do, here's the tools, and you'll really find out if they, you know, can or can't do it. And if they're like struggling, say, well, well, hey, what's the solution then? If you're not gonna do it this way that I, you know, had asked you to do or the way in the manual, right? Then what's the solution? How how are we gonna get it done? And and that's a fun thing too about about a team, and we have a small team, so we can do this a little bit more easily than you know a team of a thousand, but just like, hey, what do you guys have any ideas? You know, how how do you think you should do it? You know? What do you think is the best, the best choice, the best solution, the best decision? And and we also do the same with Ethan. It's like, what do you think you should do? What what do you think? You know, and what direction you're gonna go. Yeah. And and give them a voice, you know, um to so you can have that conversation.

Rob 16:50

Yeah, because then you know, whatever decision he makes or even our team makes, um, they know that we're here if um for guidance. But they also know to come to us with a solution. Don't just come to the problem, bring a solution. If we need to re-engineer the solution, that's fine. Um, we can do that. But you need to set you need to put some kind of skin in the game, right? Put some structure in the game and go, okay, I need to come up with a solution for a uh call mom or dad. And before I go to Robin Dawn from a business perspective, because they need to know that we're here, but we're not gonna fix all this the problems. That's why we hired you. Or that's why we have given you um, you know, our kiddo, we've prepared him for the road, uh, not just prepare the road for him. I think a lot of parents are still the, let's see, what were they, helicopter parents, or there's some new term now.

Dawn 17:39

Yeah, there was a new term we heard the other day. I can't remember it.

Rob 17:42

I remember obviously it wasn't us, I don't remember. Um so it's not about preparing the road that he goes on, preparing the road even for employees. It's about how we prepare him or prepare the employees for the road, right? Do they have the tools, the tool belt? You give them everything you need. And if not, you know where to go. And teaching those boundaries and and coaching them and then trusting them to go, you know what, go off. Do your thing. Enjoy life. Get some pizza at 2 a.m. So you feel like in the morning.

unknown 18:11

Yeah.

Dawn 18:11

And go meet, go meet some some people.

Rob 18:14

Yeah.

Dawn 18:14

Meet a bunch of different kinds of people.

Rob 18:17

Go meet people.

Dawn 18:18

Have discussions on what they think. Why do they think the what the way they think, what you know, be around some different people, different mindsets, different from different places, you know, learn from them or don't learn from them, you know. Depends on what what it is. Um and yeah, and just really just see see what's out there, you know. With Ethan, he can always call mom and dad. And with your staff, they can always ask you as a leader, as a manager, as a supervisor. Um, but again, we need to make sure that we are empowering them, kids and employees, to come up with a solution. What do you think we should do and have a discussion and let them let them figure it out? Um, and and don't always do things for them.

Rob 19:03

Yeah, that's definitely it. And most importantly, right, what's he gonna do? Call your mother. Make sure he calls every week. That's a given.

Dawn 19:15

I won't I won't text too much. I won't do it, I won't be that mom.

Rob 19:18

No.

Dawn 19:19

So

Set Expectations Then Trust

Dawn 19:20

no. Yeah, they tell you too that they say set an expectation of what do you think your your grade should be your first semester? And then, you know, ask them that, and then how often do you think that you should be contacting your kid? Like set set that expectation with them. Just, you know, hey, should we check in every Sunday? Hey, should we, you know, what what's an acceptable grade, you know, and you know, ask them what they think. Oh, I B pluses or whatever it is, you know, and um just so everyone is on the same page and kind of knows. So I it anyway, it was it was very good pointers. Like I said, I felt like I was, you know, sending my kid off to kindergarten again. But uh um we're just a little bit older than that. But it it's just funny, but uh it it has so many parallels being a parent, being being a a leader and managing staff, so many parallels to it. It it's it's really funny. So this was this was a very um that's why we decided to talk about this because it just was very a very good good timing. Um it just kind of relates this week. So as we as we prepare.

Rob 20:24

So as we prepare. Yeah, and with that, we just thank everybody for joining us this week. Just kind of uh wanted to pull back the curtain on the old Van Rien uh world here and um talk about the parallels of send our kid off to college and leadership. So I thank you guys for joining us, and I hope to join you next week. Until then, bye bye.

Dawn 20:44

Bye bye.