0:00

You're a man of action. You live

0:02

life to the fullest. Embrace your fears

0:04

and boldly chart your own path. When

0:06

life knocks you down, you get back

0:08

up one more time, every time. You

0:10

are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged,

0:13

resilient, or strong. This is your life.

0:15

This is who you are. This is

0:17

who you will become at the end

0:19

of the day and after all is

0:21

said and done, you can call yourself

0:24

a man. Starting a business

0:26

is extremely hard work. Now, I know there's

0:28

a lot of people on the socials, Instagram,

0:30

Facebook, YouTube, all these

0:32

entrepreneurs telling you how easy it is to start a business and

0:35

why this is the best time and all you have to do

0:37

is open your doors and all you have to do is sell

0:39

a product. And some of that has

0:41

some validity to it, but it's

0:43

harder than you think. And I'm

0:45

going to be real with you because I've

0:48

had some success in business, I've had some

0:50

failures in business, and I think it's very

0:52

important that we be honest with each other

0:54

about what it takes to succeed as an

0:57

entrepreneur. I do believe that

0:59

it's the best time to start a business

1:01

and I do believe that there's plenty of

1:03

opportunity out there for you to start a

1:06

lucrative side business or side hustle if you

1:08

want to call it that or

1:10

even a full-time career if you have a

1:12

desire, an inclination, and the

1:14

ability to do so. But

1:16

there's some things that you need to be

1:19

very, very aware of because if you're not,

1:21

you're going to fall prey to the Instagram

1:23

gurus who tell you how easy it is

1:25

and you're going to end up spending a

1:28

lot of time, money, energy, and resources on

1:30

something that's destined to fail. So

1:32

today I'm going to talk with you about

1:35

five things that I've learned over the past

1:37

nine years and running the order of man

1:39

organization and with my own registered investment advisory

1:41

firm for financial planning prior to that. And

1:44

then I'm going to talk with you

1:46

about five solutions that you can consider when

1:48

starting your own business. Now guys,

1:50

before I get into that, I do want to mention

1:52

speaking of businesses, one business that

1:54

I'm a huge advocate for and friends

1:57

of mine over at Montana knife.

2:00

company. Now these guys make knives

2:02

for hunting for culinary. I believe

2:04

they're coming out with a tactical

2:06

line very soon. They're

2:08

incredible knives and the best thing

2:10

about them is they are made

2:12

in America. I love that. I

2:14

support American made businesses like Origin,

2:17

like Sorenx and also like Montana Knife

2:20

Company. So if you're looking for a

2:22

great knife and you want

2:24

to have something that's going to work in

2:26

the field if you're hunting or work in

2:28

the kitchen if you're cooking then look no

2:30

further than montanaknifecompany.com and then when

2:32

you check out use the code orderofman

2:35

all one word order of man at checkout because

2:37

you're going to save some money when you do

2:39

and you're also letting them know that you heard

2:42

about them here. So it supports them, it supports

2:44

us and you'll have a great

2:46

knife in the process. Again montanaknifecompany.com use the

2:48

code order of man. Alright guys

2:51

let's jump into this. Number one I'm going to

2:53

talk about the pitfalls first. So

2:55

the first pitfall or maybe not even pitfall just thing

2:57

to be aware of that a lot of people don't

2:59

talk about is that it's

3:01

going to take a

3:03

lot of time and energy up front

3:05

and it becomes more efficient the

3:07

longer that you do it. I want you

3:09

to imagine for a second when the

3:12

most inefficient time for

3:15

a plane to take off let's say

3:17

a plane is departing LA and it's

3:19

flying to New York what

3:21

is the most inefficient element of that

3:24

flight? Well it's the takeoff it has

3:26

the most fuel which means it's the

3:28

heaviest it's trying to elevate so it's

3:31

fighting gravity and wind and other you

3:33

know natural forces that are at work against

3:35

it and it's and it's inclining so it's

3:38

the most inefficient time and it's trying to

3:40

get up to a cruising altitude of let's

3:42

say 35,000 feet. Once

3:44

it gets to 35,000 feet the plane levels

3:46

off they're not fighting friction

3:49

as much fuel is being burned so

3:51

the plane becomes lighter they get into

3:53

jet streams which help propel and push

3:56

there's a lot of efficiencies that happen

3:59

after you get get past the initial

4:01

takeoff. Well, the same thing is true

4:03

in your business. It's very inefficient. It's

4:05

very challenging. It's very frustrating in a lot

4:07

of ways. When I started Order

4:09

of Man, now look, let me back up.

4:12

Again, the InstaGurus will tell you, burn the

4:14

boats, march into your boss's office and tell

4:16

him to F off and burn the bridges

4:19

and go out and do your own thing.

4:22

Look, if you can do that, all the power to

4:24

you, that's not how I did it. That's not how

4:26

most of the guys that I work with and talk

4:29

with have done it. The most successful

4:31

people in the world, they

4:33

don't do it like that. What

4:36

they do is they leverage previous opportunities

4:38

to create new opportunities for themselves and

4:40

they do it in an intelligent way.

4:42

So an example of that might be

4:44

somebody like Cam Haynes. Cam

4:47

Haynes worked for, I don't know exactly,

4:49

no, I think it was a utilities company

4:52

in Oregon for decades.

4:55

And now he started his own podcast. So you might

4:57

look at it and say, well, you know, like he

4:59

just came out of nowhere. No, he was working with

5:02

the utilities organization for decades while

5:04

he was building his movement, building

5:07

his social media profile, building clout. And then when

5:09

that got to a level, he was able to

5:11

step away and I don't know

5:13

his financials, but he was able to step away

5:16

and probably create something that was even more lucrative

5:18

than it was before. But don't for a second

5:20

believe that that guy just burned the

5:22

bridges, burned the boats and told

5:25

his former employer to F off and

5:27

just took this leap of faith. That's

5:29

not really how it worked. You

5:31

look at guys like even

5:33

former military members who

5:35

start podcasts, start organizations, start

5:37

movements, start speaking

5:39

careers. They're leveraging their

5:42

previous employment

5:44

in the military in this case. And

5:47

they probably got a retirement, they probably got a

5:49

pension, they probably got money coming in, maybe their

5:51

spouse works. And so it looks

5:53

like they're just taking this leap of faith, but

5:55

they're not guys. When

5:57

I started order of man, I was working two

5:59

hours. hours in the morning and then

6:01

I would go to my quote unquote real job

6:03

financial planning. I would do that work and then

6:06

I'd come home. I'd see my wife. I'd spend

6:08

time with my kids. I do dinner and then I

6:10

put the kids down and then I would do another

6:12

hour or two in the evening. This

6:14

is what's required to start a business.

6:16

You have to sacrifice and

6:18

it takes time to get it up and

6:20

running and you have to realize that it

6:22

will and also I would suggest to you that it's going

6:24

to be a season. It's

6:27

not indefinite. Again when

6:29

I started order man in 2015 I did that

6:31

for about a year maybe a little longer before

6:33

I sold my financial planning practice and then did

6:35

the order man thing. Now some people might say

6:37

well there's your leap of faith. It is a

6:39

leap of faith but I

6:41

had income coming in from the sale of my business.

6:44

I didn't just shut off the income stream because I

6:46

had kids and

6:48

a wife and responsibilities. I'll

6:52

say it as bluntly as I can. We're not going

6:54

to be dumb about this even though the instant people

6:56

will tell you to be smart

6:58

about it. It takes more time

7:00

and energy than you think. Realize

7:02

it's a season. Communicate with the people your wife

7:05

your kids whoever might be affected by the season

7:07

you're in and get after it. All right. Number

7:09

two additional costs continue to accrue.

7:11

I'm noticing this now. You know as

7:13

our organization and our movement grows there's

7:16

new technology. There's new resources. There's new

7:18

social media things and all these other

7:20

companies want a little piece of the

7:22

pie your pie. I'm

7:24

not saying it's bad or it's wrong. I'm

7:26

willing to invest in my business because it's

7:28

an investment which means that I

7:30

have the anticipation of a return. So I'm

7:33

OK with that. But you also need to

7:35

know that things add up. Things

7:37

get expensive. All right. There

7:39

there there's new technology. We

7:42

use social media. We

7:44

use different platforms to administer.

7:47

We have some

7:49

back end programs. We have email

7:51

stuff that we're using. We use

7:53

ConvertKit that I pay for.

7:56

There's costs associated with it. And now there's

7:58

costs associated with people. having people

8:00

manage it because I

8:03

can't do everything that needs to be done on

8:05

my own. And so I have to bring other

8:07

people in who are experts in these departments so

8:10

that I can pay them to do a

8:12

good job in those areas. So costs accrue.

8:15

And you need to be very aware of that. You can run

8:18

something very streamlined, very minimal as far as

8:20

investment goes for only a period of time.

8:22

But if you want to grow it, there's

8:24

additional costs, additional sacrifice that needs to be

8:26

made. And again, I'm going to get

8:28

into solutions here in a minute, but I want you to

8:30

understand there's additional costs associated with this.

8:33

I'm not trying to dissuade you from starting

8:35

a business. I'm just trying to be honest

8:37

with you because all these other quote unquote

8:39

influencers are not being honest with you about

8:41

what it takes. They're lying to you. They're

8:44

telling you it's easy. They're telling you all

8:46

you need to do is start a thing that you're

8:48

excited about. And then you know, all of your wildest

8:50

dreams will come true. Well, they won't. You'll

8:52

probably be miserable for a time or you'll have

8:54

seasons of being miserable. That's how it goes. So

8:57

I'm going to be honest with you about it.

8:59

Number three is that you're going

9:02

to make mistakes along the way.

9:04

All right, you might feel really good about

9:06

your movement or your business or your service

9:08

or your offering and everything's going well and

9:10

things are wonderful. And then all of a

9:12

sudden you do something dumb, maybe

9:15

not even dumb, maybe ignorant. And there's a difference.

9:17

Dumb is doing something you know you shouldn't do.

9:19

Ignorance is doing something you didn't know you shouldn't

9:22

do. So you're going to have

9:24

a lot of ignorance about your business,

9:27

about sales, about marketing, about hiring

9:29

people, things that you would never even consider.

9:31

I'll give you a couple of examples. My

9:34

first book, sovereignty, the battle for the hearts and minds

9:36

of men, the distributor

9:40

went out of business straight up just bankruptcy,

9:42

went out of business. And I

9:44

lost three quarters of revenue that had

9:46

not been paid to me because that

9:48

business bellied up. That

9:50

was expensive. Now it worked out in the long

9:52

run because I took my lumps, I took my

9:54

hits, I lost some money and I made a

9:56

better decision moving forward and now have rights to

9:58

my own book for distribution. which is exactly

10:00

where I wanted to be in the first place. But

10:03

that's what happened. And I

10:05

didn't know that that could happen. I didn't

10:07

anticipate that happening. I wasn't aware of that

10:09

happening. And so I got hit with it.

10:12

I've also done other things where I've

10:14

bought thousands of dollars worth of merchandise

10:16

that I couldn't sell. I

10:18

got hit with a copyright, I

10:21

should say it this way, I almost got hit with

10:23

a copyright infringement. They sent a

10:25

letter to me and asked me to not sell

10:27

that because it was so close to their brand.

10:30

And they were right, it was. That was ignorance.

10:32

And so, you know, thousands of

10:34

dollars worth of merchandise that basically became

10:37

expensive house cleaning rags.

10:40

That stuff happens. And you have

10:42

to be aware of it. And you have to

10:44

anticipate it. And know that if it happens, it's

10:46

not the end of the world. It's just, as

10:49

my friend Pete Roberts with Origin says, tuition payments.

10:51

And you have to pay the tuition. I

10:53

don't wanna pay tuition, but it's the cost

10:55

of doing business. Number four is

10:57

I'm trying to figure out how

11:00

to communicate with all sorts of different people. I

11:02

know what I'm driven by. I know what I'm

11:04

inspired by. I know what speaks to me. I

11:07

know how I like to hear

11:09

things or how I wanna move forward. But

11:11

not everybody in my organization is exactly like

11:13

me. Now our vision and our

11:15

values and our mission may be aligned, but

11:17

they may be driven by something else. For

11:20

example, I've got a couple of guys in Order

11:22

Man and Iron Council that I've hired. Great

11:25

men believe in the mission wholeheartedly. I've never

11:27

doubted that. They're very data-driven. I'm

11:29

not a data-driven guy. I'm

11:31

more of an intuitive. So if I see something,

11:33

it sounds good, feels good, feels right, I'm gonna

11:35

go for it. These guys are like, well,

11:37

hold on. Let's look at the data first. I'm like, nah, screw the

11:39

data, just go for it. So there's

11:42

some friction from time to time with me and these

11:44

other men. They're not bad guys. It

11:47

doesn't mean they don't believe in what we're doing. It

11:49

just means that they see things differently. And I value

11:51

that. Even though it's hard for me to wrap my

11:53

head around and challenging because it has this friction at

11:56

times, I value somebody

11:58

who's aligned with my mission. But

12:01

sees it in a different way because they're gonna help

12:03

shore up my weaknesses But

12:05

that means that I need to be able to

12:07

expand and open up and broaden my horizon For

12:10

my ability to communicate with individuals like this

12:13

I can't shut those people down and I have a

12:15

tendency of doing that because I think their way is

12:17

not wrong But not ideal because

12:20

I'm only seeing it through my lens You're

12:23

gonna work with good people. You're gonna

12:25

work with data-driven people. You're gonna work

12:27

with assholes at times You're gonna work

12:29

with hard chargers You're gonna work with

12:31

people who are driven by things that

12:33

don't even appear relevant to you at

12:35

all And you have to be able to do

12:37

it all You have

12:39

to be able to see it from their perspective again I'm

12:41

gonna give you some solutions here shortly, but I want you

12:43

to be aware that you're gonna have to work with Some

12:46

people I was talking with my daughter the other day and

12:48

she was talking about somebody that she had met and she

12:51

said you know, I don't really like that person and I

12:54

said no I understand like but we have to be

12:56

aware that We're gonna

12:58

be around people that we don't always like

13:00

and so part of growing up and maturing

13:02

is Learning how to get along

13:04

with all sorts of different types so

13:09

It's it's a challenge, you know, and

13:11

so does my daughter not be

13:14

friendly with you know the neighbor or

13:16

or does she like she has to navigate that

13:18

a little bit and it's my job as a

13:20

father to help her but it's also our job

13:22

as Entrepreneurs

13:25

business owners employers to recognize this somebody

13:27

that I just don't like and doesn't

13:29

need to be part of our organization

13:31

Or is this somebody who just sees it differently and

13:33

I need to work with them in order to propel

13:36

our mission forward in a way That I could not

13:38

do on my own and then the last

13:40

point I want to make before I start getting into solutions because

13:42

up to This point we've done 10 minutes of griping and telling

13:44

you how bad it is to start a business and some of

13:46

you're thinking Why would I ever do this? So

13:49

I'm gonna get into some solutions But the

13:51

last point I wanted to make is that

13:53

there's a challenge in making sure

13:55

that you're continually growing I think I said

13:58

it on another Friday field or

14:00

an ask me thing that you're either growing or

14:02

you're dying. And I believe

14:04

that's true. You're either moving forward

14:06

and propelling and getting better, or

14:09

you're falling behind and you're losing ground.

14:11

There's plateaus in your business. There's even

14:13

worse than plateaus. There's dips where

14:16

things look like, oh, man, this thing has run

14:18

its course. I've gone through this over nine years.

14:20

This thing has run its course, and maybe we're

14:22

done here. And

14:24

instead of throwing in the towel, you need to

14:26

have the mental and testicular fortitude to say, you

14:28

know what? I'm going to keep driving forward. I'm

14:31

going to change a few things to ensure that

14:33

we continue to drive forward, but I'm not going

14:35

to plateau. I'm not going to dip. I'm not

14:38

going to fall under it. I'm not going to fall behind. I'm

14:41

going to look at new ways of growing. I'll get

14:43

into solutions here in a minute, but new ways

14:45

of growing so that I continue to improve and

14:47

get better. Markets

14:49

change. Consumers change.

14:52

The landscapes change. Technology

14:54

changes. Social media changes.

14:56

Buying habits change. Presidents

14:58

change. The economy changes. Everything around you

15:01

that even is uncontrollable changes, and you

15:03

need to be able to ebb

15:05

and flow, weave, and bob as

15:08

those outside factors change if you want to have

15:10

success and continued growth in your business. So

15:13

those are the problems. There's an infinite

15:16

number of challenges, but those are the five that have really

15:18

stood out to me. Again, what

15:20

does it take to get up and running? Additional

15:22

costs accruing, making

15:24

mistakes along the way, having

15:26

to learn how to communicate with all sorts of

15:28

individuals, and then making sure that you're not plateauing

15:31

or dipping. So what do we do about it? Well,

15:34

number one, again, what does it take to get up and

15:36

running? Well, you have to recognize that you're in a season.

15:39

That's it. You're just in a season. It takes

15:41

time. And so as we talked about that analogy

15:43

of the plane taking off, it's not

15:45

efficient at first, but it will get there. And

15:47

so we have to have a little faith, and

15:50

you have to have a little strength, and again, fortitude

15:52

to be able to recognize that, hey,

15:54

this is going to be a crazy three months, or six

15:56

months, or nine months, or a year. But you can have

15:58

a plan, and you can have a plan. You can bear

16:00

down when you need to bear down. Recognize

16:02

that you're gonna need to do it hard at first and

16:04

then it will get easier. I won't

16:06

say easier. It will ease

16:08

up your time constraints. But one

16:10

thing I want you to be really aware of is

16:13

you, and I said this earlier, you have to be

16:15

able to communicate with the people who will be impacted

16:17

by the decisions you're making. If you're

16:19

starting a business and you're not communicating with

16:21

your wife about how many hours

16:23

you're gonna put in the morning or the evening,

16:25

she's gonna get very frustrated very quickly and

16:28

not only do you have the business to grow, but

16:30

now you have a contentious wife and that's gonna be a problem for you.

16:34

So you need to communicate with her. If

16:36

you can't coach your son's team like you always have

16:39

or you can't go to all of your daughter's dance

16:41

recitals like you have in the past, then you

16:43

need to be able to clearly articulate why that's the

16:45

case and when it will change. Don't

16:48

assume that they're just gonna come to

16:50

the best conclusion about you being gone. Oh,

16:52

you know what? Dad's gone because he's starting a

16:54

business and we're really proud of him and I'm

16:56

so grateful that he put food on the table

16:58

and put the roof over our head and worked

17:00

so hard for us. That'd be wonderful if our

17:03

kids and our spouses always believe that, but they

17:05

don't always believe that. A

17:07

lot of the times it's, well, dad's selfish and he's

17:09

only doing this for him and he doesn't care about

17:11

us anymore and that's not the case, but

17:14

it feels that way if we

17:16

can't communicate it with the people that we love

17:18

and care about. So make sure

17:20

that you're communicating and then also make sure you're honoring

17:23

your word. If you say you're gonna be

17:25

done at Friday at 5 p.m., then

17:27

you better be done at Friday at 5 p.m. If

17:30

you say you're gonna take all day Saturday to go

17:33

play catch or go on a run or go on

17:35

a hike with your kids, then you better be done

17:37

on Saturday and go play catch or go on a

17:39

hike or a run with your kids. Being

17:42

in integrity that way will,

17:44

I was gonna say, give you the leniency.

17:46

I don't like saying it like

17:48

that, but will afford the opportunities to

17:51

double down when you really need to get to work. Number

17:54

two, I said additional costs accrue.

17:56

So the anecdote to that is

17:58

planning ahead for costs. and

18:01

maybe even consider not taking a bunch of money

18:03

out of your business at first. Now look, you

18:06

might have aspirations to start

18:09

a movement, start a business, start an organization that serves

18:11

people, but also if it's a business, you wanna make

18:13

money, let's not pretend that it's a money-making

18:16

venture, and we can talk

18:18

all about what money means and we have in the

18:20

past, and we should talk more about that, but what

18:22

you need to know is that maybe you shouldn't be

18:24

taking money out of the business and

18:26

sucking all the blood out of your business so

18:28

it can't thrive and grow. Give

18:31

it a chance to build,

18:33

to develop, to sustain

18:35

itself. If

18:37

you can't do that, then you're gonna kill the

18:39

thing before you even give it a chance to

18:41

lift off and to grow and develop. Also

18:45

look for low capital ventures. You

18:48

know, when I started doing merchandise, I was selling

18:50

one piece at a time using drop

18:53

shipping type stuff where somebody would come in and order

18:55

a shirt and then it would be printed, and then

18:57

they'd send that shirt one at a time, and

18:59

it wasn't more expensive for the consumer, but it

19:01

was more expensive for me than it would be

19:03

to order 500 shirts,

19:06

for example. But

19:08

I had to do that at first because that

19:10

was a low-cost way for me getting merchandise out

19:12

there, and gradually I've taken it on. I

19:15

was, I hired a

19:17

distribution center to take care of orders

19:19

and supplies. I brought that in-house. There's

19:22

things that I've done over the course

19:24

of nine years that have become more,

19:27

again, efficient over time, but I'm

19:29

looking for low-cost ways to sell

19:31

merchandise and products and services and

19:34

offerings. Even now, if I have

19:36

a new shirt, I'll put it on a pre-order, and

19:39

I'll go promote it to our audience,

19:41

and those individuals will buy those shirts

19:43

before I even have to pay for

19:45

them, and I

19:47

could potentially have 50, 60, 70% of

19:51

the capital covered in pre-sales before I

19:54

even have to pay for the shirt

19:56

or the hat or the merchandise that

19:58

I have. This is... This is

20:00

just smart business. And of

20:02

course I inform my customers, this is a pre-order, it's

20:04

gonna take a little longer than you might normally anticipate.

20:06

And they're okay with that. If I'm being honest with

20:09

them about it. But this

20:11

is, you have to be creative in low

20:13

capital environments. So you can

20:15

sell things without having this like $10,000 bill or

20:17

this $100,000 bill that's

20:21

gonna be difficult for you to pay. Just

20:23

be aware that if you're a vampire

20:25

of your business and you suck all the blood

20:28

out of your business because you wanna buy the

20:30

new car, take

20:32

your wife on a vacation or

20:34

live this lavish lifestyle, well, you're

20:37

killing the goose. You've

20:40

got that story of the golden goose and

20:42

it lays golden eggs. And

20:45

some people will just go ahead and take the goose

20:47

and kill the goose. It's like, well, no, protect

20:49

the goose, take the eggs as

20:51

they come. But the goose is the

20:54

value, not the egg itself. All

20:57

right, number three, I said that you're

20:59

gonna make mistakes along the way I talked about

21:01

book distribution. I talked

21:03

about failure and merchandise. The antidote to that

21:06

is working with coaches, following

21:08

people, going to events, building entrepreneurial friendships,

21:10

asking them powerful questions. What's been your

21:12

biggest pitfall or what lessons have you

21:14

learned or where did you misstep and

21:17

where did you mess up and

21:19

how expensive was your biggest mistake and what did you

21:21

learn from it? The more you

21:23

can attend events and invest in yourself by

21:26

hiring coaches, attending events, building entrepreneurial

21:28

friendships, and then listening to people

21:30

who are qualified to give the advice, the better off

21:32

you're gonna be. Right,

21:34

they've done that. For example,

21:37

you're listening to this podcast, if I'm

21:39

telling you, hey, be aware of doing

21:41

merchandise that's

21:43

already been done and then you're gonna have $2,000, $10,000, $100,000 worth

21:45

of inventory that

21:49

you can't sell, I hope you listen

21:51

to that so you don't have to do it yourself. The

21:54

adage is smart people learn from their mistakes,

21:56

wise people learn from the mistakes of others.

21:58

You have mentors, you have coaches. You have

22:00

conferences, you have emails, you have podcasts, you

22:02

have books, you have entrepreneurial friends. Befriend

22:05

them, listen to them, invest in them, go

22:07

to their conferences, read their emails, listen to

22:09

their podcasts. They're telling you what to do.

22:11

They're literally giving you a roadmap. Go

22:14

to the library, go to Barnes and Noble, get on

22:16

Amazon, I don't care. Get, like,

22:19

consume that information

22:21

and then apply it so

22:23

you're not learning the same dumb mistakes that

22:25

those people made that I've made in

22:27

my career and my 10,000 or

22:30

whatever dollar expense or cost or

22:32

lesson is gonna cost

22:34

you nothing. Learn

22:36

from me, don't learn from yourself. Number

22:39

four, I talked about learning to communicate with all types.

22:42

The anecdote or the answer

22:45

to that is that recognizing that all people are

22:47

not like you and just having

22:49

a little bit of grace and understanding and realize that

22:51

not everybody sees it the same way, I

22:53

think it's very important that you find people who are

22:55

aligned with your mission, aligned with your

22:58

objectives, aligned with your goals. I have all

23:00

sorts of guys in the Iron Council who

23:02

will push and poke and prod and give

23:04

ideas and present counter arguments to just about

23:06

everything I share. But I know these guys

23:08

are aligned with our mission and so it

23:10

doesn't bother me. In fact, I

23:12

welcome it, I encourage it, I like it because

23:14

it helps me see things from a perspective that

23:16

I could not see on my own. And

23:19

the other suggestion I would give to you here

23:21

is that if you recognize that somebody has an

23:23

aptitude for something, what you want to do in

23:25

business is you want to get the right people

23:27

in the right places. I've got

23:29

a guy, Rhys Carter, he believes in our mission,

23:31

he believes in what we're doing, he's been

23:34

in for years, he's been part of this and

23:36

helping us grow. Him and I don't

23:38

always see things the same, he's very data driven,

23:41

I'm very intuitive driven. And

23:44

so he helps us in a very

23:46

specific role inside of the organization because

23:48

that's what he has an aptitude for.

23:51

That's what he's good at. I've got

23:53

Chris Gatschko who runs our events. Well,

23:55

he used to run large events for hotels and

23:59

other conferences. conferences and conference centers. And so this

24:01

is an individual who knows how to plan logistically.

24:03

I don't know how to do that. He's

24:06

aligned with our goals. He's aligned with our mission.

24:08

He believes in what we're doing. And therefore, I

24:11

don't have any doubt about his motive. Even

24:14

though we don't always see it perfectly, he's

24:16

got the experience there. I've got

24:18

another guy, Steve Baumgardner. He just started doing

24:21

some more of our operations management. I'm

24:23

not good at that stuff. Again, very

24:25

intuitive. I love being front facing, talking

24:27

with you guys, communicating, sharing

24:30

ideas and concepts, and thinking

24:32

about what the future holds. And he's

24:35

very strategic in how we implement some

24:37

of the vision that I've considered. We

24:39

don't always see eye to eye. When

24:41

he says something, I'm like, I don't even know what you're talking

24:44

about. And he's like, what don't you get? But

24:46

I know that he's aligned with what we're

24:48

doing. I believe that he's aligned with that.

24:51

And I know that he has a different skillset than

24:54

me, and I'm very happy to have him aboard. I'm

24:57

working on getting the right people in

24:59

the right places based on their aptitude, based on

25:01

their skills, based on their communication styles. And

25:04

that has proven to be

25:06

very valuable to the

25:09

business, the organization, even though it's hard and

25:11

confronting and challenging at times. And the last

25:13

point here, guys, is I talked about continued

25:15

growth. Here's what

25:17

I've realized, and here I think is part

25:20

of the solution, is understanding that, or

25:23

at least knowing that what got you here

25:25

to this point may not

25:27

necessarily get you to that point. So you might

25:29

hit a certain level of revenue and then cap

25:32

off. Okay, well, that's it. That's

25:35

all. If you keep doing things the way

25:37

you've done them, you're just gonna stay

25:39

there. And you might be comfortable with that. If that's

25:41

the case, okay. But if you wanna

25:43

take it to the next level, then you have to

25:45

do something different. And you have to be

25:47

open to something different. So you have to

25:50

think outside the box. You

25:52

have to, to my previous point, hire coaches, mentors,

25:54

other people, bringing people in who can do certain

25:56

things that you can do as well on your

25:58

own, invest in that. And

26:00

again, it's an investment. You're not just

26:03

throwing money at the thing, you're investing

26:05

in people, you're investing in systems, you're

26:07

investing in processes. And the difference between

26:09

just throwing money at it and investing

26:11

is that an investment has an anticipation

26:14

of a return. If

26:16

you invest a dollar into a thing, then I

26:18

want $10 back or

26:21

$100 or whatever it might be. But

26:23

I'm investing in people, I'm investing in

26:25

systems, I'm investing in technology, because

26:27

I believe it will yield a return for

26:29

us. And you know that, when

26:32

I've incorporated that into my

26:34

business, it's paid off. It's

26:36

always paid off. When I bring the right people

26:38

in, when I bring a new technology, when I

26:41

think outside of the box, when I think a

26:43

little bit differently, and do

26:45

it that way. The last thing I would say is something

26:48

that I call distinctive emulation. So

26:50

what you can do is you can look at what

26:52

other people are doing. Like there's other people in the

26:54

podcasting space, for example, Larry Hagner with

26:57

that edge, Connor Beaton, man talks, Brett

27:00

McKay, Art of Manliness, Jordan Peterson,

27:02

Jordan Peterson podcast, Joe Rogan podcast,

27:05

Modern Wisdom podcast with Chris Williamson,

27:07

Keep Hammering Collective with Cam and

27:09

Haynes, like there's other people doing

27:11

things that are similar to us. I

27:14

can look at what those individuals are

27:16

doing, and I can emulate them. Notice

27:18

I didn't say copy. Because if I try

27:20

to do what Cam or Chris or Joe or any of

27:22

these other people are doing, it's going to come across

27:24

as disingenuous because it is those guys aren't me and I'm

27:27

not them. This is

27:29

why I call it distinctive emulation. Because

27:31

I'm going to run whatever they're doing

27:33

through my own filter, through my own

27:36

mechanism, through my own delivery. So

27:38

we're going to emulate what other people are doing, but

27:40

we're going to do it in our own way with

27:43

our own spin, our own flair and our own personality.

27:45

And then it becomes authentic, then it

27:47

becomes genuine, then people could begin to see that,

27:49

hey, this is a good idea. But man, I

27:51

can see that this is something Ryan's really behind.

27:54

He's not just copying other people. Do

27:56

it your own way. Think about what other people are

27:59

doing that is successful. and do it in your own

28:01

flavor. I hope that helps you.

28:03

Guys, I'm not trying to make it harder

28:05

for you. I'm not trying to

28:07

tell you not to start businesses. In fact, I

28:09

want you to start businesses. I think you starting

28:11

an organization, a movement, a business, a product, a

28:13

service, an offering, is the

28:15

path forward, not only for yourself, but for

28:17

your community, for your family, for

28:20

this country. I want you

28:22

to start businesses. I just wanna be realistic

28:24

about what it takes. Because the last thing

28:26

I'd want is for you to start a

28:28

business because some schmo on Instagram told you

28:30

how easy it was, and they lied to

28:32

you, and you started a business, and you

28:34

wasted a bunch of time, money, energy in

28:36

starting the business, and then you failed because

28:38

you didn't even give yourself a chance to

28:40

do it right because you weren't told the

28:42

truth. The truth is starting a business is

28:44

rough, and I have to ask you, are

28:46

you up for it? Are you up to

28:48

the task? If you are, I believe in

28:50

you. I believe that you can do it. But if

28:53

you're being honest and the answer is no, then don't

28:55

start a business. Pour into your

28:57

current business. Pour into your current

28:59

career. Pour into the things that you're doing

29:01

right now, and make that the best you can possibly

29:03

be. And if that changes in the future, then we

29:05

can look at starting entrepreneurship or something like that. But

29:07

for now, you need to know it's rough. There

29:10

are solutions, there is a path forward, but

29:12

it takes a lot of fortitude, grit, resiliency,

29:14

investment, heartache, heartbreak.

29:17

That's what entrepreneurship requires.

29:20

And I think you can do it. But let's not lie

29:22

to ourselves and tell us that at tell ourselves it's

29:24

easier than it is. That just sets us

29:26

up for failure. All right, guys, if

29:28

you have any other thoughts, lessons learned, things

29:31

that have been hard for you, ways that you've overcome them,

29:33

please let us know. This is a community, order

29:36

of man. And inevitably when I wear this

29:38

hat, I always have people tell

29:40

me that in, I don't know

29:42

what dialect, but in Africa,

29:44

O-O-M means uncle, which I kind of like.

29:46

I didn't know that when I did this

29:48

hat, but I kind of like that. Uncle.

29:52

All right, guys, I hope that served you. If

29:55

you want this hat, by the way, you can check it

29:57

out at store.orderofman.com. Again, check out

29:59

Montana. knifecompany.com use the code order

30:01

of man and then we're gonna be

30:03

doing a lot more emailing getting

30:06

our information to you guys that way so

30:08

if you're interested in hearing more about some

30:11

insights that I had to share updates on

30:13

podcasts and updates on new merchandise new events

30:15

things like that you can go to order

30:17

of man.com and get signed up for our

30:21

email alright guys I'll be back next

30:23

week until then go out there take action and

30:25

become the man you are meant to be.