Scaling Business Success Through a Dynamic Culture with Ryan Boylston, CEO and Founder of 2TON
“It’s no longer a culture I’m building for the company. It’s a culture the company is building for the company.”
Ryan Boylston, CEO and Founder of 2TON, spent years carefully cultivating a trust-based culture at his company. But as the business grew, he realised he needed to take a step back and allow teams to evolve the culture themselves.
In this episode, Ryan shares his insights on the importance of trust, equality, and shared goals in developing a dynamic company culture. Listen in to hear what you can do to hire based on culture fit and why strategies such as that allow the workplace to develop itself.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- Cultivate a robust organizational environment by establishing core values and trust
- Provide coaching and expansion opportunities to bolster professional growth
- For optimal team cohesion, prioritize bringing on members with cultural compatibility
Things to Listen for:
[05:29] Finding the right talent
[13:07] The importance of transferring the ownership of culture
[21:57] The challenges of building a successful business
[26:43] Analyzing the evolution of contemporary office culture
[34:11] Keeping culture intentional as a leader
[35:50] Ryan’s superpower
Resources:
Connect with the Guest:
Connect with the Host & Floyd Coaching:
Transcript
it's really important that, that ownership is transferred from me to the team.
This is Lead With Culture. I am Kate Vollman, and on this episode we're talking about strategies to scale a business and building a dynamic culture.
[:He shared a lot of really great insights and experiences in this episode, so I hope that you enjoy my conversation with
in your eyes, to you, what is the definition of culture?
[:you and I, you know, joke around about it that it's not just a cool office with ping pong tables and beanbag chairs. probably dated myself with the beanbag chair, right? , but, is that a part of it? the physical environment?
Sure. It's a part of it. but culture's so much deeper, And, uh, I really think it's about trust And this environment of, we're all equals and that we're all working together and that we all have a common goal.
and so if you start there and build everything upon that, every time you go, when you make a decision on what should that, new team member's title be, or what should, our team event be, or you know, how should we build out our new office? if you always start. . then I think you could continue to build those building blocks of a great culture.
And I learned that, I worked at, uh, JM Family Enterprises, to start my career and, as an organization I was very familiar with growing up. My mom's worked there for 35 years and they are always ranked as one of the top five companies to work for in the world. and they just, instilled a lot of those important pillars.
of a company culture, in me at a very young age.
[:Like, happy something Happiness.
[: [: [:It wasn't just a fun. Title or a title that would make people smile. Although, you know, that's, that's certainly a perk when it's chief of client Happiness and that starts off with a smile. Right? But, we were trying to solve a problem in our organization. We were starting to grow, we were probably around 10 team members, and I had brought on a consultant, and that consultant was like, wait a second, Ryan, you have no support as the c e o of this growing company.
And, uh, you're answering every phone call in every email, . And I'm like, like, you can't do that anymore. And I go, I know, but here's my issue. I can't bring on an assistant receptionist, office manager type role because we're a flat organization and everyone's equal.
And I just don't feel like that position will feel like an equal to the creative director. Right. and she's like, great, so we'll make it a chief. And I go, oh, is it that easy? And she's like, yeah, there'll be a chief position. And I go, okay. and then she goes, and what's most important?
Like, what, what are you most worried about right now? And I'm like, really, as we're growing, just keeping my clients happy. I want, every time they call from the phone, someone picks up the phone. I never wanna send 'em to an answering machine. I never wanna send 'em to a hit one for this department.
Right? I just wanna keep 'em happy. She's like, great Chief of client happiness. You're gonna go hire one and you're not gonna hire someone, at an hourly rate or someone that's been a, receptionist or office manager. You are gonna go hire the best talent out there at a salaried position equal to anybody else in an important position at your company.
and their title's gonna be chief of client. And it's the best thing I ever did.
because that position grew into our director of business business evolution, and we're a team. It's like myself, the c e o of the company and the Director of Business Evolution and we're this, little, team. So it paid off
[: [: [: [:We know , you know, really, it was just like, who do I trust in our good people? Oh, my friends and family, so let's start there. and some of them were in the industry and some of them weren't, and we said, we're willing to train. If you're willing to learn, we're willing to train you.
And then you go, okay, the network's getting a little bit bigger. I'm running out of people I know that we can hire on the team. how about you guys?
In the last few years, I think we've gone through our entire network, o of people . So as much as, I still like that practice of saying, Hey, everybody, we're hiring a new position. Here's the title, here's the job description. If you know anybody, right? That's who we'd like to interview first, that first phase.
and then second, I put it out to a larger network of, my colleagues and clients and, you know, chambers and people. I really trust because that's what we've, that's what we've found. We just need someone that fits our culture, who we can trust, and who are self-motivated. my team kind of makes fun of me sometimes.
I don't really pay much attention to the, resume or the college degrees. Those aren't really the things that are important to me, you know, it's really the type of person you are. And then we can talk about, your skillset and how it fits the. I
[:are they gonna fit with the team? What is that gonna do when you bring them on? Obviously we bring on a new team member, especially when you're smaller. Right? When you're smaller, that really impacts people. The person's personality. Yes. Do they get along all of that stuff. So how do you incorporate that into your hiring process to make sure that you're finding the right cultural fit?
That's a
[:So what they do is, after putting everyone through an initial screening, which is a lot like, what I used to do, is like, Hey, before we even get to the interview, let's, let's grab coffee. Let's just grab coffee. Let me tell you about the position, and you tell me about what you're looking for, and then take that information and then call me back and then let me know if you wanna interview for the position.
so they do something kind of like that. . And then we have the interview, which may be with, you know, one of heads of our realms or two people. But I think the most important part is that then they'll interview with the team. So you'll actually sit with a group of, you know, four or five people that you're going to be working with.
and then they all get the chime in on kind of the, vibes that they got from hanging out with that individual for, you know, a 30 or 40 minute period.
[:And, but they couldn't decide.
[:And, my team came to me and said, Hey, we're down to two candidates and we love 'em both. and one is, you know, really experienced and they're gonna come in at this level which is great. But then there's this other one that's, you know, kind of right outta college, kind of had a job.
We see so much potential in her. And I went great. Hire 'em both. why not get ahead, why lose out on one of these individuals? you know, it's always a, a position that is very hard to hire for. So why don't we get ahead of the game here, you know, offer 'em both a position.
They both came on with us.
[:Which is a challenge, right? Especially when you need people. , have you ever made a hiring mistake over your 11 years of growing the business that you can remember? That was like the biggest mistake.
[:And, um, there was a wild disconnect between, you know, our organization and what he was. know, he came in with a lot of different skill sets, not highly trained in any of them, and felt because he had so many skillsets because he could pick up a camera or because he had graphic design or because he could do a little code and said this to me that he should be paid highest in the company.
And Oh, wow. because of the list of things he could do in comparison to, his colleagues. Some of those colleagues had been designing, and been creative directors longer than he had been alive. and it was that day where I was like, we're gonna part ways today. there is definitely a disconnect here, but I gotta tell you, if you don't fit here in such a short period of time, Then maybe this isn't really for you.
Maybe you really should chase that. You know, owning your own agency, right? And like doing your own thing because you kind of had that and then you came to work for us. And it's completely cuz he agreed. He was like, yeah, this isn't working. And I'm like, okay, great. So we parted ways. He did go and start his own.
which we would send him work, when we had clients that couldn't afford our agency. And as far as I know, that was, like six, seven years ago. As far as I know, he's still running, a nice little agency it all worked out. But there is a funny part to that story that I still hear about today is that we parted ways with him on his birthday.
So now there's like a running. In the office. Still to this day, it's like, uh oh, it's your birthday. Don't meet with Ryan.
[:And I mean there's something to be said about that too because obviously you have the culture that you're building inside and people are talking about that culture. When they leave the organization, they're talking about their experience there, what it was like, how it was working with you and the team.
and that's a really big deal because, every company wants to say they have a great culture, but mm-hmm. , it's what's being talked about. How are people experiencing that culture?
[:It's gotta be the culture the company is building for the company. it's the last thing that I gotta step away from. Like, I, haven't designed something in a long time. everybody on my team's a better designer than I, am I haven't coded something in a long time because everyone's a better coder than me.
And then that last piece, you think to yourself, well I'll just never step away from managing the culture. Because that's just too, important And in the last few years I've realized, no, it's really important that I do step away from that.
it's really important that, that ownership is transferred from me to the team. and that's why we have, Nicole on our team who's our Director of Business Evolution, used to be our Chief of Client Happiness. she's really taking off like the lead when it comes to evolving our.
[:But as you were growing. . You know, you started, you were a small shop starting, and now you have 27 people over the years as you have grown, how were you creating that culture? how were you putting culture at the forefront of the decisions that you were making?
[:Like we don't use the word employee. And the word boss, you know, we had a flat organization. I really wanted everyone to walk in the. and not feel like there's people above them or there's people below them, or to elevate in the company, you gotta beat that person to this spot.
but as you evolve, you do have to make, changes. So as we got bigger, and we had to have departments, Which is into one another. One of those words, it's like, departments, right? We said, you know what? what are we gonna have? Well, we're our creative agency and we got a mixture of Star Wars and Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter fans and Marvel fans, right?
I mean, it just comes with the territory. we're all fans of all those different worlds. So we decided, you know what? We're gonna have. , right? That's what we're gonna call, right? when we finally made that announcement that, hey, I think you've all realized that we can't just be this growing, bloated one organization that we need, that we're already naturally working in our own little realm, right?
Social media content creation realm in the digital marketing realm, the design realm. we evolved and we moved to Realm. So that's just like one of those examples where, Yeah, I set a pillar in the company of like, no departments.
We're never gonna have a department. We're always gonna be a flat organization. And then later on you go, you know what? we gotta change that. We can't have that, that can't be set in concrete. that's something we gotta evolve and we gotta rebuild and we gotta change it. But we can still ensure that it aligns with the culture that everyone expects,
when working here, we don't gotta change it to something that's not us.
[:did create an environment where people feel, I mean, look, you're a creative agency, right? People need to feel inspired when they're doing the work, and you created. that space for them, and it felt very collaborative. it felt like a team.
Everyone's there to support each other to be there for each other. Have you experienced, especially again, as you're hiring new people and bringing them on, what have you seen and some of the challenges with just integrating people, what that looks like? Any. Role challenges of this person does that versus this person does another thing.
I
[:and my team actually puts almost everyone through exercises. So we really try to do as much due diligence as possible. Like if you're coming on as a developer, you'll have to, we'll give you some coding exercises to make sure, like you can handle the work that we're gonna give you.
If you are coming on as a project manager, we're gonna give you some examples. What if a client says this to you in an email, what's gonna be your reply? so with all that process in place, you know, knock on wood, like we're, pretty lucky when we bring people on, that it's gonna be a fit.
And I'll say, if it's not, it jumps out pretty quickly, because it's like we're such a well-oiled machine, and so supportive of each other.
And, you know, we've done a really good job of keeping that, like that negative office clicky environment, outside of our walls, of our company, which I know I'm sure you've experienced in organizations. I've experienced in organizations mm-hmm. . we're pretty lucky.
There hasn't been too many examples like that.
[:Mm-hmm. and really what winning looks like. What are some processes that you've put in place so that everyone on your team feels like, Hey, I'm part of this team, I'm part of this mission, and I get to do what I do. So how do you put process in place for those people to feel like, Hey, I know that I'm doing a great job.
I know that when Ryan comes in my office, I'm not getting fired on my birthday.
[:and if that resume keeps you with this company forever, great. And I hope that's the case cause I've had a great career here. But if it doesn't, then it doesn't. If you know, if I can't give you what you want in your career that's gonna fulfill you, well I'm gonna help you get there, whether it's here or not.
And I thought, man, that's really neat that he just said that. like, Hmm, I wonder if, uh, his bosses know he's saying that. it was like really refreshing. So I have that same conversation. I sit down and I go, Where do you wanna go with your career?
What do you wanna do? What do you like? And if they go, I really like making, you know, videos. that's my thing. Like, Brad, okay, no, I came on as a graphic designer, but video, well, guess what? We need video. So let's just start transitioning you into that. our previous, chief of client Happiness fantastic in the role.
Said, you know what, Ryan, this isn't what I wanna do. You know, I came on, because I wanted to work here and that was the position available and my skillset fitted. she's like, I wanna be a graphic. , I wanna work in social media, I wanna do content creation. I go, you don't really have a lot of experience in that area, but if you're willing to take kind of a step back and learn,
And join the team. we'll make it happen. But I was straightforward. I'm like, you're on this trajectory right now as a chief of client happiness. you're doing an amazing job. And she's like, yeah, it's just not what I want to do. And I go, okay, cool. So let's kind of hit the reset button a little bit and, let's start getting you working with that team.
Right. Shadowing in that team. And then little by little, she left the position and she moved on to new positions still with us today.
[:Most people would feel like they wouldn't be able to come up to you and have that conversation in fear that you would just let them go But the fact that you gave her this opportunity I mean, she's still with you today, so I'm assuming she's doing a good job.
So she built this whole other skillset, being able to kind of learn as she was growing. And that's what leaders are here to do, right? We're here to help people. .
[:that's something we're never gonna do. So I'm gonna try to find as many projects as possible close, to software. But we really stick in the web development realm. But we have, you know, jumped into app development and help you build your resume right in your portfolio.
And then one day when you get that opportunity, we're all gonna. , when you go and, and, and join that software company. And that's happened.
[:as you've been growing and building, what have been some of the biggest hurdles, the biggest challenges that you've dealt with?
[:A bus comes and picks us up and takes us go-kart, right? Say, are we go to drive shaft and hit golf balls or whatever. we've done so many fun things together. it's been great. but recently, my team has been like, what about professional development?
can we incorporate more of that into these team days?. And that was like daunting to me because, you know, I'm thinking back and, um, they're real hit or miss in my professional career where they're like, you know, we're gonna have a company workshop day and we're bringing in speakers to do extras and everyone at the same time, rules.
Oh my God. Like, you know, like, oh, okay. they weren't all horrible, right? They were 50 50, I'd say. Right. So , I was quite nervous. But, you know, luckily Nicole, who had joined our team, she has a background in education and she actually has her master's and she came to us from the world of Education and I was like, what do you think about doing our first company summit, A one day summit?
We kick it off, we bring a speaker we do a lot of team exercises and we have some breakouts with the rounds and people present back to each other. And we brought in Anthony Francis from Improv View. He uses some of the techniques in improv for professional development.
so we just did that to kick off the year and I'm like getting goosebumps thinking about it. It was such a success. it was great. but I just felt it was so daunting to like really make a professional development. That was gonna be great. That wasn't gonna be a dragon. Everyone was gonna be super excited about all day long.
And they were, and they're like, when are we doing it again? And can we keep doing it? So now we have like, Nicole's putting together these monthly, like kind of lunch and learns, you know? Mm-hmm. , where we're bringing in speakers or we're letting other people teach classes. So we're gonna keep going throughout the year, and then we're even gonna do a bigger summit, maybe a, day and a half, two day.
To kick off:So have a lot of flexibility with that organization. Uh, we wanna implement something, we can implement something. But my other job is that I'm a city commissioner, in the city of Delray Beach, which is an elected position. I'm not the c e O, right? I'm a board. And we have a city manager who acts as a C E O of the company.
And it's a large organization, all right? It's a thousand employees. It's 160 million budget, and man trying to shift the culture. is really challenging. One, I'm not in the position, I'm not in the c e o position. you know, I got a little speedboat at two ton.
this is a cruise ship. . So when you wanna turn it , you know, it takes a little bit more power, a little bit more time. so five years, you know, as a city commissioner in Delray, a lot of hurdles of evolving a culture, in government, it's a big difference.
[: [: [: [:that whole culture is still out there. In a lot of industries. I know it's crazy, you know, for you or me who both, work with incredible organizations and, you and I might be like, kind of in this bubble where we're like, that still exists.
It still exists and it's out there and it needs to be like annihilated and changed in a race. but more of like a modern issue that, that I see out there is the whole debate on do I need an. and, coming outta the pandemic. you've seen companies get rid of offices and go, Hey, we're never gonna have an office again.
And then you've seen large corporations go, Hey, you don't have to ever come in to work again. And then that same organization said, everybody must come back to work now, . what we have found Is
The hybrid approach, because we've built a culture of trust, right? And it was proven to us over the pandemic where we didn't have to worry. We had the systems in place, in the in, in the culture, in place that we didn't have to worry about whether or not someone was doing their job because they weren't coming into the office.
It shifted our thinking. However, we. Just go, cool, now we can save money. Get rid of the office instead. Actually, we, we expanded our office and we did that in a way so that we have this collaborative space.
Where we can invite people in our space, we can make sure that clients are, you know, welcome in our space, that we can have team meetings in that space, that we can have the right type of technology. So for our team members or clients that are remote and can't be there, they could feel like they're there.
and it's just been a real big differentiator cuz one, I think our clients, they go, oh good, you still have an office. Like they want their agency to still have an office, right? To still have this presence. But then also team members. I'm not forcing anybody to come into. we're office optional.
But isn't it nice to have that option? We had one team member, she joined an agency, I think pretty much right outta college. And, the pandemic hit. She then worked in her bedroom for a year and a half, and the pandemic opened up and the agency announced, we've sold the office, we're never going back.
And she was like, oh, I'm done. She's like, I'm done. So the very first question she asked, the very first question she asked in the interview was, do you have an office ? And I was like, yes. Oh, thank God. Oh, thank God. Right. And it's nice we go into the office and some days it's me and you know, one or two other team members.
And then sometimes I come in and I go, oh my God. Everybody's here today, like, what's the deal? And it's like, oh, we all were like, Hey, we missed each other. So we said, Hey, let's all come in on a Friday andwe're all gonna play a game at, you know, five o'clock we're gonna do trivia and then hang out afterwards.
And I'm like, oh, cool. Like, I didn't organize that. I didn't have to organize that. Yeah. .
[:Do we need to be physical or work from home? It's about the intentionality of the culture that you're building. How intentional are you about what you're creating? Do people feel connected to the to mission, the vision? Do they know what is expected of them? Like all of those pieces, that is what?
incorporates culture. Mm-hmm. , those are the things that we have to be caring about. And then when you hear stories like that, when your team is going out and doing things together that's awesome. Right? Like you don't even have to facilitate that. It just organically will start to happen cuz you're building that kind of environment.
Mm-hmm. , my team's the same way I was like, what? I want you guys to feel safe and comfortable, so you let me know if you wanna still work from home. It's cool.
And they were all like, get us back together. And in the office there's energy, they love it. knowing that they can, Go into the office or not. And we have to remember too, when you're running a business, there are people in your company, y you don't know, do they have an office? Is there a lot going on in their home?
Mm-hmm. , do they have a space? if you're living in a really small place and this, this girl was working out of her bedroom. How much fun can that be every day to just be living, working, sleeping, everything in one room, right? so to be able to have that option is great.
So,
[:Soon as I get off this call with you, Kate, I'm run, I'm running into the office where I actually have. A desk. but you're right. and it really does give, everybody flexibility. You know, like you mentioned, we're in South Florida and uh, you know, the affordability of rent and homes and if you're able to go 30 or 45 minutes outside of, you know, the core where our offices are both located, it gets more affordable.
Right. But man, if you have to spend an hour and a half, two hours in a car every single day because you're forced to go into the office for really no real reason. so it's given some flexibility for my team members to, open up where they live. we've even had some team members that have come to us and said, Hey Ryan, I have an opportunity.
It's been my dream to just live in New York for one year and I have this opportunity. I got a roommate and like, I can do it but I don't wanna leave the company. I look, I go, dude, Go. We have one team member that's in New York for a year right now, and we have another one that had an opportunity to go, to the UK for three months.
Go, go, you know, these are incredible experiences and I want you to have them. And we've put a culture in a system in place that, you know, allows that to happen.
[:You still get to be part of the team. You still get to do your great work that you love doing. That is so cool. there's a company called Remote Year. Have you heard of this? That this is what they do. They basically like plan all of these trips all over the world. you're in a group of people that are all wanting to live remotely from a different country and you get to do it with a.
What, what's, what a phenomenal experience.
[:because you are gonna have to step in front of a client physically, you are gonna have to present to a board in a physical environment, right? So we went through 'em and said, here are the positions that we believe have to be here, right? There's no way for you to go capture video content, you know, at one of our clients' offices or one of the restaurants if you don't live here.
and then we sat in, here are the ones that have a little bit more flexibility than the other ones, and you just now, when, you apply for a position at two Ton, we say that we let you know right off the bat that yes, everybody's office optional. but this position has to live regional and this one is a little bit more flexible.
[: [:But it's, you know, I think it's really just to, serve not only our clients, but our industry and our community, with creativity and passion. I mean, , you know, that's the root of our mission and what we're looking to do so
[:keeping that culture, going? Moving? Mm-hmm. flowing and uh, and again, being really intentional about that.
[:you know, like one for us was, I'm not going to use contractors, I'm not going to outsource. That's something that we've kept in place. and I'm not going to pay anyone hourly. Okay. So when you say that, man, you've just made a commitment that is definitely going to slow your. , growth right?
Because everyone you bring on, you're going to bring on a salary team member. You're not going to outsource. you're making this commitment. And many times I was challenged with that going, man, if you just outsourced that, you can make more money. If you just outsource that, it could happen quicker, you could grow, you could scale faster.
But that wasn't the organization that I wanted to build. And, I got into this, entrepreneur world because I wanted to start my own company, but I stayed in it because I like creating jobs. . That's what I like doing. That's my job now. I, think, is just creating more positions, right?
The more successful the company is, the more people we can bring on and we can support and not just support from a financial standpoint, but give them a work life balance that I think is pretty awesome. So, I would say just stick to your guns, that's probably the most important thing because there's going to be so many pressures that push you.
to give up those things, to give up those pillars and don't do it. it's not worth it.
[:I am exactly where I'm supposed to.
[:you know what, I guess, I, I really just trust. . I think that's it. I don't need to hold on to power. I don't need to be the decision maker. I'm okay when someone fails. when we do hire a person that I did not talk to or review the resume or anything and it doesn't work out, it just was as big as, it just doesn't work out.
I can go, yeah, that happened to me. You know, I made that mistake too, let me take a look at all the process we have in place. I don't think there's anything you could have done better. It's okay. It's cool. Let's go find the right person. and recently, leadership at two Tucson just took this test, I think it's a IP test or PI test.
And it's, you probably know about it, answered a bunch of questions and it tells you like you know, where you scale in all these different areas. And now our whole team's gonna take it next month for our lunch and learn. and, one of the areas is flexibility. And mine was so high that the flexibility dot was covering the word flexibility, which is like literally off the chart.
And my team thought that was so funny. and they're like, that's you to a t is that, you know, I'm just like, I'm just rocking and rolling and just like trusting everybody and being super flexible with everything. . And when it doesn't work, it doesn't work. It's okay. You know? We'll fix it.
[:It really is important to us that you get value out of every episode that you listen to and actually do something with the inform. Right. It's so easy for us to just listen to a podcast or go to a conference or maybe talk to a friend and we learned these new strategies or gain these new insights, and we don't do anything with them, but we want this to be a show that encourages you to take action.
And when you do, we would love to hear about it. So connect with me over on LinkedIn and let me know what you like best about the show. And if you're interested in developing your people and you're serious about becoming the best version of yourself this year, we would love to chat with you about coaching.
To learn more, go to floyd coaching.com. And until next time, lead with culture.
