Blind Multi-Million Dollar Entrepreneur Jim Stovall Explains How to Properly Manage Employees – Ask Clay Anything

Audio Transcription

All right, thrive nation. Welcome back to the thrive time show on your radio. On today’s podcast, we’re interviewing Jim Stovall, the New York Times bestselling author who has shared the stage with Tony Robbins General Colin Powell and Zig Ziglar. He’s written a book with Steve Forbes, but most notably the man became a multimillionaire after becoming blind again. After becoming blind, he became a bestselling author, a as an entrepreneur who started a very successful company, and it is my honor to interview my friend and a source of wisdom for millions Mr Jim Stovall, but I think a lot of people do get hung up on the phrase meditation. Why Jim? Just so many people get hung up on the phrase meditation.

I don’t know what’s in your Bible and the meditations of our hearts and in the things he talks about in one of the great. I read about a 16th century pope and he wrote about before he was pope. He was meditating and praying for hours a day, but when he became pope, his duties were so pressing and he had so many commitments. He had to move his meditation from four hours a day to six in like most great truth in life. That seems counterintuitive, but the reality is if you want to get more done, prepare your spirit and your mind and your body and your schedule and all those things will take care of themselves.

So for our Christian friends of we try and one like you, seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and then all these other things will be added unto you. And what this tells me is like, I can worry about that one thing I meditate on and what God wants me to do with my life. Or I can worry about every other detail in the whole universe. And I don’t have the mentality to do that, so I seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and you, you know, and that’s not something you did once. It said, seek ye first. And so I do that every morning. Where am I supposed to be? What am I supposed to, you know, God make me an instrument and a light today. Somebody out there needs me. And whether you think of your life as a ministry or you think of yourself as a capitalist or you think of yourself as an entrepreneur, it’s all about getting somewhere out there. There’s somebody that needs me today and I want to have an open mind and an open heart and a willing spirit to go make the difference for them.

CPAS where he’s helped a lot of people that need somebody to help them just financially prepare their taxes. I mean just the basic level helped me prepare my taxes. There’s people out there that need Paul to just sit down and show them how a profit and loss statement works. To have his team show people how have a profit and loss statement looks. How balance sheet works, um, but, but Paul, you’re called to help thousands of clients and I, I’m sure as we’re interviewing Jim Stovall, a man pretty with the listener, one of the listeners just now tuning in. Jim stovall is a man who became successful after having gone blind. I’m sure there’s thousands of questions you could probably ask a Jim stovall at this point here, Paul. But what’s a question that you have for Jim that’s kind of festering, are kind of stirring up in your mind where you go, Gosh, I want to ask Jim this.

Well, Jim, thank you again for taking my question. Um, so I, I find in my role in business and life in general that, that I do believe I’m called to help guide people from, from a state of mediocrity in a country that was built on free enterprise. And we’re so blessed to be born here. But what I find a lot is there so many people that there’s an excuse why they can’t do this or is there any excuse why they’re not successful? And sometimes I have to catch myself to where I care about their future more than they do and I struggle with, when do I cut that person loose, you know, I can say over and over and over and excuse is just an excuse that’s, that’s, you know, you can get, for instance, I had an employee that we’re supposed to be there at 8:30 this morning and they were, they were called me and said, hey, I’m going to be a little bit late about nine. We have a team meeting every eight at 8:30. And he said I was up until 4:00, uh, and wasn’t feeling good. And so that’s why I’m late. And I, you know, I’m saying that’s an excuse, you know, if I had a million dollar checks sitting there waiting for you at 8:30, it wouldn’t have mattered how much sleep you got. You would have been there. So how do you know from my client’s standpoint, staff standpoint when you know you want it more than them to move onto the next person?

Well, Paul, I think accountants and lawyers are two of the most important allies we have in business and I am thankful for people like you do that. Do what you do because brother, I don’t want to do it.

Have in house people that do accounting and then a once a year as a senior partner with the accounting firm I use, they come into my office, he has his own space down the hall, he works in, comes into my office and has a report and I told him, I don’t want your form so I don’t want your. He, uh, there’s about five or six numbers I want from you. I want to know those numbers in relationship to a month over month, week over week. And where were we last year at this time? That’s all I want to know. The rest of it. Just make sure the irs, I don’t ever want to see the irs and those are the things I do. But Paul, you are very talented guy. You only have so many hours and so many days you can work. And if you are putting your effort forth for someone who’s not going to take advantage of it, you need to ask, how can I help the most people in the biggest way?

And those are the people aren’t. You aren’t helping you. Like you said there. There are excuses. I always, I always tell my audiences in the arena events, I always tell them, guys, you know I’m going to give you right now. Don’t, don’t ever blame anybody else for where you are. I’m going to give you the one and only excuse you’ll ever need in your, in your life. It’s called the Jim stovall. One size fits all. One hundred percent money back guaranteed excuse for all situations. So the next time your life, your family, your business, your finances, any area of your existence isn’t going the way you want to do. Don’t blame somebody else. You just whip out the Jim Stovall, one size fits all, 100 percent money back guaranteed excuse for all situations. And it works exactly like this. Paul. You find the nearest mirror. You look directly into that mirror.

You think about those things you want to be. Do and have in that calling on your life and the difference you want to make. You look right in there and you say the magic words you say, I guess I really didn’t want it that bad because that is the one and only excused. It matters and nothing else really matters. Either you wanted it or you didn’t because I don’t believe the God that made heaven and earth and everything will ever do it. No one had ever called anybody to anything and not give them the provision they needed to get from where they are to where they are.

I never saw that in the scriptures and I don’t see that in reality, so from a motivational speaker, I mean you’re not. You’re not a motivational speaker, Jim, you’re an entrepreneur, but some people put you in that category of, you know you’re a motivational speaker. I think your speeches have provided motivation, but that’s not. I think people want to just quickly go. Jim Stovall, he’s a motivational speaker guy right now. You’re an entrepreneur who happens to motivate people with the spoken word from time to time, but you also manage employees and so this is what I see. If you interview 100 people and you say, what do you want to do? What do you want to be? They always say, I want to help people and I want to be successful. You hear people say that it’s almost an anti American statement to say, well, I want to be perpetually late. Not to help anybody at all, but that’s what most people will give you.

The verbal, okay, of this is what I want to do. Now in Paul’s case where he’s managing a team of people, in this case, an employee who cannot get to work on time. Uh, in the Bible it says, Hey, Adam, if you eat from this tree, we’re going to kick you out of here. You know, Adam ate from the tree. They kick him out of here. How do you balance that? Because as you manage a team of employees over the years, over the years you’ve had, you had to have run into dozens of employees or hundreds of employees that say with their mouth, Jim, I’m going to be there on time. I am going to help the narrative network grow. I believe in you. I love your speeches. I love your books. I love the millionaire map. I love that book, but yet their actions don’t show that they actually do care. How do you, in that moment, if somebody who worked for you showed up late today for a very important team meeting, what words would you say to that person or when would you cut ties?

Well, first of all we do as entrepreneurs because a job interview is like a blind date. The worst example of this person you’re ever going to get. And when people tell me, I’m dedicated, I’m motivated, I want to change the world and I want to help people also give several examples of when you’ve done that in the past and it gets really quiet.

I know that’s what they think they’re supposed to tell me, but I, you know, I, I started being successful as an employer when I quit listening to what people say and I start observing what they do, but you know, my company here is um, I owned the majority of it and everybody here gets to participate in the success of it and one of my original partners was a single mom and she was diagnosed with terminal cancer and she passed away and maybe guardian of her then teenage daughter and clay. What I didn’t know about a teenage daughter at that time would really embrace you. But uh, she, this teenage girl became a part owner of our company through a trust. And that one thing helped me so much because there’s guy used to work downstairs in our studio and no matter what I said, he could not get to work on time.

And I said, look, our production, our TV production downstairs is like an assembly line. I mean, there’s people down there, they can’t do their job until you do yours. Well, I’m a single dad and I have a special needs kid. He would always say, and I said, okay, you tell me when you could be here. We’ll work around your schedule. You tell me where he’s at. Nine 30. Well, the next day he wills in about 9:51. And I went down to see him and I said, look, everybody’s got a place in life and a spot they’re supposed to be and yours ain’t here. And I said, let me tell you why. If it was just me, it wouldn’t matter so bad, but see, every time you’re late you’re stealing money. You reach over there and grab a 50 or a hundred dollar bill out of my pocket.

And if it was just me in my pocket, I wouldn’t worry about it. But I have a partner and she’s a young lady who her dad died in a car wreck. Her mom died of cancer and everything she’s gotten, this world belongs to this company and I will be darned if I’m going to stand here and watch you steal from her. Can’t do it, won’t do it. Today was your last day and I hope you’ll find somewhere else. And uh, and he had to move on and you don’t, I think when you could take yourself out of the equation when people are late, Hey, I’m not trying to be a bad guy. I’m not trying to crack the whip, I’m not trying to do anything. It’s just we’re all on a team here. And if these people around this table who got here at 8:30 for the meeting, if they’re ever going to be successful, it’s because of an entire team effort and a that happens when you get here. And if it was just me, maybe I’d let you get away with it, but I’m not going to understand here and what you steal from them, don’t do it. Don’t you agree to that? It’s really that person, whether you love him and Christ or whatever, we’re enabling them. If we don’t hold them accountable, we’re enabling them to not be successful in life. Whether it’s with, with, uh, our companies or with the next company they move on by allowing them to do subpar work by allowing them not to be held accountable when they’re supposed to show up. So it’s really, um, it’s really selfish on our part. We’re not putting their interest first. We’re actually putting their interests first by firing them.

Oh, you know, that one of the most dangerous thing they can do in business, whether they work for you or they leave and go somewhere else, they’ve got to be professional. They got to be punctual and their words got to be good. And if you help them learn that you’ve done a great thing. It’s like if you had a little kid, he four years old and he wants to play in the street and you say, don’t play in the street. Well, if you’re not going to let him do that, you’re going to do whatever you gotta do to stop him because that behavior is going to kill him. We’ll professionally being late is and um, you know, and, and you know, the, the, the guy should go around the table and just tell everybody, you know, when he’s late, say don’t, don’t come up with an excuse. Just tell everybody the truth. I don’t care about you that much and my time’s more important than yours.

Jim, I appreciate you having you on today’s show and I’d love to have you on a future show, but I know I want to respect your time and so again, for anybody who’s just now tuning in, we’re interviewing Jim stovall here, international humanitarian of the year award and award, by the way that has been shared with a Jimmy Carter, Nancy Reagan, mother, Teresa, Mother Teresa. What? Nancy Reagan, who? Jimmy Carter. I think I’ve heard of that. President Jimmy Carter. So you had massive success. Best selling author life. You’ve had your books turned into movies. All the listeners want to know what is the project you’re working on right now and what’s the one action step? What’s the one website or the one book or the one thing you would direct all of our listeners to check out as soon as possible. We’re, we’re a captive audience, my friend. What’s the new project you’re working on and what’s the thing you want us all to check out as members of the thrive nation?

Well, I have a new book out called the art of optimism and it’s available everywhere. People buy books. I have another book that will be out the end of the year called the art of influence and I’m really proud of it and I just finished a movie that’s come out and it’s the documentary documentary called think and grow rich. And if you don’t get anything else out of what I said today or anything else out of anything, you pick up a copy of think and grow rich movie and read the book, think and grow rich and it is the basis for my work in everyone else. Everyone else that is succeeding in giving advice, in providing motivation, inspiration, success principles. He had all began there with hill’s think and grow rich. There’s never been a reservoir like that in the world. And I love reading other people.

I read a book every day, but every once in awhile I go back to the, well, I go to the, to the source and I read Napoleon Hill because, uh, and, and it’s not hill. I mean hill was a normal guy, but because the carnegie, he’ll got to spend time with the Henry Ford’s and the Thomas Edison’s in the Alexander Graham Bell’s. And 500 of the most successful people in the day and he put into that book, not what they said, what they did. And you know, you said, I’m not a motivational speaker. I appreciate that because I always tell promoters from these events and people who hire me and pay me ridiculous amounts of money to spend an hour doing something I love. I always tell them I’m not your normal speaker. I’m not a guy that wrote a book or read a book 20 years ago and runs around spouting theories tomorrow I will be back at my desk doing what I’m telling your people today.

If I could leave your audience with anything you know, it would be the biggest dream you’ve ever had in your life is alive and well. That, that thing that scares you to death. You haven’t taught about it in five or 10 or 15 or 20 years. And whenever you think about it, your mind comes up with excuses. Yeah, I always wanted to be that or do that or have that or change the world in that way. But now I’ve got this job, but I don’t know how to do it. I don’t know where to do it. I don’t know who to do it with. I don’t know how to get the money. I don’t know anything about it. And your mind comes up with those excuses because your mind is the greatest creation ever invented in the universe. And so when you have that dream that pops up, you come up with excuses because you haven’t committed to the dream. So whether you realize it or not, you’ve told your mind, whenever that thought comes from the subconscious into my conscious, come up with an excuse so I’ll feel good and that’s what happens. But if you’ll sit right where you are right now at home, in your car, whatever, think of that big dream that scares you to death and you still don’t know how to do it, when to do it, where to do it, who to do with or where to get the money, but say, yes, I’m going to do that.

Yeah, I’m going to do that. Your whole world will change right now. Twenty years from now, you’ll remember this moment, you won’t remember me or clay or Paul Hood or anything. We said, but you’ll remember that the day I said yes to the big green because at that moment you have changed the instruction to your mind, the most powerful force we’ve ever been given and what you’ve told it is okay. Now on when I think of that, don’t come up with excuses. Find me away. Find me away and I promise you, it’s as easy to find a way as it is to find an excuse and you start by doing something today. If you have a big dream, a goal or calling in your life, you’re supposed to do something every day. It wasn’t put there so you can sit on it. You’re supposed to do some every day and you can’t wait for all the lights to be green before you leave the house.

You start by reading think and grow rich, and then you start thinking about who has been where I want to go, and you get in touch with them and you start building your Dream Team and you start following the leaders. And sooner or later you will be there at any time. This doesn’t work. I have 10 million books in print, 2 million people a week. Read my column. Many more than that. I’ve seen my movies and it every one of my books in columns and everybody who hears me speak, they leave with my phone number and I’ll tell them the same thing. I want to tell your listeners, clay, anytime you don’t think this works, anytime you think you’re different, anytime you think your dreams aren’t coming together, anytime you’re broke or scared or afraid. Twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, you dial nine. One, eight, six, two, seven, 1000.

I have real people that answered the phone round the clock and they know that there’s one kind of call out. Always returned. You call up and say, Jim told me I could call on him when I had a problem and I need to talk to him and I will call you back every time. And if you don’t think so, you pick up the phone and call because I want you to know the darkest it ever seemed, the farthest away it ever appears, the most difficult to ever. Fields I want you to know you got one guy believes in you and believes in your dream. And if you don’t think so you don’t. Nine one, eight, six, two, seven, 1000.

It kind of a weird way to end the show. But I’m going to share this with the listeners each day. I set my alarm for around three in the morning depending upon what day, but it’s pretty much three in the morning. And first thing I think about is, oh my gosh, it was so early. And then I think about your face because you’re blind, you’re a best selling author, you’re one of the top speakers on the planet. You have decided to kick the excuses out of the way each and every day. And that is the literally. I wake up every day at three and I think of Jim Stovall by about three. Oh, six or three. Oh, seven on a daily basis. I think to myself, oh frick, it’s three in the morning, I got to get up. I don’t want to get up. I went to bed at nine six hours ago.

I went to bed, now I’m awake. What would Jim stovall do? And I asked myself that question a lot and I would also want to throw in little caveat. I’ve read, I’ve read your books, but the millionaire map is my favorite book that you’ve read as an entrepreneur. So if you’re out there and you go in and we’ll Jim’s read a lot of books and Jimmy, you’ve rewritten a lot of great books, but I would say the millionaire map is the one that to me, I, I highlighted that so much. There’s so many good nuggets. All your books are great, but the millionaire map is my favorite Jim stovall book and we’d like to interview, show with a boom. So we’re going to do a three, two, one, and then a boom. So without any further ado, again, Jim stovall. Thank you for being on today’s show. Three, two, one. Boom.