Latest / The Relentless Pursuit of Winning Podcast / The Multipreneur Code: How to Scale Multiple Businesses Without Chaos | Jordan Solender

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The Multipreneur Code: How to Scale Multiple Businesses Without Chaos | Jordan Solender · The Relentless Pursuit of Winning Podcast

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A multipreneur isn't just building the next business,
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you're building multiple businesses at the same time.
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One of the true misconceptions about entrepreneurship is that at some point
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you make it. and at that point everything gets easier.
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it doesn't. The problems just change.
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There's a huge difference between starting a company and scaling a company.
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Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
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Revenue goes up, but complexity goes up at this exact same rate
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And so that's growth, but I wouldn't necessarily call that scale.
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You can't lead a global team the same way you lead eight people sitting
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in an office together. The biggest
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I resign.
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thing you have to become is incredibly intentional about your communication.
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Hey guys, welcome to another episode of the Relentless Pursuit of Winning Podcast.
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My name is Rick Meekins. I am your host today,
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and in our studio we have Jordan Solender.
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How are you today, sir?
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I'm good. Thank you so much for having me.
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Pleasure to be here.
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It's gonna be an awesome show.
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Folks, if you haven't done it already,
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please like, subscribe, and hit the bell so you you can get updates every time
1:09
we drop a new episode. And without further ado,
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let's get to it. So Jordan, the the multipreneur.
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I I I love that term. First of all,
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where did this where did this come from?
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How did you come up with this this term or how was it applied to you?
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Multipreneur. so I I've always had an interest in building companies.
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love to scale companies. So I wish I could take credit for coming up with it,
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but but the team, my marketing team,
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you know, I definitely didn't come up with it.
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Ha ha.
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I I heard it one day and I was like,
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shit, that's me. ~ you know,
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Ha ha ha.
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I I've I've always been an entrepreneur.
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I've never really been the guy who wants to build one company,
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do one thing or or stay in that lane forever.
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Yeah.
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~
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I love building businesses though.
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You know, I was telling you before we even got started.
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I love seeing an opportunity, figuring out that model,
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putting in the right people in the systems around it,
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and then seeing what we can do to make it work.
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So I I really, really enjoy that.
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That's where my love is.
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So so how how does the multipreneur come into play?
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It's like there's one thing it's like,
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hey, I'm an entrepreneur, I see an opportunity,
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I pursue it, I build it. And what what what does the multipreneur come in?
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So I d I don't think it's about one one company,
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right? Like multi, many, right?
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It's it's having a passion for multiple things.
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I think the
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Mm-hmm.
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difference is that A multipreneur isn't just building the next business,
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you're building multiple businesses at the same time.
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Okay, and and just
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Wow.
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just as like a a a thought, right?
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Like that forces you to think and operate completely differently.
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You know, if you owned one company,
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you could be in every single meeting,
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right? If I owned one company,
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I could be in every meeting, I can know every customer,
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I can make every decision, and I could probably convince myself that
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I'm really good at running businesses.
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Mm-hmm.
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Or like that business, right? But
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when you've got eight companies,
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that's physically impossible. So
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Yeah.
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Being a multipreneur for me is really being good about building businesses that
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don't depend on me.
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Yeah.
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~ what I like to do as a common practice is I'll typically try to figure
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out like what is good look like in every single position.
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I will document that, then I will delegate that,
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then I will move on to the next thing.
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And I'll keep doing that until we get to a point where I have,
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say, a director of operations or CEO type persona in place that they
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can run the business and I'm checking in.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I guess you're you're really getting in the weeds.
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So you're starting off with an idea,
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you know, you start fleshing that out,
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you create maybe an executive summary or something like that.
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But you know, and I guess depending on the complexity of the business,
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you're you're working out you we were talking about the idea that you're working
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out like each of the roles in the company until you until you
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can standardize them and then bring good people in.
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And the key for me comes in
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comes in finding the good people because you're you're not just hiring people,
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you know, you're you're delegating authority because you can't run a company
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if you have to have your hands in like everything that's happening every
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day as you alluded to. How do you how do you find these great people?
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Finding great people is hard. good people are are hard to find.
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So we are we have a a a pretty healthy mix of offshore,
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nearshore, onshore staff.
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Mm-hmm.
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~ finding somebody though who can do a job is is pretty easy,
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but finding somebody that can own an outcome is a very different thing.
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Yeah.
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And I've gotten this wrong plenty of times.
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More more more times than I I yeah,
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Mm-hmm. Just to be clear.
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just to be clear.
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And what what I've learned is that I I'm usually looking for people that naturally
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love to take ownership.
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Yeah.
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If if I give you a problem, I don't want you coming back to me every single five
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minutes, you know, asking, What should I do next?
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I want you to come back and say,
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Here's what happened, here's what I think we should do,
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here's why, here are the options where I'm roadblocked.
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And
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Then actually have them do it.
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And I think a lot of entrepreneurs probably really struggle with finding good people
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because they'll say they want to delegate,
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but what they really mean is I want you to do it exactly the way I would do it.
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And that's just not delegation,
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right? That's hiring just
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Yeah.
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like another set of hands or you're trying to clone yourself.
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It's, you know, that's where you get micromanagers.
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yeah. yeah. That's what I mean you you stifle people's creativity,
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you know. You sit here and you hire this person,
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they do it differently. And the first time you're just like,
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my gosh, this is but then you realize they're bringing their A game.
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You know, they're they're bringing a different perspective to things.
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You know what? And if they s even if they I assume like even if they screw it up,
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it's like, Hey, this is what we learned.
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You have to figure out how to make it work better,
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right?
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Absolutely. I mean, learning learning is a huge part of the process when when
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it comes to onboarding and letting them think for themselves.
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You know, that's that's one of the hardest things to learn as an entrepreneur.
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And different doesn't mean wrong.
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Yeah.
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You know, somebody on my team might do something completely differently than
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I would have done it. And my first instinct might be,
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you know, what the hell are you doing?
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But
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Okay.
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then you look at the outcome and you realize,
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wait a second, that actually worked.
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So
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It can't always be the Jordan way.
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Sometimes it has to be the Ka way or the Rachel way or the Wendy way.
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And, you know, maybe you worked even better.
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Maybe the process needs to be changed 'cause they owned the outcome
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and the outcome was the same.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah. I bet I mean you gotta love it when somebody comes
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up with like this novel idea that you never consider just like,
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my gosh. I mean t t
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Why didn't I think of that?
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I need I need it I need we need a story about that.
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I mean this this is something that comes out left field.
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What tell give us a good story on that one.
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It's
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There's a few I could go with here.
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Okay. so this is this is one of the best examples.
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It's actually with AI right now.
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So naturally I am the guy who comes in and says,
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okay, here's the problem. Let's automate this whole thing.
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So that's that's my vibe. And I've had people on my team push back and say,
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like, why are we automating this entire process?
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Why don't we automate these last three things?
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And then the human will be right over here.
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In my initial reaction usually is like,
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no, no, no, no, no. The whole point is that it's automated and we don't have
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to do it anymore. And then they show me what they're actually talking about.
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And I'm like, shit. You're right.
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Ha ha ha.
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And because sometimes I'm looking at it through this lens of efficiency,
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and you know, that's that's part of being a multipreneur,
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right? I'm always looking how to operate,
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delegate, and automate a lot, whether I'm using AI or not.
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It's I'm looking through this lens and they're looking at it through the lens
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of a customer experience a lot of the times.
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And the best answer isn't always removing that human.
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Sometimes it's using technology to make the human dramatically better.
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So those are the moments I I actually really enjoy though,
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because I don't want to be the smartest person in every room.
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That's a terrible
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Right.
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way to scare scale any sort of company.
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I I want somebody on my team to come to me in a meeting and make me go,
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why didn't I think of that?
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Mm-hmm.
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Right to have
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that realization. I think that's really important.
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Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
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I'm with you there. you you've got a really cool history.
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you can you share that with our audience?
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Sure. So I I've been building businesses since,
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you know, I was thirteen, fourteen years old.
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Right. It I didn't have some master plan though to to say like I wanted
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to go start these businesses or grow up to own a bunch of companies.
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I've just always been entrepreneurial.
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I was always trying to figure out how to make money or turn something into
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a business. So one of the earliest versions of this was I had a snowblower.
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My dad bought me, you know, he knew he was basically
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funding the first business. and I'd go to door to door,
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like the day or two before it snowed or the night before it snowed,
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and I'd pre pre-sell people on it.
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And then I'd go to their houses.
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And then when I ran out of those people,
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I'd start dragging the snowblower around in in the big snow to to
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go handle people's driveways. And that was that was my first real business.
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From there, I actually started something I really enjoyed and I turned
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it into a company I still own today called Maryland's DJ.
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So
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Mm.
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We do weddings, Bar and bat mitzvahs,
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private events, big corporate events,
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galas. And I was a wedding DJ.
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I was a wedding DJ when my wife met me.
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You know,
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Mm-hmm.
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I was a wedding DJ. I was just gone on the weekends.
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People thought I lived in Canada,
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you know? and and she didn't really have like a boyfriend.
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It was crazy. And I was just always gone.
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And I I was a wedding DJ from the age of the seventeen
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to thirty two.
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Uh-huh.
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You know, it was a long time. And when my when we had my second kid,
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that's when I really stopped. And then I started an IT company,
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sold that for eight figures and had my first,
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you know, eight figure exit. And all of a sudden all these little opportunities
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started popping up around me. And that's what kind of turned
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me into this multipreneur where I kept having these ideas and I didn't
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not want to do them. So I just I kept going and I kept going.
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And that eventually evolved into this.
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Nice, nice. I I I I'm I'm I'm gonna ask this question.
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I'm I'm I'm kind of bracing myself just a little bit,
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but how d how did you and your wife meet?
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You know, I mean, so s I've I've got this terrible picture,
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you know, you you're this wedding DJ.
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You know, could you please connect these dots for me so I so I don't
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go throughout the rest of my life just wondering.
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Yeah, so my wife and I met. there was an old website.
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I don't think it's a website anymore.
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I think it's an app now. This is pre app dating though.
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We met on a website called Jdate So we're both Jewish.
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We met on we met on J Date dot com.
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I I think I sent her a message,
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you know, probably some cheesy,
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goofy pickup line, and she she was crazy enough to respond to me.
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And yeah, that's how we met.
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throughout the year she would come with me to DJ some weddings,
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like to come hang out with me.
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It was a lot of fun.
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that's cool. That's cool. Congrat congratulations.
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You guys been been at it for for a while now and she hadn't kicked you out.
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That's a beautiful thing.
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Yeah. She has not kicked me out.
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She hasn't
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put up with my with my nonsense for a really long time.
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we've been together. It'll be ten years next year,
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next September.
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Amazing. Congrat congratulations.
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You know,
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Thank you. Thank you.
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a l a lot of people talk about like the like exiting,
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you know, a company. and it's it's interesting when we look at it from the outside,
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it looks like the coolest thing ever.
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It's eight figures, seven figures,
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you know, whatever that is. But,
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you know, my guess is that the experience is much more complex than just putting
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that on your on your on your LinkedIn profile.
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Give us give us an idea. Give us give us that.
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that story so we can get a better picture of what that's like for you.
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Exit exits are crazy.
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All right, that's good enough.
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it's definitely Yeah. It's definitely
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not as sexy as LinkedIn makes it look.
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people people see the revenue numbers and the in the byline,
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you know, and the headline and the companies,
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the employees, whatever it is,
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and they they see the finished product.
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They they don't see what it takes to to get there.
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The years wondering if either you're gonna make
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payroll or this person stole from me or I need to replace them because their bedside
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manner is terrible or this person wore a tank top to a customer meeting,
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right? Like, you know, you get you they don't see any of that.
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They don't see the bad hires, the lawsuits,
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the deals that blow up, the the customers you lose or the decisions that,
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you know, cost you shitloads of money.
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You know, I
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Yeah.
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I've had a lot of businesses succeed.
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I've had a lot of businesses fail.
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And I've made
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Yeah.
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some incredibly expensive mistakes.
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but I think the One of the true misconceptions about entrepreneurship
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is that at some point you make it.
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Right? Like, you know, there's that phrase,
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like, we made it, you know, it's it and at that point when you make it,
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everything gets easier. But I I will tell you,
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it doesn't. The the problems just change.
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So when you're doing, you know,
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a million dollars, you got million dollar problems.
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When you're doing $10 million,
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you $10 million problems.
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When you have more
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Yeah.
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resources, which is great, but you've also got more employees depending
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on you and customers, you know,
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reaching out and more money at risk,
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and there's more consequences.
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So there are absolutely times where from the outside everything looked incredible.
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And internally I'm thinking, Holy shit,
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how am gonna figure this out? ~
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Mm-hmm.
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but I mean to your to your question,
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you know, what is what is that like?
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It selling a company is pretty crazy.
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You know, people don't see the behind the scenes.
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You know, what goes
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Yeah.
13:08
into actually selling a company,
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right? The the the diligence, the negotiation,
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the figuring out how the company is going to survive without you after you sell it.
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Right? Because buyers don't want companies that that can't survive without
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the owner.
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Right, right, right. How long how long did it take you?
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I mean, I mean, real talk. I mean,
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how long did it take you to prepare?
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And of course, you know, tagged with that,
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what were what were you not prepared for that you had to deal with?
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The I mean when when you go through an exit of of any size company,
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you need a phenomenal legal team.
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Not a fly by night, this guy's my uncle,
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I'm gonna use him, kind of kind of situation.
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You you need a phenomenal legal team.
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You need people behind you that understand the repercussions of when
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a deal goes south. Right? Six months after you do the deal,
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something goes wrong. Has your lawyer prepared you for it?
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Is it in the agreement as a mechanism to know how to deal with that situation?
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You know, you get into reps and warranties and disclosures,
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and people don't think about that.
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If you're selling your company the first time,
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they don't really know what that means or what impact that can have post sale.
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So
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Yeah.
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having having a great legal team behind you that has anticipated things going south,
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you know, because you don't have contracts for when things are going well.
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You have contracts because when things go bad,
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you need to know how.
14:30
Deal with them.
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Mm-hmm. So how l how long would it take you to prepare for it?
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some sales, forty five to ninety days.
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~ yeah,
14:38
Really?
14:38
I mean if we're talking about from LOI to close,
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is that what you're referring to?
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Or are you talking about like getting the company ready to
14:41
No, I'm I'm talking from the point where
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go to the market?
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it's like, yeah, I'm I'm I want to sell my company at some point.
14:47
you know, what what was that like when you made that decision that
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you were gonna sell the company?
14:51
How long did it take from that point until you're really
14:53
Got it.
14:54
closing the deal?
14:55
Yeah, so from from idea of I want to sell to getting an LOI or going to market,
15:00
~
15:01
Yeah.
15:02
probably about a year, year and a half.
15:04
You you really have to look at every aspect of your business and figure out,
15:08
you know, what still relies on me.
15:09
You
15:10
Yeah, yeah.
15:11
know, what's not documented, you know,
15:13
what what customers are at risk,
15:15
what situations are or what roles are not repetitive,
15:19
you know, and can be delegated yet.
15:21
You really gotta look at everything with a fine tooth comb and remove your ego.
15:25
Because most of the time you're thinking,
15:27
yeah, that works great, but in actuality,
15:30
a third party would come in and be like,
15:31
that's a gap.
15:33
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I I see that with a with a lot of businesses.
15:37
You know, we we go into business and you know the businesses I sorry,
15:41
I had a f I had a flashback of,
15:42
you know, somebody saying, Hey,
15:43
my company's worth, you know, fifty million dollars and it was obviously not.
15:47
I I I won't go into details with that one.
15:49
but I'm sure you've heard that story before,
15:51
but
15:52
You know, I I s I see a lot of entrepreneurs you know,
15:55
getting to a point where they they want to sell their company or
15:58
or they're they're thinking in that direction.
16:00
What kind of mistakes, what what do you see people doing wrong?
16:03
What are what are some inappropriate expectations that we have
16:07
as entrepreneurs as as we're getting as as we get to the point where we're just
16:12
like, Hey, I want to sell my company.
16:13
Well, the number one thing I see people mistake and misconceptions that people have
16:18
is when they when they Google how much could I sell my company for and
16:25
it gives like the highest possible multiple that doesn't apply to
16:27
you whatsoever in history. that's that's pretty crazy.
16:29
but I think the biggest mistake in all actuality that is what you just said,
16:35
right? Entrepreneurs kind of confuse what they want their company to be worth.
16:39
versus what it's actually worth and what somebody's willing to pay for it.
16:43
So we we all get really emotionally attached to these businesses.
16:47
That's something that I even I I am a victim of,
16:51
right? You pour your heart and soul into a business.
16:54
You met that customer for dinner.
16:56
You flew all the way to Alabama to take them out.
16:58
You know,
16:58
Mm-hmm.
16:59
it's it's like, man, I remember that sale,
17:01
man, I that's keeping the company afloat.
17:02
It's not gonna be mine anymore.
17:04
What do you mean I can't do anything?
17:05
Mm-hmm.
17:05
You know?
17:06
You get emotionally attached.
17:09
And we remember, you know,
17:12
the 80 hour weeks and the years we didn't take a paycheck and all the risks we took.
17:17
And, you know, unfortunately, a buyer doesn't give a shit about any of that.
17:21
They're buying the future cash flow of the business and the risk associated getting
17:26
with it.
17:26
Yeah.
17:27
So when you look at a business,
17:29
I'm asking how predictable is the revenue?
17:31
And how much of is it is it re recurring?
17:34
And
17:34
Mm.
17:35
how concentrated are the customers?
17:37
Mm.
17:37
How
17:38
strong is the management team?
17:39
Are the processes documented? Do they have SOPs?
17:42
And probably the biggest one, what happens if the owner gets hit by a bus tomorrow?
17:46
If if we are completely relying on that owner,
17:49
that's it's a huge red flag. I I've seen businesses doing millions
17:53
of dollars where the owner is still the salesperson,
17:55
the relationship manager, and the person everybody goes to for escalation.
17:59
You know, and that's not really a business at that point that somebody is buying.
18:03
They're buying themselves a job with a bunch of risk attached to it.
18:07
And I had to learn that in my own companies.
18:10
You know, if Jordan has to be there for this thing to work,
18:13
I haven't built something that's truly valuable yet.
18:16
Yeah.
18:16
So
18:17
Yeah, yeah. What what what led you to that conclusion?
18:20
If that if I had to be there, it's not valuable.
18:23
Yeah, yeah.
18:24
~ experience. And unfortunately some of it was very expensive experience.
18:28
I went through selling a company myself in that,
18:31
you know, this is a six, seven years ago.
18:35
Mm-hmm.
18:35
And that process was has completely changed the way I look at business.
18:38
Because when you're the entrepreneur,
18:40
you're looking at everything you built and the buyer is looking
18:42
at everything that could go wrong.
18:45
So they're asking questions like you
18:47
have never asked yourself as the owner,
18:49
which is, you know, what happens if this customer leaves,
18:52
or what happens if Jordan leaves?
18:54
Or why does this process only exist in Michelle's head in marketing?
18:59
Or why are these relationships all tied to Joey in sales?
19:03
What happens if he leaves? So
19:04
Yeah, yeah.
19:06
these questions as a buyer, you know,
19:08
start chipping away at do I want to do this deal?
19:11
And you start realizing that the revenue and the value aren't
19:14
the same thing anymore.
19:17
So the experience made me look at every company I own differently.
19:20
Now I'm constantly
19:20
Mm-hmm.
19:21
asking, you know, if somebody came in tomorrow and wanted to buy my business,
19:25
what would scare them?
19:26
that's a great question. That's a great question.
19:28
And and you have to have answers for those questions,
19:30
right?
19:31
Mm-hmm.
19:32
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I th I think
19:35
One one of one of the other areas where I guess we're we're we're kind of gray.
19:40
I'd I'd love to hear because you've grown,
19:42
built multiple companies, is what is your what does it really take to
19:47
to scale a company up? You know,
19:48
it's it's one thing to, you know,
19:50
to put the shingle out there, you know,
19:51
get the get the door open and do the thing,
19:53
but it's something else entirely to take,
19:55
you know, a small group of people and turn it into a a much larger productive group
20:00
of people and building a business that is,
20:02
you know, has greater value than its revenue.
20:04
Take this answer a few ways.
20:06
Yeah.
20:06
it's a it's a it's a really good question.
20:08
You know, I I think There's a huge difference between growing a company
20:12
and scaling a company, right? Or sorry,
20:15
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
20:15
starting a company and scaling a company.
20:18
And you can you can start a company just by adding more,
20:22
Mm-hmm.
20:23
more square footage in your office,
20:24
you know, more people in account management,
20:26
more customers, more employees.
20:28
You know, Revenue goes up, but complexity goes up at this exact same rate
20:32
if you if you do that though. And so that's growth,
20:36
but I wouldn't necessarily call that scale.
20:38
if that makes sense. So scale
20:39
It does.
20:40
is when the business can get bigger without everything becoming dependent on.
20:45
To go back to this idea again,
20:46
right? Of of not operating just on the owner.
20:49
And for me, that really comes down to people,
20:52
process, and accountability. Okay,
20:53
Mm-hmm.
20:54
because early on, you can get away with chaos.
20:58
Right? Just like running around,
21:00
just like figuring it out. You know,
21:02
five people could sit in a room and everybody kind of knows what's going on.
21:05
You know,
21:05
Mm-hmm.
21:06
someone drops a ball, you yell across the room,
21:07
yo, you take care of that yet?
21:09
~
21:09
No.
21:09
and that works. And, you know,
21:12
but
21:13
Then you get to 20 people or 50 people or 100 people or remote teams offshore
21:19
and customer success in Brazil,
21:21
right? And suddenly this doesn't this doesn't work anymore.
21:26
So you have
21:27
Yeah.
21:27
to start taking everything that's living in your head and putting
21:30
it into the business. Who owns this?
21:32
What's the process? What's the number that tells us whether it's working?
21:35
You know, when when that happens,
21:37
things start to click. And
21:39
When I I think the hardest transition the founder realizes is that
21:45
the skills that got you here aren't necessarily the skills that get you there.
21:49
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's it's a it's a tough lesson.
21:52
I mean, did you would d was that a conscious lesson that you had to make where,
21:57
you know, you were hands-on and then suddenly it's just like,
21:59
you know, I c I can't juggle this circus by myself?
22:02
What what was the what was that story?
22:04
Ooh, it's a good one. Strap in.
22:06
So at one of my IT companies, I was the cold caller.
22:11
I was the sales guy. I was the closer.
22:14
I was the everything.
22:16
Mm-hmm.
22:16
And the more calls I made, the more business I did.
22:19
And but then I got we went into these ebbs and flows where I'd make a
22:25
lot of cold calls and we'd have a lot of business.
22:27
And then we'd have no new leads like six months.
22:30
Mm-hmm.
22:31
And then I had to come back up again and do more cold calls.
22:33
Mm-hmm.
22:34
So I I had a very hard realization that like I needed to hire a whole bunch
22:38
of like either SDRs or train people to do this.
22:41
And then you got to manage these people,
22:43
then you got to train them, you got to put them through a training.
22:45
And you have this chaos that just grows.
22:49
And early on I realized like if you don't document anything,
22:52
you can't really delegate anything.
22:54
You can't bring people in and just expect them to know what to do.
22:57
Mm-hmm. You you talk about system thinking behind scaling companies.
23:01
What is what is that? Talk talk to us a little bit about that.
23:03
What does that mean? And what does that look like?
23:05
Yeah, in scaling companies,
23:05
Systems thinking? Yeah.
23:08
yeah.
23:08
So systems thinking to me is really just getting out of the habit
23:12
of solving the same problem over and over again.
23:14
So if something breaks once, fix it.
23:17
If it breaks twice, you probably have a systems problem,
23:19
right? so instead of asking how do we fix this,
23:22
I'm asking, why was this able to happen in the first place and what do
23:26
we need to change so it doesn't happen again?
23:28
And
23:28
Mm-hmm.
23:29
that could be a process, it could be an automation,
23:31
it could be a checklist, a KPI.
23:33
change you know, whatever it is.
23:36
I I use a really simple example with my teams that if a customer doesn't
23:41
get followed up with, we can call the customer and apologize,
23:45
but the problem solved today,
23:48
and that's not actually solving the problem.
23:50
You know, going forward, how do we make sure that never happens again?
23:55
So the systems
23:55
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
23:57
question and the same thing is why didn't they get followed up with?
24:01
Was there no task created? Was the ownership unclear?
24:04
Was there not a CRM ping? Right?
24:07
Did somebody miss an alert? Do we even have a way of knowing when
24:10
the follow-up doesn't happen? And then you fix that.
24:12
Mm-hmm.
24:14
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Just kind of getting processes in place.
24:18
That makes sense. That makes sense.
24:20
When you when you're working with I'm I'm thinking about your team
24:24
now or your teams, and you've got teams on three different shores.
24:27
What what were some things that you had to incorporate into the company
24:33
in order to lead multi-national a multinational team,
24:37
essentially, or multinational teams.
24:39
I mean three letters, S O P.
24:41
Yeah.
24:42
You know, I I learned really quickly,
24:44
You can't lead a global team the same way you lead eight people sitting
24:47
in an office together. The biggest
24:48
I resign.
24:49
thing you have to become is incredibly intentional about your communication.
24:53
Mm-hmm.
24:54
You know, you have to understand people,
24:56
you have to get to know people,
24:58
develop relationships all without being in the same room.
25:01
I mean, my my top people, I've never met in person.
25:05
Right.
25:06
We're on video calls.
25:07
every day almost all day. I talked to some of my my team more than I talked
25:10
to my wife on video calls during the day.
25:12
And you know, you have to establish really clear rhythms about how you communicate,
25:16
where the information lives, who owns what,
25:19
when are we actually meeting, live and die by that calendar,
25:21
you know, and and then the cultural piece,
25:24
I think people underestimate. You can't expect somebody halfway around
25:28
the world to communicate, think or work exactly like somebody sitting in Washington,
25:32
DC.
25:33
Yeah.
25:33
So which it which is exactly why that's why we're a Camera on organization.
25:38
We can get to know each other and develop relationships better.
25:41
You know, a lot of people are against that these days,
25:43
but I'm I'm like all in on it because if you're gonna be just so distributed,
25:47
you gotta be able to get to know the person and understand culture
25:50
and develop relationships very quickly.
25:52
Yeah, yeah. You you said camera on,
25:54
meaning you guys do video conferences and everybody has their cam Yeah,
25:58
yeah, yeah. So
25:58
Yeah.
25:59
so do they do they meet? does like the whole team meet?
26:02
Like you've got eight different companies now.
26:03
I mean, does everyone come together or how how does all of that work?
26:09
Good question. So at the end of every single day,
26:11
this is my secret sauce, but I I say it on every podcast.
26:15
I don't I don't know anybody replicating it,
26:17
but I hope you do, out there multipreneurs.
26:19
So every day, once a day, every key person from every company shows up
26:26
to a video call. One call at the end of the day,
26:28
thirty minutes. So there's thirty minutes every day at five o'clock.
26:33
My wife knows that is untouchable time for me.
26:35
So every day at five o'clock, I hop on a video call.
26:38
Typically it's the CEO of an of one of the companies or director of operations
26:43
or a COO or an HR
26:44
Mm-hmm.
26:45
person. They will hop in for their company and they'll say,
26:48
This is what we're blocked with today.
26:49
You know, and they'll bring pressing issues.
26:52
If they got nothing and everything's gorgeous and they're hitting KPIs
26:56
and they got no blockers, nothing needs to be fixed or worked on.
27:00
They'll they'll send me an all clear signal.
27:02
That's that's how that's how I do it.
27:04
So so it's it's essentially like a daily mastermind group.
27:07
You guys stand you get together,
27:09
you solve you work together to solve,
27:11
you know, whatever problem, whatever person is hap having,
27:13
you're building relationships,
27:15
you're building trust. I mean that's that's that's brilliant.
27:17
You mean nobody's doing this?
27:18
you know, there's there's not a lot of multipreneurs out there and it's it's tough.
27:22
I mean, you gotta keep it all straight.
27:24
It is. It is. I mean I c I can't
27:26
I d I don't want to say can't imagine,
27:27
but it's it's it's it's a different world,
27:29
you know, because you have to be so hands-off,
27:32
you know, with all of these these baby companies that that you've built
27:35
and you've raised and and that sort of thing.
27:37
And you're giving it over to other people.
27:39
And, you know, it's it's there's there's a there's an amount of trust,
27:43
you know, that has to be put into all the people that are in charge.
27:47
You know, I mean that's that's that's huge.
27:49
It takes a lot, you know, to to be able to do that.
27:53
You know, I mean you've you've got to have personal relationships with everybody
27:56
that's leading all of your teams and then perhaps,
27:58
you know, people on those lower levels as well.
28:01
Yeah, so I I'm pretty tight with that tier one level,
28:06
my operations team at every company.
28:07
Yeah.
28:08
in fact I'm actually gonna be going to the Philippines to just hang
28:12
out with them for a week and a half and just like work there,
28:14
Nice.
28:15
you know, on their time zone with them,
28:16
I in like December. So I'm excited about that.
28:19
Yeah. Nice. Very nice. Very nice.
28:21
Very cool. Exciting. How long how long are you gonna be there?
28:24
About a week, week and a half,
28:25
I think.
28:26
Nice. Nice wife going with you?
28:28
I think she's gonna join on the back half of it and you know,
28:31
you know, we'll we'll probably hit a beach or something like that.
28:34
But we got three little kids at home,
28:35
so it's it's hard to be away for too long.
28:37
Here here's here's an interesting question for you.
28:39
do all of your companies have like the same culture,
28:43
like the way that everybody works together and and work styles and and all of that?
28:48
Or do you find that with each company and I'm what and what my assumption
28:52
is is that or what I believe could be happening is you've got,
28:56
you know, companies that are have more of their
29:00
population in certain countries.
29:02
And so my assumption is that perhaps they behave differently
29:05
or work together differently. I I don't I don't know.
29:07
I'm just putting that out there.
29:08
I mean they're definitely different.
29:10
Mm-hmm.
29:11
And I I mean I th I actually think they should be.
29:14
You know, there there are certain things that are consistent because they come from
29:18
me. I like
29:19
Yeah.
29:20
speed, I hate bureaucracy, I want people to take ownership,
29:23
I want people to speak up. I don't want five meetings about something
29:26
we could have done in five minutes on a Slack channel,
29:29
you
29:29
Yeah.
29:29
know. So that DNA.
29:31
I I would say like exists in all of the companies,
29:34
but the actual cultures are very different because the businesses
29:38
are very different, right? So,
29:39
Right, right.
29:40
more importantly, the the people are just different.
29:42
But for instance, like I am an events company,
29:45
that DJ company I mentioned, it has a completely different energy than
29:48
my technology company. You know,
29:50
Right.
29:50
you've
29:50
got DJ, MCs, creative people working nights and weekends,
29:54
and that's gonna feel just differently than a B to B SaaS company,
29:58
right?
29:59
Yeah.
29:59
consulting firm doing AI, you know,
30:02
working with CIOs and CTOs and enterprise customers.
30:05
You know, the AI business has its own personality because everything's moving
30:08
a million miles an hour. So like with that business,
30:11
we're we're flying the plane while building it.
30:14
And
30:14
Yeah.
30:15
at the same time, you gotta seem you got to have this enterprise persona about
30:18
us because that's who we're talking to.
30:19
So
30:20
Yeah.
30:21
very different cultures.
30:23
Yeah, I I figured as much. I figured as much.
30:24
You know, you you brought up the the AI company again.
30:27
I'm I'm really curious about this because as you as you said,
30:30
I mean, everything is changing,
30:31
you know, so quickly, you know,
30:33
with AI. You know, there's it seems like there's something that's
30:36
new that's popping up like every single day.
30:38
How do you, as a company how how do you manage that?
30:43
You know, manage the speed of change,
30:46
manage the, you know, the customer expectations,
30:49
manage the
30:50
Hey, we can build this new thing for you that will,
30:53
you know, supersede, you know,
30:55
what we built for you a year ago.
30:56
How how do you how are you how are you being extraordinarily successful with that
31:00
company?
31:02
So the the biggest problem to solve right now is AI in small and medium businesses.
31:08
And honestly, I think the biggest mistake you can make in AI right now
31:11
is falling in love with a specific tool.
31:13
Mm.
31:14
because whatever you're obsessed with today,
31:15
there's a pretty good chance something better is coming.
31:17
~
31:18
Yeah.
31:19
so at Ironbridge AI Advisory, it's the name of the company,
31:22
we try to stay focused on the business problem,
31:25
not the technology. So the customer actually doesn't care what
31:29
model we're using or what agent framework is underneath it,
31:32
right? They what they care about is that they're spending 40 hours
31:36
a week doing something that should take four.
31:39
Mm-hmm.
31:39
And they care that leads aren't getting followed up with.
31:42
They care that they're spending,
31:43
you know, say 10 grand a month on something we might be able to accomplish
31:47
for a fraction of that. That's
31:48
Yeah.
31:49
that's really the problem we're solving.
31:51
I I'm trying to get people to focus on the outcomes as opposed to the tools.
31:55
You know,
31:55
Right.
31:56
you hop on a phone with somebody now and they're
31:58
They they booked they booked us for a call.
32:00
And they're like, so what are you using Claude?
32:03
And I'm like, we could be using Claude,
32:04
we could be using Gemini, it could be using Codex.
32:07
I mean, it could be a million different tools.
32:10
but people behind the scenes, I will say,
32:12
we're we're we're constantly testing things.
32:14
And
32:14
Yeah.
32:15
my team is constantly sending me things saying,
32:17
like, you gotta see this boss,
32:19
or you know, we'll test it, we'll break it,
32:21
we'll figure out if it's actually useful,
32:23
you know, and we'll
32:24
pitch these, you know, use cases to our customers.
32:28
because that's another problem with AI right now.
32:30
There's a tons of really cool shit out there that absolutely has no business case.
32:34
So
32:35
There's that.
32:36
I mean the goal here is, you know,
32:37
I don't I don't want to sell AI to somebody or consulting to somebody because
32:40
AI is cool. We we want to be able to say you have a two hundred thousand dollar
32:44
problem, we could solve it for thirty.
32:46
And now we have a conversation.
32:48
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you do you have like a team that just like focuses on,
32:52
you know, what's hot and fresh and new and just,
32:54
you know, integrating that? Or is it literally like you said,
32:57
you know, we're we're working and we stumble across something,
32:59
it's like, hey, my gosh.
33:01
Pausing because we should have a team that does that.
33:03
You're welcome. ~
33:05
It's a great idea. It's a great idea.
33:07
It's just
33:07
I'm just I'm just thinking now it will is it a cost center or is
33:10
it a revenue driving center? It's probably a cost center that's just doing,
33:13
you know, but they're probably gonna get their feeds from just like Instagram,
33:17
you know, people vibe coding tools that are just like,
33:19
that's a cool tool. You
33:20
huh.
33:21
know, so it's it's it's an interesting question.
33:23
but right now, you know, we're we're looking for this to solve the outcomes
33:27
and then we figured out what tool works best.
33:29
And it it's it's a long term relationship with our customers and I.
33:32
. So the idea is that, you know,
33:34
we build something and then we don't leave.
33:36
That's what most automation or AI agencies do is they build something,
33:40
they say, Hey, here's the widget or the thing,
33:42
and then they're gone. Poof. So we're actually there doing maintenance.
33:47
You know, if they need to be upgraded on the models,
33:49
cool, deprecations on APIs, we'll build it.
33:52
You know, we're we're there for the long haul with it on the solution.
33:55
Love it, love it. So for for someone that is in a situation where they feel like,
34:00
you know, they're they're seeing things in their business that,
34:03
you know, could potentially, you know,
34:04
be automated. What is that process like to to to work with you?
34:10
You know, from the point of, you know,
34:12
hey Jordan, I've got I've got a problem and I suspect we might be able
34:16
to do something with that through,
34:18
you know, perhaps architecture,
34:19
integration, you know, whatever that looks like.
34:20
What what is that? And if you've got a if you've got a story,
34:23
I mean that that'd be awesome.
34:25
sure, I got off a call this morning I could talk about so construction company that
34:31
their their biggest issue is it takes so long for the new people,
34:37
salespeople, and they do residential construction to onboard hire and then
34:43
for them for them to just like get it.
34:45
Right?
34:46
Mm-hmm.
34:46
Like, this costs that and this costs this and when you you know quote
34:50
and estimate this, you have to ask these questions.
34:53
And I'm like, well, how are they doing it today?
34:54
And they were like, Well, they have a recorder and they ask a list
34:58
of questions that we give them,
34:59
and then they send me the recording,
35:01
the operations guy, and then the operations guy puts it into Chat GPT,
35:05
and chat GPT says, Do we have enough information or do we not?
35:08
And I'm like, That sounds like a nightmare.
35:10
And he goes, Yeah, it's it's terrible.
35:12
And as a result of that, we don't win a lot of jobs because we can't give
35:17
a result very quickly. And sometimes we have to go back and ask more questions that
35:21
we didn't know we should have asked.
35:22
Mm, mm.
35:23
So
35:24
they told me about this lengthy process.
35:26
And I said, okay, so the outcome here is that it's a speed-to-lead situation.
35:30
We want to be able to give an estimate and get the correct information from that
35:34
customer on site right away. And he's like,
35:37
Mm-hmm.
35:37
yeah, that'd be amazing. We'd win so much more.
35:39
And I'm like, okay. So what do you use to take notes?
35:42
And we start going through this diagnosis process.
35:45
And they're like, well, this is what I use as a note taker.
35:47
I'm like, okay. So
35:50
What if we had something that API'd into your note taker and sent that transcript
35:54
to a quoting tool that as soon as the meeting was done,
35:57
it automatically said, here's your quote,
35:59
and texted it to the customer.
36:00
Yeah. Well.
36:02
And it was verified by your operations guy’s knowledge base by sitting there
36:07
and being interviewed by us. That way,
36:09
you know, if there were outstanding questions,
36:10
it could text it to the customer.
36:12
So the estimator doesn't even have to have a chance to do it.
36:14
We're talking like minutes after they leave the house or while still
36:17
on site And then send a quote immediately.
36:20
Wow, wow. I'm I'm I'm just I'm just thinking.
36:22
I mean, you know, so they're gonna win more deals.
36:24
They've got less work to do. You know,
36:26
Yep. Well, but remember
36:27
there's there's
36:29
the problem. The problem was onboarding.
36:32
I pointed out a whole bunch of other problems that you just picked up on,
36:34
but their problem
36:35
Yeah.
36:35
that came to me was the people the guys that were hiring aren't picking
36:39
it up quick enough.
36:40
that's brilliant. That's brilliant.
36:41
That's brilliant. So so you're coming at this from the perspective of a coach
36:45
or a consultant. You're truly understanding the business case for this versus just
36:50
solving the problem that they presented to you.
36:53
I mean, yeah, otherwise they just have a bunch of silly automations,
36:55
right? So, you know, I I look at every business very similarly.
37:00
Whether you are Tesla or you are my IT company or this podcast,
37:06
every business operates on the same five pillars.
37:08
I don't care if you're Apple or us,
37:09
it is lead acquisition, lead nurture,
37:12
sales execution, fulfillment and delivery,
37:14
and retention. Okay.
37:16
Mm-hmm.
37:17
We all the same five pillars.
37:18
We're all operating the same way.
37:20
You want to scale, you have to optimize those pillars.
37:22
If one of those is broken, you don't scale.
37:24
That's
37:24
Yeah. Yeah.
37:25
what it is. You you get those five pillars down,
37:27
whether it's through automation or AI or process delegation,
37:31
you're gonna scale. It's it's like inevitable.
37:34
You you talked about the idea of of just having a a bunch of tools,
37:37
AI tools, or getting familiar or enjoying,
37:41
you know, one particular tool.
37:42
Outs outside of that, what are what are mistakes you're seeing
37:45
us as entrepreneurs making with AI?
37:48
using ChatGPT and Claude like Google.
37:51
Like, what is the best restaurant?
37:52
Ha ha ha.
37:54
like I see I see a lot of that.
37:56
or, you know, look at my Verizon bill.
37:58
You know, it's it they're using it like Google or a one off assistant when
38:03
it can it can really be leveraged into this entire knowledge system and base
38:08
and a second brain and I
38:11
the majority of people out there are using say like the the skimming the surface,
38:16
you know, prompting, you know,
38:18
is that's where people are at.
38:19
They're just prompting.
38:20
Yeah.
38:21
But there's so much more, you know,
38:22
you're not seeing everything below the the tip of the iceberg.
38:26
you you gotta tell us something cool now.
38:27
I mean, if we're if we're just using it to like find a recipe for pancakes,
38:30
I mean
38:31
Yeah, like, you know, the
38:33
okay, so here here's a fun one for entrepreneurs.
38:36
whatever website hosting platform your your website is on,
38:40
okay, if you're looking for more organic traffic,
38:42
get the connector, hook it into Claude,
38:45
okay?
38:46
Mm-hmm.
38:47
And then go into routines on the top left of Claude and say,
38:50
You're hooked into my website every morning at nine AM.
38:54
I want you to run an SEO audit and do one thing every morning at nine
38:57
AM that makes my website more visible.
39:00
Mmm, mmm. Easy peasy.
39:02
I mean, a month later you're gonna have like an insane website that's ranking like
39:06
insanely high.
39:08
Wow. Wow. That that sounds
39:10
I mean, but that's
39:10
and now that's on autopilot. You don't have to do anything.
39:13
It's it's a routine. It's hooked into your website.
39:15
It's gonna do it every single morning as long as your computer's turned on.
39:17
And that's a simple one. You know,
39:19
that for entrepreneurs, that's a that's a big one.
39:21
It could have a huge impact.
39:22
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Awesome.
39:24
Awesome. Awesome. Cool, man. let's let's wrap this thing up.
39:26
So the name of the show, obviously,
39:28
is the relentless pursuit of winning podcast.
39:31
And so winning for most people is pretty easy to d to identify.
39:35
The harder part though is maintaining that relentless pursuit.
39:38
What would you recommend to our audience in order to help them maintain that
39:43
relentless pursuit?
39:44
That's a good question, man. That's a good
39:46
Ha ha
39:47
sign-off question. I like that.
39:48
I think the biggest thing you really have to be clear about is what you're pursuing
39:53
and why. Because you could listen to all the bullshit motivation YouTube videos from
39:58
David Goggins that you want, but
40:00
Mm-hmm.
40:01
you are not going to wake up every morning fired up and ready to conquer
40:05
the world every day.
40:06
There are days I don't want to deal with it.
40:09
And there are days when something goes wrong in every company before I've even
40:14
had breakfast. You know, but what
40:15
Mm-hmm.
40:16
keeps me going isn't motivation.
40:18
Okay. It's momentum. And I try to create wins every single day.
40:22
And they don't have to be massive wins.
40:24
They don't have to be revenue wins.
40:25
They don't have to be a customer sale.
40:27
But
40:29
Moving a deal forward, solving a problem,
40:31
making a call I've been avoiding,
40:34
hire the person, fire the person.
40:36
you know, just just keep moving.
40:38
You know, and I think entrepreneurs a lot of times,
40:40
you know, they they get paralyzed because they're looking at this enormous goal.
40:45
And it can be it can it can be overwhelming.
40:48
You know, they want to build a,
40:49
as you said, a fifty million dollar company and they're sitting at half
40:52
a million dollars thinking, how the hell do I get there?
40:54
Mm-hmm.
40:55
So don't think about the fifty million today.
40:57
Think about what needs to happen this week to keep momentum.
41:02
Mm-hmm. Mm hmm. Mm-hmm. Good stuff.
41:03
Good stuff. I like that. I like that.
41:05
Jordan, if somebody wants to get in touch with you,
41:07
what's the best way to do that?
41:08
Go to my website, JordanSolender dot com.
41:10
Or
41:11
Awesome.
41:11
if you're looking for AI, Iron Bridge AI Advisory dot com.
41:15
Perfect, perfect, perfect. We will make sure I need that new link so I
41:18
can have it on your show notes.
41:19
We're gonna publish in about two weeks,
41:20
so we'll make sure everybody knows and loves you.
41:23
Jordan.
41:24
Love it, man. Thanks so much for having me,
41:26
Rick.
41:26
Absolutely, Jordan. Thank you so much for being on the show.
41:28
I really enjoyed our conversation.
41:30
Yeah, me too. Thanks for having me.
41:31
This has been great.
41:32
You bet, you bet.
41:33
And
41:34
folks, thank you so much for watching and listening to another episode
41:36
of the Relentless Pursuit of Winning Podcast.
41:38
We'll catch you next time.