Latest / Crafted Clarity: Distilling the Tension Between Success and Significance / The Power of Connection: Sherman Mohr on Over 50 Pros and the Courage to Pivot | Crafted Clarity Podcast

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The Power of Connection: Sherman Mohr on Over 50 Pros and the Courage to Pivot | Crafted Clarity Podcast · Crafted Clarity: Distilling the Tension Between Success and Significance

• 0:01
  Welcome back to the tasting room.
• 0:03
  Here at Crafted Clarity, I am your host, Steve Moscato.
• 0:07
  We often talk here about the tension between what we built
• 0:11
  and what were built for. Today I am joined by a friend
• 0:15
  who has spent his career building platforms for
• 0:18
  Connection, but is currently navigating a season which I
• 0:22
  think many of you might find resonant.
• 0:25
  Sherman Moore is an entrepreneur who has navigated several major
• 0:28
  reinventions from the mortgage industry to building a
• 0:32
  successful platform for social connection called Shared
• 0:36
  Spirits. He's seen as a success from
• 0:39
  multiple angles, but lately he's been drawn towards a new kind of
• 0:44
  significance, helping those in the Over 50 demographic find
• 0:48
  their own clarity and value through a project called Over 50
• 0:52
  Pros Sherman, Pull up a chair and welcome.
• 0:57
  Thank you. Thank you.
• 0:58
  Really glad to be here, Steve. Appreciate you having me.
• 1:02
  Yeah, so we met nearly a decade ago now when you were working on
• 1:10
  a new platform called Shared, excuse me, called Shared
• 1:14
  Spirits. It was more than an app.
• 1:17
  It was about gathering people together, but even then it felt
• 1:22
  like it was something deeper, something more about sharing
• 1:26
  stories, sharing seasons, sharing meaning.
• 1:31
  What stood out to me was your heart for connection, even back
• 1:35
  then. So here we are years later and
• 1:40
  we're still talking about connection, just in a different
• 1:43
  season. So I'd love to be able to open
• 1:46
  up and just take me back to that moment when you were working on
• 1:50
  this app and what it was really about.
• 1:53
  What, why? Why was it so important for you
• 1:55
  to develop shared spirits? And tell me a little bit about
• 1:58
  shared spirits for those who don't know.
• 2:00
  Yeah, absolutely. The Genesis story is really,
• 2:05
  really around connection. I had access in the late 2000s,
• 2:13
  2007, 2008 to some space. I was always a networker.
• 2:17
  I'd been in the mortgage business in and around the
• 2:19
  Middle Tennessee market, and I was leveraging classroom space
• 2:23
  to host monthly meetups. I'd invite a speaker in and it
• 2:29
  was my first foray in a meet up. It was an entrepreneur group
• 2:32
  that I was running, was growing extremely fast, had you know,
• 2:36
  went from 200 to 1400 members in this meet up group very, very
• 2:40
  quickly. And I started conducting these
• 2:43
  monthly sessions inviting a speaker and it lasted 1824
• 2:49
  months. I met an array of people that
• 2:56
  became my partner and shared spirits, became employers,
• 3:02
  became places I stayed after divorce.
• 3:07
  The woman I married emanated from that connection in those
• 3:11
  meetings. It's hard to believe it's it's
• 3:13
  my entire late life after 47 years old can be all brought
• 3:22
  back to facilitating the connection of people.
• 3:27
  That's how important it was. So shared spirits.
• 3:31
  I was connected to my partner, Justin Maestas.
• 3:36
  I don't know what year it was, Steve.
• 3:37
  We were connected by somebody else I'd met in a wine meet up
• 3:43
  and she thought we needed to know one another.
• 3:44
  He came out to one of my networking sessions at what was
• 3:46
  Cool Springs Brewery at the time, and we connected.
• 3:50
  And a few months later we connected again at Valentino's.
• 3:54
  Many people in Nashville know Valentino's.
• 3:56
  It was one of my favorite places.
• 3:58
  And we were at the upstairs bar and he had an idea.
• 4:03
  He's spent a life in the hospitality and spirits
• 4:06
  business, wine business, and he had this idea, Man, I, I would
• 4:12
  really like to be able to send somebody a cocktail, wine or
• 4:17
  beer and they get it over to their phone and can go to the
• 4:20
  restaurant and redeem it. So as a marketing and a tech
• 4:25
  guy, I'm not a coder and I'm nowhere near the marketer and
• 4:29
  strategist URC, but I do know how to connect marketing
• 4:33
  language to technology language and technology language back to
• 4:37
  marketing language again. And so like any good marketing
• 4:42
  guy said, I can make you do, I can help you do that with with
• 4:47
  technology. It's a function of how much
• 4:51
  money and how much time you have.
• 4:53
  He and I didn't have much of either, but we started a company
• 4:57
  and started spitballing things and meeting together every now
• 5:01
  and then and some years later we both had jobs and families and
• 5:04
  stuff. Some years later we brought in a
• 5:07
  third partner. And the whole premise of shared
• 5:11
  spirits, our tag lines, literally sharing is caring.
• 5:17
  So unlike a a Starbucks card, which people always appreciate
• 5:21
  getting that little digital message in their e-mail, they've
• 5:23
  got a new $5 or $10 credit on their Starbucks card or on their
• 5:26
  phone. They're app.
• 5:29
  We thought, wouldn't it be novel to be able to treat somebody to
• 5:33
  a cocktail, wine or beer? And so that vision and that
• 5:37
  reality is now real. We're in probably 40-50 venues
• 5:44
  in Middle Tennessee, a few in Southern Florida, soon growing
• 5:49
  to Texas and have opportunities for a national footprint that
• 5:52
  should begin to take shape this year.
• 5:54
  So while you and I met and discussed this some years ago,
• 5:58
  life happens and you know it. It's now very, very real and you
• 6:06
  know, 3,000,000 lines of code later here we are so quite a but
• 6:13
  that it all began with networking and making an
• 6:16
  opportunity for people to meet one another.
• 6:17
  I I remember Steve in those meetings.
• 6:19
  It was probably six months in. Some gentleman came up to me and
• 6:24
  he said I, I don't get what's in it for you.
• 6:27
  You, you never speak. You just introduced the
• 6:30
  speakers. And I kind of laughed and I told
• 6:35
  him, I said you'll get it one day.
• 6:38
  You'll you'll understand one day.
• 6:42
  No, I love that. I mean, I love the way that, you
• 6:46
  know, you're talking about technology, you're talking about
• 6:48
  how you're the guy who just kind of put things together.
• 6:52
  But it wasn't really just about that technology.
• 6:54
  It was the technology was what enabled the people to have that
• 7:00
  connection. And I and I love that you broke
• 7:03
  it down to connection because really as as marketers, that's
• 7:09
  what we want. We want to connect people and
• 7:12
  organizations and missions and causes and things like that.
• 7:17
  And, and what I like about shared spirits is that it wasn't
• 7:20
  just what you said, just giving someone a, a, a, a gift card and
• 7:24
  then that relationship, then that transaction ends.
• 7:27
  It actually is that shared part of it.
• 7:30
  So you're actually sharing more than just a drink.
• 7:33
  And that extends actually to the to the establishment where where
• 7:38
  that, that that digital invite is actually redeemed.
• 7:43
  So I love that. That's that's very much the
• 7:46
  case. You know, it's interesting in
• 7:48
  hospitality, especially around spirits, wine or beer, you're
• 7:52
  not just delivering A commodity. You're you're not sending
• 7:56
  somebody out for a six pack or having DoorDash deliver
• 7:59
  something. When you share on shared
• 8:04
  spirits, the whole premise is that you're sharing an
• 8:08
  experience with somebody. Yeah, You're not sharing a
• 8:13
  drink. I I I'm doing this in your
• 8:16
  honor, crafting clarity's honor, By the way, It gave me a great
• 8:19
  excuse. I would have stuck on the oil.
• 8:21
  A drink. This is a 4 Roses.
• 8:27
  I would really encourage everybody to do a quick study of
• 8:30
  Four Roses. It's a wonderful story.
• 8:33
  Yeah. Unfortunately, we're not being
• 8:34
  sponsored, so we get nothing for that.
• 8:39
  But. So where did this desire for
• 8:42
  connection start? With you.
• 8:47
  That's a really terrific question.
• 8:49
  And I was doing a lot of writing on LinkedIn to have some
• 8:52
  articles that I would post every now and then.
• 8:55
  And part of it was a little bit selfie.
• 9:00
  Steve, I, I noticed that when I wrote about a specific tool or
• 9:07
  something I might have done or reported something relative to
• 9:12
  an issue, there was some traction.
• 9:15
  But the post that really garnered the most significant
• 9:21
  traction where the post where I shared the spotlight on somebody
• 9:26
  else, I pointed the spotlight to somebody else and really lifted
• 9:31
  somebody else up for the community I was connected to on
• 9:34
  LinkedIn to see. And what was digital became real
• 9:41
  with Meet Up. I saw Meet Up as perhaps the
• 9:46
  most dynamic networking tool of its time.
• 9:50
  At the time. You could go on and with a
• 9:53
  subscription run three groups for $20.00 a month, maybe 10 at
• 9:57
  the time. They could be about various
• 10:00
  topics. The network that was tied to
• 10:03
  meet up would join your meet up. You could host to things.
• 10:07
  I had a cigar group, I had an entrepreneur group.
• 10:10
  Those were the two things and there was no agenda on anything
• 10:17
  I ever did. It was only about connecting
• 10:21
  people and tying people together knowing that the outcome of that
• 10:27
  would probably benefit me, and it certainly did over time.
• 10:33
  So it was a great lesson in what I needed to do in the old days
• 10:40
  and the mortgage business was go out and make sales calls.
• 10:42
  I needed to go see people. I needed to go from one referral
• 10:45
  source to the next. It was a very traditional analog
• 10:49
  thing. Meet Up provided an opportunity
• 10:54
  to host a theme broadcast where you were going to be, what it's
• 11:03
  possible agenda may be, who might be there.
• 11:06
  The group could see who else is RSVP.
• 11:09
  Whether they showed up or not was inconsequential.
• 11:11
  You just kind of knew who was associated with things and you
• 11:16
  would host these groups. And back in the day, you know,
• 11:19
  there were establishments who who loved having an extra 20 to
• 11:23
  50 people in their lobby, whether it's a hotel, bar or a
• 11:27
  restaurant. Nowadays you almost have to
• 11:32
  secure the space with a deposit. It's a different animal in many
• 11:37
  respects, but it was a marvelous.
• 11:40
  So it was taking that old school networking and amping it up with
• 11:45
  a digital solution that still required human interaction.
• 11:50
  You know, it required leadership and human interaction.
• 11:54
  And you know, we'll probably get there to some extent, but that
• 11:59
  is been no more important than it is today.
• 12:05
  Yeah. So, so back then in that season,
• 12:09
  you were still, is it fair to say that you were still chasing
• 12:15
  success? Yes.
• 12:18
  Absolutely. All I thought about was what do
• 12:23
  I do to make this exit? What do I do to get this going?
• 12:26
  What do I do? What do I do?
• 12:27
  What do I do in the midst of being willing to live under a
• 12:30
  bridge to try to see that it happens, you know, and it was
• 12:37
  all about that. And it's been interesting.
• 12:43
  This might be where you're interested in taking me.
• 12:45
  But when I began to let that go, things became kind of better,
• 12:55
  certainly for me mostly. But you know, you can hold on to
• 13:00
  something so tight that you squeeze it to death.
• 13:05
  And sometimes you got to understand what your sump cost
• 13:13
  is and understand that you cannot get some cost back.
• 13:17
  Time goes by, money goes by. Well, let's, well, let's talk
• 13:24
  about that for a second. I mean, you brought you brought
• 13:26
  it up when I describe you to others, I describe you as an
• 13:30
  entrepreneur just because of the vision that you had with shared
• 13:33
  spirits and your latest project, which we'll talk about in a in a
• 13:38
  in a few minutes. Being an entrepreneur, you are a
• 13:42
  different animal. You are all about diving into a
• 13:47
  risk because you don't know you know what's coming.
• 13:51
  There's no security, and you're relying really on your own
• 13:54
  intuition, your own hustle relationships, of course.
• 14:01
  But you had mentioned that that was a season that really you had
• 14:07
  to let go in order to move forward.
• 14:11
  Letting go and being an entrepreneur, those seems to be
• 14:14
  conflicting ideas on the surface.
• 14:18
  So talk to me about what happened when when you're this
• 14:23
  entrepreneur, you're in one industry.
• 14:26
  You had this idea for something that is unique.
• 14:31
  It ties technology and sofa connection.
• 14:35
  It seems that that's the time you want to dig in and put more
• 14:38
  in. So what happened?
• 14:41
  Well, let's, let's, let's thank the pandemic in 2020 for some of
• 14:47
  that. We had done some technological
• 14:52
  innovations that allowed for a beta in 18 and 19 and in 20.
• 14:59
  And I was working relatively alone at the time due to some
• 15:02
  circumstances that were out of my control and, and my partner's
• 15:08
  control. My tech partner, who's their
• 15:12
  third founder, he'd done a good job of really steering the app
• 15:17
  to beta and COVID blacked it all down and we couldn't do
• 15:21
  anything. There was, you know,
• 15:23
  establishments were shut and so on.
• 15:25
  So we had to pivot. And that pivot was part of the
• 15:28
  let go. You don't know what you're going
• 15:30
  to be able to control. So you you own that and you
• 15:35
  pivot. And we pivoted by starting a
• 15:38
  promo agency that serves the spirits and wine industry
• 15:41
  because those things were available by June of 2020,
• 15:45
  technically. And we started doing that work.
• 15:48
  And over the last five years, we've grown that substantially.
• 15:52
  And that gave us the resources time to bring shared spirits out
• 15:58
  of dormancy. Build it now to the platform
• 16:02
  that it is. So things happen for a reason
• 16:06
  and you let go of something, you pivot to something else, and
• 16:13
  then when the time's right, what you might have meant to happen
• 16:17
  begins to to take place. I love it.
• 16:21
  And you let us go of it. I just let go of it for a
• 16:25
  moment. Yeah, But you had let us into a
• 16:29
  perfect conversation about pivot, about letting go of of
• 16:35
  something that was successful, but you knew inside that there
• 16:40
  is a pivot happening. We like to talk about seasons on
• 16:45
  crafted clarity. We are all in a season, whether
• 16:48
  we feel it, we understand it, we know what it is or not.
• 16:52
  We're always in a season. So we're either going into one,
• 16:57
  coming out of one or getting deeper into one.
• 17:01
  So our challenge as human beings is to one, recognize that
• 17:05
  season, and then two, to figure out what am I supposed to learn
• 17:09
  in this season? You know, in the world of
• 17:11
  whiskey, once the distillation is done, you're putting a barrel
• 17:15
  and you're sitting there for years at a time, letting the
• 17:20
  whole process do its job. And you, you know that whiskey
• 17:23
  ages. So as you're moving into the
• 17:26
  season and COVID coming out of it, letting go of, of, of what
• 17:31
  you were hanging on to describe that season between shared
• 17:38
  spirits, it's up and running. It's starting to pick up some
• 17:40
  momentum. What is that middle season look
• 17:46
  like? It looked like the need to
• 17:52
  generate some revenue and personally just what will I do
• 18:00
  with this knowledge, this expertise, this, this gained
• 18:06
  insight. And fortunately the, the people
• 18:11
  we knew in the industry I knew said, well, do you have some
• 18:15
  people that can do samplings for us?
• 18:18
  And so we began to do that. And my learning curve was steep.
• 18:27
  I had mentors, I had great people who helped, introduced
• 18:31
  more people who helped. And it's interesting.
• 18:37
  You do things enough and you begin to become expert at it.
• 18:42
  We all start by not knowing what we're doing and that kind of
• 18:48
  person who's not afraid to ask for help, I'll be the first to
• 18:51
  admit when I need it. And people were gracious.
• 18:55
  And through the course of the last five years and that pivot,
• 19:00
  I grew that division to about 1700 samplings with the help of
• 19:03
  a lot of people last year and met some phenomenal folks that
• 19:10
  ultimately inspired me to do this next iteration as well.
• 19:15
  So I think if we keep our hearts open that it's hard telling
• 19:21
  where we may go. Now, Speaking of your heart, did
• 19:28
  you have a shift in your heart, in your focus, in what's
• 19:32
  important to you as you're making the shift from shared
• 19:38
  spirits into what could possibly be next that you might not even
• 19:42
  know of yet? Yeah, I had a conversation with
• 19:52
  this. I can tell you when it happened.
• 19:53
  I had a conversation with a probably 70 year old woman in
• 19:57
  Houston who was one of our grand ambassadors and was the first
• 20:02
  job she'd done for us. I didn't know her very well.
• 20:06
  I had a conversation with her and found that three days before
• 20:09
  she'd lost her job, she. Had done a a gig for us a few
• 20:15
  days before, Has an older developmentally disabled son
• 20:21
  that she cares for and very little help, very little
• 20:24
  support. And she tugged at me, not
• 20:29
  intentionally. And I did a simple thing Steve.
• 20:32
  I just offered to pay her in advance of payday.
• 20:36
  She'd earned the money. I just offered to go ahead and
• 20:39
  then mow it to her and she started crying and I was moved.
• 20:47
  And I realized, you know, this promo work, these individuals,
• 20:57
  they, this works more important to them than sometimes it might
• 21:00
  have been to me. And I didn't really own that
• 21:03
  like I should have. And that just brought me to this
• 21:07
  place where, what can I do to continue to support this cohort,
• 21:13
  This group of people that are 50 and over who need support, who
• 21:17
  are being marginalized at work and their places of employment
• 21:21
  will likely in most cases, never secure the same level of
• 21:24
  employment and income that they might have received initially.
• 21:28
  They need more agency. They need more help than we
• 21:33
  might realize. So that was the impetus of this
• 21:35
  next heart opening, so to speak. Wow, that's incredible.
• 21:42
  I, I can just picture that moment that you know, you've
• 21:47
  hired her for a job to help support your business.
• 21:52
  And that moment turned out to be one that, if I can be bold to
• 21:57
  say it, turned your thinking from inward to outward.
• 22:02
  That. She was a means to your end, not
• 22:04
  in a nefarious way, just because you needed people and she needed
• 22:08
  work. So it was a a great thing.
• 22:11
  But that moment seems to have changed everything.
• 22:14
  Yeah. Very much so.
• 22:17
  Yeah. So there were certainly
• 22:20
  contributions before that, but she was the Nexus, yeah.
• 22:27
  So after that moment, that moment likely stayed with you
• 22:32
  for a while. What did that cause you to think
• 22:36
  and feel, and how did that change your view of your next
• 22:42
  steps? It only led to, yeah, it led to
• 22:48
  a season of research of, you know, some introspection, some
• 22:55
  more thinking in my mind around sunk cost, some more tangible
• 23:04
  plans around stepping back, and just a little way around some of
• 23:10
  the active role that I play. So I'd have some bandwidth to do
• 23:13
  something a bit more meaningful in my life and to me.
• 23:18
  And that then led to some decisions around what it is.
• 23:25
  I'm one of the offering to be around over 50 pros, and you
• 23:30
  know what I can do to help facilitate people's ability to
• 23:35
  find solutions to their problems around a little more income, a
• 23:40
  little more stability, a little more connection to community
• 23:44
  themselves. You know, Steve, my wife's out
• 23:50
  of town a couple of days as we speak and I can't believe how
• 23:55
  quiet our place is, just not hearing her work in the other
• 24:01
  room. The cats are less active and our
• 24:08
  elder population, especially those retired and above 50 to
• 24:14
  65, so much, they might still have work and know they need to
• 24:17
  make some plans. But that retired group that that
• 24:21
  might be isolated, They are hungry for community.
• 24:25
  They're hungry for connection and often times they see
• 24:30
  becoming that, that great dog Walker or that great promo pro
• 24:35
  or something like that. It's a significant contribution.
• 24:38
  Many already volunteer. So I'm just providing A
• 24:43
  mechanism for folks at over 50 pros to identify what they might
• 24:46
  be interested in, leverage their experience and desires into the
• 24:51
  next step that might lead to converting that experience into
• 24:55
  something meaningful for the next phase in their life as
• 24:58
  well. OK, well let's step back a
• 25:02
  couple seconds because we haven't talked about over 50
• 25:06
  pros yet, although you've gotten a quick peek of this.
• 25:11
  So to reframe this, you had a pivotal, A pivotal experience
• 25:17
  with a 70 year old that kind of made you think that your next
• 25:21
  step isn't really about starting a new business to be inward
• 25:27
  focused to build another business.
• 25:30
  It is more about, OK, how do I help people like this one woman
• 25:34
  who was just so moved by the fact that you were just offering
• 25:38
  to pay her in advance for something that she had done.
• 25:43
  Made you think about this population as a whole.
• 25:46
  That there are people like her who are in a situation like
• 25:50
  hers. And that your entrepreneurial
• 25:54
  spirit says, not only should I do something, but I have the
• 25:59
  ability to do it because of the way that I think and the seasons
• 26:03
  that I'm in where I'm now thinking a little bit more about
• 26:09
  what I can do. So if that's fair to say that I
• 26:14
  framed that out correctly. Tell me about over 50 pros.
• 26:19
  Your new focus, your new where you're putting your energy, what
• 26:26
  it's about, who it's for and why it's so important to you.
• 26:29
  Yeah. It's basically a, a very right
• 26:35
  now very simple platform. We have an assessment people can
• 26:40
  take. You really target the over 50
• 26:43
  pro market where they can take these assessments and within 3
• 26:48
  or 4 minutes they're delivered three recommendations around a
• 26:53
  gig match. And we provide free coursework
• 26:56
  that allows people to confidently build profiles on
• 27:01
  major platforms that then position them to be chosen by
• 27:06
  the agencies, by the individuals who are hiring on those
• 27:09
  platforms. And these are.
• 27:16
  So these are folks who are over 50 who, who, what they still
• 27:23
  feel that they can contribute, but they're maybe not finding
• 27:26
  their place in corporate American anymore.
• 27:29
  Or you know, who who, who are these people who you built this
• 27:34
  platform for? Tell me about who they are.
• 27:37
  It is for well, I've inspired by the fact that in our promo
• 27:41
  agency, the average age of our promo pros is 53 years old and
• 27:45
  some of our most effective people are over 65.
• 27:48
  One of our best salespeople, 73. So, you know, if people are
• 27:54
  really interested in outcomes, they need to be considering
• 27:58
  people over 50. It's just a reality that that
• 28:02
  that bears it out. Data bears it out.
• 28:06
  My real motivation is around equipping people who they see
• 28:14
  they're becoming invisible at work.
• 28:16
  They see they need to make some transition.
• 28:18
  They see they don't have enough saved.
• 28:21
  They see they're isolated and they know meaningful work and
• 28:27
  interaction that might be facilitated through gig work
• 28:31
  until they've learned enough about their desires, their their
• 28:35
  wishes that they become solopreneurs.
• 28:40
  It's a wonderful transitional phase that they can enter if
• 28:44
  they have a little help and a few resources.
• 28:47
  And that's what over 50 protests is really all about.
• 28:50
  OK. All right.
• 28:52
  So it's so it's for those folks who may be in transition or they
• 28:58
  may just be wanting something as a little bit more meaningful or
• 29:01
  flexible. Exactly, exactly.
• 29:04
  And you know the the if you were to poll and and we see these
• 29:08
  polls. So I do enough research that the
• 29:12
  primary emotion people over 50 are facing in most employment
• 29:16
  situations is an increasing degree of feeling invisible.
• 29:24
  They're not asked to go to the same meetings.
• 29:27
  They know something's up, and I'm wanting to play a role in
• 29:36
  helping them determine what that next phase may be.
• 29:40
  And gig work is just one of the offerings.
• 29:45
  I'm really focused on helping people flush out what that next
• 29:51
  decision might be, how they're going to leverage their years of
• 29:54
  experience. You know, I had a meeting with
• 29:56
  somebody last week who's a great example.
• 29:58
  She's one of the best online trainers in the world.
• 30:01
  She's trained literally thousands of practitioners in
• 30:05
  health and Wellness. And until I rephrased part of
• 30:11
  what she'd done, a good portion of her presentations, 30 to 40%,
• 30:16
  have been promo events where she's helped the company secure
• 30:21
  new students for the platform. She's been playing a significant
• 30:26
  role in converting millions of dollars in sales.
• 30:30
  And she didn't even know she didn't have that frame of
• 30:33
  reference to her. She was an online trainer and an
• 30:37
  educator. She didn't realize her skills
• 30:42
  had helped make a company millions of dollars.
• 30:45
  That's a reframe that sometimes, Steve, people are so deep in the
• 30:48
  forest they can't see their own assets and they need folks to
• 30:55
  call it out for. Yeah, well, what I heard as
• 31:01
  you're talking, the word connection came to mind a couple
• 31:05
  times, a couple different ways. One, the woman who started this,
• 31:10
  your promo, she was looking for connection.
• 31:17
  And when you're talking about people over 50 in the corporate
• 31:22
  world, they're starting to feel invisible, not being invited to
• 31:25
  meetings. Well, that's a lack of
• 31:27
  connection, lack of feeling like they are part of the mission,
• 31:31
  part of the cause, part of the important people, a valuable
• 31:36
  resource and and member of a team.
• 31:40
  And then when you shifted into this last story of this trainer,
• 31:44
  she's talking about how she saw herself one way.
• 31:49
  You know, she's very valuable to the company, but she didn't see
• 31:52
  herself that way. And that ties into over time, we
• 31:58
  pick up or we attach our identity to what we do, not what
• 32:03
  we're good at, not what we're called to do.
• 32:06
  So our our identity and our role.
• 32:09
  Sometimes they get tied together and they shouldn't.
• 32:13
  You know, it's about who you are, not what you do.
• 32:16
  So for you to be able to build a platform that one sees these
• 32:20
  folks that's help these folks out and help them with important
• 32:25
  connections. Because you know, us who are
• 32:27
  over 50, if we're not out there and we're not active, you know,
• 32:31
  there's less opportunity to connect with others, to be able
• 32:34
  to just have the interaction that's so important as we age.
• 32:42
  And as we, you know, our social circles tend to shrink as we get
• 32:47
  older. So you're fulfilling a lot of
• 32:51
  needs with with one approach here.
• 32:56
  So I love that. And of course, the fact that
• 33:00
  you're helping what is stereotypically a challenge
• 33:05
  demographic when it comes to technology to actually be able
• 33:08
  to leverage technology to be able to make these connections.
• 33:13
  I love that. Thank you.
• 33:17
  It's it's it's exciting work, it's fulfilling.
• 33:19
  I Every conversation is one that that surprises me right now, and
• 33:27
  I don't anticipate that will end anytime soon.
• 33:31
  So what's the feedback you're getting from the folks who are
• 33:35
  on the platform, as well as if you're getting any feedback from
• 33:39
  those who benefit from the people on the platform getting
• 33:44
  that gig work? What they feel seen, that's the
• 33:49
  primary feedback. They feel seen.
• 33:54
  We, I think, discount sometimes how important it is just to be
• 33:59
  acknowledged and appreciated and be given some hope, you know,
• 34:11
  around years of skill that somebody now diminishes.
• 34:15
  I think that's been the primary thing.
• 34:16
  They feel seen. Yeah, that is.
• 34:21
  That's huge. That's huge.
• 34:23
  Especially we're in increasingly isolated world.
• 34:26
  I think since post COVID we tend to be more OK with being by
• 34:32
  ourselves or not meeting people in person still.
• 34:35
  So OK. So for you, we've talked about
• 34:40
  you were an entrepreneur building things to make money
• 34:46
  to, you know, in your own way of being seen in the business world
• 34:51
  to having a moment to where you're like, OK, there's got to
• 34:54
  be something more than just building another company to now
• 34:59
  putting a lot of your energy into helping others be seen and
• 35:04
  helping them in a increasingly challenging part of their lives.
• 35:09
  Where are you in this whole season discussion that we've
• 35:14
  been having? I feel like I'm one of the very
• 35:19
  people that I'm helping. You know, oftentimes we write
• 35:24
  books because we need the content ourselves.
• 35:28
  We write articles because we're writing to ourselves.
• 35:31
  We composers compose because they're struggling.
• 35:36
  And you, you know, it's, it's one of those things.
• 35:39
  I'm a 65 year old guy involved in two startups.
• 35:46
  I walk the talk. I I have a season here where
• 35:54
  it's not quite time. I don't have any interest in
• 35:57
  stopping, you know, work. I love it.
• 36:00
  I love the engagement. I love what I do.
• 36:05
  I love the thought of the outcomes.
• 36:09
  But what I've begun to recognize as I've gotten older is that I
• 36:16
  want my legacy to surround certain things that I used to
• 36:20
  think might have been important. And those things aren't quite as
• 36:24
  important. I approach the gentleman I have
• 36:27
  to share the story he wrote me back.
• 36:31
  I I wanted him to be featured in my newsletter.
• 36:34
  And we feature an over 50 pro every week in our newsletter.
• 36:38
  And I see this gentleman as a very interesting guy.
• 36:43
  He travels the world facilitating a foreign trips for
• 36:48
  students. He all of his kids were born, I
• 36:53
  think, in foreign countries. He teaches foreign language.
• 36:59
  He owns a home. All three of his kids are grown
• 37:01
  with families and they own their homes.
• 37:03
  He emails me back, Steve, and he says I, I, I just don't think
• 37:07
  I'm, I'm worthy of being in your newsletter.
• 37:13
  And I emailed him back and I said, I, I, I'm going to push
• 37:15
  back. I don't understand you.
• 37:18
  You have, he said, He said I've cobbled together a life and have
• 37:24
  never really made any money. And I, I pushed back and I said
• 37:29
  I don't think you understand what I'm looking for.
• 37:32
  You've travelled the world, you've helped hundreds of not
• 37:37
  thousands of students see cultures in new ways.
• 37:40
  You've raised 3 kids who were all happy, successful.
• 37:48
  You have a house and you do an Airbnb.
• 37:51
  I, I, I think you're far more of what people look for in life
• 38:00
  than you might realize, You know, so it, it blows me away.
• 38:05
  People just don't give themselves enough credit.
• 38:09
  They just don't. Yeah, well, that speaks to the
• 38:13
  fact that, you know, we we tend to think of being significant
• 38:20
  and successful as the same thing that I'm not successful if I
• 38:25
  don't have millions of dollars in my 4 O 1K.
• 38:29
  When in reality, the goal I think is about making a life
• 38:34
  that is significant, significant, which is a line to
• 38:38
  your calling. Whatever gifts that have been
• 38:41
  given to you, you're supposed to take those and use those to
• 38:45
  benefit others. And significance is about being
• 38:50
  aligned with who you are and then to be able to just benefit
• 38:55
  others through you, just being you so.
• 38:59
  As I as I've listened to Crafted Clarity Sessions podcasts over
• 39:04
  the last few weeks and talked to that gentleman and heard his
• 39:10
  story and experienced his feedback, I thought, Oh my gosh,
• 39:15
  this is exactly what you're trying to do, Steve.
• 39:17
  You're trying to get people to understand the life they've
• 39:22
  crafted. It either may have been or could
• 39:28
  be far more significant than they realize.
• 39:31
  And yeah, it's like, Oh my goodness.
• 39:36
  And the beauty of it all is that you know, you know, it doesn't
• 39:42
  matter when you start your intentionality, It doesn't
• 39:46
  matter when how much life has passed.
• 39:49
  You always have the opportunity to stop and to reframe your
• 39:54
  mind, reframe what's important to you and really understand.
• 39:57
  And that's that distillation process.
• 39:59
  I mean, you know, to bring back in the whiskey theme here, I
• 40:02
  mean, we are all, we all have our raw ingredients.
• 40:06
  And, and so yours is different than mine.
• 40:08
  Mine is different than his. You know, but there's comes a
• 40:12
  time where, you know, we've done the distillation, which is the
• 40:16
  heat and life. Life happens.
• 40:20
  And it's how that heat and those challenges and the things that
• 40:25
  we've been through, how they shape us and then what we do
• 40:27
  with them. And then to be able to realize
• 40:30
  that we're going to have a season that's going to last who
• 40:33
  knows how long. But in that season, you, there's
• 40:36
  still work to be done, but at the end of that season, as you
• 40:40
  transition to another one, that's where you find your
• 40:42
  purpose. And I love the fact that you
• 40:45
  know, I've, I've only known you about 10 years, but I've seen
• 40:49
  you go from the one phase of I'm an entrepreneur.
• 40:53
  I'm building the next big thing because it needs to be built to.
• 40:59
  I want to take everything that I've learned and I've
• 41:01
  experienced and my special gifts and my skills and apply that
• 41:06
  something that is not only meaningful to you, but
• 41:08
  meaningful to others. I mean, again, I'm sure that for
• 41:13
  every story you hear of a 7 year old woman who's brought to tears
• 41:16
  by your kindness and by your intentionality, there's dozens
• 41:20
  of others who feel that same way because of the impact that
• 41:24
  you're making. Because you're being intentional
• 41:26
  about living out your calling and understanding the season
• 41:30
  that you're in and what that season is calling you to do and
• 41:35
  how to move. So I, I love what you're doing.
• 41:41
  Before we close here, I would love for you to be able to share
• 41:46
  where people can connect with you to follow along so they can
• 41:51
  be part of your journey. Well, they can always connect
• 41:56
  with me on LinkedIn, but what I would really appreciate them
• 41:59
  doing most is hitting my newsletter.
• 42:01
  It's called front of the check.com, frontofthecheck.com.
• 42:06
  And Steve, you can probably assess very quickly why it's
• 42:10
  called that. I'm really about the business of
• 42:13
  providing people agency so they can become the people that
• 42:20
  control who signs the front of their check.
• 42:22
  I want them to pay themselves, not just, you know, financially,
• 42:25
  but emotionally as well. Yeah, that's awesome.
• 42:31
  Well, Sherman, I, I appreciate the time that you've spent with
• 42:34
  me today and this discussion, and I love how you've been open.
• 42:39
  You've shared your journey from where you've been, what you're
• 42:43
  doing now and what's passionate for you.
• 42:47
  That's just really uplifting and encouraging for anyone who is.
• 42:53
  I'm just thinking, man, I've, I've been this.
• 42:56
  So I don't know what's next. Well, there's always room to to
• 43:01
  dig into something new and significant.
• 43:04
  So I appreciate the time that you have have spent with us
• 43:07
  today. Thank you very much, Steve.
• 43:11
  Appreciate being here. Yeah.
• 43:13
  So for for everyone who is listening here, as with all of
• 43:19
  our podcast episodes on the website under tasting room, I'll
• 43:24
  have notes and reflections about this conversation.
• 43:28
  So you can take some of the things that we've listened to
• 43:31
  and maybe apply them to yourself.
• 43:33
  So those will be on the website as well.
• 43:36
  So until next time, I'd like to remind you that Clarity isn't
• 43:41
  found, it's crafted. Thanks for listening to Crafted
• 43:46
  Clarity. If you're a leader wrestling
• 43:48
  with the tension between success and significance, or if you're
• 43:52
  trying to align your work with a deeper calling, I'd love to
• 43:55
  connect with you. If your organization is facing
• 43:57
  questions about strategy, whether it's alignment, ROI, or
• 44:01
  building confidence in your team.
• 44:03
  This is the work we do every day at ibrand.
• 44:06
  And if you walk this journey yourself, or maybe you're right
• 44:09
  in the middle of it, I'd love to hear your story and maybe even
• 44:12
  shared here on the podcast. You can find me at Craftclarity
• 44:17
  Net.