Have you ever wondered how to transform daily chaos into strategic clarity? In my journey from hustling in the trenches to leading with purpose, I learned that true growth starts with letting go and embracing vulnerability. In a candid conversation with Tato Corcoran, we uncover the raw challenges of entrepreneurship and the art of delegation. Are you ready to elevate your game and build a legacy that thrives beyond the daily grind?

He's here to guide you through the complex world of business transactions and growth. Each week, we dive deep with actionable insights, expert interviews, and real world strategies to activate and equip you to live exceptionally and build exceptional businesses. Now, let's dive into today's episode.

Here's your host, Chris Segers.

Chris Seegers: Welcome to the Exceptional Companies Podcast, where we discuss how to buy, sell, or grow your business. I am joined by my recurring guest,

Tato who I love and I'm so proud of Tato. Welcome back to the show.

Tato Corcoran: Thanks Chris. I love being here.

Chris Seegers: So we've been together on this business acquisition journey for many, many years. We met in a mindset mastermind that I think actually helped both of us go a lot further in the acquisition side. So anyways, so we were chatting about a big topic that comes up with a lot of our clients, with a lot of folks you're talking to.

Excited to have you, and let's riff on this.

Tato Corcoran: I was gonna immediately cut you off, which is the thing that I love to do, but I, my follow on was gonna be and that people perceive it as a failure if you are working in your business. That just, it seems like that's an immediate point of failure, which I think is really unfortunate. So.

Chris Seegers: Yep, a hundred percent. And when we coach, so we do a lot of sell side and buy side representation exclusively on either one. But when we're selling to a buyer, we always try to place cultural fits with the buyer and the seller, and then we generally coach the buyer moving forward. And there's this miscommunication, I think, in social media that you can buy a business like you do real estate.

You're just in chaos mode. you're learning everything. You're trying to build some level of systems. You're trying to build loyalty with your team. You're trying not to lose revenue. There's so many things going on, and so when buyers buy a business, I'm always like, Hey, I would suggest you don't do a lot the.

First six to 12 months. It's really just understanding the industry, understanding the business, and then once you start and you'll start feeling kind of a level of anxiety coming down where you're like, oh, I do have some capacity. I'm not working 10 hours a week every single day. I've got some ideas for the business.

So tell me a little bit about where you are in your journey.

Tato Corcoran: Definitely. So when I first started Granite, I bought a really small business. So every person's experience is different, but I had absolutely no choice but to be the person running the business, right? I was the day to day I. And again, I think a lot of people view that kind of unfairly as like, oh, the business you bought was too small, or, oh, you know, like that was like a failure.

And the truth is. You know, so we manufacture our product. I can't go into the shop and, you know, move my production staff out of the way and take over production. I physically don't know how to manufacture. However, I know a ton about the process, the product, the industry, the players, my clients. What we can do, what we can't do, et cetera.

You should want to run your business a certain way, right? You want it to represent your personal and professional brand. And along with that are, you know, expectations, standards, et cetera. And so I also, you know, just spent a bunch of time like figuring out like what that means to me. You know, how is it that I want to run a business?

So I've done a lot of like five steps forward, 15 steps backward, but. I've gotten great glimpses of time where I'm being really strategic and I've seen firsthand how quickly you propel forward with that type of deep work. And so it becomes more and more like elevating yourself becomes more of a priority as you see the benefits of it.

And then each time I go to hire these positions, I. Get better at it, right? I further refine requirements for those candidates, my expectations for those people, et cetera. So I'll stop there 'cause that was kind of a lot, but

Before you go into business, do I wanna build a company that has enterprise value that will be a self-governed business without me? Or do I wanna build a lifestyle business, which means I'm probably gonna work in it, I'm gonna make good money, but it may not have as high enterprise value and it probably is gonna require me always.

Now we love, like our priority is to work with folks like you that are like, Hey, I wanna build a self-governed entity. That has enterprise value, meaning someone will buy it from me eventually, and one of the biggest factors of a higher or lower enterprise value. Is, does it require the owner or not?

They aren't. But there is a path to building a self-governed company where there's a lot of business owners that are working five hours a week and have incredible businesses that are growing, right? They have to be growing. Their people are flourishing, their clients are flourishing. It's not just, Hey, I work five hours a week and we're flat.

We've been flat the past 10 years. So I think like helping people understand. If you wanna build a lifestyle business that's a hundred percent great, like you could make a quarter of a million bucks working a decent amount in the business, but it's gonna be hard to sell that business if you want to build.

A business with enterprise value, it's gonna take a lot longer. And generally we do encourage people like you've done, go work in the business and then start elevating yourself outta the business. And we've used EOS, and we've got our own system, exceptional systems. That is really a systematic approach to start delegating and elevating out of that and getting your people elevated.

Tato Corcoran: I think. My journey, which is now coming up on three years, not quite has had like distinct. Like phases. So like phase one, which is definitely a better part of the first year was a pure survival, right? Like I was not being strategic, I was just trying to like figure out which way was up and figure out how to run this thing.

And then you move into stabilization, right? Okay. I have some good people. We're working on some systems, some processes. My customers aren't calling me every single day being like, you know, you're stable but you're not necessarily growing. And it was as In that stable phase, I found you know, various hours in a week.

This is what I need to be doing. And it made me feel empowered to carve out more of that time. That was when I first elevated somebody with, from within who I would now call my business partner. He doesn't own equity in the company, but he's bonused on net profit, et cetera. He's treated as an equal to me, and I came to him and I was like, not only are you the best employee here and a key man but you know, let me dangle a carrot in front of you and describe how I know we can grow.

So that was probably a year and a half ago, a year or two year and a half ago. And then when

Chris Seegers: Stop there too real quick. Like I think it's really important to key on every industry, every size of business is different. So if it's like, hey, somebody took 12 months or two years, or three years, that doesn't mean it's gonna be the same timeline for

Tato Corcoran: Yeah,

Chris Seegers: I it could be longer depending on complexity of the business.

How many people, how. Et cetera. So I think like just doing the process and being more forgiving with the timeline, like said on previous podcasts, I think is a healthy way to go. Sorry, continue on.

You know, and so you just, you keep pushing forward. And you realize that really one of my only focuses has to be company growth, right? You can solve for a lot of other things, but you need a leader to grow the place. And so I've just, you know, really seen how important that is and have continued to just.

Then you figure out, okay, how do I put up barriers to protect my time? Right? Is it that I need more help in the office or you know, what that looks like? And to your point, that can take, you know, all kinds of different forms and evolutions. But again, like I think that people get suckered into believing that if you're working your a SS off in the business for even a couple years in a row, that you've somehow done something wrong.

I'm butchering that, but I personally have felt that and now I feel like we have so much momentum. And while I think that some of course you want to achieve life and financial freedom through owning a business for sure, I'm not negating that goal at all. But you wanna build something that's worth something.

You know, so I just, I think that, you know, immediately stepping into an ownership role and, and hoping for this passivity is not only a fallacy, but like the antithesis of the goal. Like, in my opinion, right? Like I'm building something that's valuable, that pays me than anything else, et cetera.

Yeah.

And the interesting thing is we own enough businesses in different industries that I'm in the lifecycle. I'm in like four or five different life cycles with different businesses. So we're building a upstream oil and gas company with some incredible partners. We have something, what we've called, we have our survive plan, which is like, hey, we're a startup.

We need to grow revenue, we need to continue to, you know, make a profit. And then we have our Thrive plan. And those are actually both in EOS. So it's like, and it's very acceptable to understand like, we're in survive right now. This is like, we're growing this thing, it's bumpy. We're hiring, we're firing, we're bringing on new clients, we're buying new assets, and we know we're gonna get to that thrive.

We don't know how long it's gonna take for sure. Like that's the thing that I've kind of started giving control up to God is like, Hey, I don't know the timeline, but I do know those seasons exist. And so I think when you come in with a new business or a startup, you should expect you'll be in survival mode and be good with that.

But anyways, just kinda like, Hey, when it's painful, it's like, Hey, that is a good thing. We're, we're where we're supposed to be. We're putting in the effort. And I can't remember who said it, but there's somebody. That was communicating on the fact that like, there's no free ride in the architecture of life.

Tato Corcoran: Yeah.

Chris Seegers: Like people are are posting that on Facebook, Hey, there's this passive thing and there's this get rich quick. that's not a thing. Like there's a few people that have made incredible money in tech or Bitcoin or whatever and like that was a timing thing. But I think most people, you only get what you put in.

So there's no free rides in this survival mindset is like, Hey, it's healthy, we gotta survive. It might take you 12 months, it might take you two years, it might take you three years. And then as you start getting back capacity, and that's why I like systems, because as I get capacity back, if I have a system that's operating or a process that's operating, I know what the next step is.

So I've captured that and I'm like, Hey, my free time or my free capital now is going to this new opportunity that's gonna gimme a three to five x return on that. So I love that. I love that mindset.

Tato Corcoran: Hopefully this isn't like bearing off topic. You can tell me if it is, but I feel like this is more for like your buy side clients, especially like maybe first time buyers. But it's amazing how like, for lack of a better term, how much of like a high achieving person I feel like I've evolved into, which is a whole other piece of buying a business that I think like doesn't get talked about a lot.

Like that's so true. If I think back to where I was when I bought almost three years ago and where I am now, it's unbelievable how evolved I've become, how much strength I have, how much grit I have. Things still scare me of course, but like the things that scared me then now are like. It doesn't even cross my mind or things that scared me, then I feel like don't even cross my mind now.

And you keep elevating yourself into these better peer sets, right? You seek out people like you, people you know, who are your entrepreneurial peers, maybe locally or semi locally or nationally or what have you. And you just keep like, evolving, evolving, evolving, evolving. And next thing you know, like.

Chris Seegers: A hundred percent.

Tato Corcoran: the fact that you can be a steward of something that has no limit other than like your own capabilities is incredible.

Chris Seegers: Hundred percent. And what's, what I love is journeying with you from beginning, before you even started looking at buying businesses and being able to be involved with some of the conversations. This is why I want you to grow your audience because you are so honest and most people aren't. And that's how I am too.

Like when people ask me, Hey, you know, I wanna buy a business, I'm like, okay, here's how it's gonna be. It's really, really hard. It's gonna like, you're not gonna make good money. You're gonna feel like you're crazy. But if you are willing to get through that, it's the greatest net worth wealth generator I believe, in this country.

Hey, everyone quit. Or a bunch of people quit. What do we do? And then it's like, oh, we're stabilizing. Yeah. And then now it's like you're hitting and it's that project mood curve. We talk about seasons a lot. Now you're getting into the season. Where you're starting to stabilize and now you're working more in the strategic and you know, kind of revenue generation, and then eventually you're gonna be even higher.

Higher, Hey, let's go buy another business. Let's buy a competitor. Let's do this, let's do this. But I appreciate your honest feedback and that's why I have you on the podcast so often is you're within that lifecycle. Instead of saying like. Yeah, it's awesome. Everyone should buy a business. Buy my course.

Then I'm like, what? What would I do? I'd be bored in like two weeks. This is the journey and this is how we serve people. Like whether it be our clients or our team or husband, wife, our kids. Like this is my unique ability and this is how I, I love to serve people. And same with you, but the honest, I think it's really critical for us to give honest feedback to people that are looking into it because a lot of them are real estate investors.

Um, James Masotti, who you introduced me to that I had on my podcast, he said the same thing. So they were buying real estate. They're like, ah, we can figure this thing out. Real estate, like we've mastered real estate business is the same thing. It's easy. And then he got in and he's like, whoa, this is really hard.

I wanna serve big people in a bigger way and have control over my freedom of time, purpose, capital, and relationships. If, you really want those things, this is the opportunity for you for sure.

Tato Corcoran: Absolutely. I think too, like I'm sure you would agree, a thing that again, I, I kind of touched on that I feel like gets looked over is like the amount of people you're exposed to are so much smarter than you, more successful than you, better than you. It's easier to find those types of rooms when you have, you know, like a little bit of credibility, like, oh, I own something.

I'm terrified. I have nothing to offer and I would not trade this evening for anything. It was in an instant, not about the investment opportunity, the business, what it was about, the fact that I was like, holy shit, like I just walked into this room. This is amazing, you know? Awesome. And so I think that there's a certain type of person that sees how valuable that can be and

Chris Seegers: Well, I would, I like my premise would be we're all created, uniquely gifted in God's image to do huge things. Every single one of us and some of us have just kind of tamped it down and said, I'm good with like comfort. I. I'm good with, you know, I just wanna work nine to five. I just want to have this, I wanna have my vacation.

It's just you have a unique gifting that this world needs. And when you put that into play. The universe, God will reward that. And other people are gravitated to that. When they see somebody that's like, I don't really know what I'm doing, but I'm going really big and I'm trying to learn and I'm trying to build a business, or I'm trying to do the things everybody generally rallies around is like, how can we support you?

We've been there and we want you to win. And so getting into those rooms, I think you have to pray. Pay the price of admission, which is like, I'm gonna go step out. And like, face that fear and just go do it. I mean, the risk we've taken personally, shoot, we could have lost it all 10, 15 times and my wife and I have continued to go on, not because it's like, Hey, we need to go do this crazy thing.

And when we stop creating could be in your marriage. You stop pouring into your marriage and creating a great marriage or with your kids or with your business. We start getting that anxiety of like, man, I feel like something's missing. I'm not really playing it out. So I love that. That's really cool.

Do you like what you hear so far? Make sure you never miss an episode by clicking the subscribe button now and check out our website, www. excoadvisors. com. This podcast is made possible by listeners like you. Thank you for your support. Now back to the show.

Tato Corcoran: Mm-hmm. Definitely. This is like a whole other subject, and it's one admittedly, that I've only scratched the surface on, but I've started dipping my toe into ai. As we talk about delegate and Elevate, there's, I. Always gonna be a need for people, of course. But it is pretty amazing how far you can get on technology these days.

And again, I'm the furthest from an expert. I've just kind of, dipped my toe. But particularly on the marketing side, I've started to see how much further I can get ahead using, you know, tools like ChatGPT, et cetera, that are available to everybody. I know there's now like a tool for like email organization and things like that.

Somebody recommended it to me to continue to really understand what drives your employees, what drives them as people and as professionals. A lot of people know, if you've listened to my prior content that I run a general labor un skilled, uneducated labor force, which is very unique and something that.

Came with a huge learning curve. And so I've tried to seek out resources to understand like, why do people wanna work for me? You know, why do they, why did they wanna start? Why do they keep doing it, and why would they wanna continue to do so? And again, I think it's just, it's all tied into what we're talking about is building a sustainable business where people wanna be and wanna, you know, elevate you, et cetera.

And so that's become a bit of a recent focus, if you will.

Chris Seegers: Well, thanks for coming on the show and we'll bring you back next month and we'll come up with another topic that people are asking us about. Have an day, Tato.

Tato Corcoran: You too.

If you like this show, please reach out through our website, www. excoadvisors. com for free tools to order a copy of Selling Main Street or to sign up for our free webinar on how to sell your Main Street business.