Meet Adam Liette. Director of Operations for a 7-figure online business and 8 year Army Special Operations veteran. In this episode, Adam takes you into what it really means to be an Operator and how to employ operator tactics into your business.

Learn more at https://www.adamliette.com

Discover the 5 secrets to run your business like a Special Operator: https://www.adamliette.com/sof

Transcript

Hello, my name is Adam Liette. Welcome to my new show smooth operators, so glad to have you on this inaugural episode. So I want to lead off just with the name of the show smooth operator, what exactly is an operator, it's often what's referred to as an operations director, director of operations, something like that, right.

But in my mind, operators very specific and I want to unpack that in this show. So you know, the the lens and the framework that I come from, because it's really going to help explain the next several 100 episodes.

You know, if there's one thing that life has taught us in this last couple of years, really, I mean, it's, nothing's forever, things are going to change.

And everything is subject to that change.

And if you're running a company, if you're running a team, it's only a matter of time before shit hits the fan, period, that's going to happen. And massive action has to be taken during those periods of turmoil in order to survive.

And that's exactly where operator tactics come in.

So where I come from, that phrase means something very specific, and something very different than what I'm meaning it here.

Because operators are literally the leading edge of our entire military, the US military operators are certified badass as I mean, they're given the toughest missions, with little to no guidance, or operational control from higher command over how to accomplish the mission, it's up to them to just get the job done. And that's exactly what I did in the military, especially in my later years.

So I served 12 and a half years active duty Army Special Operations.

For the vast majority of that time, I was specialized in a very specific discipline called psychological warfare. And over the years, I was in the military, I'd end up doing six operational deployments, including going to US embassies going, really literally one guy alone into an airport to meet another guy, to go accomplish my mission, you know, the whole gamut of different types of operations, what I was involved in, and it was great, I really enjoyed it, it was some of the biggest highlights of my life.

And then eventually, I knew how to transition, it was time to leave that part of my life behind and go get a job and be home for a chance I do have a wife and children. So being home was a priority for me.

So in 2018, I started the transition to corporate America. And I say corporate America very loosely because I ended up not going that way, I ended up going more of the entrepreneurial route, where I joined a very small company with the intention of growing it and really embracing the entrepreneurial spirit that you find within a small company.

So I've started off very, very low level, like a social media manager type position. And then was eventually brought out to be the first director of operations for this company. And the first couple years, my new new role, I was never really sure what I was supposed to be doing as the director of operations I didn't, I hadn't made that connection yet between what I used to do and what I was able to do now. I waffled around I did more marketing than anything else, really.

But I never had operational control and direction over what our team was doing.

And then COVID happened.

And really, the period after the world went on lockdown was unlike anything I've ever experienced before, or since it was really incredible. And I look back at that period and the quick transition and how I grew into a different role that was never really designed.

And it's inspired the last 18 months of my life to continue to build my skills and now to share it with you here on this podcast. Because when I came into the civilian world, what I found was I was trying to be just like everyone else, I was reading all the management books, I was listening all the management podcast, but I never felt like I was being authentic.

And it just didn't work for my team.

Nothing that I was being told to do felt natural for me.

So like my team could probably obviously tell I was uncomfortable with with the direction I was giving given them. When COVID happened I circled back to who I actually was internally to who I was supposed to be how I was trained. Because at the end of the day, see operators get a ton of stuff done. With little support or time we get things done by our own sheer will we just make shit happen.

We value relationships and the expertise that everyone in the room brings to the table. We know we're not always the best person for the task and therefore has worked to always surround ourselves with other A players, it can even take it a step further to say, like an operator doesn't even understand someone that's not an A player, we don't understand what makes them tick, we don't know how to motivate them, we don't even know how to work with them.

Because like it's completely against our our programming. One thing that operators do really good is we take the seed of an idea. And we just dive into what it will take to make it a reality, we're able to pull apart all the things that have to go in place to turn that seed into something that's actionable, that because there's a million decisions and steps that are along the way to bringing that to fruition.

An operator is someone who carries with them the wisdom that comes with the with experience, and maturity, it's really about your years in the seat and what you're bringing to the table. And, most importantly, like an operator, someone that can be deployed as a singleton, like you don't need always a team around you to support you or to provide you with direction you, you're trusted to do your job with minimal or no supervision that's really necessary, especially in this dislocated world that we're living in with everyone working remote and not able to see each other I like working in that fashion. It's really important. And the operator is also a quiet professional.

That's really understated. operators don't need validation, we don't feel the need to brag or compare ourselves to others.

We're never going to write a book about what we do.

Because we see that as kind of dirty like it's it's that guy who just stands the middle of the the courtyard and says how great he is like, that's not what we want to do. And matter of fact, if someone compliments us, like it makes us really uncomfortable, because we don't really that's not why we're doing it, we're we're doing the work we're doing because we have the end result in mind. And that's all we're working for.

And so even complimenting a good operator will make him super uncomfortable. You'll see it in their face if you do it. When I embrace this, when I really dove into this new role that was presented in front of me and I was able to just dive into with both feet. I not only felt like myself again. But everything I was doing to lead my team came smoother, came easier, more natural, my team felt that they responded in a huge way.

It was like, sudden, overnight immediate symmetry.

I was finally being the operator that I trained to be. That's where this podcast really comes in. I'm sharing this podcast, to document my thoughts, the things on my journey, the things that are working for me right here, right now in this business that I'm running, which has grown from 300% Over the last year, we are now a over $1 million company with our head in like a bullet for 2 million this coming year.

Like it's where we're at. And it's it's because not only do we get our marketing, right, but we have the operational stability, to enable our team to make it work to make everything that we're doing inside the company function in the way that we had to to serve our, our members.

So over the course of the show, I'll be going through the real tactical decisions and problems that you're bound to uncover in your business. Matter of fact, if you hear me talking about the show, it's likely something that I just experienced in the very recent timeframe.

So these are directly from my journey, not only as a soft operator, but in the experience of elevating a team through and past the seven figure mark, and we're continuing to grow everything every single day, it'd be real in tactical nature, you're gonna hear stuff on the show and be able to implement it immediately. So gives you the tools to not only grow your business, but also develop the infrastructure and support that you need to be able to survive that growth.

Because that's the understated thing is, is the ability to survive growth when you've grow quickly. My hope is that by sharing this lesson, you'll have a better grasp on how to be the operator that your team needs you to be. Whether you have an operations manager, or handling all of this by yourself as a solopreneur or as the sole CEO of a small company. This will help make you a better leader and head of your organization.

And you'll hear me say this over and over again. It's one of my mantras, and I kind of stole it from the Rangers, but I'm gonna go for it because at the end of the day, hey, operators lead the way. Period operators lead the way. So you're ready to lead. Alright, I hope so. I can't wait to see you next time.

And what we're going to post the shows on there post the show notes and that's exactly where we'll be posting new resource that new resources that I'll be putting up over the coming months and years as I develop the show out. So I can't wait to see you on the next show.


We're gonna continue diving into some of the things that are have been covered over the last couple of years. And I look forward to seeing you then. Alright, have a good one. Yeah, real quick before we bounce out here, I put together a free training on how you can run your business like a special operator through five simple universal truths.