Speaker 1:
0:00
All right well, welcome back to the Killer Bee Studios podcast replay. In today's episode we had our guest Brandon Peterson. Brandon Peterson came and he shared what it was like behind the curtain of being an entrepreneur. My name is Olivia. What did you think about the interview?
Speaker 2:
0:16
It was really great. I think it was really good for people to hear that sometimes you see people's business and you're like, wow, they just instantly have a successful business, but you don't see what it took to get to where that business is today.
Speaker 1:
0:37
That is so true. He has so much great advice and experiences to share with us and we had some great questions. So with that, let's go ahead and dive on in. Brandon, would you please come on out to the Killer Bee Studios, come on out to the platform there. He is right there, brandon. Thanks for joining us. Brandon, thank you, that's awesome.
Speaker 3:
0:56
I'm so glad you're here.
Speaker 1:
0:58
Yes, yes, brandon, thank you, man. Okay, what's your meta age?
Speaker 4:
1:03
My meta age.
Speaker 1:
1:04
Your meta age? Yeah, what's your meta?
Speaker 4:
1:06
age. You've been in Horizons About a year and a half, so I love being in the meta working out in here. We actually in our company we have remote people work, so we'll come in and sit around and work and get our computers set up and do that and playing games. Awesome, the whole nine.
Speaker 1:
1:26
So, yeah, we love jumping in the VR. Oh man, what apps do you guys like to use for meeting with your team and stuff?
Speaker 4:
1:35
The Horizons Workspaces is our favorite one to jump into. It is a great place where we started. Yeah, I know you can project. Also, you can work out on a beach. So if you have your conference room on a beach, nothing beats that. Right, that's right.
Speaker 2:
1:51
Yeah.
Speaker 1:
1:54
That's right. That's right, that's so nice, all right. So, brandon, I would love, like you know. A lot of people here might not know who you are, so let me give you 30 seconds just to kind of introduce yourself. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Who is Brandon? Who is Brand Aid 238?
Speaker 4:
2:07
Yeah, yeah, of course. Well, thanks for having me on here and everybody coming out to the show. So I'm Brandon Peterson. I'm from Nebraska, I'm a third gen entrepreneur, so I come from a family of entrepreneurs, kind of came growing up to it. Family vacations, that's what we talked about. But growing up I you know I've always had that itch and that urge.
Speaker 4:
2:30
I started things in college, high school, all the way up, and since then I've got into the family business and built that which we can talk about a little bit later, started a security company, and I started a handful of other companies co-working spaces, real estate, a nonprofit and some other things but not all of them are here today. Right, and it's learning through those processes what works, what doesn't, you don't they're not all failures, it's just understanding what doesn't and how do you apply that into the next thing. So both the companies I have now are international online businesses and got to go from, you know, a dozen people or zero people on some of them up to 40, 50, 60 people and on each one, and go from dealing with thousands of dollars to millions of dollars and being able to manage that through the process and have those learning experiences. It's eye-opening and humbling in a lot of different ways. So Brandon let me ask you.
Speaker 1:
3:29
You know I'm an entrepreneur, I run a business, but I would love to know what is your definition of an entrepreneur, like when you think entrepreneur. First off, let me ask you this what was the definition of an entrepreneur when you started, and has that changed to today?
Speaker 4:
3:45
Absolutely. When I started, entrepreneurship was you know, it's the highlight of you and your idea and making that come to life. And that's just the surface level. Really, entrepreneurship means to me is taking a group of people and galvanizing around a mission to make a big impact. And once you change that mindset yeah, thank you once you change to that mindset, it completely transforms how you operate the business. Because if you are just trying to make a profit and do that first, you're going to get very short-sighted and you're going to get knocked down so many times and it's really going to be really hard to get back up.
Speaker 1:
4:23
That's good, that's really good. That's what really keeps you going is having the right mindset of what success would be for you as an entrepreneur.
Speaker 4:
4:32
Absolutely, and I've had the wrong vision before. You know. I've, you know, just want the money, chase the money, chase the dollar. But in the reality situation that'll never be enough and I've learned that the hard way. There's other things, there's other factors that give you that gratification that really motivates you to keep going.
Speaker 1:
4:49
Well, how do you measure success for yourself as an entrepreneur?
Speaker 4:
4:53
Well, you know a couple things. Number one you asked you know what makes a good entrepreneur? Two things that come to mind for me. Number one you have an overwhelming sense of optimism. You have to. Just, glass is half full. I don't care if there's a drop in the glass. That glass is half full.
Speaker 4:
5:09
To you, you know, and because your team relies on you, your energy, your vibes, all of those things are, they're contagious and if you're constantly in a in a in a muck or in a bad mood, that's not going to, that's not going to translate well with your team. The second thing is keeping even keel on emotions, on the highs and the lows, because there's going to be moments where you're killing it. I mean you cannot lose and if you don't get humbled really fast, you're going to get knocked down, and it's that's when it's tough. So when you're really low, it doesn't mean it's the end, it just means I need to pivot or I need to make a change. So those are the couple of things that come apply when, when you're becoming an entrepreneur. Those are two really important qualities to have, on top of skill sets, which obviously can be learned through mentorship or online training or so on.
Speaker 1:
5:58
But what you say has been one of your, one of your biggest challenges as an entrepreneur? Yeah, because I think that, like one of the things I look at with you know, when you know we're in digital marketing and consulting, and even with the clients we work with, like it's easy to look what other people are doing On the outside, on the on the front, the front of social media, and they're like we want to be there. We're like, yeah, but you have no idea what size their team is, what struggles they went through, what failures they've had. And I was like you know it's one thing to talk about, you know the successes, but you've already started touching on this. You know there's a lot to learn there, in the failures. So what, what would be?
Speaker 1:
6:33
What has been your biggest challenge Since being becoming an entrepreneur and how long you've been? You said how many years now have you been an entrepreneur? Probably 10 years, 10 years, yeah, yeah. So I'm sure you've had a lot of life lessons. Like what would you say is one of your biggest lessons you've learned from a mistake or anything that you've made?
Speaker 4:
6:52
I don't think we got that much time. Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1:
7:00
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4:
7:01
I know exactly. I mean mistakes. You know there's minuscule ones, there's large ones. It's understanding what's a good deal when it's not a good deal. Understand not knowing your numbers, not being educated. There's so many things that I've made mistakes on. I would say the biggest mistake that I have made.
Speaker 4:
7:21
I'm in this group called convene. It's a Christian entrepreneurship group. You have to have a business of a certain size to be in it and we do this thing called an opportunity challenge and you take this at, this issue you have in your business and how can I turn into an opportunity to excel? Well, I was talking through it and One of the guys in the back he goes you got to get your home life first before you fix your business problems. I said I'm not here talking about my home life, I'm talking about my business, that's what we're talking about. This. He goes, yet nothing when you're saying really matters to me except for that part, and that really just kind of hit home for me because what I was doing is I was Sacrificing the things that really mattered in my life.
Speaker 4:
8:00
For for what? For money, for for those types of things. I fixed that at home. I I Organized my calendar, I organized my schedule. I prioritized my family. I have a wife and two kids. You know I really put more effort into that. People respected that on my team and guess what happened? In turn, they worked harder, they started doing that with their families. What that translated to our clients and it in just that care culture and that Reprioritization of your mind of what really matters. It's important now. I'm now let me say this as an entrepreneur. You are gonna have 80 to 100 hour weeks. You are, it's just gonna happen. But still make sure that you have enough left in your cup to care about and the things that really matter, and that's your family, that's your health and those types of things.
Speaker 1:
8:47
I love hearing you say that too, because I think that's what I hear a lot of today is, you know, the hustle, the grind, the hustle, the ground, and it's like, okay, that's good, but none of these sacrifice of your family and the people that matters most in your life. I love what you said about you know prioritizing that time too. What are some of the ways that you've you've learned to balance that, that work life and Personal life like? What are some of those things you've done to put in a place to help balance that?
Speaker 4:
9:36
Yeah, that and that's. That's an ever-going thing. I work, I have to work on my calendar every single month what's my theme, what's my priorities, what's my priorities for the quarter, and then you set based on that. So you know you want to put your workout schedule in there, you want to have your family time, you need to allocate so much time to internal meetings, to external meetings, and so calibrating that is an ever-changing battle. But what I do is I sit and I and I prioritize what happens first and I and I actually color code them based off of green, yellow and red. Red means it has to happen this week, yellow means it can happen in a week or two and green means it can be a three or four. Everything that as an entrepreneur and as a boss and as a leader, you're gonna have things thrown at your way constantly and they're gonna feel like to everyone else, like they're a code red, like they're an emergency. Sometimes simple questions can alleviate a lot of your time to them that they can figure it out.
Speaker 4:
10:36
I have mentors, you know, I I have a lot of mentors. I believe in coaching. If you don't have a coach, get one. It's the most powerful thing in the world. But but they said to me you know, I your calendar way. If you don't process your counter correctly, you're going to end up failing and people are going to take your time. Are you controlling your life or are you letting the world control your life? Until you're controlling every aspect of that, you're just going to get overwhelmed and burnt out.
Speaker 1:
11:04
That's good. I've actually someone once said to me like is you have to check yourself and ask yourself is the business running you or are you running the business man? That's so. There's been so many times like the business is running me, yep, that's exactly what's happening right now and that's a it's good to be checking yourself for that. Even at one time I'd notice the same thing as an entrepreneur.
Speaker 1:
11:27
We can get so caught up doing all the work that my family would start taking them backseat, and there was a time where I actually started making sure. Well, if I put the important things on my calendars, then why don't I put family time on there? And we're time to go out. We talk a lot here at the studio about reflection time. I'll go out and spend two to four hours, usually on a Friday, just to go out and walk out in nature and just talk to God about things that's going on in the business, give things to him and then listen and just be in his presence and not be trying to just figure it out on my own, like I needed that time to reflect on what's going on and hand that over and listen, because I feel like the hustle and grind has pushed so much. But if you lose focus of the things around you, you can do great. You can succeed money-wise if that's what you're thinking like money-wise is what I'm trying to succeed on. You can do that with the hustle and grind, but is your ultimate goal to get there at the end and have nobody left in your life that you cared about? You're probably going to get there. A lot of people probably do get there and they realize what was this all for?
Speaker 1:
12:25
Let me ask you this how do you stay motivated in those times when things don't go as you had planned? Because I know for myself and I don't know about anybody of you here. Maybe anybody here can raise your hand, throw some confetti. Have you ever had like this is the goal I have? And I was like shoot, it's really easy to do it. The new year right, we have goals to be fit, be in better shape. And then you're like I am way off for that goal. And then you feel like you just crash. Has anybody been there before? Yeah, okay. So when you set these goals and you have these dreams and you're diving in head first and you're giving your all, you're putting all your energy to hit a wall or see it fail? How do you stay motivated and focused? To keep, to not give up?
Speaker 4:
13:08
Yeah. So I do this challenge with every single person that comes into our business. It's called the North Star Challenge. If you follow Bob Beal, he's a big entrepreneur, coach for churches and those, and what he's come up with is called the Leadership Star and I call it the North Star Challenge. And what I do is every single person that comes into our company and it also translates to myself, I promise. But what I do is I say when they come in, one of my companies is GeoKey or the other one's DPA auctions and I'll say, can I see your GeoKey brand? And they're like what I said your brand, the brand that says GeoKey on you, and they say I don't have that.
Speaker 4:
13:48
I go oh yeah, it's because you weren't born for this company. So you were born for your own goals, your own aspirations, a job. If it's you own the business or you're working for a business, that's not your identity. That is a means to an end, that is a vehicle to your goals. Some are the Honda Civic, some are the Lamborghini. Whatever you choose in life, I hope it's your Lamborghini, but if you don't know your goals, then you're just a shotgun shell and it's terrible. So what I'm going to do is figure out what those goals are. But if I ask you what your goals are for your life in a week, you'd probably take you, you'd probably write me 10 pages or a book.
Speaker 4:
14:25
But I'm going to ask it in four short minutes Because, at the end of the day, I don't want the influence of your wife, your husband, your friends, your family or any of that. I want to know what you want. So what I tell them to do is I tell them to draw a star In the top left corner. It's why Right corner is what, how and legacy. So in one minute I'll say why are we put on this earth? Write it in bullet points.
Speaker 4:
14:47
Timer starts now. Then I say what are you going to do with your life? Timer starts how are you going to accomplish what you just said you were going to do? And then your legacy when you are dead and gone what do you want to be known for? What do you want people to say about you?
Speaker 4:
15:02
So four minutes goes by and now I just figured out your goals, your subconscious, what you truly want for your life, is right there. So when the going gets tough and you don't, and you don't know why you're doing it, you pull out your North Star and it's in your bathroom or or in your desk, or in your car or wherever it's at, and you can say this is why I'm doing what I'm doing. So if you don't have your North Star and you don't know, you haven't done this challenge in the four minutes I I I encourage you to definitely do that. It's game changer for you and really, if you have employees, thank you. Yeah, if you have employees, you can. When the going gets tough for them, you can go remember this and be transparent about yours to them, because, vice versa, they can go hey, remember this, because it's okay to have bad days and it's okay to let your staff know that you have bad days every once in a while too, they can pick you up.
Speaker 1:
15:55
That's good, that's good, that's really good. I love that. Very great advice, very great advice. Metal Livid, do you have anything you wanted to add? You want to add there?
Speaker 2:
16:04
Um, yeah, I was just going to say, obviously you two are entrepreneurs and I work for Mr Killer B Um, but as someone who you know is not the CEO of the company or whatever it may be, what is a way that you know a team member can be encouraging to you? Know, you all basically.
Speaker 4:
16:28
So I teach this when I teach, I do sales workshops and trainings. But I think the same application applies to, you know, staff, to owners and so on. There's nothing special about an owner. They're just a person. They got families, they got friends, they got hobbies, they got all those types of things.
Speaker 4:
16:47
And I think people take C-level executives and so on and put them on this pedestal and maybe they do that because there's an ego involved in them. But to realize that they're just people too and it's okay to have feelings and be a human, that's okay. You know, care about them and really want them to be successful, and that translates back and it's just an amazing, beautiful relationship. And that's really what a working relationship should be. It should be a partnership. You know, like I should know your goals and you should know my goals, because my goals to make sure you hit your goals, because what are you going to do in return? You're going to help me hit mine and so if you guys are transparent on that level and you understand that it just it makes the good beautiful and it makes the hard times easier, because now you have a communication platform that you can get through tough times.
Speaker 1:
17:42
Yeah, that's really good, that's good, you know. That actually took me back to a moment where, when I first started getting into entrepreneurship, I had a friend of mine that reached out to me and he just you know, he called me was totally complaining about his work environment. He's like my bosses they don't listen to me, they don't get it all Like, and I'm just like listening and listening. I'm like, okay, okay, now I've been in the boss, right, I know the stuff that's going on. And I let him just go on for probably about 20 minutes and then I said, hey, I just got a question.
Speaker 1:
18:13
Have you ever, like sat down and and talked to your bosses about, like how you feel and like what you like? You feel like they're not listening. Like, well, well, no, I'm like, okay, well, let me, let me take you back here a second, put yourself in there. She's like you're getting frustrated with something that maybe they don't realize is a problem, like they don't realize that this situation exists because I was like I know for myself, I've learned, I've got a lot of stuff going on. I'm in meetings all the time. I'm trying to make sure I get the best things in place for our team members where we can continue to grow.
Speaker 1:
18:42
I was like and you're complaining about this little thing here? They're like they don't see this, they don't care, like maybe it's not that they don't care, they just don't know and they need someone to step up and say hey, there's a problem here, can we talk about that? I know for myself that there's things that I don't realize, but building that trust between you and your your boss too can go a long way. Instead of just jumping into the like they, they don't care about us, don't jump in that. Go and talk to them, because they're busy. They're busy and they do care about you. They do Usually.
Speaker 4:
19:12
So yeah, usually so you're telling me, you're not a mind reader.
Speaker 1:
19:16
I thought maybe I have been practicing it and I can tell you this my wife has been, we've been together for 20 years and I she has made it very clear. I do not know what she's thinking.
Speaker 4:
19:29
Yeah, mine as well, I don't have.
Speaker 2:
19:31
I have no problem telling you. I have no problem telling you anything that's good, that's a good relationship, then, right.
Speaker 1:
19:40
Yep, she's been fired. Yeah, a little bit, one less time than she's been hired. So I know I'm sure I love it. I encourage, like I want that honestly, because that helps us all grow together. Absolutely, bobby GQ, you want to come on up? Yeah, remember guys, you guys get points for if you guys want to bring up any questions, we'll bring you up and you earn, I think, 20 points every time you you register a question. So go ahead, bobby.
Speaker 2:
20:03
Where do I learn about getting started being an entrepreneur? Like, say, I have an idea, how do I start a business? Where do I even go as a first step in that?
Speaker 4:
20:15
direction? Great question. I always go back to the mentorship side of things. There was a point in my life where I knew that there was a next level that I needed to be. I just didn't know what to do, so I needed somebody to give me advice. So, first and foremost, I just found somebody that I was, that I had aspired to be like, and so I reached out to them on Instagram. We got into talks.
Speaker 4:
20:40
If you are going to find mentorship from somebody, make sure your core values align first, because your conversations they're just not going to work out if you don't have a lining core values. And so I'm aspiring to be like you. I want to learn what to do. What's the first steps to do it in this X industry that I'm trying to make happen? So, without knowing the context of what business you want to start, I would find somebody who is a thought leader or a professional in that. Pick their brain. I promise you this Business owners love to talk about their businesses, so find them and just ask questions, and they want to see you succeed. Leaders love to watch people succeed, so that's where I would start first.
Speaker 4:
21:26
After that, there's three things that I look for in a business and a good business. And it's the three P's product, profit and people. So first product does the product? The mentor told me this if it's not one, if it's not first, second or third in this industry or your market, find a new vertical or a new industry or find a new product, because you're going to be out competed against, it's just not going to work. So one to three right. So product profit If you don't understand finances, go to YouTube.
Speaker 4:
21:55
Understand finances, p&l statements, financial forecasting, building performance. You got to know your numbers. So is this going to bring enough revenue? And what is my expenses and how can I make sure that top line is bigger than that bottom line? And we can win on that. And then people At the beginning you're probably going to wear all the hats yourself. You guys talked about it before I came on. You know you're doing sales and marketing and accounting and admin and the whole nine. But as you bring on people, don't just search for skill sets, search for the core values. Make sure you mesh. You can always teach skill sets later. So the three P's are just kind of like a make sure those boxes are checked.
Speaker 1:
22:39
That's good. That's good, sounds good. Thanks, bob. I know we've had some people in here that we've talked about. You know failures and making mistakes and stuff, and I love how you pointed that out. As an entrepreneur, that's actually part of the learning process too is going through those failures, because I know for myself like you can take those failures and really take them personally and think like this is just not for you, but it's part of the process of becoming. If you're really focused on creating a business and being an entrepreneur, that is part of the process. Like I was talking to a friend recently whose son is like you know, he's not really worked a job, he's in his 20s and he's like I'm waiting for it. I want to start my business because he wants to do his thing, but he's not doing anything and he just thinks success happens like overnight. He's waiting for that one opportunity. Is that the way it works? Is that the way it?
Speaker 4:
23:30
works. No, there's no such thing as overnight success.
Speaker 1:
23:33
I thought that's what you were going to tell us was this big secret.
Speaker 4:
23:35
I wish I thought you had the secret. That's why I came here. No man.
Speaker 1:
23:40
All right, guys, I'm sorry, there's no money back. Sorry, Yep yeah.
Speaker 4:
23:46
No, I want to the business right now. We actually just raised $3 million. We're an international company, went through seed raising rounds and growing it up. It's been five years with that one, so you know it's sticking with it, holding on the grit. It's tough, it's tough and there's many days where you're like is this even worth it? What am I doing? There's so many things, but when you just but there's those wins that just keep you going, you're like, okay, we do have something Pivots along the way, of course, but if there's no such thing as overnight success, I love that.
Speaker 1:
24:22
I love that too. You said like pivots. Like pivots along the way, because that you know I was sharing with Metalivia. I think after Killer B marketing started really picking up like the last two years, people like they had me on podcast like how are you guys becoming so successful? Like, you guys are like overnight success. I'm like no, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. Our business started in 2010. Yeah, 2010 and in 2019, you're like overnight success. I'm like not even close to it. No, I have a big role that hearts.
Speaker 4:
24:51
That was a long night. If that was, yes, yeah, very long night.
Speaker 1:
24:56
That's right. That's right. I love that. I love that. But pivoting, like I had as an entrepreneur, I saw we had some other questions. So we're going to bring up Deftune here. Deftune, you can come up, we'll get you ready here. You know one of the things that I have learned as entrepreneurs I used to think pivoting was bad, but as your things change and things change in the world and you have to be open to say wait a minute, things are changing and we have to start switching up a little bit because of the new direction and things that's happening in the world. If not, you're going to be stuck in the old past. Have you ever felt guilty about pivoting before?
Speaker 4:
25:28
Well, before that, even it's. You know, you got to put that ego aside, you know, because like, oh, I don't want to, I don't want to pivot, because this is the idea I had and this is where my mind is set on, and and you know, God's got, he'll throw some wrench in your plan, saying yeah, but I don't care, and so you go all right, I'll go this way now.
Speaker 1:
25:49
Yeah, that's good, that's great advice. Thank you, deftune. Go ahead how you doing, man. Thanks for joining us tonight.
Speaker 3:
25:55
All right.
Speaker 1:
25:56
So a quick question Just what was your biggest flop and what did you do to recover from that? I guess kind of like mentally and yeah, and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 4:
26:07
Like my biggest failure that I've had.
Speaker 1:
26:10
Yeah.
Speaker 4:
26:11
Like, well, I, you know, definitely my priority, the priority thing I had, you know, not putting my family first and so on, and that was that was definitely a difficult thing. You know, it was a point where my wife and I were talking about should we even do this anymore, right, and and that was tough and we got through it and we're great and we have two beautiful kids, but it I always blamed other people instead of just saying, actually, maybe I need to look in and say I have the capacity to make a difference. I'm the leader here, I can do this, I'm not too tired. I'd stop having a big ego. I didn't do this myself, I have a team. And then realizing, okay, there's more things I should be doing. It's scaling up and leveling up. There's there's other things.
Speaker 4:
26:55
I've had businesses. You know I've had co-working spaces and giant real estate projects that I've worked for year and a half, two years put together, you know $150 million project. And there's just one little thing that got in the way and it just just completely sunset, it just went away. A year and a half of work and you just wonder you're like, what happened? I worked so hard on that. Like that, it just crushes you. But then you got to realize, okay, what relationships that I make along the way. Those were awesome.
Speaker 4:
27:30
I learned how to do financial performance better than I've ever done before marketing, you know, there's so many things that I look at and I got to use those skills that I learned in that year and a half to do what I'm doing now. And I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing now if I didn't go through that. And so it's. It's just understanding in the moment. Okay, yeah, this sucks now, but let's, let's just move forward. And that's why, being an entrepreneur, you have to have an overwhelming level of optimism and if you're constantly beating yourself up and and don't appreciate yourself, your team, just you got to change your mindset and go forward.
Speaker 1:
28:09
That's good. That's good, great question. Thank you, defty. Thank you, great question, guys. Thank you, thank you. All right, so we've got Deener.
Speaker 3:
28:18
Deener. Come on up, Deener, hey.
Speaker 4:
28:19
Hi Deener.
Speaker 3:
28:19
So hi. So my question is when you start these businesses, are you doing these for yourself or are you doing these for other people? And do you overlap? When you start one, do you start another one while you're still working the first one? How does that work?
Speaker 4:
28:38
Yep, I'm I would be considered a serial entrepreneur, so I do start business at one time and therefore myself and our team and and I'm in family business, so it's a little bit combined. What I found out when starting these out is I'm a big traction. Eos I don't know if you've ever heard of it entrepreneurial operating system. I'm a visionary, so you have visionaries and you have integrators. So your visionaries, your high level, you're at 30,000 feet, you're way up high. Your integrators are the ones who can get down on the weeds and figure your business out, the intricacies of it.
Speaker 4:
29:15
What I found out the hard way through these businesses is that I am not a very good integrator. I'm not very detail oriented. Thinking of the little things. I'm way better at vision galvanizing, getting people around a thing and creating financial performance, and this is the way we got to go. And then bringing people along with me to say these are the details on. So bringing people on in leadership positions, give them the ability to be the boss, give them a say, say you know you get to run this with this direction of of under my, of this vision that I have, and it just makes a beautiful partnership and doing those in that structure.
Speaker 3:
29:54
Yeah, awesome, thank you.
Speaker 4:
29:55
Awesome, yeah, thank you. Great question, thank you.
Speaker 1:
29:59
So I've got a question for you. When, when you started working with like a, a bigger team, was that scary for you? Or you're like no, I'm in this, no-transcript.
Speaker 4:
30:10
Yeah Well, I learned managing people, you know. So my mother and I own gyms, and I was a director of one of her clubs and in that process I increased profits by 60% over six months and I was like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 3:
30:33
I'm good at this.
Speaker 4:
30:34
I can do sales I can do marketing, I can do this. And so she said I believe in you, you should be my regional director. I want to see what you can do there and lead. I'm like, okay, I've got leadership abilities, I did this. I just tell them how it'll be. How hard could it be? Right Wrong, I was terrible. You know people were wanting to leave.
Speaker 4:
30:54
I thought it just being the nice guy would work, and then, you know, trying to be tough or what and trying to find that balance, I was walked on.
Speaker 4:
31:01
I didn't have structure, and so I've got early leadership and management experience from a young age and the one thing I learned as a leader and as a boss and what people really want is that you have their best interest in mind.
Speaker 4:
31:16
So as long as you're coaching them and caring about them and know their goals, don't listen to feedback that you have. But if you're constantly just like this is what you got to do, this is what you got to do, and you're back to your thing over here and you don't care about them on a personal level, they don't want to follow you. It just becomes it's just a job to them and jobs you can jump jobs. But if you create a relationship. It's hard to jump relationships and so if you're on the same and that was I had to learn that through years of a few years of just screwing up and managing terribly. And it's not managing, it's just working with your team in different roles and, as you know that everyone knows that how that works and that's together in that relationship, man, it's just, it's so much more fluid.
Speaker 1:
32:03
That's good. Has there ever been like an opportunity brought to you and you had to decide do I do this opportunity or not? And if so, how did you kind of process that, that decision?
Speaker 4:
32:14
Yes, yes, you know, people always have great ideas right and I think this is a good business plan, and so on. The three Ps right. So I always go back to the three Ps the product profit, people. But I start with the people first.
Speaker 4:
32:32
When I, when I'm going to go into business with somebody, I would say, let's say, before we get married, I want to understand how you do businesses, I want to understand who you are. How do you deal with conflict? How do you communicate? What are your working geniuses? By Patrick Lencioni.
Speaker 4:
32:45
What are your love languages? What are, what's your leadership styles that you've done in the past? And then, what's your vision for the future? Are you wanting to hold this company? You want to sell this company? How big do you want it to be? What are your skill sets? Do we just do this full, just download on each other to understand? Is this going to go somewhere?
Speaker 4:
33:05
Because if your visions aren't aligned, that honeymoon phase just like a marriage that goes away. So now it's the real guts of the relationship, it's understanding. Okay, what happens when you know this obstacle comes right in front of us and so I have turned down opportunities because I didn't feel. I didn't feel right with that person. It just didn't. It just didn't mesh, it didn't clash Even with business opportunities. It looks really good on paper, but once I start doing the profit side of things and building up performance, whoa, we're going to have to spend so much money to get a profit. I don't know if the juice is worth a squeeze because of the time allocated that it has to go to it. So it's just having your you know, having those criterias and checkboxes, and then, at the end of the day, have the discernment, what's your gut say and most of the time, your gut's right.
Speaker 1:
34:00
That's good. That's good, that's really good, brian, thank you for sharing that. I needed to ask myself too. I mean, we one of the things that we do a lot, and that was kind of a question for myself too.
Speaker 1:
34:10
So there's a lot of stuff you know we're not it's great we get to ask people that normally we don't get to sit across from ask these questions and that's something that we do at our business. So we have our purpose statement and we even do it with our clients. We're like you know, we have our purpose statement and, no matter what we're doing, if somebody comes to it, we go through that purpose statement as our filter to decide do we move beyond this and have a meeting to discuss, like what? We'll have a meeting? We'll connect and say does it, does it flow through our filter state, our purpose statement? If it doesn't, then it's not for us and if we took it, it would just be for the money, which is not going to end that well anyway.
Speaker 1:
34:46
So that's a whole other thing firing clients yes, oh my gosh, that's tough to do, and I'd never thought that was a real thing until I had to start doing it. Yep, yeah, it's it's the crazy thing.
Speaker 4:
34:59
And and and people who are trying to make it in the business world as an entrepreneur. And you tell them I fired a client, they're like I'm just trying to get one. What are you doing firing clients? You're like I'm losing money on that one, like no one's winning. Yeah, you know, that's just how it ends up.
Speaker 1:
35:13
And I share that with my team members too, like people in our team members, that that is is going to the direction of like leadership team and stuff. Like middle Olivia, I sat down with her like I think it was beginning this year and we had a really big client. I mean a big client. Guys, this was a lot of money and I'm, like you know, around the time that I bought a machine, I gotta remember that sell you these. They don't align it for a purpose statement anymore. They made it very clear to me and I'm like this is hard, we can cut this job because it doesn't align. If we can cut this client, I don't want to do because the money's good, but the stress and the stuff that's coming on top of us and our team isn't healthy and I'm like we can cut the loss. It's toxic, it'll still be okay. Yeah right, exactly, it was toxic, toxic. And I tell you what it was a huge blessing it wasn't in Medellivia.
Speaker 2:
36:03
It was such a win for us.
Speaker 1:
36:04
Even though it was such a loss, it was actually a huge win and we got that work back and clients. We got that work back with clients that did value what our purpose was and that's what they want to do.
Speaker 4:
36:16
So now, it's like fun, it's like okay you go and have fun with your clients. Yeah, that's great. I mean that right there. That lesson can be translated into so many different aspects of life. If it's starting a business, having a partnership, dating someone, having a friendship, if you feel like it's toxic even though it might be good and you have things, if it feels toxic, you just got to sunset that. You just got to end it at any part of your life.
Speaker 1:
36:45
That's good. That's good. That's really good advice. What advice would you like to give someone today that you hope they'll take away from today's topic? What's it take away from you?
Speaker 4:
36:57
Yeah, I would say, if you're really thinking about entrepreneurship, do your North Star Challenge. Do that four minute challenge. Why are you put on this earth? What do you want to do? How do you want to do it? And then your legacy what do you want to be known for? Take that four minutes, just do it, and what you'll find out is something about yourself that you've never found out before. And then go ask other people. If you've never heard of what's called the Jeharry's Window, google it it's called the Jeharry's Window and you'll figure out things about yourself that you've never had. Once you have that information, you're going to go out and do such powerful stuff because you just didn't know you could, and it gives yourself a platform to do so.
Speaker 1:
37:40
That's awesome. Thank you, brandon. We have one more question just popped up, so let me go ahead and bring up Zach the artist. Come on up, zach. Come on up to the sub stage. Hey, thanks for joining us, man. Hey, no problem, what's up, brandon?
Speaker 4:
37:51
What's up Killa? How's it going? What's up Metalivia?
Speaker 1:
37:53
What's up, Arcane? Hey man, what is the best advice you'd have given yourself 10 years ago?
Speaker 4:
38:03
Do stuff for free and go learn, learn, learn, learn. My grandfather aligned School's never out, and there's so much out there. The moment you think you've learned it all, you're dead. You might be walking on the surface, but you're dead, and so learn everything that you can.
Speaker 1:
38:22
Hey, thanks for tuning in to today's podcast episode.
Speaker 2:
38:25
If you liked or, let's be honest, loved today's episode, go ahead and hit the subscribe button or leave us a review.
