Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Today on Ladyboss, Courtney sits down with entrepreneur, author, and social media superstar John Sarasani to discuss how he transitioned from the corporate world to entrepreneurship and how he's building an online brand by helping people get that 2000% raise.
[00:00:18] Speaker B: All right, so, John, you just referred. You know, the power of the Internet is that we're sitting here today finding each other through the Internet.
[00:00:24] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: Which is cool because you're really only 20 miles apart, but you probably wouldn't have connected as fast. So why do you spend so much energy and money on all the content you're producing?
[00:00:36] Speaker A: Great question. I sold my company in 2015. I had a five year employment contract. Anybody that's ever sold a company that five years, whatever your employment contract is, a lot of people, it's only six months. Mine was five years because of the nature of the business, and it made sense.
[00:00:51] Speaker B: I was four, and it was the longest 48 months of my life.
[00:00:54] Speaker A: But, yeah, so, you know what I mean? There's. There's a lot of. There's a lot of incentives. Those first three years with the earn out, those last two years, I was like, why are we here? They didn't want me here. I didn't want to be there. But contractually, I wasn't able to get fired. Contractually, I wasn't able to quit.
So, you know, then that finishes up right at the end of 2019. I have a little fun. Finally, I could celebrate. I made all this money, you know what I mean? I didn't really get to celebrate in 2015 because the next day, I was working again.
And, you know, I went through a period there where I kind of had a lot of fun. Bahamas, Vegas, La, you know, all that stuff. Thank goodness I have my kids to keep me somewhat grounded. You know, there's something to come back home for. But, you know, then the pandemic hits. All right? Then we're sitting there, and I'm like, you know what? I started to kind of feel like I didn't like how it sounded coming out of my mouth. I'm retired. How old are you? Like, it started to kind of, like, sound pretentious saying it. So I start dabbling in venture capital and doing some angel investing, got involved with some maybe high profile types of founders of celebrity and nature, and then the social media stuff I just started talking about. And it kind of took a life of its own on, and I'm like, you know what? I need to rewrite a book. I need to write a book again. I had written one in 2011, and why not do a podcast? Then, and I saw this gravitation of people coming towards me because of the message, which was second nature to me, but it was something new for other people because a lot of people start talking about what I'm talking about on the Internet, so.
[00:02:26] Speaker B: Agree. I like your.
Like, I wasn't sure if I would expect the guy on the page or this guy. It's a little bit different.
[00:02:35] Speaker A: I have alter ego.
All right, let's go, motherfuckers.
[00:02:40] Speaker B: Okay, good. Okay. So that's how you bring it.
[00:02:43] Speaker A: I'm just kidding. I'm both all the time. Really, to be honest with you, it depends on the question. Yeah.
[00:02:47] Speaker B: So who's your audience when you really look at online?
[00:02:50] Speaker A: Initially, I thought my audience was going to be high paid, business to business salespeople that need to open their eyes that they could pivot outside of corporate America and be entrepreneurs and make that much more money. Saying that person making 250 grand a year in a tech sales or insert insurance sales job, hey, buddy, that's a bribe to keep you working there. You could. Sales is the hardest part of a lot of jobs. So pivot out, do this on your own, and then you might be able to retire early before you're 40 like I did. But the message got so broadened that people were just, like, motivated by it. Besides that audience, that audience appreciated. To this day, I get DM's like, I feel you, man. I feel you. But then I'm getting, like, cops that have side hustles that are, hey, do you? I listen to you because when I'm 54, I get to retire early and collect pension. I ain't gonna be done yet. Now I'm gonna apply a bunch of the stuff I've learned from you and really everything in between.
[00:03:47] Speaker B: So do you think your goal is, like, are you happy if people listen and quit their day job and become an entrepreneur?
[00:03:54] Speaker A: If they're successful at it? I'm not. If people really listen to my message, I'll post things that are lifestyle things. I see what I'm doing every day, and I have this freedom, but I also will sprinkle in enough where if they're paying attention, they're going to see I worked my ass off. I was prepared for it. I talk about paid training. My life as a w two employee in corporate America was my paid training for the company I'd start in the future.
[00:04:19] Speaker B: So that's my problem with this idea about everybody should be an entrepreneur. I just want to get your opinion on this. I feel like, in a way, you're selling something that isn't achievable. You're the 1%. I'm the 1%. And guess what? There's 99 other people that might risk their entire future, and they had a great $250,000 a year job. But a good salesman does not make a good business owner all the time.
[00:04:45] Speaker A: Not all the time, exactly. And I actually get in my book here, 2000% raise. I talk about that evaluation process, all right? So the example I use when I left Arthur J. Gallagher, it's an insurance brokerage, all right? I was making 140 grand a year. I brought in $800,000 of business, all right? They were paying me 140 to bring them 800. Wait a minute. No, no, no.
I'm paying you 660. What are they doing for me for that? 660. And I could quantify that, okay? Support, training, technology.
Their name is getting to me indoors. You do that math, all right? Now, if you're a company that maybe manufactures an actual product, it's a little bit harder, okay? Okay, you're selling something now that has a cost to it. You gotta add that into that formula. And when you do that, okay, is that 250 that you just described? You know, are you better off or not? How much are you making the company? Would you be. You know what I mean? Cause if you're gonna pay 250, you're making the company a lot more than 250.
[00:05:49] Speaker B: I mean, look, I was a seller at a place I worked for, one of the most successful Chicagoans out of school. And my training.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:05:56] Speaker B: So why would I making seven figures when I was 35? Why did I jump off the Sears Tower? Because I wasn't fulfilled. Right? So I was a money person. I think we have that. I mean, my metrics was money early on. Like, how much money, money, money. It's not now that you. When you have all the money you want, it's like a different measurement. Like fulfillment actually matters today, or I'm getting too old, and that's why. But the reality was they tried to say, you know, stay, you know, all the things employers do. But I was able to go from great salesperson to great operator. I just find a lot of great salesperson without a partner or a CFO, CTO, whatever it is.
Maybe they can come out and make 250. But if you make 250 and you're running your own business and you were making 250 at a shop, you did not improve your situation.
[00:06:47] Speaker A: That's. Yeah, I mean, it depends how you look at it. It's the freedom. Are you working twice as many hours now to make the same amount or do you feel like you have this freedom? It depends what you want. But I think I was blessed in that regard, because a lot of salespeople will never know if they're good operators until they try to go do it right. For me, in the industry that I was in, this is going to sound bad, but I was blessed to kind of have a service team that was transitioning when I started working there, meaning there's a lot of things falling through holes. I didn't have the best account manager. I didn't have the best client service reps on my account. So here I am doing all the damn work, and then they're losing my accounts. I'm seeing this in the first six months. After that, I ain't handing shit off to you anymore. I start doing everything myself, and I'm 25 years old. I'm teaching myself every phase of this stuff to protect that 140 that I'm making. So that's when things got so lopsided for me. I start looking at this like, well, wait a minute, I'm doing everything. So now it really just became for me, is that name getting me business or not? And it was to a degree, but not to the percentage of. Not proportionally so, yeah.
[00:07:54] Speaker B: I mean, I think every, especially post pandemic, every company has to, like, right size and reconcile the value they provide their employees. Like, I'm 100%, you know, it's not the old days of, like, where it's lopsided like it was. I mean, I don't. I don't think that can exist in today's day because people are going to walk out the door because they can say, I can get two accounts and be at my 140 or whatever. So I think every. Every company needs to make sure the value they're providing their employees is high enough. Right? But now you go off on your own. What do you think? You were young, so you weren't risking what you have now, but what was your biggest fear?
[00:08:30] Speaker A: You know, it was a very calculated risk.
Probably about six months before I left, I had already put it in my brain that I'm gonna leave now. We had. My industry is filled with non compete, so you can't do the stealing of clients. That kind of stuff wasn't gonna fly. And I tell entrepreneurs this all the time, last thing you want to do is start a new company and get sued by your former employer. And by the way, if your whole plan for your company is just to steal your old clients, and that's your value proposition, you better maybe just stick to that job. They're already paying you to slow down.
[00:09:00] Speaker B: Let's say that again, because if you are going out in business to steal the clients you had at the past company, you're not a good business person. Assume you will not talk to one of those people again and go get yourself new clients. That shows you that valuable salesperson. I think it is the loserous move to go and just try to knock.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: On the same, well, it's an unethical, too. You know what I mean?
[00:09:22] Speaker B: Unethical, no value. That person was paying you a paycheck every week.
[00:09:25] Speaker A: Exactly. You accepted that job to work there. You did your best job. Now, the only thing I would maybe question myself, not really morally, but, like, just, okay, where it's like, okay, those last few months when I knew I was walking out the door, I think everyone does that when they know they're about to quit a job. Maybe my prospecting efforts, like, okay, I'm not gonna go to that conference this month. I'll wait till next quarter so I don't have to show them a new business card at the same conference. You know what I mean? So you start, like, kind of, you know, wheelbarrowing your, your centers of influence a little bit. But, but that was all sales. And, and I got to tell you, like I said, it's just the, the, you know, if you're lucky enough to be an industry, in an industry where you are the product, your consulting is the product. Now, now you talk about value propositions that around you, you better offer more to your employees as a company for that salesperson. A lot of times these companies will do this with product matter experts, you know, or specialists or whatever. And, gosh, I gotta tell you, it's smoke and mirrors and insurance. It really is. If you're a smart dude or a smart woman and you wanna work in that middle market and you're trained properly to do that, you don't need to lean on these product matter experts or subject matter experts.
[00:10:38] Speaker B: You just don't, you don't have to know the stuff.
[00:10:40] Speaker A: The problem is that you'll get a lot of people in insurance that are just good salespeople and have spreadsheets and stuff. They didn't bother to learn these mechanics that I was blessed with. My first job out of college, before I left the company, I left. They had a very good training program. I was very blessed to have that position.
[00:10:58] Speaker B: So now you're, before we get to social again, you're retired. And how did you define having enough money to retire?
[00:11:05] Speaker A: My benchmark. This isn't the number, but my benchmark. Even if you talk about money and stuff, I always had a spreadsheet from when I was like 26 years old, all right? If my net worth could be $10 million when I'm 40, I could live off 5% of that, which is half a million dollars a year, and that will be more than a half a million dollars a year salary, because I'll just be paying long term capital gains on instead of ordinary income. That's a nice life. So in my head, that was always kind of my plan, like, okay, to be in a position to do that.
[00:11:39] Speaker B: All right, by 40.
[00:11:41] Speaker A: By 40, exactly. And then what happened was, and I was on pace to do this and putting aside money, and by the way, people forget, if you don't have a company to sell, it's very hard to accumulate that much money without things falling in place for you.
I was around 34 years old, and I'm making well, well into the seven years, and I'm still putting that money aside.
Exactly.
Those rental properties are going to have to go up in value if I'm ever going to get here.
I wasn't going to be at it. I was going to be close to it, probably, or a little bit above it, but I was way more successful than I thought I would have been. And my math was just wrong. As I got closer, I'm like, then when I was 37, private equity backed competitor entered this space and just blew the doors off that number for me and just put me in a position where it's like, I didn't intend on selling the company. It was just more of like, what's the phrase? Burden hand. Worth more than two in the bush. And I'm just this dude from Schomburg that was hoping to make 300 grand one day, and now you're gonna put me in a position where my kids don't have to work if they don't want to, you know what I mean? And be an idiot not to take this, you know what I mean? That's what I did and signed my life away for five years to five years of hell. Where I shouldn't say that the company that bought mine made me rich, so I shouldn't say that. Although there's other companies that would have bought me for the same amount. There's very competitive market, so whatever.
[00:13:05] Speaker B: Anyway, well, I mean, road selling is just that. I mean, they paid you a lot of money and you just gotta focus on that.
Okay? So you've defined. You could sit back and collect your you know, interest, money every day. But now you're. Are you trying to be famous?
[00:13:23] Speaker A: I guess so. I don't know. I could tell you this. People always say, exactly what's your agenda here, John?
I will tell you this. Here's what keeps me going with this. I post on Instagram two or three times a day, and I interact with people like it's popular because I'm commenting back to people and replying to DM's.
[00:13:42] Speaker B: That's you.
[00:13:43] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm going myself. I don't do it on TikTok, but Instagram I do, and I post on TikTok, but I'm not dming people on that.
I shit you not. I know this is gonna sound like bullshit, but I would guess three to five times a week on average. Some weeks 20, some weeks zero.
So I will get DM's either thanking me for giving them the motivation. I quit my job six months ago. Cause your posts, I'm making triple what I was making. I never heard from the guy. He didn't tell me he did this. He goes, your post kicked me in the ass to do this. Or I got one the other day from a 24 year old kid, hey, man, I just got out of med, or I'm in med school right now, and I'm changing the way I look at things, kind of reevaluating what I want to do with this. Thanks for speaking the truth with this stuff. And I think smart people will look at other influencers on Instagram and kind of see through it. They're kind of like, rah rah guys are just full of baloney. Or they're not really selling anything, or they're just good at, like, sales marketing funnels to teach coaching programs. And then they could actually see the shit I'm doing and say, okay, this guy's actually real. You know what I mean? And I don't think there's a lot of that right now, probably because all the things you said, you put a lot of time and effort into it to really make no money, by the way.
[00:15:01] Speaker B: Okay? So you know you can do that, right? Because you don't, this doesn't have to be a monetized thing, but you're also a guy who measures by monetizing. So are you happy if you just keep going on writing checks and don't monetize it?
[00:15:14] Speaker A: So for, like, this much time, I put together a, like a coaching online university thing. And you gotta. To do that right on the Internet. You gotta hire closers, you gotta build a sales funnel, and you gotta get emails that are artificial intelligence, and you're going back and forth. And I just did it for literally three days. I go, dude, turn this off. This is like, I don't want to do this. So fucking hustle this guy for seven grand. And it's not a hustle. But you know what? People start to believe their own bullshit. They start to believe, like, if I just tell you my opinion on something and put it in the form of a video series and send you freaking text messages, that you should pay me seven grand for that. And you know who the people that do that are? The people that are a little bit more on the desperate side, and it ends up being their last seven grand. I'd rather not have that guy seven grand, because honestly, I don't have some secret formula for you to get rich. I could help you out and give you my advice and hopefully be a motivator for you, but there's no secret formula here. You know what I mean?
[00:16:15] Speaker B: I think it's like. Cause I feel like when I watch you, and I do look at some of your comments, I think you're also really, like, appealing to some lower economic people, that you're inspiring, you're motivating them. So is the fulfillment, you know, is the chip for you, the, like, thank you. Because you're giving back in a meaningful way.
[00:16:34] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure it is. For sure it is. And it's the lower income people that like me, I don't necessarily think they're from Chicago. So then when they hear me talking about being from Schaumburg, I think they think it's like a ghetto. Like, they think I'm from Compton or something. Just so everyone understands, Schaumburg is a very middle class suburb. And I say it in the context of, like, now my kids go to Barrington High School, and it's all uppity. And there's Hinsdale and Winnetka and, you know, all these other affluent suburbs around here, and Schomburg's just Schomburg. We're just normal. We're normal people in Schomburg. We don't go to country clubs and all this stuff, you know? So I'm from Schomburg. Well, some people I'll start getting. It's awesome when one of my videos goes viral, because people outside of my following will start to see it. And, like, a guy, like, from, like, the south side of Chicago will come. What do you mean you're from Schomburg, bro?
He's confused. People are, like, scratching their head I thought people from. Were people from, like, you know, like, maybe like Hanover park or something like that. What you talking about? Schomburg's the rich kids, you know?
[00:17:37] Speaker B: Oh, my God, that's awesome.
[00:17:38] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:17:39] Speaker B: Well, I mean, I think that. I think a couple things. Sitting with you, I realized that part of being online, you gotta bring it right? The energy. And that's not a tall task if you're you. But, like, you know, it's three times a day to do it is. Some days you don't feel like bringing it.
[00:17:54] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:17:55] Speaker B: How do you rally around that?
[00:17:57] Speaker A: I actually have the opposite. Like, I literally wake up in the morning, I'll, like, think of something, and I'll videotape it. So I have all these damn reels sitting in my phone ready to be posted, and I'm actually trying to slow myself down not to do three. Like, I'm like, okay, I'm not gonna post anything today, or I can't help myself. I'm, like, addicted to it. I don't know what it is. I literally drive in here today, I almost wanted to post one cause something funny came to my mind. And anyway.
But now I've put myself on probation. When I think of something, unless I know for sure it's gonna be really good, I'll wait at least a few days before I post it. Let me make sure this is still effective and funny a couple days from now. Cause I think I'm hilarious all the time.
I think everything I say is hilarious. And then I'll post it and I'll be like, wait, why does have no views more viewers. Exactly.
[00:18:47] Speaker B: So what is your metrics right now? So is it followers? Is it likes? Is it comments?
You're a KPI guy. You wouldn't be as successful. So how do you measure it?
[00:18:58] Speaker A: Definitely views. Definitely views. And I learned that with my audience rather quickly to look at views instead of looking at likes. All right, so hint about Instagram. Okay. All right. You press the like button. Other people can see that you press the like button. You just view it. No one can see that you viewed it. Okay, so I got people. I'm remember, a lot of my content is bashing corporate America. So if you're a w two employer, maybe you're a regional sales manager. You know, you don't want people to know. So I got people. And I could always see followers versus non followers looking at my stuff, too. I know for a fact there's people following my page that are not followers, you know, or they follow from, like, burner accounts. Yeah, so I'm fine with that. So my views to likes ratio is never proportionate, ever. So a lot of times I'll just hide my likes because unfortunately, in social media land, it's such a metric, people look at like the first, oh, how many likes does it have? Or whatever. And, you know, if something has 100,000 views, in normal circumstances, it would have like five to 10,000 likes. Okay. If it has 100,000 views, that means it's doing well. Five to 10% of the people are pressing the like button. I have 100,000 views. It probably has like 2000 likes.
[00:20:15] Speaker B: You know, interesting. I think that just exacerbates the whole thing you're talking about, that they can't even like, separate, that they're so attached to that once a week somebody takes care of me.
[00:20:27] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:28] Speaker B: God, that's so powerful.
[00:20:30] Speaker A: It really is.
[00:20:30] Speaker B: So if you split out and create a whole bunch of people that either have a side hustle, which I am all for, I think everybody should have a side hustle. Work your way to the next level by if you can't fully take out the risk and then take out the risk, but become an entrepreneur full time. But I think try it out before you commit all the way. And then some people gotta commit. But I think if you just inspire a whole generation of people to think that it's not one company to take care of your entire lifespan.
[00:20:59] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:20:59] Speaker B: And that you're in charge of that.
[00:21:01] Speaker A: That would be amazing, you know, so there's that. And then even broader than that, I've had, there's a woman actually in Phil, she's come, I have a dinner this Saturday that I'm hosting in Philadelphia, and she's flying in, actually, from, she's in Charlotte or something. She's not even in Philadelphia. And she was making sure she could go to it.
She has multiple sclerosis, she's 54 years old, and she has no interest in being an entrepreneur. She works corporate America, whatever. She resonated with some of the stuff I said. She got laid off of her job after doing well a few years back, so she jives with what I'm saying, but she's not really necessarily even wanting to be an entrepreneur, but she likes the content. And she sent me this really nice dm saying, you know, you could take your message and use it as an analogy or as a metaphor to so many other pieces of your life. Really, at the end of the day, you're trying to say, okay, society doesn't tell you what to do. You decide what you want to do just. Just because your society says you're in this box, you know what I mean? You don't have to be. Go do whatever you want. And her having Ms and everything kind of really, really hit home for that. I met Ms, too, and she didn't know that, so she sent me this damn thing, and she's like, you know, for the last eight years before telling me how it's gonna go with my multiple sclerosis, I screw that. I'm doing this. And she felt that in my message. So maybe at some subconscious level, like, my mom's influence in me was coming out a little bit with that. I don't know. You know, I like to think that way.
[00:22:23] Speaker B: So, John, you're a true sales guy at heart. Like, we all are. And yet the power of Instagram is also the haters.
[00:22:30] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:22:31] Speaker B: So I see them on your page. We all have them. How do you deal with them?
[00:22:35] Speaker A: Well, initially, I would be kind of, oh, wow, I'm doing something right here. I got these haters coming out of the woodwork, and then they kept coming, and they kept coming and start to find out things about myself that I didn't even realize. It's like, you know, people making fun of my hair. Like, what the hell's wrong with my hair? You know what I mean?
I got a lisp I didn't even like. You know, I had one guy, a guy named Shelton Jordan. I played football with it. Notre Dame used to make fun of me for having a lisp. Okay? He's the only person in my life that ever said, he called me John Therathani. He'd say therathani. He said it in funny. It was my buddy, but it's the only time I've ever heard about this lisp I had. And now Instagram blows up haters. Every other comment from a hater. Nice lisp. And then they'll maybe make some homophobic phrase towards me or something like that with the lisp. Like, you know what, man? That's kind of messed up. But I started to really embrace it, so I'm like, that's kind of a foolish comment. So I go to the person's profile. I look at their profile picture. I look at their page, actually, and find, like, the most kind of bad, like, make fun able picture that I could find of them. And I will screenshot it, and then I put it on my story, and then I copy and paste what their comment was. You know, like, nice lisp, you know? You know, Geissler. And then they'll put it above it, and then I'll, like, draw, like, the cartoon line, like it's coming out of his mouth, which is all true. And then I'll tag the person in it.
And, yeah, people. People eat that up. I did it, like, once just to kind of be funny. More, more, more. And if they really. If they really deserve it, I'll make an actual reel about them.
So there was a guy that had on his bio, real estate investor, and he called me the biggest douche on Instagram.
[00:24:21] Speaker B: Biggest douche?
[00:24:22] Speaker A: Yeah, the biggest douche on Instagram. So I started off with, like, I want to introduce you to my friend Anthony here. And I pop this picture up there.
He's a real estate investor, but he had this to say about me. And then I continue to go on, and it's kind of like a compromising picture of, like, him and, like, this woman, and they're both wearing, like, matching eyeglasses.
So I said, you know, instead of coming making fun of me for my advice as a real estate investor, you might be able to listen, and you and your girlfriend wouldn't have to go two for one glasses shopping at Costco.
And, yeah, I gotta tell you, it made some of my core followers when I first started because I used to only do business advice, and now it's, like, expanded. People just think I'm funny, I think, but want to watch me gamble or whatever. So it's a bigger audience now, but, like, the core people at first. I have a buddy of mine in Barrington Hills. His name's Andrew Stoltman. He's a lawyer. He's big sec attorney. He's one of the talking heads on Fox News all the time. And he's one of my good friends. And he says to me, dude, quit doing this stuff. Like, you know what a lion care about what the sheep say, you know? Then people say, like, that stuff to me, dude, quit paying attention. Makes people feel, like, uncomfortable.
Kept doing it, though, and it grows on you. People now, like, live for it.
He messaged me, like, a week ago. He goes, buddy, you were wrong. I was. That's, like, frickin hilarious. Because if I could find, like, a picture of, like, them and their, like, girlfriend or something like that, I'll, like, have, like, something coming out of the girl's mouth, like, saying something compromising about her husband. My husband.
[00:26:02] Speaker B: You know, you're a full time media girl.
[00:26:04] Speaker A: Exactly. I'm pretty future in stand up comedy, they think.
[00:26:11] Speaker B: All right, so where can people find you?
[00:26:13] Speaker A: On Sarasani, on Instagram and TikTok and then John Sarasani's 2000% raise on YouTube.
[00:26:20] Speaker B: I think you're pretty soft under all that. And I actually think that you're really going to look back and measure all this by how many people you inspired. And I'm definitely inspired sitting here. I think this is a good message and really powerful to spend as much time as you are and you don't have to do this, and that's what's important. So kudos to you, and I can't wait to read this.
I'm in the deep end of the pool with you, so I'm swimming as far as I can.
[00:26:50] Speaker A: Yeah, well, you got a big production here. You know, when people, when people come to ask me, like, operational advice and stuff for my business, my business was me selling insurance, having people under me, helping me service it, and making as much money as we can, you got fricking moving pieces to here and stuff. I was able to dodge that part of my professional growth, the professional headache.
[00:27:11] Speaker B: Good for you.
[00:27:12] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
[00:27:13] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
[00:27:15] Speaker A: Well, exactly. Traded it for that.
[00:27:17] Speaker B: Okay. So you're a lot tougher than me. Cause the haters really bother me. I, like, super mull on it. I gotta think through your approach and see if I could have enough chops to do it, but.
So you're just so successful and everything seems to go right. What does get under your skin?
[00:27:36] Speaker A: Wasn't it. Who said it? Didn't Donald Trump say he'll never share his phobias or weaknesses to the world? Why would I give you guys the blueprint?
I will say this.
I had a.
I love being like, what's the thing? You ever hire a salesperson and you make the person take that test to show if they're going to be good at the sales job or not? And those things, when I would do it, would always tell me stuff about myself. How did that test know that about me? And one of the things that always come up for me is I would always want, like, acceptance from people. Okay? I'm gonna be the type of salesperson that wants the manager to tell me good job all the time and stuff. You thought I was gonna be talking about me hiring. I said no back when I was a sales rep interviewing for jobs.
So it was a challenge for me when I started my company to like, you're by yourself, so you're having these wins and stuff, but there's no conference strip you're qualifying for. There's no leaderboard that you're looking at and comparing yourself to where you stand from the other reps in the country. You know what I mean?
So finding that within myself was something, and I think it's something that I still look at. And I gotta tell you, during that five year period when I worked for somebody else, there was a transition at executive level in the region I was in. And at that point, we didn't know if I was gonna be sticking around long term, because the original plan was me to work there till I'm 60, buying me when I'm 37. I'm the up and comer in the company down the road. And that went sideways.
[00:29:13] Speaker B: Very long road.
[00:29:15] Speaker A: Exactly. So that went sideways.
But before it did, there was a position that opened up that I thought had my name on it, and they didn't look at me for that position. And I was like, that's kind of effed up. And it was kind of like a little eye opening to me. As I look back now, they're right. I wasn't the right guy for that job. It would have been not good, but I didn't know that about myself. Right. So I still gotta go to work the next day. You know, they just paid me millions of dollars. You don't wanna go pout now because you didn't get some job that would have given you a better job title, and now you could be a big baby at work. So, you know, looking within on myself, that's something I look back on. There's a lot I learned about myself during that employment contract.
[00:30:01] Speaker B: God, I so resonate with that.
I think that I never wanted to, like, have to, like, vouch for myself, which is why being your own boss is easier.
[00:30:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:12] Speaker B: I didn't. Cause, you know, what if they didn't tell you at a girl.
[00:30:15] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
[00:30:19] Speaker B: And so.
[00:30:19] Speaker A: Good point.
[00:30:21] Speaker B: Because, you know, I felt like they write you these millions of dollars of checks.
[00:30:25] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:30:25] Speaker B: And then I'm in the company, and then I felt like, well, I got to be the manager of the year.
[00:30:29] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:30:30] Speaker B: Why?
That's not part of the employment agreement. But until I was manager of the year of the $13 billion company, I was like, they're gonna find out that I'm not really good.
[00:30:41] Speaker A: It's imposter syndrome. Right. Yeah. I always thought I was getting overpaid the whole time when I went on, when I was, I thought everything was. When I got there, I realized I was more talented or as talented than anyone there. But during the process of selling the company, I'm like, how much you guys gonna pay me for this company? You know what I mean?
Yeah. I resonate with everything you just said? Completely.
[00:31:03] Speaker B: Oh, you're my favorite person in so long. You know what? It's just that a lot of times that you talk to a lot of smart people, but not a lot of people that inspire you back, so thank you for that. That was really fun.
[00:31:18] Speaker A: Thank you.
