084: Creating a Business and Life by Design
Michele (0:01) Hello, my name is Michele, and you're listening to Profit is a Choice. With us today is Todd Palmer, CEO of Extraordinary Advisors. He's an executive coach, author, and speaker committed to helping business owners tackle their obstacles and a clear path to success. Todd understands struggles and he's going to share those on the podcast today. He's had it all and he's lost it all, from a thriving business to over $600,000 in debt, and then finding his way back out. We're going to talk about that journey. It is a journey and a process along with these topics, imposter syndrome, redefining success and failure and managing our mindset, as well as being authentic and vulnerable in our relationships. We cover so many topics, but one of the most important takeaways that I want to go ahead and give you even before you listen is that we are not alone in this entrepreneurial journey, even if we feel that way. So I hope you get a lot out of this and I hope you enjoy it.
Michele (1:06) Every day empowered entrepreneurs are taking ownership of their company's financial health, and enjoying the rewards of reducing stress and more creativity. With my background as a financial software developer, owner of multiple businesses in the interior design industry, educator and Speaker, I coach women in the interior design industry to increase their profits, regain ownership of their bottom line and have fun again in their business. Welcome to Profit is a Choice. Hey, Todd, welcome to the podcast today.
Todd (1:39) Great, thank you so much for having me here today. I'm excited to talk with you about entrepreneurship.
Michele (1:43) Exactly. And that is a topic that we all love for sure. As we get started why don't you just tell us a little bit about your journey, your history, and what brought you to do the work that you're doing today?
Todd (1:56) Sure. Well, I started my first business when I was 27 years old. And I started a staffing business to help people get new jobs and help companies find new employees. I had an idea of how that would go. We were going to go and deliver people. We set up a transportation company would pick people up and deliver them to businesses. This is before there was Uber. It did pretty well for about 9 years. But going on to your 10, I found out that things weren't going as well as I'd hoped. The economy was shifting and changing. This was about 2006, the economy had shifted and pivoted away where companies were using a lot of people they were scaling back. And we didn't realize that we ran in the break of a recession. During that time, I had chased a couple of other business opportunities, as well as kind of gotten frustrated with some of the employees I had.
I grew the business to three locations, I had 24 employees. And I thought, scaling the business to that size was going to make me not only emotionally happy but also financially successful. In the process, I ended up taking my mind off the ball. And by September of 2006, I was $600,000 in debt. I was two months away from running out of all of my money, as well as losing my house. And at the time, I was a single parent. So my kid was not real happy with me. And I hired a coach. I dug deep and dug into the finances that I didn't understand when I got into it. I was doing sales in my previous career before becoming an entrepreneur. I didn't understand the numbers, learn more about the numbers. And then finally, I decided to dig into the culture and the toxicity that we had allowed to occur. And on September 9 of 2006, I fired my entire company, and I started over. I changed a lot of processes, changed a lot of the way I looked at the business, how I interacted the business with the business, and finally redefine what success looks like to me. Boom. Once I did that, we went on a great run where we were one of America's fastest-growing companies. Making the Inc 5000, one of those fastest-growing businesses six times. So it's kind of been a wild ride as an entrepreneur for me.
Michele (4:03) Okay, Whoa. First, did you have a goal to start as an entrepreneur at 27? You know what, over 20 years ago, there wasn't a big push for entrepreneurship back then like there is now.
Todd (4:21) Oh, it was a completely different world. We didn't have the Shark Tanks and the CNBC is telling everybody to go after being an entrepreneur. No, for me, it was tied back to becoming a single parent. I gotten custody of my son, I realized that to have a sustainable one parent income, I couldn't be all things to all people all the time. I figured out that the best way for me to manage my time and manage my schedule, like what I think a lot of your listeners today might be running into, was to go into business for myself. And I picked the perfect time the country was like it is today in 2019 back in 97. It was full employment, companies would hire you. And it kind of became this runaway freight train of how many people can I get placed? How many companies can I acquire, and it became a very interesting scheduling model for my family.
So my son and I would get up at five in the morning, he'd still be half asleep, I dropped them off at daycare with the promise that he'd be the first kid out of daycare. So, at four o'clock I pick him up. So he was in there for several hours. But he recognized that he was able to come home and he was the first kid to leave and he made a lot of friends. And we moved a lot of mindsets around. What a work-life integration looks like. I used to explain that work-life balance was impossible. And so it grew out of that and as he got older, and as he got into school, I shifted and changed some of my work habits. But for a long time, it was get up at five pick him up at four. Daddy-son time was from four until eight. You go to bed at 8:00 and then from 8:30 until midnight and go back to work. Doing the bookkeeping in the catching up on things. I had to become very scheduled and discipline in order to have that quality time with my son. I didn't have to be on the road across the country hiring sitters doing all those things that I didn't want to do. That would have felt for me as a parent, out of alignment with my core values.
Michele (6:17) Yeah, Mine was a different push behind it, but I left my corporate job actually, in 98, where I was working for Dun and Bradstreet building financial software, and I came home because I was dropping our kids off. I had two at that point, and they were one and three. I was dropping him off at daycare practically in their pajamas and picking him up in their pajamas. Trying to be a mom at the same time and it was too much.
Todd (6:48) Sure.
Michele (6:49) My husband and I made the decision that I would come home and raise the kids. I also wanted to have that outlet and I wanted to work. I love what I do and so I ended up starting kind of a side hustle so that I could have that and make money and do my thing. But also, I love how you said work-life integration. I usually call it sometimes even just centeredness because balanced makes us think that it has to be equal. And that's not the way that it ever works out. So I like more of the idea of integration as you put it. And I would say, many of our listeners are in similar positions. Their lives change, they want to make sure that they can, I always call it almost being three dimensional. I don't want to be a one-dimensional woman, like, I am a wife and a mom or I am a business owner. I want to have more than that. And the integration allows for that.
Todd (7:45) Well, I think you hit an important thing, as a human being, you need to fill your bucket. And a lot of the entrepreneurs that I work within my new business, we talk a lot about what they want. I have one entrepreneur that I work with, he wanted to spend more time with his grandchildren. And for him to do that he had to change the way he worked within his business to free up that time. And he felt guilty about it. He had a lot of self-criticisms and a lot of negative self-talk and we worked it through. He had to understand that he can be the best grandparent, the best spouse to his wife and also the best owner for his business. If his bucket is filled. He can't fill his bucket if he's not honest with himself and what fills his bucket, sometimes working in his business, sometimes long walks with his wife and sometimes, a lot of times it was spending time with the grandchildren. And as long as he was able to do that when he went back to work, he felt refreshed, renewed, and it integrated more with a sense of purpose with things by allowing himself the freedom and removing the guilt of not being all things to all people all the time.
Michele (8:55) For sure. I just did a retreat with some of my one on one clients. We were doing business planning for 2020 at the time, and they thought I was going to start, I think by asking, what do you want your business for next year and all of that. And I brought up this idea of, as you phrased it, work-life integration. What does it feel like if I would just say, "Having a balanced life?" What does that conjure up? What does it mean to you? Right? Because like you said, "It can mean something different to each of us at different points in our life." And I had them say, Is it that I want to go on that walk once a week? Is it that I want to go out with my girlfriends to have dinner? Is it that I want to go on date night? Is it that I need to read a book or whatever it is fill in the blanks. Now let's go plan and schedule that. Now let's see how we're going to change what we do and work to be able to make that happen. Because of something shifts. Right? If this is going to shift left, something has to shift right. Another shift has to happen. And it's been really fun to see them step back and realize that they can make those changes. You made a huge change when you went in and let everybody go and started over. It just was not set up in a process and in a way that was working for you and for the life that you wanted.
Todd (10:19) It really wasn't. And it was challenging. That's what the coach I used at the time helped me figure out is, what did success ultimately look like to me? There was a process I worked on overtime. And then I became an empty nester. That shift was what success looks like. The company was doing well. We were making great money and winning awards. But ultimately, it was me sitting being quiet, recognizing who I was in the moment. What was going to help me be successful because I'd gotten sucked into a little bit of the... I guess you could maybe call it the success trap. My business is doing x millions of dollars in revenue, that should make me happy. Or I'm making enough money to be able to afford this, this and this, that should make me happy. And I found... and it has been a really important lesson for me to recognize that I found that, the awards and the revenue and the income didn't fill my definition of happiness internally.
So I saw this quote from Tony Robbins about five or six years ago, and it shifted everything for me. And he put out there that success is doing what you want when you want with whom you want to do it with as often as possible. And what I loved about it immediately was it didn't have a price tag attached. It was really about those relationships. And around the same time, I read this really interesting study, done by hospice workers. This journalist interviewed hospice workers. The question became, what did people talk to you about as hospice workers, at the end of their lives. By and a large report showed that people were talking about I wish I had more quality relationships in my life. I wish I had more time with family. I wish I had said no to more things. I said yes to too many things. And I worked too hard not doing something I was passionate about. And that resonated hard with me. I can see myself in their stories. So the redefining of success plus the understanding in learning from other people, what at the last stages of life wanted, really shifted my entire being around work-life integration.
Michele (12:35) I am a Profit First, certified coach. I'm looking at people's financial statements constantly. And one of the whole reasons that I did this particular podcast, Todd was because sometimes people think that profit, and I mentioned this to you before we came on air, that profits are all about the money and I'm about having a profitable company. Right? But that is not the only indicator of success, exactly what you just said. And I've been there where I made the money and still kept thinking, I'm not happy or I wish I had something else. And that's why I love that idea of really thinking what is the balance that I'm looking for? How do I define success? Because if not, and we make it about a number when you reach the number and you still don't feel I guess the way in air quotes we're supposed to feel, right.
Todd (13:29) Right.
Michele (13:30) Then you feel that down, yet you accomplish something great. I'm an empty nester as well. And I've been doing a lot of the same work, You are coach, I'm a coach, we coach people to do this work, but we have to do it too.
Todd (13:46) Oh for sure.
Michele (13:47) Yeah, and so for this new year, one of the things that I wanted to do was take a watercolor class. I've wanted to paint and just for years, I keep putting it off, putting it off, thinking I'll do it. I'll get around to it. When works settle down. When it gets slower, and I realized, this train has left the station and it is going fast. The only one who's going to slow the train down is me. And I've not been pumping the brakes. And so there is not going to be a time to do this. And I just made the decision that I'm going to do it, now's the time. And so I signed up for a six-week course. And I'm doing it, right?
Todd (14:26) And love it.
Michele (14:28) That's what I want to do. And honestly, even being at a place in my business that allows me the flexibility to do that, feels like success. And so it goes right into the quote that you said, I think it was, "Do what you want, when you want, with who you want as often as possible." And that's actually what I mean, right? That's maybe not quite Tony's words, but that's the gist of it.
Todd (14:49) Sure, sure.
Michele (14:50) That's what I wanted to do. And that's the business that I try to build for myself and others. But let me ask you this... Did you also, Because one of the big issues that we fear keeps us captive, right?
Todd (15:05) Of course.
Michele (15:06) Right. And so having to redefine success. I'm curious, how did you have to also redefine what failure was. I mean to be 600? Was it 600,000 in debt and having to let go of a huge staff? I know when you said it, it came across it's just something you do, but I know that that had to be a very weighty, well thought out decision. Mike, you just got you walked in and got angry one day. So I know that all of that weighed on you heavily.
Todd (15:35) It was.
Michele (15:36) Did you have to redefine failure, as you redefine success?
Todd (15:41) That's a great question. I wish more people would ask it when I do these podcasts because that's exactly what I had to do. I suffered from a syndrome called imposter syndrome. And I was struggling to make the difficult decisions. I thought I had to truly be all things to all people. At times I was a perfectionist. At times, I was a soloist, an isolationist, and that none of that served me well. My identity was strongly tied to the business. If the business was doing great, I must be great. If the business isn't doing so well, and being $600,000 in debt is not doing well, then I'm not a good person. I'm not a good entrepreneur. At my core, there's something wrong with me. And so what I ultimately ended up doing is I ended up connecting. I hired a second coach, and he helped me work on my mindset around that. Even after I let everybody go, I carried a lot of that burden with me. I can certainly in some instances point to work that they weren't doing, but then I say, "But I didn't hold them accountable." And I could talk to them. What areas didn't execute? Yeah, well, I didn't go on that appointment with him and I would just basically kick my butt and it was doing me no good. So the first coach, I had helped me get out of that, but I still carried it for many years.
My second coach ended up being a neuroscientist who specializes in working with high-performance executives. And he taught me that failure is a falsehood. That is something put in through society. And he talked about when he works with people, he puts us under brain scans, and he shows us how our brains fire. In the process of learning that, he shared with me that if I continue to talk to myself in such a negative way, and give failure that energy and that time, my brain would fire like this and it wasn't healthy. If I was able to recognize it every step along the process of success in life, in business, and parenting, there's going to be ups and downs. And to replace the word happy was satisfied and take failure off the table. And as long as I learned something, including learning that I shouldn't manage people the way I have managed them back in 2006. To learn that I was going into the bond markets in 2006. To learn that I didn't have the financial literacy that I required as Michalowicz talks about and Profit First. If I didn't have all those things, and I learned that I needed them, and when I acquired them. I didn't fail. I just learned a new skill. And it maybe it was painful. But I learned something new and I continue to iterate forward. And that's a shift away taking the mantra of the failure off the table for me, was truly game-changing, not only in my professional life but also in my personal life.
Michele (18:26) I love the book Failing Forward by John Maxwell.
Todd (18:28) Right. Great book.
Michele (18:30) Yeah. And it's the same kind of thing. And then I also think about I heard, Sara Blakely, of Spanx. Yeah. mentioned one time, that when they sat around the table... when people sat around the table to have full dinners. We used to do that, but my kids are all gone now. But they would sit around the table at night and their dad would say, Where did you fail today? And it was a great celebration.
(Michele 18:57) Right. Because what she said was, "That meant that you went outside your comfort zone and you tried something new. And so certainly they celebrated their successes where they got something, right. But she grew up in a household where they understood that her dad was kind of showed them that the world's idea of failure is giving you the ability to learn. And so what did you learn? So tell me where you fell today. And what did you learn out of that? And that struck me like, what if we all thought that way. Like to your point, I took failure kind of off the table and reframed it as an opportunity to learn. I'll tell you from my own experience, I have learned so much more when things didn't go right then when they went right
Todd (19:47) Well, that's what my coach told me is like the brain doesn't need so scientific about it, which really appeal to a strong way I looked at the world the time, as a brain doesn't learn anything when you get it right naturally, and it goes then you add in the mythology perpetrated within the media. And the mythology, watch a movie in characters is survived and lonely Xabi survives. You see something like this with kids suffer with now so much as that, dying need for social approval through Instagram, Snapchat through the social media platforms. How many likes can I get next, that external validation? Whereas if we can recognize that failure is just a construct and not an actuality and we can choose to interact with it differently. It truly changes lives. I was so blessed. I typically speak to entrepreneurial audiences or business leader audiences. A buddy of mine asked me to come and speak at his event in Toronto, Canada. And up there it was a mixed audience. So there are kids in the room and parents and school administrators, it was really so I had to move some things around. And I gave the speech and I talked about this construct around failure and a nine-year-old boy came up to me, He drew a diagram of what I had said and how he processed that and how he basically said, "You said fail 12 times. And you said you've learned along the way. So if I really never get to that 12 times, I'm never gonna fail. And he goes, I'm not gonna do something 12 times the exact same way. That's just crazy." And his parents are laughing and I'm laughing. And he goes so so basically, I'm never gonna fail again. Thank you, Mr. Todd. He walked away, blew my mind. He's down. I think in my slide deck, he's number 27. I was so blown away by this young man and his diagram, I took a picture of him because of a nine-year-old boy can learn it. Then a 30-year-old or 40-year-old or 50-years-old or 60-year-old entrepreneur, or solopreneur can learn it too.
Michele (21:41) My youngest son is dyslexic. And so I can remember when we were getting him through third and fourth grade and he is smart as a whip, but his memory and processing certain information just does not come back to him as quickly. I remember a particular Science test that he failed. And he came home and made the comment, I think he was third or fourth grade. And he's like, "I'm such a failure." Right? So that's an internalization of that. And I said, "No, you're not." I said, "What makes you think that?" Will I fail the science test? And I said, "Yeah, but is that really? "Is that all of you? "Or was that just a moment in time?" He's like, "There was a moment in time." I said, "So what I think is maybe your study skills failed you." So and then he was like, Huh, okay. And so I said, When did you start studying?" The night before? Okay, well, we know that doesn't work. I said, "How about next time?" Let's try two nights before. So he did two nights before the test, you made a B? And I said, "Oh, so you're not a failure. Right. Your study skills didn't fail, you could improve them again?" So he sold the next time right so now he's got this something to hold on to. All right. So next time, why don't I try doing two nights before and then he made an A, and so that he started to realize that he was not the action or the outcome, right? He's separate from the outcome. But as you said, financial literacy, hiring practices, working with your employee's communication skills, those are the things, study skills. Those are the things that we have to learn and recognize. There are three questions that I always ask. I think I got him from Maxwell, John Maxwell. It's like what went well, I would do it again. What didn't go so well? And I would change it, add it or delete it, and what did I learn? And I can pull myself up and ask those questions every time it gives me such a different advantage point and it takes some of the emotion out of it. So that it allows me to see what happened in a way that I can either recreate it or choose not to recreate it.
(Todd 23:44) Yep. I love about what you did, is you worked with your son in a language he could understand no different than working with an employee the best way they learn. This happens within the business and happens in families. No shame. No guilt, you acknowledged it and then you created essentially process correction, not people correction. So I give you a lot of credit for being so attuned on how to move him forward to become a successful student for the studying he needed to do.
(Michele 24:14) Well, when it's your child who is internalizing something like that you will learn a skill very quickly, because the last thing I wanted to do.... right, and that wasn't even coaching back then. But the last thing I wanted to do was to make him think that he was what he did. These are different things that would be like, again, I'm a woman. I struggle and have for years, You can't get away from the media influences. This is what beauty looks like.
Todd (24:42) Sure.
Michele (24:42) For a man, this is what success looks like. Fill in the blank. And the problem is, is that gage is always moving.
Todd (24:53) Oh, sure. You might fit the mold on Monday, but you might not fit it on Tuesday. And now what are you going to do? So I just want to make sure that my kids and myself, that our value and our worth is not tied up in that because that would keep me hostage and make me feel like I couldn't try things or do things. Nobody wants to live that way. That's a shackled way to live so that any success we get is empty.
Michele (25:19) Right. It's not long-lasting and it's not sustainable. No, even when, right,
Todd (25:24) Yeah, because every business has high points and low points. Things can happen beyond your control. I mean, I've got a client right now whose business was doing great, they change the regulation within a governmental code, his business is very vulnerable right now. And he's got a pivot away from his bread and butter of 25 years.
Michele (25:39) Right. It could happen quickly.
Todd (25:45) No, and he didn't do anything out of the ordinary. He was producing, he was providing but a switch in government regulations, his game changed for his business and he didn't even see it coming.
Michele (25:56) So I have another question for you. You use the phrase that I think I told you before, many of the interior designers and workrooms and all that I work with are female. And this phrase comes up with us all the time. I would be interested to hear from a man's perspective, this idea of imposter syndrome. Because we have it, we get it, we know it, I know what it looks and feels like as a woman. Tell me what that looks and feels like as a man, that idea of imposter syndrome.
Todd (26:27) Oh, gosh, we could do a whole broadcast on that alone. I think it's best to speak from experience. So for me, my imposter syndrome came down to the itty bitty negative committee in my head, essentially my self talk. Which tied into going back to childhood and how my parents parented me in the 80s. How were you get five A's and your report card and one C. All your parents wanted to talk to you about was you're C, not your areas you exceeded in. Nowadays, Thankfully, a lot of people have shifted over. Let's highlight and play to your strengths. Especially now in business, we can outsource a lot of our weaknesses. So I was trying to be all things to all people, which had it for me was kind of a combination of an expert, slash perfectionistic trait. I was a very much a rugged individualist from a very young age. I lost a parent when I was five years old. And my older brother went off to university when I was five, my sister got married when I was five, and my mother went back to work. So when my dad passed away, I learned very quickly that I couldn't rely upon others and I had to go within to survive in my new landscape.
Now if you pull back to a 30,000-foot view, certainly my father passed away at a young age from our heart attack didn't see that coming. My mom had to provide for her child she had to go to work. My brother got an athletic scholarship for a full ride to school, he should go take advantage of that and my sister had already been planning to get married. So nobody did anything wrong. But as a young child, I realized... I processed it that I can't rely on other people. The person I can rely on most is myself. I took that forward through all of my life, and it served me, many, many steps along the way, a lot of our behaviors service well until they don't. And as I got into entrepreneurship, I just was in the beginning, I was, rocking and rolling, I was making the decisions, the decisions weren't working. I wasn't taking into account, there were a lot more things in my universe beyond my own contribution to it. And so, as the market shifted, as the world changed, as the economy was beginning to go into a decline, I wasn't aware of those things because I was very internally focused. So my imposter syndrome got very loud because, I used to do this, and now it doesn't work. I try that and it doesn't work. And I would just continue to beat myself up internally of not being enough. And I've talked to a lot of entrepreneurs, both male, and female, but it's certainly a larger portion of them are female. And they're not enough comes into why I can't be all things to all people and trying to be like you mentioned earlier. I'm trying to behave a career, I'm trying to raise a family and trying to be a significant other and a spouse. All these things, there's only so much of me to go around. And for me, I needed to really hit bottom to break through that imposter syndrome. It's almost like someone with a substance issue. I had to hit bottom to get help because I thought it was my job. I told myself that I'm the CEO, I have to fix all these problems. And when I realized I couldn't, and I finally reached out for help, and I got a respected coach to work with me. One of the first things we did to start working on my mindset because I was incredibly internally self-critical. So that was how imposter syndrome impacted me.
Michele (29:46) Very interesting. I think that, and I've shared on the podcast many times and you sound like you would probably agree with this. The beginning of a lot of the solutions to our problems are going, to begin with, our mindset, and I know, we heard that when we were younger, and we rolled our eyes, your attitude is 99%. And we would roll our eyes or whatever, but it is so very true. I grew up in a great home, but I grew up, in the 60s and 70s. And back then, the early 80s, and grades mattered, everything mattered, those were measuring sticks...
Todd (30:22) Right.
Michele (30:23) ...that we're constantly used to measure good and bad and success. Then when all of a sudden, I internalized that if I did everything right. And I did everything well that that was good. And so I couldn't I am like a crazy rule follower, even if the rule doesn't need to be followed. I'm going to crazy follow that rule. And I have to tell myself sometimes, "Michelle, that's just a suggestion, right?" I hold myself to such a high level of things. Internalization is a child of what was allowed and what wasn't allowed and what was good and what was bad. And to your point, wasn't anything anybody said to me or forced on me, it was my interpretation of the world around me. When we have that, we all have something.
Todd (31:17) We do. So many of us entrepreneurs think we're starting a business because we have an idea. We think we have a great app, or I have this thing I can sell or this product I can provide. The reality is and the studies will show the most entrepreneurs start their first business to prove something to themselves, or more importantly, to someone else, that they can do something and that they're worthwhile.
Michele (31:44) Absolutely.
Todd (31:45) It's the craziest thing. And then when I read that, I'm like, "Oh, my gosh." So going through this conversation with a client of mine, and I'm like, "Bob, you're crushing it. Your business is doing better than ever before. Yet you just don't sound like you're really happy." He's like, "Well, I could be better. I can be this, I could be that." And we kept going. "So where does that soundtrack come from?" He's like, "I just really want to prove to my dad, I can do this business." You know what, "I've never done this for a client before, let's get your dad on a call. Let's talk him through. And I will testify that you're exceeding your original goals when we started working together." He says to me, "I'd love to do that, my dad's been gone for 15 years." I just stopped the conversation. So basically, you're trying to impress a ghost.
Michele (32:32) Right.
Todd (32:33) That gives us a whole new area of conversation. Let's work through that. And we spent a lot of time talking through some of the decisions he made. And he would say, my dad would like that, this would have this, this would have been that. The reality was is that your dad is very proud of you. We're in a different generation, and you're now a different human being than you were when you're 14 or 15. Now, this guy is 56. Like, you're crushing it, your business is more successful than ever before. And you're getting more time to do what you want to do. How can I help you make peace with the ghosts of your past? It just blew me away that he was still trying after all these years to impress his parents.
Michele (33:14) It's interesting when I get people in my coaching environment to go through their why. What is your driver? Right? What is this deeply held belief that was formed before you were 18 that's pushing you? And that comes out a lot that type of, I need to prove to this, so and so said I couldn't and I'm going to show them.
Todd (33:35) Right, right.
Michele (33:36) There is a lot of that that starts showing up. And if we are not aware of one of the biggest things that I think as entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, business owners, if we can cultivate a self-awareness? Oh my gosh, a game-changer, like game-changer, because now we start to know why we're making the decisions we're making.
Todd (33:58) Right.
Michele (33:59) It is that a healthy decision to make, because of what I'm thinking or the way I'm interpreting and processing my environment and the information that I have. And so it makes us aware, I even catch myself. Sometimes I go, Wait a minute, am I reacting because I feel threatened? Or am I reacting because that's what I really want to do?
Todd (34:19) Sure.
Michele (34:19) What's happening here?
Todd (34:21) Sure.
Michele (34:21) But it was from doing that type of work. And then being honest about it. One of the things I know or a couple of things that you are very passionate about is about being very authentic and transparent and vulnerable in our communication. We did talk about this word being overused. And I'm certain that impacted why you knew that you needed to let go of those 23 people to then build a new process and a new way of doing things, that new self-awareness that you had.
Todd (34:54) I wish it was a driver at that point. The self-awareness I had back in 2006 when I made that really difficult decision was a self-awareness that I had responsibility for where we are. Owed that money to vendors, to lending institutions. And it was my responsibility to try to fix the problem. For a long time, I was blaming the employees. I was blaming the economy. I was blaming, blaming, blaming, blaming, not taking any responsibility. But it's so funny you bring up Simon's work. Before he ever wrote his book, I had a chance to work with Simon for two years, and working on my why. And for me, my why took me two years to figure out but it's two words. I want to improve lives. In once I figured that breakthrough out. And this would have probably been, oh gosh, this is probably about 10 years ago, It shifted how I interacted with everybody. So when I'm in line at Starbucks, how do I improve the lives of the person behind the counter? How do I improve the lives of the people who are in line with me? And everywhere I go, I took it with me so I was able to live my why, not just at work but in life in general.
Once I did that, my self-awareness became much stronger because of living in internal authenticity. So now, when I'm working with a client or when I go on stage, I often lead with the story of being so far in debt, my parts in that, having to terminate an entire staff. I let 12 people go. Then I had to work on my mindset around what success looks like to achieve some financial success, achieve the inkless, etc, etc. But ultimately, I didn't get where I wanted to go internally until I did enough work to get that self-awareness to radiate through every part of my life. From family to personal, to how I interact with people in lines in retail. Everywhere I go, it's not a turn on turn off thing for me. I call it ATV, authentic, transparent, vulnerable in everything I do. Cautiously, for me, I would never stand in front of people and tell them I got a company $600,000 in debt, this guy's a complete crazy man. Well, the reality is, it's my story. And I did that. And what I find is what I do that and I share that story with people, and they've got debt problems. They don't have a safe person to talk to about that, because they probably got $600,000 in debt. And I tell them, how I got out of it Hi renegotiated with the bank and how I made a lot of different shifts in my lifestyle. But now that it's versus me being prescriptive, of telling someone what they should do. I'm authentic in sharing from a place of experience in what I experienced. What I did do and some of the negative choices I made and how I had to flip those negative choices around and make them positive going forward to honor my commitments to the lenders to the vendors, etc.
Michele (37:51) Yeah, I'm a firm believer that our midst can become our message if we allow it to right.
Todd (37:55) I love that. I've not heard that before. I'm stealing that right now. I'm telling everybody.
Michele (38:00) Go right ahead. Yeah. And the whole reason that I do everything I do is that I went from building financial software. I know how these things work. And then I started my small side hustle business and realized that my husband who was working so that I could have a business was putting money in so that I could make beautiful things for rich people's homes. I mean, that was insane. And I was like, "This is crazy." And I did what you did, I stopped, I evaluated everything. I thought I was a failure. I called and apologize to my father for even sending me to college because I have been so stupid. He was like, "What are you talking about?" That one of the lowest points for me, right? Because that always gotten everything right and I got that so wrong. And I made a decision that day, I'm gonna I'm either going to be in business or not, what does that look like? And I'm going to put processes in place. I'm not going back there again, that's not happening. And so, my life's work since then has been to teach people how not to do what I did. I always say you'll hit your own holes in the road. But if you could avoid mine, that'd be great. Let me help you.
Todd (39:16) Right.
Michele (39:16) Let me tell you how to avoid mine. But people learn so much when we're open and we're honest. And we tell our story. They learn more that way than if we sit and tell them what they ought to do. Nobody wants to hear that.
Todd (39:29) And I agree,
Michele (39:30) It's not good. So now when I talk to people and go, Yeah, I did that. Yeah, I didn't have the money to pay those taxes one year because that had such a great year. And I didn't think about it and I brought the money in and spent it. Yeah, I've done that. So let me tell you how to fix it now because I figured it out. Let me show you what I did. And I love that level of authenticity.
Todd (39:51) It's so important. We live in a very inauthentic world. We live in a world of, going back to the younger folks who can't go out for their evening until they get the perfect angle for their perfect picture to throw it up on social media. So the world can see. And they get all these likes and the world can see how they look. We live in a world of spectrums. Now either on social media, we share the greatest stuff we do, or the worst tragedies of our lives, there's nothing in the middle. 99% of life is live somewhere in that middle space. The more authentic we are, the more real we become. When we are in the eyes of folks that may see us as successful, we demystify what success really looks like. Recognize and realize that only 4.3% of businesses ever reach a million dollars in revenue in the United States. That's just a fact. So just because your business may be only doing $700,000, for example, but your margins are bringing you an income of $300,000 that makes you quite a success. If your only definition of success is to be a million-dollar company, recognize that it takes a lot of work and a lot of effort. And the flip of that is when people say, "I don't know if I want to hire people, I just want to do my own gig." Nothing wrong with that. Because if you really try to grow and scale a company, that's a different skill set than just providing the service.
My son's an accountant. He and I had a conversation. He said, "I may just go in and just set up my own accounting program." He wants to go hike in the mountains in California for two years, he had a whole plan. And I said, "Well, why don't we just get you a Winnebago, you can create the work product on your time, but you're going to be limited in what you can do because of the hours you're willing to work." And he says, "I'm fine with that because I want to go do these cool things while I'm young enough, healthy enough to do them. I'm willing to trade time or trade money for freedom and flexibility." So nothing is wrong with that. And then he says, "What if I want to scale the business." Well, you go from being a practitioner, providing the work product to managing others and managing different parts of the business. And if you love providing the work product, maybe consider that when you do these other roles. The thing you love doing the most providing the work product may not be something you continue to do anymore. Are you okay with that? Does it make it? There's no right or wrong answer. It's just what are you willing to do? What is getting you excited to get out of bed every day versus this, this perception that the only path to being successful is having a multimillion-dollar company with, you know, 2025 states with 10,000 employees? That's one definition of it. But I know some people who, especially creatives and people like that, who make a great living. They work the hours they want to work, providing the services they want to provide.hey are selecting customers they want to work for, it's so key to work with people you enjoy the people you spend your time with.
Michele (42:37) I love hearing that definition Todd because it's the same one that I have. And I was on a podcast one time and I was kind of flabbergasted when the person was interviewing me and the comment that she made was, "Well, we know that you're not even a real business until you hit a million in revenue." My jaw just dropped. Again, I know people right now that I'm working with that make a million in revenue and they're losing their shirts.
Todd (43:03) Right.
Michele (43:03) I know people making 350 to 400,000 in revenue, and they're making a killing. Why would that be the indicator? Do you know what I mean? It wasn't a million in net profit. It was a million in revenue without looking at profitability. Mike Michalowicz makes the comment, he said it on the podcast when he came on. He looks at and we talked about this on the Profit First side all the time, your revenue is a responsibility, but your gross profit, your real revenue is sustainability. And if we're just measuring on... and look on the interior design side, that total revenue can be inflated because the cost of goods is heavy.
Todd (43:45) Sure.
Michele (43:45) That 1 million could come down to 250 or 300,000. If you take all the product cost out of it. Tell me that the company is a $300,000 company that can sell 700,000 products. Two different things. And so just using that one metric is not enough. I also love your thought and suggestion that we can again create this work to be what we want to satisfy us. I push my clients as a Profit First coach, to profit first your time. And I think that's what your son did. He didn't just say, Here's the financial plan, but here's my plan for my time. Right? So what if we said what's most important, like if profit is what makes our business sustainable? What makes our lives sustainable?
Todd (44:42) Right.
Michele (44:42) Let's put that on our calendar. Let's profit first our time,
Todd (44:46) Well because at the end of the day, you can always make more money. There's someone probably right now saying, "Oh gosh, that guy was $600,000 in debt. Of course, he's going to say that." The reality is we can always make more money. We can come up with different ideas. We can use our resources differently. We can do a lot of different things. But what we can't do is we can't make more time. And it's the only real non-renewable resource we have. So let's use it wisely. And so that if you're going to choose to invest your time in doing something 8-10 hours a day, make it something you're going to enjoy, and find a marketplace to do that. And I've got friends of mine who are passionate musicians, but they just play guitar, they're not really musicians. And we've had those conversations, "Well, yeah, I'd love to be, you know, on tour and play in a band and, record records and all that kind of stuff. Their self-awareness comes into play, they recognize, like, Hey, I love to play music, but it doesn't pay my bills. So I'm going to try and do that as often as possible. So I'm not going to work nights and weekends, but I realized in order to pay my bills, I maybe have to apply this craft or do this service for somebody and that's okay too. So as that starving artist's mentality, but without you know, our ages to know there's going to be a real upside to it. But they're very happy people. One guy I talked to said, "So instead of me playing cover songs all the time, to get bigger venues or bigger bar opportunities, I'm gonna play my music. And if I don't get paid for it, that's okay. If I get paid a little bit of money, that's okay. But I'm gonna play the music I'm passionate about that. I enjoy playing. Because you know what, I only have Friday and Saturday nights to do it." And I was so proud of him for having that awareness, that he wants to go out and give his gift to the world the way he wants to do it and own that process. And money became a non-factor for him. And he couldn't be happier once you've made that shift.
Michele (46:38) So important. What did you do? I'm curious now. So you had to lay off your staff, you had to pretty much reinvent you know, your business and what you were going to do. You became self-aware over time. And we're talking about these things as if they're static. We know they're not they're very dynamic. They're happening over time. These are journeys and processes, right? Stretching and movements that we're doing. How did you use all of that, and then build something different?
Todd (47:08) It's so interesting. I had the first employee I hired after I let everybody go. I had a big office, 12 empty desks in my office were in the back. And this young lady comes in. And it's at about four o'clock. And she said, "Hey, where's everybody at?" I said, "Well, why don't you sit down?" I said, "Nobody works here right now. But for me." And it was the first time I told the story. I said, "I made these choices. These are the results of those choices. And I need to dig myself out of that." said, The company's now profitable again, and I've got plenty of money to pay you. So don't worry about that." What I need is, I've recognized that I can't do this by myself. And I need to hire people who have the right mindset. And what it came up with was the first thing in the process was I had to be authentic, transparent and vulnerable with this person. She's my longest-standing employee. She's been with me ever since. And part of that is being real in the interview, but also recognizing that she didn't have a recruiting background. But she is a really good person, she had a lot of great skill sets that were transferable. So we came up with a process called hire for DNA, not for resume. And as we were adding people to our staff, we made a conscious choice to go away from the way the market was going.
The market was only hiring people with recruiting backgrounds. I said, "This is ridiculous. I want to hire people who are good people that can work as part of our team, immerse themselves in our culture, and will teach them to be great recruiters." And that was a pivotal moment in the growth of the business. So those people came in and they were very coachable because they didn't know better from somewhere else. So the first thing we did go back to is we hire people for DNA and after resume. The second thing, we called it our fail forward mantra. And we would just try different things every day. We'd come up with different contests and come up with different creativity because we're still trying to figure out what the marketplace really needed. And we eventually figured out that the marketplace needed skilled trades machinists and skilled welders and skilled quality people for manufacturing because there were an increased demand and a diminished supply. Before we were just doing bodies that could provide temporary help. And the more we figured out the more we asked the questions of the customers what they can use. The team started really rallying around that and we had one of our recruiters say, "So let me get this straight. I just asked you if you're hiring you said no. And then the second question is if you were going to hire somebody, who would you hire? You need a guy who looks like this. Is that correct?" The customer says, "Yes. So if I get you that guy, could you make room on your team for this?" "Absolutely. Even this was during the reception was even during a recession. We need people like that." Oh, so even in a recession, this category is kind of recession-proof. By and large, excellent. Okay, another lesson learned. Finally came up with a way like okay, if we get you that person, they're not gonna be like your temporary help people. So that means we need to get paid weekly or bi-weekly. When do you pay your people we pay weekly, most a week you need to get paid weekly too because that's what this person is going to get paid. And we need to get paid quicker. And you, of course, you know, because these, these people are not a dime a dozen, we're gonna charge you more for it. Every client said, "Yeah, we understand that totally, this isn't a commodity purchase. This is a specialized, unique purchase." So throughout about a six to 12 month period, we identified a hidden niche in the marketplace, that we could charge more for, get paid faster on. And we really went from taking job wars to recruiting in locating the talent needed to satisfy these orders. We were representing people. It was like a sports agent or Hollywood agent who never had representation before. We were working for the candidates for free, charging more to the employer getting paid quicker, which helped us eventually get rid of all the $600,000 in debt and become quite profitable, versus doing it the other way that our competitors were doing. So we really went very deep in one niche that we identified was there charged more for it, and fixed a lot of our problems.
Michele (50:54) So funny during the recession, I increased my prices where everybody was dropping them.
Todd (51:00) Nice.
Michele (51:02) My husband was in between jobs. And I had to. I didn't have a choice, right? Somebody's got to bring the money in at this point. And so I, he was in between jobs and he has an executive-level job, you don't just walk out and get those the next day, certainly not in a recession.
Todd (51:20) Right.
Michele (51:20) And so I increased my prices. And what it did was it kicked me into that upper category of person to work with, who was not as impacted by the recession, where when my prices were lower, I was working with homeowners and with people that were more impacted by the recession that was holding on to their funds, but the richer of the rich, they were still spending. And so it was just interesting how understanding and knowing and applying the principles that you learn. I went against the grain and I think that's what you did as well. And I think that's one of those things that if we have to sometimes take those risks. They don't always play out the way we think, but we do have to do the research and then trust it and take some risk in that.
Todd (52:04) Yeah, and it's not something like you talked about earlier. It's a living, breathing process. We don't just try it once and say, well, it didn't work and scrap it. So what did we learn? And well, we learned that the marketplace has this need, but we don't have anybody in inventory. So okay, well, let's spend two days going out and finding three or four candidates, like the markets telling us and then let's reverse engineer that marketing piece. Instead of just calling the company on the phone when people still answer the telephone. Let's email market these candidates on there and then let's call behind. Okay, let's try that for a couple of it. And we just iterate move forward, try to see what worked. And if something didn't work, we scrapped it if we if it worked, we kept it in and because I had gone with the DNA versus resume hiring process, I didn't have to get a lot of back and forth with senior people and senior experienced level folks. I had a group of people that were hungry, who didn't really know any better. Ignorance being bliss, and they were willing to try anything. And I just kept champion and it kept positively reinforcing. The days when it didn't go well. Well, you know what we learned five ways it didn't work today. I'll see everybody in the morning. Let's come in and let's come up with some new ways. And instead of not communicating like I did it when I had bad imposter syndrome. I was over-communicating. We had daily huddles, not weekly huddles. At one point we were so busy, we had a huddle in the morning and a huddle at night. And we just over-communicated. We created a collaborative team environment where people were sharing best practices on the fly. And I pull back and think about that time frame we iterating so rapidly, that we didn't have time to feel sorry for ourselves.
Michele (53:50) Do you think there any drawbacks from your experience or Todd have you noticed any drawbacks or negative aspects to being authentic or transparent or vulnerable. I know you mentioned a minute ago that you share and other people might not share that. That was one of the things I was thinking, where's that line? And is there a line?
Todd (54:11) Always aligned based upon knowing your audience to a certain level. I actually watched a lot of stuff from Bernie Brown, and how she talks about vulnerability. I think her work is truly outstanding. And one of the favorite things she says is, I love the interview. She's like, "Yeah, I was a researcher and a vulnerability but I'm not going to be vulnerable." That was her old mindset, it laughs in the audience laugh. "Now, I'm vulnerable every darn day of my life, because I'm now the vulnerability Gal." It just kind of creates the whole thing. So when I go and talk to an audience or when I'm talking to a group of entrepreneurs. What I feel is my responsibility by being the keynote speaker, is to lead with that vulnerable step forward first and trust the process. Trust that people will embrace it. I'm sure there have been times when I've shared the hiccup story of my businesses and the choices I made. There's a lot of judging going on. And there is a lot of talks. But because I put it out there first and because it is my story, nobody can give me any feedback on what I did or nobody can be a worse or harsher critic of me than I was back in those days. I guarantee you.
Hands down I am the leader in the clubhouse, to use a golf analogy, and kicking my butt. So I recognize all that, and the blessings I've received by standing up and leaning into those uncomfortable moments first. It opens the door for people to share things that they've never maybe shared before in their lives. I literally had one client in a meeting with his leadership team start to cry because he shared something with his team about why he was in business, that his staff never heard. A lot of them had worked for them for 10 plus years. And afterward, when we did we debrief, I said, "What caused you to get to that point?" He's like, "You were so real, you were so authentic, you were so open to all of us from the very beginning. Because you created that safe space for me to do that. And now, I feel like my staff sees me more than just a dictator, but see me as a real human being, strengths and weaknesses, positives and limitations, I can now finally take off one of those masks and interact with them differently." So for me, the absolute joy of the work that I do, whether it's working one on one with a leader, with a leadership team, or even from the stage is those aha lightbulb moments. Those light bulb moments often come from hearing some of my worst stories, like, "Aha, I don't want to be that guy." Which is fine. Or "Okay, I can learn from him. I bet I can learn more from and let me ask a couple of questions." I had one person say, "Listen, you talked about how bad your situation was. Let me tell you how... it was almost like a competition. Let me tell you how bad my situation is. And maybe you can give me some help with this." Were you planning on talking about that? He was like no, my wife dragged me out here, I didn't want to talk about this stuff. Thank you so much for being real, but it's six of one, half a dozen of the other.
Michele (57:19) I remember when one of my sons was younger, and I remember turning around to them. We were in the car and I said, "I am so sorry that I did that. Whatever it was, I did." And he said, "What did she say?" I said, "I'm telling you that I'm really sorry. I messed up. And I don't know what I did." I can remember what it was I did? And he said, "Are you serious right now?" And I'm thinking come home, buddy. "Yes, I'm serious right now." And he said, "Mom, I thought you always got it. Right."
Todd (57:49) Right.
Michele (57:50) And I was like, "What?" He's like, "I just thought as a parent that you always got it right. I didn't know that you were going to get it wrong." And said, "I've been apologizing to you the whole time." I've always told my kids I was sorry if I did something. I never just covered it over and acted like it didn't happen. But he was shocked at my vulnerability as a parent to say, "I don't know what we should do, or I tried that and it didn't work or there's not a primer, this telling me what, what my next steps should be here." And I'm figuring out this parenting and adulting thing while you're figuring out this kid thing.
Todd (58:27) Right? I'll say amen to that. Isn't that the truth?
Michele (58:30) And even now, parenting adults, I am figuring out the new norm of what does it mean to be an adult with adults and that's a whole different thing. I'm still figuring it out while they're still figuring out what is it like to be where they are. And just even opening that conversation with him. I still remember to this day him like in shock that I would apologize as a parent and take off that mask of, I've got it together. And you know, our kids want to know that we kind of has it together.
Todd (59:00) You don't expect us to be perfect.
Michele (59:02) They don't expect it. And then when you turn around and go, "Hey, look, I'm figuring it out too." I don't know where he thought I got it all poured into my brain at some point. But it was a good moment for me to realize that that vulnerability, and that openness and that honesty at that moment was enough. I will say in the sales process, sometimes we need to be careful. You certainly don't want to walk in and drop Hey, I just lost $600,000.
Todd (59:29) Oh gosh, no.
Michele (59:31) There are a time and a place for it.
Todd (59:33) When I fired everybody. I told no one. I didn't tell my clients. The clients are calling. "Hey, can I talk to Bob?" He's at a client appointment. How can I help you? Oh, yeah, I lied through my teeth flat out I was not transparent because I could not afford to lose the business. I think it's a matter of where are you in your growth? Where are you? Where can you share? And the reality is, if so if someone's listening, for example, and they say, "Well, my business is really struggling. I don't have anybody to talk to maybe I'll talk to my kids about it." I would tell them not to do that. Reach out to a trusted advisor, reach out to a friend, reach out to a peer group. Heck call, go to my website, call me, there are certain things we want to have someone to go to. But I would never argue that we should need to be the same level of authenticity and transparency with everybody all the time. I think there's got to be trusted people in your life. Again, I think often the job of a parent is to provide safety and security for their children. And to tell them that you know, you're in bad financial straits is really tough, no different than a client call me up. And I'm not sure I'm gonna make payroll this week. And I think I'm gonna go in and tell my employees. Like on Tuesday, I said, Hold on, wait a minute, let's strategize. There's probably the way to work through this. The last thing you wanna do is walk in and tell everybody you're going to miss payroll on Tuesday when payroll is not going to be cut until Friday. Just hold off. Wait a minute. Well, "You said it should be really authentic that way." There's always a caveat. Yeah, be real with me as your coach, let's work this out. But don't walk in and tell everybody, you're gonna have a mass exodus, you're gonna freak people out. Sure enough, we were able to solve the problem he was able to pay everybody and the employees were never any of the wiser. It's again, pick who you need to be authentic with. But don't treat it as you should walk around telling everybody all your dark and dirty secrets, in a way that you are comfortable with the feedback you're going to get as well as making them potentially uncomfortable.
Michele (1:01:27) Exactly. It's about building trust, right? So we want to be honest in all of our dealings and all of our transactions, but it doesn't mean you got to tell everything the minute you meet them. Think about it kind of like going on a first date.
Todd (1:01:40) Right.
Michele (1:01:42) And you're going to tell everybody, every bad relationship you've ever had, they're probably going to walk out.
Todd (1:01:48) If they don't walk out the door, they're probably a little bit crazier than you really need.
Michele (1:01:51) Exactly. You're thinking I don't want all that. But I am with you. I have my own coach. I am a coach and I have a coach. I need that safe space to unload, and to share and to be vulnerable in a way that I'm understood, right. Without judgment, that's the same thing that I provide. That you provide for those that work with us is a safe place to share. Because I do work in the numbers, I've just recently been working with the client, so that we could get IRS debt on payment plans. I've got people that are having to make some really big life choices similar to what you've had to do for their business and their homes, to be able to move forward and to regroup. And these are very, very difficult decisions in weighty heavy life positions that they're in. I mean, we're not talking just the light-hearted should I hire, should I not right.
Michele (1:02:54) These are heavy things and having that safe place to talk to. I had a client tell me the other day, she commented. She's like, "This has been so bad and you're the only one I can tell.
Todd (1:02:54) Right. Right.
Michele (1:03:05) "I can't even yet tell my family or others that are involved." And I understand that I hold that dearly. That means a lot to me. And I want to respect that. But I also need that for my life. We all need that...
Todd (1:03:21) I think the best thing a coach can do is have a coach, I like you said, you have a coach, I have a coach. Someone said to me one time like, "Well, you know, I'm looking at hiring you and I'm looking at a couple of other coaches. Why should I hire you?" I said, "Well, ultimately, hiring a coach is often very much a practical decision made with a gut feeling. But I will share that I drink the Kool-Aid. So I'm not going to be just telling you that I'm a lifelong learner. I'm not going to be prescriptive in the work we do. I still use a coach. Here's why use a coach. Here's the value they provide to me because I don't have all the answers. And sometimes I need to go to somebody because the imposter syndrome will still come back. The imposter syndrome used to drive the car. Now it sits in the passenger seat, but it's still a backseat driver and I was trying to control things." We all need those things. The person ended up being a client was so appreciative of the fact that people like you and I still use coaches, we're not just talking from on top down to them, we are essentially walking that journey with them as their coach, but we still get coached versus, some coaches... I've seen these people will walk out and act as if they have all the answers to all business problems, and just plug into my system for $29.99 a month and you will be fixed too. It doesn't work that way.
Michele (1:04:34) It doesn't, and I am just I'm so thankful, Todd that you have shared today your journey. That you have talked to us about being authentic and transparent and vulnerable and, and how we can use that. And I gotta tell you, you're the first guy that has really been willing to talk to me about not that I run around and ask about it all the time... the imposter syndrome. Again, we hear about it, and we hear about it so much from the female perspective. And I remember even having it in software, just thinking, I don't know everything. And at some point, somebody's going to realize, I don't know something. Instead of going, you know what, nobody knows everything to your point a minute ago, we all are learning, we are all growing. And so the better answer is, I don't know what but I can figure it out. Or I can find resources to help us figure it out. Right.
Todd (1:05:28) I don't know the answer, but let me work on it. And I'll get back to you.
Michele (1:05:32) Yeah, yeah. And just that honesty, and transparency is worth so much.
Todd (1:05:39) So it's so valuable the conversation today because I really want hopefully, people will leave this conversation recognizing that they're not alone. So the biggest challenge I had when I had the I suffered deeply from the imposter syndrome was this sense and feeling of being alone. And then the only one who has these thoughts. I'm the only one who has these challenges on the only one who's made these choices, etc, etc. And so I just thank you so much for the opportunity to demystify this entrepreneurs' syndrome for anybody who's listening.
Michele (1:06:10) Yes, exclamation, exclamation, exclamation. That idea of isolation. Nobody understands. I'm all by myself, I'm in a room of people and I'm alone. That is a very real struggle that we can have as entrepreneurs, right? Because we do feel even to your point a minute ago about be careful who you share what with. Some people are on a need to know basis, right? Especially your staff down. If you went in and told them everything that went through your head every single day, it would scare them.
Todd (1:06:44) Oh, it's heavy is the head that wears the crown. I mean, you chose to be an entrepreneur. You chose to, in my case, to lead a company. It's the choice I made. And when I think back what I would have told them differently, what I would have done differently is not tell them how bad things were. What I would have done one is not let things get as bad as I got, two the struggles and challenges we were having, I would have at least opened the door and shared with some of them and then asked them to help me get out of it versus just telling them what to do. And then giving them goals and KPIs to measure and follow. And when they didn't hit them, instead of me I was so conflicted averse at that time in my life. I just let them twist in the wind, and not follow through and not do what they're supposed to do, and not hit their sales quotas, things like that. Versus like, wait a minute, Bob, you're not hitting your numbers, what's going on an approach, lean into that uncomfortable conversation, approach it with curiosity to learn more, and I mean, learn the Bob's got to go today versus you know, six months later when I finally let him go or realize wow, we have a real challenge with our process. Let's attack that process. But I just stuck my head in the sand and avoided everything. So I would have done a lot of things differently. With the experience, I have now versus the mindset I had then.
Michele (1:07:59) I'm so thankful to have podcasts and to have books and to have blogs and articles and resources that are so readily available for us to share that these ideas. We all can struggle with them. It's not something that only women struggle with or only men struggle with. We're all struggling with these things. And so having the conversation and kind of linking arms in it right and going, we're not by ourselves. So how did you solve that? What did you do? I'm also part of a mastermind on top of my own coach because it is so important to learn from other peers, what's working and what's not working. So the same things that I offer, I take a pardon from my own business because they're so valuable in that sharing of information.
Todd (1:08:45) Agreed.
Michele (1:08:46) So Todd, where can everybody find you?
Todd (1:08:48) So, the best place to catch up with me? Anybody who's interested in connecting work is I'm certainly on Instagram, I'm on Facebook, I'm on all the social media platforms, but the best source to go to my website, ExtraordinaryAdvisors.com. And anybody who goes there and mentions that they heard me on Michelle's podcast today, I'm happy to give you a half-hour of my time for free. We've talked a lot about imposter syndrome, someone may be feeling a little vulnerable and unpacking want to reach out to somebody, I'd like to offer my services to them just for a quick half-hour conversation so that they don't feel like they're alone. Or if you are talking about business strategy, or you want to hear more of the deep down and dirty about how I really dug out of the the the debt problem. I'm happy to have those conversations with you as well. Because really, it's an opportunity for me to give to people who are listening to the audience today in honor of all the coaches and mentors I've had before me. This is a great opportunity for me to give back. So if someone wants to connect with me, please reach out.
Michele (1:09:45) That's awesome. And I'll make sure that all of that is in the show notes as well. Todd so that they will know how to... if they're driving right now and listening. They'll be able to go to the show notes and be able to get into contact with you. And you also have a book. Tell us about your book.
Todd (1:10:00) Yeah, thank you, I wrote a book, gosh, back, oh gosh, five or six years ago. It's for kids getting out of high school or college and looking for their first job. It's called The Job Search Process. It's available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. And it's specifically geared to help someone get their first job in six weeks or less. In 2019 -2020, they should believe their job in two weeks or less. It's such a great robust economy, but it takes them through the processes of laying out a job search, acting as if they are their own recruiter in order to get themselves three to five interviews. And from those three to five interviews, one to three job offers so they can start their career off on the right foot.
Michele (1:10:38) Wow, that's amazing. But my kids have jobs. But that is awesome. I may have to think about that sounds like a great gift from graduating from college.
Todd (1:10:46) Well, and it came really from a point of view being very frustrated with the university situation. I was on the board of a university and I had a conversation with the Dean of the business school. And it really came down to what are we doing as a school to prepare these kids to go into the workforce. Because as an employer, I was interviewing these kids and they weren't prepared.
Michele (1:11:05) Right?
Todd (1:11:05) It really came down to a divide. And the divide was the school thought they were in the education business. As a parent who had a college student at the time, I thought they were in the job-readiness business. And they said, No, we're in the education business, it's really more incumbent upon the student to find their first opportunities. And well, that doesn't work for me. I'm gonna teach these kids how to do it myself. So really, more of the assault problem, how do I help attack it to be a greater service goes back to the cynic piece of how do I improve lives. That's really where the book came from.
Michele (1:11:34) Wow, that's an awesome idea. And like I said, all my kids are in their 20s. And so of course, all of their friends are either graduating or just graduated and it is a very different landscape to get a job now than even then it was 20, 30 years ago when I was out looking. So we had whole career centers that went through all of that with us. That taught us how to dress and what to do and how to speak and what to put together and I don't see it working quite the same way now as it used to.
Todd (1:11:59) It does not.
Michele (1:12:01) Wow. Well, I'll make sure that we put a link to that in the show notes as well Todd. So anybody who's interested can find it. And thank you so much again for being with us today. And sharing a bit of your journey.
Todd (1:12:13) Michele, it was a pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me.
Michele (1:12:15) You're welcome.
Michele (1:12:16) Thanks so much to Todd for sharing his experiences, insights, failures, and successes. Don't you just love the deep conversations about these topics, It was almost like an uncovering of an idea that holds us captive because we think we're the only ones suffering when clearly we're not. Hopefully, you now have a way to take your mess and craft a message. Profitability is about so much more than money. And my goal is to help us build a life and a profitable business. And that's exactly what you can find in the Designers' Inner Circle. More information is available out at ScarletThreadConsulting.com, but my goal is to help you do all this by choice because profit doesn't happen by accident.