Business Coach : Move On From Your Past
-I was getting to a point– and this was just even a years back– I couldn’t sleep, because I had this big bill. And I’m thinking like, why is this– instead of focusing my energy on getting in touch with my attorney, and then finding a new office location, I was just so wrapped up into why would they do that to me, and I couldn’t get past that. And I think it’s neat that you’re able to do that. With the help of a business coach as well
Now I want to ask you, now in terms of your personal life, what were some of the biggest setbacks that you’ve dealt with? Because a lot of entrepreneurs, we all have setbacks. What were some of the biggest personal setbacks you’ve dealt with? How do you think having a business coach would help?
-One of the big setbacks for me is, I’m going to college– and actually this is something that kind of changed my whole life– so I’m in college, I struggled growing up with different things, with my mom being an alcoholic and other things. And my sister was in a car accident. And she was just trying to get her GED, and she was trying to go back to school. She had two kids, she just turned 18, and she was down in the Dallas area, and she was in a car wreck. So we went down there, and she passed away. Well my family–
-How old was your sister?
-My sister had just turned 18.
-How old were you?
-I was 20– well, I was 20.
-What was her name?
-Her name was Kathleen.
-OK.
-Kathleen Greeno, and Kathleen– and she passed away. And I remember us having a discussion about how nobody had any money. How we’re going to pay for this funeral? And so I had to get creative to make it happen, so I ended up paying for her funeral.
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-And here I’m in college, working three jobs–
-Paying for your 18-year-old sister’s funeral.
-Correct. And it was pretty stressful, it was really hard. And I remember coming back, and I was stressed out, and the gentleman that owned the Chick-fil-A that I was at at the time said you need to take a break. And so I went and took a break, and while I was on this break, I went to another Chick-fil-A to do a grand opening.
And it was a break, because Chick-fil-A was paying for the hotel, they’re paying for the food. And see coming from my background, that was like awesome. I had never eaten two meals out in a row. And this was really big, and so– now, they did put me in the chicken suit the entire time, which I still enjoyed.
And so that’s where I kind of got my career started. But when I was doing this, I saw the love that Chick-fil-A had for other people. And that’s when I said, you know what, I want to own a Chick-fil-A. That’s what I want to do for the rest of my life, I want to be part of this company.
But I didn’t know how to– I was not a business major or a business coach, I was an art major at the time. I mean, I was really good at making crazy things, and doing a Plaster of Paris mold of my entire body and ripping all the chest hair out. I mean, I was all about having fun.
-You built a Plaster of Paris mold of your entire body?
-Yeah, I thought it was a prerequisite to be here.
-Yeah, I did not know that. We can talk about that later.
-We could do that later. We got some plaster in the car.
-We might have to hold training about that.
-So we do, we made a Plaster of Paris mold of my body. But it was– that’s just normal for me, but it’s one of those– those are the crazy things I would do. And so all of a sudden, I wanted to be part of Chick-fil-A, and I had never taken a business class. I was not a business coach. So that was a pivoting point for my life that I had to figure out, how am I going to do this?
-Whenever you’ve had setbacks, it’s always served as a set up–
ARTHUR GREENO: Absolutely.
– –for you.
-There’s always something to learn in a setback, to set you up for success.
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-There’s always something to learn in a setback, to set you up for success.
-Let me ask you this, how have you been able to keep bitterness from taking root? Because I can tell you– I can remember this, OK. I won’t mention the guy’s name, I won’t get myself in trouble recording this, we’ll call him Achilles. But I remember, I found out he was stealing money, and that was the first time I’ve ever had this happen.
So I said, hey, there’s money disappearing, do you know where it’s going? I’m seeing each week the customers are being charged x amount, only x amounts going in, is there cash that has been disappearing? We didn’t have a lot of cash, but we had cash that was going in. I don’t know, I have no idea.
Then I get a bill on my credit card for a massive amount of gas. Massive, like $500 of gas. This is like when gas was like $1.50 a gallon. I’m like, did we buy an oil taker, did we buy a tank?
So I’m asking the guys, where’s this money going? Well finally, I’m like, do you fill up your boat with gas with my credit card? And he was like, yeah, yeah, it was just a situation where I had– and I started realizing that this was– and that bitterness began to take root. And I’m just like, ugh!
And I start to pull back from all the employees, like anybody who wants to talk to me, I’m like everyone around me is a liar. And I start to feel that, and then right at the point where I needed some sort of angelic validation that people were good, another person was stealing. It was a friend of this guy. And then I’m like, oh man, and I start to get bitter.
And now today, I handle it a certain way, but I want to know, how do you handle whenever you have an employee that’s doing something crazy to you, or you deal with theft, or a lawsuit? How do you keep from getting bitter? How do you keep from being bitter? A business coach can help you with the answers.