Building a single successful company is hard enough. Running five of them while making it home for dinner? That sounds impossible. But for some business owners, the secret isn’t working harder – it’s working differently. It’s about creating systems that run smoothly whether you’re in the office or at your kid’s baseball game. That’s exactly what Brad Burns figured out. As owner of Burns Holdings Corp and several other companies including Wayne Contracting and City Seafood, he’s learned a few things about keeping multiple plates spinning without dropping the most important one – family.
1. Delegating with Trust
The secret to running several companies at once? You can’t do it alone. Brad learned this lesson early. “Delegation, huge thing. That was one of the things that I kind of put into play early on in my business,” he shares. But it’s not just about passing tasks around – it’s about building a team that knows what they’re doing and trusting them to do it. Training comes first in Brad’s playbook. “Making sure that everybody, when they become a part of the team, they get the comprehensive understanding of what their expectations are,” he explains. This upfront investment pays off in smoother operations down the line.
Here’s where Brad’s approach gets interesting: “Trust, nobody here micromanages anybody.” It’s a bold strategy that goes against many traditional management styles. His philosophy? “The expectation is that you have a skill set, you come in, you understand your job description, you kind of hit the ground running after a short period of training where you kind of just basically outline the guardrails which you have to stay within.”
2. Tracking Success Through KPIs
Brad doesn’t guess – he measures. “The second would be KPI, so everything’s data driven,” he says. But he’s not drowning in spreadsheets from different companies. Instead, he’s built something smarter. “We have a fantastic accounting management team, in terms of how we handle, we use a shared services model,” Brad explains. This isn’t just about counting pennies – it’s about working smarter. “So, all the organizations follow up to one holdings group. We have one team that manages all the accounting for all the organizations to make sure they really efficient process.”
This centralized approach doesn’t just save time – it gives Brad the clear picture he needs to make smart decisions across all his companies. By having one team handle everything, patterns emerge that might be missed with separate accounting teams.
3. Focusing on Customer Satisfaction
The third pillar of Brad’s business philosophy focuses on what really matters – the customers. “Obviously happy customers mean long-term customers,” he points out. But his approach to customer service isn’t what you might expect. Instead of rigid policies, Brad empowers his team to solve problems. “We try to mitigate friction. We want to empower the team to handle the challenges that they oversee,” he explains. This ties back to his trust-based management style: “Like I mentioned before, we don’t really micromanage. We allow everybody to be an adult and basically take the reigns of what their responsibilities are and make sure that we overcome anything that jumps in front of us.”
Balancing Business and Family
These aren’t just business principles – they’re life principles. As Brad sees it, “You can utilize these tips and tricks to essentially not only make your business run more efficiently and allow you the ability to focus on your family as well, but there’s probably some crossover where you can use these things in your family decision making and kind of make everything run smoothly.” Brad’s approach shows that you don’t have to choose between business success and family time. By building strong teams, trusting them to do their jobs, measuring what matters, and keeping customers happy, you can create businesses that run smoothly without requiring your constant attention.
To learn more about Brad Burns and his approach, check out his LinkedIn profile.
