“Blueprint for Business Success with Christopher Cochran: CEO of BlueChip Solutions

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What's up, my good people? Welcome to the CJ Moneyway Show, the podcast that brings you stories behind the success. Today we have on the show speaker, author, and CEO. We got my man Chris on the show today. How you doing today, Chris?

Doing good, CJ. How you doing, buddy?

Hey, man, I appreciate you coming on, taking the time out your busy schedule, man, to come on the show. Appreciate it. Thank you. So, Chris, so tell us a little bit about yourself and about your background.

Sure, CJ. Thank you so much for having me on the show. I appreciate it very much. You and I talked a little off, uh, offline here, and it was a pleasure talking with you there as well. My journey, I was raised in a small town in Pennsylvania. I eventually ended up going to college. I stayed with my high school sweetheart, married to her. We were dating when I was 15. I'm now 55, so it seems like ages long ago. My journey started really, I always, people ask like, you know, of course I'm the CEO of an IT company. It's a multimillion-dollar IT company here in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. But I always try to remind folks that my first job was selling door-to-door Yellow Page ads. This is back in the day when you didn't have the internet or any of this stuff, right? So, you know, I was going door-to-door trying to sell people ads to be in the Yellow Pages to get their information out. So it was an early lesson for me to be trained talking to people, right? To understand stories and to understand everyone's life. Better. And that's me on the professional side. Of course, I ended up spending much of my career in large IT companies, eventually starting my own company in 2008, became an entrepreneur. It was certainly an exciting moment, but also a very scary moment to be able to go out with nothing but myself and try to make something happen, knowing I have 3 kids and a wife and a house. And I'm like, "What am I going to do?" So, it's a little scary, but you get through it and you get past the fear and you move forward and you build upon and be confident in what you can do. On a personal side, like I said, been married now for quite some time. I have 3 beautiful children. Unfortunately, you know, we were hit as a family. This is the thing that hits you. There's the personal side and the business side. On the personal side, my son, my oldest son, our firstborn Christian, was hit with terminal cancer back in 2020, August 26th, 2020. And so that's what took us down a different road, right? We were a family that in many ways I think of is just perfect. You know, life was perfect. Business was going well. My kids were, you know, Christian had just graduated from college. I mean, things are just moving the way life's supposed to move. Like a lot of people, you know, you have different things that pop in and are not good and just part of the journey of life. But this was a journey that hit us really hard, obviously, that my oldest son, beautiful soul that he is, very caring and loving person, genuine kindness, was hit with terminal cancer. And this sent a trajectory for my family where we had to deal with the outcome of that. And so my son, he was diagnosed, like I said, August 26th, 2020. It was right as COVID was hitting. And when he was diagnosed, he told my family, he told all of us, my wife and I, when we were so down and just didn't know what to say, we were so sorry for him, what has happened to him. And Christian said to us, he said, "You know what? I wouldn't want this to be anyone else's burden. This is my burden to take on. And he had that foresight of just calmness and very cool. And he never once, I tell you, CJ, he never one time from the moment that he was given his diagnosis to the moment that he passed away one year later, he's 22 years old, he passed away on September 1st, 2021. Did he ever complain one time? He never said, "Why was me?" He said, "Why me?" And he just remained steadfast and positive. And so that's why I was on this journey to build and get out the message of the book that I have that's out now, which is called "What's Good About Today?" Right? And it was what Christian would tell us as parents when we would sit there and be upset. He would say, "No, what's good about today?" And it was his daily reminder, his daily vision to see the beauty, the absolute wonder that is in this world every single day. And no matter how difficult your days can be, You can find beauty in every single moment. So that's the legacy. That's what I do now. I spend much of my time speaking, going out to organizations or promoting the book, of course, just to get into the hands of people so that we can change lives and help people who are going through very difficult times right now across this country, across this world. And there's so much division, there's so much heartache and kids who are suffering. And I think that's part of my goal and part of my life now.

Yeah, first and foremost, man, I want to say sorry for your loss, man. And thank you. I know how sometimes things like that can, you know, affect you, seeing that you're almost on the second year anniversary right now. Yep, yep. Yeah, so my condolences to you and your family, man. And, you know, just the strength that you guys had to keep moving forward. And now you're doing things in your son's name because there's some things on here that, you know, when I was reading your bio, some things that you're doing in honor him. But since you brought up the book, I'm gonna go off the way that the questions was going. Because you brought up the book, What's Good About Today: A Purpose-Driven Life. And to the listeners, y'all go out there and go grab the book. Good read. I've seen some excerpts of it myself. But so, Chris, how was writing this book impacted you personally and professionally?

Well, on all levels, right? There's sort of the before pre-cancer and after cancer Chris Cochran. You know, I'm two people. I look back on that guy pre-cancer, I don't recognize that individual, right? Because I think a lot of my life, and I think a lot of people are like this, we lead a lot from the neck up, right? We lead with our head and we're not leading enough with the heart. And so, you know, my mindset going forward and how I've changed, I guess, is that, I lead much of my decision-making, how I go about my daily life, how I interact with people, how I lead my business, how I meet somebody for the first time is always led with my heart. And so I think if more people would do that, more people would lead with their heart, we'd have a much better purpose life in many ways. So it's changed me profoundly, obviously. Losing our firstborn Christian was— was the center of our family. You know, I always say, you know, your parents are the center of your family, right? It's me and my wife. But the truth is, I'm sure Christian would say it was us, but the truth is Christian was the center of the family. He was our go-to guy for his other siblings. He was the positive influence on all of us. He was the one who took us off the beaten path and he showed us the light. He showed us how glorious life can be every single day. And did it with positivity. And so, you know, it obviously changes you profoundly. It changes your, your dynamics as a family. I mean, statistically, families don't stay together, um, you know, over 50% fall apart when things like this happen. And that's because you're grieving in all different ways, right? And we can't understand each other's greetings. But I think that, uh, we stay together. We have a strong bond as a family. We love one another and And it's all built by love, right? And so it's profoundly changed me dramatically, of course.

Yeah, I can just imagine, you know, like you said, I think you said something that was profound, that a lot of times when you go through situations like this, it can, you know, ruin a family. It can uproot it, you know, as far as the love that we have for each other. But, you know, now it's a missing part. It's a missing element. That's there. And sometimes people go their own ways and we become unhappy with one another, stop loving one another like this, and, and so forth. But, uh, uh, thank God that he gave you guys the fortitude to stay together and be in it together, man. And that's just showed a lot about you guys' character, integrity, and like you said, the love that you all have for one another to stick through a trying time like that.

Uh, thank you, CJ. Thank you.

So, Chris, even in that time, okay, so you got the family and the family dynamics. How did, how did you find the strength and the resiliency to stay positive during such a difficult time in your life?

Yeah, I've been asked that, and, and I, I know there are really two fundamental things for that. One is to remain humble before God. I think it's very important that we remain humble in a general sense, to always remain humble in the life that we lead and the way that we do things. It's so important. Number 2, and I use this all the time, it's helped me get through, is to realize you're not in control. A lot of us want control and we think we're in control. I always thought I was in control, control of how much money we make, what kind of car we're going to get.. And it's not that those are bad things and that you want those things, and that's not the point, but to realize that, you know, your daily life, you're not fully in control because God's in control, right? Ultimately. And once you release that control, it does allow you to move forward with lots of things. It's not easy. I sit here today to tell you that for the first year and a half, tremendous struggles, right? Doesn't naturally just happen. There's a tremendous lot that goes into that. But I think at some point you learn to give over the control and you go, you know, "God, what do you want from me? What is it that I can do?" And it comes to me. And those things are, in the end, is to spread the message that Christian has left to me. The message is he loved so much, he lived so grandeurly, he did it with such purpose that I need to do the same thing, that I need to give back. That's whether it's building, to your point, which is building a mission, right? And doing the legacy fund through the Christian Cochran Legacy Fund, which was built really not per se to honor Christian, which is great. Christian wouldn't want that. But Christian, before he passed away, asked us to do this, right? Christian gave us direction at 22 years of age to give us direction. He wanted to build a legacy fund that would give back to the less fortunate, those who are in poverty, those that were hurting, specifically kids. So, like in Pittsburgh, we work with Propel Schools. It's a charter school in Pittsburgh. It's kids who really are broken families, those who are— some are homeless. It's shocking to me, and it breaks my heart. And so, I think using the legacy fund through financial means whether it's supporting after-school programs for kids in these inner-city areas, that's what we do. We give scholarships. We do all kinds of different programs to bring to light the message of what's good about today. Because you know what? These kids are going to school, they got a lot on their minds. I'm sure parents who are out there listening and that hear these things and know these things where kids are just They're bombarded with so much and they need hope. They need to know that every day is beautiful and they need to look at it that way.

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So that's where we put the effort into it there.

One thing that I find intriguing, man, I was just telling somebody this on the last episode, is that even when you're going through certain things and certain aspects of life, how you guys can just put aside what you're going through and how you're feeling and be of service to others. And I feel that's so commendable to you guys' character and a testament to you guys to say, I know we're going through this and I feel it every day and I feel this void every day, but to get up and to get out and to wanna serve others, wanna help others, I think giving out scholarships and the things that you guys doing in the Pittsburgh community, that's great, man. And we need more people with that type of attitude. 'Cause like you say, we such disarray, we division and everything. But when you have good-hearted people like yourself and your wife and your family, that's going off to the values of your child, you know, Man, that's, you know, that says a whole lot, man. That just says a lot.

Thank you so much. Appreciate that. Thank you. Yeah, we're trying. You know, it's like you say, it's not, it's not, it's not, it's not. Well, it makes it easy because Christian gave me a roadmap, right? The book is a roadmap and he gave me everything that I needed to fulfill a purposely driven life. And so the truth is that, you know, yeah, you're going through a lot, but when you give back, Man, it does so much more to your heart. You know, my heart's been ripped out of my chest a million times and pieces have just been torn away. But when you can give back, it's like little pieces just fill in your heart a little bit more and more. And when you see the joy or you see ways to help people to bring the light, it's a magical thing. It's magic.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, and one thing that you said earlier too, in the beginning of your conversation, that Although we go through things and, you know, painful situations, whatever, but when we fill that with the word of God, and when we have God, you know, put him first, then although we still feel the pain, we still question certain things, but it's like he— because his word, it doesn't lie. He fills a void that if we were just trying to go on things ourselves, that we probably wouldn't be able to conquer. And he gives us strength to endure things that we know ourselves that we wouldn't be able to endure. So we give him glory. We give him all the honor. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. 100%.

So, Chris, let's go off of that for a second, man, and start off what I wanted to ask you in the beginning, then we come back down. So how did some of the roles that you had in sales, marketing, operation, and management in large corporations shape you into the person that you are today?

Well, yeah, I think, you know, it's again part of everybody's journey. You have to start somewhere. So when I started it, you know, sort of at the bottom of the ladder, if you want to call it, in a corporation, it shapes you in a way when you're meeting people and those who end up being, you know, leaders that you look to, right? You know, when you're young, you're learning, you're absorbing, you're taking in a lot of information. For me, the way it shapes you is that I always wanted to be surrounded around positive people, people who had a vision for positivity, who saw things in a different way. And so I think that shaped me to be confident. You know, I'm very blessed to say I came from a strong family, 4 other brothers, so 5 total, my poor mother. We were all athletes. My father served in the military. He trained us to work hard, be loyal. And I think, you know, as I went into the business world, I looked for those characters, you know, that had those same traits always. And I always wanted to surround myself with smarter people. And that's the thing is like I always say to people, like, surround yourself with smarter people, better people than yourself.

Yeah.

Don't look, don't go down. Don't try to look for people who are less in many ways. It's, you know, you can help people in the world of business. I've always just tried to surround myself with those who were successful in so many different elements. Yes, successful in business, successful in their marriage, successful in life, successful with their kids, successful in how they approach their customers, how they treat their customers, how they treat their employees. And so, I've really been drawn to those kind of individuals, and that's what's helped craft me into what I do today.

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Yeah, I totally agree with you. My mother tell me that all the time. She used to tell me that all the time. Always surround yourself around people that know more than you. You know, don't ever try to be like the smartest one in the room because there are people that know more than you. And as you say about surrounding yourself with people with all these different skill sets, it does pay value because as we know, as far as we go back to the word too, it does matter who you listen to. It does matter who you listen to. Some people could take you down a foxhole and some people could take you to the avenues that you're actually trying to go. And those, like yourself, those are the people that I want to surround myself with.

Me too. Me too. Always.

So, Chris, tell us about your company, Blue Chip Solutions, where you are the founder and CEO, and what sets this company apart from others.

Yeah, so we're a small company, a little less than 50 employees, which by Pittsburgh standards is probably not too bad. But, you know, we are an IT consulting company, so we service companies with staffing. So there are companies that need IT people to come in, and so we'll staff those organizations. We also manage the backend for school districts. So there's school districts around Pittsburgh, but also I have school districts that we manage out towards the Philadelphia area and Central Pennsylvania where we manage the backend, you know, all the stuff that goes on behind the scenes, behind the curtain, you know, so to speak. So when you're at a school district and someone who's managing all the emails, and if technology goes down, if things are, uh, the network goes down and there are problems, We're the company that does that kind of thing. We also work with universities, big universities, well-known universities, where we supply them with personnel on the IT side. We do different solution programs on the IT side. What sets us apart is, I think, just that we manage the business with our heart. We're trying to run a business that's— I'm not looking to get the fast buck, you know. I also like to work with nice people.

I always—

the advice I always say is like, you know, pick and choose your customers, pick and choose the people you work with. So, you know, what sets us apart? I work with nice people. I work with the nicest people. My customers are nice. You know, I make a point that if I'm working with somebody, they got to be nice and reasonable. So You know, that's, that's important. So I sort of pick and choose. So yeah, I think what sets us apart is just trying to approach our customers with, you know, professionalism and taking care of them first and foremost and take care of our employees.

And that is a major thing as far as your employees and people that's nice. Me and my wife, we talk about it all the time. You know, you may go to McDonald's or Burger King service, sometimes it sucks, sometimes you get good service. But then you go to the chicken place, I can't—

Chick-fil-A.

Chick-fil-A.

Yeah, yeah.

The greatest service that you can possibly get. It don't matter which one you go to.

Right, right.

Or what area you go in. They just have great customer service. And that tends to bring people back probably more than the food is just because you know that you're going to get great service. And so I think, you know, what you're doing is a great model. Because that just draws people, you know. Don't nobody want to go somewhere where the employees angry or, you know, right? Right. Ain't nobody want to deal with all that foolishness. I go somewhere else, you know. Right, right. Bottom line, I don't want to spend my money with people that don't appreciate my money, you know.

Exactly, exactly. My youngest son actually worked at Chick-fil-A for a few, uh, for about a year or something. Oh yeah, he loved it. Yeah, it was such a great experience. So I'm glad. Yeah, I put my kids to work early, you know.

I hear you, man.

Get to work, get to work.

Hey, I hear you. I got a 13-year-old and he's playing basketball, but basketball don't work out on him. Work out for him. He's gonna be out there on the grind at 16.

Well, it's a good thing for kids to learn how money is made and how to get all kinds of things, right? How you work with people. So All my kids have had jobs and they're, you know, keep them active and, uh, that's important. They learn a lot.

Yeah, social skills, no idea, something that, you know, this society or this generation is missing terribly right now. So I only have a couple more questions for you, Chris, and you touched up on this earlier, but I would like, you know, for you to elaborate on it a little bit more. What is the mission behind the Christian Corwin CJ Moneyway Johnson Legacy Fund Foundation?

Yeah, well, overall the mission is to put in— to put our efforts into those who are in need, right? To help people. And so, you know, we're always seeking, and it comes to me kind of naturally, right, through the foundation, or one person passes through. So what we're doing is really focused on areas of need. Around people, people who are hurting. And again, that's just— our mission is to find goodness and to help the struggling families and kids and school districts. Part of the Legacy Fund is also to implement what's good about today, right? It's the message. And so, we've built lesson plans on this. I actually had a call yesterday from a major school district here in Pittsburgh that heard about the message and they wanna implement it across the school district, right? Because they said, look, some of our kids have lost hope. Some of our kids are just not, they're struggling. And we think that your message could actually, these kids have journals. So the first thing that happens when kids, now this is particularly, I'm working with 7th and 8th graders, right? And so kind of like your son's age, right? And what they do is they come in, they have a journal, and they write down first thing in the day is, "What's good about today?" They are right off the bat, they're trying to learn the positivity that can affect them for the rest of their day. And so, school districts wanna put this in because, and that's part of the mission, right? Our mission is to get that message out. It's a simple message, that's the thing, CJ, it's not complex, right? What's good about today is very simple. And if you break it down and ask that question, You can find the goodness, and I think every kid can find that goodness. And so the mission is focused purely on those questions and giving them good answers and that they understand there is beauty in every single day.

First, man, congratulations on that. And we pray and stand in the gap with one another and say, "If two or more come to agreement, there he is in the midst of us." And so I pray that more schools will come your way. For this initiative too, man, because as you was talking, it sounds like a good initiative because you can find something. For one thing, to the audience, that you can find good out of the day is just being able to open your eyes up to see another day. That's the first thing that you can write down, being thankful just to see another day. But I think that's a good initiative, especially for young kids, you know, like you say, like the school people said that a lot of these kids, even at that young age, like, how could you lose hope at 12, 13 years old? As we was talking about with our kids going to work, you ain't even live life yet. You ain't— you haven't even done nothing yet, you know? Right, right.

No, you're right, you're right, you're right. Yeah, you have to explain it to them many times. But, uh, you know, I think our kids are fortunate. So, but, you know, you focus on the ones that, that need the help. But yeah, You're right. You got to explain to him many times. Yeah.

And then that's a good thing, man, that you guys going out there and, you know, the less fortunate and those who don't have more than others. But sometimes you just need somebody to talk to, somebody that, somebody that knows that people cares, you know, because a lot of times people feel as though you don't care. And so it's great to have people like yourself and your family that's showing these individuals, these young, younger young kids that will be adults one day that there are people out there that really cares and want to help you get to where you're trying to go. And some of them people gonna wind up being successful in life because that's just how it go. That's the narrative.

That's true.

That's how it go.

Yep.

So to end that on this, Chris, man, I just got this one more question for you, and I appreciate you coming on the show today, man, and sharing your story. And I really believe that it was heartfelt. It was for me, I think I kind of sat over here and shed a tear a little bit. But, uh, how can listeners get involved or support the Legacy Fund inspired by Christian's life and his message?

Well, they can get involved in a couple different ways. One is they could do things on their own, right? You can start your own way of helping those, certainly through Christian Cochran. There's christiancochran.org. That is a website set up that talks about Christian, that has all the stories about Christian, all the good things that we're doing, a lot of events that we're involved in, ways to get involved through the foundation. Certainly there's ways to do it through financial means, but you know, it's not always about that. Like I said, we do a lot of things where we're just out at, we'll do a trail walk, invite families out, we'll rent out a whole space. And it's really just meant for everybody to come for the day and then have a picnic with each other and enjoy nature. So, there are a lot of ways that people can get involved. The other way is I think that getting the book provides opportunity to learn a little bit more about how to lead a purposely driven life, how to use the message of What's Good About Today. And you can certainly get those at Amazon, Barnes Noble, or any place online right now. And of course, I'm out. Certainly, anybody's welcome to reach out to me if they just want to talk. It's not necessarily anything else at chriscochranspeaks.com. So I'm always available. I love to talk to people. I also love to help people. So if you're going through something, I'm always happy to talk.

Man, that's cool, Chris. So is there anything else, man, that you would like to share with us? Any upcoming endeavors that you have going on that we can look forward to in the future?

Well, not that I can think. I mean, there's a lot of— I'm doing speaking arrangements and speaking engagements. I go all through Allegheny County. To libraries, Barnes Noble, just for the book purposes, but sometimes go to churches to speak. So it's random. Sometimes it just comes in. That's why part of that is just I let it come in. You know, when things come in, I'm ready to adapt to it. But being adapted to those things. But no, that's pretty much what I've got.

Okay, man. Well, I appreciate you coming on the show, man. Like I say, sharing your experience, sharing the heartfelt message. I hope people go out and grab the book. Like you said, it's at Barnes Noble, Amazon, and all the bookstores that you can find. A Purpose-Driven Life book. If you want to change your life and things like that, go grab the book. If you need an IT guy, I'm in Pittsburgh, hit up Solutions. Putting it out there for my man Chris. Hey Chris, man, I really appreciate you coming on the show. I want to get the book myself and check it out. Everybody that comes on the show that's authors people that written books. I'm trying to have a collection as being a writer myself. I got a bookshelf upstairs and so I like collecting books, man. I like reading, you know, just to see what other people are at life too. And so on that note, Chris, man, I'm gonna end this. Hey, go grab the book. What's good about today? Like we said earlier, just waking up, listening to this podcast. That's a good thing. I'm your boy CJ Moneyway. You have been listening to the CJ Moneyway Show. We outta here. Peace.

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