Latest / Caught on the Mike... / "Bleeding Content & Evolving Business" with Finn McKenty of the Punk Rock MBA

Transcript

"Bleeding Content & Evolving Business" with Finn McKenty of the Punk Rock MBA · Caught on the Mike...

0:28
SPEAKER_00: But if you would divert your attention away from it, what does it still rely on?
0:33
SPEAKER_00: If you would find a card growth of valuable content creators, entrepreneurs, and innovative thinkers taking up residence in your digital space.
0:42
SPEAKER_00: My next guest is an American marketing strategist, music commentator, writer, graphic designer, and he currently runs the YouTube channel at the Bunk Rock MBA.
0:54
SPEAKER_00: Finn McKenzie is joining me on the show today.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: We're going to talk about content creation, making a channel grow, and taking an analytical approach to all the things that you are passionate about.
1:06
SPEAKER_00: Ladies and gentlemen, this is Caught on the Mic.
1:17
SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much for doing the podcast.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: I really appreciate it.
1:20
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me.
1:21
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate the consideration.
1:22
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah, absolutely.
1:24
SPEAKER_00: This last year and a half, everybody's consuming content in a much different way just for full transition.
1:30
SPEAKER_00: When did something happen?
1:31
SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
1:33
SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't read the news.
1:34
SPEAKER_00: I may have missed it.
1:35
SPEAKER_00: You know, you're you're you're a smart man.
1:37
SPEAKER_00: I I saw the news that you are following.
1:40
SPEAKER_00: It's uh Sager and Crystals News, and we're we're on the same page there, my friend.
1:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:47
SPEAKER_00: But no, you know, I found your channel on YouTube during the height of it.
1:53
SPEAKER_00: And as an ex-musician myself, you know, I don't play at all anymore.
1:58
SPEAKER_00: I've always called right, I've always looked for somebody to break down the analytical stuff that I couldn't even geek out with with other musicians.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: So I've really appreciated the content, you know, getting into the minutiae.
2:15
SPEAKER_00: Um, the way I describe your channel, and correct me if this is off base, it's a little bit of a mouthful.
2:22
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of where art, business, and consumerism converge in genres and subgenres and create a moment pop culturally.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: Works for me.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: I just tell people I make videos about those Screamo bands that you liked in high school, but what you said is a lot cooler.
2:38
SPEAKER_00: Well, uh, just to kind of recap for my audience, I am talking with Finn McKenzie from the punk rock MBA.
2:45
SPEAKER_00: He is a marketing genius, in my opinion.
2:49
SPEAKER_00: Practices Brazilian jujitsu, checking all the right boxes in my world.
2:53
SPEAKER_01: I am the walking, talking stereotype of like an old hardcore guy that does podcasts in jiu-jitsu and makes uh makes videos about weird shit.
3:03
SPEAKER_01: I'm the guy.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about how did you get into merging those passions together?
3:10
SPEAKER_01: Well, I've been making content as it's called now, um, you know, since I was a kid.
3:15
SPEAKER_01: I started doing fanzines back in the early 90s.
3:18
SPEAKER_01: For anyone who's not familiar, a fanzine is like a DIY magazine.
3:21
SPEAKER_01: You know, if you came from the hardcore punk scene back then, you're familiar.
3:25
SPEAKER_01: But if you're not, you know, you would just cut and paste this thing together.
3:28
SPEAKER_01: Because I mean, this is back before a lot of people had access to computers, even I did, but uh a lot of people didn't.
3:34
SPEAKER_01: Um, you would just make this kind of homemade magazine and go find a way to steal photocopies or whatever.
3:39
SPEAKER_01: And you know, mine was like 30 pages or something like that, which was kind of big for a zine back then.
3:44
SPEAKER_01: And I ended up selling thousands of these, you know, through the mail all over the world.
3:48
SPEAKER_01: And that was sort of my introduction to content.
3:52
SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, from there I started doing stuff.
3:56
SPEAKER_01: I did I did blogging after you know, zines kind of stopped being the way to spread information.
4:01
SPEAKER_01: I started doing blogs, and then after blogs ran their course, I was like, Well, I guess I should try YouTube since that seems to be where the action is.
4:09
SPEAKER_01: Um, and so I started that, and now here I am on Twitch because you know, my thing is I I just want to be wherever people's attention is and whatever way it is, whatever way that people are currently, you know, distributing information and having interesting conversations, I want to be there.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: The online content uh was already kind of elevating pre-pandemic.
4:30
SPEAKER_00: How is the surge of creators and viewers and consumers affected how you approach the craft yourself or how others react?
4:40
SPEAKER_01: You know, I don't think it has changed the way that I I mean, I still I still have the same kind of schedule as I always did, as far as you know, how many, how many videos I make and all that kind of stuff.
4:50
SPEAKER_01: I haven't really changed anything.
4:51
SPEAKER_01: I did notice a drop in views at the beginning when you know shit was really scary and we kind of didn't know how bad this thing was going to be and all that stuff.
4:58
SPEAKER_01: And people for lots of good reasons were focused on that.
5:01
SPEAKER_01: Um, but then it came back and you know, the views were were strong.
5:05
SPEAKER_01: Um I so that hasn't really changed anything for me.
5:08
SPEAKER_01: The only thing I would say is that I do feel like people got shittier uh after a few months of it for of course for totally understandable reasons because everyone's trapped at home, people have lost their jobs or they got sick, or I mean there's just a lot of like stressful stuff.
5:24
SPEAKER_01: So if I feel like people got a little bit shittier, which is a bummer, but you know, on the other hand, I understand.
5:30
SPEAKER_01: So what can you do?
5:31
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
5:33
SPEAKER_00: If people were to go to your website, www.finmkenti.com, um, in your bio, you talk about helping people.
5:41
SPEAKER_00: Explain that a little bit.
5:43
SPEAKER_01: Uh so finmacente.com is my, I guess you would say, online resume, uh, which is just my I just thought, you know, I should have a website where I tell people who I am and what I've done.
5:54
SPEAKER_01: Because I've done a lot of kind of, you know, stuff that that that seems like it doesn't really go together.
6:00
SPEAKER_01: And I would say for one, for anybody who cares about your career, you need to be able to tell the story of who you are and what you do and why you would be a valuable addition to any team.
6:08
SPEAKER_01: And you need to be able to say that very succinctly and concisely in a way that busy executives and entrepreneurs and stuff will understand.
6:15
SPEAKER_01: Because if you're like if you're like me and a lot of other people that have kind of done a lot of different things, it's not in your head, that's a good thing because it means that you're you you have a varied skill set.
6:27
SPEAKER_01: But in the eyes of decision makers who want to hire people, it's not a good thing because you're asking them to spend bandwidth that they do not have on sort of figuring out who you are and what to do with you.
6:38
SPEAKER_01: So I would suggest that you come up with a tight, punchy way of summarizing who you are, and that's what that website is.
6:45
SPEAKER_01: So uh the way that I summarize it, I haven't looked at in a bit.
6:49
SPEAKER_01: So correct me if I'm wrong, but I I think that what I said is I help creators and entrepreneurs grow their businesses.
6:54
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
6:54
SPEAKER_01: Um, because that is it too, and it seems so simple, but it took me a long time to think of that.
7:00
SPEAKER_01: Uh, like that's probably like the eighth version of that tagline or whatever that I've come up with, because it's really hard to summarize yourself that way.
7:08
SPEAKER_01: Um, so that's really what I do.
7:11
SPEAKER_01: That's that's my sort of skill set is throughout my whole career, I've come in, like other people have started a thing and they're like, Hey, I started this thing, kind of got it off the ground, but it's you know, here's what's working, here's what's not working.
7:24
SPEAKER_01: Can you help me grow it?
7:25
SPEAKER_01: And that's kind of what I think I'm good at.
7:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
7:29
SPEAKER_00: You've done a really great job of translating your passions into a career.
7:36
SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, reading your online resume and and reading some of the places you've been and some of the journeys that you've been on.
7:43
SPEAKER_00: Give a little bit of a background of of where you went, you know, say after high school, college, and kind of the entry level of some of the other things that you've accomplished.
7:52
SPEAKER_01: Well, I took a little bit of a winding path.
7:55
SPEAKER_01: Um, as I think a lot of people do.
7:56
SPEAKER_01: And so that's the first thing I would say is like if your path, you know, you you may think that you need to have a straight path from A to B to C to success.
8:04
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and if you do, that's awesome.
8:06
SPEAKER_01: But I think most people don't have a straightforward path like that.
8:10
SPEAKER_01: So it's okay if if you feel lost.
8:12
SPEAKER_01: Um, I think that's a natural thing because I certainly did for a long time.
8:16
SPEAKER_01: Uh, after I got out of high school, I moved to Cleveland to go to hardcore shows and just do hardcore things because that's the only thing I really cared about was like hardcore and graffiti.
8:27
SPEAKER_01: Um, so I did that.
8:28
SPEAKER_01: And then while I was living there, I kind of realized that I had a passion for graphic design and that's what I wanted to do.
8:34
SPEAKER_01: So I tried to get jobs as a designer and do some freelance stuff.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: And I did a little bit of that, but it kind of never, I just I just kept bouncing off of it.
8:42
SPEAKER_01: I just was not hearing a lot of yeses or anything like that.
8:46
SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh I moved back to Seattle just sort of because for lots of personal reasons, I didn't want to live in Cleveland.
8:54
SPEAKER_01: And you know, if you've ever been to Cleveland, you can probably guess why.
8:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, but I moved back to Seattle, and that was where I was able to finally kind of get my start as a graphic designer.
9:04
SPEAKER_01: I met a guy named Chase Jarvis, who is now a pretty well-known photographer, and he started a company that I worked for called Creative Live.
9:10
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but back then he was just a local like ski photographer, basically.
9:14
SPEAKER_01: And I met him at the print shop that I was working at, and I basically just called him out of the blue and was like, Hey, we had a good conversation when you came in to get that thing printed.
9:24
SPEAKER_01: It seems like your company is doing cool shit.
9:26
SPEAKER_01: He was part of an ad agency at the time.
9:28
SPEAKER_01: Uh, seems like you guys are doing cool shit.
9:30
SPEAKER_01: I just thought I'd see if you had a job for me.
9:32
SPEAKER_01: And he said no, um, not because I sucked, but just because they didn't have budget.
9:37
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but I kept nagging him and eventually, and then I got fired from my job, but I was still able to collect unemployment for a little while.
9:45
SPEAKER_01: Um, and so I was like, hey, good news.
9:47
SPEAKER_01: Uh, I'm out of that job and I can work for free.
9:50
SPEAKER_01: And so he was like, all right, well, in that case, let's do it.
9:54
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and then I did end up getting paid.
9:56
SPEAKER_01: I did some stuff for like Nike and Nintendo and Red Bull because they were he's the fucking god of sales.
10:02
SPEAKER_01: Right.
10:03
SPEAKER_01: And he is he is the best fucking salesman I have ever known.
10:07
SPEAKER_01: He's he is a god when it comes to that shit.
10:11
SPEAKER_01: So he was able to get us some really good clients that to be honest, I was totally unqualified to work for.
10:16
SPEAKER_01: Uh, I don't think I did great for work for them, to be honest.
10:19
SPEAKER_01: Um, but you know, I did the best I could, and then I had those names on my resume, and that sort of opened the door to a lot of other things.
10:26
SPEAKER_01: I worked uh after that, I worked at a company in New York that did like uh I programmed CD, CD ROMs and DVDs because this is 2001, and you know, that's what you did back then.
10:36
SPEAKER_01: So, for a lot of like banks and stuff like that, like come some companies that don't exist anymore, like Barristern's and UBS Warburg and stuff.
10:43
SPEAKER_01: Um, hated New York, so I was like, okay, you know what?
10:46
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna admit defeat and I'm gonna go to college.
10:49
SPEAKER_01: So I ended up going to school initially for graphic design.
10:52
SPEAKER_01: I transferred out of that, graduated with a degree uh in management and marketing, because I realized kind of halfway through that business was actually my passion more so than design, although I am really glad that I have a design background.
11:03
SPEAKER_01: Uh after that, I worked for Abercrombie and Fitch doing design and marketing.
11:06
SPEAKER_01: Then I worked for Creative Live, which is an online education company for creative people like photographers and people like that.
11:13
SPEAKER_01: Uh, then uh about five, four years ago now, I uh quit that to be a partner in a company called the URM Academy.
11:22
SPEAKER_01: Uh, we teach people how to make music.
11:24
SPEAKER_01: We have two properties that people might know of.
11:26
SPEAKER_01: One is called Nail the Mix, which is for uh engineers and producers.
11:30
SPEAKER_01: So we teach you how to record and mix music.
11:32
SPEAKER_01: The other thing that we have is called riffhard.com, which is for metal guitarists.
11:37
SPEAKER_01: Uh, we started that with John Brown from the band Monuments, who's one of the kind of inventors of Gent.
11:42
SPEAKER_01: Um, and we just kind of redesigned and relaunched that thing.
11:46
SPEAKER_01: We're bringing on a guest guitarist every month.
11:48
SPEAKER_01: And the first one is Dean Lamb from ArtSpire, who is fucking insane technical death metal guitarist.
11:54
SPEAKER_01: So, any metal guitarists out there who want to get better, go to riffhard.com, check it out.
11:59
SPEAKER_01: John is a fucking god, so is Dean.
12:01
SPEAKER_01: These are the people we want to work for.
12:03
SPEAKER_01: So, all of that is to say that somehow or another I have managed to make something of myself and do some cool shit, but uh it was definitely touch and go at many, many times.
12:13
SPEAKER_01: I remember like when I was 25, uh 26, maybe I was still in college.
12:17
SPEAKER_01: I had all this debt.
12:18
SPEAKER_01: I came home and I was just in tears because I had all this fucking debt, and I did not know if I was ever going to be able to get a job that paid enough to like live and pay off this debt.
12:29
SPEAKER_01: Or I mean, it was so up in the air, you know.
12:31
SPEAKER_01: I'd been going to school for a couple of years and I was I just was sitting in my garage crying because I was so scared of would I be able to pull this off?
12:40
SPEAKER_01: And thank God I did, but it was definitely not clear uh at the time.
12:44
SPEAKER_01: And so I think for anybody listening who might be having one of those moments, just know that, you know, um, I know people hate to hear this because these days it's cool to be a victim and blame everybody else for everything and you know, make excuses for your failures and shortcomings.
12:58
SPEAKER_01: But let me tell you, if you're an able-bodied person who lives in a western country, you can do this.
13:03
SPEAKER_01: And even if you're not able-bodied, like there's, but you know, I want to recognize that there are people who have legitimate obstacles that I don't.
13:10
SPEAKER_01: But everybody else, if you're an able-bodied person in a western country, you won the fucking lottery.
13:16
SPEAKER_01: Right, you have everything you need.
13:19
SPEAKER_01: My fucking father-in-law, I'm sitting in his house right now.
13:21
SPEAKER_01: My father-in-law fucking fought in Vietnam in the jungle for seven fucking years, got thrown in prison by communists, came over here, stole a fucking boat, put his family on a boat, came over here, got a degree in computer science when he was 40 years old, and just retired after being a programmer for 20 years.
13:39
SPEAKER_01: So if that guy can do it, any of us can do it.
13:42
SPEAKER_01: So that is that is my message.
13:43
SPEAKER_01: I know people don't like hearing that because it's cooler to blame everybody else for everything, but people like him are an inspiration to me.
13:51
SPEAKER_00: You can do it.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: Listening to your story, I lead people for my day job.
13:56
SPEAKER_00: I don't talk about what I do on my show, but I lead people, and it's one of the biggest challenges I think I run into is the fact that there's six different generations in the workforce right now, right this very moment.
14:09
SPEAKER_00: And you have to manage each one of those generations.
14:13
SPEAKER_00: Each generation has a different form of currency, right?
14:16
SPEAKER_00: And you talked about the winding life path.
14:19
SPEAKER_00: You know, some of the older generations have a more straightforward you need to go A, B, C, where you get to the Gen Xers, the Xennials, and the Millennials, and it's a little bit different for each one.
14:32
SPEAKER_00: And it the differences are so extreme.
14:35
SPEAKER_00: A lot of it has to do with discipline, whether you have discipline or not.
14:40
SPEAKER_00: And uh, one of the notes I made is uh when I watch a lot of your videos, I catch little Easter eggs, and I don't know if they're intentional, but uh, like I've seen Jocko's book behind you and a few of your uh uh Jocko Willink.
14:54
SPEAKER_00: Uh uh you had the breaking points on the laptop on one of the things you posted.
14:59
SPEAKER_00: And and you post a lot about Brazilian jujitsu.
15:02
SPEAKER_00: Is discipline something you found later in life?
15:05
SPEAKER_01: No, I was uh I I guess probably born that way.
15:08
SPEAKER_01: I suppose my dad, I I had a conversation with someone I worked at at Creative Live once.
15:12
SPEAKER_01: He was like, uh for whatever reason, he I think he was just trying to figure me out or something.
15:17
SPEAKER_01: I don't know what about me, I don't know why, but he was like, So, you know, how did you how did you grow up?
15:21
SPEAKER_01: Like, what did your parents do for a living?
15:23
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, Oh, my dad was in the navy and he was a corrections officer after that.
15:26
SPEAKER_01: And he was like, Oh, that explains a lot.
15:29
SPEAKER_01: And and I never thought about that before, but I guess it does.
15:32
SPEAKER_01: Right.
15:33
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, and like doing jujitsu now, my the place I was at before was mostly cops, the one I'm at now is mostly military people.
15:41
SPEAKER_01: Um, that's just how my brain is wired, you know.
15:43
SPEAKER_01: I'm not the creative artsy mind.
15:46
SPEAKER_01: Um, I I'm somewhere between like an engineer, you know, and I don't, you know, someone engineered a cop, I guess.
15:59
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, but that's that's that's the crazy thing, is because of what you create and what your life path has been on, it's not the stereotype, you know, it's it it's it's not what people would expect.
16:12
SPEAKER_01: I tried to have a normal path, you know.
16:16
SPEAKER_01: I didn't want to have this like winding, I like I'm I didn't want any of that.
16:21
SPEAKER_02: Right.
16:22
SPEAKER_01: You know, I just wanted to have a nine to five job making a decent amount of money and just go to work and come home and not like I I didn't want to make things hard for myself, but that's how it happened, you know.
16:33
SPEAKER_01: And and just for whatever reason, I've never been a fit for those kind of jobs or sort of traditional things.
16:38
SPEAKER_01: Um, I wish I was, but it just I've never had any success, even getting my foot in the door there, other than Abercrombie, which was through a friend of mine who read one of my my old metal blog.
16:51
SPEAKER_01: So even that was like a fluke that I managed to get in there and I hated it there.
16:55
SPEAKER_01: I didn't fit in at all.
16:56
SPEAKER_01: Um, so you know, I I'm I'm not some cool person who is like all about forging my own path and doing things my way or anything.
17:07
SPEAKER_01: I I just fucked everything up so many times.
17:10
SPEAKER_01: So all right, I gotta figure this out, you know.
17:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: I I I think there's a there's a certain level of mental fortitude that comes from doing that, though.
17:19
SPEAKER_00: Like that's all all of my best lessons in life have come from mistakes.
17:23
SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, the one thing I would really credit my dad for um is that he really embedded the idea of kind of choice and consequence in me from a young age.
17:32
SPEAKER_01: Because, you know, like I remember him telling me uh he became a counselor later in his career.
17:37
SPEAKER_01: And a counselor in prison is not like, oh, let's talk about your feelings.
17:42
SPEAKER_01: It's more like, okay, you got a parole hearing coming up in nine months.
17:45
SPEAKER_01: Let's talk about how what you need to do between now and then to make that successful.
17:50
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, he would have these inmates that'd be like, you know, he'd say, Well, you gotta, you should do this job training program, uh, you should go to the senior management class, make sure you don't get any more infractions for this or that.
18:00
SPEAKER_01: And they'd be like, Fuck you, John, you can't tell me what to do.
18:03
SPEAKER_01: He'd be like, All right, I mean, you can do whatever you want.
18:07
SPEAKER_01: Uh you don't have to like it.
18:09
SPEAKER_01: In fact, I hope you don't, but this is how it is.
18:12
SPEAKER_01: And so he would always treat me the same way that I would say, I don't have to do this or I want to do that.
18:16
SPEAKER_01: And be like, Well, you can do whatever you want.
18:18
SPEAKER_01: Just what do you think is gonna happen if you do things this way?
18:21
unknown: Right.
18:22
SPEAKER_01: Is that what you want to happen?
18:24
SPEAKER_01: Okay, and so I I really appreciate that he drilled that into me at a young age.
18:29
SPEAKER_01: He's not like a hard ass or anything, he would just present me with the options and just say, All right, you pick.
18:35
SPEAKER_01: Right, you gotta live with it though.
18:36
SPEAKER_00: Right, absolutely.
18:38
SPEAKER_00: So, when the punk rock MBA took off, how did your life change or did your life change as a result of it?
18:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, for sure.
18:46
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I've been making content for a long time and people sort of knew who I was a little bit, but nothing like this.
18:53
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I've had like 40 million people watch my videos.
18:56
SPEAKER_01: So, for one, people just know who I am now in a way that wasn't true before, you know, that I have a chat with somebody from some random band for you know something related to our company and they'll know who I am already.
19:08
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
19:08
SPEAKER_01: And that I'm like, oh, I don't have to explain to you who I am.
19:12
SPEAKER_01: Like you already know me and you know what kind of videos I make.
19:14
SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
19:15
SPEAKER_01: Because just and that's a piece of advice I would have for anybody that's interested.
19:20
SPEAKER_01: It sounds like the people who watch this uh or listen to your show are sort of into their career and that sort of thing.
19:27
SPEAKER_01: Um, and just having people know who you are is tremendously valuable.
19:32
SPEAKER_01: Just know who you are and what you do.
19:34
SPEAKER_01: Like that should be a goal for you, is just be top of mind for whatever it is that you do.
19:38
SPEAKER_01: And you don't need to be like internet famous or whatever.
19:41
SPEAKER_01: That's totally unnecessary.
19:43
SPEAKER_01: Just in the circle of people who might, you know, have opportunities for you.
19:49
SPEAKER_01: Make sure that everyone knows who you are and what you do.
19:51
SPEAKER_01: So, like post on LinkedIn and whatever it is, you know, you it's gonna be different for every field.
19:55
SPEAKER_01: Go to meetups, stuff like that.
19:57
SPEAKER_01: But let's say that you are a back-end engineer, software engineer.
20:01
SPEAKER_01: Everybody that you know should know that that's what you do and should have some idea of what your particular expertise is and what your what companies you've worked at and blah, blah, blah.
20:11
SPEAKER_01: Because when the time comes that they need a person, you want to be the first one that comes to mind.
20:16
SPEAKER_01: Like, oh fuck, our engineer just gave notice.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: We need a new guy.
20:19
SPEAKER_01: Oh, we should call Mike.
20:20
SPEAKER_01: He's a back engineer, isn't he?
20:22
SPEAKER_01: That's how like so many things have have happened for me.
20:26
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and YouTube has certainly helped with that, just that people know who I am.
20:29
SPEAKER_01: Like, if I ever needed a new job, I'm pretty sure I could just ask about it on social media, and I'd probably get a lot of great, you know, uh opportunities, which I'm very grateful for.
20:39
SPEAKER_01: Um, I get recognized a pretty fair amount, um, which is weird, but everyone it's it's just strange for me.
20:48
SPEAKER_01: Nobody has ever been weird about it.
20:49
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and I I never actually intended to make, I never thought I was gonna make money for it, but I I've actually made a lot of money from it, uh, which is an amazing opportunity and surprise, which I'm really grateful for.
21:01
SPEAKER_01: I don't expect that to last forever, which is why I'm just trying to make the fucking most of this I can, because you know, it's it things don't last forever, you know.
21:10
SPEAKER_01: I mean, especially businesses, like it's very, very rare for a business.
21:13
SPEAKER_01: You look at the top companies of the SP like 35 years ago, and I think only like two of them are still like in the top 100 or whatever.
21:22
SPEAKER_00: So, do you ever feel burned out by aligning your passions together, like your passion for marketing and your passion for music?
21:29
SPEAKER_00: Does it just ever just bog you down?
21:33
SPEAKER_01: Um not really.
21:35
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, I don't have that.
21:37
SPEAKER_01: I I just I occasionally a little bit, but I'm just so grateful for the opportunity that for me to be burned out on it just wouldn't make sense to me because I have this incredible opportunity.
21:48
SPEAKER_01: I don't know, it just wouldn't make sense to me to be burned out about it.
21:51
SPEAKER_01: Like I just like let's fucking make the most of this right while I can, you know.
21:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, I get tired and stuff like anything else.
22:00
SPEAKER_01: I get burned out by I get exhausted by people being negative dicks to me all the time.
22:05
SPEAKER_01: Um, but you know, that's what I signed up for.
22:08
SPEAKER_01: You put yourself being a public figure, you're putting yourself in the line of fire, just the same as you know, leading people.
22:13
SPEAKER_01: You you signed up for you know, Sarah coming to you and telling you that she doesn't, you know, she thinks that uh Joe from the other department is mean to her and you have to like settle this.
22:24
SPEAKER_01: And right, you want to roll your eyes and like, really?
22:27
SPEAKER_01: Like, I have so many other fucking things on my plate right now, and I have to deal with the fact that Sarah and Joe don't get along.
22:34
SPEAKER_01: Well, yes, you do.
22:35
SPEAKER_01: That's your job.
22:36
SPEAKER_00: Right.
22:36
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
22:37
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: So, what is the uh what's the coolest thing that's happened to you as a result of having this channel?
22:44
SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm I'm into community.
22:46
SPEAKER_01: Um, and the fact that there's whatever, probably 120 people or something watching this right now and chatting is cool.
22:53
SPEAKER_01: There's a Discord with like 3,500 people in it that's super active.
22:57
SPEAKER_01: I this is why I read all my comments and DMs.
23:00
SPEAKER_01: Um, even if some of them are annoying and stupid.
23:03
SPEAKER_01: Like I appreciate that anybody gives a shit enough to not only watch my stuff, but to interact with me in some way.
23:10
SPEAKER_01: Um, and I just I just really value that.
23:13
SPEAKER_01: Um, so to me, that's just the coolest thing is just that there is this community of people out there who are into this stuff, and that people find each other and have cool conversations and share ideas.
23:24
SPEAKER_01: And you know, there's some people that have that I've known on the internet for like 10 years that were like graduating from high school when I when I they first started following me 10 years ago and now they have kids and stuff.
23:35
SPEAKER_01: That's really cool.
23:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
23:38
SPEAKER_00: The the construct of time seems to keep getting smaller and smaller and smaller, doesn't it?
23:43
SPEAKER_00: It's horrifying.
23:44
unknown: I know.
23:45
SPEAKER_00: I was reading an article last night, and just being the music geek that I am, that uh the following albums turned 30 last month.
23:55
SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm gonna unplug my headphones right now because I don't want to hear it.
24:00
SPEAKER_00: Bad motor finger by Soundgarden, Pearl Jams 10, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blood Sugar, Sex Magic, Metallica's Black album, both of you use your illusion albums when Guns and Roses, REM's out of time, and just because I'm I'm kind of become like really entrenched in hip hop culture lately.
24:16
SPEAKER_00: Uh low end theory by Tribe Call Quest.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: I remember when every single one of those came out.
24:21
SPEAKER_00: So do I, so do I.
24:23
SPEAKER_00: Oh, oh, and I forgot to mention the biggest one, Nirvanas Nevermind.
24:26
SPEAKER_00: But they don't seem that old to me, right?
24:30
SPEAKER_00: Right.
24:30
SPEAKER_00: But I mean you like 1991.
24:32
SPEAKER_00: That was like six years ago, right?
24:34
SPEAKER_00: Right, exactly, exactly.
24:35
SPEAKER_00: I that's horrifying.
24:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but it it goes exactly to what you were talking about.
24:39
SPEAKER_00: It's just 10 years ago, you start a certain path, and then you see other people kind of divert onto their own life paths, and it's just it's a crazy experience in and of itself.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: So, how long you've been practicing Brazilian jujitsu?
24:53
SPEAKER_00: On and off.
24:54
SPEAKER_01: Um, the first time I ever did jujitsu was in like 2000, yeah, but I didn't do it for very long and I I didn't learn much.
25:01
SPEAKER_01: And you know, the the first time I did it for real was probably 2004.
25:05
SPEAKER_01: I did MMA for like three or four years.
25:08
SPEAKER_01: Um, but uh, you know, the the the quality of much respect to my training partners back then, we did the best of what we could.
25:16
SPEAKER_01: Uh, this is when I lived in Ohio and the Midwest MMA scene back then was was was popping.
25:20
SPEAKER_01: There's this is when like Rich Franklin and everybody were like at the top of the game, George Grigell and all those guys.
25:25
SPEAKER_01: So uh, and I lived in Cincinnati when they were, you know, at the top of the game.
25:29
SPEAKER_01: So we did the best we could.
25:30
SPEAKER_01: Um, but I would say, you know, our the quality of our training back then was was not the best, pretty sloppy stuff.
25:38
SPEAKER_01: Um, but I learned I learned, you know, a thing or two.
25:42
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and then I took some time off and started again uh more seriously in like 2016, I think after my mom died.
25:49
SPEAKER_01: Um, and I've been doing it seriously since then, uh taking a little bit of time off here and there, but I've been doing pretty seriously since then.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: What does it bring to your life that may not have been there before jujitsu?
26:02
SPEAKER_01: That sort of like really intense exercise is for me the the best way to maintain mental health for me.
26:12
SPEAKER_01: And you know, for other people, it probably just makes them scared that they're gonna die.
26:16
SPEAKER_01: It's probably not enjoyable for some people.
26:18
SPEAKER_01: But for me to be like pushed that hard, you know, that that makes me feel good uh afterwards to just get my ass beat like I did today.
26:27
SPEAKER_01: Um it it's that's it's the best feeling in the world to me.
26:31
SPEAKER_01: Uh and also it's a great way to make friends.
26:33
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I really missed we moved uh we moved about 70 miles south uh a couple of weeks ago or a month ago, and I really miss all my old training partners.
26:42
SPEAKER_01: Uh, you just make so many good friends.
26:44
SPEAKER_01: Shout out to Kyle and Morgan and Alfie and everyone else who might be watching.
26:48
SPEAKER_01: Um I really miss those guys.
26:51
SPEAKER_01: Uh that that's that's the toughest thing about leaving.
26:53
SPEAKER_01: But jujitsu is great for mental health, physical health.
26:55
SPEAKER_01: You make lots of friends.
26:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, and it teaches you a lot about yourself.
26:59
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's it's definitely good for ego destruction because no matter how big and tough you are, you're gonna get your fucking ass beat by some 125-pound brown belt that looks like he's in Mumford and Sons and he's gonna fucking wreck your shit without even trying.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: And you're gonna be like, what the fuck was that?
27:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yep.
27:19
SPEAKER_00: Your white belt year, you're pretty much just getting choked out the entire year straight.
27:24
SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, yes, and so you learn a lot from that.
27:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
27:29
SPEAKER_00: So do you follow MMA still as a fan?
27:32
SPEAKER_00: I have a lot of uh mixed martial artists on my show.
27:36
SPEAKER_00: You know, my shouts out to the elevation fight team based out of Denver, Colorado.
27:40
SPEAKER_00: Okay, my uh my old jujitsu coach trained with a lot of those guys, and those guys are good friends of mine, so they you know, they uh they help put a lot of fighters on the show.
27:49
SPEAKER_01: You should ask if they remember Larry King from Praxis.
27:52
SPEAKER_01: I will do that, actually.
27:53
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna write that down.
27:55
SPEAKER_01: He was training up there with like uh when Shane Carwin and Brendan Schaub and stuff were up there.
27:59
SPEAKER_00: You know, it was one of the things that I think back to, and I was asking one of my guests recently how much the sport has evolved in the past five years over the past 25 years.
28:12
SPEAKER_00: It felt felt like it's insane.
28:14
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
28:15
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I started watching UFC like in '94 or whatever, and then I was super, super, super into Pride and K1 and all that stuff, like in the 2000s.
28:24
SPEAKER_01: Um, I've watched fucking ZST and Shudo and like every random obscure Japanese show.
28:30
SPEAKER_01: I was a mega MMA nerd in the 2000s, and uh there were some great athletes back then, but the technique now is just on another fucking level.
28:39
SPEAKER_01: Uh, the training methods, I mean, back you know, the the two mid-2000s was like the height of like that Midwest uh wrestler kind of mindset where everybody's cutting like fucking 30 of their body weight, right?
28:52
SPEAKER_01: You know, and the drug testing was almost non-existent, so everyone was juiced out of their minds, just beating the fuck out of each other in training because it was like when Vanderlei and Shooterbox was, you know, tablet food chain.
29:04
SPEAKER_01: So it's like, okay, well, shoot shooterbox and Nova Uniao just beat the fuck out of each other for an hour, and that's their training.
29:10
SPEAKER_01: So I guess that's what we should do too.
29:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
29:12
SPEAKER_00: I find that I'm defending it a lot across friends that are just not into it.
29:16
SPEAKER_00: And what I'm defending is the old stereotype versus what the sport has actually become.
29:22
SPEAKER_00: It's nerds now, yes, yes, and it's become so much more athletic.
29:27
SPEAKER_00: It used to be just brute force in a cage, and now it's just so athletic and it's so scientific now as well.
29:35
SPEAKER_00: It's a real sport now, yeah.
29:37
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, absolutely.
29:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm glad we share this.
29:42
SPEAKER_00: So, what makes you nervous these days?
29:44
SPEAKER_01: Anything?
29:45
SPEAKER_01: Uh, climate change is the only thing that really makes me nervous because everything else can be figured out.
29:50
SPEAKER_01: That one I'm not so sure can be figured out.
29:52
SPEAKER_01: And I've I've had anxiety about this, like actual anxiety about this since I was like 13 when that's sort of started becoming it was obvious to me that this was like a problem back then.
30:03
SPEAKER_01: And I honestly I'd rather not talk about it because it like legitimately upsets me.
30:07
SPEAKER_00: So, what is something that you would offer as far as advice to a new creator that's just starting out?
30:12
SPEAKER_01: I would say the number one thing is persistence.
30:16
SPEAKER_01: Uh, it there is no substitute unless you just happen to be so naturally talented and so lucky that you just sort of find your groove immediately.
30:26
SPEAKER_01: And if you do, that's awesome, good for you.
30:29
SPEAKER_01: Um, but most people won't.
30:30
SPEAKER_01: So just accept that it's gonna take a long time for anybody to care about what you're doing, and it's gonna be tough and demoralizing, and you're gonna feel like it's hopeless, and you're gonna think about giving up a lot, but don't because it's just it's a grind and you just gotta keep grinding, and there's no substitute for that.
30:51
SPEAKER_01: Anyone you see that I mean, Mr.
30:53
SPEAKER_01: Beast is a good example of this.
30:55
SPEAKER_01: It seems like he got big overnight, but you know, you watch he's been making he made videos for like 10 years since he was like 12 before he actually popped off.
31:03
SPEAKER_01: So it takes a long time, usually, and again, if it doesn't, then that's great.
31:07
SPEAKER_01: Um, but expect that it's gonna take a long time and it's gonna be demoralizing and difficult and you're gonna want to quit, but don't because if you just keep at it long enough, you will find your lane.
31:19
SPEAKER_01: And the second thing I would say is that it really is about finding the lane that only you can occupy.
31:27
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and it may seem like that is so niche that nobody would care, but if you can talk about something from a unique perspective with authority and conviction, uh, people will respond to that.
31:42
SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't matter what the thing is, they just care about that.
31:46
SPEAKER_01: They care about passion and authority and that unique perspective.
31:49
SPEAKER_01: For example, um, I don't know if you ever do you know the car guy Doug DeMuro?
31:54
SPEAKER_00: Uh-uh.
31:54
SPEAKER_00: Not familiar.
31:55
SPEAKER_01: He I don't give a fuck about cars at all.
31:59
SPEAKER_01: I don't give a shit.
32:02
SPEAKER_01: But I will watch him talk for 20 minutes about some obscure random BMW from the 80s that they made and what's interesting about it, and you know, why you should care about it and blah blah blah, because he's just like he's a car nut, right?
32:17
SPEAKER_01: And he knows everything about them.
32:19
SPEAKER_01: Uh, my wife is really into this uh genre now called like cafe vlogs, which is all these people in Korea that just make like drinks at a cafe, and they get millions of views, and it's just people making a fucking drink at a cafe, you know.
32:35
SPEAKER_01: You can you can go down the list of anything, nothing is too obscure, and it's easy to think that nobody will care what you have to say about this thing.
32:43
SPEAKER_01: Like, well, yeah, I know a lot about X, but nobody's gonna care about that.
32:46
SPEAKER_01: That's that's wrong.
32:48
SPEAKER_01: And the third thing I would say is the things that you are most afraid to share or most scared of are the things that will make people care about you.
32:56
SPEAKER_01: Uh and and you know, I feel that all the time too.
32:59
SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of things that I'm scared to talk about and scared to share.
33:02
SPEAKER_01: Um, but when I do, it's it's always, you know, some people don't like it, but that's the stuff that really is going to make people care about you.
33:09
SPEAKER_01: So you have to be, you just have to be real.
33:12
SPEAKER_01: That's it.
33:13
SPEAKER_01: Like you can't hide things, you can't um, you can't be something other than who you are.
33:18
SPEAKER_01: You know, I started out trying to talk about business and nobody cared.
33:21
SPEAKER_01: Um, I'm credible on that topic, but not like I am about music, you know, and I and and that's a little bit of a blow to my ego, but you have to admit it.
33:30
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I fucking the people who have a ton of success in business are people like Jason Calicanus and Chamath Polyhapatia, who I mean, Chamath is like the original director of growth for Facebook.
33:42
SPEAKER_01: He like basically made Facebook what it is, uh, responsible for growing it to over a billion users.
33:47
SPEAKER_01: Jason is the best venture or uh angel investor of all time.
33:51
SPEAKER_01: He was, you know, super early in like Thumbtack and Uber and blah blah blah.
33:55
SPEAKER_01: These are the people that you should listen to talk about business because you know, if people got questions about Elon Musk, I could speculate about it.
34:01
SPEAKER_01: But Jason's like, well, I asked him about this because I've known him for 12 years.
34:05
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he had to say.
34:06
SPEAKER_00: Right.
34:07
SPEAKER_01: And I can do that with music.
34:08
SPEAKER_01: You know, people speculate about why did this band do this or that?
34:11
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, well, I asked them because I've been friends with them for a long time, and here's what they said.
34:16
SPEAKER_01: Or, well, I was there when that happened, or my friend recorded that, or whatever.
34:20
SPEAKER_01: Um, I can just talk about this stuff in a way that most people can't.
34:25
SPEAKER_01: And although that wasn't necessarily my original goal for what to talk about, now I understand why I had success with that.
34:31
SPEAKER_01: And for a while that kind of bummed me out, but now I'm I'm okay with it because you know, really I'm just grateful that anybody gives a fuck what I have to say about anything.
34:39
SPEAKER_01: Um, and and and and I used to be kind of, I guess, and sometimes I still am, but I used to be a little bit kind of upset that I wasn't able to give people more valuable information that I thought would help them more.
34:50
SPEAKER_01: But you know, just entertaining people is helping them too.
34:54
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
34:55
SPEAKER_00: And there's there's a lot of or there's a fever pitch of nostalgia in the air right now, and maybe it is heightened by what's been going on sociopolitically, on top of the fact that we're um in a both a health pandemic and a mental health pandemic right now, and I think that's being underscored a lot.
35:15
SPEAKER_00: And I'm sure you probably agree that the mental health pandemic we're going through is is being underscored as well.
35:20
SPEAKER_01: And if I can give somebody, if I can talk about good Charlotte for 20 minutes, hell yes, and just help somebody like zone out, that's cool.
35:27
SPEAKER_01: I'm grateful for that.
35:29
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, absolutely.
35:30
SPEAKER_00: So you just recently um went all in on Twitch.
35:34
SPEAKER_00: What drove you to the Twitch platform?
35:37
SPEAKER_01: Well, like I said, uh I want to be where the action is, you know, and because I like community too, I think Twitch makes a lot of sense because Twitch, I think, really I mean the people on Twitch are so much nicer than anywhere else because it's you know, we're not we're not sitting in the same room together, but it kind of feels like it.
35:55
SPEAKER_01: So there's a lot of things that people will say in YouTube comments that they would never say to your face, right?
36:01
SPEAKER_01: Um, and there's a few people here and there that are nasty on Twitch, but not very many.
36:06
SPEAKER_01: Um, because it really does feel more like you're hanging out with your friends, and so that's kind of what attracted me to it.
36:12
SPEAKER_01: Um and uh just in general, I want to I want to try stuff.
36:16
SPEAKER_01: If there's something going on that, you know, is seems to be kind of getting some attention and driving conversations, I want to try it.
36:25
SPEAKER_01: And I actually I I didn't expect that I would like it as much as I do.
36:29
SPEAKER_00: Well, I know you got to get back to a Twitch stream.
36:31
SPEAKER_00: So uh I I want to thank you for doing the show.
36:34
SPEAKER_00: Um, it's been great talking to you.
36:36
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, if you ever find yourself in the Midwest, Omaha, Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska, look me up and uh well, I I have a question for you if you have a minute.
36:43
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
36:44
SPEAKER_01: For for everybody watching now, um, you you said you were talking about leadership that you lead people, and this is a topic I feel very, very strongly about.
36:52
SPEAKER_01: It's something I've learned a ton about in the last five years, I would say.
36:57
SPEAKER_01: Uh, I never thought of myself as a leader before, but now, you know, being part of this company, being one of the partners in the company, I have had to become a leader in a way that I just didn't really understand before.
37:10
SPEAKER_01: Um, so for anybody, and and I think when a lot of people hear the word leadership, they think it means, you know, they associate it with a lot of things that um they don't like.
37:19
SPEAKER_01: Right.
37:20
SPEAKER_01: Uh, either that they don't want to be a leader or that they don't like leaders.
37:24
SPEAKER_01: Um, what would you say about leadership for anybody who's reacting to it that way?
37:28
SPEAKER_01: Why should somebody care about that topic, even if they have no intention of ever becoming a quote unquote leader?
37:35
SPEAKER_00: I think that you have to set a baseline.
37:38
SPEAKER_00: Um, people are going to engage with you in the same way that you engage with them.
37:43
SPEAKER_00: I know that sounds really, really, really, really basic, right?
37:46
SPEAKER_00: It's true.
37:47
SPEAKER_00: But if you want people to invest in you, you have to invest in them first.
37:52
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
37:53
SPEAKER_00: But how you establish uh your presence in investing in other people is how you're going to get them to follow you into the burning building.
38:03
SPEAKER_00: You know, so I think that's that's kind of both the reward and the challenge of leadership.
38:10
SPEAKER_00: Um, like I had said earlier, you know, there's uh five, six different generations in the workplace right now.
38:16
SPEAKER_00: So you have to play to people's currency while at the same time selling them your personal currency, right?
38:22
SPEAKER_00: And and establishing a certain level of culture with people as well.
38:27
SPEAKER_00: You know, um culture is everything when it comes to leadership, you know.
38:32
SPEAKER_00: Um that's why you hear about toxic management situations, toxic workplace situations, because you're allowing that to happen.
38:41
SPEAKER_00: That's what's gonna happen.
38:42
SPEAKER_00: That's what's gonna cause things to erode, that's what's gonna cause things to fall apart.
38:47
SPEAKER_00: So it's it's it's all about interacting with people, not as if you're above their level, but if you're playing on the same team, like that, like my one of the first things I do with my teams, I will look for the absolute most shit-tastic task on day one.
39:04
SPEAKER_00: I'll do it myself because if my team sees me doing that, they know that I'm not going to ask them to do something I am not willing to do with myself.
39:14
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's one of the most important traits of any good leadership.
39:18
SPEAKER_01: Your point about culture is a very good one for anybody listening who might think, well, I don't ever want to be a manager or a boss or whatever, I don't care about culture.
39:26
SPEAKER_01: Well, I think that if you want to be a creator, you have to care about culture.
39:31
SPEAKER_01: It's super important.
39:31
SPEAKER_01: Like the culture you create around yourself and your content.
39:34
SPEAKER_01: For example, shout out to all my mods on Discord.
39:37
SPEAKER_01: This is why from day one on Discord, we have had like a no assholes policy.
39:42
SPEAKER_01: They drop, they they'll ban people right away if they're being shitty, if they're being edgelords, they're gone immediately.
39:49
SPEAKER_01: Because, as you said, whatever you tolerate is what you're gonna get more of.
39:53
SPEAKER_01: So, um, the the I I I think leadership is a word that you don't hear much in the scene, but I think it's something people should care a lot more about.
40:01
SPEAKER_01: So, anyway, I will let you go, but uh, I just want to kind of get your words, your thoughts on that.
40:06
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, absolutely.
40:07
SPEAKER_00: Thanks again, Finn.
40:08
SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you, man.
40:09
SPEAKER_01: Uh, you too.
40:10
SPEAKER_00: Take care.
40:11
SPEAKER_00: I think it's really cool to note here how much Finn talked about personal resiliency in the face of adversity.
40:20
SPEAKER_00: Another thing that I thought was really great about this episode is how he kind of turned the tables on me at the very end.
40:26
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna lie, I kind of got untied and twisted, but I think you got the basic point of what I was trying to say.
40:33
SPEAKER_00: He is very good at interacting with the community.
40:37
SPEAKER_00: Um, that's something that he talked about in the episode.
40:40
SPEAKER_00: So I implore you to follow Finn McKenzie on social media.
40:45
SPEAKER_00: Reach out, let him know that you've listened to this episode of the podcast.
40:49
SPEAKER_00: What a fantastic guest.
40:51
SPEAKER_00: 11 out of 10, I'd have him on again.
40:53
SPEAKER_00: Make sure you're giving me a like, follow, and subscribe on all forms of social media and giving me that five-star review on the Apple Podcast app.
41:03
SPEAKER_00: This has been Caught on the Mike with Michael Clark.
41:06
SPEAKER_00: I'm Michael Clark.
41:08
SPEAKER_00: Until next time.
41:09
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.