EntreLeadership: Dave's Playbook for Building a Company You Love

Have you ever wished you could sit down one-on-one with Dave and learn how he built his company into what it has become today? Here’s your chance! EntreLeadership is Dave’s book that contains a play-by-play of how to inspire your team, grow your business, and lead with integrity.

You trust Dave and his proven plan for your money, and EntreLeadership is his proven plan for successfully running a business.

What Does It Mean to Be an EntreLeader?

So, what’s an EntreLeader anyway? Simple. It’s someone who embodies the pioneering spirit of an entrepreneur and the humble spirit of a leader. In his book, Dave defines EntreLeadership as "the process of leading to cause a venture to grow and prosper."

Throughout EntreLeadership, he dives deeper to explain the qualities that make not just a good leader, but a great EntreLeader. In order to truly lead people well and gain their respect and loyalty, you need to perfect the fine art of EntreLeadership. This book is the tool to get you there.

Our Playbook for Building a Company You Love

Hire Intentionally

Ramsey Solutions, Dave’s company, is known for its extensive hiring process. This isn’t the kind of place where you have one interview and, boom, you’re in the door. In EntreLeadership, Dave lays out the Twelve Components to a Good Hire. This includes traditional things you’d expect like reviewing their resume and going through multiple interviews.

But it also includes a few "weird" things most companies don’t do—like taking a DISC personality profile, submitting a personal budget, and having a spousal interview.

"It takes an average of six to fifteen interviews and an average of ninety days from initial contact to hire," Dave said. "Our goal is to find out someone is not a good fit before we hire them."

It might sound over the top, but there’s a method to our madness.

Have Core Values

We have 14 core values we use to build our brand, conduct business in the marketplace, and filter every single company decision. They cover things like keeping fear out of your decision-making, pursuing excellence in the ordinary, and having a self-employed mentality.

These are the guiding principles for everything we do. But we didn’t pull them out of thin air. Dave took a look at how we operate as a company and built the core values around what we were already naturally doing.

What are the core values your company upholds? Write them down. Display them. Make sure you put them somewhere your team members can see them and be reminded of the company’s vision.

Lead With Integrity

You want to hire people with integrity? Good! You should. But remember, integrity starts from the top down. If you expect people to conduct themselves with integrity, then you need to lead with integrity.

"Loyalty is born and a quality culture occurs when the EntreLeader follows through in a predictable, positive, and proactive manner on every issue and opportunity," Dave said.

It’s easy to say one thing and then act differently simply because you are "the boss." But an EntreLeader doesn’t do that. You, and those in leadership around you, need to set the example of how you expect your team members to act.

And above all, be consistent. "If you react the same way every time in every similar situation, you don’t have to put your company values in a brochure, because your team sees them lived every day," Dave said.

Treat Each Team Member Like They Matter

That’s right—team member. Not an "employee," "worker," or "cog in the machine." Words matter.

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"When we call someone a ‘team member’ at our place, that means something; it isn’t some corporate HR program," Dave said in EntreLeadership. "It means you will be treated like and expected to act like you’re on a team."

It isn’t hard to treat people like they matter—just put yourself in their shoes and treat them how you would want to be treated. It all goes back to the Golden Rule.

"People only allow themselves to be led when they feel valued and when they are treated with dignity," Dave said. "Find out their story—everyone has one."

Create Company Culture

You can attract rock stars to your company, and it all begins with intentionally creating a culture people actually want to be a part of.

Ramsey Solutions has been named one of the Best Places to Work in Nashville 10 times. Why? Because we work hard to cultivate an environment where we have fun, value people, don’t take ourselves too seriously, and do work that matters.

And word gets around about a place like that. Create a culture so great your company is known as the place people want to work at. Let your team members know they are involved in something bigger than themselves!

As your company grows, you’ll have less team members who were there at the beginning and more and more who are new to the team. Preserving your company culture and what makes your team different can become almost as essential as your core values.

"As a leader you must learn to tell the story of your company and its history," Dave said in EntreLeadership. "As you tell the story of struggle and victories to your team over and over you are accomplishing many things."

You need to become fanatical about keeping your culture intact. Empower each of your team members to be ambassadors of protecting and preserving your company culture. Otherwise, you’ll wake up 10 years from now and wonder why the morale and spirit of the place feels off.

EntreLeaders Learn From Their Mistakes

Obviously, running a business isn’t always rainbows and butterflies. In EntreLeadership, Dave tells story after story about the mistakes he made along the way. But he took each setback in stride and learned from them all. You can do that too, and go on to help others from repeating the same mistakes.

It’s Time to Become an EntreLeader

Are you ready to take your leadership skills to the next level? Don’t settle for the status quo anymore.

You can build a better business where team members feel like family. You can lead with confidence in each decision you make. And you can fulfill your calling while operating a business with purpose.

Learn the Ramsey way of building a successful business through EntreLeadership’s business coaching, conferences and tools.