WEBVTT
00:00:00.080 --> 00:00:07.440
I'm completing my 10th year as the CEO of our business, and here is a list of things that nobody ever prepares you for.
00:00:07.599 --> 00:00:16.160
My whole career, I always assumed that people a few steps ahead of me knew so much more than me, and they had it all figured out and they knew the steps.
00:00:16.320 --> 00:00:24.879
And the more people I talk to, the more I realize that everyone has imposter syndrome, and we're all just figuring out the next step after our last one.
00:00:25.039 --> 00:00:32.000
We kind of have a plan, we're really comfortable in ambiguity, but no one's got like the know it all.
00:00:32.399 --> 00:00:34.159
We're all just figuring it out.
00:00:34.320 --> 00:00:39.359
So, number one, the things that people don't tell you is you don't really feel like a CEO at first.
00:00:39.520 --> 00:00:46.960
I started feeling like a real air quotes CEO when we were crossing the 20 million mark.
00:00:47.119 --> 00:00:55.039
And I started feeling that way because some of the decisions that I was making felt like the decisions that would need to move the business forward.
00:00:55.200 --> 00:00:59.840
But I didn't just like wake up feeling like this magical CEO one day.
00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:00.960
I still don't today.
00:01:01.039 --> 00:01:08.159
And many days I feel like I'm the wrong person for the job, despite the fact that I have tended to make the right decision for the business.
00:01:08.319 --> 00:01:15.200
And then when you look backwards at what you did, it was like, holy crap, okay, I don't give myself enough credit.
00:01:15.359 --> 00:01:17.840
Now I understand imposter syndrome.
00:01:18.079 --> 00:01:25.120
The second thing that no one tells you about being a CEO is the problems get less obvious and they don't get easier.
00:01:25.280 --> 00:01:29.040
You don't have enough information, and you should kind of make a decision on this pretty quick.
00:01:29.200 --> 00:01:38.319
And those decisions can have impacts anywhere from$10,000 to$10 million, depending on how we think about that issue.
00:01:38.480 --> 00:01:43.120
And are we approaching it with a framework or asking the right people?
00:01:43.280 --> 00:01:47.200
If it's an acquisition, a new market, we're actively hiring a CFO.
00:01:47.359 --> 00:02:05.280
All of these conversations were things that I spent hours and hours and hours ruminating and asking questions and talking to people who are CFOs, who who hired CFOs or who fired CFOs and trying to understand what are all the blind spots that I have for this kind of complicated problem.
00:02:05.439 --> 00:02:11.360
So that way I can make the most informed decision in a high-risk, very gray area.
00:02:11.520 --> 00:02:25.919
The best way to prepare yourself for problems getting grayer and more ambiguous is building a network of people around you that you can call when you just don't know the answer, which upcoming hint is almost every day.
00:02:26.240 --> 00:02:32.000
Section three: the thing that nobody tells you about being a CEO is that you carry the weight even when nobody sees it.
00:02:32.159 --> 00:02:37.280
If you run a small business, you know the pressure of everyone looking at you for the answer.
00:02:37.439 --> 00:02:40.479
You end up carrying the weight whether or not you want to.
00:02:40.560 --> 00:02:43.840
And it's hard to take vacations, it's hard to sleep for some people.
00:02:44.000 --> 00:02:55.120
A lot of people get into owning their own business because uh they think the money looks really cool from the outside and they think it sounds fun to be your own boss until you realize that you're not your own boss.
00:02:55.280 --> 00:03:03.840
And every person that uh works for you, you work for them, and you have the pressure of everything that you should have the pressure from, uh, from that responsibility.
00:03:04.080 --> 00:03:07.599
The fourth thing that nobody tells you about is you have to disappoint people.
00:03:07.840 --> 00:03:15.439
Leadership means that you have to pick the right choice, not necessarily the easy choice or the choice that makes the most people happy.
00:03:15.599 --> 00:03:27.039
Over my 10 years, we've gone through several rounds of layoffs, we've gone through branch shutdowns, we've gone through some really hard shit that was not popular and was not wanted or liked.
00:03:27.360 --> 00:03:36.400
And it was my job, it was my responsibility to deliver that news and come up with a strategy to mitigate the damage when it was causing damage.
00:03:36.479 --> 00:03:44.479
You're gonna disappoint people on this path, and your job is to do it respectfully and attempt to mitigate the damage as much as you are capable of doing.
00:03:44.719 --> 00:03:49.759
The fifth thing that no one ever tells you about is that the loneliness is real, but it's not always dramatic.
00:03:49.919 --> 00:04:00.479
It is challenging to go through the pressure and the decisions that you have to make that are unpopular or popular or whatever, and not feel alone.
00:04:00.719 --> 00:04:08.080
The way to mitigate that, which will not totally solve it, is a group of peers that you can talk to that are there with you.
00:04:08.240 --> 00:04:15.439
A lot of people have business partners for that reason, so they don't feel like they're going it alone, but it is a very real problem and it is a very real amount of pressure.
00:04:15.680 --> 00:04:24.720
So most business owners that I know, despite having friends and relationships and everything else in the world, always describe themselves as lonely.
00:04:25.360 --> 00:04:31.360
The sixth thing that nobody tells you about is that you become the bottleneck before you realize it.
00:04:31.519 --> 00:04:36.959
It's clear from the outside that the person holding the business back is the owner.
00:04:37.120 --> 00:04:41.680
It's so easy to become your own bottleneck, and it's so easy for every decision to come to you.
00:04:41.839 --> 00:04:45.279
It's so easy for that to happen because trusting people is really hard.
00:04:45.360 --> 00:04:49.199
And trusting people to make decisions the way that you would make them is really hard.
00:04:49.360 --> 00:05:01.279
And it takes grit and vigor and real risk-taking personality to go find someone that can make good decisions in your stead and hire them to come in and make good decisions for your stead.
00:05:01.439 --> 00:05:08.720
This is one of the most complicated parts of your business is hiring people that you trust to make quality decisions while you are not there.
00:05:08.879 --> 00:05:13.759
It's complicated, it's hard, and you can become the bottleneck before you realize it.
00:05:14.000 --> 00:05:20.399
The seventh thing that no one tells you about being CFO is success does not feel the way that you think it does.
00:05:20.560 --> 00:05:29.120
So it's hard to feel like you made it because every time that you clock a win, the goalpost naturally moves.
00:05:29.279 --> 00:05:34.240
It used to be my life's greatest obsession to hit$10 million of revenue.
00:05:34.319 --> 00:05:39.439
And I just couldn't imagine for those first seven years of my career being an eight-figure business.
00:05:39.519 --> 00:05:43.040
It drove me unlike almost anything's ever driven me in my life.
00:05:43.279 --> 00:05:47.360
The moment we hit it, I was like, okay, now what?
00:05:47.680 --> 00:05:51.360
Now I guess 20, 30, or 100.
00:05:51.519 --> 00:05:52.399
Like now what?
00:05:52.480 --> 00:05:58.959
And the goalpost moves because it's just the next step, despite it being a success.
00:05:59.439 --> 00:06:04.319
Section eight, you have to stay human while becoming better at the job.
00:06:04.480 --> 00:06:12.319
When you scale beyond 150 people, it gets more and more complicated to keep the human as a part of the organization.
00:06:12.480 --> 00:06:23.360
It's hard to connect in those fleeting moments that you have someone, and it gets harder for people to not feel like a number because of the lack of connection inside the organization.
00:06:23.519 --> 00:06:27.920
This is an area that I'm not especially strong at, and it's an area that I've been working on for some time.
00:06:28.079 --> 00:06:29.600
I don't think that I'm an expert at it.
00:06:29.680 --> 00:06:39.600
I think that I have a lot of people that I admire that do an incredible job at connecting their team and being like real leaders for the people inside the organization.
00:06:39.759 --> 00:06:44.319
And for me, this is an area of weakness that uh I'm continuing to work on.
00:06:44.560 --> 00:06:48.879
The company can only grow as fast as you personally grow.
00:06:49.040 --> 00:06:51.839
You can only carry what you can hold.
00:06:51.920 --> 00:07:01.279
And if you aren't training yourself to hold more and grow yourself personally and grow stronger and better at your craft, you will fail at some point in the process.
00:07:01.439 --> 00:07:02.639
You will stop growing.
00:07:02.879 --> 00:07:16.399
The business in any aspect is going to be capped by the leader, and that leader's ability to grow personally and mentally to be able to handle all of the challenges that we've talked about so far.
00:07:16.720 --> 00:07:22.720
The tenth thing that no one ever tells you about being a CEO is sometimes there is just no good decision.
00:07:22.879 --> 00:07:26.800
A book that I've read a lot is called The Hard Thing About Hard Things.
00:07:26.959 --> 00:07:36.319
And it describes this founder going through a really challenging moment in their business, and the only way through it was through it.
00:07:36.480 --> 00:07:41.759
There wasn't a magical path or a door open that would suddenly make any decision a good decision.
00:07:41.920 --> 00:07:43.680
And sometimes that's what that's like.
00:07:43.839 --> 00:07:46.800
There is no good decisions, only bad options.
00:07:46.879 --> 00:07:50.319
And you just have to pick the least of the worst.
00:07:50.720 --> 00:07:55.920
My final thought, closing this out, is that you can only lead as your authentic self.
00:07:56.079 --> 00:08:04.560
I tried to be someone that I wasn't because I read books that told me this is how you're supposed to lead your company, and that's just not who I am at my core.
00:08:04.720 --> 00:08:13.040
I do have to continue to improve, I do have to continue to get better, but I can only be who I am, and I can only bring my authentic self to me and my team every single day.
00:08:13.120 --> 00:08:20.319
And when I started leaning more and more into just like this is who I am, this is how I'm going to lead, and I'm just gonna be like a nerdy random dude.
00:08:20.480 --> 00:08:27.279
The business started compounding faster and the team started gelling better because I was just who I was.
00:08:27.439 --> 00:08:30.000
If you're on the path of being a CEO, I wish you luck.
00:08:30.160 --> 00:08:36.960
I wish you, I hope you share your comments below for anything that you've gone through or that resonates from the video that we shared today.
00:08:37.200 --> 00:08:39.200
And I would love it if you liked and subbed.
00:00:00.080 --> 00:00:07.440
I'm completing my 10th year as the CEO of our business, and here is a list of things that nobody ever prepares you for.
00:00:07.599 --> 00:00:16.160
My whole career, I always assumed that people a few steps ahead of me knew so much more than me, and they had it all figured out and they knew the steps.
00:00:16.320 --> 00:00:24.879
And the more people I talk to, the more I realize that everyone has imposter syndrome, and we're all just figuring out the next step after our last one.
00:00:25.039 --> 00:00:32.000
We kind of have a plan, we're really comfortable in ambiguity, but no one's got like the know it all.
00:00:32.399 --> 00:00:34.159
We're all just figuring it out.
00:00:34.320 --> 00:00:39.359
So, number one, the things that people don't tell you is you don't really feel like a CEO at first.
00:00:39.520 --> 00:00:46.960
I started feeling like a real air quotes CEO when we were crossing the 20 million mark.
00:00:47.119 --> 00:00:55.039
And I started feeling that way because some of the decisions that I was making felt like the decisions that would need to move the business forward.
00:00:55.200 --> 00:00:59.840
But I didn't just like wake up feeling like this magical CEO one day.
00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:00.960
I still don't today.
00:01:01.039 --> 00:01:08.159
And many days I feel like I'm the wrong person for the job, despite the fact that I have tended to make the right decision for the business.
00:01:08.319 --> 00:01:15.200
And then when you look backwards at what you did, it was like, holy crap, okay, I don't give myself enough credit.
00:01:15.359 --> 00:01:17.840
Now I understand imposter syndrome.
00:01:18.079 --> 00:01:25.120
The second thing that no one tells you about being a CEO is the problems get less obvious and they don't get easier.
00:01:25.280 --> 00:01:29.040
You don't have enough information, and you should kind of make a decision on this pretty quick.
00:01:29.200 --> 00:01:38.319
And those decisions can have impacts anywhere from$10,000 to$10 million, depending on how we think about that issue.
00:01:38.480 --> 00:01:43.120
And are we approaching it with a framework or asking the right people?
00:01:43.280 --> 00:01:47.200
If it's an acquisition, a new market, we're actively hiring a CFO.
00:01:47.359 --> 00:02:05.280
All of these conversations were things that I spent hours and hours and hours ruminating and asking questions and talking to people who are CFOs, who who hired CFOs or who fired CFOs and trying to understand what are all the blind spots that I have for this kind of complicated problem.
00:02:05.439 --> 00:02:11.360
So that way I can make the most informed decision in a high-risk, very gray area.
00:02:11.520 --> 00:02:25.919
The best way to prepare yourself for problems getting grayer and more ambiguous is building a network of people around you that you can call when you just don't know the answer, which upcoming hint is almost every day.
00:02:26.240 --> 00:02:32.000
Section three: the thing that nobody tells you about being a CEO is that you carry the weight even when nobody sees it.
00:02:32.159 --> 00:02:37.280
If you run a small business, you know the pressure of everyone looking at you for the answer.
00:02:37.439 --> 00:02:40.479
You end up carrying the weight whether or not you want to.
00:02:40.560 --> 00:02:43.840
And it's hard to take vacations, it's hard to sleep for some people.
00:02:44.000 --> 00:02:55.120
A lot of people get into owning their own business because uh they think the money looks really cool from the outside and they think it sounds fun to be your own boss until you realize that you're not your own boss.
00:02:55.280 --> 00:03:03.840
And every person that uh works for you, you work for them, and you have the pressure of everything that you should have the pressure from, uh, from that responsibility.
00:03:04.080 --> 00:03:07.599
The fourth thing that nobody tells you about is you have to disappoint people.
00:03:07.840 --> 00:03:15.439
Leadership means that you have to pick the right choice, not necessarily the easy choice or the choice that makes the most people happy.
00:03:15.599 --> 00:03:27.039
Over my 10 years, we've gone through several rounds of layoffs, we've gone through branch shutdowns, we've gone through some really hard shit that was not popular and was not wanted or liked.
00:03:27.360 --> 00:03:36.400
And it was my job, it was my responsibility to deliver that news and come up with a strategy to mitigate the damage when it was causing damage.
00:03:36.479 --> 00:03:44.479
You're gonna disappoint people on this path, and your job is to do it respectfully and attempt to mitigate the damage as much as you are capable of doing.
00:03:44.719 --> 00:03:49.759
The fifth thing that no one ever tells you about is that the loneliness is real, but it's not always dramatic.
00:03:49.919 --> 00:04:00.479
It is challenging to go through the pressure and the decisions that you have to make that are unpopular or popular or whatever, and not feel alone.
00:04:00.719 --> 00:04:08.080
The way to mitigate that, which will not totally solve it, is a group of peers that you can talk to that are there with you.
00:04:08.240 --> 00:04:15.439
A lot of people have business partners for that reason, so they don't feel like they're going it alone, but it is a very real problem and it is a very real amount of pressure.
00:04:15.680 --> 00:04:24.720
So most business owners that I know, despite having friends and relationships and everything else in the world, always describe themselves as lonely.
00:04:25.360 --> 00:04:31.360
The sixth thing that nobody tells you about is that you become the bottleneck before you realize it.
00:04:31.519 --> 00:04:36.959
It's clear from the outside that the person holding the business back is the owner.
00:04:37.120 --> 00:04:41.680
It's so easy to become your own bottleneck, and it's so easy for every decision to come to you.
00:04:41.839 --> 00:04:45.279
It's so easy for that to happen because trusting people is really hard.
00:04:45.360 --> 00:04:49.199
And trusting people to make decisions the way that you would make them is really hard.
00:04:49.360 --> 00:05:01.279
And it takes grit and vigor and real risk-taking personality to go find someone that can make good decisions in your stead and hire them to come in and make good decisions for your stead.
00:05:01.439 --> 00:05:08.720
This is one of the most complicated parts of your business is hiring people that you trust to make quality decisions while you are not there.
00:05:08.879 --> 00:05:13.759
It's complicated, it's hard, and you can become the bottleneck before you realize it.
00:05:14.000 --> 00:05:20.399
The seventh thing that no one tells you about being CFO is success does not feel the way that you think it does.
00:05:20.560 --> 00:05:29.120
So it's hard to feel like you made it because every time that you clock a win, the goalpost naturally moves.
00:05:29.279 --> 00:05:34.240
It used to be my life's greatest obsession to hit$10 million of revenue.
00:05:34.319 --> 00:05:39.439
And I just couldn't imagine for those first seven years of my career being an eight-figure business.
00:05:39.519 --> 00:05:43.040
It drove me unlike almost anything's ever driven me in my life.
00:05:43.279 --> 00:05:47.360
The moment we hit it, I was like, okay, now what?
00:05:47.680 --> 00:05:51.360
Now I guess 20, 30, or 100.
00:05:51.519 --> 00:05:52.399
Like now what?
00:05:52.480 --> 00:05:58.959
And the goalpost moves because it's just the next step, despite it being a success.
00:05:59.439 --> 00:06:04.319
Section eight, you have to stay human while becoming better at the job.
00:06:04.480 --> 00:06:12.319
When you scale beyond 150 people, it gets more and more complicated to keep the human as a part of the organization.
00:06:12.480 --> 00:06:23.360
It's hard to connect in those fleeting moments that you have someone, and it gets harder for people to not feel like a number because of the lack of connection inside the organization.
00:06:23.519 --> 00:06:27.920
This is an area that I'm not especially strong at, and it's an area that I've been working on for some time.
00:06:28.079 --> 00:06:29.600
I don't think that I'm an expert at it.
00:06:29.680 --> 00:06:39.600
I think that I have a lot of people that I admire that do an incredible job at connecting their team and being like real leaders for the people inside the organization.
00:06:39.759 --> 00:06:44.319
And for me, this is an area of weakness that uh I'm continuing to work on.
00:06:44.560 --> 00:06:48.879
The company can only grow as fast as you personally grow.
00:06:49.040 --> 00:06:51.839
You can only carry what you can hold.
00:06:51.920 --> 00:07:01.279
And if you aren't training yourself to hold more and grow yourself personally and grow stronger and better at your craft, you will fail at some point in the process.
00:07:01.439 --> 00:07:02.639
You will stop growing.
00:07:02.879 --> 00:07:16.399
The business in any aspect is going to be capped by the leader, and that leader's ability to grow personally and mentally to be able to handle all of the challenges that we've talked about so far.
00:07:16.720 --> 00:07:22.720
The tenth thing that no one ever tells you about being a CEO is sometimes there is just no good decision.
00:07:22.879 --> 00:07:26.800
A book that I've read a lot is called The Hard Thing About Hard Things.
00:07:26.959 --> 00:07:36.319
And it describes this founder going through a really challenging moment in their business, and the only way through it was through it.
00:07:36.480 --> 00:07:41.759
There wasn't a magical path or a door open that would suddenly make any decision a good decision.
00:07:41.920 --> 00:07:43.680
And sometimes that's what that's like.
00:07:43.839 --> 00:07:46.800
There is no good decisions, only bad options.
00:07:46.879 --> 00:07:50.319
And you just have to pick the least of the worst.
00:07:50.720 --> 00:07:55.920
My final thought, closing this out, is that you can only lead as your authentic self.
00:07:56.079 --> 00:08:04.560
I tried to be someone that I wasn't because I read books that told me this is how you're supposed to lead your company, and that's just not who I am at my core.
00:08:04.720 --> 00:08:13.040
I do have to continue to improve, I do have to continue to get better, but I can only be who I am, and I can only bring my authentic self to me and my team every single day.
00:08:13.120 --> 00:08:20.319
And when I started leaning more and more into just like this is who I am, this is how I'm going to lead, and I'm just gonna be like a nerdy random dude.
00:08:20.480 --> 00:08:27.279
The business started compounding faster and the team started gelling better because I was just who I was.
00:08:27.439 --> 00:08:30.000
If you're on the path of being a CEO, I wish you luck.
00:08:30.160 --> 00:08:36.960
I wish you, I hope you share your comments below for anything that you've gone through or that resonates from the video that we shared today.
00:08:37.200 --> 00:08:39.200
And I would love it if you liked and subbed.
