Avoid Negative People or You Will Lose and Wake Up in the Morning with Regrettable Tattoos | Knowledge Bomb

Audio Transcription

Grabbed the duct tape and mentally prepare yourself for yet another mind expanding knowledge bong from America’s number one business coach. Clay Clark.

Yes, yes, yes and yes. Thrive nation. On today’s show we’re talking about why you must avoid negative people or you will lose and wake up in the morning with a regrettable tattoo. Matt Klein’s on the line, sir. How are you?

I am doing awesome. How are you guys,

Man, I’m, I’m really am excited to talk to you about this today because it Oxi fresh great things are happening I think in large part because you have great franchisees, you have great business coaching employees. Could you guys improve? Sure, everybody can, but there’s a great mojo up there in Denver. Can you explain some of the excitement that’s going on during your, your, your daily schedule up there in Denver, Colorado?

Yeah, I think I do agree with you. I think we’re very fortunate. We worked with a very I’d say young group of driven business minded people that are all going down the same road. You know, we have our development team, our, our actual tech team that’s doing new enhancements to our, our websites. We’re getting ready to launch a chat bot that can actually book jobs for our franchisees, which it’s exciting. You know, we always are fortunate when we have new franchisees. It just gives life to our franchise, right? Getting them off the ground and getting them on the business coaching program, watching their success. So a lot like when you guys have your conference, everyone’s wanting to be successful and everyone’s trying to, to, you know, get, you know good ideas and share best practices. So it’s just an environment where everyone’s trying to be the best they can be and grow every single day. And some days are harder than others, but it’s infectious.

W what I have found, Matt, is that the infectious attitude can be really, really bad or really, really good. And Napoleon Hill, the bestselling author of think and grow rich once wrote and he said, avoid all negative mental influences and especially the shadow of mournful regret, mournful regret, which can keep all of the sunshine out of your life. And keep out other gold as well, Matt. Well, how important is it that you guys had Oxi fresh? Only hire positive people?

Well, it’s crucial for us because if we have people that are not motivated and happy and giving off good vibes, if you will, then that’s gonna roll down to the franchisees and the franchisees are sitting there saying, I don’t want to call the home office or the set up there. Right? I mean, how that’s going to be pretty hard for you to want to call and get advice or call and share best practices or ask for advice. Right? I mean, everyone, you know, not every day is easy, but if you can, if you can make somebody else’s day a little better, you’re going to win. Most cases

You don’t. Napoleon Hill went on to write here. He says, worry is a state of mind based upon fear. It works slowly but persistently. It is insidious and subtle step-by-step. It digs itself in until it paralyzes one’s reasoning. Faculty destroys self confidence and initiative. So, so Andrew, I’m not sure if you’ve seen this before, but this is a situation that I have dealt with time and time again. Yeah, it is where we’ll go with a female entrepreneur. Okay. We’ll reach out to our business coaching program for one on one business coaching, one on one health because they’re, her friend has used our program and therefore she wants to, we’ve been bonafide in her mind. Yeah. She, the female entrepreneur goes online and watches the testimonials, has bred her reviews, done her research. She wants to move forward. Another example would be maybe Oxi fresh, maybe a female entrepreneurs thinking about buying an Oxy fresh because she’s used Oxi fresh for her, for her, her home.

She’s read the reviews. She’s maybe even called other franchisees and it’s bonafide in her mind. But enter into the picture a Madam, I’m sure you’ve never seen this. Enter into the picture. You’re about ready to award this new female franchisee, the franchise DDD territory. And then in the 11th hour, in the last minute, at the final, just right before the end of the fourth quarter, right before you sign on the dotted line and move forward, a third party enters into the room. Oh, her mother, her best friend, her doubtful husband, her doubtful best friend, her doubtful business partner, her doubtful accountant, her doubtful. Somebody with some of whom? Someone who’s a kind of a fearmonger. Oh yeah. Matt, what happens to the momentum, the moment that optimism and hope and belief encounters perpetual negativity, doubt in fear. What happens when you have two people on the call now and all of a sudden you had that momentum and all of a sudden the fearmonger hops up on the phone call.

This happens to me a lot, right? I mean, because rarely do I see multiple people as business partners or couples, both of them exactly on the same page, you know, in terms of, you know, confidence or maybe, you know, people start to develop a question with each other. But yeah, what you’re doing is you’re basically taking all of those good feeling and confidence from that person, right? Cause they’ve, they’ve gone through the process of evaluating and they say, yes, I can do this. And someone else comes on and says, ah, no, you can’t. Right. Or what about this? Or they start doing that. What if,

Oh, that what if game? Or you can

Want it for yourself until you’re blue in the face. Right? But essentially what you’re doing is you’re just putting roadblocks in front of that person mentally. And maybe they can get through all of them, but you’re essentially just taking them back to a situation where maybe they’re afraid of your success because you’re going to be, you know, great. I mean, I don’t know what it is, but that’s something that happens all the time. And I would just say, if that person didn’t your life, you know, maybe you should have a conversation about the direction you need to go. Because if you to change, you want to do something different and you want to make your life better, you’re not going to do that. If today is the same as tomorrow and the same as next year and the year after that. So you have to try to eliminate those or at least try to let them understand what’s your, what’s your processes, right? What’s your goals are, and you don’t want people standing in your way for that.

I see

Killers, you can’t have that.

I see it a lot. I see it a lot when you wouldn’t, when someone buys an Oxy fresh I don’t see it as much with the Oxy fresh franchisees cause I’m not involved on a day to day basis with that. But I see in a small business where there are, let’s say 10 employees or less just having one negative toxic person in your staff meeting who’s rolling their eyes, who’s yawning, who doesn’t want to be there. Just that one person can really, really impact the atmosphere of the entire company. Matt, have you seen that before? I mean, w what advice would you have for somebody out there that has one negative person on their team right now who’s in that staff meeting? Who’s a, anytime that the boss tries to assign an action item, they passively aggressively disagree. They give counter advice. They, they argue, they debate whenever the meeting’s about ready to wrap up with everyone on the same page. They then right before the meeting’s over, they ask a, a passive aggressive question. They’re, they’re not paying attention. They’re may be sleeping in the meetings. What would you say to the business owner out there that has that one negative wave? A pulsating throughout their company?

Yeah, I would say, you know, if you value them so much, you better try to change their behavior real quick. But to me, I think you just got to get rid of them and find someone else who wants to be on board. But I think more than anything, those types of people take you away from your positive mental space to actually do things that are, that are going to help your business. Right. Because what happens, they just get frustrated and go, Oh, that person doesn’t understand where I’m going. And they’re always fighting me on everything. Right now you’re not even thinking about your business. You’re not even doing things or activities that can help you grow. You’re just thinking about how sucky it is to have that person on your team and how are you going to get rid of them and how are you going to live without them, right? You’ll live without them because you’ll be happier. You’ll be more, be more successful. Just, you know, make the decision that you don’t want those people in your life and everything else will follow. Business is no different, right? If you have a bad relationship personally, you get out of it. You’ve got a bad relationship with a coworker and you have the ability to change your atmosphere, get out of it, move them, find somebody else. Your life will be better for it. Your coworkers will be better.

I’m not asking for you to share any details that would in any way get us in trouble for being accurate, specific and honest. I’m just asking for you to maybe think of an example where you had somebody maybe at a different job or somebody involved in your business career who was a complete idiot. You know, somebody who is just a complete moron. Somebody who you know is you over financially, little by little, you know, it just, it’s one broken agreement after the other. Andrew, you’ve seen this where they just can’t be on time. You know, it just, it starts with that and then Matt, they’re supposed to pay you, but it can’t really pay you today because you know, this situation, I want you to hold the, hold the check please. Can we hold the check? I mean it just hold it for two days. It should be fine tomorrow. They, they always have some sort of, they met after you’ve agreed on something and you’ve signed a piece of paper, they say, but what I thought you meant was, have you ever had to, to just cleanse the mental colon mat from that kind of person that of your life?

Yeah. And I think, you know, every small business owner goes through a period of time where they just hang on and hang on and hang on and think that they’re going to change behaviors of people that are just negative. Right. I’ve had that. I’ve worked with people like that. I’ve been victim of kind of going down that road a time or two where you had to kind of step back and be like, well, what am I doing here? Yup. Right? And so again, it just comes down to what are your goals? Like if you, if you see your goals out there, right in the near future and every single day you’re doing things that are, that are making, going the other direction. Well, it’s not that hard to understand. If you keep doing those things, you’re never going to reach your goals, all right? But if you change your path, you get those people out of there, right? You start talking to people that are likeminded, your path is going to be less. You’re going to be able to get over some of those hurdles easier. Right? You don’t want to be, you don’t want to have headaches around every single corner because other people are affecting you, right? So you just have to make the decision for whatever it is, personal or business, make the decision and then follow through with it.

Oh,

Mallow through that. And get those pieces

Follow through. So we’re talking again, if you’re out there today, think about who is the person in your foxhole in your business right now, who is absolutely negative and especially this is dangerous in a startup. I’m telling you in a startup, because in a startup, this is how it starts. This is how, this is Amber, Andrew, I’m sure you’ve seen this before. This is why I do not use the general rule. Like working with startups. You’re on the call with the business coaching client who’s focused, ready to go. They’re committed, they’re in, and they have some friend, partner, neighbor, minority partner or something. And they will say, yeah, but I don’t know if it’s gonna work or you have it. Our industry is different, or you haven’t met. If we ever, have you guys ever opened up an Oxi fresh in Delaware? You’re like, listen, we’ve got 400 plus locations.

And they’re like, yeah, but have you ever opened up one in Western Illinois and it, and you say, yes, yes, yes we have. We’ve opened up one over here. You have it. If you ever opened up one during the spring in Western Illinois and you’re like, yes, we’ve opened up one in the spring, not in Western Illinois. Oh, so you don’t, or they didn’t. Oh man. You know what I’m saying? That’s the kind of person that that just repels confidence. Napoleon Hill writes about this. He says, a man’s personality is his greatest asset or his greatest liability for it embraces everything that he controls his mind, his body, and his soul. Matt, have you ever had somebody like that who just repels confidence? Ever seen this?

Ah, luckily I live in a world where I see all different types and this is common. The funniest one to me, which is, well, there’s two of them that I run across almost on a daily basis. If someone will say, well, why isn’t that territory already taken? Oh, that’s a good one. And I go, well, here you go. Well, if it was, we wouldn’t be having a conversation because somebody already owned it, right? I mean, that’s like saying why on the day we opened, isn’t the entire country sold out? Right. It’s a process we have to evaluate people. So that question is tough, right? You automatically have gone to a negative spot or anything that you’re thinking is making you not move forward. So that person, that’s a difficult person to deal with. Cause there’s, there’s nothing that I can say. They’re already in a spot where, where I’m trying to prove our business business, right or wrong. Right? That’s hard. The other one I see a lot, and this was like across the country, U S Canada, you can’t hire good people here, right? It’s like, well, I’m fairly confident there’s a bunch of companies where you live that are super successful, that people that are happy to go to work with, whether you can create that environment for them. I don’t know yet. But this initial conversation is making me very weary of,

That’s good. Now, business coaching client Josh, with living water irrigation. How long ago, sir, did you start living water irrigation? Almost three years ago. Can you remember what it was like the first year before you did even $100,000 of revenue? What was it like getting to that first $100,000 of revenue? Well, the honest answer is very scary,

But it was honestly really exciting and fun too though because it was just me and a shovel and a van

And a phone. When did you first hire, and I’m not asking for specifics, but when did you first hire the a person who was a negative influence or, or lack of energy? Was it a couple of years in, was it like a weekend? Was it months? It was it, did you ever have that person, cause I, I see this happen, it’s like a big speed bump in the momentum and you can speak in a very safe general way, but, or did you have anybody that was a speed bump along the way? There was someone I brought on and I’ll be very careful, very vague.

There was someone at some point down the road at the early point in the road that assisted me down the road, who has just had the worst day of his life every single day. Like just couldn’t get something right, ran out of shampoo. It was the wrong deodorant. Traffic. There was a car that pulled out in front of him before he wanted to pull out, when he was thinking about backing up. Oh. And his breakfast burritos were cold and it was, I mean it was just a doom loop beyond, and then he, every time he put the shovel, the ground, he hit

Like the world’s largest rock formation. It was, I mean like everything that ever could possibly go wrong. Yes. And it was, I honestly, and I really shouldn’t admit this, I kept him around for a while for the sheer comedy of it. I have a situation, Matt, that it will blow your mind. This is a funny story. It’s far enough in the past that I can share it mad. And then, and w we’ll kinda, I want to get your thoughts on this, this kind of take. Okay. I’m working for a construction company. I was not a yet 20 years old and it was a, it was a landscaping company where they did huge, beautiful home decor, outdoor living space kind of things like big boulders, big rocks, big pools, really cool stuff. And Minnetonka, Minnesota, a mad if you’ve been to Minnetonka before. I have not.

It’s kind of like the ritzy. It’d be like cherry Creek if cherry Creek Colorado was on a Lake. It’s like very, the ritzy, uppity part, you know what I mean? But you can kind of boat throughout the different parts of the area. It’s a lot of people visit up there. It’s right in Minneapolis. It’s pretty cool. And so the owner of the business says, guys, I want you to make sure you’re drilling. We’re drilling, but we’re, we’re digging. And we’re putting in drain tile and we’re putting in drain tile. Basically. It’s like a big plot, a black tube. It’s perforated. So that way water will drain off without eroding. You put that before you put that down, before you put down the boulders and it keeps erosion down, that whole thing. So, and he says, I want you guys make sure you don’t dig over here, here, here, because we’re waiting for the natural gas people to call.

Make sure you dig over here, not over here. Dig here over here. Don’t. Okay. So a probably an hour later the guy I’m working with, and this happened all summer by the way. He says, Hey man I already finished my stuff. Homeboy won’t be back. Our boss won’t be back for like an hour and a half. Why don’t we just go ahead and get started digging over here? And I said, no, no, no, no. And he said, he said, dude, like it’s like we got, we got to stay busy, right? And I go, I know, but he said specifically, don’t dig. So Matt, this guy, I’m like, dude, if you dig down there, I’m not looking. I’m not looking. So I’m just standing. I’m just sitting upstairs. I’m, it’s like a big old tooth to almost a three story house looking out over this Lake. Beautiful view. And I said, I’m going upstairs.

I’m, I’m not, I’m not going to be a part of this. So I go up there and all of a sudden I hear and I see the tree, like what the I look, tree leaves are going everywhere. Homeboy hit a gas line, but not only the homeboy hit a gas line, he keeps digging and I’m like, what are you doing? It’s so loud. I mean if you’ve ever seen a gas line, it’s like, and it’s, and I’m like, what are you, I die and I’m just like, cause if any sparks at all have we blow up, it’s over with. Yeah. So he anyway meanders back up the Hill smelling like natural gas and he’s like, dude, I don’t, what were you yelling at me? And I’m like, dude, you could have blown up. You could have blown up. Maybe blown me up, but definitely blown yourself up.

He said, don’t do it. He said, okay. So the owner shows up and it’s been going on for the longest time. I’m not sure if it’s a criminal offense, but when you don’t call before you dig, I think, I think if there’s something bad that happens, there’s a, it’s not very polite. All of a sudden it’s got cops, police, the whole thing showing up, you know, to stop this thing, to stop the leak. It’s crazy. I mean it’s guys in suits when they was like protective suits running around. So like a week later we’re at a different house now. And this guy’s still employed. Oh, same, Oh, same. Same guy. Yeah, because he’s, he’s a legacy. He’s, he’s related to the owner in some capacity. So Matt, the owner says, here’s, here’s what I want you to do. What I want you to do is I want you guys to be putting these boulders in the place, not the big ones, just a small one.

So the Bobcat guy, I’ll move the big ones and you guys just more or less manually move this stuff over here, yada, yada, boom, boom. The owner of the house, she’s a wealthy lady. She comes up to us and she says, Hey guys, this is around noon. We’d been there about a week working on the project. She comes up to us and said, do you guys want any subway or lunch or something? And we said, sure. And she says, guys, I really appreciate you and I want you to know next week I’ll be gone. And I just, it’s really important to me. You take care of the house, I’ll keep it open. So if you want drinks, water, whatever you can, but just please, please just don’t make the house dirty. Just whatever. So Matt, you can imagine this, cause this is like this Ferris Bueller kind of personality, you know, it’s just this crazy Ferris Bueller kind of personality.

And so you in the scene from Ferris Bueller where the car drives off the cliff, do you remember the smell to the guy’s house kicking it in the garage? Yes. So this lady’s got a Mercedes, really nice Mercedes, a re it’s restored. It’s a convertible Mercedes and it’s sitting there on the driveway. And if you can picture this, there’s like a 20 foot tall, a 20 foot drop off from the driveway where the car would flip and tumble into a certain doom if you were to back it up because we hadn’t finished building the wall yet or the railing, et cetera. And he’s like, dude, we got to take this for a spin. I said, I’m not taking it for a spin. He was, let’s take it for us. It’s been no, cause she leaves the keys ignition. She has a lot of luxury cars. He gets in the car.

But you don’t have the old Mercedes or the old luxury cars. How you put it in reverse differently mat. Like it’s a different kind of reverse. You don’t like the American cars. It’s a standard where you kick it in gear. But the foreign cars, have you seen this Andrew? Oh is it a manual? Yeah, it’s a manual transmission but it’s different how you do it. It’s not like the American car. So anyway, so he’s, he puts it in neutral and he’s going back back like slow kind of getting some momentum and he’s like, dude I can’t stop it. And I’m just like, what that, I guess he gets out of the car, I guess an attempt to stop it but it’s rolling back slow and the car pins on his leg breaks is like almost like Matt, we’re going to snap off the leg like that.

Kind of like, like just so I’m looking at the guy mad, scared, worried, all of that at the same time. And I’m like, dude, cause it’s like, I guess almost like snap. It’s like, well those nasty NBA breaks where you’re like bone protruding kind of thing. And I’m just like, dude dude, dude does he, so anyway call the ambulance, her car part of it got wedged on this rock so it’s teetering off the cliff. Kind of like where it could maybe potentially fall off. Long story short, that guy had to go the hospital, our boss had to pay for the hospital bill cause he, that guy filed workman’s comp and all this kind of crazy stuff. And then they had to get a crane and actual crane. I’m not sure how many cranes there are in Denver. Rita. There’s like big skyscraper cranes. Then this is like a three story crane

And it’s

Boot and this is till like till it’s night, maybe eight o’clock at nine o’clock at night,

Boom, boom.

If this happens. And I knew this guy from high school and knew this guy growing up, this guy’s just that kind of guy. He breaks bones, he runs into things, constant car accidents. It’s like that. What’s that meant? Not. What about Bob, but it’s the, the pure luck movie, the pure luck movie. Matt, have you ever seen this kind of employee terrorize a franchise or terrorize a business? Have you ever seen this kind of person?

Yeah, I’ve had him really hard to deal with because every single day they leave to go out in the job. They cost you money right?

Every day

Bringing money in. But it’s just a constant source of headache and, and you know, cash deposits into fixing problems. It’s a hard person to be around.

It is, and I just want to say this, a lot of times these people have good branding. And to quote dr Zellner, a squirrel is a rat with better branding. A squirrel is a rat with better branding. And I have just found that when you say someone’s squirrelly, a lot of times there are rat, they just are cuter looking. They’re not, you know, [inaudible] little cuter than a rat. So you’re like, Oh, it’s a squirrel. Squirrel. They burst. And this is a squirly bird. Your wife right now, Andrew, we won’t mention the time or date that we recorded this show. She’s managing a person who cannot get to even a quarter of the meetings. So she told you about this guy? Yes. And he has endless injuries. Yep. Hospital visits. I mean it’s just endless. It’s just, it’s wild. Every week. Final notable quotable, Matt, and I want you to break it down and we’ll wrap it up here.

Napoleon Hill writes everywhere, regardless of the form in which it is found, power is developed through concert, through concentrated energy, going in the right direction, whatever you are doing at your daily occupation, do it with all of your attention, all of your heart and soul focused on that one definite thing. Matt, what would you say to the person on your team, to the listeners out there that have one person on their team who’s not going the right direction there? They got the one person on the team who’s not with that concentrated effort. What would you say to him?

Well, two things. If you haven’t tried to remedy their behavior that’s on you as the owner, you owe it to that employee to make them better at their job. Now, if you’ve done that and you’ve shown you just cannot get this person to get on board, and usually you can see it very easily with paths that are, that are not hard, right? If you can’t get them on board, then don’t waste your time, right? Your time is very valuable. Put it into someone that’s going to learn, make them a better employee. They’re going to gain skills that they can take with them forever. If you have someone that’s not willing to learn is it’s hurting your business, get rid of them immediately and people go like, yeah, get rid of him cause I can’t get my, my customers saying care. Get rid of them today. Fire them today. If you do that, you’ll force yourself to get somebody else because you don’t want to disappoint your customers. Fire them today.

One tip I give to the listeners a lot. As I says, if you have to, if you find yourself in a spot on a road trip and you have to poop,

Hello,

Just do it. You don’t, you don’t win the war by refusing to pinch a niche. You don’t win the battle. It’s serious. You bet. No, you know what are we going to road trip and we’ve all been with somebody cause it’ll get stuck in their brain and people will never forget this. I’m telling you, I been on road trips on youth groups where there’s people who will not go to a public restroom and they’re getting sold it and they’re like, hold it. Do it man. You can’t hold it. Can you man, you just gotta let it go. But a PLO,

I like that reference. It’s good cause what happens if you hold it, you’re going to get to a point where you can’t anymore and now you got a problem. Now your family’s in trouble. Now if your entire trip is stalled until you fix that problem. I like that in there. That’s a good one.

Your dad. When you hold in the turtle head, put that on a shirt.

You need to push that button for the lab.

Oh, hit that button here. You’re dead when you try to hold in the turtle head.

This message brought to you by the good [email protected] Matt Klein. I have a great day. Keep things crushing. Clean up there. Don’t, don’t hold it in. Cleanse the colon map. Thanks guys. Take care of Austin. Good.

All right. Thank you. You too.

[Inaudible]

Hey, now without any further ed, you three, two, one. Boom. Hey, you have a nice watch.

Are you talking about the one you have on right there? Beautiful. That was unbelievable. Now let me show it to ya.

He gave her to me back in 1957 handmade man there by the label Fletcher. Well, let me shake your hand.