S5E3: Aristaeus Brewing Big Oak Bend | Avoiding Payroll Tax Fraud | Hiring for Success

Disclaimer: The information in this video does not constitute Financial Advice. Consult with a Financial Advisor before making any decisions regarding your finances.

Join Pam Prior and Francis Plata as we dive into team building and hiring. We'll share tips on finding top talent, focusing on work ethic, dedication, and culture fit. Learn how to nurture growth, foster collaboration, and build a high-performance team. Plus, we'll cover Fiverr updates and break down payroll tax fraud, showing you how to stay out of trouble.

Don't miss out! Like, share, comment, and subscribe to our channel for more on entrepreneurship and leadership.

5 Key Lessons:
1. When hiring, prioritize work ethic, dedication, and culture fit over just entrepreneurial mindset or experience.

2. Use situational questions during interviews and trust your gut feeling when making hiring decisions.

3. Provide opportunities for growth and development to retain high-performing team members.

4. Address performance issues promptly and hold team members accountable to maintain high standards.

5. Invest in nurturing your team members, even if it means they may eventually seek new opportunities outside your company.

📰 On this week's What's News:
https://smallbiztrends.com/fiverr-transforms-into-hiring-platform-with-2024-summer-product-release/

https://smallbiztrends.com/former-tech-ceo-pleads-guilty-to-14m-payroll-tax-fraud/

Today's Brew🍺: Aristaeus Brewing Co. Big Oak Bend Rye Saison

🍻 The P.B.K.P.I (Pam's Beer KPI) Scale ⚖️: 
1. Pam's Not Touching It
2. It's Sippable
3. I'd Drink it Again if You Gave it to me
4. I'll Order it if it's on the Menu
5. I'll Seek it out

About the Brewery: 
Aristaeus Craft Brewing Co. is an open-concept nano-brewery in Langhorne, PA. Their taproom features indoor and outdoor seating with 12 taps that serve a variety of true-to-style beers and hand-crafted nitro cold brew coffees, as well as wine, hard seltzers, and specialty cocktails.

🍻 Learn more about Aristaeus Brewing Company: https://www.aristaeusbrewing.com/

Transcript

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That how you do is much more important than what you do. And I always knew how I wanted to be treated as a team member. And that as a, you know, kind of an a player, I wanted to always have something to develop into. And as business owners, we need to accept is if we want a players on our team, they're going to want to do that as well. Now, there are, like I said, some people who just want to do the nuts and bolts work, and that's great. But if you've got, you know, four year a players, you want to always provide them the opportunity to grow and develop. Hey, welcome back to the Cash Flow podcast, me, Ann Pryor. Glad to have you here where we talk about everything money related in your business. So without further ado, let's hop right in. We are so glad to have you back with us this week. We got a great lineup for you. We're going to start with Aristaias Brewing Company and a fun beer from them. Then we're going to talk about two headlines in our news section that cover a couple of really important things. One is employing people, and the second is how not to go to jail for payroll taxes. And then finally, we're going to have a conversation about building out teams. Once you start to feel the stress in your organization of too much work on your own shoulders, how do you go about taking that next step and hiring the first person? So stick around with us. Come have a sip of this great beer. All right, folks, today we are talking about the Aristaias brewery, which happens to be close by to us. But I didn't know it, and I tripped over it by going to a farmer's market where they had a beer display. And the beer surprised the bejesus out of me. So this actually isn't a tasting. This is a reveal of a beer I know is delicious. And it's called Aristais big oak Bend Rye Saison. And I almost didn't get it. I went to the counter and said, hey, I want an IPA. Of course they had their IPA. I got the IPA. Deb says to me, pam, they have a rye Saison. You like Saison, don't you? And I went, you know, whatever, and I don't know what a rye saison is. He said, well, let me give you a little taste. Well, I had a taste of, and it knocked my socks off. I walked away with two four packs of that and only one four pack of the IPA. And I knew I needed to share it with y'all because, and really think about the taste a little bit. So we're gonna do that here today. Ooh, we got a little. That's my fault for pulling it off too fast. We're gonna pour here, take a little sniff, and talk about. Okay, I poured that one with about a one inch head. Not too bad. There go the dogs. And it's got a lovely goldish color. Look at that. Just beautiful. And the smell. It just smells like beer. I don't know how else to put it, but what I pick up from it is a little bit of. A little bit of pine, probably, and probably rye. You know what it's like smelling a piece of rye toast. That's what it's smelling. Rye toast. This is not for you, but cheers. That's the smell. So now we're going to give it our taste. I love this beer. I can tell you right now, the Pam KPI on this beer is hands down a five on our one to five scale. I will hunt this down, and luckily, I don't have to go far. This may have become my favorite beer. First of all, it's got an incredible amount of, what do you call the fizzy stuff? Aeration carbonation. Thank you. The carbonation is great and I really like that. So it really bites your tongue with that carbonation right away. And then the taste is like a not too harsh rye bread. It really is. It's clean and crisp and it feels nice and light for the summer. So I highly recommend this one. If you are anywhere near Langhorne, Pa and can get to the Aristaias, they have a tap room locally that's really kind of cool. They do a lot of stuff. They bring in food trucks, you name it. They're automatically entertaining folks almost every night of the week. And it's a beautiful little spot. If you look it up online, we've got the link down here. You'll see it's got a really nice outside portion to it, as well as the inside portion. And if you're there, get this rise on and you can thank me for it. So, cheers. Let's jump into the news. Big news from Fiverr just this week, and it's going to take effect this summer. They're morphing their platform a little bit into a hiring type platform, and they're really starting to align themselves a little bit more with what business owner needs, owners need. So very specifically, the couple of things that are going to change are really significant, even though they sound small. The first is that they're going to change from just being able to hire for a project where you give very detailed information, they do the project and then you're done to being able to hire people hourly as contractors to keep on hourly, not really as a retainer, but you can continue to use them for more and more things as you move forward. That is a new step for Fiverr and pretty significant. The second thing they're going to be doing is allowing you to hire them to manage a whole project for you. So that's not something that we've been able to do before either. So those are a couple big changes coming to the fiverr platform. Now, if you don't know what Fiverr is yet, we're going to drop all that information down in the comments. But historically, literally, you have a job you want them to do, you want somebody to create a logo, you send them the project, you tell them what you want, they create the logo, they send it back and it's done. You couldn't say, hey, I know I'm going to need ten to 20 hours of time of a person with these skill sets. Now they're going to make those skill sets very available. So you can say, yep, that's what I want. I want 10 hours of that a week. That's the person I want. And on you go, as if there were any other virtual employee in your company that you might hire out through a VA or an office business manager. So they're really stepping into the space a little bit differently. Great news article on this. I suggest you click on it and take a peek if you're in need of some more help in your business. Now the second one is about tax fraud, and I want to just read the headline to you because I want it to register. And I'm going to emphasize a few words. So Andrew Park, a New Hampshire resident and former CEO of a startup technology company. So, an entrepreneur like the rest of us has pleaded guilty to evading over $14 million in payroll taxes and failing to file personal returns. So he is being sued for tax fraudhouse and it's entirely possible that he could end up going to jail. So here's the thing. If you are employing people, don't ever what? Here's what he did. He collected their share of income taxes. He collected Social Security taxes from the employees. He collected Medicare taxes from the employees. And if you're doing any kind of payroll, you're doing the same thing. But then instead of remitting that cash on to the government, he kept it for himself or for the business. And that is just plain illegal. And it's land yourself in jail illegal. So I thought it was important to bring this up because the other thing that's starting to happen is the individual states and in some cases the feds are starting to challenge contractors and say that, hey, these should really be employees. And once they switch to employees, if you've never had them before, you really want to make sure you understand how this works so that you're sure to remit any taxes that you withhold from an employee on to the IR's without any exceptions. Not I'm going to do it in a week. Not I'm going to hold it in this special account and remit it once a month. Just do it. This is the one thing that will tank businesses more than anything else when they have a lot of employees. Any payroll service that you get gusto, Quickbooks, justworks, ADP, whatever. If you're doing this through a payroll service, they will pretty much guarantee they won't let you do that. Basically what happens is when you withhold the money from your employees paycheck, they actually take it, put it in an escrow account and send it to the government right away. So it's never in your hands. But you want to make sure as the CEO, you don't ever try and bring this kind of a thing like paying payroll in house unless you have a complete understanding of what it means to pay your payroll taxes. Andrew park is going to have a very different next segment of his life as a result of a couple of decisions that could very well have been from not knowing any better. So just wanted to share that little story with you because it popped up this week on the news and it always makes me worry for startup entrepreneurs. All right. And I want you to stick with us because now we're going to sit down with Frances, who is a business owner, a new business owner, and already is. At that point, a lot of us reach where it's like, oh my God, there's so much to do and it's all me. And you have to start making some decisions about growing an organization or adjusting workload in an existing organization. So we're going to have that conversation today with him. I hope you stick with us because there's a lot of good tips Francis has shared with me as he's done a number of other businesses in his previous lives. We are welcoming back today. I'm so excited. Francis Plata of Forward Press Media, who is a perfect person to have on our couch here, our small business couch, because he's going through all the things that a startup business owner goes through. And as a result, we're able to have some really good conversations that I know are going to bring a lot of the financial questions and the operational questions to mind that cash flow can help you with. And Francis. So forward press media, give us a little quick history on what you're doing with forward press media and where you are at this point in the business as far as doing things by yourself versus needing some outsourced assistance. Yeah, definitely. So thanks for having me back. I'm here on the couch in great company and at Forwardpress Media. Basically what we're doing right now is marketing services creation, content development, podcast production, that is this and then a little bit of strategy as well. So a little bit everything in the marketing space and one of the things that we're running into now is we've just recently taken on an influx of clients. And what I'm realizing is you can't sell the ship by yourself. You need a lot of extra hands on the deck. So one of the questions that I have had come up recently is how have you gone about building a team that you know and trust can scale your business with you, and how have you gone about approaching the mindset behind I can afford this or different things like that? These are really great questions. And I think one of the most common questions I get is when can I hire somebody? And the first thing I would say is one of the biggest things you want to do early, especially because you kind of have hit the scene and now you're exploding. Right. So it's not like you had time to go, oh, let me take on a client and see what that means. And then we'll add a second one and see what that means. Some of us have the luxury slash bad news of when we start with kind of consulting blowing up a little slower. Yeah. So this has hit you pretty hard. But one of the things we've talked about from the beginning, and I'll reiterate here, is a budget and a forecast. And what that lets you do is say things like, okay, I want to hit, when I hit this much in revenue, I want to have this much in net profit. So that gives me this much to spend. Yeah. And then we break up that spend amount. And then as you hit, so that you have targets, like, so when I hit, you know, when I have my 1st 30,000 in the door, when I have my first hundred thousand in the door, when I have my whatever it is, and maybe there's smaller increments than that, but, you know, when that's the number that I've hit year to date, I can go higher. I can go spend this much on hires. Gotcha. What I find, though, and I think you know this from your past lives, but now let's say we've hit that point and you can hire somebody, how do I go find the right person? Yeah, right. And I always laugh because I've said, and in my career for 33 years, I always take it pretty calmly and go, well, I never really looked the right people crossed my path at the right time. And for the most part, that's really, really been true in corporate. And it was true with us because we met through a dog walking friend of ours. And, you know, albeit now we're partners in business and we're all sorts of things. So one of the things I would say is always have your eyes open and always be thinking, which you do already. And I encourage everybody to do, like, note pieces have ever fully settled in your mind. So be aware of all the sort of things you're looking for in your business. So when it comes time and say, you decide you need somebody to outsource editing to whatever we're not doing with AI now, that needs to go to get outsourced for editing. Have that in your head when you're going to other dealing with other things. Like you just went out and did some filming on the road for another company, and you might have met somebody there that has a brother who's all of a sudden looking to do just pick up a little side work. So what I've always done is been acutely aware of all of my needs at one time. I keep all those nerves raw at the top, so that if something happens in a spot where I'm not necessarily thinking about that thing, I could still connect the dots. Gotcha. And those tend to always be the best people, because you're not out looking for somebody and going through the interview, you've gotten to know them another way. And, you know, if they've got the work ethic and the skillset and all of those things that you need in your business. So, like anything else in business, the relationship is key. Now, you don't always have time to do that. I just need a freaking editor, Pam. What the hell should I do? And the advice I got from one of my mentors, which I love, is hire slowly. Fire fast. Yeah. And the thing I would say about hire slowly is it's not necessarily the degree or the year's experience or the whatever that's going to make the big difference. I started in a mail room at Dupont. You started here as a dog walker. Yeah. And with this little guy. Yeah. And if I had said to you, oh, show me your marketing resume, Francis, I wouldn't have the amazing CMo that I've got now. And that's what's so important. The things you're after mostly in your business are culture fit. Culture fit work ethic. And it doesn't necessarily, I want to explain work ethic because there are work ethic people like you, like me, who have this entrepreneurial thing, but we also need people with the work ethic of, hey, I don't want to run a business. I want to do one or two things really, really well. And those people are equally as valuable to a business as the entrepreneurial mindset. So I think that we want to have the work ethic for whatever their personality is. But it can't be like, oh, you know, sure, I go to work sometimes and do like, you need to drive out of them in the interview process how they work. So one of the things that I always do is questions that are, how have you handled this in the past? Or when have you ever been, like, so busy that you felt like you couldn't sleep and how did you deal with it? And if they come back with that story and it's, you know, oh, well, that really has never happened. Okay. I don't want people who are going to ruin their work life balance, but I'll be honest, I want people that are going to put blood, sweat and tears in and be tired at the end of the day. Yeah. You know, to really earn that keep that you're going to give them. So that's kind of a big piece of it. So if you're going into something without knowing them, and it's a typical, you know, you've narrowed down 50 resumes to four people and you're having the conversation. Ask situational questions, okay. And then use some terminology and pay attention to how many questions they ask. And the last thing I'll say, which flies in the face of almost everything any recruiter will say, is, trust your gut. Okay? If this person is the perfect fit on paper and they have the perfect interview with you on paper, and there's something in your gut that says, no, don't explain it to anybody, just don't hire them. Okay? Trust your gut. Because you're picking up something, it's going to be some disconnect in their body language or their eyes or how they're dealing with things that's picking up, you know, they're misleading you on something or it's a personality that's just going to hit your triggers. So really kind of pay attention to that stuff. And in giving you this advice, I've done that well, and I've done it poorly. Gotcha. And the reason I think I can give it, like, so clearly, just trust your gut and make sure it's the work ethic and it doesn't have to necessarily be the resume, is that I've made all the mistakes. I've hired with just my gut before, and I've hired with just a piece of paper before, and they never work out. It's when the two come together and it's like, oh, yeah, this is the kind of person I want to have in the business. Awesome. So question, could I jump in there just so, like, going back to the higher slowly. Gotcha. Looking at, like, how we've developed our relationship and how I came to be on your team, was there an aha moment with me that stood out to you that would translate well into the overall hiring process, or do you have aha moments from before that? Like, we're like, oh, yeah, I definitely need this person on my team that could benefit the kind of new hiring approach that I have now. That is a really, really good point. When does the aha moment come? Where you go, oh, I want this person on my team. Yeah. Because I tend to over plan and overanalyze things, you know? So you're not paying attention to the. Yeah, like, I almost get stuck in the. Okay, this. This. This part of things, you know? And I almost have a hard time identifying and seeing that moment. When do I bring this person in? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So, well, first of all, like, the biggest question that you asked, and I think it's the most important, is when can I afford it? And that's how I would do it. I would set revenue targets and then say, okay, how much do I want to have at the bottom line? This is how much I have to spend in the middle. What are all the other things I have to spend on? Okay, I can hire here and spend this much. Okay, so that'll answer a lot of the questions. But then when you get to this point, like, I knew that I was doing a lot of things that I needed help with around social media, any kind of video work I was doing, I knew the quality needed to improve, the quantity needed to improve. And you. Well, first of all, every job you did, no matter what it was, you did it like, you freaking did it. Like, you studied and you did. I bet you know more about my dog's health than I do, frankly. And then when I made. When I saw that kind of ethic and I knew we were wrapping up the dog walking thing, you had started to pay attention and ask questions about the business, and it was. And I, of course, had time to spend with you. So we got to learn, you know, I got to learn about your history and experience with the hotel industry and other things that you've done. And I knew I could trust you. Like, if I trust you with my animals, I'd trust you with my kid and certainly with my business. So I think I had a bit of an advantage there and that we got so much time to spend together during the dog, baby. Not as traditional. It's not as traditional, but, you know, to your point, we have our bruise and schmooze that we have, and you've met a couple of people through that, and you get to be. Some of them you really attach to and get to become friends with, you know, love and trust them, and then all of a sudden, they'll say, oh, my God, I've got this va that I trust. So the second best thing to you, knowing somebody and having them fit as referrals from people you trust. Gotcha. And that becomes a big thing. So if I said to you, hey, Francis, I know this great va who is awesome at editing, and here's, you know, I know I can count on them. I've worked with them this long. And you're going, okay, I'm in. Yeah, that's the next best thing. It's just like anything. Like, if you're trying to get on a stage or if you're trying to get clients, referrals are the best thing in the world. So talk to people, other people in business, who've been where you are and say, hey, do you know anybody? It's kind of like the same approach that you have with almost everything else. You know, it's all based on relationships, kind of developing those relationships. And when the right person comes, they come. Bingo. And the cool thing about that is you're in the journey of enjoying the relationship, and then the aha comes and you're like, oh, so you're not, like, worried that, oh, how am I going to hire a media person? You're just. I was just moving along. And, like, I wonder if Francis would like marketing. He's got a natural curiosity about everything. And sure enough, you had the marketing experience, and you had all sorts of stuff that you brought to the table. If I'd never asked, I wouldn't have known. Yeah, we'd ended our relationship right there when the dog walking was over and that would have been that. And who knows where we would be there. And it's all about taking real interest in people. And we've talked about this over and over again with business, with employees, with customers, with vendors, with everybody. That's kind of the key. Awesome. Awesome. That's really, really insightful and helpful. I guess following that up, going, you know, strictly off of our relationship and how we've kind of come to be and how we've worked together through this journey. Have you always had the approach to put in and develop your team this way and what's the mindset behind that and how do you do that as a growing business and make the time and make the resources there for that? Yeah. So again, I'm really lucky because of the leaders I had in corporate and they taught me really that how you do digs is much more important than what you do. And I always knew how I wanted to be treated as a team member and that as kind of an a player, I wanted to always have something to develop into. And as business owners, we need to accept is if we want a players on our team, they're going to want to do that as well. Now, there are, like I said, some people who just want to do the nuts and bolts work, and that's great. But if you've got four your a players, you want to always provide them the opportunity to grow and develop and let them in part pick the path and make sure that it still aligns with business need. Right. So you always have to have your eye on that. But you also need to expect the fact or, and actually the best businesses are the ones that go, hey, you may outgrow what I can offer you here, and when that happens, I want you to be ready for what you need to do as a business owner. And so that's how we've kind of approached this is, Francis is an entrepreneur, you know. Yes. Is he working here with us? Sure. Is he learning his skill set here with us? Every dollar I invest in you comes back to me, you know, tenfold. And I also, my job is to make sure that when I run out of things that will keep you challenged, if it ever happens, change my mind enough that it will never happen, but that you have the opportunity to do something else, which surely now you've done. You're launching your own company, which is amazing and it allows you to take the value you've pulled from here and share it even further with the world. So having the lack of possessiveness, I think, is really important. And that's where you get the best out of people, because now I have somebody who likes working in this company, is able to explore his own curiosity however he wants to without either being threatened. And we've created the environment for that. That's ideal. Right. That's plant dirt and fertilizer. Now, it can be problematic if there are people who don't want to expand into that kind of thing and they're just not interested in the development. And that's okay if they're interested in making sure the job, you know, they change with the times and the job and can handle the fluidity and the madness of working for an entrepreneur. Because as I tell all my clients, y'all are crazy. We're all crazy. We're all crazy. I'm one of them. I'm one of them. But I like to say y'all are crazy, which is why I like working with you. So, you know, that's the thing you have to keep an eye on. You actually shared with something with me, something I really liked because I've had some contractors before that I've had performance issues with and have had to deal with. Tell them your three strike philosophy on. Because I remember I said, hire slowly, fire quickly. I really like how you approach personnel development, and I'd love for you to share that. Yeah, definitely. So my thought process, just from experience, is, you know, I played baseball. You love softball, but I have the three strike, you're out rule, and the first one is it's on me. You know what I mean? If I'm not communicating something enough to a team member about whether it's requirements for the job, KPI's that need to be hit. Anything along those lines, that's on me. You know, as a leader, as a manager, that comes back to you as you're. So the first kind of performance issue with an employee is it's on you. Yeah. You're the guy who laid this thing out. You may not have laid it out, clearly. Okay. Yeah, exactly. It always goes back to the business owner or the manager. What about the second strike after that? And you've communicated everything and you've gone through the, this needs to be here. This needs to be where we're sitting at as a standard. If that's not still being hit, you know, second strike is on you. It falls back on how you're approaching this and how you're approaching either retune the employee. Yeah, the employee. Yep. How the employee is getting the feedback, how they are receptive if they're taking that and developing themselves and using that, not as something that they're taking to heart or being critical on, but, you know, if they're applying the feedback. Yeah. Actively in the business in their day to day. And then the third one is, you know, three strikes are out, the third strike, you're done. You know, so you get all the way to the third strike. It's not a string of nine foul balls. No. Basically, yeah. You got one more strike and you're done. There's no foul balls, there's no hit by pitch. We're out. You're out after that. I really, really like that because it puts the accountability, I think it nicely captures accountability where it belongs. So, you know, that is something that I wish I'd known 30 years ago because I would have been a lot. I think, number one, I would have recognized my role a little earlier, which I didn't always do in these discussions. And this has made me really acutely aware of. Did you give them enough? Did you give them the tools? Did you give them the resources? Did you give them the support and the information they needed to do the job? Yeah. Cause as a manager, as a business owner entrepreneur, with your team, it's almost like you're a parent. And as a parent, when you're raising your kids, your kids are a reflection of you, and your team is a reflection of you, whether it's in their day to day lives or if it's in their work, anything, really, they're a reflection of you and your business. And it's important that, one, you hold them to the standard that you hold yourself to in the business. It's not the same work. Right. They're not being there. Everybody doesn't have to be an entrepreneur. Right. But, you know, holding them to, like, I respect these core values, and I live by these core values in my life, in the business, outside of the business, that type of thing. But then it's just also important to make sure that you and I have worked so well together. You're putting into me, developing me, mentoring me, and I hope that I'm giving you just a half of what you're giving me. I mentioned ten x return on every hour or dollar I've invested, and it's the energy, it's the ideas. We just had a strategy conversation this morning. It's like, oh, my God, that's a really good idea. That was a blind spot for me, it's something we should be doing in our business that I didn't see or I just didn't even not see it. It's just like I'd always assumed I'd never do it and never thought about it. I just assumed I'd never do it. And all of a sudden you went, well, Pam, why don't you do this? And I'm like, huh? Yeah, that's a really good idea. So, yeah, that's really, really cool. And I love how that all plays out. And the last thing I said was fire quickly. And that's why I like your one, two, three. You don't want to drag those things out. And Alex Sharfen is the one who taught me the higher slowly, fire quickly. And I'll always appreciate him for that because I think it's full of gold. So all right, we're going to wrap up with that, but I think this is such an important topic that we tend to give really limited time to when we're rushing through the day to day. But getting that support staff in place is so important. So thanks for sharing your experiences. Thank you asking the questions as you're going through getting things started up. Yeah. As I've been developing the business and figuring out where my place is as a entrepreneur, as a business leader, instead of just being support staff, it's really been insightful to have these conversations with you. So thanks again for having me on and I'm excited to be back anytime. And I mean it. Yeah. All right. Thanks a lot, everybody. We hope we see you back next week. You know, we're going to have three good segments for you. We're going to talk about a beer, we're going to talk about some news, and then we'll have some finance and or business conversations as Francis continues to involve his business and or some of our other local entrepreneurial friends. Drop in for some couch time. You have a great week. We'll see you next time. Thanks so much for watching the Cash Flow podcast with us. We want to bring more and more of this to you. So please like share, subscribe, comment so that we can keep bringing more of this content to.