IM Landscape Growth Podcast

Sergi: Landscaping CEO’s Secret to Growth: Fixing the Leader Bottleneck

Episode Summary

Landscapes by D&J CEO Tiffany Sergi breaks down the primary growth constraint for entrepreneurs in the green industry—the leader becoming the bottleneck—and details how she scaled her company to $4M+ by relentlessly focusing on culture, implementing authentic core values with a $20 weekly incentive, and overcoming imposter syndrome by hiring her weaknesses.

Episode Notes

TimestampTopic
01:04From Hobby to CEO: Tiffany Sergi's journey to leading Landscapes by D&J after quitting nursing school to take over the business.
02:27The Primary Growth Constraint: Leaders themselves being a bottleneck is the biggest thing holding entrepreneurs back in the green industry.
03:10Changing Culture: How self-reflection and implementing core values changed the company culture, starting with the leader.
03:59The Core Values "FEATT" Acronym: Fun/Family, Excellence, Accountability, Transparency, and Teamwork.
07:19Authentic Reinforcement: Creating a weekly core value winner who receives $20 to reinforce desired behavior.
09:56Business Scale: Landscapes by D&J is currently around $4 million in revenue, aiming to flip to 70% commercial.
10:30Personal Hurdles: Overcoming imposter syndrome as a female leader in a technical industry and hiring a fractional CFO to manage financial analysis.
11:47The Superpower of Support: Acknowledging weaknesses and bringing in strong support (SME, fractional CFO) is a critical leadership style.
13:20Fighting Imposter Syndrome: Reflecting on past successes and the team created to shift the framework and focus on the mission.
14:49The Delegation Hurdle: The next biggest constraint is still being the bottleneck by having a hard time delegating ("I can do it quicker").
17:47Balancing Profit and Capacity: How adding administrative salaries (heavy G&A) is an investment that frees up the CEO for higher-leverage, revenue-capturing activities.
20:48The Accountability Chart Exercise (EOS): Placing roles and tasks in buckets, not people, to identify where tasks fall and reveal necessary new positions (like Director of Operations).
24:49The Hard Part of Leadership: Tiffany walks through the difficult process of terminating employees, grounding the decision in the company's core values.
27:52The Arrogance of Cocooning: The flawed thought process of keeping someone for the sake of "not messing up their life" at the expense of the whole company.
29:30The Biggest Lesson: "Look in the mirror and not through the window." The culture is a reflection of the leader.
30:36Resource Recommendations: Traction, How to Be a Great Boss (Gino Wickman/EOS), and Leaders Eat Last (Simon Sinek).

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