“I can't think of one reason not to have a Dream Manager. There's nothing like it out there because it requires commitment. It requires the individual to really change over time.”

In this episode of Lead with Culture, Kellie Zimmet, a certified Dream Manager for the Friendly Group, explores the transformative impact of the Dream Manager program. She reveals how this approach helps employees achieve both personal and professional dreams, boosting job satisfaction, improving retention, and enhancing overall workplace well-being.

Kellie shares compelling success stories and explains the significant business advantages of implementing the program. She highlights how focusing on employee dreams can reshape company culture, discusses how to measure the program’s ROI, and encourages leaders to consider integrating this powerful tool into their organizations.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

• How to successfully introduce The Dream Manager program to your team
• Measuring the ROI of The Dream Manager program
• Benefits of running The Dream Manager program

Things to listen for:

(00:00) How Dream Managers influence leadership choices

(02:50) How to Launch the Dream Manager Program

(07:10) Onboarding challenges for the Dream Manager program

(17:42) Dream management's transformative impact on individuals

(18:26) Business benefits of helping people achieve their dreams

(22:00) Measuring the ROI of the Dream Manager program

Resources:

• Floyd Coaching
• The Culture Assessment
• Matthew Kelly’s Books
• Floyd Coaching’s Blog

Connect with the Host & Floyd Coaching:

• Kate Volman’s Linkedin
• Floyd Coaching on Linkedin
• Floyd Consulting on Facebook
• Floyd Consulting on Twitter
• Floyd Consulting on YouTube
• Floyd Consulting on Instagram

As a Dream Manager, we're hearing stuff from the ground level, right? We're getting so much information, and how can we use that information to help the organization be better? I can have conversations with leadership about some of the things that we could change. That'd be really simple and easy, that would really impact the organization and our culture. And so those are the things we really need to be paying attention to as a Dream Manager and helping leadership to make better choices if they want some additional input from us.

This is Lead with Culture. I'm Kate Volman, and in this episode, we are talking to another certified Dream Manager. I was joined by Kellie Zimmet, who is the Dream Manager for The Friendly Group. So we talked all things about rolling the program out, how her people responded, what that looks like. We got a little bit into the logistics of it, which I know some people are very curious about, because the cool thing about the Dream manager program is it is in a box. It's, here it is, here's the program. This is how you do it. But every organization obviously gets to learn how to do it and then rolls it out in their own way, what makes sense for them.

And so we talked about the launching of the program, the impact that it's having. We did dig in a little bit about ROI and how she views ROI and how the leadership team is really measuring the success of the program. So we got into all the, all the things. And so you're going to love this episode, especially if you're considering becoming a Dream Manager or if you are a Dream Manager and you are just interested in how other people are experiencing the program. So I hope you enjoyed this episode. Kellie, thank you so much for joining us today.

Thank you, Kate, always great to see you.

I'm very excited to talk about your Dream Manager experience and what's happening over there at The Friendly Group. So before we start, why don't you give us a little context and share with us who is The Friendly Group, who you work with and how many team members you have.

Awesome. Friendly Group is a management company. We've got five different HVAC and plumbing companies that we help manage and grow. And so we've got about 350 employees right now, and all the companies range from between 8 million and about 30 million. So as far as size goes, that gives you a good idea. So HVAC plumbing is our industry.

And how many team members do you have?

So I am currently coaching 54 people. We have over 350 employees between the five companies, so there's lots of room for opportunity. I'm currently only working with three of the companies, and then there's two that we're looking to work with next year.

Beautiful. So I love this for a lot of reasons. One, because we do work with a lot of organizations or people come to us, and they have hundreds of employees or even thousands of employees and multiple locations, and they're thinking, how is this whole thing going to work? How do we roll this program out to our team members? So can you talk a little bit about how you actually introduced the Dream Manager and then invited people into the program?

Yeah, it's definitely a tough task, thinking through five different organizations, how are we going to do this? Who needs it the most, and how do we do this in the simplest way and communicate it and to be able to have the biggest impact on the most people. So what we did is we decided to start with one company, and we did that last year. I live here in Phoenix, and so we started with a local company, and we ended up starting with around, I would say, 50 something participants. As you know, as the program goes, we did have some dropout in the first couple months, and so we ended up graduating 33 people. And so that was our first year, kind of. Our pilot program was at the local company here, and then we decided to add in a second round for them and then also add in two more companies. And so the other two companies are ones in Kingman and Vegas, split between there, and the other one is out in Castle Rock, Colorado. So my goal for launching those was to go in person, talk about the program, get excited, let them see me.

I feel like people really want to get to know us as Dream Managers as well. And being a coach, you know, the perception is that we have it all figured out. And I love that people get to know me a little bit and ask, wow, okay, I can maybe talk to her, and maybe I can share about some of the challenges I'm having in my life with her and be really open and honest and share some of those vulnerabilities. So the launch was local first, and then think through the other two companies. We still have two companies that we're holding on for next year, but it's really going in, getting the employees excited and getting the managers excited and on board about what we're going to do about the program. I usually have managers that are so excited, like, can I be a part of it? I'm like, yeah, I would love for you to be a part of it, because we know that when leaders are involved, they can really pass things along to their employees and give them some of the skills. So that's what the launch kind of looked like. I do 1 hour once a month Zoom sessions, and that's how I handled the time differences and the geographical differences.

And so I also believe in peer learning. So we do those as group sessions. And so when we do the launches, it's really difficult to figure out times.

Right.

You know this. You've been working with it for long enough to know it's like, what time is perfect for everybody? Well, none. Right. So it's trying to figure out times that employees can be a part of it. So we kind of do that as part of the launch of talking through managers with how do we not impact operations in a negative way and how do we make sure that people are able to be a part of their sessions and not missing them or canceling them. So what we do at friendly group is we offer as an unpaid benefit to our employees. We want them to be able to show up excited, and it is something that they need to want. Right.

And they apply for it. And so it is unpaid benefit. So we do that in their off time, which is on Saturdays for our technicians. And so my Saturdays are really full. We've got lots of people that want to be a part of things on their day off, and so it's just once a month. So it's not like we're saying, hey, every Saturday you're giving up for the whole year of the program. They're giving up one Saturday for an hour to be a part of it. And then our salaried employees or hourly employees will do it over their lunch hours.

And so that's how we've fit it in past time zones and geography and the complications that are with multiple companies.

I really love that you laid that out so beautifully. Thank you very much. Because we do work with so many organizations that are, it's cleaning company, HVAC Home services type. And that is a challenge that people go through. Right. You want it, you want to invest the time into the program, but when are you going to do it, especially if you have guys out on the field? We work with a trucking company. You know, there's all different industries. And what's interesting is I love that you're offering it to them as the benefit and, but it's cool to see that there are individuals that will make the time on a Saturday on their personal time.

It shows you how much they really do want to invest in themselves kind of at that, that different level. Right. I mean, it's one thing when you're offering benefits and many people don't take advantage of them, but when you're actually introducing something and people are like, okay, I'm going to take some time on Saturday because it's good for me. Like, it's good for them personally. So was there kind of any communication or hurdle over really, really communicating to the team? This is for you to become the best version of yourself. It's life coaching. This isn't just about you becoming a better team member. It's truly about you becoming a better individual so you can live a happier, more fulfilling life.

Yeah, it is a challenge, exactly what you're saying and really communicating the fact that this is your off time. So for you to do this program and be successful at it, I want your brain to be fresh and not thinking about work. You need to be thinking about yourself. And so to do that, that is your off time. And so it is your Saturday. My Saturday sessions are a blast. We have an 08:00 a.m. session.

The guys are getting on there. They're all excited, right. Because it's a positive peer influencing session, right. They're excited about what they're doing. I do a thing that's like, introduce yourself. It's something that you're celebrating today. So we're all lifting each other up. They're getting on, they're feeling that positivity.

And then we dive into the materials and I do interview everybody to be a part of the program. And I kind of joke around that it's not just an interviewing them to make sure they're a fit for it. Of course, they need to make sure they can work with me and feel comfortable about it. But I'm also trying to convince them not to be a part of the program. As I joke around, and that's not true. I really want them to understand what kind of a commitment that this is. It is in their off time. They're going to be on vacation on one of these Saturdays and need to plan ahead and commit to that or log in when they're on their vacation, and they need to understand that the benefit is for them.

So it is a communication hurdle that we have. But I feel like I've kind of figured out how to make it work and help them to understand what type of a commitment that it is for them.

It's interesting because when people come to certifications, you came to certification, you learn, obviously, how to run the program. And then there is a period we always say, trust the process, trust the process. Right? Because every organization, while the program remains the same, the way that in which you roll it out and communicate it and sign everybody up, they're very similar, but also there's things to figure out. There's logistics to figure out, and every company has to figure out kind of what works for them. And so it sounds like you have really been able to do that in a great way that supports your people and also supports the business, which is great. Let's talk a little bit about when people start the program. What are the first few sessions like? How long did it take for you to see some of the changes, the impact that it was having on the team?

I think the changes start before the first session sometimes. Cause they're excited and they're anticipating some of the things that they'll say to me in the interview. Okay. I know I needed to look at my budgeting and my finances, and so I decided to do that before I got started because I knew you were going to ask me. And the same with, like, weight loss. I see that a lot of times they'll be like, I knew I needed to start healthier habits, so I thought I'd just start before I started working with you. So some people get really excited and get a head start on it, but the dream storming session in the second session is, of course, the first session is always, like, just mind blowing to a lot of people. They've just forgot what it's like to dream, and they forgot what it's like to just put aside reality, put aside that brain thing that kicks in and say, okay, what do I want to do? Who do I want to be like? You could redo all this.

I get that you've got kind of things that have come into your brain and said, oh, I can't do that or this, or, we've started families and lives and we've got commitments, but we can still make our dreams come true and we can still figure out what's new for us. And so that's just a fun process for me, helping them to kind of reframe their thought process and start to really think of what's possible again and start to see some of the ideas that they, maybe they always say, I wanted to do that at one point, but I forgot, you know, like, oh, good, that's so fun for me to hear. And let's start to figure out how to make that happen with maybe you and your family now, right? So it's just a fun process. I think it's just as soon as they make the commitment to get in the program. They start to get excited and start to think about changes, and there's always the fun ones that are a little apprehensive. Like, I don't know about you, and I'm always like, I can't wait to work with you. Those are the ones that I'm like, I can't wait to work with you. Because I know once we start the coaching process and once you kind of fall into things, you're going to realize how much this changing your mindset really impacts your life.

So those are fun.

I love the. That the people that are the most apprehensive about joining are the ones that have the biggest breakthroughs. There's times we'll do a training and we'll go into the training. There's that one person that's in the back with their hands, their. Their arms folded, and they're like, ugh, I don't want to listen to this. It's just some stupid mandatory thing I had to go to. And you just, like, don't know as a facilitator. Then all of a sudden, that's the person that comes up to you after and was like, I really found this interesting, or this was really great.

And you're thinking, what did you tell your face that? Because that's not exactly what you were conveying the entire time I was up there. So it feels like this. It feels very similar when. When people are kind of hesitant with the program, but it makes sense because most people have never how to coach. Most people have never been fed this kind of content. Most people have never taken time for themselves. And they also. A lot of people don't have a cheerleader.

They don't have someone who's holding them accountable to doing the work that they say they really want to do or to achieve the things they want to achieve. So I think it's really cool that your team started before the first session to get, like, a little kickstart, and it shows you how powerful dreams are, because if all we had to do is write down some dreams and that got us so excited, but then that coupled with someone that's actually gonna hold you accountable till those dreams, now that that's the combination.

It is. It's so fun. It's such a blast. It's funny that you bring up the whole person there. I've learned not to judge because it's so funny because sometimes in the Zoom sessions, I'm like, is that person even paying attention? I feel like they're not even engaged at all. And then when we do key insights and takeaways, it's always that person that has this amazing key insights and takeaways to share with the group. And I'm like, okay. So I've just learned over time, like, let people process how they need to process.

It's not always through their face, even, like, if you ask if anybody has any input, sometimes it's not until the end, until they really can gather their thoughts. So I've tried over the years to help refine that because it's hard as a facilitator. You're like, is everybody getting something out of this? And you can't really control that always. So that's fine for you to bring that up.

Yeah, you show. You show up as the Dream Manager as best you can, and people are going to take what they are going to take, and some people aren't. And then we just focus on doing the best job that you can and giving them that opportunity to empower themselves, because that's what it's about. It's about empowerment. It's about giving people the opportunity and they get to do with it what they want. And that is. That is your job.

It could be on their own timeline, too, right? Like, sometimes it's. It's like, okay, wasn't the right time, so maybe they dropped out of the program to restart another time, and they're, like, the best participant the second time around because they realized what they were missing and it just wasn't the right timeline. So I can't judge that or define that for them.

So talk about some of the dreams that your people have been achieving.

What I really find is that most people want to do simple things. It's like, figure out their finances, build their wealth for their future, get healthier, get in shape, just be better versions of themselves. And I love that quote because it really is what I find most people come in with. So usually when I start working with people, it's like sleep, diet, and exercise. Right? Like, if we start there, we could typically help change lives by just being a little bit more accountable in that area. Then as we dive into finances, that's always interesting because that's such a key part of everyone's dreams. I would say one that comes to mind for me, that I loved this conversation. And you know how it is coaching.

You have conversations with people every day that can be life changing or altering. One of the guys that I was working with was rent. It was up for renewal for his apartment rental, and we were talking about finances, figuring out he has a family of three kids and he's a single dad. And we were just talking about where it was and what he was doing. I said, have you ever thought because he was talking about the yard and one of his dreams was to build a treehouse for his son? And I was like, okay, but you're an apartment. How are you like, that doesn't line up. How are you going to do that? He's like, oh, that's not going to happen anytime soon. It was just something I really envisioned happening.

I was like, well, have you ever thought about renting a house? You know, I know it might cost a little bit more than an apartment, but not always. Have you ever even considered that? And he's like, no, I never even thought about getting out of apartment complex to take my family into renting a house. And so it was just one of those things to me that was like, well, how could you not consider that? But in his mind, renting wasn't an apartment, right? Not necessarily renting at a house. And so he ended up finding a great place. His kids had more space. They had a yard. He has not built the treehouse yet, but it was just a life changing alteration for him to be in the house right now. His vision has changed of whats available to him in his future, and now hes considering buying a house, right? Sometimes it just takes opening up that ladder or that window to go, okay, what is the next step? Because I cant see myself there and I can help to get them to see themselves there.

And sometimes its really just incremental little things like that. That was just a cool experience that I will never forget him saying, no. I've never even considered renting a house. So that's one of the experiences I can think of.

I love that you helped him see what was possible, what is possible. And so many people, to your point, about their dreams, and we've stopped dreaming. Not only have we stopped dreaming, we don't allow ourselves to actually believe that our dreams are possible. This is why coaches exist, because you're having someone not tell you what you should do. Or here's the right answer, because no coach can give you the right answer. You got to figure that out for yourself. But it's cool that you can have a coach that is challenging you to question your belief system, to question how you're living, to question how you are approaching your goals and your dreams. There's nothing better than that.

Like, you changed this man's life and his kids and what it's going to do to his kids. His kids are now going to think differently, right?

And his career has changed. That's the other thing. So all this kind of happened. I watched him be able to stand up in front of a group of people now and talk more confidently. All these little things help to just make him a different person and be more confident about life. That's the biggest thing that I think we forget is about the circle of influence that we have. If we can just help one person, their whole world start to change in that ripple effect, that's super exciting to me, and that's. That is part of what drives me.

One of the girls that I work with, she had said, like, she's communicating differently with her family and with her roommate, her boyfriend, and the people in her life. She's learned to communicate differently with and interact differently with. All those things are just really awesome. So great. I love it so much.

So how does helping people achieve their dreams? How does this impact The Friendly Group and the business?

Well, hopefully. I mean, of course, when we talk about the business case, reduce turnover. I mean, that's really what I was brought in for, is, like, how do we help people stay, and how do we help them value here? There's so many competing things and factors, and, of course, great management's a key part of it. We know that. And so that's what I was brought in for, is really help reduce turnover, help technicians want to stay and help managers do a better job. I think one of the areas that as a Dream Manager, we're hearing stuff from the ground level, right? We're getting so much information, and how can we use that information to help the organization be better? Sometimes it's just little stuff saying, hey, can we get these snacks? Or can we do this differently? Or, what is our PTO look like? That's been a big thing. You know, people, we start to help them dream, and then they said, well, I don't have enough time off. Let's evaluate that.

And so I can have conversations with leadership about some of the things that we could change. That'd be really simple and easy, that would really impact the organization and our culture. And so those are the things we really need to be paying attention to as a Dream Manager and helping leadership to make better choices if they want some additional input from us.

So talk a little bit about your leadership team, the president. Like, what does that look like and how did they decide to hire you as their Dream Manager? Like, what did that look like and why is it important to them?

There's a few different layers to that. But basically, I was brought in because our founder at day and night, heating and plumbing, had read the book and got really excited about it. And then when he sold the company over to friendly group, his predecessor, who runs the company, Mike Littell, brought me in. We had interview, processed through it all. They just knew it was going to be something that was really important to them and their culture. But our founder of The Friendly Group that I work with also understood his, his big thing is wellness, and so employee wellness, and really just trying to take care of the whole employee the best as possible. So his vision was also to bring this in. It was kind of a combined effort.

I don't know how else to say it. And of course, my boss, Jody, is amazing and really believes in really trying to help the employees. So it's just kind of an overall culture that we have that believes in helping the whole employee and employee wellness.

What I love so much about that is when you have a program like this in place, you do learn so much about your people, how they communicate, how they work, what they need, what's important to them, and then you learn about those dreams that they have. And then many of our Dream Managers, they start implementing other programs that support that. So you just mentioned wellness because it's one of the top dreams that we see among our dreamers.

Right.

People want to get healthy and fit, lose weight, you know, look good, feel good, and it's great when you learn that about your team members, because then, oh, this might be an opportunity to extend whether it's classes or fitness classes or nutritionist or bring someone in as, just to give people more content in that way so you can feed into them more. So I love this idea that you're really getting to know your team members and what's important, and that that really can influence the direction of how you're serving them, which ultimately helps with retention, which is a big issue, one that you're tasked with. And obviously, it starts with the leadership really caring about their people. How do you approach return on investment? That's one of the biggest questions we get when people are rolling out this program. They say, all right, what's the ROI on this program? And different Dream Managers seem to measure it differently. So what does that look like when you're talking to the, to your leadership team?

So how I measure it, how my leadership team measures it would probably be a little bit different. So Jodi did measure it. She looked into the people that were in the program, Jodi's by boss, and she looked in the people with a program and retention with them versus people that weren't, and it was higher. So that did happen as far as I go. And my return, like, the ROI that I come up with, I came up with an evaluation that's like, would you accomplish these goals with or without the program? And kind of looking at it this way, on the scale, how did you accomplish these goals? Where are you at with your target goals? Where are you at in these areas? And then just asking for input as well. I think the feedback, anonymous feedback, is really good and important. And so I also incorporated that kind of as a self check and to look into what ways that we could be improving. One of the areas that did come out of it is making sure that we are offering different things right.

It's not just the program. And you brought that up, whether that's therapy, nutrition classes, all the different kinds of things that are added to it. So I keep, I try to keep my eyes and ears open about some of the fun things that I wanted to do. One of them, I love to run. And so one of the participants wanted to do a half marathon. He's like, you've done all these races. Why don't you just do this with me? And I was like, okay, sure. Who else can do it with us? Like, if I'm going to put the energy into doing this and training and helping with you, like, let's get a group together and let's do that.

So he's rattling and getting some people together. Someone else was like, well, I can't do a half marathon, but I could do a five k. I was like, cool, let's do that. Like, again, looking for those additional touch and talk points there. But that all came out of, like, the conversations and the evaluations and really me evaluating what can I be doing better and how can I have a bigger impact? Because I am only one person as well, so.

Aw, that's so fun. I love that you started asking other people to get involved. See, we all get to support each other. That's what it's all about.

And I, we laugh about that, but I have told other people as a joke, hey, why don't you comment and cheer us on at the end? And they're like, yes, I can't wait to do that. So it is because people do want to support each other, and we can't forget that as part of the Dream manager program, right? It's enlisting your people, gathering the people around you so that not only are you being your best, but others are supporting your friends and your family.

So, yes, and I do love a good challenge. So I'll do a walk. I'll do a walk in some weightlifting. That's what I'll do instead. And then I'll meet you at the finish line. Is there anything that surprised you about the Dream Manager program?

I think the overwhelming support from management. I thought at first, like, I was going to have to be, you know, really getting buy in and helping them understand the impact. But really, once you kind of get started and realize and they're involved in this process, they've just been so excited. And I think that's really fun for me. Like I said, when they do say, hey, can I be a part of this? I want to change my life, too, and I know I could help my people with this. So I think that's probably one of the biggest surprises is how involved that they do want to be and how they could help me. And if I ask for a meeting anytime, like, absolutely. What can we do to support you in this program? Because we're really excited about it.

And I find that in any of the companies that I start with, how excited that they are to really just have me there and supporting them and supporting their team.

If somebody is thinking about potentially becoming a certified Dream Manager or there's a CEO listening, thinking, I might want to do this with my team, what advice would you give to them?

You know, I'm a huge advocate for the Dream Manager program. I'm happy to talk to anybody, but really, it's thinking through, how do you fit it into your company? Right? How do you make it work? There's always going to be a way, whether that's having a Dream Manager part time or whether that's figuring out there's a great network of people out there that would be willing to support them. So I can't think of one reason not to have a Dream Manager, even if there's three people. Figure it out. It's such a great program, and there's a lot of things out there. There's lots of trainings. I spent my whole life in facilitation and training and leadership development, communication training. But this program, there's nothing like it out there because it requires commitment and it requires, like, the individual to really change over time.

That's another thing. I hear that, well, why don't we compress the program so people can make these changes faster? I'm like, it's not possible. People don't make changes faster. It takes time. Right? We can't go to a three day Tony Robbins rah rah stuff that works for some situations. That's not what this is. Right. This is about changes over an entire year or more to help change your life.

And so I would say if you're thinking about being a Dream Manager, it's the most fun job ever. It's the coolest thing. I'm just so grateful for the opportunity. And I think it's really refining your coaching skills, getting real about what you're wanting to help with and where you fit in that organization, how you can help them and really thinking through where's the advantages there for them to have you in the program. So that's what I would think through both Dream Managers or CEO's, either way. Absolutely. It's so fun.

Well, thank you for keeping the integrity of the program because, yes, it's a process. Matthew put together this program very intentionally. There's a reason why it's the twelve months and we always start with the twelve months, but there is a whole other twelve month curriculum. So once people do the year one, there's year two. We've worked with individuals. They're doing year three, year four, year five, because it's a continuous learning. Think about it. I always think about it, like when you read a great book and then you pick it up maybe a year later and you look through it and you're like, how did I not know? Notice that? And the first time I read it and then you read through it again and you notice something else.

So you're a different person after you go through the program. And then you go through the program again and you, you gain new insights, you gain new ways to really grow personally and professionally in all the different areas that you focus on. So there's no need to rush it. It's a lifetime.

Yes. We just need to soak it in. Right. There needs to be life experiences in between. Learning some of this stuff, shoving it in does not work. Like it takes time to change. Yeah, it's fun, for sure.

Yeah. If someone could figure out a way to change people immediately, that would have been figured out already and they would be a billionaire. Well, Kellie, thank you so much for the work that you're doing. Thank you for the impact you're having on your people. We're so grateful that you are a certified Dream Manager doing this incredible work and helping your people, helping the organization. Thank you so much for taking the time to share your story with us.

Thanks, Kate.

I hope you enjoyed this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I absolutely love talking to our Dream Managers. They are incredible humans who care deeply about their people. And it's really cool to hear I stories all of the dreams that are being achieved. And I love when Kellie said that what she notices right away is how many people have stopped dreaming. When we invite people to dream again, it just starts to drum up this excitement about life because life can be really challenging. It can be really hard.

And so when we focus on our dreams again, it just brings so much life and empowerment because we then believe it's possible to achieve those dreams. And so if you are interested in either having a Dream Manager, maybe you're listening to this episode and you don't run an organization, but you're thinking, gosh, I would love to have a Dream Manager in my life. We would love to be your Dream Manager. And if you're also considering rolling the program out in your organization and to see what kind of impact it would have for you and on your team and really impact the business, and we would love to have that conversation with you. You can go to theDreamManager.com, fill out that form, and someone on our team will get in touch with you. Thank you again for listening. We so appreciate you. And until next time, Lead with Culture.