Welcome to episode 51 of The Last 10%, where today we're diving into the intricate world of entrepreneurial success and personal well-being with our esteemed guest, Aaron Marcum. Founder of several multimillion-dollar enterprises, Aaron shares his profound journey through business highs and personal lows, leading to pivotal changes in his life in 2015 and beyond. Throughout this episode, Aaron enlightens us about the importance of relationship-building, both in business and personal spheres, revealing insights from his book "EntreThrive". He emphasizes the significance of high-quality connections, the critical role of culture in leadership, and how defining personal values can prevent burnout and skyrocket productivity.

Join us as Dallas Burnett unpacks Aaron's transformative strategies and discusses potential collaborations. Whether you're an entrepreneur, a leader, or anyone looking to enrich your understanding of professional growth aligned with personal health, this episode is packed with actionable wisdom you won't want to miss.

The Last 10% listeners can find your FREE DOWNLOAD at https://www.entrethrive.com/last10

You can buy Aaron's book HERE

Mentioned in this episode:

1on1 App Information

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Hey everybody.

We're talking to Aaron Markham today.

What an amazing guy.

He founded and scaled several multimillion dollar businesses in 2015.

He'd reached financial success, but was burnt out and he was struggling

to find sustainable happiness.

But.

From that point on, he decided to make some really big changes and

that's, what's propelled his success.

He's got some incredible stories about entrepreneurship, burnout, and

what it means to live the good life.

He's a great new friend of mine.

You don't want to miss.

This incredible conversation.

Welcome.

Welcome.

Welcome.

I am Dallas Burnett sitting in my 1905 Coke Brothers Barber chair in

Thrive Studios, but more importantly, today we have a great guest.

He's got a master's in applied positive psychology.

He's a bestselling author, speaker.

Entrepreneur extraordinaire.

Oh my goodness.

Welcome to the show, Aaron.

Oh, so good to be here, Dallas.

Thanks for having me on.

I'm excited to sit down with you.

yes.

this has been good.

we've been looking at this on the calendar and excited as well.

You've just had such a great wealth of experience in leadership, leading and

growing teams, which we're all about and entrepreneurship, which we're all about.

And so we just, we're really excited to have you on.

So you've got a background in the healthcare industry.

Tell us a little bit about what got you into healthcare and

about some of your journey.

Right.

Yeah.

when I graduated from college, I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur.

I wanted to do my own thing, but I knew I had to go work for the man

for a little bit, for a few years.

and I did, and, I think it was about five years after I graduated, I just

came across the field of home care.

the sector of health care and knew that, that the senior industry, baby

boomers knew what was going on there and how much they were going to need.

It had no background in, in home care.

Obviously I was doing telecom sales at the time and decided just on a whim.

Not, I wouldn't say a whim.

I knew I wanted to do my own thing, but organically opened

up my own home care company.

In Salt Lake and, it started from scratch, wasn't a franchise or anything

like that, started it from scratch.

And then over the course of about seven years, I grew it to be the

largest in the state in that area.

And so it was, it was, it was quite a journey, and, throughout that journey

ups and downs, but the first three years crazy, I, I was, I remember coming home.

I had four kids at the time.

I have six kids.

I don't, we didn't talk about that before the show, but I have three

boys, three girls at the time.

I had four and I was coming home eating dinner and then I

would go back to the office.

Almost every day to 2 a.

m.

And back then I was younger.

I started that when I was 28 years old.

And so I had maybe the energy to do that.

I know, I don't, there's no way I think I could do that now, but,

Yeah.

I don't think I would last.

And gratefully I've learned a ton where I would never have to do that.

Like I feel like I could start any company and get it to a million

dollars within a few months.

I really feel that confident and that, in, in all the things I've learned, but.

But it was back then that I was experiencing burnout, and

I knew I had to make changes.

So I did make changes back then.

it was slow, but over time within that seven year period before

I actually sold it to a public company, I got my life back.

And I became even back then fascinated with wellbeing and investing in

yourself and so forth and launched my second company, which really was

one of my most successful ventures.

Back in the home care space, data analytics, it was a, think of like J.

D.

Powers for home care.

Ah,

So home care pulse is the name of the company.

they're a wonderful brand in the home care space.

Very well known, but you think I'd learned my lesson.

So by the time that.

in positive psychology, we call it obsessive passion.

I became obsessively passionate about making an impact in the home care space

and changing the quality standards, which we were doing and which we ultimately did.

But I sacrificed my well being.

So by 2015, I was exhausted.

I was overweight.

I was not taking care of myself and I was living, I write about this in my book,

the lie of the either, or I thought, if I could just continue to grow my company

and invest in my company, eventually my personal wellbeing will catch up.

I was living that lie that, that I couldn't have both personal

and professional wellbeing synced at the same time.

Right.

a lot of us live that

And I think of the you've got this dream.

Like you'd say, okay, I'm going to create this thing and it's going to be

wildly successful on the front side.

At least you think that, this is, you've got all the, and then, as you're going

through it, you've still got this vision for this thing you create, but I think

a lot of entrepreneurs say, I know I'm not taking care of myself, but this

is what entrepreneurship is all about.

It's all about the grind and it's all about, pulling ridiculous

hours and taking ridiculous risks.

and my wellbeing is going to just, heck, care because whenever I either

sell out or meet that vision or whatever, then I cannot focus on that

because I've accomplished that out, then I'll be able to put myself first,

and I think It just doesn't work.

It doesn't work.

It doesn't work.

I was, 2015 financially was doing well, I, we were growing.

things were going well that way, but yeah, you just live this lie that eventually,

I will, it'll catch up with itself.

Yeah.

And I've worked with, and since coached many entrepreneurs and I've seen

some of the wealthiest, I remember sitting down with a guy probably worth

about a half a billion dollars and he was one of them, he's just unhappy.

He had burned a lot of his relationships along the way.

And, I remember him just being open and honest of all his

regrets that he had experienced.

Yeah.

And he had all the money in the world.

he didn't have a care in the world when it came to his financial wellbeing, but, But

he certainly did, with his relationships.

And so 2016, I got, I finally got it where I just invested in my wellbeing.

I, April of 2016, I got into cycling.

I signed up for 200 mile bike races.

My personality, by the way, Dallas is a lot of this blows people

away that I would do this, but.

I ordered my bike the same day I signed up for a 200 mile bike race.

I never sight like road biked in my

life

man.

You just needed some

Yeah, that's right.

I like if I'm going to do

this, I'm going all

I totally get it.

I

totally get

it.

I call it, now I have a program.

Now for home care providers called the breakaway accelerator.

And it's based upon that concept, is like the best growth is accelerated growth.

slow growth is to me, and there's a lot of science behind that too,

that, That, it's hard growth.

It's harder to grow slowly than it is to accelerate.

So I went through this accelerated journey in 2016.

And as I did.

what's amazing is if you look at the trajectory of my company at

the time, it also grew along with we're talking hockey stick growth.

wow.

if you talk to my leadership team back then, they'll tell you it

was when Aaron decided to invest in his own personal Journey and his own

personal well being that when he started letting go, of, not just letting go.

I still had control and I don't know if letting goes the right term.

It was more or less.

I put my, I delegated.

I created a more self managed company and I started trying to, I stopped

trying to do everything myself.

All the big things.

I had a wonderful team, that could handle that, fortunately, we had to

make some changes to make that happen.

But and then 2018, two years later, I stepped down as CEO of that company.

Wow.

Wow.

acceleration.

Like when you really start investing in yourself and in your

own wellbeing, you show up better.

You're a better person, you're a better boss, you think more clearly.

I started doing other investments and other businesses at the time.

I just, and I was doing less work.

right,

that's what's cool about it, is that my, my coach is Dan Sullivan.

I don't know if you're familiar with Dan, but he's a strategic coach wrote 10 X is

easier than two X with Benjamin Hardy.

And

he's a hero of mine.

I know Dan personally, and he has this term called his four freedoms.

Freedom of time, money, relationships, and purpose, which is also what

Aristotle calls the good life.

I see that as also the good life that they're synonymous of each other.

And so entrepreneurs, when they can create those freedoms in their lives,

I've added an additional one health, like health has been really important

to me, but, Anyway, that's my, that's the two thirds part of my story.

And then I got into positive psychology in 2017.

I ended up going to UPenn in 20, 2021 at the age of 49, 50, got accepted

to the top program in the world in positive psychology, studied

under Martin Seligman, who's like the father of positive psychology.

I wrote my thesis capstone, which was really the foundational

kind of the beginning of the

book.

then after I, I graduated from that, I wrote the book and, it's,

it was transformational for me as a father, frankly, not just as

a, not just as an entrepreneur, but my kids saw a difference.

I started using the, the science that I was learning into my own investment,

into my own personal wellbeing.

So I just elevated even more from 2016, forward.

but it's not perfect.

I just, I always tell people like I struggle all the time.

So it's not because I have this degree that I live in this like ideal life,

it's, I live a life like anyone else.

you have to continually check your mindset, continually

check your limited thinking,

yes, I would love to

know.

there.

That's

my journey though.

I wanted

Really great.

Really great.

I would love to ask you a question about your, you talked about starting

into that positive psychology, graduate work and how that was very influential

too, and it sounds like you had a lot of pieces in place because of your

entrepreneurial experience and growth.

And obviously if you're scaling businesses, it's pushing you to grow.

And change your limiting mindsets already, but you, it's almost like you were able

to codify some of these things as you go through your master's there was there one

or two things that were any, was there aha moments in your positive psychology, stint

in that graduate work or your thesis, or one or two things that stood out to

you as oh my gosh, I'm so glad I've, completed this program to learn this?

Mm-Hmm.

yeah, yeah.

There's so many.

And one that comes to my mind that you can find information on this theory, it's

called the self determination theory.

And it's based upon three components and one of them just, all of them resonated

with me, but the first one is autonomy.

I had realized that up until 2016, I hadn't created autonomy in my business.

I'm doing a startup right now, this breakaway accelerator, for example, and

I'm taking my family to Cancun flying out Saturday in the middle of a startup.

I do things differently now.

That's different than going back to work after it's dinner

at night till two in the morning.

that's a different approach.

Right?

exactly.

Completely different.

My mindset's different, you know, I realize how important it is early on.

And I get it when you are a new entrepreneur, aspiring entrepreneur,

and maybe you don't have the capital to invest in all the right people, because

I have, I've already created a team in, To surround myself with, but in the

book, I do talk about that, that there are still things, even if you don't

have capital to where you can create the space that you need to continually

thrive while you're starting that.

And so autonomy early on.

And my capstone was actually for the aspiring entrepreneur and

people can read that capstone.

It's, it's on the UPenn, website.

Masters of applied positive psychology sites really use a Google it, frankly,

it should pull up, but it was all about the aspiring entrepreneur,

not the experienced entrepreneur.

Like how can they

thrive

Hmm.

and when they're starting, because so many great ideas

die because they get burned out.

Early on and they give

up.

A hundred percent.

and so I want to help the entrepreneur, even on the early stages

to say, you know what, I'm not going to give up because I'm still investing

in me and I'm experiencing autonomy.

So that autonomy freedom, really important.

The other two pillars to that is relationships.

the book, the good life that came out last year on the longest

Harvard study on relationships.

It's the number one contributor to wellbeing.

You know, so really important.

And the 3rd pillar is competence.

we have to feel like we're capable and competent in what we're doing.

And I would go beyond competent to say, that we are in our superpower.

if a entrepreneur is.

Is doing what they're wired to do.

And I talk about this in the books.

So Dallas, I think you're going to love this concept.

So I talk about one of the third law in my book is called entre

grit, entrepreneurial grit.

And I go through these five levels of

grit.

And the first level is curiosity.

Like when you first start or when, before you even start, you're

curious about an idea or a concept.

Like I was curious about home care.

what is that about?

What, what's the, opportunity there.

Then interest goes into the research.

You get more interested.

That's second phase.

And the third phase is the practice phase.

To where's the further you go, the more grit you have in

an entrepreneurial venture.

And the problem I think, even with, especially with younger entrepreneurs is

that they want to skip the practice phase.

They think I'm just going to have the passion, the passion is just

going to come.

Cause that's the fourth one.

Like you have to practice

enough and test things, find out what's working, what doesn't work.

Like when I first started my home care business, I wouldn't say I

was passionate about home care right out of the gate to be fully.

Right.

Right.

It was only when I started taking care of others and

practicing that and leaning into it.

Did that.

passion come,

Yeah.

I think there's a, I think there's an interesting thing because I think it's

almost like the difference when you're.

When you're first dating someone and you're infatuated with that person

versus you, you talk to somebody who's been married for like 50 years.

Right.

And there, and it's like, there's just a difference, right?

Cause when you're an entrepreneur and you see something bright and shiny,

you're like, yeah, I'm going to be passionate about that, but is that really

a feeling or you just infatuated the, with the idea and, or is it a belief?

And I think what you're getting at is that passion was a deep seated belief

that was attached to something a lot.

Bigger and stronger than just a business.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

would say, you know, that last 10 percent

that you talk about is that.

Is that you don't really get to enjoy that last 10 percent until you're there

right until the passion phase perhaps

Yeah.

because what's going to get you from the 90 to the 100 percent is

passion and then I think once you get to 100 maybe it's between 90 and 100 percent

who knows, but the 5th one is the calling.

Hmm.

Hmm.

Like when we feel called, it's different from passion.

Passion's more internal and you have to have it.

It's what am I passionate about when calling is what's my contribution to

the greater whole, like who am I going to impact?

you feel called to make a difference as an entrepreneur.

And when you are called, man, you're not going anywhere,

Yeah.

right?

Is that you're perseverance.

Now you can become obsessive like I did.

So you got to check that right when you're called.

But, but I, it sure helps.

Let's talk about that for a second, because it was a great jump off.

you've written a new book.

It's called Entree Thrive.

It just came out in February.

Is that correct?

It's just out and just hit Amazon bestsellers.

You were featured in USA Today.

So that's huge, man.

That's

huge.

so,

yeah, yeah,

you talked about getting to a place of burnout in 20, 2015.

And so how would you recognize that you were burnout and what are some

of the things, especially things that you unpack in the book that you would

want to speak to maybe a leader or business owner or entrepreneur that

is feeling like they're in your 2015.

Burnout.

yeah, yeah, going back to that cycling term and I, try not to get

emotional when I talk about this because there was someone who had a significant

impact on my life back in 2015.

That's no longer with us.

Dale.

But, uh, uh, I think, In the cycling world, we have this concept

called drafting and drafting to get behind someone's tire.

It saves you literally 33 percent of your energy, and I

believe to really break away.

And again, I use that term a lot and I have a whole program want

to start up as the breakaway accelerator for home care providers.

Yeah, it's like.

If we stay in the pack where we're at and we just do what everyone else is

doing, really changes in our lives.

And I, in 2015, I was in the pack.

It wasn't like I was like, super unhappy falling back behind the pack.

I was just in the pack, but I knew I could do so much more and

I was capable of so much more.

And I had a buddy.

Dale Green who would remind me that I was still in the pack and I needed to

break free that he knew I could do more.

So it started out he was a 4:00 AM or meaning he was at the gym at 4:00

AM you know,

Oh,

and I don't know if I ever got that vision.

I was usually, I started 5:00 AM but he was still there.

Oh, my goodness.

know, of course,

and he became my, he got me going to the gym back then in 2015.

That's when it all started and became great friends.

He ended up investing in my company in 2016.

Very well, very, successful entrepreneur.

And the things he would just, he was just so brutally honest with

me, but in a very compassionate way.

It wasn't like he was rude about it.

He was just like, Aaron, you can do better.

You can do more.

And he was my drafting partner.

He was in front of me and allowing me to draft from him.

And.

Part of that was that he had put so much trust in me.

I mean, he invested a significant amount in my business in

2016, purely out of trust.

And I had this concept is it's better to give trust and

then allow people to earn it.

I don't really earned his trust necessarily.

He just gave it to me and that my confidence in myself just soared.

2022, April, 2022, he passed away of cancer Dale, uh, which was,

you know, he was as fit as, as, I mean, guy was, was a tank fit.

he had, he ended up, with bone cancer and, anyway.

We, the hardest point of the hardest losses I've ever had,

as far as a friend, even fan, he was like an older brother to me.

I have six brothers and he was like one of my other brothers.

And, anyway, that, the concept.

And Fast forward with the book, right?

Is that I talk a lot about people and relationships in our lives is

that if we really truly want to break away doing it by ourselves,

it's like the tour de France.

Anyone who wants a yellow Jersey isn't going to get that yellow Jersey by

themselves.

That's right.

they need a team, they need someone getting in front of them.

And, and that's what Dale was for me.

And that's what I want to, I try to be for other people is to say,

Hey, let's break away together.

And this is your breakaway.

I'm going to help you with your breakaway.

if I have to go back to where I'm at, that's fine.

I'm going to help you with your breakaway.

Yeah.

And that's a real key concept.

And so when I wrote the book, I thought about my 2015 self.

I was my own target market.

I was like, okay, I'm writing for that

person in

2015

Right.

and said, what did that guy need back then to help him break away?

And what did Dale do and others?

It wasn't just Dale.

I had a team, Eric, who was also, He helped me, he was my COO at the

time, helped me break away and he continues to play that role in my life.

there's just a lot of people like that, that, reach out to those mentors, those

people who have already been there.

One thing, a concept that I have always loved that I continue to remind myself

of is that if I'm going to take guidance from somebody, as far as a breakaway, I

want to take guidance from someone who, who lives on the path that I want to take.

who's been on it.

And that was Dale, that was, rather than someone who just

talks about it but has never done

it.

I think that's important is find those people that you

want, that's what you want.

And a lot of those people are givers, like they want to help.

They want other people to get on that path.

They're selfless people typically.

They're not, they don't want to just hold it to themselves.

I have found that time and time again in my life, you

know, so.

That's, awesome.

that, so yeah, I wrote for my 2015 self and that's where the

eight laws spurred from as well as positive psychology and my capstone

and all those things just culminated.

awesome.

So, so as that relates to burnout, what is some advice that you would

give to an aspiring entrepreneur who's suffering from burnout right

now, what would be the first thing in terms of breaking out of that burnout?

What would you say in your experience was something that helped you shift,

or maybe something were doing or not doing that helped you break

out of that that 2015 pattern.

Yeah.

I think the first law I talk about in the book is entrepreneurial

clarity or entre clarity.

And the first phase, I break up every law into three, three different, really four.

And it's based upon the quote by Martin Luther King.

He says, if you can't, if you can't, run, then walk, if you can't walk, then crawl.

But whatever you

do,

you know, keep moving forward.

And I love that quote.

And I broke that book out like that.

And so the first kind of crawl part of EntreClarity is,

what are your guiding truths?

These aren't your core values in your business.

These are your guiding truths, things you want to be true about yourself.

And I actually created my guiding truth several years ago.

And I have nine guiding truths.

I added a ninth one, last year.

And so I had the eight for several years.

But they go my mind is at peace.

Hmm.

My actions reflect character.

my, my family receives of my time, my ventures create freedom.

Those are my guiding truths.

And I think as an entrepreneur, you've got to decide what you want out of

your life and what those truths are.

And so I walked through the book and if you can get clear on that, that helps

you also guide you through decisions, things you should or shouldn't be doing.

It also helps you.

Your guiding truth should help you say no to.

even financial endeavors that might give you a nice return financially,

but burn you out completely

Right.

because what's the

point,

right?

If that's going to burn you

out,

you know, so really important.

So I'd say guiding truths.

and then again, on the clarity is to accept where you are today.

It's self acceptance.

We talk a lot about that in positive psychology, which.

Require self awareness.

They go hand in glove.

They're just, they match together.

and then, the run phase of the clarity is the breakaway.

what are you, where do you want to go?

What do you want out of life?

Dan Sullivan has taught me that it's okay to want what you want

and not make justifications for it.

Hmm.

not make excuses.

A lot of times I think as entrepreneurs that we, even financial wanting, we

try to make justifications for that.

Well, it's okay to want what you want, just as long as you know what that is.

And that as long as it's legal,

you know, as

long as it's like going to help the greater good, in my opinion, then

it's okay to want what you want.

And, and then, uh, And lean into that.

So I'd say it starts with that clarity, honestly, and getting clear on those

breakaways and where you want to

go with

I think it's so true.

I think that if you're struggling with burnout or you are in, you feel like

underwater, I think what those, that clarity, that entree clarity that you

talked about does with those values is it allows you to refocus and start

prioritizing What's the most important thing and what do I need to be focused on?

Because if you don't, you just, there's the tyranny of the urgent and

there's all these could have, should have, would have, and all this stuff.

and then you've got the shame and guilt and all this other stuff, the baggage

that you're carrying along and, you can worry about , am I being too greedy

to want this success or have I wasted my time and, or did I screw up that

last venture that failed and, what it just, there's So many things out there.

So I think that if you can.

Describe with great clarity, what you're all about, like what makes

you and you really want, then I think that it really helps you focus.

And that can take a lot off your plate and help do some recovery from burnout.

So I think that's really good.

I think that's really good advice.

Let's talk about, let's talk about the, we talked a little bit about

the either or myth for entrepreneurs.

But you mentioned, and we were talking about this before the show, the

good life, and I even said it in the opener is the good life, what does

it look like to you when you say, you like working with entrepreneurs and

helping them with their wellbeing and helping them understand the good life

concept, what does that mean to you?

and what would that look like for an entrepreneur?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Aristotle was the first one who came up with that, the good life, the concept.

And if you asked Aristotle what the good life was, I think he

would say the complete life.

It's the, but it's not, it's, I know this is a little bit

cliche, but it's a journey.

Right.

Is that the good life is there's not necessarily an

end to creating the good life.

And I love the term create rather than live the good life because it takes

some effort to create that for yourself.

And back to going, deciding what you want, like the good life for me.

Means more freedom of time

Yes.

like that to me as I protect my time, I'm not going to

create a new venture if it's going to rob me of my time for the long term.

I realize you have to dip a little bit when you create something to

put the time and energy into it.

But if 2 years from now, I'm still going to be doing that.

It's a no for me.

so it's, so the good life, again, you create it in your own mind,

what that is, and again, going back to Dan Sullivan's four freedoms.

And again, health is the fifth for me, but freedom of time, money, relationships,

purpose, and health is that.

To me, if you look at, there's really not a whole lot that fits outside of that

as far as what we want as entrepreneurs.

And so what does time look like for you as an entrepreneur?

Create that's part of the good life.

Is that, okay, I want my Fridays and weekends.

Mm.

Um, perhaps, where I'm not checking my

email on Saturdays and Sundays.

Mm.

Mm.

That's the good life, for me at least, and I think it is for many

people is that, what does that look like?

Money?

what does that look like for you?

But this is a dangerous one, I think, because we can always say, okay, if

once I get $5 million, I'll be happy.

And then you get to 5 million and what happens, you know,

well, once I get to 10 million,

I'll be happy, and that's a, that's a real trap, you know, for entrepreneurs

is that sometimes it's not an amount, sometimes it's a lifestyle.

Or sometimes it's just that you are, there's no debt and

you're financially secure.

you have to check yourself on that one, I think, to make sure that you're

not setting this arbitrary goal.

And then you're just going to keep moving that out because you'll never be happy.

Money isn't truly is, doesn't create happiness, on its own,

but I'd be a hypocrite if I

didn't say it

Yeah.

Right.

I mean it does create some freedoms that you

normally wouldn't maybe have.

And so that's important.

relationships, man, oh man, that's a huge

one when it comes to the good

I would love for you to talk a little bit about more

relationships as it relates, because we've got a lot of coaches and we

call them leader coaches on the show.

These are people that are leading in companies and organizations.

I think you talked about having a right hand man, a COO and, there's VPs and

directors and managers, these are people that have responsibilities and part of

their responsibilities is leading teams.

What would you say is.

Something that you've learned through your career that's been really helpful,

either in values that you instilled in your leadership team that's

leading others or things that's helped you as it relates to relationships

in business Lead Well Mm-Hmm.

Yeah.

And I've learned something.

A lot of what I've learned is from other people, right?

Is you watch some, the masters of relationships and I've had, I've been

surrounding myself some really, the people who are just masters at this.

I write about it.

So the fourth law is entre connections and entrepreneurial connections.

And the first, the crawl part of that is congruency.

Yeah.

So I think in order to foster and cultivate relationships is what

I think is undervalued is that to be congruent with who you are

in public as you are in private.

So with your team, if you're leading a team is that you are showing up congruent

with them, this is that what you're asking them to do is exactly what you would do.

and that's how you lead.

it's that congruence.

I think it's really imperative.

Second one is being present is that and we hear that a lot.

But when I say president, I'm talking in your in both your personal family

relationships, deep connections as well as your team members.

Is that you're really sincerely present.

I mentioned Eric's name previously, and I actually talk about him in

the book is that he would sit down.

We had a, I had a call center, one of my companies, we had a call

center of about 80, 80 college kids,

Wow.

and here's Eric in his mid forties.

Six, four, I think big guy, just as, very has a presence about him.

He could be a, maybe a little intimidating if you didn't know him.

Once you know him, he's not at all, but, and he would sit down with these,

call center research associates and have real meaningful conversations with them.

I'd sit there and

watch him do

that's so good, yeah, oh,

in positive psychology, which is the third phase is

the high quality connections.

if we could have those connections on a daily basis with our team members,

where we're just asking them about their lives and, or even if it's

work related, I remember Eric sitting down and he would go, or he would

ask him what their frustrations were.

And he'd learned so much about, like we use this proprietary software we

would build and he would get feedback from them because they, he just let

their guard down and they were open and honest with them with their

frustrations.

he had built that trust that that safe space, they had a safe

space, could share, I know the listeners, percent are gonna be like, duh, we did

not plan this, but we have a coaching system what do we know is that a lot

of companies can spend money on coaches for the CEO, COO, directors, VPs.

Everyone in the organization would benefit from coaching.

So we have a coaching scaffold that we've put in that companies can apply.

And it's fascinating that you would say that because really what it's all

about is facilitating high quality connections and conversations, just like

what you said in positive psychology, because like you said, it's just

sitting across from someone that's being present and asking questions.

Then just listening, just letting just hearing them out.

And you're not expecting necessarily anything.

And yet you, you, can receive so much just by

You, you receive so much.

You benefit.

That's the point of the high quality connections is that there's

two people who benefit in that.

So you and the other person is that you're receiving back from them.

things you often don't expect.

I share the example.

I, several years ago, I Flew into Boston and I got an Uber as late,

like 1130 flight was delayed.

I was tired.

I got in with my Uber driver.

He was from, Eastern, country.

Nice.

This guy, he started talking to me and I wasn't initially in the mood,

but he asked me about my spirituality.

He asked me about my family.

And we just got into this meaningful conversation for 45 minutes.

And he dropped me off at my hotel.

I came around.

And it's the only time I've ever gotten a hug from my Uber driver, you

know, and I'll tell you for the next several days, I was on cloud nine.

I was like, that was the coolest thing, so those connections in our, when we're

leaders, when, with our staff, as it's, it, it changes our, that's the good

life to me is like, when you're having those on a regular basis, we need those,

even if you, Are an introvert or you are label yourself as an introvert.

you still need those connections, those meaningful

connections.

that's so important.

It's not only that, what you can get as well, because here's the funny thing.

we'll hear people that go this program and they may be a new leader

or a technical manager, they're not used to, a times people, it just

naturally because of the business of life, I know I'm guilty of this, one

of the first things that goes is.

That presence with people when, it, everything's going nuts and haywire.

And there's all kinds of problems solving.

You get busy.

You sometimes neglect just stopping for a minute, man.

Hey, how's your kids?

How's your, where are you at?

where are you at checking in?

How's your role there?

Are you happy with doing what you're doing?

because we're so transactional at that point, we're just moving, And

so that for me, one of the cool things is that we've seen through

this system is that you get feedback.

Like you said, you were on cloud nine after talking to your Uber

driver and getting a hug from him.

And that's like this most random like it's hug from your Uber driver.

But then.

He blessed you like you're like, man, I'm blessed for getting this hug.

I'm feeling this for days.

And so I think a lot of the coaches that, and I would say business leaders

to, to, to your point to encourage them.

Yes.

We get information and feedback from them.

Yes.

We build trust.

Yes.

We build engagement and all those things.

But you can't overlook what you're actually getting out of it beyond

the transactional, I'm just going to listen to you so that you'll work

harder to, tell me what I need to know that you're missing the boat.

The point is connection.

And so if you listen, someone with intent to really get to know them

and really understand them, you end up being, especially if you're

curious, you end up being blessed just like you were with the Uber driver.

So I think that's

I like curiosity.

Yeah.

Huge.

and it's creating the space to do it.

if you over schedule your day and you are up against projects and up

against things, and I'm as guilty as anybody doing that, right?

Is that we can over schedule ourselves to where we don't make the time

for those high quality connections.

And so that white space in your schedule.

As a leader that builds culture, like culture should be your number one

priority when it comes to your business.

That's right.

I love it.

So now let's talk a little bit about Entree Thrive.

This is your book.

We've talked all about the different laws that you have in it and all

the great advice that you've shared.

What inspired you to write Entree Thrive?

you've done these businesses, been successful, and now you're

like, I'm writing a book.

So tell us a little bit about what inspired you to write Entree Thrive.

yeah.

I don't think I had a big goal of writing a book when I started my master's program

and it was in the process of doing all the research for my capstone at the end where

I'm like, you know what, this could be a.

This could be a book.

And I, I met, I met my publisher through a networking group or what was

strategic coach and we just hit it off.

I told him what my thoughts were and what I was thinking.

And he was like, that would be a

great book.

So it was not just a great book.

We talked about.

The target audience and I have to come back to my 2015 self and said,

okay, I'm out, that's my target.

And there's many out there that I felt needed these more science

backed approach to being is I'm a huge fan of the self help out there.

I, I've absorbed plenty of that over the years and a lot of it's helped me, Brian

Tracy wrote my introduction in the book.

I'm a huge fan of Brian.

he was a game changer for me early on in my entrepreneurial journey.

And he's turned out, I've gotten to know Brian.

He is one of the nicest, most generous people on the planet.

And so love all that.

But I also wanted to, lean into the research of wellbeing

and positive psychology.

I.

Really like to make this point.

it's not the science of happiness necessarily, like how to be happy.

It's really the science behind why do some people thrive

and why do some people don't.

And there's, you'd be blown away by the research that's

been done in that field on that.

it's really the proactive side of psychology

rather than the

reactive side.

where we're trying to get in front and allow everyone to thrive, regardless,

you don't have to be going through a crisis to use these principles, and so

that's why I wrote the book as I thought of my, like I said, I was in the pack.

I wasn't like behind in 2015 of most entrepreneurs.

I was just with everyone else.

And my goal again is to help people break away from that

and really lean into their best

selves.

I

I love it, man.

That is so good.

We're all about leaning in.

I love how you said that lean into your best self.

If there was a, if there was a slogan or catchphrase for the last

10%, man, that would be a, that would be a lean into your best self.

That's fantastic.

So, we're.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Let's do it.

Let's do it.

man.

Collaboration, man.

We're all about it.

So, yeah,

go, go.

it, where can they, if they want to find Aaron and the

entree thrive, where can can they connect with you and your book?

Yeah.

Yeah.

We'd love to offer your listeners.

We actually created a, a URL or a website and then just go to entrethrive.

com E N T R E T H R I V E.

com forward slash

last 10.

All right.

last 10.

And they can download.

Yeah, they can download the last 10 numerical 10, the

number 10

and they can download the entre clarity guide.

So I talked about those guiding truths.

there's questions in there to help them build out their guiding truths.

And so we just want to offer that to your listeners and, and then

for home care providers, you can go to our breakaway accelerator.

com.

Okay.

But, but entre thrive dot com will get you where you need

to go and order the book from there.

You can

link to it.

put all of that in the show notes.

So guys, please check that after you can absolutely go and download that.

We would encourage you, highly encourage you to go and download

and check out Aaron's website.

I will ask ask this to this question to all of our guests at the end of the show.

And that is who is someone and that you would like to hear as a guest,

On the last 10%, it may or may not be someone, but it would that you

would like to hear on the last 10%.

Chad Willardson, I don't know if Chad, Chad Willardson,

he's a four time bestselling author.

He's more in the financial side, but he's written some really epic books, Stress

free money's one of them, Chad's a friend, but, and I can connect you to Chad, but

he's, he'd be an exceptional host or

a guest.

Awesome.

Okay.

we'll we'll have to reach we'll get with you at the and see we can,

can connect and we'll have him as a guest, we'll tell him, we'll tell

him that Aaron, Aaron put him up.

to, to be a guest on the show, that'd great.

and this has a fantastic.

Fantastic episode.

I really appreciate all that you've shared with, I know the listeners

have been digging all the, you just dropped a lot truth on the show today

and a lot of great some tactical and mindset advice been really good.

I'd love to hear in your story and, man.

We, just have to, we'll have to talk, we'll have to talk soon about that book

project that we'll do a collaboration on, but listen, we'll have you, we'll

have you, back on the show sometime.

The last 10%.

Thanks for being a guest

today.

I would love it.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.