[00:00:00] I'm Scott Eckart, and this is Future Proof, A Show for building something that lasts. Let's get into it. So with a stroke of a pen, I lost my health insurance, my life insurance, my disability, and any retirement that I had. And you walk out the door and you think, okay, that company had complete and total control over my life.
[00:00:21] Hello everyone. Today on Future Proof, we have a special guest host Amanda Smith from Share Your Genius. She's going to be talking with me today about how I got my start working with business owners. They invest their heart and soul mind and body. Blood, sweat and tears, everything. They put everything in it and at the end of the day, they didn't have a lot to show for it.
[00:00:44] Well, welcome back to Future Proof. We're flipping the script here and I am playing the part as host and your usual host, Scott Eckert, is going to be the guest today. Oh, wow. Are you ready for it? Yeah. Yeah. I have known you for [00:01:00] a short amount of time, but I feel like there are some things from your past that are just really important to where you've gotten today.
[00:01:06] He told me a story not too long ago about. Sea turtles. Tell me that story about sea turtles and why that's so relevant to it. Yeah, the sea turtle. So if you are not driving a car, you can close your eyes and imagine a very beautiful, peaceful beach. Okay. And there is a ridge of kind of a bump in the sand, and all of a sudden there's this motion and things are happening and the sand starts to kind of move.
[00:01:31] And so these eggs are buried right, and they're left alone. Which is kind of a key theme here, right? They're left alone and all of a sudden hundreds of eggs start to open up, kind of almost like a switch has been flipped and somebody is almost calling them and saying, okay, it's time to wake up. It's time to go.
[00:01:47] And they all crack open and they know they have one job, and that's to get to the ocean. If they can safely now before they have predators, and many of them just don't make it [00:02:00] Seagulls. Birds and others just come and they're kind of tasty treats because their shells are not hardened and off they go and they struggle.
[00:02:06] They can barely make it through the sand, but as they do, they actually get stronger, and it's the struggle that makes them stronger now once they get to the water. Their struggle is not over. Now they have different predators and now they're in the water, but they inherently know how to swim. There's nobody there to teach them.
[00:02:24] They have to rely on themselves. And they grow and they grow. And if they make it to the next step and the next step that shall begins to harden, and that is their protection. And then at some point. Amanda, they now become kind of teenager ish if they make it with that shell. They live a really long time.
[00:02:44] Many of them, the ones that I see are probably 80, 90, a hundred years old, and they have made it. What I have learned from that, I guess, is that when you lean into struggle, you get stronger. Can you tell me on a personal level, you said you've got [00:03:00] several sea turtle moments. What have been a couple of those formulative moments?
[00:03:05] In your life of struggle and then overcoming that. Yeah. So without going into, you know, uh, oh, I was a victim or, you know, that kind of thing. But, you know, bullying is real and, and when you, you know, you grow up and you're different than others and you don't have the skills that maybe the adults around you think that you should have, you kind of wonder what your purpose is and you wonder.
[00:03:28] You know, why am why am I here? And you don't get much support. It's hard to be bullied by kids, but it's also really hard to be bullied by adults, you know, and those that happen to be in your family, and you don't get that kind of support. And, you know, adults can be dream makers or dream killers. And so when you have dream killers there and you have an idea and someone just looks at you and says, no, that's a moment at which you, you really, at least I did second guess really everything.
[00:03:52] And so you're left to your own devices and wondering. Do I have skills? And if I have them, are they worth anything and, and what [00:04:00] should I do? So one sea turtle moment was I went to college orientation and I was just sent and told to go, and I didn't know. Until the morning that you wake up and you go to this, that parents went with you and I looked around and every other incoming freshman had at least one, if not two parents that were there with 'em.
[00:04:23] I had no idea, Amanda, that a parent would do that. So here I was with. Some book and you were supposed to pick things and do you know how alone I felt in that moment? Yeah. You're an 18-year-old. Yeah. You don't know what you're doing. I had no idea. Yeah. That was a definite sea turtle moment and I thought, well, I guess I'll figure it out.
[00:04:42] And I did, but very insecure and had no idea if I were making any of the right choices. And I just kind of kept that all inside. I didn't even really say anything, but the amount of loneliness that I felt at that point was. Quite staggering. So [00:05:00] let's fast forward a little bit to the work that you do and the business that you have built.
[00:05:05] Tell me a little bit more about why you decided to start your business. Yeah. When I finished my MBA, I went and worked in, you know, corporate America, and I realized quickly that I made a bad employee. Because I asked a why question one too many times and I was invited to leave, right? Which is putting it nicely.
[00:05:23] And it was right after nine 11 and this small consulting company I was working with was contracting. And so they called me in on a Friday and they said, thanks for playing in our game. Here's a, here's your last check and you can leave now. So with the stroke of a pen, I lost my health insurance, my life insurance, my disability, and any retirement that I had.
[00:05:40] And you walk out the door and you think, okay, that company had complete and total control over my life. And I went home and I had to figure out what to do. I had to figure out how to replace all of that. So it was in that. Quest that I realized two things. One was I never wanted anyone to have that amount of control over me ever again.
[00:05:59] [00:06:00] And two, I could probably do that for other people. So I realized that most people in their job rented their benefits. They didn't actually own them. Tell me about that. Okay, so when you go to work for someone else and they say, okay, as long as you're with us, we'll provide this for you, but as soon as you leave, or more importantly, we're done with you and we ask you to leave, you have nothing.
[00:06:20] So I realized that I could do that for other people. I could help educate them, and I've often said, Amanda, that I'm a terrible salesperson, but I'm a really good educator. So if you educate people, you never have to sell. And so I thought, I can do that. I can go talk to people and help educate them about what they might need.
[00:06:37] Young families just like mine. And so that led me on this quest to say, wow, that could be a really cool thing to do. So I began doing that and that was very interesting. But along the way. I realized, oh, I'm actually a business owner because now I am in control of my destiny, and I guess I'm just stubborn enough that I didn't ever want anyone to have that kind of control.
[00:06:59] [00:07:00] Right. You were on this quest to educate people and it was an afterthought that you were a business owner. Is that what I just heard? Totally. I didn't grow up around any entrepreneurs. I couldn't even spell the word. I didn't know that was an option because. All I had ever seen was that people work for other people.
[00:07:16] We didn't grow up with much money at all, and so I didn't know where money came from. I didn't understand it. I knew that there were people who were very wealthy. We were not them, and you drive by big houses and you know, people with fancy cars. I didn't know where that came from, so I just assumed that everyone worked for someone else.
[00:07:33] I didn't know that you could work for yourself. Until I started doing it, and then one day I realized, wait, I actually own my own little thing, my own little business, and I. Make the decisions. And the coolest thing was that I could go to all of my kids' plays and baseball games and parent teacher conferences, which was another sea turtle moment for me because [00:08:00] they didn't come to my stuff as much.
[00:08:02] And that really bothered me. So the one thing I told myself was. I'm not gonna miss stuff. So as a business owner, you get to control your schedule. So if I want to be go to a parent-teacher conference in the middle of the day, I can do that. That freedom, Amanda. Was mind blowing to me. So I get to choose what I wanna do when I wanna do it, and I can go where I want to go.
[00:08:26] Tell me why it's so important for you to work with other business owners, founders, people who have families. Why focus on that group so much? It's a Securus route that I took, you know, kind of through that. As I looked at the unique challenges that business owners have, there's a, there's a couple things going on.
[00:08:50] One is they invest their heart and soul, mind and body, blood, sweat, and tears, everything. They put everything in it, and at the end of the day, they didn't have a lot to show [00:09:00] for it. And when they, when it was time to leave or time to go, maybe their health wasn't good. They, they had to stop working. They just didn't have enough to show for it.
[00:09:09] So I thought there has to be a better way to do that. So a friend of mine introduced me to this group called the Exit Planning Institute, and I thought, well, I need to retool. I, I wanna really learn about that. And, and clients don't really care about initials after your name. And, and that's not why I did this.
[00:09:26] So I went off to training. And I learned how to actually work with business owners specifically. They have unique challenges and unique opportunities, but what it really boils down to is that they care about everybody else, but nobody cares about them. So I realized that I could position myself as someone who is solely focused on the business owner.
[00:09:48] And when I began having conversations with business owners about Let Me Care For You, it was pretty easy for them to say, yeah, I want you to help me. Did you feel that way as a business owner? Like, oh wow, I. [00:10:00] Sea turtle moment, I'm the only person who's going to save me. I'm the only person who's going to help me.
[00:10:05] Did you feel in, even in that freedom, did you feel some of that loneliness and isolation? Mm-hmm. I did. Tell me about that. Yeah, so in, in this business that can be very lonely if you're not careful, and so very quickly I realized that I needed to have great people around me. And there's one person in particular, his name is Daryl, that I met years ago in this.
[00:10:24] School that I went to. Okay. We talk every Tuesday morning at seven 30. We have for years. He is my great friend and so people like that and he is a business owner. We do, we work together. Actually, you know, you can say misery loves, loves company, but. Actually success loves company too. And it's people like him who together we're not lonely anymore because we understand every single day what we signed up for.
[00:10:51] So very quickly I realized if I'm gonna do this, I need to have great people like Gerald around me. And I did that. People like him and, and a couple [00:11:00] others. Um, one of EM'S named Greg, he has been there with me every step of the way. And so you get great people around you who you can go to. And say, you know what?
[00:11:08] I'm having a really bad day. I need you to talk me back into the game. Um, Michelle Wallace, um, in her book mattering, she talks about cornermen, and this is a new term to me, but in the boxing ring, there's the person who stands in the corner who when, when the bell rings and they go to get, you know, water or whatever, the corner man is the one who whispers in the boxer's ear and says, you can do this.
[00:11:32] Get back in the ring. And sometimes they have to say, you're not doing so good. Lift your hands, do the thing. But Gerald's a corner man. Greg's a corner man. Okay. And they're the ones that, you know, I say, look, I'm, I can't do this. And they're like, yeah you can. You need to put some steel in your spine. Get back in there.
[00:11:50] And that's what they have done for me. The thing that I have known or heard a lot about that's been really important just for me and my growth, is who are your core five? [00:12:00] There are five people that you have in your life that you go to, and you may be for different reasons, but you have that core five.
[00:12:07] You have to, leads me to my next question. You started to then educate, help business owners by saying, Hey, let me care about you. You're a core five. What were some of those early breakthroughs, aha moments where you were like, oh my gosh, this is my purpose. This is gonna probably surprise you, but I could actually make money doing it.
[00:12:32] Which I might sound a little crass, but I did have a friend early on who was a very dear friend, and I told him what I was doing and he said, well Scott, how many times are you going to, you know, reimagine yourself? And I was like. What do you mean? And it kind of hurt my feelings and, and I realized as a visionary that maybe I was idea du jour, right?
[00:12:52] And I was chasing clouds or chasing dreams. And the reason I say that, Amanda, is because people were willing to pay for it, I [00:13:00] guess, which tells me it had value. So it really wasn't about the money, but it was really about the value. And when people would say, this is a very important thing, and when people are willing to pay for something, it has value.
[00:13:14] Let me know that what I do has value and that I needed to get better at it, and I needed to continue. And, and Rachel actually said something to me, um, who you work with? And I said, I didn't necessarily wanna talk about these things. And she said, Scott, do you help people? And I said, I do. And then she said, well be wrong of you not to talk about it.
[00:13:33] So. I'm not in the habit of talking about myself, but if I'm helping people and so to help, help me reframe that, and I think it really is the value. And so I realized that there is a business here, a very important business, and one that people will pay for. So that was an aha moment. But also to see people make decisions with confidence and then to be able to do the things that they wanna do.
[00:13:58] So we do [00:14:00] intergenerational planning. I work with a lot of family business and sometimes you can't get a family in a room and talk about the weather and they don't argue much less money. 'cause money makes people do weird things. But to see a plan succeed and to watch in particular a family and or an executive team to say, this is what I want to do, and then to watch it happen, there is nothing more fulfilling for me than that.
[00:14:25] So let's talk about. What that even means because I think the world, we live in society, when they think about family generational wealth, everybody thinks about cash or maybe an estate or land, but that still has some more tangible cash value. You're talking about businesses and legacies and a lot of that.
[00:14:49] Isn't cash, it's not liquid. So we've had some side conversations about this, but I'd love for you to go into what that means. Uh, I think silver [00:15:00] tsunami is something that you have mentioned to me before and really how that translates into why it is so important to think about the transferring of generational wealth for the business owners that you serve.
[00:15:10] So a couple things. We'll break it down into two big, two big areas. The first is success versus significance, and a business owner can have a lot of success and yet not feel significant when we're going to sell the business. Whether it's in internal, external, doesn't really matter. They're questioning their significance.
[00:15:29] If I am no longer in charge and nobody, everybody went under my schedule and now nobody does, does that make me significant any longer? Meaning like, do they matter? Correct or correct? What's what? What's their purpose? Correct. Anymore. Exactly. So the financial deal can make all the sense in the world, and they're not going to do it because we haven't answered the fundamental question of mattering or significance.
[00:15:51] So part of my process is to steer into that, lean into that and say, okay, here's what your life is gonna look like. Can we please talk about that? And they say, oh, [00:16:00] that's fine. No, it doesn't matter. I'm like, yeah, it does matter and we really need to talk about it. And oftentimes there is a marriage there, and so I really want to.
[00:16:08] That's, that spouse needs to be there. And then this isn't a male female thing at all. Okay. I deal with a lot of female business owners. It's not a male female thing, and so we have to talk about what comes next, and if we don't, then it's not gonna be a very successful transfer. What are some of the key things that you find people?
[00:16:31] Are surprised by, they might get hung up on like, what are some of those through lines that you're like, I see this every single time. When you're talking about what happens next. That's where the vision part comes in. So it's people, places, and purpose. I said, who are the people that you want to be near?
[00:16:46] Where are the places that you either want to go or wanna live? And what's your purpose? When you can do anything you want. When you get up Monday morning and you can do anything, what are you, what are you actually going to do? And so one of the things that, uh, my business [00:17:00] partner and I are working on, the Velocity network is that very thing.
[00:17:04] So you have a lot left to give and come with us and give it to that next generation of leaders because there's so much that you know, and we really wanna give you a place where you can continue to, to share. Right. And I, I often tell people is if you don't have to get a paycheck, okay, you don't need to be paid.
[00:17:22] What would you do? Would you help kids learn to read? Would you help kids learn algebra? 'cause you love algebra? Would you teach French? My wife is an artist, right? And she loves. To teach people how to paint and draw and do that kind of thing. So if you didn't have to be paid, what would you do? And we expand.
[00:17:43] We push the curtains back from the window and help people dream dreams, and it's so much fun. Are people surprised? They are. No one asks them that question ever and then they get real creative real fast. What are some of your favorite answers that you've heard? Learning languages is one that really [00:18:00] surprises me and then completely different hobbies sometimes to do with music or things that are left brain, right brain, like completely different things.
[00:18:08] It's very fun. Uh, racing cars is one I've heard too, which is pretty fun. Yeah. What's your answer? I want to be a master gardener. Okay. Wait, tell us all about that. Love trees. I love trees. I love there. Trees have two lives. One when they're living right. And they bear fruit and leaves. And the other is when they die, then you can build things with them.
[00:18:28] Oh my gosh. Actually that is, I've never thought about that. And that is so beautiful. Well, I didn't make it up And math. Matthew Slee, who is a, an author, he, I learned that from him, so That's amazing. Yeah. Um, do you have like a vibrant garden? Well, we live in the woods now and it's our happy place and it was a, a dream come true that we were able to buy this property and I wake up every day and I think, I can't believe we get to live here.
[00:18:52] Alright, so we talked about that first phase of what happens next. Do I matter? What is my purpose after the business? Let's now talk [00:19:00] about more of the brass tax. The process of actually selling or passing on the business. And you've talked a little bit about the silver tsunami and the significance of that.
[00:19:13] Sure. So can maybe let's start there. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, three key things that every business owner needs to really think about, whether you're 25, 35, 55, 85, um, continuity. Number one, succession. Number two, exit continuity is if I get conked on the head. And I can't come into work. What happens? So temporarily or permanently, that is something that a lot of people don't want to think about, right?
[00:19:41] So we do a fire drill and we come in and it's pretty easy to do and we line up everybody against the wall, just, you know, not literally. And we say, who do we lose? That hurts you the most? And what are we doing about keeping them? Because right now there is such a drain on talent. [00:20:00] Cost of retraining are so high, and with a few tweaks, we could think about how do we make sure that we don't lose X and such?
[00:20:08] Okay. Then we examine the five Ds. So we have death, we have disability, we have debt, we have divorce. And we have partner departure, and I don't mean departure to the great beyond. I mean, they just get sick and tired and they leave. That's like business partner specifically. Yeah. Whether they're family or not.
[00:20:26] Right. And they're, I, I have so many cautionary tales about partners who, for one reason or another. Don't get along. And there's a, it's a business divorce. I've had one myself. And then your clients become the children and they have to pick, do I wanna live with mommy or daddy? And it, and it's, and it's terrible.
[00:20:45] So we just run the fire drill and we say, okay, if we have a death, are we prepared? If we have a long-term disability, are we prepared? If the, the couple that started the company, Amanda, get divorced. Oh my. Let's talk about that. We got through [00:21:00] COVID. The government was hand a lot of money and then they didn't.
[00:21:03] Debt is a real issue. Um, we get questions all the time about how leveraged are we, should we do it? Should we not? Do we buy that big piece of machinery or the new printing press to be able to get to the next level? It's a big deal. And then if the economy shrinks, so we didn't see it coming. And now we're underwater, right?
[00:21:21] So we run the five Ds and that is all about continuity. And it doesn't matter how old you are, especially, it has nothing to do with exit. It has nothing to do with whether or not I'm gonna hand this thing off. It's just common sense. Okay? So that's risk. Risk mitigation, everybody. Everybody needs continuity plan.
[00:21:38] And so that's the, you know, in case of emergency break glass, I mean that's all that is. So we can do that very, very quickly. Then the second one is succession. Succession is a longer term plan where I am training my successor or not. And that is the gradual kind of layover. Um, and that's where in family business, it's very interesting, the, a [00:22:00] parent is not always a family member.
[00:22:03] It's not always the next generation son or daughter. Sometimes it jumps to an in-law. I see that. Talk about awkward Thanksgiving dinner. Right. That's very, very interesting. And so I have a, in family business, I have a maxim that says either the family runs the business or the business runs the family.
[00:22:22] You don't want it to be the second. So you want to have, I measure functionality or dysfunction of a family and I help them, you know, kind of work through that and have, have good communication. And then sometimes we have to go to the outside, you know, to look for the successor. And then the biggest issue there is will the owner.
[00:22:42] Admit it. Come to it. Okay. And just say, I'm looking. Ah, or announce it. Oftentimes they see that as a sign of weakness. I was working with one company where they actually lost a business because they didn't publicly announce their succession plan because the owner clearly was an [00:23:00] elderly person and they had the succession plan, but they didn't announce it.
[00:23:04] And so this big account went somewhere else because they said, oh, if that person is gone, they have no succession plan. Yeah, we're out. So succession planning can be a great marketing opportunity. Only companies don't understand that. And why, why do you think it's so hard for companies to think of a succession plan or, or business owners to think of a succession plan as a.
[00:23:27] Positive as a marketing opportunity or client retention opportunity. Why is that? Because the owner's ego gets in the way because they love being in charge and they love it being about them. And what they're, what they're not realizing is they are not allowing the next leaders to emerge. The greatest gift that they can give is to allow the next leader to emerge, and that actually makes a company stronger.
[00:23:50] It makes them stronger, that leader, they don't understand that. It makes them look weak if they're not willing to announce succession. Okay. So then why is it so [00:24:00] important for these business owners right now to be thinking about their cont contingency planning, their succession planning, like. What is happening right now in the next five to 10 years that is so important for this planning to happen?
[00:24:14] Well, the, I think the main reason is that we don't know if we have tomorrow. You know, there's too many things that happen in the blink of an eye, and it's never too early to start planning. I had, uh, someone came to one of my workshops and who was fairly young and she was all excited and told the friend, and the friend said, oh, why are you going to that?
[00:24:31] You're so young. Um, it's not time for you. And this person said. You always plan with the end in mind. It's never too early to start planning. It's the person that waits is the one who's caught unaware, because then your best choices are now gone. If you don't start, the third is then exit. And that's either put a for sale sign in the front yard and somebody's gonna come by third party.
[00:24:54] But most deals are done internally and that's where. You know, it's an esop, [00:25:00] right? Employee stock ownership plan where, you know, everybody gets to be an owner or, you know, you're doing it to that group of, uh, non-family executive team and they're gonna buy it. You know, there's a lot of great things that can be done, but it takes time and it doesn't happen overnight.
[00:25:14] So those are, those are the three things that really need to occur. And as far as the silver tsunami. It's the amount of wealth that is gonna change hands in the next decade. It's seven to $10 trillion from one generation to the next, but about 70% of that is held by closely held business, which means it's illiquid.
[00:25:36] Advisors don't wanna deal with that because it's very difficult. And the reason that I steered into it was because it's the most underserved group of people in the market today. And there's more opportunity than I can ever get to. But I want to help those folks. 'cause I wanna unleash the value that's inside of there.
[00:25:55] But it's difficult. It takes a long time, but those people need help and I want to help 'em. [00:26:00] Yeah, and you can't do it alone, right? No. Yeah. One thing that I really loved about you and your story is just this emphasis on mentorship. You having received it, uh, you giving it, uh, and now I know you mentioned it briefly before, but it's the, uh, velocity network as a part of what you do.
[00:26:16] So could you tell me a little bit more about that, and again, just touching on why mentorship is so important in this process? Yeah, so the Velocity Network is going to be or is a group of very experienced business people. And we're going to cross pollinate there, right? So CEOs and owners who want to be mentored as well as those who will do the mentoring.
[00:26:37] So, um, it's going to be and is a great place for that cross pollination to happen. We're very excited about that. Um, and so for those that are exiting their, their business and those that are needing additional. Council. So one of our principles in in our business is Wise council. And so where do you get that?
[00:26:59] And [00:27:00] it really is my own personal experience as a 19-year-old freshman at University of Missouri, where there was a man named Rick, who was my first mentor. And I describe mentorship as seeing something in someone. That you don't see in yourself. And I did not understand. He wasn't a family member and I couldn't figure out, but he saw something in me that I didn't see in myself.
[00:27:25] And Amanda, I would not be sitting here in this chair today, if not for that man who changed the trajectory of my life. And I think at the very core of what I do. Is to pay that forward every chance I get, whether it's with a 22-year-old right out of college, who says, Scott, I just don't know what I wanna do.
[00:27:44] Or a business owner. Who pays a consulting fee to ask that same question, right? But mentorship and that connection, that wise counsel, in my opinion and my opinion only is the way it happens and is the best way it [00:28:00] happens. And it's one-to-one where you can actually learn someone's story and say, what is it that you want to accomplish?
[00:28:07] What's holding you back? And how can we solve for that? So. As we wrap up today, what are some of those principles that, for anyone listening, they're like, I really just dunno where to start. Maybe Wise Counsel is one of the places to start. It's so, wisdom is one of them. Okay. And one of the things that I'm most concerned about is that people live in an echo chamber.
[00:28:27] And one of the lessons that I wish I had learned a long time ago, but I think I was too insecure. To do so was to ask for feedback. And when I started asking for feedback specifically, and I'll give you an example, when I created a new curriculum and I spent a lot of time writing it, and I thought in my mind, oh, this is so good, right?
[00:28:46] The old Scott would've just gone to market with it, but instead, um, I thought, you know what? I'm gonna get some trusted advisors in a room. And I'm gonna tell 'em what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna say, look, this is new and I'm gonna bring [00:29:00] you in. I'm gonna feed you a nice lunch, but I'm going to specifically ask you to punch holes in this thing.
[00:29:06] So two things happen. One is I came in with open hands and I said, yeah, this is my work. And. You know, I'm, uh, you know, a sensitive guy and so I'm like, but they took it with honor and they said, this guy is actually asking for our feedback, so we're gonna respond and take it. With a lot of care, and they did, and I got some of the best feedback that I have ever gotten.
[00:29:37] It made it if 50%, if not a hundred percent better, and I went in with a completely different mindset of learning and I just, it was such an epiphany for me. It was such a, I, I, I'm like, why didn't I do this 20 years ago? And it was just because I was too insecure to do so. So my advice to anyone listening.
[00:29:57] Learn how to honestly take feedback. If [00:30:00] you ask for that and you tell people ahead of time, look, I'm gonna give you something that I've written that I've done, and I am going to ask you to respectfully help me make it better, people rise to the occasion and they understand and they're gonna put their best thoughts forward.
[00:30:15] And uh, when I left that room, I was so encouraged by the criticism I received because it was constructive. It wasn't mean, it wasn't hurtful, it was constructive and it was such a gift that they had given me their very best thoughts, and it was because these people are for me. So in a very long-winded answer to your question is if you want to get out of the echo chamber, create a council, an advisory council.
[00:30:46] Cross industry, but people that know you, they care about your ultimate success and say, please be honest with me. I am thinking about this new product, this new idea, this new thing. Will you do me the honor to [00:31:00] actually be honest, and I don't wanna live in an echo chamber anymore. So that's number one.
[00:31:05] Number two is collaborate with givers. This is also something that I wish I had learned a long time ago, if I put my needs aside for the needs of others when it comes to business, and my favorite book and top five is Give and Take by Adam Grant. And if you haven't read it, you, you must do this because he says there's three kinds of people in the world.
[00:31:27] There's givers, there's takers, and there's matchers. What are, what are matchers? Matchers are people that say, Amanda, I'm gonna help you only if you help me, but if you stop helping me, I'm not helping you anymore. Ah, got that. They're, they're the most dangerous. Now we can all spot a taker. They just take, and they, they want nothing.
[00:31:43] They, they have no interest in helping you. Okay. They just take things. The giver is the one who puts their needs aside for the needs of others. So when in the business, it's so interesting, um, and I'm part of an organization that, you know, called Accelerant. And what we do is when we go into our small groups, we say.
[00:31:59] [00:32:00] Amanda, tell me about share Your genius. Tell me about how I can help you grow your business. What are you looking for as your next opportunity? So you're, you're changing the whole conversation, the whole dialogue around, I'm putting my needs aside for the needs of my business partners. So what happens there?
[00:32:16] The power balance shifts. The giver becomes actually the most powerful person in the room, which is, sounds like an odd thing to say, but it's actually true because now the person who is giving people tend to move towards them. What happens, people want to help them. I was gonna say, yeah, it's the, the good karma mantra of like, you put good out into the world and you get it back.
[00:32:37] Golden rule, all that kind of thing. And to have abundance versus scarcity. If I had learned that a long time ago, you know, but I was too, I think I was, I, I needed to make money, I needed to put food on the table. You know, you get it right, but I think that it's never. Never too early as a business person, as a young entrepreneur, to understand that if you focus on others, [00:33:00] not only will you learn a ton, but you'll get it back tenfold.
[00:33:03] So those are, those are just two of the things, two of our 10 principles of transformation that we talk about. Okay. So those are wonderful principles to. To employ. Right. And if anybody's listening, they can go to your website to go read the other ones. But before we officially call this closed, I am curious, you talk a lot about education and that mentorship, and I know you do these workshops, can you.
[00:33:30] Tell me a little bit more about the purpose of those workshops and how that ties into the education that you do. Sure. As I've mentioned earlier, that, um, I'm not a good salesperson, but I am, I think my, uh, superpower is to educate and if you educate well, you, you just don't have to sell. But the reason I do them in small group, and I don't do seminars, right?
[00:33:49] I stopped doing those years and years ago, is that in the small group? And there's a magic in the number 12. And I've done some research on that. [00:34:00] The number 12 is a very safe number, and I have 12 people in there. Generally speaking, I'll have a couple COIs, which is a way for me to give, right? So I'll have some of my very strategic partners in the room, and I present them as a thought leader and I incorporate them into the dialogue.
[00:34:17] So the, the number 12 also allows me to shape the room in a u. And I learned from my daughter's first grade teacher and she told me this and just has burned a hole in my brain. She did this and she said, everybody's in the front row, and when you're in first grade, you have to be in the front row. And I thought that is absolute genius.
[00:34:38] So in my 12th, it's in a u. And everybody's in the front row now with adults. The reason I do it is because they can't sit on their phone. They can't hide. Yeah. They have to pay attention. They're, they're in the front row, have to participate. Okay. But 12, uh, the, the science of 12 is the safety. There is, it's a big enough number that they don't feel exposed, but small [00:35:00] enough that there's intimacy and generally speaking in the workshop.
[00:35:04] What happens is, the way I have it organized is the business owners are ready to share their story and. They begin to talk about when we go through the 10 principles, the actual mistakes they've made. And I'm Amanda fascinated by what people will, will share with perfect strangers in the room, and they're just waiting to be able to get some things off their chest, right?
[00:35:28] So that's kind of the magic of 12. So I do that, and in that workshop I, I believe that I need to provide value if they never meet me again. We never have the honor of spending time together. I want them to leave with value, and I want them to leave with something that they can take back to their team and implement.
[00:35:48] Without ever seeing me again. That's my goal in the workshop. So I give them tools, I give them a survey. I give them the ability to take these things away. Right? And [00:36:00] that's the abundance part of it. I don't wanna leave that behind. Now if they vote with their feet and they come back, that's great. But my goal in that is to liberate them, to take them to the next step.
[00:36:10] And that's what my coach did with me. And so I just, again, wanna pay that forward. And so we, we go through the 10 principles and they walk away the tools that they can go back to their team. And my number one goal is to encourage them to take the next step. Now, do I care if they exit? Or grow. I don't, but I want them to do it with confidence.
[00:36:33] And the main point here is the number one mistake, and I don't like the word mistake, but I am going to use it today, is that at the end of the day, I. When they're ready to go and they can't, for one specific reason, is they have not extracted enough value for themselves along the way. So I've created a concept, it's called systematic value extraction, and that is the quest that I set them on because that is the process of [00:37:00] extracting value from the business.
[00:37:02] To convert it to personal financial freedom and peace of mind. So at the end of the day, when it's time to go, they have created a third bucket, enough resources that they can do what they wanna do, when they wanna do it. So can you tell me just very more like explicitly, I guess, what that might look like?
[00:37:19] Like an example, run me through a simulation of what that might look like for someone. Sure. When someone builds a house, right, and they invest in a new kitchen, new bathroom, and a pool, and they go to sell it. They hope to get all of that money back out and rarely do they. So a business owner will invest everything back in their business and they won't save anything for themselves because they want a really, really big check at the end of the day.
[00:37:41] But as you know, when you go to sell your house, which you just did, it's only worth what someone's willing to pay for. It doesn't matter what I think it's worth. And if I need $4 million net after tax to live and somebody's only gonna pay me 1.2 million, I have a problem. But if I've been systematically extracting [00:38:00] value.
[00:38:00] The 20 years I have owned it and I know what I need to have in that bucket. That's freedom. And we calculate that number to the penny. And so that's that long-term vision. And so that's what SVE is all about, is helping people plan so that if the economy's bad or there's a recession or whatever, you get to do what you wanna do when you wanna do it, and that's future proofing.
[00:38:23] By the way, which is what this is all about. Yeah. That's awesome. I can totally see it. Yeah, and it's funny, like I as employees and not business owners, mm-hmm. You know, we've got 4 0 1 Ks Roth or traditional IRAs, like we've got those savings that we systematically do, but as business owners, we think it's like that's.
[00:38:39] Not something that crosses minds, right? But individuals are doing it. Why aren't business owners doing it? Because they, they forget, but they're good people and they're like, oh, we need to invest here, here, and here. And they hope they get, I call it Google money at the end of the day, right? Somebody's just gonna write me a big fat check and it's gonna all be better.
[00:38:58] But what if they don't? [00:39:00] Yeah. Yeah. You got a future proof. That's right. Scott, is there anything else that you'd like to share with the audience before we close? Just the future is bright. I really firmly believe that Amanda, and, and I know there's a lot of not great things going on in the world right now, uh, but there's a lot of great things going on and a lot of great people doing a lot of great things, and I just want to talk about that.
[00:39:20] Oh, I love it. That's what we're here for. Yeah. Alright. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you for listening today. If you like what you've heard. Please join us in the Velocity Network and sign up@www.velocoaches.com, which is a gathering of entrepreneurs, business owners, and people who desire to learn more about running and owning a business.
[00:39:46] Also, you can subscribe to future Proof on Spotify, apple, YouTube, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
[00:00:21] Hello everyone. Today on Future Proof, we have a special guest host Amanda Smith from Share Your Genius. She's going to be talking with me today about how I got my start working with business owners. They invest their heart and soul mind and body. Blood, sweat and tears, everything. They put everything in it and at the end of the day, they didn't have a lot to show for it.
[00:00:44] Well, welcome back to Future Proof. We're flipping the script here and I am playing the part as host and your usual host, Scott Eckert, is going to be the guest today. Oh, wow. Are you ready for it? Yeah. Yeah. I have known you for [00:01:00] a short amount of time, but I feel like there are some things from your past that are just really important to where you've gotten today.
[00:01:06] He told me a story not too long ago about. Sea turtles. Tell me that story about sea turtles and why that's so relevant to it. Yeah, the sea turtle. So if you are not driving a car, you can close your eyes and imagine a very beautiful, peaceful beach. Okay. And there is a ridge of kind of a bump in the sand, and all of a sudden there's this motion and things are happening and the sand starts to kind of move.
[00:01:31] And so these eggs are buried right, and they're left alone. Which is kind of a key theme here, right? They're left alone and all of a sudden hundreds of eggs start to open up, kind of almost like a switch has been flipped and somebody is almost calling them and saying, okay, it's time to wake up. It's time to go.
[00:01:47] And they all crack open and they know they have one job, and that's to get to the ocean. If they can safely now before they have predators, and many of them just don't make it [00:02:00] Seagulls. Birds and others just come and they're kind of tasty treats because their shells are not hardened and off they go and they struggle.
[00:02:06] They can barely make it through the sand, but as they do, they actually get stronger, and it's the struggle that makes them stronger now once they get to the water. Their struggle is not over. Now they have different predators and now they're in the water, but they inherently know how to swim. There's nobody there to teach them.
[00:02:24] They have to rely on themselves. And they grow and they grow. And if they make it to the next step and the next step that shall begins to harden, and that is their protection. And then at some point. Amanda, they now become kind of teenager ish if they make it with that shell. They live a really long time.
[00:02:44] Many of them, the ones that I see are probably 80, 90, a hundred years old, and they have made it. What I have learned from that, I guess, is that when you lean into struggle, you get stronger. Can you tell me on a personal level, you said you've got [00:03:00] several sea turtle moments. What have been a couple of those formulative moments?
[00:03:05] In your life of struggle and then overcoming that. Yeah. So without going into, you know, uh, oh, I was a victim or, you know, that kind of thing. But, you know, bullying is real and, and when you, you know, you grow up and you're different than others and you don't have the skills that maybe the adults around you think that you should have, you kind of wonder what your purpose is and you wonder.
[00:03:28] You know, why am why am I here? And you don't get much support. It's hard to be bullied by kids, but it's also really hard to be bullied by adults, you know, and those that happen to be in your family, and you don't get that kind of support. And, you know, adults can be dream makers or dream killers. And so when you have dream killers there and you have an idea and someone just looks at you and says, no, that's a moment at which you, you really, at least I did second guess really everything.
[00:03:52] And so you're left to your own devices and wondering. Do I have skills? And if I have them, are they worth anything and, and what [00:04:00] should I do? So one sea turtle moment was I went to college orientation and I was just sent and told to go, and I didn't know. Until the morning that you wake up and you go to this, that parents went with you and I looked around and every other incoming freshman had at least one, if not two parents that were there with 'em.
[00:04:23] I had no idea, Amanda, that a parent would do that. So here I was with. Some book and you were supposed to pick things and do you know how alone I felt in that moment? Yeah. You're an 18-year-old. Yeah. You don't know what you're doing. I had no idea. Yeah. That was a definite sea turtle moment and I thought, well, I guess I'll figure it out.
[00:04:42] And I did, but very insecure and had no idea if I were making any of the right choices. And I just kind of kept that all inside. I didn't even really say anything, but the amount of loneliness that I felt at that point was. Quite staggering. So [00:05:00] let's fast forward a little bit to the work that you do and the business that you have built.
[00:05:05] Tell me a little bit more about why you decided to start your business. Yeah. When I finished my MBA, I went and worked in, you know, corporate America, and I realized quickly that I made a bad employee. Because I asked a why question one too many times and I was invited to leave, right? Which is putting it nicely.
[00:05:23] And it was right after nine 11 and this small consulting company I was working with was contracting. And so they called me in on a Friday and they said, thanks for playing in our game. Here's a, here's your last check and you can leave now. So with the stroke of a pen, I lost my health insurance, my life insurance, my disability, and any retirement that I had.
[00:05:40] And you walk out the door and you think, okay, that company had complete and total control over my life. And I went home and I had to figure out what to do. I had to figure out how to replace all of that. So it was in that. Quest that I realized two things. One was I never wanted anyone to have that amount of control over me ever again.
[00:05:59] [00:06:00] And two, I could probably do that for other people. So I realized that most people in their job rented their benefits. They didn't actually own them. Tell me about that. Okay, so when you go to work for someone else and they say, okay, as long as you're with us, we'll provide this for you, but as soon as you leave, or more importantly, we're done with you and we ask you to leave, you have nothing.
[00:06:20] So I realized that I could do that for other people. I could help educate them, and I've often said, Amanda, that I'm a terrible salesperson, but I'm a really good educator. So if you educate people, you never have to sell. And so I thought, I can do that. I can go talk to people and help educate them about what they might need.
[00:06:37] Young families just like mine. And so that led me on this quest to say, wow, that could be a really cool thing to do. So I began doing that and that was very interesting. But along the way. I realized, oh, I'm actually a business owner because now I am in control of my destiny, and I guess I'm just stubborn enough that I didn't ever want anyone to have that kind of control.
[00:06:59] [00:07:00] Right. You were on this quest to educate people and it was an afterthought that you were a business owner. Is that what I just heard? Totally. I didn't grow up around any entrepreneurs. I couldn't even spell the word. I didn't know that was an option because. All I had ever seen was that people work for other people.
[00:07:16] We didn't grow up with much money at all, and so I didn't know where money came from. I didn't understand it. I knew that there were people who were very wealthy. We were not them, and you drive by big houses and you know, people with fancy cars. I didn't know where that came from, so I just assumed that everyone worked for someone else.
[00:07:33] I didn't know that you could work for yourself. Until I started doing it, and then one day I realized, wait, I actually own my own little thing, my own little business, and I. Make the decisions. And the coolest thing was that I could go to all of my kids' plays and baseball games and parent teacher conferences, which was another sea turtle moment for me because [00:08:00] they didn't come to my stuff as much.
[00:08:02] And that really bothered me. So the one thing I told myself was. I'm not gonna miss stuff. So as a business owner, you get to control your schedule. So if I want to be go to a parent-teacher conference in the middle of the day, I can do that. That freedom, Amanda. Was mind blowing to me. So I get to choose what I wanna do when I wanna do it, and I can go where I want to go.
[00:08:26] Tell me why it's so important for you to work with other business owners, founders, people who have families. Why focus on that group so much? It's a Securus route that I took, you know, kind of through that. As I looked at the unique challenges that business owners have, there's a, there's a couple things going on.
[00:08:50] One is they invest their heart and soul, mind and body, blood, sweat, and tears, everything. They put everything in it, and at the end of the day, they didn't have a lot to show [00:09:00] for it. And when they, when it was time to leave or time to go, maybe their health wasn't good. They, they had to stop working. They just didn't have enough to show for it.
[00:09:09] So I thought there has to be a better way to do that. So a friend of mine introduced me to this group called the Exit Planning Institute, and I thought, well, I need to retool. I, I wanna really learn about that. And, and clients don't really care about initials after your name. And, and that's not why I did this.
[00:09:26] So I went off to training. And I learned how to actually work with business owners specifically. They have unique challenges and unique opportunities, but what it really boils down to is that they care about everybody else, but nobody cares about them. So I realized that I could position myself as someone who is solely focused on the business owner.
[00:09:48] And when I began having conversations with business owners about Let Me Care For You, it was pretty easy for them to say, yeah, I want you to help me. Did you feel that way as a business owner? Like, oh wow, I. [00:10:00] Sea turtle moment, I'm the only person who's going to save me. I'm the only person who's going to help me.
[00:10:05] Did you feel in, even in that freedom, did you feel some of that loneliness and isolation? Mm-hmm. I did. Tell me about that. Yeah, so in, in this business that can be very lonely if you're not careful, and so very quickly I realized that I needed to have great people around me. And there's one person in particular, his name is Daryl, that I met years ago in this.
[00:10:24] School that I went to. Okay. We talk every Tuesday morning at seven 30. We have for years. He is my great friend and so people like that and he is a business owner. We do, we work together. Actually, you know, you can say misery loves, loves company, but. Actually success loves company too. And it's people like him who together we're not lonely anymore because we understand every single day what we signed up for.
[00:10:51] So very quickly I realized if I'm gonna do this, I need to have great people like Gerald around me. And I did that. People like him and, and a couple [00:11:00] others. Um, one of EM'S named Greg, he has been there with me every step of the way. And so you get great people around you who you can go to. And say, you know what?
[00:11:08] I'm having a really bad day. I need you to talk me back into the game. Um, Michelle Wallace, um, in her book mattering, she talks about cornermen, and this is a new term to me, but in the boxing ring, there's the person who stands in the corner who when, when the bell rings and they go to get, you know, water or whatever, the corner man is the one who whispers in the boxer's ear and says, you can do this.
[00:11:32] Get back in the ring. And sometimes they have to say, you're not doing so good. Lift your hands, do the thing. But Gerald's a corner man. Greg's a corner man. Okay. And they're the ones that, you know, I say, look, I'm, I can't do this. And they're like, yeah you can. You need to put some steel in your spine. Get back in there.
[00:11:50] And that's what they have done for me. The thing that I have known or heard a lot about that's been really important just for me and my growth, is who are your core five? [00:12:00] There are five people that you have in your life that you go to, and you may be for different reasons, but you have that core five.
[00:12:07] You have to, leads me to my next question. You started to then educate, help business owners by saying, Hey, let me care about you. You're a core five. What were some of those early breakthroughs, aha moments where you were like, oh my gosh, this is my purpose. This is gonna probably surprise you, but I could actually make money doing it.
[00:12:32] Which I might sound a little crass, but I did have a friend early on who was a very dear friend, and I told him what I was doing and he said, well Scott, how many times are you going to, you know, reimagine yourself? And I was like. What do you mean? And it kind of hurt my feelings and, and I realized as a visionary that maybe I was idea du jour, right?
[00:12:52] And I was chasing clouds or chasing dreams. And the reason I say that, Amanda, is because people were willing to pay for it, I [00:13:00] guess, which tells me it had value. So it really wasn't about the money, but it was really about the value. And when people would say, this is a very important thing, and when people are willing to pay for something, it has value.
[00:13:14] Let me know that what I do has value and that I needed to get better at it, and I needed to continue. And, and Rachel actually said something to me, um, who you work with? And I said, I didn't necessarily wanna talk about these things. And she said, Scott, do you help people? And I said, I do. And then she said, well be wrong of you not to talk about it.
[00:13:33] So. I'm not in the habit of talking about myself, but if I'm helping people and so to help, help me reframe that, and I think it really is the value. And so I realized that there is a business here, a very important business, and one that people will pay for. So that was an aha moment. But also to see people make decisions with confidence and then to be able to do the things that they wanna do.
[00:13:58] So we do [00:14:00] intergenerational planning. I work with a lot of family business and sometimes you can't get a family in a room and talk about the weather and they don't argue much less money. 'cause money makes people do weird things. But to see a plan succeed and to watch in particular a family and or an executive team to say, this is what I want to do, and then to watch it happen, there is nothing more fulfilling for me than that.
[00:14:25] So let's talk about. What that even means because I think the world, we live in society, when they think about family generational wealth, everybody thinks about cash or maybe an estate or land, but that still has some more tangible cash value. You're talking about businesses and legacies and a lot of that.
[00:14:49] Isn't cash, it's not liquid. So we've had some side conversations about this, but I'd love for you to go into what that means. Uh, I think silver [00:15:00] tsunami is something that you have mentioned to me before and really how that translates into why it is so important to think about the transferring of generational wealth for the business owners that you serve.
[00:15:10] So a couple things. We'll break it down into two big, two big areas. The first is success versus significance, and a business owner can have a lot of success and yet not feel significant when we're going to sell the business. Whether it's in internal, external, doesn't really matter. They're questioning their significance.
[00:15:29] If I am no longer in charge and nobody, everybody went under my schedule and now nobody does, does that make me significant any longer? Meaning like, do they matter? Correct or correct? What's what? What's their purpose? Correct. Anymore. Exactly. So the financial deal can make all the sense in the world, and they're not going to do it because we haven't answered the fundamental question of mattering or significance.
[00:15:51] So part of my process is to steer into that, lean into that and say, okay, here's what your life is gonna look like. Can we please talk about that? And they say, oh, [00:16:00] that's fine. No, it doesn't matter. I'm like, yeah, it does matter and we really need to talk about it. And oftentimes there is a marriage there, and so I really want to.
[00:16:08] That's, that spouse needs to be there. And then this isn't a male female thing at all. Okay. I deal with a lot of female business owners. It's not a male female thing, and so we have to talk about what comes next, and if we don't, then it's not gonna be a very successful transfer. What are some of the key things that you find people?
[00:16:31] Are surprised by, they might get hung up on like, what are some of those through lines that you're like, I see this every single time. When you're talking about what happens next. That's where the vision part comes in. So it's people, places, and purpose. I said, who are the people that you want to be near?
[00:16:46] Where are the places that you either want to go or wanna live? And what's your purpose? When you can do anything you want. When you get up Monday morning and you can do anything, what are you, what are you actually going to do? And so one of the things that, uh, my business [00:17:00] partner and I are working on, the Velocity network is that very thing.
[00:17:04] So you have a lot left to give and come with us and give it to that next generation of leaders because there's so much that you know, and we really wanna give you a place where you can continue to, to share. Right. And I, I often tell people is if you don't have to get a paycheck, okay, you don't need to be paid.
[00:17:22] What would you do? Would you help kids learn to read? Would you help kids learn algebra? 'cause you love algebra? Would you teach French? My wife is an artist, right? And she loves. To teach people how to paint and draw and do that kind of thing. So if you didn't have to be paid, what would you do? And we expand.
[00:17:43] We push the curtains back from the window and help people dream dreams, and it's so much fun. Are people surprised? They are. No one asks them that question ever and then they get real creative real fast. What are some of your favorite answers that you've heard? Learning languages is one that really [00:18:00] surprises me and then completely different hobbies sometimes to do with music or things that are left brain, right brain, like completely different things.
[00:18:08] It's very fun. Uh, racing cars is one I've heard too, which is pretty fun. Yeah. What's your answer? I want to be a master gardener. Okay. Wait, tell us all about that. Love trees. I love trees. I love there. Trees have two lives. One when they're living right. And they bear fruit and leaves. And the other is when they die, then you can build things with them.
[00:18:28] Oh my gosh. Actually that is, I've never thought about that. And that is so beautiful. Well, I didn't make it up And math. Matthew Slee, who is a, an author, he, I learned that from him, so That's amazing. Yeah. Um, do you have like a vibrant garden? Well, we live in the woods now and it's our happy place and it was a, a dream come true that we were able to buy this property and I wake up every day and I think, I can't believe we get to live here.
[00:18:52] Alright, so we talked about that first phase of what happens next. Do I matter? What is my purpose after the business? Let's now talk [00:19:00] about more of the brass tax. The process of actually selling or passing on the business. And you've talked a little bit about the silver tsunami and the significance of that.
[00:19:13] Sure. So can maybe let's start there. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, three key things that every business owner needs to really think about, whether you're 25, 35, 55, 85, um, continuity. Number one, succession. Number two, exit continuity is if I get conked on the head. And I can't come into work. What happens? So temporarily or permanently, that is something that a lot of people don't want to think about, right?
[00:19:41] So we do a fire drill and we come in and it's pretty easy to do and we line up everybody against the wall, just, you know, not literally. And we say, who do we lose? That hurts you the most? And what are we doing about keeping them? Because right now there is such a drain on talent. [00:20:00] Cost of retraining are so high, and with a few tweaks, we could think about how do we make sure that we don't lose X and such?
[00:20:08] Okay. Then we examine the five Ds. So we have death, we have disability, we have debt, we have divorce. And we have partner departure, and I don't mean departure to the great beyond. I mean, they just get sick and tired and they leave. That's like business partner specifically. Yeah. Whether they're family or not.
[00:20:26] Right. And they're, I, I have so many cautionary tales about partners who, for one reason or another. Don't get along. And there's a, it's a business divorce. I've had one myself. And then your clients become the children and they have to pick, do I wanna live with mommy or daddy? And it, and it's, and it's terrible.
[00:20:45] So we just run the fire drill and we say, okay, if we have a death, are we prepared? If we have a long-term disability, are we prepared? If the, the couple that started the company, Amanda, get divorced. Oh my. Let's talk about that. We got through [00:21:00] COVID. The government was hand a lot of money and then they didn't.
[00:21:03] Debt is a real issue. Um, we get questions all the time about how leveraged are we, should we do it? Should we not? Do we buy that big piece of machinery or the new printing press to be able to get to the next level? It's a big deal. And then if the economy shrinks, so we didn't see it coming. And now we're underwater, right?
[00:21:21] So we run the five Ds and that is all about continuity. And it doesn't matter how old you are, especially, it has nothing to do with exit. It has nothing to do with whether or not I'm gonna hand this thing off. It's just common sense. Okay? So that's risk. Risk mitigation, everybody. Everybody needs continuity plan.
[00:21:38] And so that's the, you know, in case of emergency break glass, I mean that's all that is. So we can do that very, very quickly. Then the second one is succession. Succession is a longer term plan where I am training my successor or not. And that is the gradual kind of layover. Um, and that's where in family business, it's very interesting, the, a [00:22:00] parent is not always a family member.
[00:22:03] It's not always the next generation son or daughter. Sometimes it jumps to an in-law. I see that. Talk about awkward Thanksgiving dinner. Right. That's very, very interesting. And so I have a, in family business, I have a maxim that says either the family runs the business or the business runs the family.
[00:22:22] You don't want it to be the second. So you want to have, I measure functionality or dysfunction of a family and I help them, you know, kind of work through that and have, have good communication. And then sometimes we have to go to the outside, you know, to look for the successor. And then the biggest issue there is will the owner.
[00:22:42] Admit it. Come to it. Okay. And just say, I'm looking. Ah, or announce it. Oftentimes they see that as a sign of weakness. I was working with one company where they actually lost a business because they didn't publicly announce their succession plan because the owner clearly was an [00:23:00] elderly person and they had the succession plan, but they didn't announce it.
[00:23:04] And so this big account went somewhere else because they said, oh, if that person is gone, they have no succession plan. Yeah, we're out. So succession planning can be a great marketing opportunity. Only companies don't understand that. And why, why do you think it's so hard for companies to think of a succession plan or, or business owners to think of a succession plan as a.
[00:23:27] Positive as a marketing opportunity or client retention opportunity. Why is that? Because the owner's ego gets in the way because they love being in charge and they love it being about them. And what they're, what they're not realizing is they are not allowing the next leaders to emerge. The greatest gift that they can give is to allow the next leader to emerge, and that actually makes a company stronger.
[00:23:50] It makes them stronger, that leader, they don't understand that. It makes them look weak if they're not willing to announce succession. Okay. So then why is it so [00:24:00] important for these business owners right now to be thinking about their cont contingency planning, their succession planning, like. What is happening right now in the next five to 10 years that is so important for this planning to happen?
[00:24:14] Well, the, I think the main reason is that we don't know if we have tomorrow. You know, there's too many things that happen in the blink of an eye, and it's never too early to start planning. I had, uh, someone came to one of my workshops and who was fairly young and she was all excited and told the friend, and the friend said, oh, why are you going to that?
[00:24:31] You're so young. Um, it's not time for you. And this person said. You always plan with the end in mind. It's never too early to start planning. It's the person that waits is the one who's caught unaware, because then your best choices are now gone. If you don't start, the third is then exit. And that's either put a for sale sign in the front yard and somebody's gonna come by third party.
[00:24:54] But most deals are done internally and that's where. You know, it's an esop, [00:25:00] right? Employee stock ownership plan where, you know, everybody gets to be an owner or, you know, you're doing it to that group of, uh, non-family executive team and they're gonna buy it. You know, there's a lot of great things that can be done, but it takes time and it doesn't happen overnight.
[00:25:14] So those are, those are the three things that really need to occur. And as far as the silver tsunami. It's the amount of wealth that is gonna change hands in the next decade. It's seven to $10 trillion from one generation to the next, but about 70% of that is held by closely held business, which means it's illiquid.
[00:25:36] Advisors don't wanna deal with that because it's very difficult. And the reason that I steered into it was because it's the most underserved group of people in the market today. And there's more opportunity than I can ever get to. But I want to help those folks. 'cause I wanna unleash the value that's inside of there.
[00:25:55] But it's difficult. It takes a long time, but those people need help and I want to help 'em. [00:26:00] Yeah, and you can't do it alone, right? No. Yeah. One thing that I really loved about you and your story is just this emphasis on mentorship. You having received it, uh, you giving it, uh, and now I know you mentioned it briefly before, but it's the, uh, velocity network as a part of what you do.
[00:26:16] So could you tell me a little bit more about that, and again, just touching on why mentorship is so important in this process? Yeah, so the Velocity Network is going to be or is a group of very experienced business people. And we're going to cross pollinate there, right? So CEOs and owners who want to be mentored as well as those who will do the mentoring.
[00:26:37] So, um, it's going to be and is a great place for that cross pollination to happen. We're very excited about that. Um, and so for those that are exiting their, their business and those that are needing additional. Council. So one of our principles in in our business is Wise council. And so where do you get that?
[00:26:59] And [00:27:00] it really is my own personal experience as a 19-year-old freshman at University of Missouri, where there was a man named Rick, who was my first mentor. And I describe mentorship as seeing something in someone. That you don't see in yourself. And I did not understand. He wasn't a family member and I couldn't figure out, but he saw something in me that I didn't see in myself.
[00:27:25] And Amanda, I would not be sitting here in this chair today, if not for that man who changed the trajectory of my life. And I think at the very core of what I do. Is to pay that forward every chance I get, whether it's with a 22-year-old right out of college, who says, Scott, I just don't know what I wanna do.
[00:27:44] Or a business owner. Who pays a consulting fee to ask that same question, right? But mentorship and that connection, that wise counsel, in my opinion and my opinion only is the way it happens and is the best way it [00:28:00] happens. And it's one-to-one where you can actually learn someone's story and say, what is it that you want to accomplish?
[00:28:07] What's holding you back? And how can we solve for that? So. As we wrap up today, what are some of those principles that, for anyone listening, they're like, I really just dunno where to start. Maybe Wise Counsel is one of the places to start. It's so, wisdom is one of them. Okay. And one of the things that I'm most concerned about is that people live in an echo chamber.
[00:28:27] And one of the lessons that I wish I had learned a long time ago, but I think I was too insecure. To do so was to ask for feedback. And when I started asking for feedback specifically, and I'll give you an example, when I created a new curriculum and I spent a lot of time writing it, and I thought in my mind, oh, this is so good, right?
[00:28:46] The old Scott would've just gone to market with it, but instead, um, I thought, you know what? I'm gonna get some trusted advisors in a room. And I'm gonna tell 'em what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna say, look, this is new and I'm gonna bring [00:29:00] you in. I'm gonna feed you a nice lunch, but I'm going to specifically ask you to punch holes in this thing.
[00:29:06] So two things happen. One is I came in with open hands and I said, yeah, this is my work. And. You know, I'm, uh, you know, a sensitive guy and so I'm like, but they took it with honor and they said, this guy is actually asking for our feedback, so we're gonna respond and take it. With a lot of care, and they did, and I got some of the best feedback that I have ever gotten.
[00:29:37] It made it if 50%, if not a hundred percent better, and I went in with a completely different mindset of learning and I just, it was such an epiphany for me. It was such a, I, I, I'm like, why didn't I do this 20 years ago? And it was just because I was too insecure to do so. So my advice to anyone listening.
[00:29:57] Learn how to honestly take feedback. If [00:30:00] you ask for that and you tell people ahead of time, look, I'm gonna give you something that I've written that I've done, and I am going to ask you to respectfully help me make it better, people rise to the occasion and they understand and they're gonna put their best thoughts forward.
[00:30:15] And uh, when I left that room, I was so encouraged by the criticism I received because it was constructive. It wasn't mean, it wasn't hurtful, it was constructive and it was such a gift that they had given me their very best thoughts, and it was because these people are for me. So in a very long-winded answer to your question is if you want to get out of the echo chamber, create a council, an advisory council.
[00:30:46] Cross industry, but people that know you, they care about your ultimate success and say, please be honest with me. I am thinking about this new product, this new idea, this new thing. Will you do me the honor to [00:31:00] actually be honest, and I don't wanna live in an echo chamber anymore. So that's number one.
[00:31:05] Number two is collaborate with givers. This is also something that I wish I had learned a long time ago, if I put my needs aside for the needs of others when it comes to business, and my favorite book and top five is Give and Take by Adam Grant. And if you haven't read it, you, you must do this because he says there's three kinds of people in the world.
[00:31:27] There's givers, there's takers, and there's matchers. What are, what are matchers? Matchers are people that say, Amanda, I'm gonna help you only if you help me, but if you stop helping me, I'm not helping you anymore. Ah, got that. They're, they're the most dangerous. Now we can all spot a taker. They just take, and they, they want nothing.
[00:31:43] They, they have no interest in helping you. Okay. They just take things. The giver is the one who puts their needs aside for the needs of others. So when in the business, it's so interesting, um, and I'm part of an organization that, you know, called Accelerant. And what we do is when we go into our small groups, we say.
[00:31:59] [00:32:00] Amanda, tell me about share Your genius. Tell me about how I can help you grow your business. What are you looking for as your next opportunity? So you're, you're changing the whole conversation, the whole dialogue around, I'm putting my needs aside for the needs of my business partners. So what happens there?
[00:32:16] The power balance shifts. The giver becomes actually the most powerful person in the room, which is, sounds like an odd thing to say, but it's actually true because now the person who is giving people tend to move towards them. What happens, people want to help them. I was gonna say, yeah, it's the, the good karma mantra of like, you put good out into the world and you get it back.
[00:32:37] Golden rule, all that kind of thing. And to have abundance versus scarcity. If I had learned that a long time ago, you know, but I was too, I think I was, I, I needed to make money, I needed to put food on the table. You know, you get it right, but I think that it's never. Never too early as a business person, as a young entrepreneur, to understand that if you focus on others, [00:33:00] not only will you learn a ton, but you'll get it back tenfold.
[00:33:03] So those are, those are just two of the things, two of our 10 principles of transformation that we talk about. Okay. So those are wonderful principles to. To employ. Right. And if anybody's listening, they can go to your website to go read the other ones. But before we officially call this closed, I am curious, you talk a lot about education and that mentorship, and I know you do these workshops, can you.
[00:33:30] Tell me a little bit more about the purpose of those workshops and how that ties into the education that you do. Sure. As I've mentioned earlier, that, um, I'm not a good salesperson, but I am, I think my, uh, superpower is to educate and if you educate well, you, you just don't have to sell. But the reason I do them in small group, and I don't do seminars, right?
[00:33:49] I stopped doing those years and years ago, is that in the small group? And there's a magic in the number 12. And I've done some research on that. [00:34:00] The number 12 is a very safe number, and I have 12 people in there. Generally speaking, I'll have a couple COIs, which is a way for me to give, right? So I'll have some of my very strategic partners in the room, and I present them as a thought leader and I incorporate them into the dialogue.
[00:34:17] So the, the number 12 also allows me to shape the room in a u. And I learned from my daughter's first grade teacher and she told me this and just has burned a hole in my brain. She did this and she said, everybody's in the front row, and when you're in first grade, you have to be in the front row. And I thought that is absolute genius.
[00:34:38] So in my 12th, it's in a u. And everybody's in the front row now with adults. The reason I do it is because they can't sit on their phone. They can't hide. Yeah. They have to pay attention. They're, they're in the front row, have to participate. Okay. But 12, uh, the, the science of 12 is the safety. There is, it's a big enough number that they don't feel exposed, but small [00:35:00] enough that there's intimacy and generally speaking in the workshop.
[00:35:04] What happens is, the way I have it organized is the business owners are ready to share their story and. They begin to talk about when we go through the 10 principles, the actual mistakes they've made. And I'm Amanda fascinated by what people will, will share with perfect strangers in the room, and they're just waiting to be able to get some things off their chest, right?
[00:35:28] So that's kind of the magic of 12. So I do that, and in that workshop I, I believe that I need to provide value if they never meet me again. We never have the honor of spending time together. I want them to leave with value, and I want them to leave with something that they can take back to their team and implement.
[00:35:48] Without ever seeing me again. That's my goal in the workshop. So I give them tools, I give them a survey. I give them the ability to take these things away. Right? And [00:36:00] that's the abundance part of it. I don't wanna leave that behind. Now if they vote with their feet and they come back, that's great. But my goal in that is to liberate them, to take them to the next step.
[00:36:10] And that's what my coach did with me. And so I just, again, wanna pay that forward. And so we, we go through the 10 principles and they walk away the tools that they can go back to their team. And my number one goal is to encourage them to take the next step. Now, do I care if they exit? Or grow. I don't, but I want them to do it with confidence.
[00:36:33] And the main point here is the number one mistake, and I don't like the word mistake, but I am going to use it today, is that at the end of the day, I. When they're ready to go and they can't, for one specific reason, is they have not extracted enough value for themselves along the way. So I've created a concept, it's called systematic value extraction, and that is the quest that I set them on because that is the process of [00:37:00] extracting value from the business.
[00:37:02] To convert it to personal financial freedom and peace of mind. So at the end of the day, when it's time to go, they have created a third bucket, enough resources that they can do what they wanna do, when they wanna do it. So can you tell me just very more like explicitly, I guess, what that might look like?
[00:37:19] Like an example, run me through a simulation of what that might look like for someone. Sure. When someone builds a house, right, and they invest in a new kitchen, new bathroom, and a pool, and they go to sell it. They hope to get all of that money back out and rarely do they. So a business owner will invest everything back in their business and they won't save anything for themselves because they want a really, really big check at the end of the day.
[00:37:41] But as you know, when you go to sell your house, which you just did, it's only worth what someone's willing to pay for. It doesn't matter what I think it's worth. And if I need $4 million net after tax to live and somebody's only gonna pay me 1.2 million, I have a problem. But if I've been systematically extracting [00:38:00] value.
[00:38:00] The 20 years I have owned it and I know what I need to have in that bucket. That's freedom. And we calculate that number to the penny. And so that's that long-term vision. And so that's what SVE is all about, is helping people plan so that if the economy's bad or there's a recession or whatever, you get to do what you wanna do when you wanna do it, and that's future proofing.
[00:38:23] By the way, which is what this is all about. Yeah. That's awesome. I can totally see it. Yeah, and it's funny, like I as employees and not business owners, mm-hmm. You know, we've got 4 0 1 Ks Roth or traditional IRAs, like we've got those savings that we systematically do, but as business owners, we think it's like that's.
[00:38:39] Not something that crosses minds, right? But individuals are doing it. Why aren't business owners doing it? Because they, they forget, but they're good people and they're like, oh, we need to invest here, here, and here. And they hope they get, I call it Google money at the end of the day, right? Somebody's just gonna write me a big fat check and it's gonna all be better.
[00:38:58] But what if they don't? [00:39:00] Yeah. Yeah. You got a future proof. That's right. Scott, is there anything else that you'd like to share with the audience before we close? Just the future is bright. I really firmly believe that Amanda, and, and I know there's a lot of not great things going on in the world right now, uh, but there's a lot of great things going on and a lot of great people doing a lot of great things, and I just want to talk about that.
[00:39:20] Oh, I love it. That's what we're here for. Yeah. Alright. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you for listening today. If you like what you've heard. Please join us in the Velocity Network and sign up@www.velocoaches.com, which is a gathering of entrepreneurs, business owners, and people who desire to learn more about running and owning a business.
[00:39:46] Also, you can subscribe to future Proof on Spotify, apple, YouTube, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
