Business Podcast | Effective Management 101 w/ Author of The One-Minute Manager, Ken Blanchard + Attention Business Owners: Learn How You Can Reduce Your Expenses By $3,000 Per Year + Tebow Joins Bus Conference

Audio Transcription

My name is Tyler Hastings and this is my wife, Rachel, and our company is Delricht Research out of New Orleans. During our time working with Thrive, we’ve had numerous successes. When we first started, we were working with one physician, we had one research site, and we were seeing on average between 10 and 15 patients a week. Since working with Thrive in the last 18 months, we now have four research sites, we work with over five physicians and on average we’re now seeing over 60 patients per week. Recently we’ve been the top enroller worldwide in seven studies, which is just incredible considering where we were, you know, two years ago, 18 months ago. Thrive really differs from the other conferences that we’ve been to and the other kind of programs that we’ve been through because they actually really practice what they preach. And they implement the same systems and the processes that they teach you about. And they give you real life examples that really work for them and show you with the training how to implement that yourself. For example, Tyler and I actually got the opportunity to come out to Tulsa. And we’re fortunate enough that the Thrive team took us out to some of the businesses that they own. And we really got to see in real life, real time, some of the systems and processes and it was just incredible. A real life example of some of the businesses and the things that they’re implementing. Having a coach is important to us. They act as not only an accountability factor, but they’re someone we can talk to on a daily basis as we go through the problems of running a business that inevitably come up. They always understand what we’re going through and they’re always there to help us or guide us through the problems that we experience. The best part of our experience working with Thrive has just been seeing our relationship grow. So at each step as our business grows, we know that they have something else to provide us with. They’ve got the resources, whether it be marketing, graphic design, and website development, or even in accounting practices, maybe we need a new insurance policy. If they have someone they can connect us with, or they have the direct resource we need to speak with for any of the problems we face. If someone’s thinking about signing up for the coaching program, I would highly recommend that they call in for a free 30-minute coaching session and see exactly what the team can do for you. Just speak with someone, let them know what you’re going through. And I think you’ll find that, you know, regardless of what you need, there’s someone there that can help you. Some shows don’t need a celebrity narrator to introduce the show, but this show does. In a world filled with endless opportunities, why would two men who have built 13 multimillion dollar businesses altruistically invest five hours per day to teach you the best practice business systems and moves that you can use. Because they believe in you and they have a lot of time on their hands. They started from the bottom, now they’re here. It’s the Thrive Time Show starring the former U.S. Small Business Administration’s Entrepreneur of the Year, Clay Clark, and the entrepreneur trapped inside an optometrist’s body. Dr. Robert Zurbach. Two men, eight kids, co-created by two different women. Thirteen multi-million dollar businesses. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom and we’ll show you how to get here. Started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here We should fly Started from the bottom, now we’re at the top Teaching you the systems, do you care what we got? Colton Dixon’s on the hooks, I break down the books See, he’s bringing some wisdom and the good looks As the father of five, that’s why I’m alive So if you see my wife and kids, please tell them hi It’s the CNC up on your radio And now, 3, 2, 1, here we go! We started from the bottom, now we’re here Started from the bottom, and we’ll show you how to get here Started from the bottom, now we’re here We started from the bottom, now we’re here We started from the bottom, now we’re here We started from the bottom, and we’ll show you how to get here Started from the bottom, now we’re here We started from the bottom, now we’re here you After selling 16 million copies of the number one New York Times best-selling book, The One-Minute Manager, Ken Blanchard was asked to speak and teach his proven management systems to some of America’s largest companies, including Nordstrom, American Express, Xerox, IBM, and other leading companies. And then Ken made a poor life choice. He decided to join me on the Thrive Time Show podcast. What I love about you is your enthusiasm and excitement about learning and learning and learning and caring about people. We just need more folks like that. Amen. Folks like that. Amen. Folks like that show. Amen. Some shows don’t need a celebrity narrator to introduce the show. But this show does. Two men. Eight kids, co-created by two different women. Thirteen multi-million dollar businesses. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Thriving Time Show. Now, one, two, one, here we go! Started from the bottom, now we’re here. Started from the bottom, and we’ll show you how to get here. Started from the bottom, now we’re here. Started from the bottom, now we’re here. Started from the bottom, now we’re here. Yes, yes, yes, and yes. Thrive Nation, on today’s show we are having an incredible special guest by the name of Ken Blanchard. But before we get started today, Dr. Z, I have a question for you. Sure. Is it not true that you own one of the most successful optometry clinics in Oklahoma? Absolutely. Is it not true that I own a chain of men’s grooming lounges? That’s true. Is it not true that you own an auto auction? The largest in the state. Is it not true that I used to own a massive wedding entertainment company called DJConnection.com. That’s the word of the street. Is it not true between the two of us, at last count we have built 13 businesses that do consistently more than a million dollars of gross revenue? That is correct. Okay, so would it not be true that the hardest thing for most business owners to learn is to how to manage people? People ask us all the time. They pull you aside and they say, Z, I want to pick your brain. How do you manage people? How do you manage people? And people ask me, how do you manage people? And both of us are always saying, well, you’ve got Jack Welch’s book winning, and you’ve got Ken Blanchard’s book called The One Minute Manager. I kept hearing this idea, so I cold called the CEO and President of Quick Trip over and over and over, trying to pick his brain. And this just in, he didn’t want to meet with me. It was shocking. But eventually, his assistant, Valerie Painter, said, Valerie, he says, why do you want to meet with Mr. Caggio so much? I said, because my company, DJ Connection, cannot scale unless I learn to manage. And I’m willing to pay whatever it costs to meet the guy for a half hour. So I go to meet with Mr. Caggio at the Quick Trip Facilities, a billion dollar company, and Mr. Caggio says to me, he says, I said, Mr. Caggio, what is the number one management book that you would recommend and he said well my father Mr. Chester Kajo told me that if I wanted to run this organization I first had to read the one-minute manager by Ken Blanchard And I’m going everyone’s been telling me this he just told me this perhaps. I should read the book perhaps I bought the book it changed my life my mind and my approach to management and now I am Sincerely nervous to have on today’s guest, Mr. Ken Blanchard, the author of The One-Minute Manager. Sir, how are you? Well, I’m doing great. It’s good to be with you guys. I love your enthusiasm. You guys are fabulous. Sir, your book, The One-Minute Manager, really did blow my mind when I read it for the first time, but I’d like to ask you, as the author of the book, why do you feel that this book, The One Minute Manager, resonated with so many people throughout the years? Well, I tell you, I wrote it with Spencer Johnson, and I met Spencer at a cocktail party, and he wrote children’s books. I don’t know if you remember the value tales, The Value of Honesty, the story of Abe Lincoln, The Value of Determination, the story of Helen Keller. My wife Anne carried him over to me first and she said, you two ought to write a children’s book for managers, they won’t read anything else. The only thing I had written at that particular time was a textbook. So Spencer was working on a one-minute scolding with a psychiatrist on how to discipline kids. So I invited him to a seminar I was doing for the next week, and he sat in the back and laughed and came running up and said, forget with parenting, let’s do the one minute manager. And since he was a children’s book writer, and I’m a storyteller, we decided to write a parable because we both agreed our favorite books were Jonathan Livingston’s Seagull, The Littlest Prince and Augment Dino’s The Greatest Salesman of the All. And so I think why people really enjoy it is not only the concepts good but it’s a story format and one of the beliefs I have is you don’t want to overload people with information. They can only handle three or four things and so there’s three secrets to the one minute manager and if people can remember those three we think that’s the 20% that’s going to give you the 80% that you want for managing people and I think that’s why it’s been so popular. You know, I own, one of the companies I own is the Elephant in the Room Men’s Grooming Lounge and then I have the Make Your Life Epic Marketing Agency and Z, you know, multiple companies and so today, Z, I dealt with a situation where I had a member of our team who she is a sweet lady, a really sweet lady, and Ken, she’s in a management position. That’s what she does. An employee on our team showed up late and she overreacted in a way that was way, I mean it was like the punishment was way beyond the act. I pulled her aside and I said, hey here’s the deal. You overreacted towards something that I am fastidious about being on time, but I feel like as a leader, I might have done a poor job if you feel like that’s how you should have handled it. Can you please explain to me what happened? Long story short, I went through your one minute manager principles to try to correct the situation in just a minute, and she left feeling good. But I want to ask you, Mr. Ken Blanchard, if you had a manager on your team, someone who worked for you, and they overreacted about that kind of situation. They’re just freaking out that somebody got to work late. By the way, this personal backstory has been on our team for over three years and is never late. They’re late one time and this person just blows up. Ken, what’s the proper way to handle a situation like that? Well, one of the things I always say is when in doubt, confront, and when all else fails, try honesty, which sounds what you did, which is you have to say Mary, I assume her name is Mary or whatever. You know, I saw where you responded to so and so as later, it seems to me to be a little over the top. Tell me what was going on with you at that time. Because when people react like that, I think it has more to say about them than the lateness of the person. And that’s why I always like to say, what was going on with you at that time? And then I think you get the people to start thinking about it personally and all, but you’re not there to punish them. You’re just sort of saying, this is what I observed, and I just wanted to know what was going on. It just seemed a little over the top. You know, you once wrote, you wrote, take a minute, look at your goals, look at your performance, and see if your behavior matches your goals. I’d love to have you break down what this quote truly means. Well, what it really says is that all good performance starts with clear, clear goals, okay? So you want to have goals, and if you have goals, you want to look at your performance, which is how is your performance stacking up to your goals? And if it’s matching your goals, then probably, you know, your behaviors is consistent. If it isn’t, then what’s the problem? And if you aren’t able to figure it out yourself, then you might want to go to your boss or a mentor or somebody and try to find out because any time that your performance isn’t matching your goals, you got a problem and you got to figure that out. Is it something you can fix yourself or you need some help? But all good performance starts with clear goals, and it gives you something to to take a look at and determine how you’re doing. What are you doing? I love the concept. I love the book. I love the way that it helps managers. Because training of managers is a very important thing. And why? Because we all want managers in our business. We all want to manage appropriately and properly. Let’s go with the reprimand kind of part of it. The one minute reprimand. What’s your take on how many times you reprimand someone before you, dare say, fire them? Is that a negative question? Is that bad? I mean, is that too bad? Well, you know, we were a one-minute manager about three years ago, and one of the changes we made is we call it now one-minute redirection because I think today young people like to look at management relationships as a side-by-side relationship rather than a top-down. But what you really need to do is if somebody is making a mistake with their performance, you need to stop them and say, Harry or Jane or what have you, here’s what I’m noticing about your performance. It’s not quite up to what we were expecting. What do you think is happening? Is there any way I can help? So you’re not there to beat them up, you’re sort of sit there and say, you know, what’s happening? Is there any way I can help because I want to get you back on track, and then have a good dialogue, you know, and if, if you do that, and, and then, while back, the same thing comes up, again, you might go and, and say to the person, you know, you know, I’m noticing the same thing and we talked about it last time. And here’s what we the conclusion of our meeting. What’s what’s going on, you know? And to find out, you know, and but I think if somebody continues to make the same mistake like three times of my friend Gary Ridge for President WD 40 is a wonderful statement. He doesn’t fire people. He shares them with the competition. I’d like to say we make him a customer status. I want to tell you, if that continues to happen, I’m going to have to share you with the competition. Ken, I want to confess to Ken. Ken, since you’re the management guru, I feel like you’re sort of like the pastor of management. Ken, is it okay if I confess to you and you can correct me? Do you want some professional music? I just want to share this with Ken. I want to get his Ken’s take on this. My first career I had was I was a DJ, a disc jockey, because the cost, the barrier of entry was pretty low. If you showed up on time and you brought the energy and the enthusiasm every night, you would get hired. If you became a very good entertainer, I feel like before I quit, I was probably the best in America in weddings in terms of just the reviews I was getting and the kind of acclaim and the kind of awards. I got to, my company DJ Connection was very good. But the thing is, I would do 52 weekends a year. I would DJ every weekend. I would do a little over 100 events a year. And I was the head of a company. We had like probably 10 employees at the time. So there’s 10 employees, and as a company, we’re doing about 500 weddings a year, total. And if I ever got a bad review, and we didn’t have online reviews, it would be somebody who would call me and complain, or they would tell their friend I wasn’t very good, or wasn’t very responsive. It would wear me out. And I would, and I’m not kidding, I would tell Vanessa, I have to go to sleep. So I would go into my closet on a Sunday at our house. We had a big house at 91st and Lynn Lane in Broken Arrow. If you want to Google search it, big 6,000, 7,000 square foot house. I would just say I cannot handle it. I would go into the closet and just sleep like a polar bear to kind of block it out because I was so appalled and so emotionally hurt by the bad review, Ken? And then on Monday, when I would talk to my team of nine guys or ten employees, I would sometimes take it out on them, unintentionally. I’d bring that negativity into the meeting, and as a leader, it would set the wrong emotional tone. So what advice would you have for someone like myself at that time, or the managers out there, that sometimes will bring their personal issues, their personal struggles, and they wear that and they bring that into their interactions with their employees and their team members. Well, that’s why earlier I said in the example with the person overreacted, the person late, I sort of said, what’s going on with you? Because I think very often when we’re out of control, it really is more about us than all. But one of the things that’s really interesting is that, you know, you might do a seminar and you’ll get tremendous feedback, and there’ll be three negative. What do most people do? They focus on the negative. But what Rick Tate, who’s an old colleague of mine, said, feedback is the breakfast of champions, you know. And so if somebody has some negative comments, the big question is, is there anything I can learn about this? Or is it maybe something about them? But what I think, we talk about the power of catching people doing things right. We need to catch ourselves doing something right. Most people beat themselves up more than anybody else. And so I think you just need to recognize that you’re okay, but you can learn. And not, you know, go in because, God, I got a couple of negative feedback things. Well, hey, that’s life. You know, if everybody said you were great, that’s nice, but there’s maybe some learning. And also some people might be bringing some garbage into the seminar themselves or listening to your program. Ken, your book, The One Minute Manager, has sold many copies. Many many copies. How many copies do you estimate approximately that your book, The One Minute Manager, has sold throughout the years? I think they said it’s around 15 or 16 million or something like that. Okay, so which leads me to my next quote. Your quote was, people who feel good about themselves produce good results. Do you feel good about yourself, Ken? I mean, do you feel good knowing that you’ve sold 15 million copies? When did you go, I’m not a terrible author? When did it occur to you that people actually liked your book? At what point was it like a half a million? Was it seven copies? At what point were you going, because I know what it feels like to write a book and going, is anybody going to like this book? Did you ever, I mean, when did you start to feel good about yourself as an author? Well, it was amazing. We, Spencer and I met in the first week in November in 1980, and we had a draft ready in the One Minute Manager by the time we were going to the Rose Bowl at the end of December. And people really loved it. And I said, Spencer, we ought to go to New York and, you know, find a publisher. He said, no, he said, they don’t know us, so they’ll beat us up and take all the money. He said, let’s self-publish it initially and build a track record. So we actually self-published the One Minute Manager. And a friend of mine was the executive of the National Restaurant Association. So he led us keynote there. And we sold, you know, 1500 copies at the back of the room at the end of the session. I mean, people were diving in and, you know, saying I want to order the 100 centimeter. And it was, and so we sold 20,000 copies with no advertising. So when we went to New York, we had endorsements from corporation presidents and all this kind of thing. And so they thought we were pretty good, you know. And it was funny. We would go into publishers and someone would say, you know, you’re charging $15.95 for a little book. That’s just too expensive, you know. So Spencer would always get up and go to the door. And they would say, where are you going? He said, you know, if two unknown guys can sell, you know, 20,000 at that price and you can’t, this must be a little league outfit, you know. But the point is, when it finally came out nationally, we were on the Today Show in Labor Day 1982. And it went on the bestseller list the next week, and never left for got a couple of years. And so we got pretty good feedback even before publishing it nationally that people really liked it. And so we thought, wow, people must like this style. So Spencer followed up with Who Moved My Cheese? It only sold 25 million. Right? I remember that book was required to read at a company I worked at called Faith Highway back in the day. I want to get your take on this. Can you share with Ken your connection to the Today Show? My sister lives in Manhattan and she’s one of the producers of the Today Show. There we go. She wasn’t there in 1982. No, not 1982. Now, we have Wes Carter joining us, one of our incredible show sponsors. Wes, are you mic’d up over there? I believe so. Now, Ken, Wes, his company, Winters and King, they represent some of the top literary minds in America throughout the history of Winters and King. Correct me if I’m wrong, you guys have represented Joel Osteen, you guys have represented T.D. Jakes, Joyce Myers, and now the pastor of the largest Protestant church in America, Craig Rochelle. Yeah. What management questions? Craig’s a good friend of mine. Really? You know Craig Rochelle? Yes, I spoke down to his people and all. I have a lead like Jesus Ministry that is all over the world, and Craig has helped us with that. He’s quite a guy. Wow. Okay, so I want to ask you this here, Wes. You are a top attorney. We’re talking to one of the best-selling authors in America here. What management questions would you have on behalf of the Thrive Nation or on behalf of yourself about management would you have for Mr. Ken Blanchard? I think one of the questions I would have, you know, coming in I hear you talk about people who feel good about themselves produce good results. What are your thoughts on if you don’t feel good about yourself and the people who don’t take any active steps to fix that. I mean, you can’t just make things up to make yourself feel better. What’s your advice to someone who’s down in the doldrums, they wanna do the right thing, but they just haven’t quite taken any actions to get there? First of all, let me tell you, that was a quote that a lot of people use, people who feel good about themselves produce good results. Well, we changed that to say, people who produce good results feel good about themselves. So if you want to help somebody feel good about themselves, help them produce good results. Now if somebody comes and has lousy feelings about themselves, you know, I think you can talk to them about it and say, you know, is there anything I can help? You seem to be down. But some people, if it’s a heavy duty, you need to get them to a, you know, professional that can can deal with depression or those kinds of things. But I’d say the best way to make people feel good is for them to know that you want them to win. You want them to be successful, and you’re not there to fold your arms and evaluate and put everybody into a normal distribution curve. I’m on your team. And the big question I’m going to constantly ask you is how do I help? It’s really interesting. My daughter worked for Nordstrom’s when she was in college. And when she first started there, she said to me, Dad, I got a really strange manager. And I said, what’s strange about him, Debbie? She said, well, about three or four times a day, he’ll come up to me and say, Debbie, is there any way I can help you? She said, he acts like he works for me. Why says he does? That’s why Borsstrom’s is such a great story, you know? Yeah, I think that’s great advice. I mean, everybody has out there, our listeners, those negative personalities on the team that are always pessimistic about everything instead of looking at the upside. And I think that’s great advice that if you can help teach them how they can win, they can produce, can help produce those positive feelings and that positive vibe in the people you’re trying to get to produce for you. Ken, I want to bring this up. The other day I went to Wes’s office because I was dealing with a legal situation. A situation. And at the CityPlex Towers, the way it works there, Z, is you can’t… What floor are you guys on at the CityPlex Towers? We’re on the 59th floor. I can’t go up to your floor, by the way you have the entire floor, I can’t go up to your floor unless you come down to greet me. Wes is kind of a big deal here, Ken. So I go to the front desk, I talk to security, Wes comes down and greets me. I go up there and get a chance to ask Wes some questions and knock out some stuff. But the energy, the lady who greeted me was very positive. You pick up on weird energy and positive energy. I really do know Winters and King. You guys do this. I know, Dr. Z, you do this. But, Ken, I want to ask you about this concept you’ve written about in your book. You write, help people reach their potential. Catch them doing something right. I know Winters and King, you’re big into praising your people. Z, I know you’re big into praising your people. Ken, make it practical for us. And then, Z, I’d like for you to one-up Ken Blanchard. Oh, I can’t do that. Mr. Ken Blanchard, how do you help people reach their potential by catching them doing something right? Give us some examples of how we can do that. Well, I think one of the key things that managers need to do is get out of their office, you know. And, you know, as I said earlier, all good performance starts with clear goals. So you want to make sure that people have clear goals and are observable and measurable. And then once that is, you need to be constantly watching people’s performance and see if you can cheer them on, you know, and catch them doing something right. So often, as I go around the world, I’ll ask people, how do you know whether you’re doing a good job? The number one response I get is nobody’s yelled at me lately. You know, no news is good news. And so that’s just not the way you want. You want to spend a lot of time wandering around and see if you can accent the positive and all. I remember I was with Don Sotiquist, who used to be vice chairman of Walmart, and he picked me up. We were going to speak together, and he said, why don’t we stop at this store? I haven’t been there in a long time, and he walked in and put his badge on, you know, and everybody knew he’s vice chairman. And the manager came and he said to him, why don’t you take me around on a praising tour, just show me all the things that are going well around here and the people that are making this happen, I’d love to find that out. The manager looked at, whoa, you know, they went around and all. And what’s so interesting is at the end of that thing, he said to him, God, this is great, things are going well. Is there any issues or problems you have that you think we in corporate could help you on? And the guy was very honest on some things. What so often happens is when managers show up, everybody wants to hide any problems, you know? But if they know that you’re there to catch them doing something right, you’re on their side, they’ll also share with you issues that they need to work on. I just thought that was just a wonderful example of a great way to enter an organization. Z, you do this. I see you do this. My wife used to work with you, or work for you, and she’s seen you do this. She’s talked about this. Can you talk about how you’re at your optometry clinic, or at your auto auction? How do you… Z66 auto auction. Z66 auto auction. How do you catch people doing something right? Well it’s a beautiful… Ken, you say it so well. You first have the goal. So I have a meeting with my sales team. The guy’s out there hustling. And I say, who are your top 10? Who’s your number one draft pick? Who’s the guy you’re going after this week? What dealership, what auto place are you targeting and then they tell me it could be XYZ right right XYZ XYZ motors XYZ This just it just did And so then what I do is I follow up and I see XYZ at the sale now, right? Right selling cars and I beeline it to that sales guy and you get out your air horn and you say Well done! I give him a big man hug. Do you typically carry an air horn or no? I don’t typically carry one. I mean, it’s kind of weird. Ken wanted to know. I wanted to know. Wes wanted to know. I don’t know. I’ll start carrying one, okay? I missed that. I missed that move. It’s a Don and Ken’s book, but we believe it could be. It’s an updated book. Everything’s in the updated book. We believe it could be a tip that Ken will give later. I sold $15,000,000,000,000 of this. Now, guess what? I’m going to sell another. Bring an air horn to praise your people. $15,000,000,000 or $16,000,000,000 because I like that move. But anyway, it’s beautiful, and whenever you go in and praise him, with the fun part about it, and Ken, you know this, and Clay, you know this, and Wes, you know this, and everybody that owns a business knows this, you just see them and they just swell up. They go about a few inches taller. They gleam in their eye, and there’s just something very powerful about that. Somebody out there is saying, though, but Ken, I’m paying them, right? And that should be reward enough. Ken, break it down. Somebody out there is saying that. You know they’re saying that. I pay them. That’s reward enough. That’s their job. Yeah, well, you know, that’s just crazy, you know. The great organizations I’ve worked with that do well all think that their number one customer is their people. And so if they take care of their people, empower their people, praise their people and all that, people will go out of their way to take care of their number two customer, which is the people who use your products and services. And then they’ll become raving fans of your organization, become part of your sales force. And that’ll take care of the owners and the bottom line, but the people who are problems as a manager, they’re always thinking about the bottom line, or I pay them to do this, and they’re not realizing they’re dealing with human beings, and without your people, you’re going to be nothing. Ken, you have said, you’ve written, that the best minute I spend is the one I invest in people. I’d love for you to share with us what you mean by this. Enlighten us. The best minute I spend is the one I invest in people. Well I’d really get to what I was just saying that the best managers realize that the best minute they can spend is with their people because if their people are going to accomplish the goals, it’s their people are going to do things. I mean if you think that you know it’s going to be you and your brains or you can do anything. You’re crazy. I mean, you can always tell these, you know, I’m doing a lot of work on servant leadership now and I, you see these self-serving leaders who some think all the brains are in their office. And as a customer, you know, you go to, you have a problem, you go to a frontline employee and rather than getting somebody that will solve it for you, they go quack, quack. It’s our policy, quack quack, I just work here, quack quack, you want to talk to my supervisor, quack, and you’re talking to a duck pond, you know, because nobody wants to make a decision because they can get in trouble. Where if you have a manager who turns the pyramid upside down when it comes to managing their people, you know, I’ll take care of it. I had a friend a while back went to get some perfume for his wife at Nordstrom’s and the woman said, I’m sorry we don’t sell that form of perfume here, but I know where I can get it in the mall. How long are you going to be in the store? He said about a half hour. She said fine, I’ll go get the perfume and bring it back and gift wrap it. And all blew his mind when he went back to it when he was leaving the store. The woman who left the store went and bought the perfume, gift wrapped it, charged him the same price that she had paid in the other store. The Nordstroms didn’t make any money, but what did they make? They made a customer, plus that employee felt, I’m pretty important. I can use my brains. Isn’t it great to be able to bring your brains to work? You know, Ken, I want Wes Carter to be able to one-up me on this question. So Wes, you probably have a better question than I have. But I’m going to, can I ask you question number one, and then Wes can ask you question number two, kind of piling on to this question. Yeah. But you’ve written here, Ken, you wrote, if you can’t tell me what you’d like to be happening, you don’t have a problem yet. You’re just complaining. A problem only exists if there’s a difference between what is actually happening and what you desire to be happening Ken you’re the great encourager talk to me about how we draw the line as a manager here How do we know if someone’s just complaining? Versus if somebody’s actually you know looking for some improvement, or how do you handle it when an employee just? complains Well, I think if they’re complaining is to tell me you could just use that as a framework, say, well, tell me before we listen to the complaint, what do you want to be happening? And they said, what do you mean? I said, I mean, what would be good behavior here, good performance here? Well, blah, blah, blah, blah. Now, well, tell me what’s happening now. I assume that’s what you’re complaining about. Well, this is what, okay, it’s the gap between what’s actually happening and you want to happen where the problem exists. You say, okay, now, how are we going to close the gap? You know, because complaining is not going to do it. Let’s get into problem solving. And I think you get them off of it when you start to say, well, you know, what would you like to be happening, you know, complaining doesn’t this isn’t the complaining department. This is a problem-solving department. Ken, you have so many knowledge bombs per capita. Wes, you manage a team of people. I’m sure you’ve never had a member of your team complain in a vague, esoteric way, where they’re not actually wanting to improve anything. They’re just wanting to complain. What question do you have for Mr. Ken Blanchard on how to deal with complaints. I got a selfish question here, Ken. Not so much about the employees, but the middle management. In my office, it’s associate attorneys or it’s your middle manager. They’re complaining about the staff underneath them. And as a manager, you know, you have, and Clay and Z are great at this, setting goals, expectations, so your employees know what they have to live up to, what you expect, the accountability. How do you drill that in, teach that to your middle managers that when they come to you and complain, oh, so and so is not very productive, or they’re not doing it right, but then you drill down and you find out, you haven’t explained to them well how to do it in the first place, what your expectations are, there’s no accountability. Do you have any advice for our listeners how you build that and teach that to your middle management? Good. That’s when we give them a copy of the One Minute Manager. I think that’s why that thing was so popular, you know, because when you really think about it, here you’re managing people and somebody complaining, you say, well, are the goals clear? Well, okay, well, if that’s a problem, we better deal with that first, you know, and they say, oh yeah, the goals are clear, but well, tell me, what are you spending most of your time? Are you catching people doing things right or doing things wrong? Well, you know, I mean, and, you know, and if somebody makes a mistake, you know, how do you deal with it? You know, do you lose your temper? Or do you, you know, you see how you could help them? You know, and I think he asked all those questions around that it really, really helps. It just, you have to stay calm as a manager because you gotta have a lot of interesting people around. And you wanna constantly say, okay, how can I help you be better so you can help your people be better? And, you know, complaining isn’t the deal. And your people aren’t all bad. Because, you know, who hired them? That’s a great point. It sounds like what I need to do is just go buy a bunch of copies of the One Minute Manager and have a group reading for lunch. Now, Ken, I want to ask you this. How many copies of the One Minute Manager have you sold throughout the years, do you think? Well, we got a new one minute manager that came out recently and that’s really doing really well. But I think it’s 15, 16 million copies overall, I think. A million. Let’s just say it was 15 million. Let’s be conservative. I’ll tell you an interesting thing. I had a young guy come up to me in the seminar I was doing. He said, Ken, you’ll get a kick out of this. My grandfather gave my father the one minute manager when he started his first job as a manager. And my father gave me the one-minute manager when I started my first job. You know, so here’s a couple of generations, you know. Because, you know, I was 1982 and it’s a few years. It’s really amazing that a book that came out, you know, 36 years ago. Everyone needs to buy the book. Everyone needs to get a copy of the book. And the book, I mean, can you, Ken, just some of the listeners out there who are not familiar with the book, people who live under a rock, they’re not familiar with the book. This is the book that was recommended to me personally by Mr. Chet Kajo, the CEO and chairman of Quick Trip, a billion dollar company. What other companies have hired you to speak throughout the years? Just kind of, you know, just give us some name drops here. Not that you’re a name dropper, but I want you to name drop. What are some companies that have hired you to speak over the years? I already named some of them, you know Wegmans in the grocery business, Disney, you know Southwest, Nordstrom’s, you know, just a lot of, we’ve done a lot of work with American Express, you know, and you know, just, you know, they always, the companies that are doing pretty well are the best customers because they want to get even better. The people that aren’t doing well, they want to be hiding under a rock. Wait, wait, wait. You just said you’ve spoken for, you’ve been asked to speak and coach and teach up, to train up. Disney? Have you ever heard of Disney? It sounds like a mouse. I think mouse. Wes, have you ever heard of Southwest Airlines? Is that a taxi company? Andrew, show observer taking notes today. Nordstrom, have you ever heard of that company? I’ve definitely been there. You’re ruining the whole vibe, Andrew. American Express. No, no, no. American Express. Is there any other company that you have spoken to over the years there, Ken, where you’d say, okay, that’s a company everybody would know? Because I am a huge believer in what you’re teaching and your book is just the gospel for management. What’s a couple other companies you’ve spoken to? There are big companies that people would know out there. Oh, gee, let me think. I don’t want to put you on the spot. Xerox. Zero to Xerox? IBM. These are all different times in my career. You’re like the Yoda of business management, but yet you look like Luke Skywalker. Yeah, well, it’s really been fun, you know, and I think the fact that what I write about and teach is common sense organized, so it’s not complicated, and people really appreciate that, and they can get excited and share it. So I’ve written a lot of parables and all. My editor just said I just finished my 70th book. Can you imagine that? 70th? Wow. Yeah, 70th. And so publishers say, well, you ought to write only one book every three or four years so we can publicize it. And I said, I’m not writing for you. I’m writing because it’s fun. Ken, OK, here we go. You are a best-selling author and an author that pumps out content like people would not believe. But one of the powerful quotes you’ve written over the years, which has resonated with me and I want to get your take on it, and then I want to have Dr. Z kind of pile on with a question for you about this, is, feedback is the breakfast of champions. Again, feedback is the breakfast of champions. Ken, why is this such a powerful concept for all of our listeners to understand? As I mentioned, I got that from a colleague, Rick Tate, but it’s, you know, you just look at it, imagine somebody trying out for the Olympics in high jump and nobody will tell them how high they jumped, you know? You know, imagine if you went bowling and they got, you know, a curtain in front of the pins and you can hear a crack, but you don’t know how many are knocked down, you know, I mean, how long are you going to want to bowl, you know? And so I think it’s what really keeps people going because they get a sense of how well they’re doing and can they get better and all that kind of thing. So I think it’s just such a powerful, simple concept that people just love feedback. And if it’s negative feedback, and you’re not punishing them, it’s a redirection, you’re saying, okay, how can we get it back in shape? And when they start to get it back in shape, then you can catch them doing something right again. And so feedback is just really important, you know. I think it’s really is. And, you know, sometimes when you’re learning things, you don’t want a lot of feedback, you know. Like I had a golf university, you know. And so a lot of times with beginners, we would have them hit into a net, you know, and they said, why do you have this hit into your net? Because you’re learning. And if we had you out there in the T and you kept on dribbling things and all that kind of thing, you’d start to feel lousy, you know. So we want to make sure we got the skills before we get you out there for feedback. So, you know, people need training first before you throw them out on the job and give them feedback. Ken, there’s a new sheriff in town. It’s called the Internet troll. Oh, the Internet troll. The Internet troll. The troll. The troll. And I completely agree with what you’re saying. And I guess what I’m, what I’m, my question really kind of, kind of spills around this idea that someone now can get online and say whatever they want to say, whether, you know, they could be, they could have their own nefarious reasons for doing it. You may or may not figure that out. You may not even care at some point. But this idea that people come on and they rate you, they talk about you. Do you say rape? It feels like that sometimes. Oh, sorry. I was just saying how I feel. A T, not a P. I was just saying how I feel as a business owner. Tom, not Peter. Tom. I’m sorry. Back to you. Right. Yes. I’m sorry. I didn’t pronounce it. Sorry about that. Just how I feel. I’m projecting on you. Anyway, they get on and they can say whatever they want to say and give whatever star rating they want to give anonymously. This is SweetTigerAtYahoo.com, right? Ambiguously. Yes. I know feedback’s very important, but where do you draw the line? Because it’s a new day and age of this anonymous kind. I can get on. It could be a competitor, it could be an employee, you fired, it could be… The spouse of an employee who loves… Recently, Ken, I had an employee who loved working for us and their spouse wrote a bad review. True story. Yeah. So, Ken, where do you draw the line? Where do you draw the line? Because I know some criticism and some… First of all, if people don’t identify who they are, I don’t pay any attention to their feedback. That’s a good word. There you go. I’ll start to write that down. They don’t want any dialogue, you know. And so but if people are giving you feedback, because they they want to help you, that’s really good. If they’re just, you know, trying to get at you. Again, that has more to say about them than it has has to say about you. Come on now. That’s a good word. And some people need to hear that. Because there’s so many guys out there that get that bad review, that get that, and they just from this anonymous person, and they don’t want the dialogue, and they’re not there to be helpful, they’re there just to be mean for whatever reason that’s on them. You’re right. And so, it’s the ability to shake that off and not worry about that and let that go, I think is one of the things we try to do. Ken, I’m looking at your book right now. I’m pulling it up right now. Now, this is what I’m going to… Ken, have you been on Amazon lately, Ken? Excuse me? Have you been on to Amazon.com lately to look at your book reviews? Have you done this recently? No, I haven’t, but, you know, they’re out there. I’m going to pull it up real quick here. This is the kind of candor we get on this show that we don’t get anywhere else here. The book right now has a rating that’s just a little bit under five. Ken, you have 487 reviews. That’s good. Now, every single person that I know who’s worth a million dollars has told me the One Minute Manager is hot. It is great. It is good. It is helpful. You should buy the book. But Ken, you’ve got some people out there that, you know, you have a 4.8 score. Where do you draw the line when it comes to processing the reviews about your book? Because you’re close to a 5, but it appears as though you’re not pleasing everybody. I don’t think you can please everybody. 4.5 is a pretty good score. people saying you’re doing well than not, then well, that’s good. And, you know, I think you got to be your own best friend, you know, and if you get negative reviews, you can say, God, I wonder what’s wrong with that poor person, you know, that he couldn’t see how great I am, you know. I’m just saying, you know, you can just go some people that, you know, but it depends on your upbringing, you know, a lot, a lot of kids got all they got was caught doing things wrong, not right. I happen to be in a family where I was caught doing things right all the time and cheerlead, cheered on by my mother and father. And so, you know, I, I like that. And I’m, I’m absolutely open to learn if somebody has some good feedback for me. And I have learned, I tell you, one of the things that the reason I think our books are good is Spencer and I started a process together is that when we write a book, and we feel good about it, we first give a draft to people close to us. We have a form that says, what did you like best about it? Oh, what’s the best title for this book that you want. And, and so we give it to people and get feedback. And then we look at the feedback and decide which ones we really think makes sense. We go we use the haha factor, you know, haha, we should have thought of that. And then we rewrite that and then we give it to a bigger circle of people. And we get feedback. And then we give it the bigger and about the third or fourth time, we spend a summer in upstate New York, skinny Atlas Lake, and we belong a little country club there, which is really fun, because it’s got GE executives and farmers and all. And so what I’ll do is I’ll put a notice in the newsletter, I got a new book coming out. If you’d like to pick up a copy at the manager’s office, a draft copy, and read it, and fill out the feedback form, and come so and so night, I’ll buy you dinner to get your feedback. Yeah. And I usually get 50 or 60 people to come to dinner. And what I do is that during while the reading dinner, I said your job at your table is to agree on three things you really like about the book, three things that you think should be changed about it to make it better, and the best title. And then I go around after dinner with a microphone and people report it out. I remember I wrote a book with Norman Vincent Peale, you know, the old positive thinking guy. And he had started his ministry in Syracuse, right near where we live. And so I told the people that Norman and I had written this book, The Power of Ethical Management, we wanted to get feedback, and 300 people showed up, you know. And so I went around and gathered all the feedback, and then I asked Norman to get up and talk to the group. And he said, I’ve never been to a free-for-all like this in my life. He said, I’ve written 30 books, and when I finish one, my wife Ruth and I pray. He said, Ken doesn’t trust that process. I love the analogy you made a little bit earlier about your family and feedback and catching them doing positive things. And it makes me wonder, so the more you catch people doing the right thing, do you think they receive the feedback better? As opposed to just coming with the feedback and not enough of the catching them with the positives? Yes, I think that feedback is, you know, human relations is like, you know, money, you know, water in a bank or something like that, you know, that anytime you give negative feedback, I don’t care how good a relationship, you’re taking something from your account. But if you’ve got nothing in the bank, then you better have a mask and a gun, you know? And so I always say that, you know, you need to catch people at least four times as many positive things as negative things, you know? Oh, wow. Ken, real quick. That is huge. You said, you said that you better give people how many times more positive feedback than negative? What was the number you just said? At least four to one, yeah. Four to one? Wow. And I agree with that. Z, you manage hundreds of employees. Do you agree with that? I hadn’t really thought about it, breaking it down that much, but it seems like that, yeah, the more you… I agree with that. The more you can encourage, the more, because, you know, whether you’re leading by a carrot or a stick. I just think that’s a big idea Ken. I mean you’re talking about you want to praise people, catch them doing the right thing. Where are people getting that wrong Ken? That is powerful. Yeah well I tell you that if you do that then you got money to grow out of your account. And like my wife and I have done a lot of stuff with marriage in the last number of years because it’s really sad about. But what happens in marriage is when you’re courting, everything is right, you know, you’re just catching each other, you know, and then all of a sudden, you get married, you move in with him, you say, What the hell is that? You got to be kidding me, you know, what happens is, you start accenting the negative. And people tell me, you know, how can you turn the marriage around? You know, you start accenting the positive more than the negative, you know. I mean, what did you fall in love with? How can you reinforce that thing? But the reason people don’t want to go home is why do you want to go home and get grief all the time, you know? And so you love to come home when you get caught doing things right and somebody’s happy to see you and all that. That’s the same way in organizations. We have a hiring philosophy here that if you hire somebody and they come through the front door the first day on the job and when you see them you don’t feel a chemical difference in your body because you’re excited to see them, why did you hire them? There’s enough jerks in the world, we don’t need them working here. Ken, you have a notable quotable that I know my partner in crime, Dr. Robert Zellner, would 100% agree with. I’m going to read it to you. I’d like for you to break it down. I know you’re familiar with it, but I want Z to be able to pile on with some questions about this because nobody lives and believes this quote more than you and Dr. Zellner. You wrote, there’s a difference between interest and commitment. When you’re interested in something, you do it only when it’s convenient. When you’re committed to something, you accept no excuses, only results. Ken, what do you mean by this? Well, it really is a lot to say about your performance and all that. You know, a lot of people, you know, they say, oh God, I’m so frustrated with my golf game. I said, well, do you ever practice? Well, you know, I mean, so, you know, if you’re interested in golf, that’s fine. But, you know, go out and play NATO golf, which is not attached to outcome, you know. But if you’re committed and you really want to get better, then what are you doing about it? You need to practice and all. Commitment is really an important thing that you want from your people and all. You want them to be committed to be high performers. If they’re only interested, then they’re probably in the wrong job. And so it’s really interesting to take a look at that as you analyze your own thing. What are you really committed to do? And what are you just interested in doing? And spend your time on the things you’re really committed to do because that’s that’s where you perform the best. Yeah it seems like that this is a more and more just people are just interested. It’s hard to find any more people that are committed especially when you get down to you know employees and how do you feel like as a manager you can help those employees be more committed. I mean, they’re punching the time clock. They’ve got a job. It’s just a job to them. I mean, you know, Forbes and everybody says, you know, there’s what, 70% of the people don’t like their job. Oh, this is good. They don’t want to be there. You know, they’re just, the only interest is, is that, is their paycheck going to be there in two weeks and it’s not going to bounce, right? And can they get through the day? I mean, you walk in a business… And what are we having for lunch? What are we having for lunch? What are we having for lunch? What time is it? Because I get out of here at five, so I mean, what time is it? So how do you teach management skills to try to get people a little more committed versus interested in what they’re doing for you? Well, I think the biggest thing is to look at your people as your business partner and And to recognize that none of us, one of our favorite sayings is none of us is as smart as all of us. You know, and so if we have a problem, we go to our people. You know, for example, in 2008, you know, when we had the economic downturn and all looked like we were going to be down about 20, 25% of our people in our company, and we share the, you know, the books with them, you know, here’s how we’re performing, here’s what we do. So we were going to celebrate our 30th anniversary. And we brought this, it was a two day thing at the Hotel Del Coronado, it’s a wonderful place. But the first day, an outside consultant, and we divided all of our people, we had over 300, into groups of six to eight people at a table. Half of the groups, we said, okay, here’s the data. It looks like we’re going to be down this much. A lot of people say, well, okay, let’s just downsize, let’s get rid of a whole bunch of people. What we’d rather do is find out from you, what suggestions do you have, one half of the room, on how we can cut costs, and the other side of the room, what’s ways that we can increase revenue? And it was just amazing, the stuff that came out of the people, including, you know, why don’t we all take salary cuts, you know? The higher salary to people take more of a cut. Why don’t we stop paying, you know, our retirement thing for a while. Why don’t we do this and that and all? And it was really interesting. At the end of the year, we didn’t make any profit, but we didn’t lose any money because everybody pitched in, you know, and took some of the hit and all rather than saying let’s downsize everybody. And we said, you know, if we can get turned around and get this thing off, we’ll take everybody to Hawaii. And when we finally turned it around, completely two years, we took, you know, 300 people to Hawaii. What island did you go to? That’s awesome. What island did you guys go to? We went to Maui. Nice. But the big thing, the big thing is your people know where, you know, and people are committed to work for an organization when they think that they’re important. I want to, Ken, I’m so sorry, I want to ask you a couple questions here. The Hotel Del Coronado, Wes Carter, have you been there before? I have not. Zee, have you been there? Sounds fun. Yes, I have. I can say it is one of the nicest hotels I’ve ever stayed at. You’ve spoken, haven’t you? I’ve spoken there, yes. It’s a very nice hotel, great hotel. Can you talk to me, you said you rewarded your team by taking them to Hawaii. You also said that you had a consultant come in and speak to you, and you had the event at the Hotel Del Coronado. Why are you hosting your event at the Hotel Del Coronado? Why are you taking people to Hawaii and not taking them to a local Days Inn or an affordable Motel 66. Why are you taking people to these nice venues? Well we do it based on performance, you know. And if they’re really pitching in and we’re doing well, we want to share it, you know. And so I think the most important thing that people look at the top managers is that they – is this a bank that they’re just trying to rake all the money in? We had a gal who ran for governor in California, and she was really bright and all. The people found out that in the tough economic times, she took a $20 million bonus and laid off 1,500 people. What kind of deal is that, you know? And so, you know, we kind of share with people. And, uh. Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to speak over you. One of the things I’ve noticed over the years is that as we reward employees sometimes, you know, we’re trying to do what you’re talking about. We share in the good times. We try to, you know, financially incentivize us when everybody’s performing well. Right. Sometimes, sometimes, employees start to take these things for granted and see that as a new baseline. New baseline. Do you have any ideas, you know, have you seen that happen? Any suggestions how to just keep employees aware that these are bonuses? This is us trying to do the right thing, not every year from now on we’re going to be able to do this. Well I think that’s why you want to keep your people informed, you know, that’s why, you know, we open the books, you know, once a quarter with our people so they know, you know, how well we’re doing and what, you know, what we need to do and all that kind of thing. So when we all of a sudden look at it and they compare the figures between that year and the year before, what have you. And we say, wow, we really, we did a home run. So let’s celebrate, you know. But if if we’re having a tough time, then we say, Okay, how can we all dig in and help, you know, and get get get to the other side, so we can get back to celebrating. So you, you want to make sure that everybody knows that. Sure, we love you all. And we want this to be a great place but we it’s not a country club we’re trying to run a business too so we need to say how can we help and all but but we we use the brains of our people not just depend on our selves to figure everything out can you you have once written you you wrote here we can’t always control what happens in our lives. Things will go well, things will go poorly, but we can control our response to those events. Talk to the listeners out there about the importance of embracing and understanding that stoic philosophy that we cannot always control what happens in our lives, or that things will go well, but we can control our response to those events. Yes. Well, it’s interesting. We’ve been doing a fair amount of work with First Tee, you know, and they work with urban kids using golf to teach about character and life and all. See, because golf spells game of life first, and it’s a wonderful laboratory because if you’ve ever played golf, sometimes you get good breaks you don’t deserve. Sometimes you get good breaks you do deserve. Sometimes you get bad breaks you don’t deserve. Sometimes you get bad breaks you do deserve. Sometimes you’re playing better than you should and you need to deal with success. Sometimes you’re playing worse than you should and you gotta deal with failure all in four and a half hours. I think that’s the way life is. You gotta really roll with the punches and realize, okay, you know, this isn’t going quite as well. And what can I learn from it? What can we do to turn it around? And all and so. You’ve got to learn how to deal with adversity and make sure you embrace adversity as an opportunity to see what we can do to turn it around. Ken, you wrote in one of your books, you wrote, the best way to teach people is by telling a story. And Dr. Zellner is perhaps one of the best business storytellers I know he has a way of communicating an idea with the team in a way where everybody I mean this people run around in Your company Z. They say what would Z do and they have like a story that goes with it So you have a certain principle you teacher there’s a story that has resonated and I want to start with you Ken I want to go to Z here for the follow-up piggyback one upsmanship question Ken you said here again the best way to teach people is by telling a story. What do you mean by that and why does that work so well? Well, my father retired as an admiral in the Navy and he taught me that early. He said, what you need if you want to be a good speaker is make a point, tell a story, make a point, tell a story. There’s nothing worse than some dry person up front who’s just given one concept after another concept after another concept. So people really resonate and learn from stories. I mean, who was one of the great storytellers of all time? Jesus, you know, somebody asked him, he’d say, let me tell you a story. I’ve heard of him. And so, but I think people really identify with stories. I think that’s why, you know, with the one minute manager and some of these other books, you know, it was a story about a young man searching for an effective manager, you know, because he wanted to work for one and wanted to be one, you know, people said, Whoa, I, I like to get into that, you know. And so how do you, how do you create a story? Because that’s where people learn the best, I think, is through stories, you know, I mean, we were down at the World War Two Museum in New Orleans this last week, we’re doing a collaborative relationship with them. But they had a whole exhibit on Bob Hope, you know. And I mean, he was such an amazing guy with the military, going behind lines during the war and doing everything. And he just, you know, made them laugh through stories. And he would make points by the by telling stories, you know, it’s just a wonderful way to learn. Ken, I know you guys help coach and teach great management and great managers and for people to be better managers. How do you teach someone to be a better storyteller? Well, I think you’re going to ask them, well, how did you learn such and such? What’s the story? Who impacted your life the most? What did they do that impacted that? You know, start to ask them about their lives, because our lives are a story. And I think that it’s really interesting that a lot of the best speakers are also vulnerable because they laugh at themselves. Yes. I mean, I tell a lot of stories about myself. Colleen Barrett, who took over as president of Southwest after Herb Keller stepped down, she said, people love your, admire your skills, but they love your vulnerability. You know, when you can laugh at yourself or say, you know, Gary Ridge at W40 said, the most important thing, sentence I learned to be an assessment manager is to say to my people, you know what, I’m not sure what we ought to do. What do you think? Yeah, that’s good. People would say, God, they’ll think that you’re a lousy manager. You should know, baloney. Baloney, yeah, exactly. Ken, I want to ask you this. You, where do you live now, geographically speaking? Where do you call home? We’re in San Diego. My wife grew up in San Diego, California, and she had a lot of family in El Cajon out there. Did you ever come to Tulsa, Oklahoma? Yes, one of our best friends lived there for years, Pete and Nancy Meinig. And the fellow who took over, Oral Roberts, his president, was a buddy of ours when he turned it around when the sun was screwing it up. It’s a wonderful, wonderful time. Well here’s the deal. I know it’s probably short notice, but if you want to come out this Friday, we’re having a Ken Schmidt, the guy who did the Harley Davidson turnaround. He’s going to come to our conference on Friday. We have Michael Levine, the PR consultant for Nike, for Prince, for Michael Jackson. He’s going to be coming and speaking. Wes, are you going to attend the workshop? I am trying to move my schedule around just so I can be there. That’s going to be a big thing. So again, kid, if you’re ever in the Tulsa area, especially this Friday, we’d love to have you at the workshop. We’re teaching our course at the University of San Diego. I respect that kind of rejection, but this is what I want to ask you here. People come up to me at the conference all the time and they say, Clay, I heard at a conference that you said or on a radio show or I heard a friend of mine told me you took your ACT three times and algebra three times is that true? I said well yeah I did I mean they said why three I’m like I don’t know I just kept taking it and I finally got a high enough score to get into ORU or Roberts University on my third attempt. Algebra I’m not kidding my teacher Mrs. Gow she pulled me aside and she said, if I don’t give you a certain grade, you can’t graduate. So, just do your best and I’ll do my part and we’ll get you through this. And I mean this, but there’s certain, like the third times, you know. But people sometimes feel like when they come up to me at a conference and ask that, I’ve been asked that hundreds of times, people seem to connect with me more, you know. Or when they meet my wife and they go wow she’s a beautiful and they meet me they go you are gross I Think some people relate more when they realize that when Z and I are being self-deprecating We’re not just making this up when they realize that you guys are Deeply flawed humans who happen to be good at one thing. We’re not perfect You know we’re good at this and that but we’re not good at everything You know we’re all we all fall short of the glory of God. Why does self-deprecation work so well in your mind? Well, I think it brings everybody down to a level that you’re not up there, you know, telling us how great you are, you know. And I wrote a book, a follow-up book called The One Minute Apology, and we changed the name to The Four Secret. the fourth secret, but I think that people really admire your vulnerability, particularly if you apologize, you know, and say you made a mistake. I mean, the thing that’s so sad about some of the Washington folks, you know, is they would never admit they made a mistake. Like, you know, Bob, you know, Ted Kennedy, what did he say? The problem with the Bay of Pigs, it was my fault. Don’t blame anybody else. I mean, how many other people have actually said that and said we made a mistake, you know? And we’re not perfect, all of us. I mean, I married way above myself, which really helps me with having Margie in my life. Right. How long have you guys been married? How long have you guys been together? 56 years. So we’re just getting used to it. 56 years. Congratulations, by the way, sir. Congratulations there. And by the way, I know she’s trying to make out with you during the show, so I know we’ve got a limited time here, but here’s my question for you. You wrote here, you said, effective managers manage themselves and the people they work with so that both the organization and the people profit from their presence. What do you mean by that? Well, it’s really interesting. We think that effective leadership is a transformational journey, and it starts with yourself. All the managers I have felt, and leaders who have a problem, are scared little kids inside. You know, Thomas Harris years ago wrote a book called I’m Okay, You’re Okay. He said the worst life position is I’m okay, you’re not. And all the research showed that they were really covering up not okay feelings about themselves. And so like in our graduate program, we start with a self and help people, you know, develop their own mission statement, look at their personality, look at their strengths and their weaknesses. How can they, you know, gather people around them to build on them. And then we move to one on one leadership, which is how do you build a trusting relationship with somebody, then we move to team leadership when you’re trying to develop a community. And then finally, organizational leadership, which is now you’re trying to build a culture. And those those themes run out this program. And then the University of San Diego, faculty teach the accounting and the marketing and the, you know, finance and all of those kinds of things. But self-knowledge is really important and feeling comfortable about who you are, because none of us is perfect. That’s for sure. We all got strengths and weaknesses. And the greatest leaders gather people around them who cover their weaknesses, you know. You know, if you have a whole bunch of people gathered around you that are all like you, then a lot of you aren’t necessary. That’s a great word. Ken, Ken, okay, I have a question I know Wes wants to pile on here. You have a notable quotable you wrote, when people don’t know what’s going on, it’s human nature for them to imagine a version that’s 10 times worse than the truth. As an example, just today I was talking to a member of our team about how a certain aspect of their performance was not up to par. And I’m telling you what, Tim, Ken, you said if we praise people four times, if you make four Love Bank deposits, maybe we can do one withdrawal. And I think John was present, but I was like, hey, we need to improve this aspect of what you’re doing.” And right away, somebody heard the buzzword and they’re like, what are we talking about here? Are we talking? Because they heard something related to what they’re doing, and they were all of a sudden concerned like, oh my gosh, is my department doing a bad job? Are we doing a bad job? Is the band doing a bad job? Oh no! And I had to over-communicate. Not only are you doing good, you’re doing great. And here’s what I was talking about. Because curiosity will kill the cat. And for a lot of employees, when they don’t know what’s going on, if they hear me say, hey, Sharon, I need to get your updated Social Security number, your correct Social Security number so I can pay you this week on time, somebody will hear from a distance, they’re going, I don’t think they can pay us on time. I think they’re running out of money. I think the company’s going bankrupt. What are we going to do? And the people in their mind, it becomes exponential. Can you please explain why you’ve seen this to be true over and over again? When people don’t know what’s going on, it’s human nature for them to imagine a version that’s why I’ve always said you can’t over-communicate, you know, and so you want to keep people informed all the time because, you know, their imagination is a lot worse than reality, that’s for sure. And so just keep people up to date and then they won’t be trying to guess what’s going on. I love this quote because I think that this is one of the things I try to preach to my clients. I work with a lot of churches, and any time something happens in a church, the worship leader all of a sudden is not there. Anything happens. Where’s Billy? I see this in congregations over and over where the story mill just gets jenned up, and it’s always worse than the truth. In the office, I guess my question, when you’re dealing with employees and sensitive issues, you know, is there a line somewhere there? I mean, how do you communicate to your staff, so and so is not gonna be here for a while, if they’re dealing with a sensitive personal issue or something they’ve asked you to keep private, is there a way to handle that situation when you can’t over communicate like you want to, but at the same time, you don’t want people just making stuff up? No, it’s a, I think you just have to try to be as honest as you can but you’ll say So and so is going to be leaving us and we really wish them the very best, you know and some of you might ask why they’re they’re leaving well, it’s you know, it’s between us and them and you know, but you can certainly ask them but We wish them best and you know, do your best. You can’t always share sensitive stuff with everybody, but be as open with people as you possibly can be. Okay, I have a question now, and Z, I know you have a better question, so I’m gonna go first. I’ve got a hard-hitting one. I’m gonna give you a soft question here, Ken. You wrote, unexpressed thoughts don’t mean squat. What do you mean by that? Well, if you’ve got a feeling about something and you don’t express it, well, don’t expect anybody to help you solve it. So, that’s the one expressed thoughts. Don’t mean squat, you know, unless you get them out there and say, you know, I got a concern about this. I’d like to talk to you about it. And, again, you can’t over communicate. No matter where you are, if you’ve got a concern, get it out. And don’t keep it inside. And, and then end up, you know, a lot of a lot of people in organizations that have quit and stayed, you know, mentally, they’ve dropped out. That’s nice. People have the courage to quit mentally, but not so much the courage to quit actually. And so they continue to show up getting a paycheck, but they mentally have given up on the situation. That is a profound observation. There’s so many people out there like that. Ken, two part question. The second one’s really hard hitting, but the first one’s kind of a light, kind of a fluff ball. Okay, nice. One of your quotes is, the key to successful leadership is influence, not authority. How can that be? Because you give managers authority, right? You give them, when you give them authority, you say, hey, you’ve got the authority to make changes, to do this, to correct, to inspire, to, you know, hey, you know, pump them up, but also make sure they’re doing the right thing. I mean, all that stuff. And so, what do you mean by the influence over authority? Talk about that a little bit. Well, I think when you’re operating on pure authority, now it’s a top-down hierarchy, you know, but what you’re trying to do is influence people. You’re trying to motivate them, trying to create an environment that they’re excited about. And that’s a lot better than my way or the highway, you know, and it’s all from the top down. And my father, I told you, was an Admiral in the Navy. And he said, it’s a misconception that in the military, it’s all my way or the highway. He said, you know, he said, I would have been nothing without my chiefs, you know. And he said, if you acted like a really big deal, and you went into battle, your men would shoot you before the enemy, you know. But he said, you’re only as good as your people. You know, I never forget, I won the president of the seventh grade in New Rochelle, New York, and I come home and I’m all proud, and tell my dad, and my dad said, well, Ken, this might be the beginning of your leadership training. And he said, and now that you’re president, don’t ever use your position, because great leaders are great because people trust and respect them, not because they have power. That’s good word from dad. Now the hard-hitting question that’s on everybody’s mind. Real quick, before you paint Ken into a corner with a hard-hitting question, I have an audio clip I’d like to play on behalf of the Thrive Nation. Oh, here we go. Boo! Boo! Okay, now you can ask Ken. He’s a legend. He’s like the Yoda of management. Why would you paint him into a corner with this kind of question. Well, the world wants to know, especially Thrive Nation, why did you, how could you let the Chargers leave San Diego? Well, I didn’t. We just had a self-oriented owner. It was just really kind of ridiculous. I can’t understand why the National Football League would let that happen. They’ve been here for over 50 years, and to send them up to LA where there’s another team, they’re not getting much crowds up there. We’re playing better football overall, although we got beat pretty good by Pittsburgh. But it’s strange, you know. I really gave up on some of that ownership stuff. I grew up in New York, and the Brooklyn Dodgers, they were everything to the people in Brooklyn. When O’Malley took them to L.A., that was the end. I would never root for the Los Angeles Dodgers if my life depended on it. How could you take them away from Brooklyn? Right, exactly. Ken, I have two final questions for you. On football-related questions here, you have had a lot of success during your career. I believe that’s for a myriad of reasons, but one is the consistent, diligent application of effort. I would like to know how do you structure the first four hours of your day typically, and where are you physically when you are organizing the first four hours of your day? What do the first four hours of your day look like? Well, one of the things when I wrote a book with Norman Vincent Peale, we decided that we all have two selves. We have an external task-oriented self that’s used to getting jobs done, and we have a thoughtful, reflective self. And the problem in the morning, which self do you think wakes up the quickest? It’s the external task-oriented self, because the alarm goes off. And John Ortberg, who’s a wonderful pastor friend of mine, he said, why isn’t it called the happiness clock, or it’s going to be a great day clock? No alarm! And people race out of bed, and they’re trying to eat while they’re washing, and then they jump in their car, and they’re racing here and there and all around, and they might get home at seven or eight at night, and they fall on the bed, and they’re absolutely exhausted, no human energy, say goodnight to anybody who’s lying next to me, and the next day they’re out of there again. And pretty soon they’re caught in a rat race. And the great Hollywood philosopher, Lily Talman, said, the problem with a rat race is even if you win it, you’re still a rat. And so, one of the things I try to do is enter my day slowly, you know, and so I got a fabulous dog, you know, by the name of Joy. And I named her Joy because Fred Smith, who wrote You and Your Network, a great Texas Christian businessman who died a few years ago, said that real joy in life was when you get in the act of forgetfulness about yourself. And if you want to forget about yourself, get a dog, you know, because Joy could care less that I’m going to be home late because you guys are keeping me on here so long. But when I get home, she’s going to go, Ha, ha, ha, you know. And so I take her out first and feed her. And then I like to do some spiritual reading. I read the daily Word that my parents gave me since I was 10. And I like to read Jesus Calling and do things and just get my mind. Then I like to try to think of the day and what’s happening in the day. How do I want to be seen in the day and all that, you know? And so I try to enter my day slowly. And in terms of writing, I do my best writing early in the morning, you know? And so after I enter my day slowly, then I think about writing and all. And then I like to come into the office, you know, and see people and have fun and all that kind of thing too. But I think it’s really interesting for people to look at their first two or three hours and what they do and how quickly they get into their task oriented self or race around and all. So. Ken, this has been the longest 10 minute interview of your life. And so I wanna ask you my final question here. Your, this next 12 months, what’s the big project you’re working on? What’s the big thing you want to promote? Our Thrive Nation is very action-orientated. These people want to take action. They want to get things done. Is there a certain book out there that you’ve released recently that you want The Thrive Nation to check out? Is there a certain website? What is the action step that you would recommend for all of The Thrive Nation to take? My friend, you have as long as you want here to share this. Well, you know, I wrote my biggest project about a year or so ago called Servant Leadership in Action. You know, and I normally write parables, but I think the world is in desperate need of a different leadership role model. We’ve seen what self-serving leaders have done in every sector of society, and Washington is a complete self-serving system. And so I got 44 people to write short articles about what they thought about servant leadership. And I didn’t want any article to be more than about six pages. But I got people like Marshall Goldsmith and Simon Sinek and Brene Brown and Francis Hesselbaum and Patrick Lencioni and Greg Grishel wrote an article for me, and just a whole bunch of people, some faith-based people if I’m not. And so that’s a book that I really want to push out there because I think people could really get a sense of a different thing. And then we just finished a summary of what we’ve been teaching in our company for years, the third edition of Leading at a Higher Level. So these were two books where I had a lot of co-authors writing articles in them. But I just want to get people to start thinking about leadership at a higher level, looking at it as serving rather than being served, and seeing how we can make a difference out there. And so when we were down at the World War II museum, you know, Trump says he wants to make America great again. I tell you, the greatest time probably was in the Second World War. I don’t know if you all knew that in 1940, when the war was kind of stirring up, we were in a lot better shape. But I want to tell you, all of a sudden, people really pulled together, you know, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt and then Harry Truman and all the way, they were pulling people together. And, you know, how can we, you know, save the world for democracy, you know? And so that’s what I’m really interested in. I’m also having fun. I’ve started to work on a book called Duh, D-U-H apostrophe. Why isn’t common sense common practice? That always kind of confuses me. Ken! I’m still having fun. Ken, you are a living legend and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you taking the time out of your schedule to be on the show. Z, I know you’re excited to have Ken. This has been incredible. Wes, I know you’ve been excited to have Ken. This is amazing. Ken, you are absolutely one of the best guests we’ve ever had on the show. And we like to end every show with a boom, which around here stands for big, overwhelming, optimistic momentum. Essentially, we say three, two, one, and then we all say boom. Ken, are you ready to bring a boom from sunny San Diego? Sure. Wes, are you ready to bring the boom? I was born to boom. Andrew, are you ready to bring the boom? Yes, sir. Z are you prepared? I’m gonna boom like a charger. Here we go Thrive Nation. Three, two, one, boom! My name is Taylor Hall. I’m the general manager of the Tulsa Oilers professional hockey team. You know our goal every night here at the BOK Center is to try to fill the seats with lots of people and create an exciting environment so when somebody comes to a game, they want to come back. Working with Clay and the staff at Thrive, they’ve really helped us in many, many ways. Website and graphic design and video production and a lot of things that go along. And a lot of businesses, including ours, doesn’t have a staff or a full-time, you know, videographer or graphic designer. But the biggest thing that we noticed was the needle mover. More sales, more attendance, more successes in business. We had a record year last season working with Clay for the first time. Our average attendance is higher than it’s ever been, so there was a lot of really cool things that we did and they worked. That’s the nice thing about working with Clay and the team over there. It’s just not one person, you get the entire team. If you need video design and editing and production, they’ve got that. If you need graphic design, if you need some coaching, your salespeople, call scripts, PR, they offer all that. Clay was instrumental in helping guiding us and getting us on the right track so that we could really raise the bar and become ultra successful. So it’s been an amazing experience for us. Well Thrive Nation, on today’s show we’re going to talk about how you as a business owner can save thousands and thousands of dollars per year. On today’s show we’re going to feature a guest that I actually use. He’s a vendor, a supplier, a trusted vendor that I’ve used for years and years to handle all my credit card processing. So over the years a lot of people ask me, they say, Clay, you know, what attorney do you use? And I’ll tell them I use Winters and King. And people say, well, why do you use Winters and King? Well, when you find a good attorney and you’ve used them for 10 years, it makes sense to keep using them, right? When you find an accountant you can trust, I use CCK. People say, why do you use CCK? Well, because I’ve worked with them for years and they do a good job. People say, well, who do you use for credit card processing? I say, I use Tyler. They say, who’s Tyler? Well, I want you to meet him. I want you to know who he is. And I encourage you, if you’re out there today and you process credit cards for your business, I would encourage you to give Tyler a shot. Check out what he can do for you to help you with your business, to help you reduce your fees associated with processing credit cards. Tyler, welcome onto the Thrived Time Show. How are you, sir? I’m good, Clay. Thanks for having me this morning. Hey, so tell us out there, first off, for anybody out there that wants to look you up and verify you’re real, what’s the website people need to go to to find your business? Integratedpaymentservices.com. Okay. So I’m going to pull it up real quick here so we can see it. Integratedpaymentservices.com. Integratedpaymentservices.com. What is it that you do for anybody out there that doesn’t quite understand what your role is there, sir? My role at IPS is managing partner and one of the owners. But what we do is we set businesses up to accept credit card as a form of payment. But that’s a small piece of what we do. Really what we do is we meet with business owners that already accept payments and we help them lower those fees. So as an example, one of my longtime clients, they have a restaurant and I know they utilize your services and they’ve told me they’re saving thousands of dollars a year since switching to you. Can you walk us through, how is that possible that you’re able to reduce somebody’s credit card fees so dramatically? We’re not exclusive with any one processor, so it gives us the ability to really look at what they’re doing and be able to find them the best price point for their type of business. Why is it that your company would… To me, it seems logical that you’d want to charge your customers the least amount of money possible and you’d want to keep your customers for a long time, but it seems like a lot of your competitors don’t have that mindset. Why is it that you have that mindset? Tell me your vision for your business because I feel like everybody I’ve ever sent to you has been shocked by how much money they can save. And yet that doesn’t seem to be a common best practice in your industry. Yeah. I mean, I can’t speak for the other companies, but I can speak for us. Um, you know, our, our whole model is we’re going to price you as aggressive as we can out of the gate. And then we hope to be your, you know, processor for years and years and years. So, you know, what are the steps? I’m listening right now and I want to compare rates and, you know, step one, step two, and how long will it take? Yeah, I mean, step one would be to, you know, just to contact us. It’s a two to three minute conversation. We’ll be able to figure out what, you know, what the best things are for your business. And then from there, we’ll be able to tell you what the savings are. I mean, total, you know, you’re looking at maybe a five, 10 minute conversation. We’ll be able to get everything set up. And then the agreement takes about one to three minutes to complete. OK, I’m going to pull this up here, folks. Again, this is Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit card. We create a landing page to make it easier to get to as well for people. It’s Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card. How much money can you save people? I’ve seen people who’ve told me that you’ve saved them tens of thousands of dollars in a year. I feel like at least, I feel like the average, I mean I haven’t heard anybody saving less than $3,000 a year. What are some extreme examples of how much you’ve been able to save people? Just kind of, just so people can have, you know, extreme low, extreme high, or just have sort of an idea of what kind of money they could look at saving here. Sure. I’m actually working on a couple of comparisons now. One of them is a customer that uses QuickBooks and Intuit. We actually integrate with QuickBooks and Intuit, so we’re going to be able to replace Intuit. We’re going to be able to save that customer right around $7,700 a year. But we’re also working on a restaurant right now where we’re going to… They process about $250,000 a month. They’re a big restaurant, but we’re going to save them right around $2,300 a month because they were being taken advantage of. So those are just two examples of things I’m working on right now today. Well, and again, I love talking to you because I know that you’re sincere, you’re the real deal. I actually work with you myself, so I encourage everybody out there, again, folks, if you haven’t compared rates, I just think it’s something you should do right now. I mean, if you’re saying, wow, the cost of everything is going up, one thing you can do is look at how you can reduce your expenses. And one great way to do that is by going to Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit card and comparing rates today with Tyler Carson. Tyler, I really appreciate your time today, sir. And we’ll talk to you next week. JT, do you know what time it is? 4.10. It’s TiVo time in Tulsa, Oklahoma, baby. Tim TiVo is coming to Tulsa, Oklahoma, June 27th and 28th. We’ve been doing business conferences here since 2005. I’ve been hosting business conferences since 2005. What year were you born? 1995. Dude, I’ve been hosting business conferences since you were 10 years old, but I’ve never had the two-time Heisman Award winning Tim Tebow come present. And a lot of people, you know, have followed Tim Tebow’s football career on the field and off the field. And off the field, the guy’s been just as successful as he has been on the field. Now, the big question is, JT, how does he do it? Well, they’re going to have to come and find out, because I don’t know. Well, I’m just saying, Tim Tebow is going to teach us how he organizes his day, how he organizes his life, how he’s proactive with his faith, his family, his finances. He’s going to walk us through his mindset that he brings into the gym, into business. It is going to be a blasty blast in Tulsa, Russia. Also, this is the first Thrive Time Show event that we’ve had where we’re going to have a man who has built a $100 million net worth. Wow. We’ve had a couple of presenters that have had a billion dollar net worth in some real estate sort of things. Yeah. But this is the first time we’ve had a guy who’s built a service business and he’s built over a $100 million net worth in the service business. It’s the yacht-driving, multi-state living guru of franchising. Peter Taunton will be in the house. This is the founder of Snap Fitness, the guy behind Nine Round Boxing. He’s going to be here in Tulsa, Russell, Oklahoma, June 27th and 28th. JT, why should everybody want to hear what Peter Taunton has to say? Oh, because he’s incredible. He’s just a fountain of knowledge. He is awesome. He has inspired me listening to him talk. Not only that, he also practices what he teaches, so he’s a real teacher. He’s not a fake teacher like business school teachers. So you’ve got to come learn from him. Also, let me tell you this, folks. I don’t want to get this wrong, because if I get it wrong, someone’s going to say, you screwed that up, buddy. So Michael Levine, this is Michael Levine. He’s going to be coming. He’s going to say, who’s Michael Levine? I don’t want to get this wrong. This is the PR consultant of choice for Michael Jackson, for Prince, for Nike, for Charlton Heston, for Nancy Kerrigan. 34 Grammy Award winners, 43 New York Times best-selling authors he’s represented, including pretty much everybody you know who’s been a super celebrity. This is Michael Levine, a good friend of mine. He’s going to come and talk to you about personal branding and the mindset needed to be super successful. The lineup will continue to grow. We have hit Christian reporting artist Colton Dixon in the house. Now people say Colton Dixon’s in the house? Yes! Colton Dixon’s in the house. So if you like top 40 Christian music, Colton Dixon’s going to be in the house performing. The lineup will continue to grow each and every day. We’re going to add more and more speakers to this all-star lineup, but I encourage everybody out there today, get those tickets today. Go to Thrivetimeshow.com. Again, that’s Thrivetimeshow.com. And some people might be saying, well, how do I do it? I don’t know what I do. How does it work? You just go to Thrivetimeshow.com. Let’s go there now. We’re feeling the flow. We’re going to Thrivetimeshow.com. Again, you just go to Thrivetimeshow.com. You click on the Business Conferences button, and you click on the Request Tickets button right there. The way I do our conferences is we tell people it’s $250 to get a ticket or whatever price that you can afford. And the reason why I do that is I grew up without money. JT, you’re in the business. You’re in the business. You’re in the business. You’re in the business. Or whatever price that you can afford. And the reason why I do that is I grew up without money. JT, you’re in the process of building a super successful company. Did you start out with a million dollars in the bank account? No, I did not. Nope, did not get any loans, nothing like that. Did not get any inheritance from parents or anything like that. I had to work for it and I’m super grateful I came to a business conference. That’s actually how I met you, met Peter Taunton, I met all these people. So if you’re out there today and you want to come to our workshop, again, you just got to go to Thrivetimeshow.com. You might say, well, when’s it going to be? June 27th and 28th. You might say, well, who’s speaking? We already covered that. You might say, where’s it going to be? It’s going to be in Tulsa, Russell Oklahoma. It says Tulsa, Russell. It’s I’m really trying to rebrand Tulsa as Tulsa, Russell. I’m sort of like the Jerusalem of America. But if you go to if you type in Thrivetimeshow and Jinx, you can get a sneak peek or a look at our office facility. This is where you’re headed. It’s going to be a blasty blast. You can look inside, see the facility. We’re going to have hundreds of entrepreneurs here. It is going to be packed. Now, for this particular event, folks, the seating is always limited because my facility isn’t a limitless convention center. You’re coming to my actual home office, and so it’s going to be packed. So when? June 27th and 28th? Who? You! You’re gonna come! I’m talking to you. You can just get your tickets right now at Thrivetimeshow.com and again, you can name your price. We tell people it’s $250 or whatever price you can afford. And we do have some select VIP tickets which gives you an access to meet some of the speakers and those sorts of things. And those tickets are $500. It’s a two-day interactive business workshop, over 20 hours of business training. We’re gonna give you a copy of my newest book, The Millionaire’s Guide to Becoming Sustainably Rich. You’re going to leave with a workbook. You’re going to leave with everything you need to know to start and grow a super successful company. It’s practical. It’s actionable. And it’s Tebow time right here in Tulsa, Russia. Get those tickets today at Thrivetimeshow.com. Again, that’s Thrivetimeshow.com. Hello, I’m Michael Levine, and I’m talking to you right now from the center of Hollywood, California where I have represented over the last 35 years 58 Academy Award winners, 34 Grammy Award winners, 43 New York Times bestsellers. I’ve represented a lot of major stars and I’ve worked with a lot of major companies and I think I’ve learned a few things about what makes them work and what makes them not work. Now, why would a man living in Hollywood, California in the beautiful sunny weather of LA come to Tulsa? Because last year I did it and it was damn exciting. Clay Clark has put together an exceptional presentation, really life-changing. And I’m looking forward to seeing you then. I’m Michael Levine, I’ll see you in Tulsa. James, did I tell you my good friend John Lee Dumas is also joining us at the in-person two-day interactive Thrive Time Show Business Workshop. That Tim Tebow and that Michael Levine. Have I told you this? You have not told me that. He’s coming all the way from Puerto Rico. This is John Lee Dumas, the host of the chart-topping EOFire.com podcast. He’s absolutely a living legend. This guy started a podcast after wrapping up his service in the United States military. And he started recording this podcast daily in his home to the point where he started interviewing big time folks like Gary Vaynerchuk, like Tony Robbins. And he just kept interviewing bigger and bigger names, putting out shows day after day. And now he is the legendary host of the EO Fire podcast. And he’s traveling all the way from Puerto Rico to Tulsa, Oklahoma to attend the in-person June 27th and 28th Thrive Time Show two-day interactive business workshop. If you’re out there today, folks, you’ve ever wanted to grow a podcast, a broadcast, you want to improve your marketing, if you’ve ever wanted to improve your marketing, your branding, if you’ve ever wanted to increase your sales, you want to come to the two-day interactive June 27th and 28th Thrive Time Show Business Workshop featuring Tim Tebow, Michael Levine, John Lee Dumas and countless big-time super successful entrepreneurs. It’s going to be life-changing. Get your tickets right now at thrivetimeshow.com. James, what website is that? ThriveTimeshow.com. James, one more time for the four enthusiasts. ThriveTimeshow.com. I’m riding tonight, even if I got three strikes, I’mma go for it. This moment, we own it, ayy. I’m not to be played with because it could get dangerous. See, these people I ride with, this moment, we own it. Thrivetime Show two-day interactive business workshops are the world’s highest rated and most reviewed business workshops because we teach you what you need to know to grow. You can learn the proven 13-point business system that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. We get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website. We’re going to teach you how to fix your conversion rate. We’re going to teach you how to do a social media marketing campaign that works. How do you raise capital? How do you get a small business loan? We teach you everything you need to know here during a two-day, 15-hour workshop. It’s all here for you. You work every day in your business, but for two days you can escape and work on your business and build these proven systems so now you can have a successful company that will produce both the time freedom and the financial freedom that you deserve. You’re going to leave energized, motivated, but you’re also going to leave empowered. The reason why I built these workshops is because as an entrepreneur, I always wish that I had this. And because there wasn’t anything like this, I would go to these motivational seminars, no money down, real estate, Ponzi scheme, get motivated seminars, and they would never teach me anything. It was like you went there and you paid for the big chocolate Easter Bunny, but inside of it, it was a hollow nothingness. And I wanted the knowledge, and they’re like, oh, but we’ll teach you the knowledge after our next workshop. And the great thing is we have nothing to upsell. At every workshop, we teach you what you need to know. There’s no one in the back of the room trying to sell you some next big get-rich-quick, walk-on-hot-coals product. It’s literally we teach you the brass tacks, the specific stuff that you need to know to learn how to start and grow a business. I encourage you to not believe what I’m saying, and I want you to Google the Z66 auto auction. I want you to Google elephant in the room. Look at Robert, Zellner, and Associates. Look them up and say, are they successful because they’re geniuses, or are they successful because they have a proven system? When you do that research, you will discover that the same systems that we use in our own business can be used in your business. Come to Tulsa, book a ticket, and I guarantee you it’s going to be the best business workshop ever and we’re going to give you your money back if you don’t love it. We’ve built this facility for you and we’re excited to see it. And now you may be thinking, what does it actually cost to attend an in-person two-day interactive Thrive Time Show Business Workshop. Well, good news, the tickets are $250 or whatever price that you can afford. What? Yes, they’re $250 or whatever price you can afford. I grew up without money and I know what it’s like to live without money. So if you’re out there today and you want to attend our in-person, two-day interactive business workshop, all you got to do is go to thrivetimeshow.com to request those tickets. And if you can’t afford $250, we have scholarship pricing available to make it affordable for you. I learned at the Academy, at King’s Point in New York, acta non verba. Watch what a person does, not what they say. Good morning, good morning, good morning. Harvard Kiyosaki, The Rich Dad Radio Show. Today I’m broadcasting from Phoenix, Arizona, not Scottsdale, Arizona. They’re close, but they’re completely different worlds. And I have a special guest today. Definition of intelligence is if you agree with me, you’re intelligent. And so this gentleman is very intelligent. I’ve done this show before also, but very seldom do you find somebody who lines up on all counts. And so Mr. Clay Clark is a friend of a good friend, Eric, Eric Trump, but we’re also talking about money, bricks, and how screwed up the world can get in a few and a half hour. So Clay Clark is a very intelligent man, and there’s so many ways we could take this thing. But I thought, since you and Eric are close, Trump, what were you saying about what Trump can’t, what Donald, who’s my age, and I can say or cannot say? What was- Well, first of all, I have to honor you, sir. I want to show you what I did to one of your books here. There’s a guy named Jeremy Thorne, who was my boss at the time. I was 19 years old working at Faith Highway. I had a job at Applebee’s, Target, and DirecTV. And he said, have you read this book, Rich Dad, Poor Dad? And I said, no. And my father, may he rest in peace, he didn’t know these financial principles. So I started reading all of your books and really devouring your books. And I went from being an employee to self-employed, to the business owner, to the investor. And I owe a lot of that to you. And I just wanted to take a moment to tell you, thank you so much for allowing me to achieve success. And I’ll tell you all about Eric Trump. I just want to tell you, thank you, sir, for changing my life. Well, not only that, Clay, you know, thank you, but you’ve become an influencer. You know, more than anything else, you’ve evolved into an influencer where your word has more and more power. So that’s why I congratulate you on becoming. Because as you know, there’s a lot of fake influencers out there, or bad influencers. Anyway, I’m glad you and I agree so much, and thanks for reading my books. That’s the greatest thrill for me today. Not a thrill, but recognition is when people, young men especially, come up and say i read your book change my life and doing this and doing this and doing this i learned at the academy king’s point new york octagon watch what a person does not what they say and ryan and the american people’s and race here i went to a small private liberal arts college and i didn’t and i didn’t learn anything like they’re teaching here. I didn’t learn linear workflows. I learned stuff that I’m not using and I haven’t been using for the last nine years. So what they’re teaching here is actually way better than what I got at business school and I went what was actually ranked as a very good business school. The linear workflow, the linear workflow for us and getting everything out on paper and documented is really important. We have workflows that are kind of all over the place. Having linear workflow and seeing that mapped out on multiple different boards is pretty awesome. That’s really helpful for me. The atmosphere here is awesome. I definitely just stared at the walls, figuring out how to make my facility look like this place. This place rocks. It’s invigorating. The walls are super. It’s just very cool. The atmosphere is cool, the people are nice. It’s a pretty cool place to be. Very good learning atmosphere. I literally want to model it and steal everything that’s here at this facility and basically create it just on our business side. Once I saw what they were doing, I knew I had to get here at the conference. This is probably the best conference or seminar I’ve ever been to in over 30 years of business. You’re not bored. You’re awake, alive the whole time. It’s not pushy. They don’t try to sell you a bunch of things. I was looking to learn how to just get control of my life, my schedule, and just get control of business. Planning your time, breaking it all down, making time for the F6 in your life, and just really implementing it and sticking with the program. It’s really lively, they’re pretty friendly, helpful, and very welcoming. I attended a conference a couple months back and it was really the best business conference I’ve ever attended. At the workshop I learned a lot about time management, really prioritizing what’s the most important. The biggest takeaways are, you know, you want to take a step-by-step approach to your business. Whether it’s marketing, you know, what are those three marketing tools that you want to use, to human resources. Some of the most successful people and successful businesses in this town, their owners were here today because they wanted to know more from Clay, and I found that to be kind of fascinating. The most valuable thing that I’ve learned is diligence, that businesses don’t change overnight. It takes time and effort, and you’ve got to go through the ups and downs of getting it to where you want to go. He actually gives you the road map out. I was stuck, didn’t know what to do, and he gave me the road map out step by step. He’s set up systems in the business that make my life much easier, allow me some time freedom. Here you can ask any question you want, they guarantee it will be answered. This conference motivates me and also gives me a lot of knowledge and tools. It’s up to you to do it. Everybody can do these things. There’s stuff that everybody knows, but if you don’t do it, nobody else is going to do it for you. I can see the marketing working. It’s just an approach that makes sense. Probably the most notable thing is just the income increase that we’ve had. Everyone’s super fun and super motivating. I’ve been here before, but I’m back again because it motivated me. Your competition is going to come eventually or try to pick up these tactics. So you better, if you don’t, somebody else will. I’m Rachel with Tip Top K9 and we just want to give a huge thank you to Clay and Vanessa Clark. Hey guys, I’m Ryan with Tip Top K9. Just want to say a big thank you to Thrive 15. Thank you to Make Your Life Epic. We love you guys, we appreciate you and really just appreciate how far you’ve taken us. This is our old house. This is where we used to live two years ago. This is our old neighborhood. See? It’s nice, right? So this is my old van and our old school marketing. And this is our old team. And by team I mean it’s me and another guy. This is our new house with our new neighborhood. This is our new van with our new marketing, and this is our new team. We went from four to 14, and I took this beautiful photo. We worked with several different business coaches in the past, and they were all about helping Ryan sell better and just teaching sales, which is awesome, but Ryan is a really great salesman, so we didn’t need that. We needed somebody to help us get everything that was in his head out into systems, into manuals and scripts and actually build a team. So now that we have systems in place, we’ve gone from one to 10 locations in only a year. In October 2016, we grossed 13 grand for the whole month. Right now it’s 2018, the month of October. It’s only the 22nd. We’ve already grossed a little over 50 grand for the whole month and we still have time to go. We’re just thankful for you, thankful for Thrive and your mentorship and we’re really thankful that you guys have helped us to grow a business that we run now instead of the business running us. Just thank you, thank you, thank you, times a thousand. So we really just want to thank you Clay and thank you Vanessa for everything you’ve done, everything you’ve helped us with. We love you guys. If you decide to not attend the Thrive Time Workshop, you’re missing out on a great opportunity. The Atmosphere Claves office is very lively. You can feel the energy as soon as you walk through the door. And it really got me and my team very excited. If you decide not to come, you’re missing out on an opportunity to grow your business, bottom line. Love the environment. I love the way that Clay presents and teaches. It’s a way that not only allows me to comprehend what’s going on, but he explains it in a way to where it just makes sense. The SEO optimization, branding, marketing, I’ve learned more in the last two days than I have the entire four years of college. The most valuable thing that I’ve learned, marketing is key, marketing is everything. Making sure that you’re branded accurately and clearly. How to grow a business using Google reviews and just how to optimize our name through our website also. Helpful with a lot of marketing, search engine optimization, helping us really rank high in Google. The biggest thing I needed to learn was how to build my foundation, how to systemize everything and optimize everything, build my SEO. How to become more organized, more efficient. How to make sure the business is really there to serve me, as opposed to me constantly being there for the business. New ways of advertising my business as well as recruiting new employees. Group interviews, number one. Before we felt like we were held hostage by our employees. Group interviews has completely eliminated that because you’re able to really find the people that would really be the best fit. Hands on how to hire people, how to deal with human resources, a lot about marketing and overall just how to structure the business, how it works for me and also then how that can translate into working better for my clients. The most valuable thing I’ve learned here is time management. I like the one hour of doing your business is real critical if I’m going to grow and change. Play really teaches you how to navigate through those things and not only find freedom but find your purpose in your business and find the purposes for all those other people that directly affect your business as well. Everybody. Everybody. Everybody. Everyone. Everyone needs to attend the conference because you get an opportunity to see that it’s real. Hello, I’m Wes Carter. I’m one of the shareholders at Winters and King. My favorite thing that Thrive has helped me accomplish here in our firm is thinking a little bit outside the box. They do SEO, they do printing, they help us with a lot of things from the day to day marketing for the firm, but they also help us think of things that as attorneys we probably wouldn’t normally think of that help us market our services to our clients. One of the things I love about working with Thrive is that they make it enjoyable to actually do work with them. It’s not dry, it’s usually fun, but it’s always very enjoyable and practical. They give me things and ideas that I can put into place. It’s not just some theoretical spiel that they give me. We get practical steps that we work on together to do my job better. So me personally, I would easily recommend Thrive 15 services to my friends, my families, I recommend them to my clients. I think they do a good job, they’re passionate, they care about their clients, and I think it’s actually a valuable service they provide to people that are in the business world. My name is Jeff Thomas. I’m originally from Atlanta, Georgia. It’s all about getting to the grindstone. It is about putting the… It’s one thing to have a specific vision or a dream, but knowledge without application isn’t knowledge at all. That’s nothing. It’s really funny. The atmosphere is very lively. Everybody that is working for Clay is very upbeat and not tired, not sluggish, not complaining, not whining. They don’t have anything to do with those types of characteristics. It’s all about getting to the grind and having fun while you do it. I haven’t actually been to any conferences in the past, but what I will say from what I’ve seen on YouTube and what from other friends have told me is this isn’t like a motivational kind of thing to just, you know, hoo-hoo, rah-rah, get you motivated, but it’s like practical steps that if you do take them, which most people aren’t willing to do, then you will grow and you will achieve the specific things that you want. Well, for one thing, I will say that this isn’t necessarily for everyone. So if you’re not willing to work, this isn’t for you. But I will say that if you are willing to work and you know you’re just getting started, but you have actually taken a step in that direction, then this will actually help you grow further exponentially than you could ever imagine. My name is Taylor Hall. I’m the general manager of the Tulsa Oilers professional hockey team. You know, our goal every night here at the BOK Center is to try to fill the seats with lots of people and create an exciting environment so when somebody comes to a game they want to come back. Working with Clay and the staff at Thrive, they’ve really helped us in many, many ways. Website and graphic design and video production and a lot of things that go along. A lot of businesses, including ours, doesn’t have a staff or a full-time videographer or graphic designer. But the biggest thing that we noticed was the needle mover. More sales, more attendance, more successes in business. We had a record year last season working with Clay for the first time. Our average attendance is higher than it’s ever been. So there was a lot of really cool things that we did and they worked. That’s the nice thing about working with Clay and the team over there. It’s just not one person, you get the entire team. If you need video design and editing and production, they’ve got that. If you need graphic design, if you need some coaching, your sales people and call scripts, PR, they offer all that. Clay was instrumental in helping guiding us and getting us on the right track so that we could really raise the bar and become ultra successful. So it’s been an amazing experience for us. My name is Caitlin. I own a tumbling gym called Justice Tumbling Companies in Tulsa. Working with Clay is so helpful. It’s being diligent with everything and making sure we execute our goals and really make things happen. It’s fun. It’s tight. It really gets you energized and going. It makes you really want to work. To get the momentum going, to really just get that buzz, I’m Bob Healy. I’m in the charcoal grilling industry and the name of my business is Grillblazer. How will I apply what I’ve learned so far into my business? I’m actually a client of the Dry 15 and I learn so much from what I’m learning at this conference and my regular weekly attendance that it’s helping me establish the business and get it off the ground. Clay’s presentation style is just blatant disregard for what anybody wants. He just has fun, it’s him, everything that you see is authentically Clay. It’s a great deal of fun. Everybody enjoys it. They know when they walk in, they think they’re coming in to a carnival, and frankly they are. It’s just great fun. There’s not another conference like it. You just don’t go to a carnival atmosphere and learn like you do here at the Thrive Conference. It’s great. The reason people should attend at least one of these conferences is because it’s common sense. And everybody’s fed an entire line about the way you should run a business, but until you actually experience running a business, which is, candidly, what you learn here, how to run a business. You don’t know what you’re doing. My name is Tyler Hastings, and this is my wife, Rachel, and our company is Delricht Research, out of New Orleans. During our time working with Thrive, we’ve had numerous successes. When we first started, we were working with one physician. We had one research site, and we were seeing on average between 10 and 15 patients a week. Since working with Thrive in the last 18 months, we now have four research sites. We work with over five physicians, and on average, we’re now seeing over 60 patients per week. Recently, we’ve been the top enroller worldwide in seven studies, which is just incredible considering where we were two years ago, 18 months ago. Thrive really differs from the other conferences that we’ve been to and the other kind of programs that we’ve been through because they actually really practice what they preach and they implement the same systems and the processes that they teach you about and they give you real life examples that really work for them and show you with the training how to implement that yourself. For example, Tyler and I actually got the opportunity to come out to Tulsa and we’re fortunate enough that the Thrive team took us out to some of the businesses that they own and we really got to see in real life, real time, some of the systems and processes and it was just incredible. A real life example of some of the businesses and the things that they’re implementing. Having a coach is important to us. They act as not only an accountability factor, but they’re someone we can talk to on a daily basis as we go through the problems of running a business that inevitably come up. They always understand what we’re going through and they’re always there to help us or guide us through the problems that we experience. The best part of our experience working with Thrive has just been seeing our relationship grow. So at each step as our business grows, they have something else to provide us with. They’ve got the resources, whether it be marketing, graphic design, website development or even in accounting practices, maybe we need a new insurance policy. They have someone they can connect us with or they have the direct resource we need to speak with for any of the problems we face. Someone’s thinking about signing up for the coaching program, I would highly recommend that they call in for a free 30-minute coaching session and see exactly what the team can do for you. Just speak with someone, let them know what you’re going through, and I think you’ll find that regardless of what you need, there’s someone there that can help you. Clay’s presentation style is very real and raw. It just gets real down to the bone of it and the real purpose of it. There’s no like fluffy vagueness about it, you know. So, he really gets to the point. I’m always reminded about how important it is to be intentional and to really pay attention to how you schedule your time and really honor it. Because whatever gets scheduled gets done. That’s what he said from Lee Cockrell. Just constantly hearing that and getting reminded helps me to reinforce that in my own life. It always helps to get an outside perspective, and especially from a guy that’s run so many multi-billion dollar businesses, it doesn’t hurt. My name is Nick Guajardo. I heard about the Thrive Time Show workshop through Andy Mathren. He is my, Andy Mathren and Larry Montgomery, they’re my bosses at Restore Home Health. So I work with a home health company called Restore Home Health and my role is pretty much to bring in business. So I was hoping to learn kind of the sales process on top of just kind of the responsibilities and help understand what it looks like on the SEO side and just kind of an all-around what it looks like to own a business because that’s something I want to do in the future for sure. How I would describe the atmosphere here at Thrive is high energy, great professionalism, great people. It’s just a place you definitely want to visit and be at. Plays delivery style, humorous, professional, hilarious. Just, he does it, I haven’t seen someone do it better. So he does a great job. Most valuable thing I’ve learned so far, a lot of it has been extremely valuable. But one thing that’s always really stuck out to me is learning the SEO stuff. I mean, that is, I think, things you don’t really even think about, and then you hear it, and you think you know it, but you don’t know it. So I feel like that was the most valuable. Well, they’re missing out on just, come down to just basic applications to be a business owner. I mean, I feel like it’s like an absolute necessity, you know, to come here and learn the ins and outs and maybe come here once or twice if they, you know, take good notes, that kind of thing. Why? To just, it’s the experience here and what you can learn, like absolutely. So marketing and SEO seemed like something that would be very scary, but then in the way that Clay and his team described it, it became very clear and concise and something that’s very accessible to any business owner. I’ve learned a lot about marketing at this conference, a lot about business management and HR, really everything, the key components of anybody’s business, they’re going to give you the best tools to be successful. So most workshops or conferences can be really boring, really one note, or they just seem so theatrical that it’s a joke and it’s not even giving you the tools that you need or that you came there for. But here it’s still high energy, it’s still fun, everything’s to the point, but it’s very professional and yeah, you’re missing out on easy steps to use in your business that are very accessible and very clear. My name is Abigail McCarter. The best thing I’ve learned so far is definitely like organization, schedule wise, always keeping a to-do list, keeping your calendar organized. I’m kind of all over the place, so that’s always good to know. So, Clay’s presentation style and the atmosphere is electric. It’s so energetic, it’s just really great all around. This conference is much different than any other conference I’ve gone to, again because it’s fun. A lot of other conferences, it’s really quiet, really cold, and you just kind of get bored. But this one, you’re always engaged, you’re always learning something, and the staff is amazing. They’re always super helpful, so it’s just been really great. My name’s Clay Howard. We’re a personal training and fitness training facility. Oh, wow. I’m learning a ton. Like, this morning so far has been search engine optimization. So really just the importance of being at the top of Google, how Google works, and why it’s so important to go out and get video reviews and testimonials and getting Google reviews. And so all those things, we can take back and really apply that immediately. So it’s really cool to see not only how to do it, but really the relevance and importance of it in the long-term strategy of business. Now, it’s amazing actually the way in this morning and yesterday I was videoing as I was walking in the front entrance. And actually me, I go to a lot of seminars, I go to a lot of conferences, masterminds. I’ve been doing that since I was like 22 years old, so I got to almost 20 years now. And this is by far the most entertaining, not only the content, the content is amazing, but Clay and you guys do a great job mixing in, edumatama entertainment where it’s fun, it’s fresh, it’s lively, you never get bored. And I heard a study one time that the reason that children learn so much quicker is because it’s fun, learning is fun. And so obviously Clay is nailed that. It’s very fun to be here and it keeps you awake, keeps you energized. So I’m having a blast. Yeah, I think any business owner or someone that wants to own a business or considering owning and starting a business should definitely come. I know that I was referred here by friends of mine and clients of mine and I’ve referred other people. Again, just to understand what it takes to make a business that wants to start a business. My name is Jamie Fagel, I’m with Jameson Fine Cabinetry. I heard about the conference through Andrew, he’s the coach that I deal with here at The Thrive. The most valuable piece I found even working with Andrew, but it’s been solidified when it came here, was you got to actually do the things that they’re telling you. With no action, you’re not going to get anything from it. I would highly recommend this to almost anybody in business today. I have recommended to some of my other business partners. It’s phenomenal. It’s really something that if you want to start a business, the old way of doing things is gone. This is what you got to do. It’s the only way it’ll work. Hey, this is Charles and Amber Kola. We’re the owners of Kola Fitness. The way we’re able to do that is working with Clay for the last three years. He has really readjusted our thinking and taught us that our business is here to serve us. And by doing that, we’re able to live the lifestyle we want and take off on a random vacation last minute. So we had totally planned on being at the conference. So wish we could be there and meet all of you. We know you’re having a great time. So. Yes. Clay, in the last three years, has helped us build all the necessary systems, checklists, workflows, task lists, time blocks, audits that are always running, and the right capable lieutenants to keep track of all that, so that you, too, can get time freedom, financial freedom. And that’s what we have done, and Clay has helped us do. We’ve got multiple companies in multiple states and they’re all doing very well, getting ready to go to two more locations in this next year. And Co-op Fitness has a really big future. We’re teaming up with a couple other groups and we should scale the company here shortly. Hopefully we’ll open like 50 locations in the next 10 years. So, but yeah, we’re on the way. We’re gonna probably more than double our company, maybe triple our company in the next eight to nine months. And it’s just awesome. God is working in our business and we’re making Jesus and changing lives. We’re a strong Christian company that focuses on making Jesus famous and changing lives in the fitness field. This is Charles and Hammer Cola. Thank you Thrive. Hit your action items. We love you guys. We wish you were there. You guys have a wonderful day. Bye-bye. My name is Jennifer Johnson. I’m in the pest control industry and also weed control and fertilization. My business is Platinum Pest and Lawn. Some of the things that, I’ll be able to apply a lot of the things that I’ve learned in our business because this is not my first conference, and so a lot of the things that we learned we’ve put into place and now we’re doing the next level of refining the processes for just a different concept and so it’s getting better and better. Things that were just big processes before, we have the foundation laid, and now we’re able to make it better, and better than hearing different things, now that we’ve implemented things, and so we can just make it even better, implementing it in our own business. Clay’s presentation and the atmosphere is very exciting and fun, it keeps you awake. It makes it interesting, you have a lot of information, but if it’s not going to be entertaining your brain is going to tune it out. But Play makes it just entertaining enough that you retain what you learn. Lots of rhyming and catchy things so that you remember stuff. Something that makes this conference different than other workshops or conferences that I’ve been to is that there’s a lot of people here in my same situation. Most of us are pretty small businesses wanting to improve. And we want real life information and something that will work and that’s attainable. And not just some crazy magic formula, but actual action items that we can implement in our business and actually see a difference. Everyone should attend a DriveType business conference, whether you’re a business owner, it has practical applications that you can apply to so many different parts of your business. And then you need to come back for more so that you can keep doing more of the wonderful things that you learn. But secondly, I am also a mom of three kids and a lot of the concepts can actually be applied to home, like getting routines and getting, Setting systems at home has just seriously made a huge difference in my life at home. So I’ve been able to improve our business, but I’ve also been able to improve things at home. And so that’s why everyone should come, no matter what your station is in life. My name is Nolan Khoo. I’m originally from San Francisco, California. The industry that I’m in is financial services. I’ve learned a ton so far, but what I can best apply from this conference is the opportunity, that hunger to go out there and make a big difference in my industry. Blaise’s presentation style is amazing. He’s got an endless amount of energy. It’s contagious. And yet by being here, I really do want to go back and be able to face all the adversity that the industry has. Yeah, this conference, the thing that makes it different is that it’s special because it has a unique set of individuals that all share that same energy. I think he picked it as a dragon energy, but yeah, that’s what we’re looking at. Everyone should come to multiple, but their first would be very special. Yeah, you’re welcome with a lot of enthusiasm. That’ll last for a long time. My name is Gabriela Cruz. Our business is HCS Electric. My husband’s the owner, but I’m involved with that, so we’re a lucky company. Well, here at the conference they talk a lot about consistency, and so just staying consistent with different things in the business, and I feel like applying that to our business model will really help us grow. The atmosphere is very positive, uplifting, and it gets you excited and it encourages you to do big things. I probably how real they are. They tell you upfront what you need to do and what’s like a no-go. And some conferences are, they kind of trigger code things. So I like how real they are here. I think it’ll definitely, if you want your business to grow, I think this would be a great experience. And then not only that, it’ll encourage you and inform you on so many things you don’t think about on a daily basis. Hey, I’m Ryan Wimpey. I’m originally from Tulsa, born and raised here. I’ve definitely learned a lot about life design and making sure the business serves you. The linear workflow, the linear workflow for us in getting everything out on paper and documented is really important. We have workflows that are kind of all over the place. Having linear workflow and seeing that mapped out on multiple different boards is pretty awesome. That’s really helpful for me. The atmosphere here is awesome. I definitely just stared at the walls figuring out how to make my facility look like this place. This place rocks. It’s invigorating. The walls are super, it’s just very cool. The atmosphere is cool. The people are nice. It’s a pretty cool place to be. Very good learning atmosphere. I literally want to model it and steal everything that’s here at this facility and basically create it just on our business side. The play is hilarious. I literally laughed so hard that I started having tears yesterday. And we’ve been learning a lot, which you know we’ve been sitting here we’ve been learning a lot and so the humor definitely definitely helps it breaks it up. But the content is awesome off the charts and it’s very interactive. You can raise your hand. It’s not like you’re just listening to the Professor speak, you know the wizard teaches with the wizard interacts and he takes questions. That’s awesome If you’re not attending the conference, you’re missing about three quarters to half of your life you’re definitely It’s it’s probably worth a couple thousand dollars so You’re missing the thought process of someone who’s already started like nine profitable businesses. So not only is it a lot of good information, but just getting in the thought process of Clay Clark or Dr. Zellner or any of the other coaches, getting in that thought process of how they’re starting all these businesses, to me, just that is priceless. That’s money. Well, we’re definitely not getting upsold here. My wife and I have attended conferences where they upsold, where it was great information and then they upsold us like half the conference. And I don’t want to like bang my head into a wall. And she’s like banging her head into the chair in front of her. Like, it’s good information, but we’re like, oh my gosh, I want to strangle you. Shut up and go with the presentation that we paid for. And that’s not here. There’s no upsells or anything. So that’s awesome. I hate that. Oh, that makes me angry. So, glad that’s not happening. So the cost of this conference is quite a bit cheaper than business college. I went to a small private liberal arts college and got a degree in business and I didn’t learn anything like they’re teaching here. I didn’t learn linear workflows. I learned stuff that I’m not using and I haven’t been using for the last nine years. So what they’re teaching here is actually way better than what I got at business school. And I went what was actually ranked as a very good business school. I would definitely recommend that people would check out the Thrive 15 conference. The information that you’re gonna get is just very, very beneficial. And the mindset that you’re gonna get, that you’re gonna leave with, is just absolutely worth the price of a little bit of money and a few days worth of your time. I’m Rachel with Tip Top K9 and we just want to give a huge thank you to Clay and Vanessa Clark. Hey guys, I’m Ryan with Tip Top K9. Just want to say a big thank you to Thrive 15. Thank you to Make Your Life Epic. We love you guys, we appreciate you and really just appreciate how far you’ve taken us. This is our old house. Right, this is where we used to live a few years ago. This is our old neighborhood. See, it’s nice, right? So this is my old van and our old school marketing, and this is our old team. And by team, I mean it’s me and another guy. This is our new house with our new neighborhood. This is our new van with our new marketing, and this is our new team. We went from four to fourteen, and I took this beautiful photo. We worked with several different business coaches in the past, and they were all about helping Ryan sell better and just teaching sales, which is awesome, but Ryan is a really great salesman. So, we didn’t need that. We needed somebody to help us get everything that was in his head out into systems, into manuals and scripts, and actually build a team. So now that we have systems in place, we’ve gone from one to 10 locations in only a year. In October 2016, we grossed 13 grand for the whole month. Right now it’s 2018, the month of October. It’s only the 22nd, we’ve already grossed a little over 50 grand for the whole month and we still have time to go. We’re just thankful for you, thankful for Thrive and your mentorship and we’re really thankful that you guys have helped us to grow a business that we run now instead of the business running us. Just thank you, thank you, thank you, times a thousand. So we really just want to thank you, Clay, and thank you, Vanessa, for everything you’ve done, everything you’ve helped us with. We love you guys. Hello, my name is Charles Colaw with Colaw Fitness. Today I want to tell you a little bit about Clay Clark and how I know Clay Clark. Clay Clark has been my business coach since 2017. He’s helped us grow from two locations to now six locations. We’re planning to do seven locations in seven years and then franchise. Clay has done a great job of helping us navigate anything that has to do with running the business, building the systems, the checklists, the workflows, the audits, how to navigate lease agreements, how to buy property, how to work with brokers and builders. This guy is just amazing. This kind of guy has worked in every single industry. He’s written books with like Lee Crocker, Head of Disney with the 40,000 cast members. He’s friends with like Mike Lindell. He does Reawaken America tours where he does these tours all across the country where 10,000 or more people show up to some of these tours. On the day-to-day, he does anywhere from about 160 companies. He’s at the top. He has a team of business coaches, videographers, graphic designers, and web developers. They run 160 companies every single week. So think of this guy with a team of business coaches running 160 companies. In the weekly, he’s running 160 companies. Every six to eight weeks, he’s doing Reawaken America tours. Every six to eight weeks, he’s also doing business conferences where 200 people show up and he teaches people a 13-step proven system that he’s done and worked with billionaires helping them grow their companies. I’ve seen guys from start ups go from start up to being multi millionaires, teaching people how to get time freedom and financial freedom through the system. Critical thinking, document creation, making it, putting it into, organizing everything in their head to building it into a franchisable, scalable business. One of his businesses has like 500 franchises. That’s just one of the companies or brands that he works with. So amazing guy. Elon Musk, kind of like smart guy. He kind of comes off sometimes as socially awkward, but he’s so brilliant and he’s taught me so much. When I say that, Clay is like he doesn’t care what people think when you’re talking to him. He cares about where you’re going in your life and where he can get you to go. That’s what I like him most about him. He’s like a good coach. A coach isn’t just making you feel good all the time. A coach is actually helping you get to the best you. Clay has been an amazing business coach. Through the course of that we became friends. My most impressive thing was when I was shadowing him one time. We went into a business deal and listened to it. I got to shadow and listen to it. When we walked out I knew that he could make millions on the deal. They were super excited about working with him. He told me, he’s like, I’m not gonna touch it, I’m gonna turn it down, because he knew it was gonna harm the common good of people in the long run. And the guy’s integrity just really wowed me. It brought tears to my eyes to see that this guy, he doesn’t, his highest desire was to do what’s right. And anyways, just an amazing man. So anyways, impacted me a lot. He’s helped navigate any time I’ve got nervous or worried about how to run the company or you know navigating competition and an economy that’s like I remember we got closed down for three months. He helped us navigate on how to stay open, how to how to get back open, how to just survive through all the COVID shutdowns, lockdowns because our clubs were all closed for three months and you have $350,000 of bills you’ve got to pay and we have no accounts receivable. He helped us navigate that and of course we were conservative enough that we could afford to take that on for a period of time. He was a great man. I’m very impressed with him. So Clay, thank you for everything you’re doing and I encourage you if you haven’t worked with Clay, work with Clay. He’s going to help magnify you and there’s nobody I have ever met that has the ability to work as hard as he does. He probably sleeps for maybe six hours a day and literally the rest of time he’s working and he can outwork everybody in the room every single day and and he loves it. So anyways, this is Charles Kola with Kola Fitness. Thank you Clay and anybody out there that’s wanting to work with Clay It’s a great great opportunity to ever work with him. So you guys have a blessed one. This is Charles Kola. We’ll see you guys. Bye Bye. Hi, I’m Aaron Antis with Shaw Homes. I first heard about Clay through a mortgage lender here in town who had told me what a great job he had been doing for them, and I actually noticed he was driving a Lamborghini all of a sudden, so I was willing to listen. In my career, I’ve sold a little over $800 million in real estate. So honestly I thought I kind of knew everything about marketing and homes and then I met Clay and my perception of what I knew and what I could do definitely changed. After doing 800 million in sales over a 15 year career, I really thought I knew what I was doing. I’ve been managing a large team of sales people for the last ten years here with Shaw Homes. And, I mean, we’ve been a company that’s been in business for 35 years. We’ve become one of the largest builders in the Tulsa area, and that was without Clay. So when I came to know Clay, I really thought, man, there’s not much more I need to know, but I’m willing to listen. The interesting thing is our internet leads from our website has actually in a four-month period of time has gone from somewhere around 10 to 15 leads in a month to 180 internet leads in a month. Just from the few things that he’s shown us how to implement that I honestly probably never would have come up with on my own. So I got a lot of good things to say about the system that Clay put in place with us and it’s just been an incredible experience. I am very glad that we met and had the opportunity to work with Clay. So the interaction with the team and with Clay on a weekly basis is honestly very enlightening. One of the things that I love about Clay’s perspective on things is that he doesn’t come from my industry. He’s not somebody who’s in the home building industry. I’ve listened to all the experts in my field. Our company has paid for me to go to seminars, international builder shows, all kinds of places where I’ve had the opportunity to learn from the experts in my industry. But the thing that I found working with Clay is that he comes from such a broad spectrum of working with so many different types of businesses that he has a perspective that’s difficult for me to gain because I get so entrenched in what I do, I’m not paying attention to what other leading industry experts are doing. And Clay really brings that perspective for me. It is very valuable time every week when I get that hour with him. From my perspective, the reason that any business owner who’s thinking about hooking up with Thrive needs to definitely consider it is because the results that we’ve gotten in a very short period of time are honestly monumental. It has really exceeded my wildest expectation of what he might be able to do. I came in skeptical because I’m very pragmatic and as I’ve gone through the process over just a few months, I’ve realized it’s probably one of the best moves we’ve ever made. I think a lot of people probably feel like they don’t need a business or marketing consultant because they maybe are a little bit prideful and like to think they know everything. I know that’s how I felt coming in. I mean, we’re a big company that’s definitely one of the largest in town. And so we kind of felt like we knew what we were doing. And I think for a lot of people, they let their ego get in the way of listening to somebody that might have a better or different perspective than theirs. I would just really encourage you if you’re thinking about working with Clay. I mean, the thing is, it’s month to month. Go give it a try and see what happens. I think in the 35-year history of Shaw Homes this is probably the best thing that’s happened to us and I know if you give them a shot I think you’ll feel the same way. I know for me the thing I would have missed out on if I didn’t work with clay is I would have missed out on literally an 1800% increase in our internet leads. Going from 10 a month to 180 a month, that would have been a huge financial decision to just decide not to give it a shot. I would absolutely recommend ClayClark to anybody who’s thinking about working with somebody in marketing. I would skip over anybody else you were thinking about and I would go straight to Clay and his team. I guarantee you’re not going to regret it because we sure haven’t. My name is Danielle Sprick and I am the founder of D. Sprick Realty Group here in Tulsa, Oklahoma. After being a stay-at-home mom for 12 years and my three kids started school and they were in school full-time. I was at a crossroads and trying to decide what what do I want to do. My degree and my background is in education but after being a mom and staying home and all of that I just didn’t have a passion for it like I once did. My husband suggested real estate. He’s a home builder so real estate and home building go hand in hand and we just rolled with it. I love people, I love working with people, I love the building relationships, but one thing that was really difficult for me was the business side of things. The processes and the advertising and marketing, I knew that I did not have what I needed to make that what it should be. So I reached out to Clay at that time, and he and his team have been extremely instrumental in helping us build our brand, help market our business, our agents, the homes that we represent. Everything that we do is a direct line from Clay and his team and all that they’ve done for us. We launched our brokerage, our real estate brokerage, eight months ago. And in that time, we’ve gone from myself and one other agent to just this week, we signed on our 16th agent. We have been blessed with the fact that we right now have just over 10 million in pending transactions. Three years ago, I never would have even imagined that I would be in this role that I’m in today, building a business, having 16 agents, but I have to give credit where credit’s due. And Clay and his team and the business coaching that they’ve offered us has been huge. It’s been instrumental in what we’re doing. Don’t ever limit your vision. When you dream big, big things happen. I started the business because I couldn’t work for anyone else. I do things my way. I do what I think is in the best interest of the patient. I don’t answer to insurance companies. I don’t answer to large corporate organizations. I answer to my patient and that’s it. My thought when I opened my clinic was I can do this all myself. I don’t need additional outside help in many ways. I mean, I went to medical school, I can figure this out. But it was a very, very steep learning curve. Within the first six months of opening my clinic, I had a $63,000 embezzlement. I lost multiple employees. Clay helped us weather the storm of some of the things that are just a lot of people experience, especially in the medical world. He was instrumental in helping with the specific written business plan. He’s been instrumental in hiring good quality employees, using the processes that he outlines for getting in good talent, which is extremely difficult. He helped me in securing the business loans. He helped me with web development and search engine optimization. We’ve been able to really keep a steady stream of clients coming in because they found us on the web. With everything that I encountered, everything that I experienced, I quickly learned it is worth every penny to have someone in your team that can walk you through and even avoid some of the pitfalls that are almost invariable in starting your own business. I’m Dr. Chad Edwards I’m Dr. Chad Edwards and I own Revolution Health and Wellness Clinic.