The Power of Personal Growth in Business Success with Mike Agugliaro

I think this is where it becomes powerful. You talked about selling with purpose for a higher purpose and exiting a very powerful, successful electrical company into building from scratch. A coaching business to essentially help people facilitate what you went through and what you learned. Walk me through a little bit about CEO Warrior and why you wanted to build that.

I'm going to tell you what we do, and most of you probably shouldn't do what we do. We have a say no to anyone policy. So who do we work with? We do work solely with business owners, predominantly 99%, that's who in our world, business owners. We're in 120 different industries. One more thing on AI. AI is not going to remove any of your leadership weakness. If you think that AI to improve a little bit of conversion, that it's a conversion problem in your company, an average problem in your company, a lead problem in your company, I got news for you. No different you than me. It's a me problem in my company. So AI is knowledge, but you need wisdom. And if you don't get wisdom, AI is a complete distraction today.

Good day and welcome to the Wealthy Entrepreneur Podcast. I'm your host, Bob Govreau. It is a pleasure to have you here with us today. I want to remind you that this is the place where we dissect the elements that contribute to entrepreneurial success, from mindset and leadership and to profits and revenue. We're in for a treat today. I've got a special guest, a good friend of mine, Mike Aguilera. And this episode is going to be called From Electrician to Empire. Mastering Business wealth and Life Design with Mike Aguilera. Mike has been a tremendous entrepreneur from starting an electrical company and exiting to starting a coaching business focused on the trades and exiting and now focusing on coaching hundreds of different industries and people on life, wealth and mastering everything in between with business. It's a real pleasure. I've been fortunate to be along the journey with Mike. I think I first met Mike right after he sold his electrical business, which I'm going to get him to speak about today. And it's been a true pleasure to watch him. He is one of the most focused, intense, but very specific. Right. He's very calculated in how he does things and he's also an extremely generous human being who's just here to serve people and help people along their journey. So it's an absolute pleasure to have Mike join us here today. And I guess without further ado, I'm going to welcome in my friend, Mike Aguilera. All right, guys. I am really excited to have my friend Mike Aguilera in here today. Mike, before I get you maybe sharing your story, I want to share a little story about you, sir. If you guys had the opportunity to connect with Mike in person, you would find one of the most genuine, giving, intelligent, motivated, inspired people that you would ever meet in your life. And sometimes that comes with a little of an intimidation factor, Mike. So I'm just gonna throw that out there a little bit. Not to mention being martial arts trained and a pretty serious guy about life and performance. And when I first met Mike, when we actually were in the same coaching community and Mike and I had the opportunity to go for dinner out in the LA area and I remember Mike sitting across from me. We were at a steakhouse. He picked up the steak knife in a very weird, like, you know, martial arts kind of guy way and I'm like, oh, damn, this guy's just, he's mind blowing. And I remember you turning to me and you said, you know, Bob, we've got this opportunity, we're spending this time together. How can I help serve you? Which is something that you would hear Mike say very often because he's very giving. And I remember just sort of being blank at the time. I was a young, young kid at the time, really. And Mike's like, well, where do you want to go? And I said, well, Mike, I want to build a hundred million dollar CPA firm. No one individual's ever done it before I want to do it. And he looked at me and he said, you're going to have to change who, who you are and become the leader of the hundred million dollar firm before you're going to be able to ever start the process of getting there. And it's been probably the most impactful conversation I've ever had in my business life ever. And certainly I've been working a lot on myself. So just as a bit of an intro, guys, this is the type of person that we've got on the other end of this. Mike, it is a pleasure to have you. Thank you so much for joining today and would love to hear the story of how you got started.

Yeah, well, I'm excited that I was able to impact your life because that's really what I'm alive for today. I mean, that's my soul's purpose, is impact. But it wasn't always like that. So if I give everybody the fast round kind of story is, you know, I'm from a blue collar family and I always say I'm a survivor of A pretty wild divorce. My mom and dad got divorced very young. I ended up on my own at 15, out there with my brother. He was 17 at the time, and we were just figuring it out. So any of you out there listening now, or maybe you could relate to this? Like, I understand sometimes it could be scary, it could be tough. And I, I learned to live off of ramen noodles. If anybody listened to Never, you could get five for A$25, convince yourself you're eating like Asian food and stuff because you put it in a little water. Later it got more advanced. I ate it later too. It was called cup of noodles. So they made it a little more convenient. And you get five for A$25. And when the woman would say, how many in the bag? I would say, oh, there, there's only five. But I would try to throw a couple extra inning. And, I mean, we're talking about a quarter more. But when you're on your own at 15, like, every 25 cents really, really mattered. And, you know, through this, we'll probably come up with some of the toughest things in life, are actually the greatest gifts. But also, I don't prescribe to that crap that if you could rewind time, you hear, people go, oh, if I could rewind time, I would change nothing. I'm like, hell, no. I would change a lot. There'd be a lot of things I would do different. I did go to a vocational school because that's where all the misfits went. If you weren't built for college, it was like a conveyor belt. It's like college college. Mike, probably electrician or plumber. I mean, I already. Well, I have a bunch of tattoos, but I got my first tattoo when I was, I think, 14 years old. I had a big Afro, chain wallet, cut off, jeans, pretty much call them combat boots. So if you looked at me, you're like, yeah, definitely criminal by nature. Even though, Peter, you know, you had said like, this intense person. But, you know, I looked intense when I. I was young. But I've never done drugs my entire life. I've never drank alcohol my entire entire life. I never drank coffee my entire life. I never smoked cigarettes my entire life. I haven't eaten gluten for 18 years. I haven't done any form of real caffeine in 18 years. But before you make me, my wife says, look, you're like a purple unicorn. We know they exist. We never met one. But don't confuse me with someone who waits up at 4:30 and sniffs butterfly Butts and cold plunges. I'm not, I'm not that guy. I'm not that guy either. But I went to a vocational school and became an electrician. And people say, why electric? Well, it was the only thing when I went and experienced it, Robert, that if you do it wrong, it kills you. So I'm pretty sure I was living the death wish back then. I was like this. The teacher said, well, if you touch this and this to your body by accident, you'll die. And I was like, hell yeah. Like, are you kidding me? This is like, like taming. Taming venomous snakes every day. So I graduated in 88. My brother and I had started our own electrical contracting business. I love my brother. It was the first time I found out that you may not want to do business with your brother. That didn't last too long. And then I ended up, you know, starting electrical contracting business and doing it horrible for a decade. Horrible. Every, every excuse you could imagine. I mean, afraid to hire people. All my people were horrible. Everybody was on drugs. They all stole from you. I had to do everything myself, do the paperwork, the permits. I climbed in a lot of attics, crawl spaces. I mean, my dad was a mason. I posted a picture on Facebook the other day if anybody follows me, and it was me. I was about eight years old, carrying bricks and mixing cement. I mean, my dad's not around no more. He passed a couple of years ago. But I mean, talk about a hard job mixing concrete and stuff. That's. I was bred into. I did the post the other day. I said, I, I was not born into blue collar. I was conditioned by blue collar. Like, they formed me into a machine. I'll hand it back over to you a minute. After a decade of struggle, my son was born. And any of you that are listening, this is an impactful moment in your life. And my son was born. And my wife was in the hospital with my son Michael. And I was home. And I built one of these, you know, gliding rocking chairs for my wife because she was going to do the breastfeeding thing. And I remember sitting in that chair after it's built. It must have been 10 or 11 o' clock at night. I could feel it like it was yesterday. I just sat in a chair and I just started crying. I was bawling and I was like, not from happiness, from. I was going to become just like my dad. I was going to miss everything. And I love my dad. He did the hardest working man I know, but he worked seven days a week. He Saw us for a little bit of time. Yeah, we did a couple vacations, but I thought I was going to miss everything. And that was a turning point where I said, it's not learning curves, it's lack of education. Right? That's what it is. It's lack of education. So I went on a quest to find people smarter than me. And I was brave enough to listen. So let me hand it back to you because I want to squeeze as much tangible action for everybody that listens to this.

No, I love that. I actually want to keep the story going, Mike, a little bit. So you built this electrical. Tell me what you built ultimately, at the end of the day. And then what happened once you built this absolute machine?

Yeah, I went from me and my business partner working in two old vans as an electrical contracting company. We weren't fancy. Like today. Like today, if you don't have a Mercedes Benz van that you could stand up in and dance, it's like you're a loser. I'm old school. We had an effing beeper on our side. We no cell phones. When the beeper went off, you felt like you were getting electrocuted multiple times a day. And you had to bend over in the truck to get parts. I mean, nobody can, like, unless you live that. And hopefully some people listening can. You can't relate. And I know it might sound like you walked a hundred miles, you know, barefoot in the snow with three toes or something. No, it was really, really, it was like that. And just to give everybody a little motivation. In New Jersey, where we were running this company, every company's bigger than us. At least that's what it felt. There was companies with 50, 75, I mean, big companies all over. And we decided one day, me and my partner, that we would build a company bigger, more professional, better than anybody else, which you better be brave to do that. But it's easier today than ever. We took it to 32 million in under 10 years. We were tracking. Now this is not that 32 million like I did. One million plus two equals. Three plus five equals. It's not that shit, everybody. This was 32 million double digit profit tracking for 40 million in 2017. 165 vehicles on the road, 200 employees serve at 34,000 customers a year. And a culture that would battle up against, you know, Zappos culture and a theory that can combat against Disney. And I sold it in 2017. I didn't sell it. I sold myself into a bigger future. And I wanted to do something. I got that company to run five years without me. Five years. Because I heard somebody, actually a good friend of mine, very smart person, if anybody hasn't read any of his books. Mike McAllowitz, great guy, real profit first. A toilet paper entrepreneur. He's got more books. He's a brilliant guy. And I heard him speak a long time ago about exiting companies because he sold a bunch. And one of the people, either him or someone else speaking, said, you know, if you're going to sell a company, the last thing you want to do is walk them through the company and be like, that's my office there. I'm in at 6:30 and I leave at 6:30. Because your multiple goes down, your value goes down. When I heard that, I walked in and I said, I'm not going to have an office no more. I grabbed my shit, I got out of the office, I put someone in there and I didn't have an office for the last five years of owning that company. Which when they did tour before, they bought me and said, where's your office? I don't have an office. You kidding me? I come when I want, I leave when I want. So here's what the unique thing was, which is was rare, Robert, but it's not so rare. It's not so rare today. It was very rare. I wanted to sign my name, become very wealthy and walk away the next day. I didn't want to stay on for three months. I didn't want to stay on six months, two years. I didn't want another bite of the apple. I wanted to sign and go into my biggest future. And that's what exactly happened. The other unique thing was I had a number in my mind I wanted to sell for. I sold to that number to the penny, to the. Which is, you know, you put a number 30 million, 32 million. I won't give everybody exact number, but if you write that down, the chances of you closing at exactly that exact number, that's like lightning striking three times on top of the winning Lottie lottery ticket. But since I proved it, I've later now, now that I helped the Last Less than 4 years Over 150 people Scale and exit companies. I learned that I've been able to produce that over and over again. So. So there's success story number one. You tell me if you want to go go into number two.

Yeah, I definitely do because I think this is where it becomes powerful. You sort of talked about selling with purpose for a higher purpose and exiting a very powerful, successful electrical company into building from scratch, a coaching business to essentially help people facilitate what you went through and what you learned. Walk me through a little bit about CEO Warrior and why you wanted to build that.

Yeah, so when I was going and I was scaling in 2014, he wasn't wrong. Everybody listening by saying, I'm a little intense. I was going to conventions and stuff and I kept watching these people in suit and ties trying to teach stuff that they did 40 years ago. And there's companies that were in organizations for a decade and they never broke a million dollars or maybe they got to 3 million. And I came home and I told my wife, I'm pissed off. And my beautiful wife Jennifer, we're together over four decades now, since we're 15 years old. So me telling her I'm pissed off is not a new thing. I said I'm aggravated. She said, why? I said, because the industry is weak. The coaches today are weak. The people helping the service and blue collar industry are effing weak. And I'm tired of watching great people struggle because I, I would go to these shows and conventions and they would go, I would say, how's things going? And they would go, you know, horrible. Hard to find people and this and that. And then I'd go, yeah, I understand, understand. I just added, I just did a six and a half million additional in a year. That was one of the biggest jumps. I went to six, I just ordered 22 vans at one time. I just hired 30 people. And now I got to go like this. Dim my flame. Oh, I understand. It's so hard out there today. We should slice each other's wrist, right? Okay. I'm not promoting violence. Nobody, nobody do that. So I got annoyed and I told my wife, I'm going to change the whole effing blue collar industry single handedly. So I went out there at first and I called myself the business ninja because I got 40 years in martial arts and actually I was trained in ninjutsu and daichiro Ike jujitsu and shorin r karate and all the Okinawan weapons and tension ryu, kenjutsu, live sword and Muay Thai. I've been trained almost my whole entire life. And they made fun of me. Oh look, the business ninja. And I said, oh baby, fuel me, Fuel. Keep fueling me. So in 2014 I started that. By 2019. 20, let me see, 2014, yeah. By 2019 I was coaching a thousand business owners in the blue collar space. I become known and I still am known as the top guy to help scale anybody. I'm in 120 different industries now. But if it's blue collar, I sneeze that stuff and results happen. I mean it's so easy for me. And I had over 20,000 tradespeople come through my trainings. We ran 35 three day events and I scaled that with because it was a movement, I built Gold medal service because it was a movement to show what was possible. I built CEO Warrior to change an industry. Look, money comes as a byproduct of your soul's purpose, doing what it feels it needs to do next. I did sell that company in 2020. I never sold a company. I moved myself into a bigger purpose and we could go there if you want. But those two exits happened in less than four years combined, which is always, is also pretty rare for a business owner to do two over eight figure exits in less than a four year period is pretty rare too. So where do you want me to.

Take them from there and then to start another venture? Right. And I think, you know, we're seeing the pattern here, Mike, with the evolution of okay, I've continuous higher purpose. So when you sold CEO Warrior, and I won't necessarily go into the details about that, but I think it was a private equity purchase and certainly would, would value insights or ideas or comments on how that whole situation went from a business owner's perspective. But then you looked at the next purpose to say, okay, I've really done the blue collar, done the service. Now I want to expand and help even more people. Maybe even, I would say maybe more spiritually or mindset wise. Walk me through the start of Food Dog Group and what really inspired you to get that going?

Yeah, I sold in, I sold Sea of Warrior in 2020 to a private equity, I'm a fan of private equity. I mean they got, it's kind of like a double sided sword. You get a, you get a big win with a couple little slices from the sword too. But I'm a big fan. They're really smart people. Everybody that bought every one of my companies way effing smarter than me. Way smarter. I mean these PE guys and M and A guys, they, they have degrees like you, you're really smart. Me, I, I, I've, I've only gained some knowledge because I did more stupid stuff stuff than good stuff. And I'm, I'm good at learning because I don't like pain and suffering. But you know, in 2020 I wasn't planning on selling CEO Warrior, but, but a pandemic was coming in. People were suffering, relationships were suffering and I needed to go save the world again. And I said it was time I changed an industry, let me go impact people's lives and what I wanted to do. I started Food Dog because one, food dogs are these. Why have them back here? They're these mystical lion dogs, a male and a female, which is very balanced because a lot of life and business seems to be out of balance. I mean you get a company that's nothing but testosterone driven and no balance in it. The thing self destructs itself. So I said to myself, me, my wife and somebody that's been in my world a long time, business partner now Aaron, who's with me. We went to dinner one night in Jersey and I said guys, I want to start a new movement and I want to call it Food Dog. And I think Aaron was like, what the heck's a food? Because nobody knows what a food dog is. Actually somebody, they sometimes say it wrong. Sometimes when I'm in airports they go F you dog. I said, no, that's only when we're mad at you. We say F, otherwise it's Food Dog. And I said, I want to change the way people think, the way they feel, their relationships, every aspect of that. Now later we morphed into what I finally made it to my soul's nirvana. I have no thoughts of ever. The way I'm an eggs at Food Dog is I die. It's built to go a thousand years. It's built for my son in the next generations to run it because. And I built it. So I can't leave this one, Robert, because I built it. We now do life, business and wealth. Which means the only way I can leave it is if I'm going to go dribble in a corner and do nothing. I was born on earth to, to, to help people and remove suffering. So today what we do is, I believe we're the most complete system because if you focus on business at what the sacrifice of relationship and if you, if you focus on business and you don't understand wealth, how will you get there? You know, you help people with numbers. We have the, the biggest illiterate literacy of business owners understanding numbers than ever in history. And AI is not making it better. If anything, it's making people more, more confused over it. So I moved into this movement and this one, I would say if I opened up and my soul like sat here in front of you, this is what it does. Today. I do own other companies and I do own build other companies and want them to exit because I'M good at it and it's fun. And I want everybody I help to get to the point they can create impact in the world. That's actually when I choose to partner or work with somebody, I say, look, two things. One, you got to do personal growth because if you don't, we can't partner. We can't do it yet. Number two, I'll help you become wealthy, wealthier than you could imagine. But we have to promise that you're going to get back in some way when we get there, when we get to nirvana, you're going to play a part in changing the world. If those two things are aligned, then I'm aligned with them. If they're not aligned, then I'm out of here. We just can't do it.

Yeah, yeah, no, that, that is awesome. And love that. And Mike, as far as Food Group, who is it that you're working with right now? And just if there's anybody listening how they could get in touch with you about that, I just don't want to miss this opportunity right now.

Well, you know, I'm going to tell you what we do and most of you probably shouldn't do what we do. We have a say say no to anyone policy. So who do we work with? We, we do work solely with business owners, predominantly 99%, that's who in our world. Business owners. We're in 120 different industries. I have doctors, coaches, I'm working with five different agencies. I have one of the top AI expert companies I work with. I work with one of the top IT and cybersecurity companies. I work with plumbers and H vac, electricians, drain pest control, garage door. Anybody that services a service industry, residential or commercial, we work with, we have doctors that own doctors, martial arts studios. I mean it's 120 industries. The majority of them fall normally between 1 and 10 million. We do have a lot of handful of people that are about 500,000 because at 500,000 most people don't want to bother with them. But for me, 500 to 1.5 or 2 million, 10 months or less, I don't care what business they're in because most people don't understand marketing, sales, operation systems. They're not strategic, they don't have, they were never born into critical thinking. And we have startups. And I mail out books every single day. I've written, I think 28 books now. I send them out every day for free. I cover shipping. Matter of fact, the full one day together we just spent with 55 people. I'm old school Italian. That's what I was born. I mean they're like, how much does it cost to hang out with you for the day? I'm like, that day it's free. And I'm not feeding you a little box lunch with like stale bread and an old apple. Like it's full blown, like Italian. Now I'm gluten free. So we do have gluten stuff and healthy stuff, but we give more. I mean we send my Mind Power book to shelters and battered women's shelters and I cover all the shipping to help people. So yeah, and our biggest companies we work with probably fall pushing up around 30 to 50 million. After they're 50 million, they're actually too smart for themselves. Most of the time their ego's too big. They think they can't go any anymore. So that's the realm of what we work with. Now everybody listen. And I would tell you probably, probably don't do that. You know what I mean? Most people will tell you know your exact stay in one niche and do things. But I gotta tell you, son Robert, being in one niche is actually, there's consequences for people. With that I owned a, I built and scaled with what I would call best practice organization. The, the reality is if everybody's doing the same thing, it has a reversal effect. Right?

Right.

It's like you can't outrun the next mo more motivated or bigger company. And now today, and Jay Abraham taught me this. I mean if anybody doesn't know, look up Jay Abraham. He's probably one of the highest paid consultants on earth. Very smart. I paid him for one on one coaching for three and a half years, which I'm pretty sure I bought him a few, few Mercedes G wagons and stuff in my day. He's a brilliant guy and he taught me something. He said, mike, the secret weapon is don't do what others in your industry are doing. Go to a completely different industry and take some. So I started studying Zappos, Disney, Amazon, Walmart, Target. And people would say, I don't understand why you're scaling so fast. I said, because I'm doing nothing the way everyone else is doing it. And I hope everybody just wrote that down because I don't know who said it lately. I'm sure you heard it. And I think I heard it from Robin Robbins, another smart person or someone else. They said, you can't be better than better. You got to be different. And if you're not different going from first off, everybody, if you want hope from 2020, 26 to 2030, whenever you're watching this, more wealthy people will be created than ever in history. This is exciting. Also, we're facing the biggest purge since 2008 and 2010, and I went through that. And maybe you might want to ask me some questions about 2008, 2010, because we are facing. The indicators are already blinking that we're surpassing that right now, which is exciting for those that are learning, getting coached, and it's very scary for those that are not.

Yeah, let's talk about that a little bit, actually, because it's something that we feel right. So we work with about 2500 business owners across North America. We can feel that in sort of not. Not coaching them, but helping them from a professional services side. But we're feeling that, you know, the tightening of cash flow, the hesitation, the holding back right now, are you seeing that? And, and how does this tie into 20 2008, which is the year I started as well? So I remember that very well. And what were maybe some. Some of the most impactful decisions you made in 2008 that moved you forward?

Well, first off, look, in 2008 and 2010, I would call it not business. Combat sports, that was like maybe pre or UFC of business. It's not about what you do when it's happening. It's what I want everybody to know. Right now, there's a blinking light that I look for, at least in the United States. And right now, we serve. We serve companies all over United States, Canada, New Zealand, Japan, Australia. I mean, we got companies all over the globe. We serve. There's a blinking light. And I always been. I've been watching this one blinking light since I learned it back in 2008. It's. It's car repossessions. And if car repossessions are going up, that's a. That's an economic indicator that we're heading turbulence. The car repossessions right now in the US are actually starting to surpass 2008. That means we're a very inflated market. Now, in 2008, even though it was what they said, as close to the Great Depression as possible, I added at least an extra million to my company that year. But it was not easy. It was like combat. What I would tell everybody is I went and. And I was brave and I doubled down. And this ain't a new phrase to everybody listening, right? When everyone's running, you run in, right? Because where everybody's running away to that, that's not where that's not where freedom lies. That's where suffering lies. And I'm doing the same thing right now, except it's way easier because Today, you know, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X all, it's. It's nearly free, right? We didn't have that in 2008. You. You like. And I know that people today, suffering, you're, like, probably flipping the middle finger at this podcast, like, f. No, I don't want you to do that. I'm not making it sound too easy. I'm just saying it's way more possible. It's not difficult. It's just different. So what I would say right now is make sure you become really different. Number two, you have to rally and get ready for this. Now, I'm not in the real estate. Maybe you want to ask me how to not get into the. The crazy trap of wealth and what it could do to you if you're not prepared. It'd be good for people. But I focus on right now, the land of opportunity. And that's what everybody has, because when everyone runs away, you get to be strategic. You could change your marketing. You could ab split, test marketing today. You could change your positioning and be different. And now I do think it's a shrinking window. I think the next generation of wealth is. Is 2026 to 2030. After 2030. Now, why do I do this? People say, mike, you're kind of like Nostradamus, because I've helped a lot of people come wealthy. And through Covid, the industry that I was serving, which was blue collar, was down below 28%. My average client that I was working with in 2020 and 2021 was up over 600%. Because I knew. Did anybody really think. Actually, a guy from JP Morgan did something today. He said, We've been using AI since 2012. Well, everybody's acting like it's new. It's around pre 1970 or whatever. No, no, it's not new. It's just true for everybody now because everybody's ready to. To listen. And I would say to everybody, like, first off, the baby boomers, there's a land of opportunity there for everybody because they don't know how to retire. They don't even know how to exit. They don't know how to scale. So growing a company really is faster. And I would tell everybody, listen this. Don't back down. Back forward. Prepare your family and go all. Go all in. Go all in.

Yeah. The only thing Micah, I will add from my financial side too, with this to support it Is that now is a great time, Right. If we're seeing those blinking lights and those factors of economic struggle, right, that we're starting to see people get pinched a little bit, now's a really good time before. Before we get into the repercussions of that economically. Let's get our safety net built up. Let's get our financial resources in place. Let's stockpile our cash resources to go all in, right? Because to go all in means we have to invest. We have to invest time, we have to invest resources. So let's make sure that our house is in order right now before everybody else starts dropping off and everybody tightens their purse strings. Let's get our lines of credit in place and available for us, and let's keep our eyes open, because I agree with you, Micah. You know, every time there's a challenge, 2008, I would even say Covid as well, was another good challenge. Those people who are leaning into the opportunities, man, oh, man, there's a lot of good. There's a lot of good.

Yeah, yeah. And. And I don't think there's. There's problems. I think there's observations. If people can look at that. And I'm a big fan of you, because, look, you need, like. And people seem to wait too long and. And they seem to not want to pay enough. Like, tax advisor, key critical person, fractional CFO role, someone that looks at the numbers, strategic bookkeeping. Like, I am such a fan of this, and I've been a fan a long time, because not only is it watching the numbers, I just said this a week ago. I said to people, I had a whole. I don't know, maybe it was 150 or 180 people on. On Zoom. And I said to them, how good are you at what you do? Oh, you know, the edge of honor. They're all great. Okay. How much do you believe in what you do? Muscles, right? Big muscles and shit. Okay. If you believe in what you do and you believe in your product and your service, I would. You should be willing to sell your house and put all your money into it. Now, I had to buy out a business partner many, many years ago for $2.375 million. I had to come home to my wife. We couldn't get a loan and tell her, we're going to empty our whole home equity line. We're going to sign over everything we own, literally the clothes on our back, everything but our physical body. And kids. I'm going to sign over. If we fail, they will Come in. And they will just say, walk down the street lonely and alone. And my wife said to me, okay, so do what you got to do. And I signed over everything because I believed in myself and I believed in Skillset and I believed. Look, let me give everybody a secret sauce here. The secret sauce is this. Be connected to people way smarter than you. There. We're done. We're done. It's not. It's that effing simple.

It's true.

I have seven coaches right now. You've been one of my coaches for years and years. I rely on you. I reach out seven right now. I pay. Cause I don't believe in free insight, because free insight is only half the story. I have seven. And I spent 350,000 on coaching this year. I think I'm pretty effing smart. I mean, I've done over 500 million in my companies. But the thing is, people will not pay for smart people. And if they do, and they just said to this, what if every day, Robert, every business owner said, I'm going to buy this thing. Should I or should I not? I'm going to hire this person. Should I, should I not? I'm going to put this. I'm going to add this vertical into my company. Should I or should I not? I promise you, if you could afford Warren Buffett to be your financial advisor, you're probably going to win more than if you get the guy at Wells Fargo, I'm pretty sure, so. And that's really been my secret sauce since I figured it out. Now it's decades and decades. And I'm not saying this number to brag, so please, everybody. I'm not even impressed with myself. I'm now probably over 5 or 6 million in investing, in education. People go, oh, my God, that's crazy. Really. I went over 500 million. That's. And I get that wisdom for the rest of my life. So I would tell all of you, if you want one, know your numbers. And if you're not working with Robert or me or somebody, you better know your numbers, you better have them managed. And I agree, you should have a slush fund, but man, double down, because I do. I didn't read the book yet. There's a book that came out, I think it's called 1929. We are in the greatest growth time in history since the Industrial Revolution, since we went from horse and buggy to cars, is right now with what this AI and technology revolution's doing. So I don't forget to give everybody, like, so People know probably what an organizational chart is, right? Like, it's a chart. Everybody's role is what you need. You need to build the OR chart for your future. There's only really two new distinctions in an organizational chart. You now don't only have humans on it. My organizational chart has human robot technology. And those of you better have written it down. And you better ask Robert or his team or anybody. You better ask someone smart. What's the organizational chart of the future? It's not now, Robert. People, it's funny, they go, oh, I put this AI thing, and I'm going to remove my person who answers the phone. I'm like, are you effing kidding me? I'm trying to hire more smart humans than ever in history, and they're the smartest ones are in the market. So everybody's trying to reduce in what we're heading into. You got me all cranked up this morning.

I can see this, and I love it.

By the way, we're heading into the greatest time where trust economy is a superpower and people are like, no, no, no. I want AI to answer my phones. Okay, Poll all your clients and customers. Hey, Mrs. Jones, would you like to talk to a robot or a human? 90% of them will say, a human. And you want to shove a robot. I call Amazon. I mean, American Express. And they put me through their effing machine. And my wife looks at me and shakes her head because I'm like, effing representative. Effing representative. Then the representative comes on and says, I'd like to thank you for being a loyal member for 37 years. I said, thank me by putting a human on the phone when I call. 37 years, I have to talk to. Push three, push five, push six. And that's what I got for the. I had a black card at one time. I got rid of it because I was tired of acting like LL Cool J and stuff. Like, here's my black card, everybody. Aren't you so impressed by Mike's life? But look at me. Me and LL Cool J, a black heart. I got rid of the thing because it. You know, because they kept putting a robot on, and all it was doing was stroking my significance, which was pathetic how I behaved like. Like that.

So, all right, it's funny. I was on a panel for an AI conference, which I am not an AI expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I don't have my head in the sand either, right? I would say paying attention, implementing what. What can work. But on the panel and I think there were six or seven hundred people in the room. And they said, so what? What is something that people should be thinking about as they're implementing AI? I said, double down on personal connection 100%. And. And everybody kind of looked at me and they're like, it's an AI conference. And I'm like, absolutely. When everybody is, is trying to implement a thousand different flashy tools and taking away the personal connection, we know from 2020, we know how the importance of personal connection, everybody better not forget that. Right? I want to make sure that I come back to this because it sounded like you've got some great insights. The crazy trap of wealth. Talk to me about this.

Hey, I'll tell you about that. And one more thing on AI, AI is not going to remove any of your leadership weakness. It's not going to like, if you think that AI to improve a little bit of conversion, that it's a conversion problem in your company, an average problem in your company, a lead problem in your company. I got news for you. No different you than me. It's a me problem in my company. So AI is knowledge, but you need wisdom. And if you don't get wisdom, AI is a complete distraction. Today I see what people are doing. Look at this video I created. I'm half lion, half man. I'm like, that's real cute. How many leads to bring? 0. How much revenue it bring? Nothing. How long did it take? Only three minutes before bed. Okay, so you wasted three minutes before bed. Congratulations. Let me, let me tell you about the success trap, man. I got sucked right in, baby. I, I know when I look at Jim Carrey and stuff, some of these big famous people, that they deliver the message that's very different than awakening. I went out, you know, I owned buildings, companies. I mean, I was running to, you know, high eight figure companies at the. From 2014 to 2017, I was running two mega companies doing over 30 million a year at the same time. I started buying houses because that's what the gurus do. You buy real estate all over the place. I'm buying them like effing bubblegum, man. People are sending me, here's a house, it's 200,000. It's going to give you 15% return. I'm like, sign a name, bought another one, you know, and, and I gotta tell you, it's taken me over three and a half years, Robert, to, to unwind it. I looked and I'm like, what the hell did I do to myself? I got properties. I can't Keep up. I got multiple financial advisors. It took me two years to convince them. They lost three and a half million of my money, which I found and then I could never get. I ended up doing specialty insurance things. When I sold, trying to save every dollar on taxes and I got, I got robbed. Six and a half million there. You know, I said to my wife like, and we didn't have all the fancy cars because I'm not that type of guy. We own two vehicles, me and my wife. They're both Compact B class RVs. That's what my wife drives full time. We had the Mercedes and the BMW. And they're like, oh, that's what your wife drives? I'm like, yeah, it has a kitchen in it. She goes to the mall. It has her own bathroom in it. We could travel anywhere we want. Why do I need anything? Anything else? So three and a half years I went on a quest and I'll challenge you guys. Don't get in the trap. Actually, I'm so thankful I'm selling my last 15,000 square foot building. It will close before the end of the year or I'm going to probably get a big shovel and a couple attorneys are going to end up in a hole or something. Maybe scratch that out of this recording. No, I'm not going to do any of that.

He's not intimidating folks. I take it back.

Yeah, not at all. I got like, I got like knives and swords all over here and stuff. But I'm getting rid of my last building. And you know, I look at today a simple portfolio, a simple diversified portfolio is going to push almost as much money to you as, as a real estate portfolio. Except you're not fighting leases. Nobody stole all the copper pipes out of the residential home. You're not a slave. So look, we are going into a time the next two years that if you want to be a real estate mogul, like, it's right there. It's coming up. We are going to see. I'm a firm believer. I've been in it long enough. I mean I'm level 55, which I'm proud of because I'm reversing my age says by blood testing. I'm beating it by a decade. So I'm happy with that. But we're at the greatest economic time if you want to build it, because we're going to have the biggest real estate dump, I believe in the US than in history. In history. The indicators are there. How the false people's behavior of buying shit on Amazon and going to Disney they're all eating their big turkey legs. It's all a facade of the reality. So I don't want to tell everybody I'm against it for you. I'm against it for me. I would like nothing more. I wear the same shirts, I wear jean pants. I have the same socks, a pair of sneakers. I don't want anything complex because complex steals from, I think, your mental health. It steals from your physical health. And I know that because all I was doing was chasing money and homes and things. And Facebook makes you feel that you're a loser because you don't have a Lamborghini. You don't smoke big cigars, you don't have a big monster home. Even though most of those people that have that stuff, they can't stand their wives, their kids are disconnected from. I know, because I've been in that, you know, they put. Oh, Mike, before you speak, you're going to be in the green room. We're going to give you Fiji water and some green M and M. Like, I don't sit in this effing green room. I'm going to go out there and stand with the people, please. The minute everybody puts people on a pedestal, you're destroying yourself. I'm just a normal guy, but when I was in the green room, I was like, I'm seeing these people, Robert. I'm like, oh, so famous. And I'm listening in. I'm like, oh, my goodness, their life must be amazing. And they're like, yeah, I'm in a divorce for five years. She's taking the home. And I'm like. Then I look to the other side. Yeah, I'm battling all kinds of things and I'm drinking too much. And then they go on stage and they say, everybody, you gotta grind it out. You gotta. Gruden, get up and do push ups. I'm like, like, you do the push ups while you're drinking vodka or something. And then they're like, yeah, and everything is about your wife and your family. I'm like, what the hell is going on here? You were just saying you hate your wife, she's divorcing you. And I'm like, oh, my God, the world is. Is this fake, fake facade now. I normally don't make a lot of friends because I'm off stage. I'm like this, look at you, you big liar. Look at you. Look at you. I'm like, you're. That's not gonna serve your health long term, brother. You gotta go out there and say, as much money as you make the walls can fall. I mean, I've had four million dollar lawsuits. I thought I didn't even do anything wrong and I was getting sued and you know, but I don't lie to people. I, I don't lobby people. I tell them because. And actually the thing we just did, I told you the other day, 55 people. And the number one thing is why warn everybody? Like, if cursing offends you, you either gotta pray extra for me or don't come in my world. My dad taught me how to curse. They said one of the number one compliments from it was real, raw and not sugarcoated, authentic.

Absolutely.

That's what people want today. And I don't care if you want to judge me because I'm tattooed or judge me because I had a problem or judge me, but like, I think that's what's going to change the world. And for those of you business owners, I'm rooting for everybody. Robert, like I'm telling you, this is the lamb to the free. And if they get focus, guidance and they build the right team, so many are going to listen. This is going to be the turning point today for them. So I'm proud that you're doing this for the world.

Yeah, 100%. Mike, I know, I want to be respectful of your time and I know you've got to run, so I want to thank you for this. This has been, I'm glad I got you fired up a little bit. I can see it. I know you're going into your next session. It's like, I know he's ready to pump it today always, but. But thank you for your time. You've been very generous. I always love collaborating. I always feel like it's very special. You definitely bring a very raw, authentic energy. Very real, very straight and I appreciate it and respect it so much. So thank you. If someone were to say, hey, food dog group sounds like something I want to be part of or I want to be part of Mike's universe because look at how powerful this guy is. How do they connect with you?

Yeah, look, I don't want this to be a drive by for anybody. I would find me on social media. I'm on Facebook, I got YouTube. If anybody out there, if you're a business owner and you're just suffering, send me a private message. I'll give you insight. I'm not a guy that needs a dollar to help a human. Go to foodallgroup.com there's free resources and cool stuff there and that's probably the best way to find out. And, Robert, if you ever want me to come back again, we could get tactical and just talk. What are the five things on marketing or the five things on sales or the five things on operational? I know we're trying to. I mean, I don't want this to be motivational only either, because motivation goes away. I want it to be transformational for you guys so you could have clarity, alignment, and accountability. And if you work on your mindsets, your skill sets, and you take action and you get rid of all your past traumas and rewire that subconscious mind and start thinking different, don't worry about. There is no positive and negative, right and wrong, good or bad. There's only perspective of what you think. And I'm honored to have you and I'm honored to call you a friend, man. We've been friends for over a decade.

It's been a while.

Yeah, it's been a while. And I'm proud of what you're doing here and I'm proud of your success, man. You're a model to the world. So thank you.

Thank you, brother. Guys, this has been the Wealthy Entrepreneur podcast. I'm your host, Bob Govreau. It's been a pleasure to have you here, Mike. Again, so many insights. Can't wait to have you back. I will follow up on that for sure, guys. We're here to empower entrepreneurs with the financial confidence to really transform the world. We're here to move, make a movement together. And ultimately, if you feel like there's been really great insights, which I know there have been, and we can impact the lives of somebody, you know, make sure you grab this and you share it out. Ultimately, we're trying to impact the most amount of lives we possibly can. Make sure you give us a. Like, drop a comment in, but make sure you give a follow because we'll release another. Another episode again next week. Once again, Mike, thank you so much for joining, guys. Look forward to seeing you again next time.