Latest / Success Story with Scott Clary / Ilana Golan - Founder of the Leap Academy | Restarting Your Career at Any Age

Transcript

Ilana Golan - Founder of the Leap Academy | Restarting Your Career at Any Age · Success Story with Scott Clary

• 0:00
  Nothing prepares you for starting your own business.
• 0:03
  Beer can be numbing.
• 0:04
  In a relatively young age, basically, 18, 20, 21,
• 0:09
  you find yourself with more responsibilities than I probably had at age 40.
• 0:13
  When you are always in a proving mode, you can never admit to a motion.
• 0:17
  You just gonna go, go, go.
• 0:19
  Charge your worth. You can move people's minds.
• 0:22
  The challenges are inevitable. They're gonna be there.
• 0:24
  Success leaves clues, but we sometimes don't look at them.
• 0:27
  When we're our younger self, we don't boundary our self.
• 0:31
  And we just know what works and we go chase it.
• 0:34
  Teach them well enough so that they can leave.
• 0:36
  Treat them well enough so that they don't want to.
• 0:39
  If you don't trust yourself, you will never be extraordinary.
• 0:44
  Welcome to Success Story. I'm your host, Scott Clary.
• 0:48
  The Success Story podcast is part of the HubSpot podcast network.
• 0:51
  Very exciting news. HubSpots inbound converts is back,
• 0:55
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  And you're gonna hear inspirational narratives,
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  visionaries on effective strategies for personal and professional growth.
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  And there's so much more. And on top of all that,
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  I'm speaking again, this is my third inbound.
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  So I'll be doing a segment.
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  So if you want to hear from Ryan Reynolds, Serena Williams,
• 1:37
  or you want to hear from me, go to inbound.com,
• 1:41
  go see the lineup and grab your ticket today.
• 1:43
  I'll see you in Boston.
• 1:55
  All right, Elana, I'm very excited to chat today.
• 1:58
  We're gonna go into all things, career transition,
• 2:01
  entrepreneurship, mindset, all the things that you've experienced in your own life.
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  And I mean, you work with so many different
• 2:07
  incredible entrepreneurs and executives.
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  But I want to kick this off because you've had a really
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  interesting origin story.
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  When you look at all the things that you've done,
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  what would you say is more difficult?
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  Would it be you being an engineer?
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  Would it be you flying an F-16 fighter pilot?
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  Or would it be you building a business from scratch?
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  What's the scariest that of all those three?
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  Yes, I had a lot of weird things in my life.
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  But I think nothing prepares you for starting your own business.
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  If I'm being really, really honest,
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  I think the fear can be numbing.
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  And like you said, I went to a lot in my life.
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  So when I thought about it, I was like,
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  oh, nothing is gonna happen to me.
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  I just got this.
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  And no, I hadn't.
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  So I think that was like a realization that was really
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  humbling and a very interesting slap in my face.
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  Well, I would say so not everybody who listens to this
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  has been part of an army, any army, flown at F-16.
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  So that's obviously a very unique perspective.
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  And I'm curious how that shaped your view of entrepreneurship.
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  Some of the lessons that you went through when I'm assuming it was it IDF?
• 3:32
  Yeah.
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  Yeah, it was IDF, so mandatory military service, right?
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  And then you chose to go into the Air Force.
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  How did that sort of shape your perspective on hard work,
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  on putting in the reps and eventually how did that help you out?
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  Oh, it's an incredible question.
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  So it a relatively young age, basically, 18, 20, 21,
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  you find yourself with more responsibility
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  than I probably had at age 40, right?
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  And I don't know if we understand that when we're that young,
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  if I'm being really honest.
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  I think I didn't even realize the magnitude
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  of the things that we were doing.
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  And as much as I wanted, at that point,
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  women were not really allowed to be beyond combat lines.
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  Like there was a very clear regulations around it.
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  So I went to become a flight instructor.
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  And there was a lot around breaking barriers.
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  So how do we break barriers and how do we prove
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  that women can do this too?
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  And I learned some really hard lessons at that point
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  because I was always in this proving mode.
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  I need to prove myself.
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  I need to be better.
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  And when you are always in a proving mode,
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  you can never show vulnerability.
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  You can never admit to emotions.
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  You can never admit that something is scary.
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  You're just going to go, go, go.
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  And inside it's eating your alive,
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  which is really, really interesting and dynamic,
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  but you always hide the fear.
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  You always hide all the things that come up for you.
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  But I did learn some really interesting things,
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  especially there was one specific occasion.
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  I don't know if you want to go into it,
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  but there was an emergency in the air.
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  We needed to help somebody land.
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  And it wasn't clear if they can land
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  or they're going to need to eject in the sea.
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  And I remember trying to help them decide
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  and really experiment with it.
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  And it was literally life and death decision
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  that I'm like, I don't know if I can do this.
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  And...
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  How old were you when you were doing that?
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  I was probably around 20.
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  That's...
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  Like, that's incredibly young.
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  To be making those incredibly scary.
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  Yeah, you're no kidding.
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  So you literally realize that every decision you're about to make
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  can be a life or death decision.
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  I was looking around me like,
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  is there somebody that will pick this up from me
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  because I don't want to make that decision.
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  And on the other hand, no,
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  I'm the person that is training them on emergencies.
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  I should be the person helping them when it's real.
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  And at that point, what I realized,
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  and we can fast this forward a little bit,
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  and at the end of the day they did land fine
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  and it was an incredible teamwork that made this happen.
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  But what I learned is a lot of lessons
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  that will live with me for the rest of the life.
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  And I think the first thing is a mission.
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  So I don't think I ever thought about a mission that, you know,
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  that well, like I was just like,
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  yeah, we're just kind of doing this thing, right?
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  But I suddenly realized my mission is to train these pilots
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  to defend my country and come home safe.
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  If my training is not doing that, I missed everything.
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  And suddenly when you see the bigger perspective,
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  you suddenly know what you need to change.
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  Suddenly things become so much clearer.
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  And you know that you need to train better.
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  You need to change the whole education system for all the pilots in Israel.
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  You know, like suddenly things become so much clearer
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  when you're just willing to look a little higher, you know, above,
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  you know, the 30,000 for you and say,
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  what is really needed?
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  Which is a big thing that we're bringing to entrepreneurship today
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  or to my business or to other executives today.
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  The other thing that I would probably point to
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  beyond just the breaking barriers, which is, you know,
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  it just teaches you that it's possible.
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  But I think the second lesson that was really important
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  is to know your audience.
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  And it sounds like a cliche,
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  but it's incredibly important.
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  So I have the story where, you know,
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  I'm giving feedback to one of the pilots in another occasion.
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  And then he comes up there and, you know,
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  and I can feel, you know,
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  how you sense that things are not going well.
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  And you're like, I don't know what's going on,
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  but this is not going very well.
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  And then he stands there and he stands, you know,
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  like the funny Jason says,
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  Ilana, do you know who I am?
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  And I'm like, oh, don't it.
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  There's going to be a catch here.
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  And I know his name,
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  but I don't know anything beyond that.
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  And then he says, well, when you're about six years old,
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  I balled a nuclear plant in Iraq, right?
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  Which basically says he clearly knows air to ground and his sleep.
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  Now, it doesn't mean that the feedback wasn't correct.
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  It doesn't mean that, you know,
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  I said something wrong,
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  but it meant that I didn't say it in the right way.
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  And I would have changed it if I knew who I'm talking to.
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  And that became, it was very humiliating at the time,
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  but it became one of the biggest lessons of my life
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  because every single person, no matter who you talk to,
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  whether it's a clerk in the supermarket,
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  or you know, your kids,
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  or you know, a peer, or a boss, or an investor,
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  you have to understand them so well,
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  better than they understand themselves.
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  And once you do everything opens up,
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  you can, you know, you can negotiate better,
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  you can charge your worth,
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  you can move people's mind,
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  you can persuade, like I can go on and on,
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  but that changed so much in my life, Scott.
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  So there's a couple of lessons and we'll get into
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  how those lessons impact the people that you work with now
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  and have even impacted you.
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  But I think it's really interesting that you mentioned,
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  you saw beyond the 30,000-foot view and you saw the mission.
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  And I actually have seen this with other people
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  that had massive amounts of responsibility at a young age.
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  And then they seem to, even like,
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  I mean, there's a lot of very incredible Israeli entrepreneurs
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  and they all went through the military.
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  And even in the US and other countries,
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  you have these incredible entrepreneurs that,
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  I mean, not everything is always rainbows and unicorns
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  after the military.
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  There's a lot of people that don't build massive things.
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  But for some people, it seemed like that responsibility
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  and that pressure, it creates this perfect environment
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  to understand what you could be capable of.
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  And then you go apply that to a civilian venture
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  or a civilian idea and it's like this perfect mindset
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  and habits and training environment
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  to go build something massive.
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  And I guess, I guess it's more a question
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  about how can somebody understand your perspective shift.
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  And I think this is probably what you work with people
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  with some of the executives you work with.
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  Because you experience this
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  because you're in a high pressure situation,
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  you're a smart individual,
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  you were charged with lots of responsibility
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  and then you sort of saw the light,
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  you saw this bigger picture.
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  A lot of people never see that bigger picture.
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  And they are only so focused on what's at right in front of them
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  and they work their whole career
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  just doing the same thing and not understanding
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  what else they could do outside of their nine to five.
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  How do you unlock this particular thought process
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  in someone who was not put into that high pressure situation
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  and perhaps has been coasting along for the last 20, 30 years
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  and they're not happy but they don't have the vision that you had.
• 11:28
  It's a beautiful question, Scott.
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  I mean, again, the military teaches you
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  to be comfortable in the uncomfortable
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  and that's a great trait and skill to have.
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  However, if I'm being really honest,
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  the corporation has a way to just mold you back
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  into the mold that everybody else needs to go by, right?
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  So if I'm being really honest after the military,
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  you know, I studied engineering,
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  I went to Intel and it from that point on.
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  And by the way,
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  Inter was an incredible company.
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  Like they treated me so well.
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  But from that point on, I became part of the mold.
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  And the big reason that I started Lee Academy
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  is because 20 years later,
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  I realized that I could see only like,
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  I had these blind spots.
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  All I could see is that one title above that I want to get to,
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  I forgot the 30,000th view.
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  That just wasn't there anymore.
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  All I could see is like,
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  how do I get to a senior director?
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  How do I get to a VP?
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  Like that's all I could see.
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  So you were almost like, you had it and then you lost it.
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  I lost it and I say,
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  if I can be losing that after everything that I accomplished,
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  if somebody never had that,
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  how do I wake them up because they're sleepwalking to life?
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  And they will wake up in a decade or two or three,
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  with massive regret that they could have done
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  so much more with their life than they haven't.
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  And if I can catch them in this space and stage and say,
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  wake up, there's more to life.
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  I want you to see what else is on the menu.
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  Let's go get it.
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  That's where it becomes incredible.
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  So, okay.
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  So what was the thing?
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  So even like walking through your own journey.
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  So military,
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  massive pressure,
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  tons of responsibility,
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  switch to intel.
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  Still a lot of responsibility,
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  but you're more a cog in a machine.
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  But then you transitioned into building your own thing.
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  You started to become an entrepreneur.
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  And you started to figure out that you didn't want to do
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  the W-2-9-5 thing for forever.
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  What pushed you into the entrepreneur space again?
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  It's a great question, Scott.
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  So unfortunately, I sticked around
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  quite a while in the corporate world.
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  I was with one company
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  and I did start going into more startup worlds,
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  but I wasn't part of the founding team.
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  And there was a huge difference between number one and number two.
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  Like, light years away.
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  We didn't really realize at that time.
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  Like, I thought I was kind of badass,
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  but no, there's a big difference.
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  So I did go into some startup.
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  We had the great some great exits.
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  Some not so great, you know,
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  but it was just like I started,
• 14:05
  but I love the pace.
• 14:06
  I love the pace of change.
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  And actually,
• 14:10
  it was a friend of mine that came to me
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  and think became kind of a norm, right?
• 14:15
  And you're starting to cruise.
• 14:18
  You know, you're comfortable cruising.
• 14:20
  It's fine.
• 14:21
  You're getting a paycheck.
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  Things are cool.
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  I'm a vice president at the point.
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  And a friend of mine came to me and said,
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  hey, Lana, let's start a startup.
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  And he's been in the suburb for a while.
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  I knew him for about 20 years.
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  And I was like, oh my god.
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  Yeah, that's exactly what I was meant to be.
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  And every awake hour,
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  I was building this startup on the side.
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  We were, you know, already going to investors.
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  We actually raised capital.
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  It was incredible.
• 14:46
  Scott, like within a few weeks,
• 14:48
  there was $800,000.
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  The term sheet,
• 14:51
  they're evaluating our little baby at five million.
• 14:54
  And it wasn't even, you know,
• 14:56
  like some weird investors.
• 14:58
  Like three prominent Silicon Valley investors.
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  Like I remember looking at this thing
• 15:02
  and I was like, oh my god,
• 15:03
  like how did that become my life?
• 15:05
  And by the way, this is like,
• 15:07
  this is like an entrepreneur's dream.
• 15:08
  Like an $800,000,000, you know,
• 15:11
  I'm assuming pre-revenue,
• 15:13
  seed check for $5 million valuation,
• 15:15
  prominent Silicon Valley VCs.
• 15:17
  Like that's like, oh my god.
• 15:19
  Exactly.
• 15:19
  But the dream kind of became a nightmare.
• 15:23
  Yeah.
• 15:24
  But I did, you know,
• 15:27
  so I left my job, my, you know,
• 15:29
  comfortable VP job,
• 15:31
  which I built from, you know,
• 15:33
  here in the U.S.
• 15:33
  from the first printer to, you know,
• 15:35
  this incredible multi-million dollar machine.
• 15:39
  And I left the job.
• 15:41
  I was excited.
• 15:42
  Like here we go.
• 15:44
  You know, this is an incredible entrepreneur.
• 15:46
  And the same day my co-founder decided
• 15:49
  to take the money and told me out of the business
• 15:52
  and Scott within a day,
• 15:53
  I found myself with no job,
• 15:55
  no salary, no startup, no investment.
• 15:59
  And probably the hardest thing in my life
• 16:01
  was that my ego was down the drain.
• 16:04
  I told everyone about the startup.
• 16:07
  It became your identity.
• 16:09
  Just what this became.
• 16:10
  My identity.
• 16:11
  What do I say now?
• 16:12
  Do I say that I was kicked out?
• 16:13
  Do I say that I was just,
• 16:16
  I was devised to start.
• 16:18
  I had no clue how to even cope with it.
• 16:20
  I couldn't even figure out how to breathe.
• 16:22
  I couldn't figure out what to do next.
• 16:24
  Do I look for a job now?
• 16:26
  Do I look for, you know,
• 16:28
  to start another business?
• 16:29
  Do I look for revenge?
• 16:30
  What do I do?
• 16:31
  Can you tell us, tell the audience
• 16:34
  because there's a lesson there.
• 16:35
  Obviously, exactly how this went down.
• 16:38
  Because obviously somebody's listening is like,
• 16:39
  how do you get kicked out of your own startup?
• 16:42
  And there's many ways.
• 16:43
  But I want to share what happened to you
• 16:45
  and I want to hear the lesson
• 16:47
  that you're going to teach everybody
• 16:48
  when they're starting their own company.
• 16:50
  At least talk about it.
• 16:52
  Well, in hindsight,
• 16:54
  I can say it's probably the best thing
• 16:56
  that happened to me.
• 16:57
  And, you know, obviously,
• 16:59
  I'm living the dream now every single day.
• 17:01
  But at that moment,
• 17:03
  the big thing was,
• 17:05
  first of all,
• 17:05
  that we just never wanted to talk about it.
• 17:07
  Like, we didn't really want to talk about the day after.
• 17:10
  And that's so common
• 17:11
  because we're living this fantasy.
• 17:13
  We're working on things together.
• 17:15
  Again, it's somebody I knew
• 17:16
  from way back for 20 years.
• 17:19
  So it's not some stranger
• 17:20
  that we just went on a date
• 17:22
  and decided to start something together.
• 17:24
  It's somebody I knew for so long.
• 17:26
  And there's this trust
• 17:29
  that shouldn't be there
• 17:30
  because the minute you start something,
• 17:32
  this is business.
• 17:33
  This is not relationship anymore.
• 17:35
  This is business.
• 17:36
  Obviously, you want to get along.
• 17:37
  Obviously, everything needs to
• 17:39
  fall into place.
• 17:40
  But you also need to put the things.
• 17:42
  You need to write them down.
• 17:44
  You need to have agreements in place.
• 17:47
  Now, in hindsight,
• 17:48
  again, Scott, I would just say,
• 17:50
  thank God, I dodged that bullet.
• 17:52
  That company never lifts it off the ground.
• 17:54
  And my, in this already,
• 17:55
  you know, I already sold one
• 17:56
  and I have this eight-figure business,
• 17:58
  you know what I'm saying?
• 17:59
  So, in hindsight,
• 18:00
  it's the best thing that happened to me.
• 18:02
  But at that moment,
• 18:03
  it was the hardest thing
• 18:05
  that I could even imagine.
• 18:07
  And it was,
• 18:09
  it took me on this
• 18:10
  credible, down-to-spiral
• 18:12
  that I didn't think somebody so strong.
• 18:15
  So, you know,
• 18:16
  brave, theoretically,
• 18:18
  that ticked all the boxes of success
• 18:20
  or many boxes of success.
• 18:22
  And suddenly, I can find myself
• 18:23
  waking up in three in the morning
• 18:25
  and trying to figure out
• 18:26
  how did I become such a failure.
• 18:28
  And that was hard.
• 18:29
  It was hard on my family.
• 18:30
  It was hard on my relationship
• 18:33
  on, you know, like on my health.
• 18:35
  Like, we were deteriorating.
• 18:37
  It was just taking a huge toll.
• 18:39
  So, what you experienced,
• 18:40
  unfortunate, hopefully,
• 18:41
  nobody has to experience
• 18:43
  that kind of failure
• 18:45
  or disappointment
• 18:46
  because obviously,
• 18:47
  you hope that the people you do business with,
• 18:49
  you get the contract signed,
• 18:51
  that, you know, everything's legally binding
• 18:52
  and you go into business together.
• 18:53
  And if you fail,
• 18:54
  you hope it's not because of somebody
• 18:56
  sort of stabbing you in the back.
• 18:57
  You hope it's because you weren't able to
• 18:59
  scale the company.
• 19:00
  I know that failure is failure,
• 19:01
  but I much rather fail
• 19:03
  going to business with somebody
• 19:04
  and trying our hardest
• 19:05
  and working together.
• 19:06
  And then it doesn't work
• 19:07
  and somebody stabbing me in the back.
• 19:08
  That seems like a different kind of failure
• 19:10
  that just sucks,
• 19:11
  to be honest.
• 19:12
  It's just not a fun.
• 19:13
  I guess if I was going to rank,
• 19:15
  like, how fun different kinds of failures are.
• 19:19
  It seems like the least kind of fun failure, for sure.
• 19:23
  So, okay, so,
• 19:25
  and the point is,
• 19:26
  everybody's going to go through a lot
• 19:27
  of these kinds of failures
• 19:28
  as they transition into entrepreneurship.
• 19:32
  You turn your identity into the company,
• 19:35
  which is going to have a huge toll
• 19:36
  on your mental health,
• 19:38
  on your physical health,
• 19:38
  on your relationships.
• 19:40
  What is your advice for people?
• 19:43
  Because you work with people
• 19:45
  that are trying to do career transitions.
• 19:47
  It could be career transitions
• 19:48
  to different kinds of careers,
• 19:50
  career transitions,
• 19:50
  into entrepreneurship.
• 19:51
  Failure is inevitable.
• 19:53
  After going through that,
• 19:55
  how do you coach people
• 19:57
  and even almost encourage them
• 19:59
  to take a jump
• 20:00
  when they're going to listen to your story
• 20:02
  and be like, damn, I don't...
• 20:03
  Scott's saying it's failure is inevitable.
• 20:06
  Her partner stabbed her in the back,
• 20:09
  like, how would I have...
• 20:10
  Maybe she was just nuts,
• 20:11
  and maybe that's why she did it a second time.
• 20:13
  Like, I don't have the courage
• 20:15
  to be able to do that,
• 20:16
  and maybe we are a little bit nuts.
• 20:18
  We are nuts.
• 20:19
  Okay, so someone comes to you.
• 20:20
  What do you tell them?
• 20:21
  They're listening to this story.
• 20:24
  So, first of all, we are nuts,
• 20:26
  and it's also the best thing
• 20:27
  that could happen to me, too, right?
• 20:29
  So, I will say a few things.
• 20:34
  First of all, the challenges are inevitable.
• 20:36
  They're going to be there,
• 20:37
  but the suffering of the choice
• 20:38
  throughout the journey.
• 20:40
  And I think one of the things
• 20:42
  that I would say to anyone
• 20:43
  that is listening
• 20:45
  is you can't have your entire identity
• 20:49
  only defined by one title,
• 20:52
  one company, et cetera.
• 20:53
  It has to be also defined by your own brand.
• 20:56
  And once you have that safety net,
• 20:59
  you're never alone.
• 21:01
  You never are nobody.
• 21:02
  Like, for me, the biggest thing
• 21:03
  is that when I would go to events,
• 21:05
  suddenly, it's like,
• 21:06
  hi, Ilana, what do you do?
• 21:08
  Nothing.
• 21:09
  What do you want to do?
• 21:10
  I don't know.
• 21:11
  You know, like, I became a nothing.
• 21:13
  How can you become a nothing
• 21:14
  from being somebody that is so proud of themselves?
• 21:18
  So, I think a lot of it
• 21:19
  is how do you build such a powerful
• 21:22
  personal brand
• 21:23
  that really clear on what you want to do next,
• 21:26
  really align your story,
• 21:27
  really align, you know,
• 21:29
  like everything.
• 21:30
  And then, yes, what?
• 21:31
  It's okay if it's in parallel.
• 21:33
  Everybody will have
• 21:34
  for your careers these days.
• 21:35
  And if you, you know,
• 21:37
  and again, I want you to have
• 21:38
  one stream of income.
• 21:39
  And it could be from a job.
• 21:40
  It could be from a business.
• 21:41
  It could be something.
• 21:43
  But if you now have your own identity
• 21:45
  as part of your own brand
• 21:47
  and your own reputation,
• 21:48
  you never fall so deep
• 21:50
  because you always are left with yourself.
• 21:52
  I was left with nothing.
• 21:55
  Well, that word you said,
• 21:56
  portfolio careers, what's that?
• 21:58
  So, for, you know,
• 21:59
  and we're really kind of in the air of change,
• 22:02
  like with AI and gig economy
• 22:04
  and working remote and all of this,
• 22:06
  like we are seeing a pace of change
• 22:08
  that we've never seen before.
• 22:10
  And there is not even
• 22:12
  a thing called stock,
• 22:13
  like nobody's stock.
• 22:14
  If they're not moving forward,
• 22:15
  they're losing relevant at a speed
• 22:17
  we've never seen before.
• 22:18
  But one of the things
• 22:19
  that we were seeing more of
• 22:21
  is something called
• 22:22
  more of a portfolio career,
• 22:23
  basically multiple stream of income.
• 22:26
  Because what happens is that
• 22:27
  people want to not just have
• 22:31
  one thing and that's all they do,
• 22:33
  9 to 7 pm and then go to sleep, right?
• 22:36
  Some people want to be,
• 22:38
  you know, excited about other things
• 22:40
  or maybe have some impact on the side
• 22:42
  or maybe be part of some non-profit
• 22:45
  or maybe some doing some board
• 22:46
  then maybe do some public speaking
• 22:47
  and maybe do some consulting.
• 22:50
  So, they want to richer life,
• 22:52
  they want more experiences,
• 22:53
  they want extra income on the side,
• 22:54
  they want to create not just an okay life,
• 22:56
  they want to create an incredible life.
• 22:59
  If you don't want to work paycheck to paycheck,
• 23:01
  they want to create, you know,
• 23:02
  generational wealth or freedom
• 23:04
  or whatever that looks like for them.
• 23:07
  And what we're seeing is that
• 23:08
  the many of things that you can do today
• 23:11
  is just, you know, incredible.
• 23:14
  It's God, you know, you know it, right?
• 23:17
  I get it, listen, I'm living it.
• 23:19
  You don't have your preaching to the choir,
• 23:21
  but right now that I know
• 23:23
  and that's why, you know,
• 23:24
  we're talking,
• 23:25
  that's why, you know,
• 23:26
  you're on my show, right?
• 23:28
  Because it's incredible to watch,
• 23:30
  because when you have this portfolio of things,
• 23:33
  that's what changes your life.
• 23:35
  It's not going to be about negotiating
• 23:37
  another 10K for yourself.
• 23:38
  What is that going to do?
• 23:39
  A hundred K in a decade?
• 23:40
  Like, how is that changing?
• 23:41
  How is that moving the needle?
• 23:43
  But if you now start creating some income on the side
• 23:46
  and some portfolio careers,
• 23:48
  hey, you're never alone.
• 23:49
  You're never, you know,
• 23:51
  go into this downer spiral like I did.
• 23:53
  You never find yourself in nothing,
• 23:55
  but also you have other streams of income.
• 23:58
  So you always have a safety net.
• 24:00
  You're always, you know, it's more exciting.
• 24:02
  You're happy here.
• 24:04
  And again, it needs to be done right.
• 24:05
  So I want to make sure that I'm not telling everybody
• 24:08
  so spaghetti in the wall,
• 24:09
  see what sticks.
• 24:10
  No, that's what I'm saying.
• 24:11
  But if it's done right,
• 24:13
  it actually changes lives.
• 24:15
  And it created an incredible life for me too.
• 24:17
  So let's, let's talk about that.
• 24:19
  I think that's probably what you help people understand
• 24:22
  specifically,
• 24:23
  because somebody who's listening to this,
• 24:25
  who is a W29 to 5.
• 24:28
  And they have, they've never tried to build anything before.
• 24:32
  If they start to look into entrepreneurship,
• 24:34
  even in 2024,
• 24:36
  they're going to get into this trap of,
• 24:38
  I'm going to quit my job
• 24:40
  and I'm going to go try and build maybe some cool tech idea
• 24:44
  that I've thought of and I'm not technical
• 24:46
  and I don't know how to do it.
• 24:47
  And I have maybe six months of,
• 24:49
  maybe even a year of money saved up
• 24:50
  and that should be enough to figure it out.
• 24:52
  I think that is the worst version of entrepreneurship.
• 24:55
  Full stop, worst version.
• 24:58
  That's my, that's my opinion.
• 24:59
  I think that there's many healthier ways to do it.
• 25:02
  So, so what, what do you advise people to do?
• 25:06
  Do you advise that everybody should be an entrepreneur?
• 25:09
  Do you advise that everybody should have a side hustle?
• 25:12
  What happens if the side hustle compromises your job?
• 25:15
  What happens if your boss doesn't like
• 25:16
  that you're building a personal bread?
• 25:18
  There's so many scary questions.
• 25:21
  I'm curious how you sort of go through this exercise
• 25:24
  to understand when somebody comes to you and leave Academy.
• 25:28
  This is where you're at now.
• 25:29
  Let's start to think strategically
• 25:31
  and where do we go from here.
• 25:32
  Let's unpack this because I think this is such a beautiful question
• 25:36
  and it's so, so, so important.
• 25:37
  And again, it's also going to be very individual.
• 25:40
  But I'd like, we need to understand
• 25:42
  where you are now, where you want to go
• 25:44
  and see what's, what's going to even help.
• 25:46
  The, the, the one thing that I will say is
• 25:51
  unfortunately the education system, you know, right now
• 25:54
  is not a good help, right?
• 25:55
  Because again, whatever I start day to day 22,
• 25:59
  electric engineering, how is that helping me right now?
• 26:03
  Nothing, right?
• 26:03
  So, and even if you do go to an MBA,
• 26:05
  it's very theoretical.
• 26:07
  What you need is something that will meet you
• 26:09
  where you are and take you to the direction
• 26:11
  that you want to go, right?
• 26:12
  So, that's the first, you know,
• 26:13
  so we wanted to first of all, for every driven person
• 26:17
  to have a home and for them to be
• 26:19
  among other driven people about, you know,
• 26:22
  surround with experts that will really analyze
• 26:25
  where they are and when they want to go.
• 26:27
  But the way I'm looking at this is,
• 26:30
  if they have a W2 right now, like you said,
• 26:33
  the worst thing that you can do is leave everything behind
• 26:36
  and jump all in.
• 26:37
  There is something to burning the boats,
• 26:40
  but it needs to be done right.
• 26:42
  And if you have no clue what you want to build
• 26:44
  and you really haven't even tested the grounds,
• 26:49
  the chance of success is about zero.
• 26:53
  Okay.
• 26:54
  And the truth is, Scott, I think there's also a lot of,
• 26:57
  like, we tend to paint into entrepreneurship
• 27:00
  and very pink and roses type of colors.
• 27:04
  It is hard and not everybody is meant to do it
• 27:06
  and not everybody should do it.
• 27:09
  And I still think that if you know how to monetize your skills,
• 27:13
  at least a little bit, you at least have a safety net.
• 27:17
  So, and that's where it's really like,
• 27:20
  I'm going, you know, with, you know,
• 27:22
  even if somebody is a W2,
• 27:24
  I don't want you to burn the boats yet.
• 27:25
  You're not ready for it.
• 27:27
  You don't even know what you want.
• 27:29
  But if you start monetizing a little bit of your skills,
• 27:32
  whether it's again, like for some people,
• 27:35
  it's mentorship and startup accelerators
• 27:37
  and maybe some advisor here and there
• 27:39
  and maybe some of them can go into board seats
• 27:41
  and maybe some of them can do some coaching, consulting,
• 27:44
  whatever and maybe some of them,
• 27:45
  it's speaking of attorneys and maybe, you know,
• 27:46
  and I can go on and on,
• 27:48
  like for different people, it will be different things
• 27:51
  and also different companies will allow different things.
• 27:53
  Like you said, you know,
• 27:55
  there's the big consulting companies in the world
• 27:57
  that you can do a lot.
• 27:58
  So you also need to take that into account
• 28:01
  and say, okay, what is allowed here?
• 28:03
  And how do I make sure that my brand
• 28:06
  and my identity stand on its own
• 28:09
  and I don't want to rub my boss in the wrong way?
• 28:11
  So I also going to make sure that the company is leveraging
• 28:15
  my new capabilities and there's actually
• 28:17
  an incredible win win, right?
• 28:20
  So I think if it's done right,
• 28:22
  it's actually really, really powerful.
• 28:25
  So it does take such a unique approach.
• 28:28
  I'm wondering if when you start to work with people,
• 28:31
  do what is the exercise that you have them go through
• 28:34
  to figure out what is really important for them?
• 28:36
  Because I think that is probably what leads to
• 28:39
  all the right answers.
• 28:40
  Yeah, absolutely, Scott.
• 28:41
  So the very first thing is you need to understand
• 28:44
  what motivates them and what's important for them.
• 28:46
  And I think for me, this was the hardest thing.
• 28:49
  So if you, if I look back 10 years ago,
• 28:53
  this was the hardest thing because somebody driven,
• 28:55
  they always know what's the next step.
• 28:57
  They know what college you need to go through.
• 28:59
  They know, you know, like everything is always clear
• 29:02
  until it isn't.
• 29:03
  And when it isn't, you're lost.
• 29:06
  So not knowing what's next was one of the hardest moments
• 29:09
  in my life.
• 29:10
  So for me, that's the first thing that I want people
• 29:12
  to get clarity on.
• 29:13
  And it really gonna be, you know, basically two things, right?
• 29:16
  One is kind of what is, you know, what are your muscles?
• 29:19
  Like what's really critical for you right now?
• 29:21
  And we'll talk about it if you want.
• 29:23
  And then what is that zone of genius that, you know,
• 29:26
  where is the secret sauce?
• 29:27
  Because when we're kids, we always try to lean on, you know,
• 29:30
  learn new things and try to be, when we're at 40 plus,
• 29:34
  50 plus, 60 plus, we don't want to learn new tricks.
• 29:38
  We might need to learn new tricks,
• 29:41
  but we rather like really lean on this zone of genius.
• 29:44
  And when we do, that's where we're going to shine.
• 29:47
  So if I want to be a chef now, that's a disaster.
• 29:50
  That's my husband saying like, I'm not good.
• 29:54
  Okay, no, but that, we can go into that
• 29:56
  because I think it's a very useful thought experiment
• 29:59
  for somebody who is later in their career.
• 30:01
  And actually, I think there's probably, you know,
• 30:03
  it's interesting.
• 30:03
  So you work with people that are later in their career
• 30:05
  and they're not trying to learn a ton of new things,
• 30:07
  trying to focus on what they really know best.
• 30:10
  More is a, more is a necessity.
• 30:13
  It's more a necessity because of where they're at.
• 30:15
  However, I do believe and maybe have ideas on this.
• 30:19
  I do believe that if even a younger entrepreneur adopted
• 30:22
  the same mindset, I think they would still be more successful.
• 30:24
  I think that maybe being young, they feel like they can learn
• 30:28
  everything and anything and I actually think
• 30:30
  that could be a detriment to them focusing and building.
• 30:34
  You are a thousand percent correct.
• 30:36
  And the truth is, I think eventually,
• 30:39
  whatever we teach in Leap Academy,
• 30:40
  should be part of colleges in high school.
• 30:42
  Like, you know, I don't, I don't think it should be proprietary.
• 30:45
  I don't think it should be what they exclusive.
• 30:47
  Like, I really think every single person needs to have
• 30:50
  a very engineered way to always decide what they want to do
• 30:55
  next, align those story, align them network,
• 30:57
  align the reputation and go into the hidden market
• 30:59
  because that's where all the opportunities are.
• 31:02
  So I really do believe everyone should know this.
• 31:05
  And I do believe we also gonna have this habit
• 31:08
  of leaping again and again every year
• 31:09
  to now this, this pace of changes.
• 31:11
  So vast, right?
• 31:13
  So now that we see this, people will change,
• 31:16
  even within the same company, they change responsibility,
• 31:18
  they change function, they change the tech
• 31:20
  that they're working with.
• 31:21
  They change, you know, everything changes all the time.
• 31:24
  And if you're not ready to reinvent Leap, Leap, Leap, Leap,
• 31:28
  you're gonna fall behind.
• 31:29
  So first of all, I do think it's just a skill
• 31:31
  that everybody needs to know.
• 31:34
  But the way that looks specifically the Mustavs,
• 31:38
  if you're gonna look at your career
• 31:40
  and it was actually kind of a fun exercise to run,
• 31:44
  you're gonna see that your Mustavs also change
• 31:46
  throughout your career and it's really interesting.
• 31:49
  So the way I look at it is sometimes all we need is finance.
• 31:52
  Like all we need is to just make cash.
• 31:55
  And that's all we care about, that's our biggest priority
• 31:57
  and this could be because we need the cash,
• 31:59
  it could be because we, you know,
• 32:01
  it's bringing us more confident.
• 32:02
  I wanted to make more than my husband.
• 32:04
  It really doesn't matter what it is,
• 32:06
  but cash is king, right?
• 32:08
  It's, you know, there are stages where it's more about growth.
• 32:12
  Like I wanna feel like I'm growing.
• 32:15
  I wanna grow entitled and reputation
• 32:17
  in a responsibility to have a team.
• 32:21
  I wanna learn more, I wanna even fang, you know,
• 32:24
  like I just wanna feel like I'm growing.
• 32:28
  Sometimes it's really more about the impact.
• 32:30
  Like I just wanna finally feel like I moved the needle.
• 32:33
  I make a difference whether it's on the company,
• 32:35
  whether it's on people, whether it's some kind of a legacy,
• 32:39
  whether it's on the world, whatever, right?
• 32:41
  But I wanna feel like that I'm moving the needle.
• 32:44
  And sometimes it's balanced because whether we like it or not,
• 32:48
  there are some stages in life, you know,
• 32:51
  that we, you know, the career will take a little bit of a backseat
• 32:53
  and whether it's for kids or health or hobbies or whatever it is,
• 32:57
  it will take a little bit of a backseat.
• 32:59
  And the interesting things,
• 33:00
  and we've done this research on thousands of the people,
• 33:03
  the interesting thing is again, no career will have all four.
• 33:06
  And if somebody thinks they have all four,
• 33:08
  don't ever leave, you got this.
• 33:10
  Right, like I just don't like that.
• 33:11
  But if you look back, you'll see that you rotate
• 33:14
  between the two of them and you switch every a few years.
• 33:18
  And one of the things that we look at is, first of all,
• 33:22
  if you just look, don't look too far
• 33:24
  because it's gonna change all the time.
• 33:26
  But if you just look a year, two, two,
• 33:29
  what are the two must have that are right now critical for you to chase?
• 33:34
  Because that defines a lot of things, right?
• 33:36
  If somebody says, I need cash right now,
• 33:39
  they can't go to entrepreneurship.
• 33:40
  Like that just, you know, that's irresponsible, right?
• 33:43
  Or if they're already working,
• 33:45
  then maybe we can start something on the side, right?
• 33:47
  But a lot of the decisions will be derived,
• 33:49
  but what are these must have?
• 33:51
  And based on that, we can make a lot of conclusions happen.
• 33:54
  And that becomes your compass.
• 33:56
  That can become like a GPS that really helps you figure out what's next,
• 34:00
  but also realize it's gonna change.
• 34:02
  And that's what's beautiful about it.
• 34:03
  So, no, I love it.
• 34:06
  And I'm now the second piece to that equation is your zone of genius.
• 34:10
  And I'm even curious because after you had failures,
• 34:14
  you had successes.
• 34:15
  So before leap, you went through this whole exercise yourself.
• 34:18
  And this is probably how you built out the framework.
• 34:20
  So using even yourself as an example,
• 34:23
  how did you find your zone of genius,
• 34:24
  which allowed you to be successful?
• 34:27
  No, it's a beautiful question.
• 34:28
  So the truth is that success leaves clues,
• 34:31
  but we sometimes don't look at them.
• 34:33
  And I think the interesting thing with all of this is that
• 34:37
  when we think about our zone of genius,
• 34:40
  usually we look at the very specific thing
• 34:42
  that are always on job descriptions.
• 34:44
  Like the very specific skill I learned computer engineering,
• 34:47
  I did this, I did coding and it,
• 34:50
  but the truth is a lot of times the zone of genius is not there.
• 34:54
  It's what people are already intrigued by you.
• 34:56
  What people already come to you for?
• 34:58
  Where did you get awards?
• 35:00
  Where did you shine?
• 35:01
  Where did your eyes sparked so much that you were like,
• 35:05
  I can't breathe, this is incredible, right?
• 35:08
  Like it's things that are not necessarily that specific skill,
• 35:11
  that specific software programming that you've done, right?
• 35:15
  Like it's something different and it's usually a pattern
• 35:19
  that is actually you can see it in different places in your life
• 35:22
  and different places around your career.
• 35:25
  And sometimes it even goes back to your younger self
• 35:28
  because when we're our younger self,
• 35:31
  we don't boundary ourselves.
• 35:34
  We don't put limitations, we don't try to give it names
• 35:37
  and we just know what works and we go chase it.
• 35:41
  When I was about five years old,
• 35:43
  I took half of my house and when my parents were not home,
• 35:47
  which I don't know why my parents weren't home,
• 35:49
  but anyway, it makes you think,
• 35:51
  but I took a little box and I sold it outside the house
• 35:57
  because I thought that was so exciting.
• 36:00
  And my parents came home and I'm like,
• 36:02
  what just happened, like where did everything go?
• 36:05
  I was like, oh, I sold it, I thought.
• 36:07
  So it was so entrepreneurial.
• 36:10
  When you really kind of look back,
• 36:13
  there's always lose and the question is,
• 36:16
  whether you're willing to look at the clues.
• 36:18
  And for me, the clues were,
• 36:20
  there's a lot of imposter syndrome
• 36:21
  that I'll have about the various things.
• 36:24
  But the one thing nobody can take away from me
• 36:26
  is that I leaped in so many ways throughout my journey
• 36:29
  from Air Force to engineer, to technical sales,
• 36:32
  to product management, to architect, to VP operations.
• 36:35
  Like I leaped so much that nobody can take that away from me.
• 36:39
  And I think when you start realizing that
• 36:41
  and suddenly people are asking me about their career
• 36:43
  and suddenly, you know, I'm like,
• 36:45
  and I don't think myself at that point as a career coach,
• 36:47
  like I hold businesses.
• 36:48
  I invest in a hundred companies.
• 36:50
  I, you know, like that was not even a thing for me.
• 36:54
  But suddenly when I saw that,
• 36:55
  I was like, maybe that's where the pattern is.
• 36:59
  And that became the zone of genius.
• 37:02
  I just want to take a second and thank the HubSpot podcast
• 37:04
  network for sponsoring the show's success story,
• 37:07
  even part of their network for the past three years now.
• 37:09
  If you're a podcast fan,
• 37:10
  you have to check out some of the other incredible podcasts
• 37:13
  in the HubSpot podcast network like My First Million,
• 37:16
  hosted by Sam Parr and Sean Perry.
• 37:18
  They feature famous guests like Alex Ramozi,
• 37:21
  Sophia Emma Russo, Hassan Minhaj,
• 37:23
  sharing their secrets on how they made their first million
• 37:26
  and how to apply their learning to capitalize
• 37:28
  on today's business trends and opportunities.
• 37:30
  Listen to My First Million,
• 37:32
  wherever you get your podcasts.
• 37:33
  I love this.
• 37:35
  You know, I'm also curious,
• 37:37
  I'm also curious just because there's a flip side
• 37:41
  to leaping and there's a flip side to the things
• 37:43
  that you coach and I just want to touch on this briefly
• 37:45
  because it's obviously a real concern.
• 37:48
  And we can keep going and talking a little bit more
• 37:50
  about how you coach people through this transition
• 37:52
  in their life.
• 37:53
  But the flip side of this is
• 37:57
  when people are leaping so much,
• 38:01
  somebody who you are coaching or working with
• 38:04
  is either going to be an executive in a company
• 38:06
  or they're going to start,
• 38:07
  some of them are going to start companies
• 38:08
  and those companies will be successful.
• 38:11
  Now, think about the employees
• 38:13
  that will eventually work for them
• 38:14
  that are switching careers and switching
• 38:16
  and starting personal brands
• 38:18
  and starting side hustles and stuff like that
• 38:20
  because if you do it, you know,
• 38:22
  there's going to be somebody young and ambitious
• 38:24
  that's going to be doing the exact same thing.
• 38:26
  And then you're like, now you're a CEO,
• 38:27
  you made the career transition,
• 38:29
  you're a founder, you're hiring people
• 38:31
  and you realize that they're wanting to switch jobs
• 38:33
  every two years and they're wanting to leap themselves
• 38:35
  into entrepreneurship.
• 38:37
  From a leadership perspective,
• 38:39
  how do you manage people that are in this process
• 38:44
  are sort of navigating their career in 2024 and beyond
• 38:47
  and doing these leaps and doing these career transitions
• 38:49
  because that can be massively disruptive to a business too.
• 38:53
  So first of all, I think it's a brilliant question
• 38:55
  and very, very important one to address.
• 38:57
  I don't know if you've noticed my social media,
• 38:59
  but one of my, you know, I'm a huge fan of Richard Branson.
• 39:03
  I go visit his private island and go on safaris
• 39:06
  with his aunt because I'm learning so much from this guy.
• 39:08
  And one of the quotes that I really love that he says
• 39:12
  is teach them well enough so that they can leave,
• 39:15
  treat them well enough so that they don't want to.
• 39:18
  And that became like a really big mantra for me
• 39:22
  because the truth is I'm so armed with a team
• 39:25
  and we have, you know, 20 something people on my team, right?
• 39:30
  And it's almost 30 now that are, that, you know,
• 39:33
  if they're going to leave every year,
• 39:35
  like that's going to suck because that's what I...
• 39:39
  Winning it lightly, right?
• 39:40
  But the beautiful thing is one of the things that we did
• 39:44
  with them is again, speaking of treated,
• 39:46
  first of all, I want this to be their multimillion dollar
• 39:49
  mastermind, like I really want them to feel like they're
• 39:52
  learning to take their career and their life
• 39:55
  and their reposition to a whole different level.
• 39:57
  And what we did with them is something called
• 40:00
  professional, professional, personal, financial goals.
• 40:05
  And they, you know, we set with each one of them
• 40:08
  and kind of looks at where they want to be
• 40:09
  and each one of these for one year, three years, five years.
• 40:13
  And then we basically looked at how this company
• 40:16
  can help them get there.
• 40:17
  And when you can align the company's goals
• 40:20
  with their personal, professional, financial goals,
• 40:24
  now they see the value of actually not only staying,
• 40:27
  but they see the value of actually realizing
• 40:30
  that this mission is what they want to be associated
• 40:33
  with this mission of changing lives
• 40:36
  and creating this massive impact in the world.
• 40:39
  That's what they want to be associated with this.
• 40:41
  That's what they want their brand to be around.
• 40:43
  And they can see how that creates
• 40:45
  this massive success for them too.
• 40:48
  And so again, for me, it's really important to walk the walk
• 40:51
  and my team, we, you know, make sure
• 40:54
  that they build their own personal ground
• 40:55
  with it, we make sure that they go
• 40:57
  and, you know, just some public speaking,
• 40:58
  we make sure that they have their own shiny light on them.
• 41:02
  Because first of all, I, you know,
• 41:04
  that I think that's gonna make them happier,
• 41:06
  it's gonna make them feel more fulfilled,
• 41:08
  but they also gonna see how this place is actually
• 41:12
  exactly what they need to, you know,
• 41:14
  create a bigger tomorrow for themselves.
• 41:16
  And yes, in 10 to 10 somebody wants to start their own,
• 41:20
  I will totally wish them luck
• 41:21
  and just know that I created a little piece of that in them.
• 41:26
  So I think that's amazing.
• 41:28
  I think that more brands should do that.
• 41:29
  I think that brands are really missing out
• 41:31
  and companies are really missing out
• 41:32
  on enabling people to build their own personal brand
• 41:36
  and to shine the spotlight on them.
• 41:37
  Because from what I've seen,
• 41:38
  it's always a net positive for the business.
• 41:41
  It's not often when somebody is investing,
• 41:44
  I think the concern is,
• 41:46
  if I let somebody post their own stuff
• 41:48
  and build out their brand, the concern is,
• 41:51
  well, what if they say something stupid
• 41:53
  or what if they embarrass the company?
• 41:54
  From my experience,
• 41:56
  anybody that is that committed
• 41:58
  to building out their own personal brand
• 41:59
  and their professional career,
• 42:01
  they actually probably air almost too much on the side
• 42:04
  of caution as to what they post,
• 42:06
  because they're so concerned with their self image.
• 42:10
  And I think that brands have to trust more.
• 42:13
  I think they really have to trust more.
• 42:15
  I do have, I mean, you're doing it
• 42:17
  because you're living it and you're doing it yourself
• 42:19
  and you live in this world of enablement
• 42:22
  and personal brand and career transition.
• 42:25
  Is there best practices that you deploy
• 42:28
  for your team that gets them on stages
• 42:30
  or helps them understand what content to post
• 42:33
  versus what not to post?
• 42:34
  And is there anything that you do?
• 42:37
  So what I tell my team is that I am a big believer
• 42:41
  and again, I think it changes when you have
• 42:44
  100,000 people under you, right?
• 42:46
  Like it's something that I can do
• 42:48
  because we're still small.
• 42:51
  So there will be probably different rules for bigger teams.
• 42:55
  But for us, the way I look at this
• 42:58
  is I want to hire people that I trust.
• 43:02
  And I want to feed them with insights
• 43:05
  on how I see things.
• 43:07
  I have full transparency.
• 43:09
  They always know our numbers.
• 43:10
  They know exactly how much we make.
• 43:11
  They know exactly how our expenses are.
• 43:13
  Like they know everything.
• 43:15
  And the reason why I want them to know everything
• 43:17
  is because again, I'm going to hire smart people
• 43:20
  that I trust and they can make the decisions.
• 43:23
  And at that point, I don't need to micromanage them.
• 43:25
  I can just let them go and they're going to say
• 43:29
  the right thing anyway because they believe in us,
• 43:32
  they believe in the mission, they believe in themselves.
• 43:35
  And that's all that matters.
• 43:38
  But I will also say Scott,
• 43:39
  if somebody loses my trust, it's like this.
• 43:43
  So you give them the trust until they don't have it.
• 43:46
  And actually, as you're saying this, I'm just thinking,
• 43:49
  I'm like, if somebody really is upset with the company,
• 43:53
  I mean, they're going to act out.
• 43:56
  Maybe they say something stupid online.
• 43:58
  But if you're letting somebody go,
• 44:00
  if you're terminating, if you're exiting from the company,
• 44:03
  I mean, they're going to say the things
• 44:05
  they want to say anyways.
• 44:07
  They're going to say what's up, what they're upset about.
• 44:09
  They're going to talk, I mean, then there's,
• 44:11
  you know, they can go on glass door.
• 44:12
  They can, they can, they can talk shit
• 44:14
  in a whole bunch of places about a company
• 44:16
  if they weren't happy there, right?
• 44:18
  So I think that it's best just to enable them into trust.
• 44:21
  I think that's probably a healthy way
• 44:22
  because there's too much stress in business anyways.
• 44:24
  The way that works, I don't know how to micromanage,
• 44:27
  honestly, Scott, like, you know, for me,
• 44:29
  the biggest portion is about,
• 44:31
  I know every piece of the company and what it needs to be.
• 44:34
  And at some point, I probably did every piece of it.
• 44:37
  And the reason why I'm hiring somebody
• 44:40
  is because I don't want to do it anymore,
• 44:42
  because that part of the game, right?
• 44:44
  So to some extent, it's like, I have to hire people I trust.
• 44:49
  I have to give them the trust,
• 44:51
  and I have to teach them as much as I can in trust, right?
• 44:54
  But at that point, I need to make sure
• 44:58
  that they're going to make decisions on their own,
• 45:00
  and that they just understand how I make the decisions
• 45:03
  and what's important for the company.
• 45:05
  And I, the truth is, you know,
• 45:08
  and I'm really proud, I think most people
• 45:10
  just been with me for the very first second
• 45:13
  that they were hired, and...
• 45:15
  I mean, that's a good sign when people stick around, right?
• 45:20
  Okay, so let's go back to talking about
• 45:23
  people going through career transitions,
• 45:24
  life transitions, couple questions,
• 45:27
  but to start off, what would be one of the biggest mistakes
• 45:30
  that say somebody in their 40, 50, 60s makes that you see
• 45:35
  that can really hurt them.
• 45:38
  When they start to think about,
• 45:39
  I want to do something different.
• 45:40
  Outside of just, we already went over one,
• 45:42
  which is jumping into a startup that they're building themselves,
• 45:47
  really with no experience,
• 45:48
  or no semblance of product market fit,
• 45:51
  or six months of runway in their bag.
• 45:53
  That's obviously a huge mistake.
• 45:54
  Is there other things that you see the people do?
• 45:56
  Yeah, so I mean, I think the other biggest mistake
• 46:00
  that I see is just not even being open to realizing
• 46:04
  that you need to be intentional,
• 46:05
  strategic about your career, right?
• 46:07
  And just kind of like letting it slide and think that,
• 46:11
  okay, if I'm not going to change anything and nothing,
• 46:13
  would change, well, we are in an era of change.
• 46:15
  And if you don't really move forward,
• 46:17
  you're losing relevance and you will find yourself
• 46:20
  with ageism, with other things,
• 46:22
  like you will find yourself out of that stability.
• 46:27
  So for me, not being in the driver's seat,
• 46:30
  not being very intentional,
• 46:31
  strategic about your career is a huge mistake.
• 46:33
  So I believe everybody needs to be leap ready all the time.
• 46:37
  Whether you decide to leap or not,
• 46:39
  that's a whole different story.
• 46:40
  Whether you decide to move up the ladder
• 46:42
  in your own corporate environment, it's up to you.
• 46:45
  Whether you decide to build your brand, it's up to you,
• 46:47
  but what I'm saying, you always need to know what you want,
• 46:50
  how you wanted, how do you tell your story,
• 46:53
  tell it was confidence, you know,
• 46:54
  like you always want to be leap ready.
• 46:57
  So that's one, the second thing that I'm saying,
• 46:58
  speaking of mistakes, I think, you know,
• 47:00
  there's this cliche, don't you network, talk to them, right?
• 47:05
  And what we see is like, you know,
• 47:07
  people are just creating all these meetings
• 47:09
  with like really influential people
• 47:13
  and they completely butcher it
• 47:14
  because they have no clue what they want to do.
• 47:16
  They don't know how to tell their story
• 47:18
  and they burn bridges.
• 47:20
  And honestly, like they become a red flag
• 47:23
  and they have to stop because again,
• 47:25
  that you can't go back to the same people again again
• 47:29
  and hope that they will now open the doors for you.
• 47:31
  You lost it.
• 47:33
  So one of the things that I would say is like,
• 47:35
  hold on before you talk to a network
• 47:38
  and don't worry about the network
• 47:39
  is the most precious thing you have.
• 47:41
  But make sure when you go to them, you know,
• 47:43
  what you want to say, how you want to say it,
• 47:46
  what you want to be known for, what kind of ask do you have?
• 47:49
  What are you trying to open, really understand,
• 47:52
  but also understand who's your audience,
• 47:54
  what can you add to carry to win win?
• 47:57
  Like really understand what's going on,
• 47:59
  how to do this right?
• 48:00
  Because again, all these cool opportunities
• 48:03
  are only the hidden market, like all the executive roles,
• 48:06
  all the co-founding things, the investments,
• 48:09
  the speaking, the boards, the advisory,
• 48:11
  I can go on and on, like it's all the hidden market.
• 48:13
  It's never gonna be on job boards.
• 48:15
  We're done with job board at about 35 year olds.
• 48:18
  Like after that, nothing is relevant, right?
• 48:20
  So if you don't know how to play in that hidden market,
• 48:23
  you're losing on so much in life.
• 48:26
  When people are more advanced in their career,
• 48:29
  they have a lot of expertise.
• 48:31
  If they've been in a company for a long time,
• 48:34
  I bet they feel pretty highly about themselves.
• 48:36
  They probably have a little bit of an ego.
• 48:39
  So let's give some wisdom to somebody
• 48:43
  who's in that position.
• 48:44
  When is it useful to lean on your ego
• 48:47
  and appreciate your own self importance?
• 48:51
  When is it important to maybe be a little bit more humble
• 48:54
  and to humble yourself to the market
• 48:58
  and the fact that maybe you aren't as good
• 49:02
  as you think you are.
• 49:03
  Because you can lean on expertise to a degree,
• 49:05
  but I've seen a lot.
• 49:08
  Consultants that come out of CXO roles
• 49:11
  and they think they are so good,
• 49:14
  and I think that turns people off,
• 49:15
  and I think that that can kill the chance
• 49:17
  of them doing anything new or innovative,
• 49:20
  or getting on a stage or getting on a cool podcast.
• 49:24
  I think that, I mean, you've seen this more often,
• 49:27
  and I've seen it a lot.
• 49:29
  So I'm curious about how you balance the experience
• 49:33
  plus the humility.
• 49:36
  I can't, I don't know how you thought of asking this question.
• 49:39
  It's a brilliant question.
• 49:41
  Because I see it.
• 49:42
  I see it when people want to come on the podcast,
• 49:45
  and they're like, look at what I've done.
• 49:46
  Look at, I'm so cool.
• 49:48
  And this is what I can talk about.
• 49:49
  And then I get 50 of those a day.
• 49:52
  And then the person doesn't get exposure to this,
• 49:54
  but I see it.
• 49:55
  And I see it with consultants that come at me,
• 49:57
  and they say, listen, I've worked in this company
• 50:00
  for 50 years.
• 50:01
  Look at all the cool stuff I can do.
• 50:03
  And I'm like, well, can you make a clip on Instagram,
• 50:08
  go viral by finessing the first 15 seconds of the hook?
• 50:13
  And I'm like, if you can't,
• 50:15
  then there's a little bit more that I know about marketing,
• 50:17
  and Alex Chamozzi and Gary Vee know about marketing
• 50:20
  and not putting myself at that level.
• 50:21
  They're phenomenal marketers and much better than me.
• 50:24
  But I mean, there's something to be said for what you know.
• 50:28
  And there's also a time when you have to just relax
• 50:32
  and be open to knowing, be open to the concept of,
• 50:36
  I don't know what I don't know.
• 50:37
  I think that's an incredible thing.
• 50:40
  And honestly, I wish somebody caught me 10 years ago
• 50:44
  when I was that VP that knows everything.
• 50:47
  Oh my God, I know everything.
• 50:49
  Mine said his crap.
• 50:50
  It doesn't exist.
• 50:51
  And I was the person that knows everything.
• 50:55
  And in fact, I think because I knew everything,
• 50:59
  theoretically, right?
• 51:01
  That's why the downed inspire was so painful
• 51:04
  because I think it was just humbling to realize
• 51:07
  how much I didn't know.
• 51:09
  And there's this cliche.
• 51:10
  The biggest thing is what you don't know,
• 51:13
  but it is so freaking true.
• 51:15
  Like I wish somebody slapped me in the face 10 years ago
• 51:18
  and said, no, you don't.
• 51:20
  Now listen, right?
• 51:21
  And the truth is that in every conversation,
• 51:25
  there's two frames, right?
• 51:27
  And the stronger frame always wins.
• 51:29
  And unfortunately, I was this VP was a very strong frame,
• 51:33
  a lot of great energy, great background
• 51:36
  in my strong frame always won.
• 51:37
  So people didn't stand up to me and said,
• 51:40
  no, you're not listening, and I wish they did
• 51:44
  because the amount of things I did not know Scott,
• 51:48
  it's actually embarrassing.
• 51:51
  And I wish somebody told me my journey
• 51:55
  towards entrepreneurship would have been a thousand times
• 51:58
  or a million times easier if I would just a little more open
• 52:02
  to ideas, a little more open to the fact
• 52:04
  that mine said is real.
• 52:06
  That the reason why I was not taking action
• 52:08
  is because of fear.
• 52:10
  And what will people say?
• 52:11
  It wasn't the strategies, the strategy was easy.
• 52:13
  Write a post that this is what you wanna do.
• 52:16
  It wasn't complicated, but I made it complicated
• 52:19
  because I was scared.
• 52:20
  But you don't wanna admit that fear is numbing, right?
• 52:23
  Like why would you?
• 52:24
  I'm this badass person.
• 52:26
  So, you know, like I learned so much along the way.
• 52:30
  And I think there's like this really beautiful thing
• 52:33
  that you alluded to and you said it, you know, so well,
• 52:38
  you have to trust yourself on one hand, right?
• 52:40
  Like if you don't trust yourself,
• 52:43
  you will never be extraordinary.
• 52:44
  That's versatile.
• 52:46
  But on the other hand, if you don't realize
• 52:48
  that you are in learning mode all the time,
• 52:51
  you are this one year old
• 52:53
  that always needs so strive for understanding,
• 52:55
  understand, understand, learn, learner
• 52:57
  because there's endless things that you don't understand.
• 53:01
  And I'm right now, I'm paying about a million dollars
• 53:04
  this year for different coaches.
• 53:06
  I have a coach for this business
• 53:08
  to take me to 20 plus middle of it.
• 53:11
  I have, you know, for the podcast
• 53:12
  and for the LinkedIn and for the Instagram, you know,
• 53:14
  like I have, seriously, like I've invested so much
• 53:17
  and I'm the person that didn't even believe in coaches.
• 53:20
  What?
• 53:21
  Okay, like I thought they were all BS
• 53:24
  and all were brought, you know, you can do it.
• 53:26
  I'm like, no, there's people that have walked the walk
• 53:29
  and if I can learn from them, how much is that worth it for me?
• 53:33
  So I switched, I knew that earlier.
• 53:36
  It's just fascinating how experience really clouds
• 53:40
  somebody's perception of what they don't know.
• 53:42
  It's, it's what.
• 53:44
  And we're working with the directors, VPs all the time.
• 53:47
  I know you are.
• 53:48
  I know, so you see it.
• 53:49
  You see it all the time.
• 53:50
  And I try to shake them up and say, I was you,
• 53:54
  not listening, right?
• 53:56
  Because I was dumb and that in only when they truly listen,
• 54:00
  this is where you see suddenly people move
• 54:02
  from directors to sea level
• 54:03
  and to create incredible things.
• 54:05
  And we had so many, you know,
• 54:06
  selling their company for $10 million.
• 54:08
  And we had one that is now expert in M&A
• 54:11
  and one that started a fund for $20 something million.
• 54:13
  And like now we're seeing people do incredible things,
• 54:16
  but it's only when they realize how much they didn't know first.
• 54:20
  That has to come first.
• 54:21
  It's like, you know, all the conversations I have,
• 54:25
  self-awareness keeps coming up like again and again
• 54:28
  and again and again.
• 54:29
  And I think that there is a self-awareness,
• 54:34
  a massive lack of self-awareness in society.
• 54:37
  And I think the people that are the most successful
• 54:39
  have the most self-awareness they have to.
• 54:42
  I think so anyway.
• 54:43
  And John Maxwell said it so well with the lid, right?
• 54:46
  Like you think your lid is somewhere
• 54:49
  but you actually have this leadership lid
• 54:51
  and your success will never go beyond that lid
• 54:55
  that you actually have in yourself.
• 54:56
  So that self-awareness is really important
• 54:59
  and it's so easy to quad our view.
• 55:02
  I think it's definitely another thing.
• 55:04
  I like sort of painting these pictures of conflicting ideas
• 55:08
  and wrestling with these two conflicting ideas.
• 55:10
  So the other conflicting idea that I have for you to think through
• 55:14
  is we're talking about for a zone of genius you're focusing
• 55:19
  on the things that move the needle the most in your business
• 55:22
  or the things that will move the needle the most
• 55:23
  even in your life.
• 55:25
  And that's what you should focus on
• 55:26
  and you're not trying to be a jack of all trades.
• 55:28
  However, there is a point where you do have to upskill.
• 55:33
  So what are the things that you have to,
• 55:36
  and you can, I mean, just to think about a few
• 55:38
  it could be, it could be tech,
• 55:40
  it could be understanding AI, it could be understanding
• 55:43
  social media and marketing or whatever.
• 55:45
  There's a whole bunch of the things, right?
• 55:47
  So what are the things that you are in your mind transitioning
• 55:54
  from VP to business owner and entrepreneur
• 55:57
  and speaker and author and podcaster and all the stuff
• 56:00
  that are sort of like the mission critical skills,
• 56:03
  could be hard skills, could be soft skills
• 56:05
  that you've had to incorporate into your own life
• 56:07
  to be successful.
• 56:09
  This is a great question because like you said,
• 56:11
  it is a balance, right?
• 56:12
  So you're on a focus on one hand, yeah.
• 56:15
  Yeah, I'm learning all the time, all the day, you know,
• 56:18
  and again, like I said, I'm investing in like a million dollars
• 56:21
  and learning as fast as I can so that we can grow, right?
• 56:25
  The way I look at it in, you know, there's basically,
• 56:31
  like you wanna, I mean, there's gonna be things
• 56:33
  that you're just incompetent about, right?
• 56:35
  Like again, you know, my joke about the kitchen, true, right?
• 56:39
  There's things that you're competent about,
• 56:41
  but you're just, it's never gonna be your secret sauce.
• 56:45
  Like I could have continued writing code in Intel,
• 56:49
  but that would never be what I'm shining in, right?
• 56:52
  Like I could always see the people that, oh my God,
• 56:55
  I can call the full day all day, this is so fun.
• 56:58
  And I'm like, no, there you go.
• 57:00
  And for me, it was low for the interaction with the clients
• 57:04
  and the people and putting that business, you know,
• 57:08
  accum together with the people that made it really fun for me.
• 57:12
  And so if I'm being really honest,
• 57:13
  I was looking for that combination of people, business,
• 57:17
  for a long time, and that's why I did all these roles
• 57:19
  of technical sales and product management, then, you know,
• 57:24
  operations and leaders.
• 57:26
  And so I was looking for that too, right, for a while.
• 57:30
  So it takes, first of all, some time to really nail that zone
• 57:32
  of genius and don't be afraid of experimenting.
• 57:35
  So that would be what I would say to your audience, right?
• 57:37
  Like experimenting is the right mechanism.
• 57:39
  Start-ups need to experiment all the time
• 57:42
  in order to find where their market fit is.
• 57:44
  Why are we so afraid as individuals to do that too, right?
• 57:48
  So first of all, it's been a lot about experimentation.
• 57:51
  But once you find this thing, and for me,
• 57:53
  that passion became really helping people
• 57:55
  with the same thing that I had, you know,
• 57:58
  to really reinvent the leap so that they can do it again,
• 58:00
  again, and become the best version of themselves.
• 58:03
  And once you have that, now you can say,
• 58:05
  okay, so now, what do I need to learn
• 58:08
  to make it do the first million?
• 58:09
  What do I need to learn to make it do the first 10 million?
• 58:11
  What do I need to learn?
• 58:12
  You know, it's because now there's things like there's sales,
• 58:15
  there's marketing, like you said,
• 58:17
  like I don't know how to do this, you know,
• 58:18
  editing thing, whatever.
• 58:20
  How do I hire?
• 58:21
  Who do I hire?
• 58:22
  How much do I pay?
• 58:23
  How do I train?
• 58:24
  You know, how do I scale?
• 58:26
  Like I can go in and on, like I mean,
• 58:28
  I just came back from a course on finance.
• 58:30
  Like I don't know enough finance, like I know enough finance
• 58:32
  to put, you know, some random check of $50,000
• 58:36
  on an entrepreneur that I cared about,
• 58:37
  but I don't know anything about finance.
• 58:39
  Like it's a very different thing.
• 58:41
  So you're learning all the time,
• 58:43
  but as long as you know this is getting you closer
• 58:46
  to your goal, that's where, you know,
• 58:48
  that's where you want to be.
• 58:49
  And again, for me, it's about eventually championing
• 58:53
  those who really dare to dream,
• 58:55
  but in order to do that, I need to dream too.
• 58:58
  And that's why, you know, like for me,
• 59:00
  I need to keep on pushing my dreams,
• 59:03
  keep on being surrounded with incredible people.
• 59:06
  That's why I have the podcast that I get
• 59:08
  to talk to incredible people.
• 59:09
  That's why I go to Richard Branson Private Island
• 59:11
  because he inspires me.
• 59:13
  So that's why I need to constantly move my lid of belief.
• 59:17
  And that's the only time I can actually start
• 59:20
  helping more people move their belief as well.
• 59:23
  So I hope that answers the question.
• 59:24
  It does.
• 59:25
  And I'm also curious for you as a business owner
• 59:28
  and an entrepreneur, you, I mean,
• 59:31
  you've done all the right things.
• 59:32
  You've immersed yourself with people
• 59:34
  that are a couple steps ahead of you
• 59:37
  and far, far ahead of you through your network
• 59:39
  and your connections and your podcast,
• 59:41
  you're investing in coaching and consulting
• 59:43
  a little bit curious about that
• 59:45
  because I know not every entrepreneur
• 59:47
  invests that much money in coaching
• 59:49
  for sure that's a lot of money to invest in coaching.
• 59:52
  But then you, you know, you figure out what things
• 59:54
  are KPIs or metrics you got to track
• 59:56
  and you figure out the activities
• 59:57
  to sort of move them forward.
• 59:59
  That's a lot.
• 1:00:00
  So that's very overwhelming.
• 1:00:01
  So I think that this is a great conversation
• 1:00:03
  for somebody who is just starting to build
• 1:00:05
  if you're going to give advice for an entrepreneur
• 1:00:07
  to say they really do want to start to build.
• 1:00:10
  They have their own, they have their zone of genius,
• 1:00:12
  they've sort of listened to this whole show so far
• 1:00:15
  and then they're like, listen, okay,
• 1:00:16
  if entrepreneurship, even after I figure out
• 1:00:19
  my zone of genius is going to take
• 1:00:20
  all these different new things that I have to learn
• 1:00:23
  plus, plus a million dollars a year in coaching,
• 1:00:27
  forget about it.
• 1:00:28
  No.
• 1:00:29
  So let's, let's, I mean, you're the perfect candidate
• 1:00:32
  for this sort of case study
• 1:00:34
  because you transitioned out of corporate
• 1:00:35
  and you now made not only your first million
• 1:00:37
  not only your first 10 million
• 1:00:39
  but that you started out your first million.
• 1:00:40
  So how did you find product market fit for your zone
• 1:00:43
  of genius because there's, you know,
• 1:00:45
  the concept of Ikki guys.
• 1:00:47
  It's what you're passionate about,
• 1:00:49
  what the market needs and what you're good at, right?
• 1:00:53
  So there's these Venn diagram of the three things
• 1:00:56
  and the zone of genius is, I guess,
• 1:00:58
  the similar Venn diagram intersection.
• 1:01:01
  So it's not only what you know and what you're good at
• 1:01:04
  but the market needs it and you have to be able
• 1:01:06
  to actually do the thing.
• 1:01:09
  How do you figure out for yourself?
• 1:01:11
  Look, leap, how did you figure out
• 1:01:12
  there was a market need, product market fit
• 1:01:15
  to get you to your first million dollars?
• 1:01:17
  So it's a great question and I want to put,
• 1:01:19
  you know, first start with, you know, the numbers, right?
• 1:01:23
  Like you don't invest the million dollars
• 1:01:25
  if you don't know where this is going
• 1:01:27
  where the ROI is, right?
• 1:01:28
  Like first of all, let's put some caveat.
• 1:01:31
  And also like let's be real.
• 1:01:32
  First of all, we talk about that not everybody
• 1:01:34
  wants to be entrepreneur and I also gonna say
• 1:01:38
  not everybody wants to work as hard as I do, right?
• 1:01:41
  So I don't want to make it sound like I sit
• 1:01:44
  on the beach all day and collect the money.
• 1:01:46
  I'm the hardest worker I know
• 1:01:48
  and not everybody wants to work that hard.
• 1:01:51
  So the fact that I told you see how this can become
• 1:01:54
  a billion dollar company and I will do whatever it takes
• 1:01:57
  to get there, that's not necessarily
• 1:01:59
  where everybody else is going, right?
• 1:02:01
  So first of all, you need to find your own journey
• 1:02:03
  and what's right for you.
• 1:02:04
  And this is also where the must have really helped
• 1:02:07
  because you know, if you want a quick, you know,
• 1:02:09
  I just want some, you know, bigger paycheck
• 1:02:12
  and you know, to just cruise and do some,
• 1:02:16
  you know, fun things on the side, this is not it.
• 1:02:18
  And that's okay.
• 1:02:19
  So first of all, just kind of like putting a little bit
• 1:02:22
  of perspective and that's also not how I started.
• 1:02:25
  So I started with probably investing about,
• 1:02:28
  I don't know, 5K and you know, that helped me get
• 1:02:31
  to the first whatever 15K.
• 1:02:33
  And then I say, you know, put 30 and that helped me
• 1:02:36
  get to 100K and then I put 100 and that got me
• 1:02:39
  to the first two, three million.
• 1:02:41
  You know, like it, there was like a rhythm there.
• 1:02:44
  So you don't just start with shielding money
• 1:02:46
  if you don't know where the ROI is.
• 1:02:48
  But I will go back to experimenting
• 1:02:50
  because I think one of the things that companies do so well
• 1:02:53
  and I was mentoring in the biggest startup accelerators
• 1:02:55
  like in Google, you know, Google accelerator
• 1:02:58
  in Singularity University and I was teaching
• 1:03:00
  Carnegie Mellon and other places.
• 1:03:02
  And one of the things that I realized,
• 1:03:04
  it's so common for us to help companies experiment
• 1:03:08
  or startups experiment with how do you find your first clients?
• 1:03:12
  Is there a market fit?
• 1:03:13
  Like how do I assess it?
• 1:03:14
  And for some reason, people don't do this for themselves.
• 1:03:19
  So the one thing that I would say is,
• 1:03:21
  hey, it's easy to test, so cheap.
• 1:03:24
  Like let's see if there's the demand.
• 1:03:26
  Like let's put an ad together.
• 1:03:27
  Let's put a landing page and just see if something comes up.
• 1:03:31
  Let just post somebody, you know, something and see,
• 1:03:34
  you know, people say, yes, I'm interested.
• 1:03:36
  Like that's all it takes initially
• 1:03:38
  because initially you're not looking for 100 clients.
• 1:03:40
  You won't even know what to do with 100 clients.
• 1:03:43
  What you're looking for initially is those 5, 10 individuals
• 1:03:47
  or one or two corporate that will say, yes, I do.
• 1:03:50
  So initially we're not looking at big numbers.
• 1:03:53
  So all we need to do is a few really, really cheap, free ways
• 1:03:57
  basically to just let's get this off the ground.
• 1:04:00
  Let's test it.
• 1:04:02
  And the beautiful thing is not only you test the man,
• 1:04:04
  but you also test it this is what you want to do.
• 1:04:06
  And once you do, you learn more.
• 1:04:08
  And now you can like take it to a next level.
• 1:04:11
  You can change the pricing.
• 1:04:12
  You can start scaling.
• 1:04:13
  You can decide how you want to scale.
• 1:04:15
  So I really believe those experimentations
• 1:04:18
  are really, really critical.
• 1:04:19
  And I don't think enough people do that.
• 1:04:22
  Very, very smart.
• 1:04:23
  Okay.
• 1:04:24
  What did we not, we went into a lot.
• 1:04:26
  What did we not go into?
• 1:04:27
  What did we not talk about yet?
• 1:04:29
  Trying to, yeah, I can go into everything.
• 1:04:31
  We went through a lot.
• 1:04:32
  We went through a lot, a lot.
• 1:04:33
  Okay, so we can say, like listen, I want people to know.
• 1:04:38
  I'll ask a couple of questions just to close it out.
• 1:04:40
  But where can people, like you're working on leap academy
• 1:04:42
  now, even just a quick description of what that is,
• 1:04:46
  who it's for and where people can find you and leap academy.
• 1:04:50
  So just so that it's in the in the podcast.
• 1:04:52
  And then I'll put it in the show now to see
• 1:04:53
  what's some links and whatnot.
• 1:04:54
  Awesome.
• 1:04:55
  So we help driven professionals,
• 1:04:57
  or driven individuals that really are feeling either stuck
• 1:05:01
  or they feel like there's a lot more that they can do
• 1:05:04
  to really reinvent and leap in their careers,
• 1:05:07
  leap their reputation, leap their income,
• 1:05:09
  leap their capabilities,
• 1:05:11
  and really become the best version of themselves.
• 1:05:13
  And whether that means that they need to just land
• 1:05:15
  a job right now and then leap again again,
• 1:05:17
  or whether they want a faster leadership
• 1:05:19
  or want to jump to a entrepreneurship
• 1:05:21
  or play with a portfolio career,
• 1:05:23
  that's what we want to help them do.
• 1:05:25
  And it's leapacademy.com.
• 1:05:27
  And my email is elanaethleapacademy.com.
• 1:05:30
  It's really simple.
• 1:05:32
  And I'm probably gonna push it to my team.
• 1:05:34
  But the one thing that I will say is,
• 1:05:36
  and if I may, because you asked what we didn't talk about
• 1:05:39
  and I will just say it one thing,
• 1:05:42
  leaping is a habit.
• 1:05:43
  And once you learn the skill,
• 1:05:45
  you can just apply it again, again, again.
• 1:05:47
  So one of the things that people ask us
• 1:05:49
  is you just started a podcast.
• 1:05:51
  How are you already top charts in education, right?
• 1:05:54
  Like that doesn't make sense.
• 1:05:55
  And the reason is because we're just applying
• 1:05:58
  the same skills again and again and again, right?
• 1:06:01
  You want to join boards, you do the same.
• 1:06:03
  You want to do public speaking, you do the same.
• 1:06:05
  You find your clarity, you find your story,
• 1:06:07
  you're a linear network, you're a linear repetition.
• 1:06:09
  Like it's really not rocket science.
• 1:06:11
  So when you learn this skill,
• 1:06:13
  you can apply it again and just start taking the boxes
• 1:06:17
  and live a life of dreams.
• 1:06:18
  So I think that's a great example.
• 1:06:21
  I love that.
• 1:06:22
  Okay, if you were going to,
• 1:06:25
  if you look back at all the different things
• 1:06:27
  that you've accomplished through your life,
• 1:06:29
  through your career,
• 1:06:32
  and I also, I don't,
• 1:06:33
  I use to ask this question all the time.
• 1:06:35
  I don't ask it because a lot of people
• 1:06:37
  have the same answer to it,
• 1:06:38
  but I want to understand your perspective on this question
• 1:06:42
  as well as some of the people
• 1:06:45
  who are later stage in their career,
• 1:06:47
  their perspective on this question
• 1:06:48
  because I know that you will have answers for them as well.
• 1:06:51
  But the question is what does success mean to you?
• 1:06:53
  So what does success mean to you
• 1:06:55
  and your life and your business
• 1:06:56
  as an entrepreneur who's gone through
• 1:06:57
  like very distinct different careers?
• 1:07:01
  But also what does success look like
• 1:07:05
  for somebody who's at a later stage?
• 1:07:06
  What should people aspire to be like or to emulate?
• 1:07:11
  So that's a beautiful question.
• 1:07:12
  It will vary.
• 1:07:14
  So one of the things that we're hearing
• 1:07:16
  are pretty much three types of answers
• 1:07:19
  and I'll then say kind of blind.
• 1:07:21
  So one is we hear people that basically want
• 1:07:26
  to tick the box of the C suite
• 1:07:27
  or just tick the box of that corner office,
• 1:07:30
  managing a large team.
• 1:07:32
  I just need to feel and it doesn't matter if
• 1:07:34
  because they need to tick the box,
• 1:07:35
  they want to prove to their family
• 1:07:37
  that they tick the box.
• 1:07:38
  It really doesn't matter.
• 1:07:39
  But they're that driven,
• 1:07:41
  they did everything right
• 1:07:42
  and they just want to see themselves in that corner office.
• 1:07:45
  And the second thing that we're hearing is freedom.
• 1:07:49
  And freedom, I think it varies,
• 1:07:52
  like I call it freedom to choose
• 1:07:54
  because the freedom to choose can be,
• 1:07:56
  I want the bigger house,
• 1:07:58
  I want the house at the lake,
• 1:07:59
  I want the second home, I want to fly first class,
• 1:08:01
  but it can also be,
• 1:08:03
  I want the freedom to know that money is not an issue
• 1:08:07
  and I want to create everything
• 1:08:08
  and I want to donate to nonprofit that I care about
• 1:08:11
  and I want to create my own nonprofit
• 1:08:12
  and that is a big portion.
• 1:08:15
  And the third thing is more that legacy,
• 1:08:18
  thought leadership,
• 1:08:19
  to really feel like you have a name
• 1:08:23
  and you're moving people
• 1:08:25
  and you get the status
• 1:08:27
  and you find yourself on your finance
• 1:08:30
  or on the big stage
• 1:08:32
  and you just feel like,
• 1:08:34
  oh my God, look what I created, right?
• 1:08:37
  So we do see a little bit of kind of people
• 1:08:41
  kind of splitting to some of these
• 1:08:43
  in terms of where they want to go
• 1:08:46
  and kind of what there's the big thing for them.
• 1:08:48
  For me personally,
• 1:08:51
  if you would have asked me probably two, three years ago,
• 1:08:54
  my answer would have changed.
• 1:08:56
  My answer was basically just to feel like I've been successful
• 1:08:59
  to feel proud, to feel accomplished.
• 1:09:01
  And only three years ago,
• 1:09:04
  you still hadn't felt that.
• 1:09:06
  Because of my big, downed spiral,
• 1:09:08
  I think I shattered my whole view on myself.
• 1:09:12
  You know how ridiculous that sounds though?
• 1:09:15
  Given like what you've accomplished.
• 1:09:17
  No, I'm serious.
• 1:09:18
  You've accomplished so much.
• 1:09:19
  It's pathetic.
• 1:09:21
  But it's true.
• 1:09:22
  Like it's shattered every confidence level that I had.
• 1:09:25
  Well, if you ask me now,
• 1:09:27
  after I know what we achieved
• 1:09:31
  and maybe being inspired by people like Richard Branson
• 1:09:34
  and others,
• 1:09:36
  what I realized is that there is a level of impact
• 1:09:40
  that I didn't even realize exists.
• 1:09:43
  And obviously we get a lot of impact here in leap academy.
• 1:09:47
  I know we change people's lives.
• 1:09:49
  I mean, we change probably almost 1,000 lives a year, right?
• 1:09:52
  Like it's a big number.
• 1:09:54
  But I also know,
• 1:09:55
  and you know, when we change our lives,
• 1:09:57
  their families are better,
• 1:09:58
  their companies are better, their role models,
• 1:10:00
  there we change societies,
• 1:10:01
  we create a better life in better world.
• 1:10:04
  But what I realized is there's a different level of impact
• 1:10:08
  that I would love to aspire to.
• 1:10:11
  First of all,
• 1:10:12
  because I would love to move the needle on millions of people
• 1:10:15
  and kind of be able to change millions of lives
• 1:10:19
  and a billion people in the world.
• 1:10:22
  That's kind of how we say it for our company.
• 1:10:24
  But what I realized is that when you build
• 1:10:28
  a specific personal brand
• 1:10:29
  in a specific level of success,
• 1:10:32
  you can actually call almost anyone in the world.
• 1:10:34
  And you can actually create bigger things
• 1:10:37
  than you ever imagined.
• 1:10:39
  And if I could, you know, kind of have a crystal ball
• 1:10:42
  about where my next 10, 12 years, 15 years are going,
• 1:10:48
  this is where my crystal ball is going.
• 1:10:50
  I love that.
• 1:10:51
  How much, just to add a dendum onto that question,
• 1:10:56
  how much of,
• 1:10:57
  if you mentioned freedom and freedom to mean a lot of things,
• 1:11:00
  you made a lot of money as an engineer,
• 1:11:02
  obviously I'm assuming for Intel engineer,
• 1:11:04
  that's a decent sized paycheck.
• 1:11:06
  I mean, making a lot of money as an entrepreneur,
• 1:11:10
  how much money do you think people need to make
• 1:11:12
  to truly be comfortable?
• 1:11:13
  Because I think that it's a lot more than a lot of us think,
• 1:11:17
  like I don't think that 100K in Canada,
• 1:11:21
  I'm Canadian, 100K in Canada after tax,
• 1:11:23
  cost of living in Toronto is really hard, right?
• 1:11:27
  That's not, that's actually not a lot of money.
• 1:11:29
  But I think that it's a lot less than $5 million,
• 1:11:35
  $10 million a year.
• 1:11:36
  For most people.
• 1:11:38
  So I'm curious in your experience with all these executives,
• 1:11:41
  some of those executives are pulling big paychecks too,
• 1:11:44
  like some of them are, they're not, they're not making nothing.
• 1:11:46
  So what do you think that like perfect amount is
• 1:11:49
  based on your experience as a W2 entrepreneur
• 1:11:53
  dealing with execs?
• 1:11:55
  It's a great question and I think it's a really hard one
• 1:11:59
  to answer because the interesting thing is,
• 1:12:01
  as human beings, the more we make, the more we somehow,
• 1:12:05
  make use of it, right?
• 1:12:09
  So I think there's, again,
• 1:12:10
  when I came to the US for the first time,
• 1:12:13
  I just made 60K and I was so proud of myself
• 1:12:16
  because they basically asked,
• 1:12:17
  how much did you make in Israel?
• 1:12:19
  And I just flopped the answer
• 1:12:22
  and I didn't even think that we're not paid the same.
• 1:12:25
  So it took me a few years to realize,
• 1:12:27
  oh, okay, yeah, I'm the lowest paid engineer
• 1:12:30
  probably ever in Silicon Valley.
• 1:12:32
  So I think it's also,
• 1:12:35
  so I needed to kind of learn also the hard way
• 1:12:37
  to negotiate and charge my worth.
• 1:12:40
  But I will also say that it changes, right?
• 1:12:42
  Because somehow I was okay with making that amount.
• 1:12:47
  And right now, I think it's very, I mean,
• 1:12:51
  again, it's not necessarily what we take home obviously, right?
• 1:12:54
  But even as a company, you know,
• 1:12:57
  if we're making less than half a million a month,
• 1:13:01
  we're in trouble as a company, you know what I'm saying?
• 1:13:03
  So the number has changed.
• 1:13:06
  But it's not like your lifestyle changes dramatically either
• 1:13:08
  because a lot of that, especially as an entrepreneur,
• 1:13:10
  you're putting that money back into the company anyway.
• 1:13:12
  So you're putting it back to growth, right?
• 1:13:15
  And I think that's also where you need to decide
• 1:13:17
  what your priorities are.
• 1:13:18
  So I barely take paycheck right now.
• 1:13:20
  I just keep pushing it on more hires, more ads,
• 1:13:23
  more marketing.
• 1:13:25
  So I barely take anything because I'm so believe
• 1:13:28
  on what we're creating and I just want to make sure
• 1:13:31
  that we keep on changing more and more lives.
• 1:13:34
  But on the other hand, I do live a dream
• 1:13:36
  and I find myself on a cruise ship
• 1:13:38
  through the Bahamas with celebrities and, you know, whatever.
• 1:13:41
  Like I do allow myself to live in incredible lives
• 1:13:45
  that I don't know if I could ever imagine.
• 1:13:48
  But I try to also create a lot of impact and a lot of change
• 1:13:52
  and to donate a lot more than I ever could.
• 1:13:56
  And also know like he buys other things
• 1:13:58
  that I don't think I knew in advance.
• 1:14:00
  So just to kind of like say what you know,
• 1:14:02
  I mean, with professionals, I mean,
• 1:14:05
  we worked with professionals all the way from
• 1:14:08
  trying to get to the first six figures
• 1:14:10
  all the way to people who landed $2 million rolls a year.
• 1:14:14
  Yeah.
• 1:14:15
  And $2 million with no responsibility, you know.
• 1:14:18
  You don't have a superdarsive responsibility.
• 1:14:20
  So let me tell you, they're going to make
• 1:14:22
  a lot more than me for sure.
• 1:14:24
  But the interesting thing is, so again,
• 1:14:27
  we see a variance and we see all this, you know,
• 1:14:30
  but I think this pros and cons in that too
• 1:14:32
  because I call it the golden, you know, handcuffs.
• 1:14:35
  Like they feel like they can't leave
• 1:14:38
  and they're trapped now.
• 1:14:39
  And again, some people are like,
• 1:14:40
  well, I'm not going to cry about that.
• 1:14:41
  But the truth is they don't necessarily live the life
• 1:14:44
  that they want.
• 1:14:45
  They travel as much of the company wants.
• 1:14:47
  They don't see the kids as much as they want.
• 1:14:49
  You know, like there's like there are drawbacks to that.
• 1:14:52
  So I think that's also where it kind of comes back
• 1:14:54
  to the Mustavs and really to the side.
• 1:14:59
  So one of the big moments in my life
• 1:15:01
  and kind of how I came with the square focus in the Mustavs
• 1:15:06
  is when, you know, I got an opportunity
• 1:15:08
  to be somebody very, very high up
• 1:15:12
  in one of the big companies that we know.
• 1:15:15
  And that would have meant basically flying every single week.
• 1:15:20
  Yeah.
• 1:15:21
  At that point, I tried to think about what is the number
• 1:15:23
  that will get me inspired.
• 1:15:26
  And I thought big, I was like a million dollars a year,
• 1:15:28
  two million dollars a year, three million.
• 1:15:29
  Like, is there a number that will make me
• 1:15:32
  leave my family every week again?
• 1:15:34
  And I was already there for my, you know,
• 1:15:37
  previous start I've been like, you know what?
• 1:15:38
  I don't think there's a number.
• 1:15:40
  And if there isn't a number,
• 1:15:42
  that means that it's not meant to be.
• 1:15:43
  So I think there's also a level at some point
• 1:15:46
  that you're like, you know what?
• 1:15:47
  I'm not, what am I going to do?
• 1:15:48
  Buy more clothes.
• 1:15:49
  I was like, what am I going to do?
• 1:15:51
  The only thing that I can do is donate more,
• 1:15:54
  be involved with bigger sayings, you know,
• 1:15:56
  and make sure that leap academy changes
• 1:15:58
  as many lives as possible.
• 1:16:00
  So at some point, you just don't need more cash.
• 1:16:02
  You just need fulfillment and freedom
• 1:16:04
  and to live the best life you can.
• 1:16:06
  Hello, that very, very good answer.
• 1:16:08
  I think that's smart because a lot of context,
• 1:16:11
  because I don't like when people just,
• 1:16:13
  I mean, you should never start a business for the money.
• 1:16:15
  But I don't like when people just want more for,
• 1:16:17
  and I'm a big fan of capitalism
• 1:16:19
  and making a ton of money.
• 1:16:20
  But I think that you have to figure out
• 1:16:22
  how you want to make it too, which is very important.
• 1:16:25
  Last thing I wanted to ask you just to give some last wisdom,
• 1:16:29
  bits of wisdom to the audience,
• 1:16:30
  because you've given a lot today.
• 1:16:32
  But you go back in time, you can talk to your 20 year old self,
• 1:16:36
  but it would be one thing that you would tell
• 1:16:37
  your 20 year old self.
• 1:16:38
  Wow, it's funny because I asked this,
• 1:16:41
  and it's really a hard start.
• 1:16:44
  I think one of the things that I would tell myself
• 1:16:50
  is to not go through this alone.
• 1:16:51
  I think my journey was a lot lonelier
• 1:16:54
  that it should have been in the first 20 years of my life.
• 1:16:57
  I thought that with my Air Force background,
• 1:17:00
  I need to continue that facade of everything
• 1:17:04
  is under control.
• 1:17:05
  I got this.
• 1:17:06
  I don't need to ask anybody for help.
• 1:17:08
  I will always figure this out.
• 1:17:10
  And if I need to, and I don't cry,
• 1:17:12
  don't show emotions.
• 1:17:14
  And if I need to, I will show it on my pillow,
• 1:17:16
  but I will never, you know,
• 1:17:17
  like I was just really like,
• 1:17:22
  you know, this loneliness, it's lonely.
• 1:17:25
  And there's no reason because people have walked the walk,
• 1:17:28
  people can help you get there faster,
• 1:17:30
  and people can get there higher.
• 1:17:32
  What would have happened,
• 1:17:33
  you know, the biggest cost in their life
• 1:17:35
  is always the money we're not making.
• 1:17:36
  What would have happened if I started this years ago?
• 1:17:40
  We would probably be at a hundred million now, right?
• 1:17:43
  So it's like, what was I thinking, you know,
• 1:17:46
  so I think there's something about just
• 1:17:49
  stop being alone on journeys.
• 1:17:52
  Find the person that have been roughly where you are.
• 1:17:56
  It's probably the way it's honestly us, right?
• 1:17:58
  But find the person that's been where you are,
• 1:18:01
  know where you're going,
• 1:18:02
  and they can probably get you there faster,
• 1:18:05
  higher than you ever imagined possible.
• 1:18:07
  And I wish I didn't do all of this on my own.