The fastest path to growth is through relationships; especially those that hold you accountable to your word.  

I had the privilege of sitting down with Sir Darren Jacklin, a global business leader and philanthropist, whose journey from being labeled a throwaway kid to building international companies is a testament to the power of integrity. Darren shares why keeping your word creates unstoppable credibility, how he tests potential partners (on hiking trails of all things), and the simple but powerful requests that open doors you never thought possible. 

What impressed me most is Darren’s unwavering commitment to service—acquiring businesses not just for profit, but to fund his mission of building schools worldwide.  

In this conversation, you’ll learn how to raise your standards, make better asks, and transform connections into meaningful collaborations. His wisdom is both practical and inspiring, showing exactly how business growth and lasting impact can go hand in hand. 

Highlights: 

1. Integrity that scales - How keeping your word, reputation, and credibility becomes a career flywheel—and the three structures Darren uses to protect them. 
2. Requests that get results - A simple “make the ask” framework so people either accept, decline, or counter—without you taking it personally. 
3. Vetting partners in the wild - Why Darren takes prospects hiking to read true behavior, reduce risk, and spot red flags before deals. 
4. From broke to builder - How micro-commitments, mentors, and accountability reversed an R9 credit rating and set the stage for acquisitions. 
5. Rolling up “boring” businesses - Why acquiring bookkeeping and tax firms creates predictable revenue—and how that fuels his goal to fund 1,000 schools. 

Connect with Darren: 

Website: https://www.darrenjacklin.com  

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrenleejacklin 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/darrenleejacklin 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sirdarrenjacklin 

X: https://twitter.com/Sir_Jacklin 

Check this out: 

In appreciation for being here, I have some gifts for you. 

A LinkedIn Checklist for setting up your fully optimized Profile:  

An opportunity to test drive the Follow Up system I recommend by taking the  

3 Card Sampler – you won’t regret it.   

AND … Don’t forget to connect with me on LinkedIn and be eligible for my complimentary LinkedIn profile audit – I do one each month for a lucky listener! 

Connect with me: 

http://JanicePorter.com 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/janiceporter/ 

https://www.facebook.com/janiceporter1 

https://www.instagram.com/socjanice/ 

Thanks for listening! 

Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. 

Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a note in the comment section below! 

Subscribe to the podcast 

If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app. 

Leave us an Apple Podcast review 

Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. 

Aaron, Hello everyone, and welcome to this

week's episode of relationships rule. Today's guest sir Darren

Jacklin went from being labeled a throwaway kid with learning

difficulties to sitting on the board of a multi billion dollar

global company and leading $100 million philanthropic initiative

along the way, he's trained executives from 157 fortune 500

companies, mentored countless entrepreneurs and helped build

schools in some of the most underserved communities in the

world. But what fueled that transportation, transportation,

that transformation, wasn't just grit or strategy, it was

relationships, and in this conversation, we talk about the

people who saw him differently, the mentors who shaped his

mindset and how giving back has become his greatest driver of

success. So if you have ever questioned the power of belief

or the ripple effect of a well timed relationship, then listen

in. Welcome. Welcome to the show. Darren, I'm

Sir Darren Jacklin: grateful to be here. Janice, thank you for

allowing me the opportunity to make a difference.

Well, it's so amazing, because I think what's

funny is how we reconnected through bordy, right? It was

boardy. And do you want to just give a blurb about what bordy

is? And because boardy reached out to me, right? Yeah.

Sir Darren Jacklin: Okay, so boardy Boardman is an artificial

intelligence human connector. It's a superhuman connector.

It's artificial intelligence. It's computer program. Somebody

designed it. I've been on it for a couple of years as one of the

original people. It's free right now to use, and people just go

to boarding, B, O, A, r, d, yeah. Bordy.ai, they can do a

bit of research on that, and you can call boardy, or you can

WhatsApp, or you can email boardy. And what it does is

basically just fast tracks people, if they use LinkedIn or

social media to network and professionally connect and

collaborate. Boarding, just, you know, expedites that thing with

speed and execution to connect. And so it speaks to 1000s of

people around the world, from all over the world from all

walks of life, every day, every 24 hours. And then boarding

collects all that data as artificial intelligence and then

connects and match makes people and so, you know, I speak to

boarding almost on a daily basis, either by whatsapp or by

telephone. We've got a great AI relationship. So it's an

artificial intelligence agent and somebody who's like your

side person. So the first couple times you do it, it's kind of

awkward and weird, until you kind of build that relationship

that you're talking to AI, and then after a while, it gets to

know you and build that relationship with you. Then it

seems like kind of your best friend or your best buddy, sort

of

like chat GPT does for me, but this is more of

a networking guru for me, and it's it is so interesting. And

so when we when you came up in my LinkedIn messaging, I went, I

know this person. I think I knew this person a long time ago, so

I was curious to to reconnect, and that's how it happened. And

I just thought it was great, and I'm so glad that we did. So

let's start with a little snapshot, because you wrote this

book, which I did just read until I become, yeah, I pretty

much read everything except the last chapter. I'm being honest,

because I didn't quite finish. But a snapshot, for those who

don't know your story, of the headline, version of how you

went from struggle to service, success and service, I would

say, you know,

Sir Darren Jacklin: I think a lot of it comes from my mother.

I'll give my mother credit. My mom worked in, you know,

palliative care and hospice in a senior care facility for many

years in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, Canada. My mom's

still alive. She's 77 years of age, and I learned a lot from

role modeling and mentoring my mom. My mom was always about

community service and making a difference in a city of less

than 20,000 people. And you know, when I failed grade one of

public school, and I was misdiagnosed with a learning

disability and reading disability. It really affected

my self confidence, and I felt that I didn't fit in in terms

of, you know, we call it community today, but I was in a

classroom in a public school where, you know, I was unfit

based on the school system to be in regular public school,

wait, because they misdiagnosed you when you

correct.

Sir Darren Jacklin: So what they did is I was very hyperactive as

a kid, and I didn't want to sit still in a school chair. I want

to be out there. I'm a very action oriented person. I'm also

a very visual learner. I see things visually, and so school

is primarily auditory learning. And so because I failed grade

one, my parents were brought into class one day and sat down

with a school teacher and a guidance counselor said, you

know, based on, you know, Darren failing grade one, we're not too

sure what to do with them, so let's put them into special

education. Oh my gosh, yeah. So at age seven, I created my first

business called rent a kid, and I would go out and knock on

doors and cut grass, shovel snow in the wintertime, deliver

newspapers, and a lady across the street, Pat Smith, she

became the Deputy Premier of Saskatchewan, next to our

premier grant Devine back in the 1980s anybody from the prairies,

they'll know those names. Yeah, and she became my first paying

client at age seven. Now her husband, Ed Smith, he was in a

wheelchair. He had a work related accident. They owned a

company called Sam's general trucking all across western

Canada, and they worked in the oil services field industry. So.

So Pat Smith became my first paying client. So right through

from 789, all the way up to my junior high and high school, I

did work with them. And so I would just realize that if I

wanted to earn more money, I would just go serve people and

solve a problem in my community. Because we don't have money

problems in life. We have thinking problems in life.

There's no lack of money, it's a lack of thinking and taking

action and then serving people and solving their problems. So

every morning, when I'd walk to school, Janice, I had a little

notepad, and I would look at, oh, that person has a dog. That

person needs their grass cut. That person needs their windows

washed. That person needs their leaves raked. That person has a

hot tub in their backyard or a swimming pool. And I would

always keep notes, handwrite notes every day. In fact, I

still do it to this day. I know you do. Yeah, I have a notepad

right over here. And what I do is I'm very visually observant

to seeing opportunity zones. So when people are in crisis or

they're complaining, like, if I can go into social media, or I

can go on to a mainstream news broadcast and everybody's

complaining, I'm looking at, what are the opportunities that

people are complaining about, and how can I monetize this and

turn this into an income producing asset? And it's not,

I'm not worried about money. What motivates me is serving

people and solving problems and making a difference.

So So school, during school, you probably

hated school. Oh,

Sir Darren Jacklin: it's so boring to me. I was, we call it

daydreaming, you know? I was dream building. I was

visualizing my future of how I go out and serve people and

solve problems and make more of a difference in the world and

create a ripple of impact. And so I was thinking about, you

know, I gotta go to that hotel, or I've gotta follow up with

that person, and I gotta talk to that decision maker. And, you

know, and I was doing all these things all the time, and I

always got into trouble by my teachers because, you know, I

was a collaborator. I'm about collaboration, building teams

and and winning together. And in school, they call that cheating.

To me, it's collaboration.

I love it. So it just, it's fascinating, because

a lot of well, you mentioned, ADHD, I have a little

granddaughter who is hyperactive. She has been

diagnosed with that. She is so smart, but she just started just

started grade one, and the teacher has said to my daughter

already, your your daughter is very smart, and she she's very

quick and very intelligent. She finishes her work, and then then

she gets into trouble because she's got too much time left on

her hand, right? Well, then you've got to feed that somehow,

right, become an

Sir Darren Jacklin: entrepreneur, give her a project to work on,

exactly, yeah, when I was a kid in school. So for example, ADHD,

I call it attention, developed to higher dimension. Oh, I love

it, right? Attention. What I did is, so we used to have Jump Rope

for Heart, like the Heart

Foundation, yeah, I used to teach school. I

remember that you did at that, yeah?

Sir Darren Jacklin: So we used to have a catalog in our

elementary school about if we did, certain we did, you know,

skipping Jump Rope for Heart, we could raise money. So I used to

go knock on doors. I actually raised more money by myself than

all the school students of a few 100 students combined. And I

actually won our our school. I won all the top prizes, and we

were number one in Saskatchewan, Canada, our elementary school

and a semi tractor trailer. No exaggeration, right? No

exaggeration. I we had a semi tractor trailer pull up at my

house and the school with all the prizes that I won. It was,

it was unbelievable. My family still talks about this day that

semi tractor

So, wait a second, so, but you weren't

motivated by money. No.

Sir Darren Jacklin: What it was is, money was a tool to me. What

it was for me is I was never good enough, right? Full Troy. I

was never, I felt I was never good enough. I was never going

to amount to much. You know? I was clumsy and in sports. In

school, I was a kid always picked last night, he said,

teach, you know, phys ed team and school sports. I was a D

student. I was labeled most likely not to ever succeed. I

was a kid you would write off, and just like, oh, kids going

nowhere fast, right? And I was that kid and but outside of

school, there was a different me. There was this Hustler, this

kid who was fearless, this kid. But the thing is, because I was

never good enough, and I felt that it didn't matter, and I

wasn't a smart kid, what happened was, well, I the thing

was that I didn't fit into that school system box, right, right.

Just like in business, we call it asset classes. I didn't fit

into that school public system. But where I was outside was I

realized at a very young age that as human beings, all we are

is a network of conversations.

Yeah, okay, stop there. This is perfect. Okay, so

this you tell a story in here about, you know, every place you

go is an opportunity to talk to people, and I totally agree with

you, and I'll give you a quick story just to show you why I

agree with you. My husband golfs, and he was golfing one

day a couple of years ago with a friend, and then there was

another couple that was brought to golf with them, right? That

they didn't know. So he comes home, and he says, we go off to

this really nice couple. They're from Australia. And I said, Oh,

great. Where in Australia? How many kids did they have? What

were they here for? I'm asking all these, I don't know, Janice,

I was just golfing with them, right? It's not a natural thing

for some people. This. Is what I'm writing. I'm reading from

your book. Many people go to Hot Tubs to relax, but I see hot

tubs as an opportunity zone. Those who know me best have said

there isn't a time when Darren doesn't talk. He never doesn't

talk. I believe that I've experienced it. I know it.

Others jokingly say they get exhausted just by watching me do

my thing, yet I thrive from it. Now that I've conquered my

insecurities and fears, collaboration isn't work. It's

play. Simple as it is, it feels good to be good at what I do. I

think one of the big reasons people are willing to talk and

collaborate with me is because I don't have a hidden agenda. I'm

curious, I ask questions, and genuinely want to know more. My

intentions are rooted in the same curiosity I've had since I

was a child, absolutely. And it goes on a little bit further,

but, but you say you're you're fortunate to have experienced

many of the hardships that you went through, as tough as it was

for you to mature and evolve, you're grateful for the life

that's unfolded. And I just think that's the essence of you

and in this book. And you know, that says a lot

Sir Darren Jacklin: like you. You know, to me, I learned that

authenticity and vulnerability, because, you see, I'll give you

an example. When I grew up, I had no integrity just to be

fully transparent with you. And then I had selective integrity

because I had to hit agenda when I was younger, because it was

always what's in it. For me, what can I get? Because I felt I

was never good enough. I always, never had approval or

recognition or validation from other people externally,

especially in the school system, growing up and stuff. So I would

exaggerate things. I would embellish things. I would lie

about things until a little bit older, and I was raising money

one time for a startup company, and I was flat broke

financially. Yeah, I borrowed money, and I was flying to this

other city to raise money with accredited investors and high

net worth, ultra high net worth investors. And I was sitting at

this Holiday Inn hotel because they had free continental

breakfast the next morning. Yeah, next morning, when I woke

up, I had no money. And so before Uber, we had tax calves

and public public transit. Well, I didn't have the money to go to

this gentleman's office to meet with him. And so what I did was

I lied. And so I called him from the hotel room phone, and I

said, Listen, it's rush hour traffic. It's really busy. This

is before, you know, technology, with GPS, all that stuff, we're

using paper maps. I said, Listen, it's very confusing for

me. I'm not used to big over big city like this. You know, I'm

living in Vernon, British Columbia, Canada, 60,000 people

in population at the time. And I said, Would you, could you come

to the hotel like, and I just made up this exaggerated story

totally live. And he comes to the hotel, and he's not happy

this high net worth investor. And I sneak him into the hotel.

There's signs everywhere for registered hotel guests only.

And when he sits down, I go into pitching and selling like a

timeshare salesperson, like, aggressively, yeah, if I

realize, if this guy's gonna leave in 30 minutes, and I

better get a check, because I need $50,000 from this startup

company, you know, because we're gonna be busting out of business

in a couple of weeks, we got no money. And I go into this

aggressive sales pitch to this guy, and in about 30 seconds, he

looks at me, goes, Darren, shut up. He goes, let's just deal

with your out of integrities. I'm like, What? What do you mean

out of integrities? He goes, You have a lot of blind spots in

your life, a lot of lot of integrity. I'm like, What are

you talking about? Blah, blah, blah, you know what I mean. And

he goes, first of all, let's deal with when you called me.

The reason why you called me is you're probably flat broke

financially. Are you yes or no? And of course, I lie. No I'm

not. Yeah. And he says, so why did, why did I have to come to

you when you agreed to come to me? Why couldn't you just take a

taxi? Why couldn't you take public transit? Right? I made up

some BS story, right? So then he says, Listen, you told me you're

going to buy me breakfast this morning if I came to the hotel.

There's registered signs all over this hotel. It says for

register hotel guests only. I don't I'm not a hotel guest,

yeah, because they listen. I'm going to give you some advice

for those. I'm going to walk out the door. You'll never see me

again. Never see me again. He goes. First thing is, he said,

Stop pitching and selling. Successful people. You repel

them. He said, rather than pitch and sell, start to educate and

inform by listening and asking questions. Stop talking. He

goes, take Dale Carnegie, take Toastmasters, which I end up

doing. Yes. And he goes, the next thing I want you to do is

you need to, you need to confront yourself on how much

you exaggerate, you embellish and you lie about things because

you're a master at it, yes. And he says, because you don't have

any self worth, you don't believe in yourself, so you have

to exaggerate things. And he says, you know the reason why

you exaggerate things. You embellish things. You lie about

things because you don't have to confront yourself. And he says,

the most suspicious and mistrusting people in society

are people who have a lot of broken promises and with

themselves. They break their promises by things they're going

to say, they're going to do throughout the day, like do

their laundry, do chores. They break their personal promises

with themselves, and they break verbal or written agreements

with other people. And he said, until you can confront yourself,

you're never going to get ahead. You're gonna live in this

vicious cycle in your life. And he says, I'm not going to invest

today, but I hope you got $50,000 worth of mentor advice.

I need to go now. And he left, and that day, Janice changed my

life.

I was gonna say that was obviously your first.

Mentor, yeah,

Sir Darren Jacklin: because I had a blind spot of lying and

exaggerating indulge myself. I wasn't authentic, I wasn't

vulnerable. I was just hustling and grinding try and get

whatever good to coming out of fear and doubt and worry and

insecurity and tremendous amount of fear and negative self talk

in my head. Yeah. And what I did was, a few years later, I

actually hired, and I've hired three now, integrity coaches,

where they actually audit my life, personally and

professionally. It's the most uncomfortable. I'd rather stand

in a bonfire. You know, it just, it just so confronting, but so

freeing. Because the blind spot was I never realized how much

until age 38 I'm 53 now, but it was a transformation in my life.

Because what happened was, the payoff was I never had to

confront myself. Now integrity is everything for me, because

without integrity, nothing works. And so what I do now is I

focus on three key things. Number one is be my word, and

I'm very intentional with it. Like I said, alarms. I have

structures. I'm very mindful of what I give my word to. I'm very

mindful of my reputation. I'm very mindful of my credibility,

so my word, my reputation and credibility, because, because I

can be flat broke me anywhere in the world. But if I got my

integrity, my word credibility, reputation, I can, I can move

forward in my life, and I see workability with people today,

because, if you look back, is all people who are in courts and

legal systems all the time comes down to broken promises and

broken agreements, horses, business breakups, all these

things split ups. And if you retrace the strips and do a deep

dive of a due diligence, you'll realize broken promises and

broken agreements and people not keeping their word or

exaggerating or embellishing things. And it's fascinating,

because that's the way I used to be, and

I love that you know that, and that you that you

rose above it. Because I remember when I met you the

first time, and I think it was probably in around the mid to

late 2000s the aughts, or whatever they call 20 years ago.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And one thing that you said at the time, I

remember you, you were all about networking and getting people

together, and you were very proud. And this may be before

the time that you know that you had found yourself, so to speak,

I don't know, but I remember that you always talked about

your your phone and the contacts in your phone and how many

contacts you had in your phone. You were very proud of that. But

was that built on the right stuff

Sir Darren Jacklin: or stuff? Yes, because what happened was I

had to do a whole cleanse once I started hiring integrity coaches

and getting around these masterminds of people holding me

to accountable and responsible for my word and my integrity.

Yeah. What happened was I realized I had to do a cleanse

of like a friend inventory, as they call it. And you have to do

like an inventory, and basically do a friend inventory. And I had

to, because, you know, if you hang out with four financially

broke people, you become the fifth. And, you know, in my 30s,

I had an r9 credit rating. And most people have no idea.

They've never heard of an r9 credit rating. But anybody who

ever works with Equifax or credit union, or in the

financials industry or banking industry, you'll know what an r9

credit ring, which is the worst possible case scenario, not

good. I knew that it's worse than bankruptcy, okay? And I

went to r9 and I turned that around becoming a multi

millionaire. And I'm not saying it to brag, but I was so out of

integrity and with everything like and I turned that around

over a seven year period. Took seven years I was so financially

broke Janice that I went in to file personal bankruptcy and I

couldn't afford the application fees. I couldn't pay to go back.

So people always ask me to go you ever go bankrupt? I said I

couldn't afford it, because I couldn't afford it. But the

whole thing was, is that when people look at their finances,

their relationship, they're like, Well, why? Why aren't I

getting ahead? You gotta confront yourself and look at

who you are as a human being, and it's ugly, it's

uncomfortable, but that's where growth happens.

That's where the breakthroughs happen. So you

didn't do that by yourself. No,

Sir Darren Jacklin: I started taking so I was in Dale Carnegie

training, Toast Masters. I started to take different

workshops, training, development programs, and I started to get

around people who were straight with me, who weren't there to be

my friend. They were there to be just straight with me. And call

it the way it is. And that's the key thing, is that you don't

join an easy crowd, because you won't grow I got around people

this morning. I went hiking this morning. At four o'clock this

morning, I went with a guy that most people would not want to

hang out. This guy makes you squirm. This guy's a black and

white he's a No BS kind of guy. He's like, he's, you know, he's

Canadian, but you think he's a New Yorker, and he he's somebody

who is gift to the world. Is seen where your BS is okay,

seeing your BS. He's got a high BS. And I love him because he

loves me around me, because he always sees things that that

most people won't point out and say, but he says things with me,

and I've come a long ways. I've known him for many years, but

most people don't want to be around the guy like this,

because he just calls you out on things in private, in

confidential, but it's uncomfortable. But when you when

you step back, you think, wow, okay, yeah, absolutely blind.

Spot. Yeah, that's a growth opportunity for me. But mostly

don't want that. They want to be sold the raw, raw, the fluff

make me feel good, versus saying, hey, where can I

improve? How can I level up and scope and become better?

So I'm curious with the people that you have

trained over the years in corporate training multiple

companies, have you seen yourself in those students, your

former self and how? What have you done?

Sir Darren Jacklin: Anything? A big thing is when you watch

people's feet, not their lips. Okay? So we hear in business

that talk is cheap. What I learned a lot from corporate

training, I trained over a million people in over 25 years.

25 years in 50 countries, is that we hear that talk is cheap,

but most people cheap in their talk because their words have no

power. And I saw this a lot in corporate America and corporate

Canada. Corporation on the world is, you know, people go, they

get great academics, and they got degrees and diplomas, and

they talk a really good game, but the execution of following

through consistently is different, and what you do is so

I learned years ago from a billionaire friend of mine. He

said, Darren, give people micro commitments. So one of one of my

mistakes I made early on my years is I would meet people and

I married them before I date them, right? And I just like,

let's be gym business partners, or let's joint venture. Let's do

and what I do now is I take my time to go through the discovery

process and then due diligence process. And what I realize is

you want so one of the things I do today is a vetting system. Is

I take people hiking, and I'll tell you the reason why, yes,

you can play you can play pickleball, you can go golf, you

could do tennis. See, here's the thing I'll share with you, the

psychology if you and I go hiking, as soon as we leave the

parking lot up the hiking trail, in the back of your mind. Now

this is unspoken communication. So you may not verbally say it

out loud, but it's unspoken communication in the back of

your mind. You're thinking, oh my gosh, what happens if we get

attacked or eaten by a wild animal like this morning, I had

an encounter with a black bear, pitch darkness this morning. How

you get on the trail? And three feet from me was a black bear,

full encounter with a black bear this morning, just a few hours

ago this morning, and he didn't do anything. He was just

checking me out. Check him out. We just carried on. He left

trail off trail. And so first thing is, when you leave the

trail in the back of your mind, thinking, oh my gosh, you're

gonna get attacked by a wild animal. Then is if I get hurt or

injured, can this person, or the people I'm with in this hiking

group, can they call 911, or call for search and rescue or

first responders? So what happens is, the social mass

comes off, because if you're not authentic with me, I'm not going

to save your life, right? So you got to be authentic. You got to

be vulnerable, yeah. And as we're hiking, what happens is,

you realize, the further we get away from your automobile and

the parking lot, yeah, is now you're out in the wilderness,

and all you have is each other. It's a different environment,

right? Yeah? And you've got no safety devices, so you've got to

be your true, authentic, vulnerable self. And so the key

thing is, most human beings, they want to look good. That's

why you see a lot of image and ego and golf and pickleball and

tennis. People want to look good, and they don't want to

look bad. Now, when you're hiking, you may have to fart,

you may have to burp, you're going to be sweating, you're

going to be stinky. We're going to be elevating. You're going to

try and catch you, like when I take people up the gross grind

in North Vancouver, they can't lie to me. No, can't lie to you.

When you go up the gross grind in North Vancouver. Bz, you're

trying to catch your breath. Totally. You can't exaggerate

things. You can't embellish things. It's a great place to do

an interview for people. Or, you know, it's great because you can

really do discovery and due diligence. Here's the reason why

Janice behavior never lies. I'll give you example. You watch how

when people show up. I always give them, you know, the all

trails app to the website for for hiking. I say, Hey, bring a

water bottle. Bring proper footwear. Bring, if you have a

whistle, bring a whistle, bring a backpack. You'd be amazed how

many times people show up. They have none of the 10 essentials.

And they, you know, I had a guy the other day, came one to work,

do some business with me, showed up with we did a four hour hike,

not even a water bottle, not even a backpack. Well, I got to

him, I said, I'm just curious. So are you in a relationship?

You married, single, divorced, separated, common law. He goes,

No, I'm married. I said, oh yeah. Do you have any family or

Troy goes, Yeah, two young kids. I said, Oh yeah. I said, we can

ask you a question. So we started in the dark hiking at

6am Does your wife know where we are? She goes, No, I she thinks

I'm at the gym and then going to work. I said, let's say worst

case. You know, something unexpectedly happened to you.

How would your wife get a hold of me? She goes, Well, I have no

idea. I said, is it in your calendar? Did you leave a note?

He goes, No, none of that stuff. Behavior never lies. So, so

here. So something to happen to this guy unexpectedly? I don't

have a contact his wife. Yeah, I only have his cell phone number

and his email address. His wife doesn't know who I am, doesn't

know the hiking location of where we are, no GPS, no hiking.

Troy, nothing. And this guy tells me he's a great leader,

but it shows me that he's not a great communicator, a great

planner,

right? Exactly. Very interesting. So, so right

now you. Spend a lot of time hiking, and you and you're

working on a new venture right and we're doing

Sir Darren Jacklin: a roll up right now in the bookkeeping,

accounting, tax planning industry across North America.

So the big problem we're solving for right now is an aging

population of men and women, baby boomers, and the average

CPA charter professional account right now in the United States,

American Canada, 63 years of age. Just look at your

accountant. How old is your average accountant? And so these

men and women no different than the veterinary industry, the

dentistry industry, the chiropractic industry, the

medical industry, they're they're aging as baby boomers

and a lot of their children today want to get into

cryptocurrency or artificial intelligence or cyber security

or other different industries. So we're not seeing generational

or legacy businesses. So we go in and we acquire the book of

business, we acquire the employees, and we also acquire

the real estate holdings that they have real estate assets as

well, and then we roll them up into smashing numbers our parent

company, and we're building this to a 50 million in annual

recurring revenue through the acquisitions, because here,

here's the key thing. People always ask me, Why are you doing

these acquisitions? It's easier to acquire revenue than to

actually go out and create revenue. And there's more risks

with the startup than first three to five years. So a lot

more risks in a startup phase. So we don't really buy an

existing company that's been around for decades, 1020, 3040,

50 years. It's got a history and experience or a proven track

record. It's got financial statements and we can put into a

data room as part of our discovery and due diligence. So

when you want to raise like it's great for it's a boring

industry. It's heavily regulated. It's compliant

industry. But the cool thing is, it's predictable revenue in the

book of accounting, tax money, so it doesn't matter if there's

a natural disaster. Doesn't matter who's in political power,

you've got to pay your taxes. Two things you can't avoid is

death and taxes. So we're building this to 50 million in

revenue over the next few years. We'll scale it, and then I want

to do a nine figure exit. And then with the nine figure exit,

my financial proceeds, I'm going to contribute $100 million to

then build 1000 schools around the world through link

Foundation to help alleviate poverty, provide access to clean

drinking water, food security, education, enriching children's

lives around

the world, some schools and we have in

whereabouts again, in Africa. So

Sir Darren Jacklin: our first pilot school, we started in

Liberia, West Africa, one of the most impoverished countries on

the planet, according to the United Nations, I think the top

five most impoverished countries. Our second school was

in Honduras, Central America, and now our link foundation

team's proactively collaborating right now on multiple other

schools. When I got knighted back in 2022 through the Royal

Order of Cappadocia from Spain, the royal family of Spain, I

took on the accountability and responsibility of 100 schools

through link Foundation. And now that we've had some great

success with this roll up strategy, with smashing numbers,

and we're making huge gains and momentum, and we're getting lots

of speed and traction, I realized that, you know what, I

need to play a bigger game in my life, because I've been

challenged by my inner circle saying, Darren, you're not

playing a big enough game in life to really do a passion

project, to really serve humanity. Okay, so what's the

gap? And they go, the gap is, you can easily do 100 schools

that's done. You'll make that happen. You'll get that done,

but you need to stretch yourself to do 1000 schools with your

team. Now that's a stretch goal for you. So I'm thinking, yeah,

that gets me uncomfortable. Yeah, that gets me uncomfortable

to do 1000 schools over the next, you know, 10 plus years

with a high performance team of men and women and but I know we

can do it. We've got a great high performance team. We've got

accountability, responsibility, transparency, discipline and

high integrity, which I love, and we've got a lot of

workability. So and we have a lot of people starting to watch

and observe what we're doing, but also we have a lot of people

who want to financially contribute. We have people who

want to volunteer. We want people who come on humanitarian

groups down the road. So we're really start to build this

ecosystem through link foundation to really serve

humanity and create that ripple of impact. And people will say,

what is link foundation? Link foundation is we build schools.

Okay, fair enough. So I remember who was

it? Somebody. I forget who it was I was talking to about this.

But, okay, some people say third world countries, they need that,

you know, and it's wonderful that you're doing that, but

there is poverty at home as well. Yes, yeah. So yeah, go

ahead. Good

Sir Darren Jacklin: question. So I've tried to do stuff here in

Vancouver, really, and I've been threatened to have my windows

smashed, my tires slashed, because what happens is, when

you're in the first world, yeah, so if you look at business

models and government structures, when you take

people, I used to be on welfare. I was a well, I was on welfare

for a few months years ago, and, you know, 30 years ago. And what

happens is, when you're on welfare, you create jobs. People

have to keep statistics on you. They have to meet with you. You

have to fill out application forms. They have to vet you.

There's all that stuff. It creates an ecosystem. It creates

jobs, right? So what happened is, when you start to change the

numbers of people that are homeless, like in North America,

you threaten people's jobs. You threaten. Consultants,

livelihoods and income. And I've actually brought a number of

years ago, I brought together a team of people one time in a

mastermind who had, like minus who wanted to actually deal with

the downtown East side of Vancouver, Canada, yeah. And we

were threatened, verbally, threatened by people that, if

you come into this territory, you know, we want these people

on the streets homeless, because it's a business for us, that's

scary, isn't it? But I totally hear what you're

saying. Look at

Sir Darren Jacklin: the business model, right? And so the thing

is, is that when we go to these third so the thing is, today,

we're globalization. We're in a global village today with

technology and the way the world is today, we're globalized. If

you look at from a population basis, North America, Europe has

an aging population of men and women called Baby Boomers. If we

go to India and we go to the continent of Africa, and you

walk around East or West Africa, and you look at like I was just

not too long ago in Tanzania, East Africa, I was in Kenya. I

was in Uganda, East Africa, you'll see tremendous amount of

youth, young men and women thriving. So there's a balance

of, you know the law of duality, of older population here,

younger population there. If the African continent can get it

right and mitigate the amount of corruption and honesty and

transparency in the next 20 years, they could be a dominant

continent on the planet, because there's so many young people

there that could be youth and they're hungry. I speak to a lot

of people in Africa. I'm in frequent communication through

zoom and through WhatsApp and through social media. And these

young men who are hungry, and I have a lot to follow me on

social media, they don't like their elected officials because

they find it's too corruption and they're pushing

the wrong things. They're learning the corruption

and so on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And

Sir Darren Jacklin: they don't. They need positive people to

show so I like to teach about integrity, but the way I teach

about his integrity is experientially. So that's why I

love hiking so much. Because to me, hiking is a classroom like

tonight. I'm taking a group of people tonight, night hiking,

and these are people who are scared of the dark. And what I

share with people is I said, Do you want to develop your

critical thinking skills? Do you want to have more mental

toughness? Do you want to change your mindset? Do you want to

focus more on, you know, going in and just mitigate, mitigating

the amount of negative self talk or mind chatter. You're like,

Well, how do you do that? Do I go to a temple? Do I do yoga? Do

I sit in a corner and meditate? I'm like, No, you're going to

come out hiking with me. I said, Well, what the heck does hiking

have to do with with calming my negative self talk, on my mind

chatter, and building my belief? What does that have to do with

it? I said, Come night hiking with you. What do you mean

nighttime hiking? Because as soon as you come on the night,

because I got people today, like right now, they're terrified of

going out tonight,

because what happens people you know or

you've just met through different

Sir Darren Jacklin: things? So I have a very large hiking group

here in Vancouver, Canada, yeah, but I have friends, bring out

friends, okay, okay. And so we always end up with more people,

because I create a real, safe container for people to be safe.

But what it is is it's the briefing and the debriefing and

the life lessons that people unpack through a collaborative

experience when they come on hiking. So there's times we

talk, times we don't talk, but I, but I so one of the one of

the things I do when I keep people on hiking, sometimes, and

you might see this on my social media, is I get people to take a

rock at the bottom of the mountain, and I say to myself,

Okay, we all have things in our lives that we're we're carrying

that feel heavy at times. Could be about a broke break up in a

relationship. Could be financial stress. It could be a death of a

child or a family member or loved one that we're grieving

about. It could be, you know, things that we gotta make

decisions in our job or career or business or aging parents,

whatever it is, we all carry the weight of things, sometimes,

personally, freshly. So here's why, you know, I'd like to take

this rock. If you'd like to, you can choose to say, No, I want

you to carry this rock. And for the next half hour, we're going

to climb this mountain. And when we get the top, I'll show you

what we're going to do next step. And so people are carrying

this rock, and sometimes, if they talk a lot, or, you know,

they get distracted. It's okay, great. I want you to take some

water, and I want you to take a gulp of water, and you're gonna,

you're gonna have the water in your cheeks so the mouth is

full. You cannot spit the water out till we get to the top. You

have to breathe through your nose and have the same amount of

water because, because we can measure, if you want to get

really specific, at the top of the mountain, and you're going

to carry the rock for next 30 minutes. Be like, you mean, I

can't open my mouth. Yeah, you gotta breathe through your nose.

And you're gonna climb the mountain, you're gonna sweat,

you're gonna heart rate's gonna go up, and we're gonna get the

top mountain. I'll show within your next step. And be like, you

gotta be absolutely crazy. I tell you, when we get to the

top, you'd be amazed. Janice, the majority of men and women

from all walks of life start crying. They have such a

profound breakthrough experience because it's practical. It's on

the court. It's really because they experience it in their

physical bodies. It's not an intellectual thing. They're not

reading out of a book or studying on or watching a

YouTube video. They're actually experiencing their life on the

court. And they get to the top, and that rock feels like it's

5060, pounds, so it could be a pound or two, and they get the

top and they're like, Okay, you spit the water out. They spit

the water out. I'm like, Oh, what'd you learn? My gosh, my

breathing. I'm like, let's have a conversation. Tell me about

that. Wow. I'm so present, wow. Darren, do you hear the

squirrels? Do you hear the birds? Oh my gosh, wow. Do I

ever look at all the colors of the green? Everything? Change

from because they're in, because most people are walking around,

but they're not present, right, right? They're disconnected,

focused. They had to go grounded, yeah? And so they get

ground, they get the top. And I'm like, What do you want to do

with the rock? Let's put the rock on this rock pile. They're

like, wow. And they said, This is what I'm dealing with. And

some people yell, some people scream, I some people hug me. I

had a group just a couple weeks ago. The whole group broke down

emotionally. It was great, because we had a psychologist in

the room, and we had a brain scientist in the group, in the

hiking group. It was just fascinating. And the one lady

kiss me after she goes, Darren, listen, I have a PhD. I said,

No, I know you have a PhD. And she goes, Darren, I've never

seen like this. This is this, this. This is like a case study.

To me, she was, this is fascinating to see human

behavior like this. I've never, I've never seen people she was,

I just dear. When you ask people to pick up the rock and then

take some water and fill up their cheeks with water, she's,

you should see people like what they're saying, like, go screw,

go pound sand. And, you know, just the mind, like people are

thinking in their mind, like, Are you absolutely crazy? And

people just and then she goes, when they're going up, she goes,

you could just see the mind chatter, like, if you could just

caption the words, like, people are yelling at you in their

head. They're screaming at you, like, who are you? Why did I

sign up for this hike? This is ridiculous. It's stupid. Because

people want to look good. They don't want to look bad. But when

they get to the top, they have a phenomenal breakthrough. And

then they next couple hours, they enjoy an incredible,

beautiful hike. And people today write me letters, they send me

cards, they send me emails, text messages, saying that hike was a

life changing experience for me. How

long have you been doing these for five years

now? And have they evolved as well? Yeah,

Sir Darren Jacklin: because I watch and observe people all the

time human behavior, and you get a chance to see things as people

evolve, and also different cultures as well. Yeah, right.

Different cultures do things differently and different from

different walks of life, and it's fascinating. Sometimes

you'll have mothers who just do everything for their children

and put themselves last, right? And when they come out hiking

with me, and they go up top, and they realize that I do

everything for everybody else to put myself last, and the other

day, there's no energy or time for me. And then, so I have them

hug a tree. I have I the other day, I had two women who

wouldn't stop talking. So I said, ladies, I'm gonna separate

you. We're gonna take five minutes. I'm gonna time. You

wanna come back in five minutes. No talking. You're gonna each

hug a tree. And the woman was like, come on, Darren, Listen, I

I don't have time for this kumbaya stuff. This is a bunch.

I don't have time for this kumbaya stuff. Like, I'm not

gonna drink the Kool Aid on this. I said, right, whatever. I

just want you to hug a tree. You can feel the edge of a tree. She

goes, Darren, come on, let's be realistic. Like, this is a bunch

of BS. And I'm like, okay, yeah, that's, are you just open to

being coachable? I said, you, you want to meet me. You wanted

to have some breakthroughs your life. Are you coachable? Yes or

no, because I am okay, good. Then trust the process. Oh, my

God, because, because I'm not gonna argue for your

limitations. Yeah, so and so she hugged a tree and she broke down

crying at the end of five days. She goes, Wow. I said, What are

you feeling? She goes, You know what her word was at the end of

the hike, because I asked everybody to give me one word,

and her one word was oneness. She said, I've never felt

oneness. I had a gentleman the other day. He said, Darren, for

the first time in my life, I feel aliveness. I know the woman

says, I feel joy. I feel invigorating. This is your gift,

right? This is your gift. And people, we're on a hiking trail,

right? And people, people like I and the one guy's like, they're

I've never said the word aliveness in my life. I don't

even I've never even thought of that word before my it's not my

vocabulary, but that word just came to mind when you said, how

what's the one word? The one woman, oneness, joy,

fulfillment, self expression, being seen at a woman the other

day, she thought with me. She goes, Darren, I feel the first

time in my life I've ever been seen, been seen.

That's scary. Yeah, wow. So can you just, can

you name for me two mentors in your life that made such a

profound difference to you?

Sir Darren Jacklin: Jim Rowan the first one the best, yeah?

Jim Rowan, Bob Proctor,

yeah. I met him, too, yeah. Louise Hayes,

Sir Darren Jacklin: dr, Wayne Dyer, okay, all the good ones.

Dr, John Demartini, I've traveled the world

with you're very fond of him, right? He's from

here, Houston, Texas, that's right. Okay, all good ones,

yeah. I think Jim Rohn has to be one of my favorites, for sure,

his

Sir Darren Jacklin: Girl Guide story. When he talks about the

Girl Guides coming to his house one day, knock on the door to

sell Girl Scout cookies, and he politely said to the girl scout,

he says, Oh, I'm sorry, we have a whole bunch of cookies in the

cupboard, so we're fine. And a little girl scout leaves, and he

closes the door and he says, I lied to a Girl Scout. We don't

have cookies in the house. I don't have $2 I'm an outline

flat broke because that was the day. It changed my life when I

realized I had to become accountable and responsible

because I couldn't afford $2 to buy the Girl Scout cookies and I

lied to her. Interesting. If you go to YouTube and type in Jim

Rowan Girl Guide story on YouTube. Yeah, I don't know clip

will come up. It's, it's, I cry every time I watch it on

YouTube.

Yeah, I've listened to some of his network

marketing. Of course, yeah, of course, yeah, of course, yeah. I

Sir Darren Jacklin: love it. One of the things he says, yeah,

yeah, I have a picture of Jim Rohn and I in Kelowna, British

Columbia, Canada. I was on welfare. I lady bought my

tickets. I had no money, and she loaded me up into her van. She

was a social worker, and she had a foster care home. She's passed

away now, and this is many years ago, and she actually took me to

a Jim Rohn seminar, and I got a chance to meet Jim Rowan, and

I'm there, and you could just see like I got this picture, and

here I am with Jim Rowan, a guy who's on welfare, and I've then

met Jim multiple other times before he passed away, and he

had a profound difference in my life. Still listen to his audio

cassette tapes and CDs and and books and videos on YouTube all

the time,

amazing. Well, Darren, this has been

delightful, and I know that we could talk for a long time.

You've got so many stories, and I'm fascinated by but I think it

all comes back down for me to being curious, being able to

read people, and being able to, I think, to to to see the world

through relationships, because In the end, that's all we have.

Are each other, right? Absolutely, yeah. So that's what

I think really speaks to me the most about the work that you're

doing in so many different ways, and yet you're so excited about

you're so passionate about smashing numbers, as you are

about building the schools and you know, so it's been a

delight. I appreciate talking to you. I feel like I have to have

you come back, because I want to ask you so many more questions,

but Last one, last question, what's your best piece of advice

to people listening today who are working for themselves, who

might be have limited beliefs, who might want to get you know

more out of life and have that aha moment that you had so many

years ago.

Sir Darren Jacklin: So one of the key things to consider,

because I like to give people an exercise, yeah, is I want you. I

want people to write this down. Where am I not requesting in my

life? So for every question that we don't ask, the answer is

always no. And what I always trained in all people on is

making requests, okay? Because for most people, they don't want

to ask, right? Could be pride, could be shame. You know, I'm

better than asking. I'm above this. So the key thing is, if

you're ever around me, you'll see that I'm always making

requests. Sometimes they're outrageous requests, sometimes

they're powerful requests, sometimes they're unreasonable

requests, but I'm always making requests. So I want people to

look at, where am I not requesting my life? Because

people play a really small game in life, and the reason why is

they're not allowing other people to be a contribution to

their life. Most people are not allowing other people. See

strangers have everything we want, everything we need

everything we desire in our lives, but we're taught as

children, don't talk to strangers, but strangers have

everything we want. And so the key thing is, is, where am I not

requesting my life? So whatever area of your life, I'll give

people a hint to look whatever area of your life is not giving

you fulfillment or freedom or full self expression in your

life, where there's a lot of joy and energy you're contracting,

you're playing small because you're not requesting. So people

can come in and say, well, Darren, you know, my

relationship's not working right now because we're not doing any

date nights. Okay? Why are you doing date nights? Darren, we've

got three young kids, right? The house is crazy, with the kids

running around. Man, Darren, by eight o'clock, man, we're

exhausted. We don't have any time to go on a date night,

although my wife will only get dressed up in her sexy dress and

go on a date night, go someplace. We have three young

kids running around the house. So where are you not requesting?

What do you mean? Is there one of the neighbors that you trust

that can look after the kids for a couple hours? Is there a niece

or a nephew or a family member or friend, a loved one, a

neighbor, a colleague, they go after kids for a few hours? Oh

no, Darren, we would never do that. No, there's no everybody's

busy. There. Everybody's busy. I got that. But what if you made a

powerful request and you went to somebody in your neighborhood

said, Listen, it's been months, been years since took my wife on

a date. My date. My wife would love to go on a date. She's

completely exhausted looking after the kids and running the

family, running the household. I just like to have three hours

take my wife someplace special, right? Or go for a picnic in the

park. Would you mind looking after my my kids and it Darren,

well, Darren, but you see, most people take themselves out of

the game or the game's even begun. So I said treat as a

game. So I want you to start making requests. Right? The next

day, we walk into a store say, hey, what would it take to get

10% off? You know, I'm a freaking customer. I come here

all the time. I spend few 100 or a few $1,000 a year. I've been a

great, loyal customer. I'm loyal here a couple times a week

buying coffee. Could I get 10% off?

You know, I hear you. I hear you. You don't ask.

It's always no. And what

Sir Darren Jacklin: happens is, when people start making

requests, you'll be amazed. It's awkward, uncomfortable at first,

but it develops your confidence, your belief in yourself, your

self worth goes up because you feel you matter, you're worthy,

and you allow other people to be. Contribution to your life,

because people are around you, because we teach other people

how to treat us, and people are always wanting to help, but most

people are scared to ask to help, because most people don't

want to be rejected. So start being so I always say to people

and running small businesses and becoming entrepreneurs and some

employees, they're like a lot of realtors, financial planners,

mortgage brokers, insurance. I said, When was the last time you

asked your your hairstylist for a referral? Who do you know is

looking to buy, sell or invest in real estate like, what do you

need? My hairstyle? She's been my hairstyle for 30 years. I

never asked her. Why not you guys talk about the news,

weather, sports and traffic all the time. Why not talk about

making her just make a powerful request. So here's the key

thing, when you make a request, I'll leave you this. When you

make a request, people only do one of three things. Step number

one is they'll accept the request, so they'll accept it.

Step number two is they'll decline their request. And step

number three is they'll counter offer, counter offer the

request. They'll either accept it, decline it, or counter offer

it. And a lot of times in business, when they decline the

request is because they're not a decision maker, but people, by

nature, generally want to help. And you're going to read a story

in the book about me with a homeless guy, if you've not got

to that point, I did. I read it. Was it a powerful story,

but $100 asking for a $25 Yeah, yeah. We'll come

back and talk about that

Sir Darren Jacklin: one. Sure. All right, life changing

experience that homeless gentleman, great book. I

encourage anyone who is in business to read it

and be inspired. And thank you, Darren. I think your your story

is proof that one relationship, one person who sees your

potential can change everything. And I think, as we heard though

here today, it doesn't stop there. Darren has taken the

belief others gave him and turned it into fuel for building

businesses, mentoring others and changing lives around the world.

And here at relationships rule, we believe success isn't just

about what you build. It's about who you lift along the way, and

Darren, your life is a testament to that. Thank you. Thank you.

Sir Darren Jacklin: My pleasure. Grateful to be here. You.