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We're back with part 2 of 10 things learned while growing a business. If you missed part 1 be sure to go back and listen!
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Transcripts
All right, John, this is one of my favorites.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:And this comes directly from Mike.
Speaker:Everything takes twice as long as you think, and is twice as expensive
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:Everything takes twice as long as you think, and is twice as expensive
Speaker:And bill, you and I are working through this insurance thing, you know,
Speaker:with the licensing and everything.
Speaker:How long did it take us to get our license.
Speaker:Incredibly ridiculously long.
Speaker:And then how long did it take me to go get my fingerprints done?
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:You know, had to go twice or three times because you know, of different
Speaker:things and then you waiting on this date to give you something right.
Speaker:And then you're waiting on this and then people tell you, oh,
Speaker:money will start coming in here.
Speaker:It hasn't yet.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And so, everything takes twice as long costs, twice as much.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And you get about half the results you want.
Speaker:Now I have been told that Mike, this is true for you.
Speaker:True for Mike, because I'm an Uber optimist.
Speaker:I expect things to go.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:I expect things to work.
Speaker:I expect things to produce.
Speaker:I expect, you know, and I will tell you I'd much rather have
Speaker:expectations of things going, right.
Speaker:Instead of people walking around saying, oh, here's what could go wrong.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:. Most of you guys all know I bought myself this incredible new vehicle.
Speaker:It's like my it's like my midlife crisis.
Speaker:It's like my post midlife crisis vehicle.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:My midlife crisis vehicle was my mustang okay.
Speaker:And it was a Mustang convertible.
Speaker:It was an incredible car and a lot of fun with it.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:But it has Sirius radio and I've been waiting for a Sirius radio
Speaker:for, I can't even tell you how long.
Speaker:And one of the reasons is because every time I would go visit
Speaker:somewhere and I would get a rent car.
Speaker:That had Sirius XM radio.
Speaker:I would start pumping it through.
Speaker:And I found this guy who I'd seen in who I'd heard about Joel Osteen.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And I will tell you that guy is incredibly motivating.
Speaker:So now almost every day he is like channel number one on my xm radio
Speaker:and I listened to him and he has this silly little joke
Speaker:he tells at the beginning of every sermon, he has a pattern.
Speaker:He has a system, a, you could almost write down his principles if you
Speaker:listen to enough of his presentation.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:But he talks about how people sometimes are optimist and
Speaker:some people are pessimists.
Speaker:And here's the truth is optimists have an incredible.
Speaker:Opportunity above other people that was not quite the right word but
Speaker:opportunity because they just, they see the opportunity more than pessimists.
Speaker:I was reading through something the other day and it may have come from the book.
Speaker:I'm trying to remember where it came from.
Speaker:I think it actually came off of TikTok believe it or not.
Speaker:And this was guy, it was saying, so in college, we got all these
Speaker:graduates to do something.
Speaker:And we said, Hey, we'll give you a hundred dollars.
Speaker:And all we need you to do is take a look at 30 pages of the New York times.
Speaker:And do something for us.
Speaker:And so they signed up all these graduate students.
Speaker:He said, the first thing you learn is that the test is
Speaker:never what they tell you it is.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:It's never what they tell you it is.
Speaker:And he said, so here's the test guys.
Speaker:And he said, one is, they gave him a whole series of things, but one of the questions
Speaker:in there was, do you think you're lucky or do you think you're unlucky?
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Or do you think you're not lucky?
Speaker:Okay. And the vast majority of people said
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Then say that we're unlucky, but they're not lucky.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So I will tell you, I go around and one of my Crow principles to some
Speaker:degree is that I'm just damn lucky.
Speaker:I get lucky all the time when I'm sitting at the poker table and somebody goes,
Speaker:golly, I cannot believe you pulled that card And I go, you know, sometimes
Speaker:it's just better to be lucky than good, you know, I just, I just, I am lucky.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So here's the test they're reading through 30 pages of New York times, right.
Speaker:And he says, I want you to count the number of headlines, and I want
Speaker:you to count the number of pictures.
Speaker:And if you get that right , then we will give you a hundred dollars.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:And so everybody sits down and they start reading and start taking a look at it.
Speaker:Now, inside that 30 pages is this little ad that runs down the side.
Speaker:And it says, if you're reading this ad and you're reading it pretty much in
Speaker:the entirety, then you will know that all you have to do is now say I saw
Speaker:this ad and bring it up to me and I'll give you your hundred dollars and you
Speaker:don't have to count the headlines and you don't have to count the pictures.
Speaker:80%
Speaker:of the people that said they were lucky, caught that ad
Speaker:hardly anybody, hardly anybody.
Speaker:I'm not sure anybody that said they were unlucky, caught the ad.
Speaker:And he said the conclusion, to some degree that we derived from this is
Speaker:that people that are optimistic, people that are, that feel like they're lucky.
Speaker:Part of the reason they're lucky is because they're more observant they're
Speaker:taking a bigger picture than most people.
Speaker:Now you've all seen the, where the gorilla walks through the middle, you
Speaker:know, bouncing the ball and everything.
Speaker:And people were saying, look at the white jerseys and tell me how many
Speaker:times the white jerseys bounce the ball.
Speaker:And while you're counting that the gorilla walks through and you don't even see it.
Speaker:And I'm going to be honest with you.
Speaker:I didn't see the stupid gorilla or the first time either.
Speaker:What an effective learning tool though, that tells you, you need to be more
Speaker:observant to the whole process sometimes.
Speaker:Cool.
Speaker:What's next, John?
Speaker:Number seven, listening is your secret weapon for marketing sales and service,
Speaker:which by the way, we all consider subsets of service because in each of those
Speaker:phases, marketing, sales, and service, we're looking to bring value to the
Speaker:people that we're interacting with.
Speaker:A good example of this would be are you looking for
Speaker:exactly how you can bring value to your mavens.
Speaker:Well, then if you ask them the right questions and listen to
Speaker:what they say, they will tell you specifically how you can step in
Speaker:and serve them and bring them value.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:Now I'm going to, I'm going to re-tweak this just a little bit because I'm Mike.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Uh, Listening is your secret weapon for marketing sales and service,
Speaker:which by the way, It's all marketing
Speaker:the service we deliver.
Speaker:, we're marketing the service we deliver.
Speaker:It's all marketing to me and John I want to be very clear.
Speaker:I'm not saying you're wrong.
Speaker:I'm not saying that at all.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:What we're talking about, maybe more of a philosophy.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Depending on how you see it.
Speaker:I think Barbara Cochran, if she read this she'd go listening is your secret
Speaker:weapon for marketing sales and service, which by the way, it's all sales.
Speaker:I guarantee you, she would say it, but she would emphasize it.
Speaker:And here's a secret.
Speaker:We all have this tendency to become really good at one thing.
Speaker:And we think that one thing is what not only defines us, but creates our success.
Speaker:And if my one thing is, I told people, if you cut me open, I
Speaker:bleed marketing all over the place.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Jenn, you want to add something?
Speaker:I just want to add where the background or the perspective behind that philosophy
Speaker:that we came up with that, that everything is service because that
Speaker:came out of the coaching world where a lot of people, when they first start,
Speaker:they struggle with the concept of sales.
Speaker:They struggle with the concept of selling.
Speaker:They struggle with the concept of marketing.
Speaker:They don't want to self promote.
Speaker:They just want to help people.
Speaker:They just want to serve people.
Speaker:So that framework all came from the place.
Speaker:People want to serve others.
Speaker:And so that's why Barbara Corcoran, it would be sales because the truth
Speaker:is that even when you're coaching somebody you're still selling when
Speaker:you're like, you're still selling.
Speaker:And the truth is you're still marketing because you're still
Speaker:moving them to a place where they're ready to take the next step.
Speaker:So exactly what you said, Mike, it's all the same thing, regardless of the
Speaker:frame, you look at it, but the intention of the quote behind it is to make
Speaker:people feel comfortable with showing up.
Speaker:Yep, absolutely.
Speaker:And John, thank you for sharing that.
Speaker:Number eight, John.
Speaker:If you want to build a real business and not just a job, you have to build a team.
Speaker:And then I think about the concept that we talk about a lot around the
Speaker:office, which is future banking.
Speaker:So what can we invest now to get more time and money later?
Speaker:And this is one of the biggest, it's one of the biggest challenges.
Speaker:And I'm going to tell you that in the beginning I thought nobody
Speaker:could do it as good as me either.
Speaker:And then I watched Jenn run the coaching call this morning and I'm sitting
Speaker:there going, damn that was pretty good.
Speaker:I'm not sure I would've said that or that.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And then I watched Jonathan give a presentation to a group of
Speaker:real estate agents and he's doing all this stuff and I go, wow.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And I don't know about you bill, but I go out on a home inspection and Chris, I
Speaker:bet you go out on even more frequently than I do, or bill probably combined.
Speaker:And I'm watching one of our inspectors has been with us 10 years and he crushes it.
Speaker:He catches things I would have never seen.
Speaker:He writes it up really well.
Speaker:He pulls the customer aside.
Speaker:The home buyer aside does a great job with it.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:But honestly, 95% of people will never know how to grow a team.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:They think they do.
Speaker:But they don't.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And that's what makes this group of people different more than anything
Speaker:else is they know how to grow a team, how to encourage a team, how to inspire
Speaker:a team, how to help a team prioritize, how have a team literally do what they
Speaker:are supposed to do, whether it's sales or service or marketing or admin.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And so, what you guys don't know is in between the coaching call this morning
Speaker:and in-between this call, I had what we called a freeze frame meeting.
Speaker:I hate freeze rate meetings.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Because I always pissed somebody off.
Speaker:Because freeze frame meeting is where I have to ask the tough questions
Speaker:that nobody really wants to answer.
Speaker:Like, why did we spend money here?
Speaker:Why is the money here?
Speaker:Where does that money come from?
Speaker:Where did it go to, you know, all those meetings.
Speaker:And so freeze frame is something I created years ago to be able to once
Speaker:a week, like take a snapshot in time and tell me where all the money is.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And kind of like what John said, future banking.
Speaker:I want to know where the money's coming from next week.
Speaker:Next month, six months.
Speaker:And I'm going to tell you, future banking is probably it's a term I started
Speaker:using, oh, I don't know, 20 years ago. But when I started coaching people,
Speaker:In fact, a Crow principle would be, Mike wants you to understand how powerful
Speaker:future banking is because the 95% they're banking the paycheck this week.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I'm banking the paycheck 20 years from now.
Speaker:Think about that.
Speaker:I'm banking my paychecks 20 years from now.
Speaker:spend more time with my dad.
Speaker:And you know, my dad called me yesterday morning.
Speaker:He said, Mike, what are you doing today?
Speaker:And you know what
Speaker:I got to say nothing, dad, what do you want to do?
Speaker:And he said, Hey, I got a proposition for you.
Speaker:I'm going to come out and see you.
Speaker:I said, well, dad I borrowed his truck recently.
Speaker:Cause my cause Christa's moving and I said, I can, I was going
Speaker:to bring your truck back.
Speaker:And I'm just going to ask Jonathan, if they come with me and bring me
Speaker:back home or I'll catch an Uber home. And he said, yeah, that'd be great.
Speaker:So I went out and dad's proposition was, he wanted to buy me lunch for my birthday.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And I got to have time with my dad, but I got to have time with my dad
Speaker:because I believe in future banking.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I've been a future banking my time for the last 20 years.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So there's money time, all of that.
Speaker:John number nine, every roadblock you face along the way to your dream.
Speaker:Every pitfall, every hardship, every problem you solve, and every
Speaker:experience you have as part of that journey is increasing your power
Speaker:to impact the people you serve.
Speaker:And Jenn, I think had it.
Speaker:An interesting way sort of to summarize that as far as
Speaker:that statement about advice.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, I don't remember if this is actually what you're asking for
Speaker:John, but it's just that people want, they don't want advice,
Speaker:but they want your experience.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And guys when Jenn talked about that earlier today, I wrote in
Speaker:the notes for the coaches I wrote in there, accountability, and I
Speaker:created a new word just today. It's an old word that I created a day.
Speaker:Focus ability.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Because I teach people when you're coaching.
Speaker:I don't want accountability.
Speaker:I don't need your stinkin accountability.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:What I need is your help to focus on what I'm trying to get
Speaker:done and how to get it done.
Speaker:Maybe why to get it done.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I don't need you to beat me up going, did you get it done?
Speaker:Did you get it done?
Speaker:Did you get it done?
Speaker:You know, I don't need another six year old sitting in the back of
Speaker:the seat going, are we there yet?
Speaker:Are we there yet?
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I want somebody going sitting next to me going, Hey, if we
Speaker:take a left at this next exit.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:It's a left-hand exit.
Speaker:We're going to hit this interstate and it's going to take us here.
Speaker:That's what I want.
Speaker:And so when John talked about this, I thought it was incredible.
Speaker:And the other thing that I got out of this was I've been very,
Speaker:very fortunate in my life.
Speaker:I've never had a bankruptcy. I'm not divorced.
Speaker:I have four amazing kids, but I will tell you that you know, all of us hit
Speaker:these roadblocks, but these roadblocks help prepare us to be able to help other
Speaker:people be able to overcome some of those.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And it's incredibly impactful.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Remember your job is not really accountability as
Speaker:much as it is focus ability.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:how are you helping your people stay focused on what needs to get done today?
Speaker:And if they didn't get it done today?
Speaker:Well, something stopped them.
Speaker:What roadblock did they run into that needs to get shifted?
Speaker:Move sideways up, down, buried, you know, so that they can get
Speaker:done what they need to get done.
Speaker:John, number 10, you have to stop and take a moment to celebrate wins.
Speaker:Even the small ones.
Speaker:So completion of projects or business successes, positive things in your
Speaker:personal life, and this is really important to help you maintain.
Speaker:Positive perspective when you have those days where you feel like all you're
Speaker:doing is putting out fires or you're just caught up in the whirlwind and you
Speaker:can't zoom out to see the bird's eye view of the impact that you're making.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And John, you have a kind of a bonus one here, and by the way, before he gets
Speaker:the bonus one, guys, I celebrate wins every single day in one way or another.
Speaker:Now sometimes I'm future banking my wins.
Speaker:Like I have been counting on going on this Disney trip for a month now.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So every day that's like a future win.
Speaker:So Jonathan and I went out on Amazon and we bought ourselves t-shirts a different
Speaker:t-shirt for each part different days.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So we're going to magic kingdom and they have Liberty square there.
Speaker:It says Hamilton is now a Disney product or whatever because they bought it.
Speaker:And we watched it as a family and everything.
Speaker:I got a t-shirt says I'm not throwing away my shot.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Which is a great line in the movie.
Speaker:If you get a chance to watch it in Jonathan Uh, Burr shot first
Speaker:and that is Hamilton shot first.
Speaker:And then it says on there, he says, I don't care.
Speaker:What you heard.
Speaker:It's Jefferson.
Speaker:Jefferson is lying.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So it's another great line of the movie, but you know, we went out and a little
Speaker:win was we ordered t-shirts for the trip.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:John, your bonus here.
Speaker:And then we're going to run the question around the.
Speaker:Sure things.
Speaker:So gratitude is the quality of being thankful.
Speaker:It's the readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness.
Speaker:I know we all want to work with mavens and vendors and clients and
Speaker:employees that express gratitude.
Speaker:And I just think every day is an opportunity for us to actually
Speaker:embrace that, live it out and also model gratitude for others.
Speaker:And hopefully that becomes a magnet that draws the people around you
Speaker:into a spirit of gratitude as well.
Speaker:Heck yeah.
Speaker:The more grateful you are, you'll find out the more grateful
Speaker:And I will tell you that this is one of the, this has been one of the most
Speaker:difficult things in my last year.
Speaker:If I have somebody around me that every day they're ungrateful.
Speaker:I eliminate them from my world.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And it's painful.
Speaker:It's painful.
Speaker:Eliminating.
Speaker:We had this most amazing, wonderful lady at the office.
Speaker:She planted flowers.
Speaker:She did all this great stuff.
Speaker:She organized stuff.
Speaker:And every single day she complained about something.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:She complained about her apartment.
Speaker:She complained about the maintenance man.
Speaker:She complained about the neighbors she complained about.
Speaker:And I already said, is your maintenance man here right now?
Speaker:She went, no.
Speaker:I said, then don't bring him to my office.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And we tried Jenn and I both tried.
Speaker:And by the way, we've had some people come in and leave and they
Speaker:go, this place is a damn cult.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:You guys are like, you know, you're, you just are not realistic.
Speaker:You, you just don't want to see the reality in the world anymore.
Speaker:And um, Uh, maybe true, you know, maybe true which by the way, my dad
Speaker:even gave you that, like yesterday, he said, son, one of the best lines
Speaker:I ever learned from you, when people tell you a piece of garbage and you
Speaker:don't really want to argue with them, you simply say, ah you might be right.
