Latest / Scrappy but Successful [Consultant's Personalities When No One's Watching] / 58. Reality Is Undefeated: Lessons from Six Exits with Russ Sorrells

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58. Reality Is Undefeated: Lessons from Six Exits with Russ Sorrells · Scrappy but Successful [Consultant's Personalities When No One's Watching]

• 0:03
  What's happening, everybody? Welcome to Scrappy But Successful. It's a show where I sit down
• 0:07
  with your favorite consultants and we find out if they're successful today because they're sophisticated
• 0:11
  or because they're a little bit scrappy. I'm your host, Jack Tompkins, CEO of Pineapple
• 0:16
  Consulting Firm and Pineapple Analysts AI, always helping small businesses become more data driven. Fun
• 0:20
  fact of the day, Purdue University, our guest alma mater, has sent twenty-seven alumni into
• 0:24
  space, including Neil Armstrong, which is the most for any public university in the country.
• 0:29
  But that's neither here nor there. Today I'm joined by my friend Russ Sorrells He's
• 0:33
  the founder of Beyond the Grind. He's a certified pinnacle business guide. He sold five
• 0:38
  businesses. After a whole bunch of years buying, building, and selling businesses, he's now a
• 0:42
  full time coach. And this guy has got all the energy. I'm gonna I'm gonna
• 0:46
  guarantee that right up front here. he helps open and in the weeds owners that
• 0:51
  want to allow their team to thrive. So, Russ, buddy, thank you so much for
• 0:55
  coming on, man. I'm pumped to talk with you. We know that you're successful. Question
• 1:00
  we have for you today. Do you think you fall more on the sophisticated side,
• 1:04
  more on the scrappy side?
• 1:06
  Man, it depends on the day. It depends on the day. Some days I'm sophisticated
• 1:09
  and other days I'm scrappy. And then the third day would be I'm just a
• 1:13
  hot mess. So that's that's day number three. Now, so being from I'm from Indiana,
• 1:17
  and of course we got this Purdue IU rivalry thing.
• 1:20
  Yeah.
• 1:21
  one of my favorite jokes was always, do you know what the greatest thing a
• 1:25
  graduate from Purdue ever said? One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.
• 1:30
  Do you know what the greatest
• 1:32
  Yeah.
• 1:33
  thing a graduate from IU ever said? Would you like fries with that, sir? So
• 1:35
  that is that was that
• 1:36
  Yeah.
• 1:39
  was a an inside Indiana joke that I had to share. but really the the
• 1:43
  Nice.
• 1:44
  joke's on us these days with Purdue or with IU winning the football championship last
• 1:48
  year. That's kind of a big deal.
• 1:50
  I was gonna say, how do you feel about that? Now they can say the
• 1:54
  greatest thing they ever said was, Congrats, we won.
• 1:57
  Yeah. It was amazing. I it was fun to watch. Obviously rooting for the whole
• 2:01
  time and the rivalries there for sure, but just excited that I mean out of
• 2:05
  the blue, who would've known? So
• 2:07
  Yeah. Very out of the blue. But anyways, so take us back to the thing.
• 2:11
  Are you are you born bred Indiana?
• 2:13
  Yes, I grew up in in Indiana, southern Indiana, a little town called North Vernon,
• 2:17
  which is north of nothing. is where
• 2:20
  Okay.
• 2:21
  where I I grew up at technically Scipio, population five hundred, but somehow
• 2:25
  Right.
• 2:26
  I made it out. I don't know. I I did I did make it out.
• 2:29
  Okay. And the entrepreneurs in the family growing up?
• 2:32
  I didn't have any entrepreneurs. I was the first person on either side of my
• 2:36
  family to graduate from college. So that was that was something. That was an achievement
• 2:41
  in itself. I, you know, going looking back on how I ended up deciding to
• 2:46
  be on this entrepreneurial journey, it I'll take you back a long way. My parents
• 2:50
  split
• 2:51
  Reason.
• 2:52
  up when I was when I was young. My dad moved to Tucson, Arizona. And
• 2:55
  So I would go out there and spend the summers with him. Anywhere from four
• 2:59
  to five weeks, I would just spend the summer. And he was a sales guy
• 3:03
  and he sold steel and aluminum to these machine shops and he also called on
• 3:07
  like Hughes Aircraft and these companies. But because it was the eighties, he would just
• 3:10
  drag me along with him because of course he took couldn't take the whole summer
• 3:14
  off, right? He would just drag me. I was a sales pawn, if you will,
• 3:18
  right? And so
• 3:19
  Yeah.
• 3:20
  so we're sitting at the stoplight and Paul Harvey's on. You know, are you familiar
• 3:23
  with you're too young to remember Paul Harvey, but
• 3:26
  I don't think I know Paul Harvey, no.
• 3:27
  Paul Harvey would he came on every day and he also had this talk little
• 3:30
  talk half hour thing, but he it was Paul Harvey, good day. And so he
• 3:34
  came on and he talked about something that was going on. Well, I was just
• 3:38
  waiting for the music to come back on at this particular moment. We were sitting
• 3:42
  in a stoplight, and my dad starts poking me in the chest really hard and
• 3:46
  he says, son, let that be a lesson to you. And I'm like, well, I'm
• 3:50
  10 years old, right?
• 3:52
  Yeah.
• 3:53
  I don't know, I don't know what he's talking about. He said, he said, you
• 3:57
  can't rely on the government for anything. They're not going to be here for you.
• 4:01
  And so he's just poking me in the chest. And and what I what I
• 4:05
  realized, you know, over I've I've figured out what he was talking about is Social
• 4:09
  Security. You know, he was saying at that time, that was back in the 80s,
• 4:13
  Paul Harvey said, They've determined that Social Security is going to run out by X
• 4:17
  number date. And it was just a bunch of IOUs that were that were in
• 4:21
  this in this imaginary safe, you know, that had the American people's money. And so
• 4:25
  he was, you know, in instilling in me the importance of being scrappy and and
• 4:30
  get out there and and make it happen for yourself, as opposed to relying on
• 4:34
  other people to make it happen for you. So that was. That was, you know,
• 4:38
  as I look back, we have those inflection points in our lives. As I look
• 4:42
  back, I'm like, that was that was one of those inflection points that I had
• 4:46
  no idea at the time. I just wanted the music to come back on. But
• 4:50
  it certainly triggered something inside of me that that never really settled and probably hasn't
• 4:54
  settled, I don't know. But it was it was a meaningful interaction that he has
• 4:58
  no recollection of. Yeah.
• 5:00
  It's funny how that works with parents, but yeah, I know we we joke in
• 5:03
  our in our monthly meetings that we're on together that you're always still trying to
• 5:07
  figure out what you want to be when you grow up.
• 5:10
  Yeah, yeah. Well, I think that's just the nature of life. You know, it's like,
• 5:14
  you know, we we go down that, you know, we're on this entrepreneurial journey and
• 5:19
  then over time, not for everyone, but for for some people, especially if you got
• 5:24
  that hyper activity, you're like, all right, what's next? You know, what's that next journey?
• 5:28
  What's the next mountain I want to climb? And and that's you know, certainly happened
• 5:33
  to me. I've switched I've switched mountains a time or three from my my early
• 5:38
  days. I had a machine shop in my garage. Dynamic Products Incorporated. I was 21,
• 5:42
  22 years old when I launched that. That was my first foray into entrepreneurship. And
• 5:47
  then I started the rep agency down here in the Carolinas. That's what brought me
• 5:52
  here years ago. Bought a prosthetics orthotics company, bought a car wash and oil change
• 5:57
  facility, bought a laundromat, and you know, real estate. I mean, just all, you know,
• 6:01
  all kinds of different things. And and that's that. You just continue to stick and
• 6:06
  move and grow and be curious, you know.
• 6:09
  What was what was the very first mountain that you climbed? Like you're ten years
• 6:12
  old, you have this sort of accidental epiphany, if you will. Are you do you
• 6:16
  then say, like, all right, I'm gonna go sell candy at school, I'm gonna do
• 6:20
  a lemonade stand? Like, what's the first initial entrepreneurialism in you?
• 6:23
  Yeah, so it would have been raking leaves and mowing lawns. That was my
• 6:27
  Nice.
• 6:28
  my first journey. I got scars on my fingers where I was cutting with a
• 6:33
  hedge trimmer, maybe twelve, thirteen years old. And turns out you need to keep both
• 6:39
  hands on the hedge trimmer. I
• 6:42
  Yeah.
• 6:43
  was trying to knock some of the weeds away and still using the hedge trimmer
• 6:46
  and I ran it into my fingers when I was doing a job for a
• 6:51
  neighbor. So Yeah, that was that would be it. Yard work for the neighbors.
• 6:56
  Okay, okay, very nice. and you throughout your many different lives, you have been a
• 7:00
  sales guy. Were you selling as a kid? Like did were you getting clients, aka
• 7:05
  neighbors pretty easily? Like did that come natural to you?
• 7:09
  Yeah, it's you know, with people I know, but I the the sales thing never
• 7:14
  I think the what happened as far as my sales evolution was, and again, unknowingly,
• 7:20
  the time that I had with my dad in traveling with him in the car,
• 7:26
  he would run his route every week. He was consistent. he knew his clients and
• 7:32
  he would he would banter with them, he would tell jokes, he would have fun
• 7:37
  with them. And I think just that presence, just being there in that environment, experiencing
• 7:43
  that was really unknown unbeknownst to me, set me up to be successful when I
• 7:49
  did join a sales agency in Michigan and then ultimately start my own down here.
• 7:55
  It was that was very helpful in flexing that muscle, if you will, before I
• 8:00
  ever knew that it was being flexed. So
• 8:04
  Okay. Okay. Give me give me thirty seconds on Beyond the Grind, like what you
• 8:07
  do today, and then we'll we'll kind of build a bridge throughout the timeline here.
• 8:11
  So thirty seconds on what you do today.
• 8:13
  Yeah, so most organizations, most businesses, they they don't have a clear plan or clear
• 8:17
  path for their business. I I find that that businesses struggle with a few things.
• 8:22
  Number one is communication. Like there is generally a lack of communication. the second is
• 8:27
  a is a lack of consistent revenue generation. Like how do we consistently generate revenue?
• 8:32
  sell our products or services is a challenge. And then third is it not a
• 8:37
  a solid handle on the financials. Right. So we we're our financials are are a
• 8:42
  mess. And so what I do is I work with these organizations to get clear
• 8:47
  on where we want to go. And we define that. So we answer that question
• 8:52
  and then we get clear on who we want to be a part of this
• 8:57
  business that we are creating. And then we define a clear purpose as to why
• 9:02
  would we do this work? How do we make sure that it's inspirational, fun to
• 9:07
  do? And then we define the path up the mountain, if you will. That's the
• 9:12
  how part. And then lastly we say, what does winning look like? And that's where
• 9:17
  your work comes in in the what does winning look like. We got to measure
• 9:22
  our progress along the way. We got to use data as a a report card
• 9:27
  on our performance, right? Are we doing what needs to happen or what we need
• 9:32
  to do to make the the numbers what we have committed to making them. So
• 9:37
  so it's it's really about helping them to become accountable, prioritize their focus, and then
• 9:42
  do the work necessary to execute at the highest level possible.
• 9:46
  Okay. Okay. And I we're we're gonna go back in time for a second here,
• 9:50
  but but before we do that, this is organizational goals are set, so to speak,
• 9:55
  and then you do a great job of energizing the whole team and making sure
• 9:59
  that people are, you know, butts in the right seats kind of thing, doing what
• 10:04
  they want. How difficult is that translation of top the organization, we're gonna grow by
• 10:08
  a million dollars, individual person, stick in your, you know, specific thing, and here's how
• 10:13
  we're gonna motivate you. Like, how does that translate?
• 10:16
  Yeah, the the challenge the setting a goal to make another million bucks is is
• 10:20
  easy, right? That's the
• 10:22
  Right.
• 10:23
  that is certainly the the easy part. But it's the it's the effort that's required.
• 10:26
  but as far as the work, it's it's really making sure, like you said, we
• 10:30
  got the right people in the right seats doing the right work. We're clearly everyone
• 10:35
  understands their role. And part one of the sayings that I always have is it's
• 10:39
  easier to it's easier to do work than it is to think about the work
• 10:43
  we're doing. Meaning our our nature is to come to work and we do work.
• 10:48
  And it's work that we've done day in and day out. maybe as a leader
• 10:52
  we're just, you know, we're just putting out fires because that is how we derive
• 10:57
  a level of fulfillment. You know, that that we put the cape on every day,
• 11:01
  we grab our fire hose and we and we put the fires out and we
• 11:05
  leave exhausted, like, who man, did we have problems today? and of course that's not
• 11:10
  what we want, right? And oftentimes the we turn into the arsonist in that case,
• 11:14
  right? Where we're we're lighting
• 11:16
  Yeah.
• 11:18
  the fires so that we have something to put out. But it's it's really getting,
• 11:22
  is that what we want? Why do we want that million dollars? What is it
• 11:26
  what does it matter? And then how to align the entire organization to focus on
• 11:31
  what it's going to take to make that happen. Too too often what happens is
• 11:35
  we want to launch a new service. We wanna, we wanna design a new product,
• 11:39
  we want to, we want to, you know, make that million dollars. We gotta revamp
• 11:44
  our marketing strategy, we've gotta, you know, add to our sales team, we've gotta, we've
• 11:48
  gotta, we've gotta, we've gotta, and we've we we got ourselves to get nowhere because
• 11:53
  we end up trying to be everything to all people and do everything. And the
• 11:57
  result is we we get nowhere when the year's up, we look back, we're like,
• 12:01
  man, we didn't accomplish everything that we had set out to accomplish. And it's it's
• 12:06
  just a bandwidth situation most often. And it's how okay, how do we what really
• 12:10
  matters? What do we really need to how do we if we get rid of
• 12:14
  the noise, what do we really need to be focused on as an organization in
• 12:19
  order to achieve the outcome that we're looking for?
• 12:22
  I I promise we are gonna go back to I got one maybe twelve more
• 12:25
  questions on this. How many goals is too many? 'Cause I think people and you
• 12:29
  and I have talked about this a little bit too, but like one overarching million
• 12:33
  dollar goal for the year, easy to say, mm depending on obviously where you are
• 12:36
  in a company, could be hard to do, but do you focus on one goal
• 12:40
  per quarter? Like is it is there a hard and fast rule for that?
• 12:44
  Yeah, the the there is no hard and fast rule. I
• 12:48
  Okay.
• 12:49
  my thing is I say we're not gonna have any more than three or four
• 12:52
  major objectives for the year. And
• 12:54
  Okay.
• 12:55
  in the way that we break it down, I I call it the seven three
• 12:59
  one ninety plan. It's what's our seven year pinnacle or seven year north star? Like
• 13:03
  when we're We're seven years from today, if we could put it in a couple
• 13:07
  of sentences, what imp impact have we made? What difference have we made? How many
• 13:11
  lives have we impacted? What's the influence that we want to have? And how do
• 13:16
  we look back and say, man, we did great work? What does that look like?
• 13:20
  And then we back that up and say, What are the three year milestones that
• 13:24
  if we achieve those milestones will confirm that we're on track to achieve that North
• 13:28
  Star, that pinnacle that we've set? And then we want to back that up to
• 13:33
  what are the one year objectives? What are the three or four things that we
• 13:37
  really need to focus on this year? in order to ensure that we're making progress
• 13:41
  toward our seven year pinnacle North Star. And then we break that down into the
• 13:45
  rocks, which everyone talks about rocks, but it's you know the 90 day the 90
• 13:50
  day rocks. And so how do we How do we back that up? And so
• 13:54
  you it's here's the big plan. How do we continue to narrow that down so
• 13:58
  that we've got the focus? And with the teams that I work with, we really
• 14:02
  only want obviously depending on the size of the leadership team, because that certainly varies
• 14:07
  depending on the size of the organization. Three to four is three to four real
• 14:11
  major initiatives is enough. I mean, four maybe too many, depending on how big they
• 14:15
  are. and obviously you don't want have three in one specific area of the business.
• 14:19
  You'd want, you know, one in this area of the business, one in this area
• 14:24
  of the business, and one in another area of the business. And so that we're
• 14:28
  not because otherwise, again, you got a bandwidth issue, you're asking too much of a
• 14:32
  specific group, and then because the work has to get done, right? These these are
• 14:36
  these this is not our when we have a a goal or an objective, it's
• 14:41
  not our work. Our work is in our job description.
• 14:44
  Yeah.
• 14:45
  This is work outside of our job description that is focused on making work lighter,
• 14:49
  making work easier, or eliminating an issue, or bringing on a new program, or something
• 14:55
  that's a a major initiative. It's it's a it's a big lift. So it's not
• 15:01
  just doing more of our job that we wouldn't need to set rocks and or
• 15:07
  anything like that if it was just about coming to work and doing your job.
• 15:13
  But I I'm working with an organization now. I just just getting ready to start
• 15:19
  with them. And they have 14 years been working with the same strategic advisor, and
• 15:25
  their sales have gone down 44% in in aggregate over the course of time. And
• 15:31
  they have they have lost 13 salaried employees over the last month or two.
• 15:37
  Well
• 15:38
  And there's been some been some real challenges in this in this organization. And the
• 15:42
  when I look back, I said, well, share me, share your objectives from from the
• 15:48
  last year. And and really they were, you know, revamped the marketing plan, develop two
• 15:53
  new products. And and it's it's not that they weren't important or weren't valuable or
• 15:59
  weren't meaningful, but they were really part of someone's job. Like if you're a product
• 16:04
  designer or you head that department, your job is to design products. And if you
• 16:10
  are the marketing leader, your job is to make sure that you've got a clear
• 16:15
  marketing plan and all the action associated with it. The focus needs to be in
• 16:21
  that situation on sales. Like it is like literally the house is on fire. We
• 16:27
  have got to focus all of our energy. on they they use reps or distributors
• 16:32
  as their way to go to market, which is what I used to be back
• 16:38
  back in the day I was a rep. And so how do they engage that
• 16:43
  sales force that they've got? I mean, up to 1,200 people out there potentially selling
• 16:49
  their products, but clearly none of them are selling it because their sales have continued
• 16:54
  to drop while the sales in their industry has continued to go up. On aggregate,
• 17:00
  that line of business that they're in is growing six to seven percent per annum.
• 17:05
  So it's not like it's it's going away. It's The sales in that market is
• 17:11
  is continuing to grow, but they're not capturing any of it. They're actually regressing. My
• 17:17
  point with it is that in that situation, the strategic advisor should say, let's stop
• 17:22
  everything we're doing. And here's where we need to focus our energy. And that's where
• 17:28
  my personality comes out because I'm like we're we're gonna have a sense of urgency.
• 17:33
  Like where's the urgency and leadership that is going to turn this thing around? because
• 17:39
  people are leaving because they've lost confidence in the organization.
• 17:43
  Right.
• 17:44
  So
• 17:45
  Okay. This is all right, so this this is all years of experience. This is
• 17:47
  the seven three one ninety is a very learned thing at this point. Take me
• 17:51
  back to twenty one years old at the machine shop. I imagine you're starting from
• 17:55
  scratch and how do how do you get that started? Is it on the side?
• 17:59
  How are you funding it? What's give me some high school stories from back then?
• 18:03
  Yeah, that's burning the candle on both ends for sure. So I
• 18:06
  Okay.
• 18:07
  my first job after Purdue, I was an engineer at Cummins Engine Company in Columbus,
• 18:10
  Indiana. and so that was my work. And I had decided while I was talking
• 18:14
  to one of my mentors, I said, Man, I want to start a machine shop.
• 18:18
  And and he said, Well, do it. I was like, No, no, I I really
• 18:22
  do. I want to start a machine shop. And he said, Well, do it. And
• 18:26
  effectively put, you know, put my money where my mouth was is or at least
• 18:30
  my effort because I didn't have any money, but my effort,
• 18:34
  Yeah.
• 18:35
  you know, where my mouth was. And so I started, I bought a computer that's
• 18:39
  way back when I bought a compact laptop and I had a stolen version of
• 18:43
  AutoCAD 10. And what I would do is design machines for his company and then
• 18:48
  he would pay me for designing those machines and then I would use that money
• 18:52
  to buy my machine. So I bought a Bridgeport mill. I bought a lodge and
• 18:57
  shipley lathe, I bought a wire EDM, I bought a reed grinder, I bought a
• 19:01
  drill press, I bought all the stuff, you know, all the all the necessary tools
• 19:06
  to have a machine shop. And my the garage and the house that I had
• 19:10
  bought had 200 amp service, so I was able to to you know bought a
• 19:15
  rotary phase converter and I was able to just unplug and plug things back in
• 19:19
  and and run those machines. So anyway, that was that was burning the candle at
• 19:24
  both ends for me because I would I would go to work at Cummins during
• 19:28
  During the day. And then after work, I would go around to the local machine
• 19:33
  shops because none of them had a wire EDM. And I had one in my
• 19:37
  garage. And so I would get their offload wire work, I would take it home,
• 19:41
  I would program it, I would set it up, I would run it. And then
• 19:46
  the next morning, I would take it back and I would drop it off on
• 19:50
  my way back to Cummins, right? So it was it was it was good service
• 19:55
  and it was you know everything that that someone would would want in that situation.
• 19:59
  And then I had my buddy that said, put your money where your mouth is.
• 20:04
  He had subcontracted a job that he had to me. And so I would do
• 20:08
  it's called Anvils. And so in Sinoco, you know, Sinoco is the big ha plastic
• 20:13
  bag manufacturing company. And so the plastic bags, they have these cutting boards. And they
• 20:17
  call them anvils. And so what happens is they've got this die that has the
• 20:22
  shape of the handles. And they drag, you know, the paper's going really fast, or
• 20:26
  the plastic is going really fast underneath it. And as it does it, it bam,
• 20:31
  bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. So it it stamps the handles into the the plastic.
• 20:35
  And so this anvil needed to change because that so it was a cutting board
• 20:40
  effectively. And so the anvil was the cutting board that that it would change, it
• 20:44
  would change positions, it would clock. So that it, you know, it didn't go down
• 20:48
  in one groove, right? 'Cause otherwise you'd catch the the plastic and and it would
• 20:53
  all run on top of itself. So and then they would flip it over, use
• 20:57
  that side, but it was a perishable product. So they would throw it away and
• 21:02
  have to put another one on. And so I made those products for Sinoco, shipped
• 21:06
  them all over the country, you know, to Texas and Florida and and and everywhere
• 21:11
  and beyond. But that was a job that I had every month that My buddy
• 21:15
  Mike had had sent over to me. So between the wire work and the and
• 21:20
  the lathe work, I mean, and and the I was twenty-two, I was partying, you
• 21:24
  know, so I was running around with my buddies and hanging
• 21:28
  Yeah.
• 21:29
  out. And so I mean I literally I was burning the candle at both ends.
• 21:33
  But it was, you know, the that was a great time for me personally, just
• 21:37
  to to learn and grow and understand what it took. that was a lot of
• 21:41
  hard work at you know, early early on, but again, you just realize what you
• 21:45
  can accomplish. When you just
• 21:47
  Yeah.
• 21:48
  say yes, okay, yes, okay.
• 21:51
  And from what I understand, you're you've got multiple different machines going, but you th
• 21:54
  you only have one outlet, it sounds like. So you're unplugging one and replugging the
• 21:57
  next one to move on.
• 21:59
  Yes, because I had this rotary phase converter, it was it was a situation where
• 22:02
  I'd you know turn it on and it and it's rotary. So it you know,
• 22:05
  it's a the my I can't imagine what it was like for a neighbor to
• 22:08
  walk by my garage. Because this
• 22:10
  Ha ha
• 22:11
  this machine in there's going whoa like it's making all kinds of noise. Yeah, but
• 22:15
  it because it's it's converting the single phase that comes into my house to three
• 22:19
  phase, because the the machines run on three phase electricity, so that's what it a
• 22:23
  rotary phase converter does. And so it's converting the electricity to three phase. And and
• 22:28
  so I'm I have these SJO plugs they're called and and so I would take
• 22:32
  the plugs and and plug it in. So I ran the wire, I'd have to
• 22:36
  plug it in and I would run the wire. And I did have multiple plugs
• 22:40
  coming out, but the wire, because of the electronics and the computer, I couldn't run
• 22:45
  any other machine because the the electricity wasn't stable enough for it to run. So
• 22:49
  but I could I could run the drill press drill the drill press and well
• 22:53
  it was plugged in the wall but I c I could run the bridge port
• 22:57
  and the lathe at the same time. But I mean if they were manual, so
• 23:02
  it it didn't matter, right? 'Cause I only one person I'm only one person and
• 23:06
  then and only one person could run it. So
• 23:09
  Any ridiculous marketing at that time where it sounds like it was just like a
• 23:12
  lot of referral business?
• 23:14
  Yeah, no, I was literally just knocking on knocking on doors. That was my that
• 23:18
  was my marketing effort was knocking on doors and and convincing people to trust this
• 23:22
  twenty two year old with whatever it was that and my gosh, I'll tell you
• 23:27
  one one project in particular. this company had they had this coin die. It's called
• 23:31
  a coin die, and they were stamping very thick metal with it. And Well, when
• 23:35
  I was setting up to run it in my in my wire, I left a
• 23:40
  what's called a dowel pin in the bottom of it, as I was I was
• 23:44
  touching things off. And so I I went to zero in my machine and the
• 23:49
  dowel pin was still hanging from the bottom. And so as the wire went in,
• 23:53
  it it hit it and it and it broke it off. And so I It
• 23:57
  literally broke off the the bottom of my wire. So and it was due the
• 24:02
  next day. This was on a Sunday, because you know, why do anything ahead of
• 24:06
  time? Always do it last second, you know. Yes, of course.
• 24:10
  Right. Procrastination's the way to go, sure.
• 24:14
  And so I called my buddy Mike and I say, Mike, I need to borrow
• 24:18
  your wire. And he's like, All right. And so so I go down and and
• 24:23
  I set it up on his machine. And this by this time it's ten thirty
• 24:27
  at night, right? And and and so I set it up on his machine. And
• 24:32
  I it started running and then the wire broke. So that which happens sometimes because
• 24:36
  it's just a little thin wire, you know, electricity's running through it, and that's ultimately
• 24:41
  how it it cuts the metal. Well, I when I ran the wire back through,
• 24:45
  I reset the machine and it started running from the wrong spot. And so it
• 24:50
  didn't start, and so it started wiring into the coin die. And so it's where
• 24:54
  it shouldn't be going. Now this is the they supplied the coin die to me.
• 24:59
  That was like theirs. They gave they gave it to me. And and so I'm
• 25:03
  just I'm just panicked now. I'm like, my gosh, what am I gonna do? And
• 25:08
  And I went ahead and finished it, got the draft in it, did everything that
• 25:12
  was needed. It just had this, had this thing that that came out on it.
• 25:17
  Well, my buddy Mike was like, no problem. We can fix that. So he gets
• 25:21
  his welder out and he welds it. And
• 25:24
  Ha ha.
• 25:25
  he welds it up and and then I I I put on the grinder, I
• 25:30
  grind it down, and and I you couldn't even tell. It was beautiful. It was
• 25:35
  beautiful until the company, you know, put it into their coin die press first hit
• 25:40
  where the where the where the weld had been, it just totally breaks out. You
• 25:45
  know, breaks out of the thing and you know my gosh. Yeah. So I I
• 25:50
  didn't get any more work from that company. They didn't and I stayed up till
• 25:55
  It's very well
• 25:56
  six in the morning. I was up till six in the morning doing that work.
• 26:00
  I delivered it and and I called it I called out sick. That was something
• 26:04
  I I rarely have ever done in my entire career. I don't know that I
• 26:09
  ever did it at Cummins, except for that one time I called out sick because
• 26:13
  I was exhausted. So I went home and and slept, but yeah.
• 26:17
  And one of my somewhat regular questions is, have you ever done have you ever
• 26:20
  sold anything that you're really confident in and you're like, I get a hundred percent
• 26:24
  guaranteed can do it, but have never actually done it? It sounds like that was
• 26:28
  the majority of the work in the machine shop. Yeah.
• 26:31
  That has been the work of my life. You know. Can you do that? I
• 26:34
  don't know. But we can try. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I used to sell
• 26:37
  Right. Right. But I'll figure it out there.
• 26:40
  engineered solutions. So I, you know, automated equipment, like multi-million dollar assembly lines that put
• 26:44
  things together like this, you know, this road mic, you know, the automation to put
• 26:49
  that together. I would sell a machine to do that. And So you're you're literally
• 26:54
  selling something that's in someone's imagination that they've typed up on the paper and they've
• 26:59
  scribbled out in some AutoCAD drawings to say, here's what we're what we're proposing to
• 27:04
  build you. Give us three million dollars and we'll build it for you. And obviously
• 27:08
  you talk about a an exchange of trust. There certainly has to be
• 27:13
  Yeah.
• 27:14
  a real exchange of trust because they're relying on you to not weld the coin
• 27:19
  die after you have screwed it up.
• 27:22
  Do you
• 27:23
  And then try to sell it to you know, so
• 27:26
  do any machine shop work today?
• 27:29
  I don't do any machine shop work today. I haven't I have not turned a
• 27:33
  crank for for many years. But I would say that that was one of the
• 27:37
  most rewarding that was some of the most rewarding work that he did. It's nothing
• 27:42
  like taking a a print and a block of steel and then making it look
• 27:46
  like the print. Like that was that was a great skill skill to develop. Like
• 27:50
  I I told you I broke the I broke the bottom off of my piece.
• 27:55
  Well I I made the part to fix it, right? So I literally took that
• 27:59
  part, I reverse engineered it, and I made it myself and and and it all
• 28:04
  you know worked out well. So Definitely a great skill to have, especially if you
• 28:08
  know, when you from a creativity perspective, because you need to be creative in in
• 28:12
  how you're going to solve it. And and there needs to be some type of
• 28:17
  linear flow to it as well, right? You don't just take this block and start
• 28:21
  drilling holes in it. You've got to square it up and and then get it
• 28:25
  exactly right. Then you have to have a touch off point to where you can
• 28:30
  start to measure in and like all that stuff that that goes along with it.
• 28:34
  There's just it's a it's a progression that you learn and you realize, I mean,
• 28:39
  when you're hanging a paper. painting. Like it you know it it's there's a whole
• 28:43
  progression that you can apply, you know, from from that lesson of machine shop. But
• 28:47
  obviously painting a painting is not quite that, but sometimes it is for me, because
• 28:52
  it has to be just right.
• 28:54
  This is as crappy as it gets. I love it, man. Okay, so then you
• 28:57
  go from the machine shop. Just we'll focus more on today, but still what what
• 29:01
  were the other businesses that you end up buying? It sounds like there was a
• 29:05
  variety there. And did you did you use the first one to buy the second
• 29:08
  and then sell the second and buy the third?
• 29:11
  Yes, that's exactly right. Yeah, it was all you know, the the funding came in
• 29:15
  different ways. We we bought a a laundromat and that was really helping my sister
• 29:20
  in law out. She wanted to buy it. I had capital and so rolled the
• 29:24
  capital in and that was pretty much a hand off hands off. I would go
• 29:29
  up. It was up in New York, so I would go up and help out
• 29:34
  sometimes and and be a part of it. And it was fun, you know, looking
• 29:38
  through the numbers and helping guide her. And and that was gosh, that was twenty
• 29:43
  years ago now. I mean it's been a long time since we since we did
• 29:47
  that venture. but then ultimately she had enough capital that she could buy me out,
• 29:52
  which was the plan all along. so that that happened. And then from there, I
• 29:57
  bought the prosthetics and orthotics business with a friend of mine. We bought it for
• 30:01
  a dollar because it was it had seven hundred thousand dollars. Was it seven It
• 30:06
  was about seven hundred no, it was four hundred thousand dollars in debt. It had
• 30:10
  seven hundred thousand dollars of receivables. but the receivables were way far, way far along
• 30:15
  because it was a medical practice. It was a prosthetics and orthotics business, so not
• 30:20
  a medical practice, but it was in the medical field. and aging receivables that you're
• 30:24
  having insurance pay, you're never gonna get paid for aging receivables. So anyway, that business
• 30:29
  was in a in a in a real challenge. I think it was one pay
• 30:33
  period away from being in default, you know, not being able to pay its employees.
• 30:38
  So we we got that business for a dollar. I injected the capital that I
• 30:43
  had into it and then I started applying an operating system in the business, working
• 30:47
  with the team members, getting them in a in a position to lead it from
• 30:52
  a day-to-day perspective. We made some changes, got the cash flowing again, and ended up
• 30:56
  with a a really amazing business. that someone else had had had and it had
• 31:01
  been successful, but they took their eye off the ball. And when you take your
• 31:06
  eye off the ball, it Yeah.
• 31:08
  How the heck did you find that? Like 'cause you this is a field that
• 31:11
  you had experience in at the time.
• 31:13
  No, well, so I I I didn't, I didn't. So my my accountability partner, who
• 31:18
  Sunday morning before church, we would get together on a on a regular basis. And
• 31:23
  so his name's Kelvin. He was in the business, right? So he he was he
• 31:28
  owned at the time like ten percent of the business. And so
• 31:32
  Mm.
• 31:33
  he was He and then my wife is an orthodist, so I understand that industry
• 31:36
  overall, right? So I had a I certainly had some perspective. I didn't have, you
• 31:41
  know, an ownership stake in it. But you know, business is really simple. You got
• 31:45
  to get work, you gotta do work, and you gotta get paid. Like this fundamental
• 31:50
  every business bottom line, that's it. And and so when when you're in any business,
• 31:54
  it's a matter of figuring out, okay, how do we how do we win business?
• 31:59
  Right, how do we do that? And What do we have to do to execute
• 32:04
  on delivering the value to our customer? And then third, how do we make sure
• 32:08
  that we get the ratio right so we get paid for that? So that that
• 32:13
  is fundamental to it. So it was it would that was a lot of fun.
• 32:17
  I really I would say, you know, as I look back on my career and
• 32:22
  and the fun, like that was a blast to take something that was on the
• 32:26
  verge of of being done and figuring out how to how to revamp it and
• 32:31
  turn the spigot on again and and get it get it rolling. So that was
• 32:36
  a great experience.
• 32:37
  Did you have any clients in that business or the machine shop or anything, or
• 32:41
  I guess even beyond the grind today? any clients early on they're like, All right,
• 32:45
  this is gonna be easy money, I know how to do this, this is gonna
• 32:49
  be super easy, and then they end up losing you money.
• 32:52
  Well, let's see. Do any of them that end up it's gonna be well my
• 32:55
  gosh. Yeah, so I have I have one right now. I love them to death.
• 32:58
  I love the
• 32:59
  Ha ha ha.
• 33:00
  admission. I love it. But it's you know, very it's a hard business. It's a
• 33:06
  it's a really challenging business that's very people dependent. The the the clients are very
• 33:12
  demanding just because of their socioeconomic challenges that they are experiencing. and and that that
• 33:18
  Business is it is hard work. And they're they're so mission driven that the numbers
• 33:24
  don't come into focus as much as I would really appreciate that they would for
• 33:30
  their long-term survival. Right. So it's okay, we've got five lines of business, which ones
• 33:36
  are successful and which ones are not. And and getting them to step back and
• 33:42
  be willing to say no. That's the the biggest challenge is, you know, we we
• 33:48
  sign up to do this, we sign up to do that. we just want to
• 33:54
  add multiple revenue streams and because you know more is better. but obviously we know
• 34:00
  from experience that we need to do less better. That's really the the recipe for
• 34:07
  success over the long term and getting them to step back and define which product
• 34:13
  lines we Intuitively they know. They know which ones they should be doing and then
• 34:19
  know which ones they should stop be doing or stop doing. But the stopping is
• 34:25
  so hard for people. Right? You've you've got you got this thing and you're doing
• 34:31
  this thing and it's just hard to stop doing the thing. But even though the
• 34:37
  thing
• 34:38
  There's money coming in.
• 34:39
  is pulling everything else back, I mean, really, you know, the ship is sinking. You
• 34:43
  let's let's let's throw that thing over so that we can get more buoyant. But
• 34:48
  So that's you know, that's the challenge that I have in my in the work
• 34:52
  that I do is I'm very candid with clients. I don't beat around the bush.
• 34:57
  I think you know, clients pay me to help them see reality. You know, I
• 35:01
  hold up a mirror often. It's it's holding up a mirror. They know what's going
• 35:06
  on. They're smart people. and you know, so they then they understand fundamentally, but the
• 35:11
  accountability part that comes with you said you were gonna do this. You didn't do
• 35:15
  it. What was more important than doing what you said you were going to do?
• 35:20
  Like where's where's the the gap here or what am I missing? And and so
• 35:24
  having those very candid conversations, I think is what you know, CEOs, owners, leaders appreciate
• 35:29
  most is that even though they don't always want to hear it, it's what I'm
• 35:34
  gonna share. And but I and I tell them too, I'm a hot mess. Like
• 35:38
  I we're all a hot mess at the end of the day, right? It's but
• 35:43
  it's a It's a matter of first recognizing that we're a hot mess, then we
• 35:47
  can we can have that humility, but just live in reality. I so many people
• 35:52
  are fighting reality. And the last time I checked, it was undefeated. Like I don't
• 35:56
  even I don't have you ever beaten reality? I so
• 36:00
  Ha ha ha.
• 36:02
  we but yet we fight it all the time. It's just we gotta accept what
• 36:07
  is and then take action and do the moves necessary to create what it is
• 36:12
  that we want from a a different outcome.
• 36:15
  Okay, okay. I like it. I do love that saying of reality is unbeaten. That's
• 36:20
  pretty good.
• 36:21
  Hmm.
• 36:23
  all right, let me hit you lightning round, scrappy versus sophisticated. We're gonna go back
• 36:27
  all the way back in the day. Did you collect anything as a kid? Stamps,
• 36:31
  baseball cars, anything like that.
• 36:33
  Man, you know, I I didn't. I didn't. no, I I did I Star Wars
• 36:37
  figures. I did I did collect Star Wars figures. I don't mean if that's a
• 36:41
  thing.
• 36:42
  Yeah.
• 36:43
  but I certainly had the Darth Vader you know, box that had all of the
• 36:46
  different ones in it. So I had two of those. I had so many. And
• 36:50
  I had the Millennium Falcon, I had the X Wing Fighter, I had the TIE
• 36:53
  Fighter, I had them all.
• 36:55
  Did you think that was gonna make you rich one day or is it more
• 36:58
  just fun to collect?
• 36:59
  the Hoth battlefield. no, I spent a lot of time by myself as a kid.
• 37:03
  And I would set up these imaginary wars, you know, in Star Wars. And I
• 37:08
  was obsessed with that. So so really it was my entertainment as a as a
• 37:13
  kid. Yeah.
• 37:14
  Okay, all right. shout out to your dad for bringing you along to all these
• 37:19
  different sales calls. Did you have to unlearn anything from either parent in terms of
• 37:24
  entrepreneurship? Or selling for that matter.
• 37:27
  Mm.
• 37:29
  Sound like your dad knew his way around
• 37:30
  You and I'm where I
• 37:31
  a a sales meeting.
• 37:33
  He's he certainly he certainly did that. I would say trying to trying to please
• 37:38
  everyone. You know, that's the the bigger challenge that you know I my mom is
• 37:43
  a she's a people pleaser. you know, I would say we even my dad to
• 37:48
  a degree, obviously you get in sales, you're a people pleaser, and then that yeah,
• 37:53
  was part of me when in my sales career trying to be a people pleaser
• 37:58
  and and the reality is that generally people need to please themselves, you're not gonna
• 38:04
  please them. And but it's not that you don't want to delight them. So you
• 38:09
  want to deliver, if you deliver fair value, then and you're doing good work, that's
• 38:14
  what that's what matters. And if if people I mean you definitely want the feedback,
• 38:19
  but ultimately you're not gonna please everyone all the time.
• 38:23
  Okay, that's pretty good. That's pretty good. I can actually take that lesson for myself.
• 38:27
  early days of business. Was there a version of ramen noodle dinners that was keeping
• 38:31
  you fed at night?
• 38:33
  Man, so when I was early on, I didn't have a stove in my house
• 38:38
  or a refrigerator.
• 38:39
  Yeah.
• 38:41
  I used a cooler. so I the house that had the
• 38:44
  Nice.
• 38:45
  that had the machine shop on the back of it, I I literally had a
• 38:48
  cooler that I that I used. I didn't have a stove. I had a crock
• 38:53
  pot and so I I love to hunt and that's what people think that's gross
• 38:58
  but I I would you know get squirrels and rabbits and and so I would
• 39:03
  I would literally crock pot my my rabbits or squirrel
• 39:07
  Yeah.
• 39:08
  and in some cases that's the only way you could soften up the squirrel meat
• 39:11
  was to put it in the dang crock pot and make it edible. But yeah
• 39:15
  that was some barbecue sauce and so yeah there was those were some times where
• 39:18
  eventually
• 39:19
  Yeah.
• 39:20
  I bought a I bought a stove 40 bucks, I think I paid for that,
• 39:25
  for that stove. I probably paid about the
• 39:28
  Yeah.
• 39:29
  same for the refrigerator. but yeah, so it was it was definitely scrappy. Yeah. I
• 39:34
  I had a bed, I had a couch, I not much else.
• 39:39
  I love it. I love it. have you ever used two previously used dryer sheets
• 39:45
  instead of using one new dryer sheet?
• 39:49
  Well I gotta I don't do I don't do laundry. I don't
• 39:53
  Okay.
• 39:57
  I don't I don't know, but I would definitely would. Like I I am the
• 40:00
  you know, use one every other load kind of person. you know,
• 40:04
  Gotcha.
• 40:05
  if I if I were to and I mean there was a time certainly when
• 40:08
  I when I did laundry, but now it's it's like magic, it it comes back.
• 40:12
  Done. And it's not that it's not that I won't do it. It's just I
• 40:16
  don't do it right. Right. And so if you don't do it right, then you
• 40:19
  end up not doing it.
• 40:21
  Right. Yeah, there you go. It is not the task for you. take me inside
• 40:25
  the office. How many monitors do you use on your desk?
• 40:29
  So I've just got I've just got the one in front of me now. I
• 40:33
  do a I do a ton of writing. Like that like in a you know
• 40:37
  day for me would be the writing in in this in this on this remarkable
• 40:42
  or you know, I'm big into in into journaling and and just getting those thoughts
• 40:46
  out, those creative thoughts that are that are in there, trying to flex that muscle.
• 40:51
  I think that's the for me personally, that's my happy spot. So not looking at
• 40:55
  a a computer monitor, you know, nowadays I don't I don't really need, you know,
• 41:00
  I check my email. obviously we have Zoom calls, but I'm not looking at spreadsheets
• 41:04
  and doing all of that on the regular like like you would be. So I
• 41:09
  mean, but my
• 41:10
  Interesting. Okay.
• 41:11
  my office or my desk here looks like a train wreck at the moment. It
• 41:15
  it has it has stuff everywhere. So
• 41:18
  That is the next question. How many business cards are on the desk currently?
• 41:22
  Yeah, I don't have any business cards
• 41:24
  Ooh.
• 41:25
  on on the desk. and that's simply because I wait, here's one. No, I lied.
• 41:30
  Here's one. free agency, Summerberry, is is here and yeah, and then repattern
• 41:37
  Sure.
• 41:40
  it. Reverend Mary Schneider and then yeah. So I there's a there's a you know
• 41:47
  you collect these things and and you're like, who who was that?
• 41:54
  on that same note of collecting things in the office, anything really unique in your
• 41:58
  office? Any any mementos, anything like any awards from past days or anything like that?
• 42:02
  Well, let me show you this. So this here, you know, my my dad was
• 42:07
  you know so he was very into Jim Roan, who was a motivational speaker. He
• 42:13
  was very into Zig Ziggler and and all those guys. So he was he was
• 42:18
  very into them. But his this is Earl Nightingale's lead the field. My dad My
• 42:24
  dad gave this to me. I don't know when it was from, but you can
• 42:29
  see like it is and it's it's it's the it's the binder. This is the
• 42:35
  binder like that came
• 42:37
  I would for the audio listener, this is a this is a book that's been
• 42:41
  through some days. it's a okay.
• 42:43
  that came with the with the content. And it's it's a it's a workbook. And
• 42:48
  it has it has the it also has the records in it. See the the
• 42:53
  records in there.
• 42:55
  wow.
• 42:57
  Yeah, and so So that is that is extremely unique to and and something that
• 43:02
  I mean I have I'm sure it's probably not worth any money, but that's not
• 43:07
  the point. It's it's
• 43:09
  Yeah.
• 43:10
  something my something my dad gave me that is is meaningful for me. So that
• 43:14
  would be an end.
• 43:16
  That's pretty good.
• 43:17
  And I've got another one up here, you know, that so my says my father
• 43:22
  didn't tell me how to live, but lived and let me watch him do it.
• 43:27
  So, you know, those those I love those kind of sayings that as a as
• 43:32
  a parent, it's so we we want our kids to to be successful. We're gonna
• 43:37
  try to give everything and and and make it as easy as possible on But
• 43:42
  I I didn't really have that philosophy. It's like, man, they need to have we
• 43:47
  they need to have challenges like we had. Like they've you gotta experience the the
• 43:52
  wire breaking in the middle of ten thirty at night and try to fix it
• 43:57
  in the in just the the stress that comes with that. But I think it's
• 44:02
  such a challenge that we have is we're trying to lift the burden off of
• 44:07
  people when ultimately if we have them challenged, especially early on, it's going to make
• 44:12
  them more resilient as they get older. Antifragile, I think is the word they use
• 44:17
  nowadays. So
• 44:18
  There you go. Yes. Okay. Okay. I like it. These are this is the very
• 44:23
  unique things. take me inside the inbox. How many emails unread is too many?
• 44:28
  I don't know. I I there I've got one email inbox that has 23,492 unread.
• 44:33
  Yeah.
• 44:34
  And I have another one that's the one I use more frequently has I think
• 44:39
  about 2,300 unread. Because well the inbox
• 44:42
  Okay. Okay. So the limit does not exist for you.
• 44:45
  is the inbox is everyone else's agenda, right? I mean that's it is it is
• 44:49
  someone most often saying, I want something from you, right? It's and in the case
• 44:53
  of a customer, obviously that's not the case. I we want to respond to those
• 44:57
  and but if someone's sending a message that they you know, just there's a lot
• 45:02
  of a lot of spam and bam that goes on, man, it's amazing how fast
• 45:06
  they can get your darn email address and the and they they just are relentless.
• 45:10
  No matter how often you block It just it doesn't stop.
• 45:14
  And then they Yeah. They
• 45:18
  So
• 45:19
  they find a new way. The hackers and the spammers are always smarter. does your
• 45:22
  phone currently have any cracks or screen issues?
• 45:25
  It does not. It is not. I am you know I'm fortunate to have not
• 45:30
  that not be a thing for me. I never I never have really cracked when
• 45:35
  we got a screen protector on it's yeah. My phone's good.
• 45:40
  That is shocking. Okay. All right. That's pretty good. how many phone numbers do you
• 45:43
  have? Just one? Okay. If somebody's trying to set up a meeting with you.
• 45:46
  Just one. Just one number. Yep. Just one number. I know I see a lot
• 45:49
  of people carrying around two phones. I'm like, my gosh, I can't even keep track
• 45:53
  of one. I'm gonna keep track of two.
• 45:56
  If somebody's trying to set a meeting with you, do you say, I'm free later
• 45:59
  this week, or are you sending a calendar invite?
• 46:02
  Well, if we are, I generally send a calendar invite because otherwise I will say
• 46:06
  yes and then promptly miss the meeting when it comes up. So
• 46:10
  Gotcha. Yep.
• 46:11
  I have to I have to know that it's going on.
• 46:14
  Okay.
• 46:15
  it has to be on my if it's not on my calendar, it ain't happening.
• 46:19
  Yep. Yep. I feel ya. okay, man, I'm trying to get a a a clear
• 46:23
  determination of scrappy or sophisticated. I think it does depend on the day, but I'm
• 46:28
  guessing more days are scrappy than others, Russ.
• 46:31
  Yeah. Well, that is I think that's how I would categorize myself. Don't let the
• 46:35
  books throw you off. I just buy
• 46:38
  Yeah.
• 46:39
  I just buy to make myself look smarter. Like that's the
• 46:42
  Right. There you go. what do you got coming up? Anything you want to promote?
• 46:48
  Anything you want the folks out there to know?
• 46:52
  man, I just been I've been blessed with a couple new clients coming on board.
• 46:56
  I've got still have still have room for for one or two more clients in
• 47:01
  in the practice. but we were just making a heck of an impact on the
• 47:06
  clients that we get to serve and and the transformation. I love it when my
• 47:11
  clients let me in and it's really I I I'm on the leadership team with
• 47:16
  them. It's the we are on this journey together and that has been a more
• 47:21
  and more of my clients were in it together. It's not like I'm just consulting
• 47:26
  on the outside. And the difference in my practice and how I do things is
• 47:30
  a lot of people that do what I do, they come in, they do a
• 47:35
  session, they leave, they come back 90 days later. And there's really not much interaction
• 47:40
  that's going on. My work is I will have a regular conversation one-on-ones with the
• 47:45
  leaders in between the sessions. So that's important to me to stay connected, to make
• 47:50
  sure they're focusing on their priorities, to address any issues that they're having, talk to
• 47:55
  them about their people challenges, whatever's going on. I love it when the owners and
• 48:00
  leaders get me involved in helping them to make those decisions in that process. And
• 48:05
  I always say I don't make decisions for anyone. What I do is I share
• 48:09
  my experience. experiences. And and then those experiences can maybe help direct someone to to
• 48:14
  make a decision. But ultimately it's really about them making the decision that's right for
• 48:19
  them. It's their business.
• 48:21
  And there you go. And if we learned anything, we uncovered just a tiny fraction
• 48:26
  of experiences. And I'm guaranteeing there's a whole lot more experiences to share though. Russ,
• 48:31
  I've been I've been blessed.
• 48:33
  I always enjoy talk with you, man. I always get excited after a conversation. Thank
• 48:36
  you so much for coming on, man. I appreciate it.
• 48:39
  Yeah, I appreciate you, Jack, and good luck to everyone out there.
• 48:42
  Thanks so much. Stay data driven, everybody.
• 48:44
  Mm-hmm.