Ep 77 | What Can the CIA Teach Us About Exit Planning?

Welcome to the Exit Engine Podcast, episode 77. Welcome to the Exit Engine Podcast, where we help founders, owners, and entrepreneurs turn their businesses into assets buyers fight for. If you're looking to grow smarter, reduce risk, and ultimately exit stronger, this is the show for you. I'm your host, Jo Stapleton. And with me, as always, is my partner in value and salability, Mr. John Kniff. Good morning, John.

Good morning, Joe.

John, if there's one thing growing a business takes, it's resilience, right? The one thing selling a business takes is resilience, right?

Right. Because, again, every business owner has faced challenges and has persevered. Or else they wouldn't be there, right? They wouldn't be in the position they are to sell their business if they haven't overcome all sorts of challenges along the way in getting to where they are.

And it's one thing to be resilient, like, as you kind of expect that you need to have this resilience when you're growing the business, right? Because you're kind of constantly faced with challenges. You're constantly putting out fires, especially as the founder, especially at the beginning. And so there's the resilience that it takes to grow the business is kind of like identified. It's like a known thing. People will teach you about it all over the place. And they'll tell you, by the way, the key to the success of it is actually just the resilience itself. Like, maybe showing up every day to it is actually what kind of keeps it going, right?

Yep, exactly.

Well, we believe that exit planning isn't something you just do at the end, right? It's a mindset and a strategy you adopt while you're still building. And so, every decision you make today either increases or decreases your future value. And we're here to help you stack the deck in your favor, right? So what we want to talk about today is the kind of resilience it takes, the leadership it takes to be able to lead through a period of uncertainty, how you stay mentally and emotionally strong during what is really chaos, often in terms of actually going through due diligence, going through the transaction, and the way that your relationships sometimes with yourself, With your, with your partners, with your employees, with the buyer, with your spouse, right? All this potentially is going to be tested because this is a very difficult time.

Yeah, 100% agreed.

Right.

So deals fall apart, guys. This is part of something that we have to kind of just know, right, is that team members leave during this stuff. Sometimes people don't want this to happen. Sometimes they have differences of opinion. There might be a buyer may come in and the buyer may get along with one partner and not another. Um, the point is, is that there— this is a very challenging time, whether you know it or not. Trust us, we've been through it, we've been there. It is a challenge mentally to go through this. It's a roller coaster, right? It's an up and down. Well, our guest today is a heavy hitter, John. Someone who understands high-pressure environments better than most people. Just check out this resume, right? We're— she is— she was first— ready for this? A CIA analyst, right? She was there at the time bin Laden was caught, right? She was like— right, this is like— this is a heavy— um, after that she worked for Elon at Tesla, right?

Which I can't wait to ask her which was more challenging, but that's enough. That's— that'll be a question in the future. In the future.

Absolutely right. And a great question. And again, and then for you AI nerds out there, she most recently was at actually at OpenAI. All right. So she understands big-time pressure, right? She understands she's a big-time manager of change under pressure. And I can't wait to talk to Robin Sotaloff in just a minute. But first, John, let's talk about the new ExitEngine ecosystem. We've just launched the ExitEngine ecosystem. We think is going to be a very valuable and important platform for those of you who care and enough about their business and your own futures that you want to learn and grow towards a successful exit.

It's everything and everyone you'll need to plan and execute a successful exit on your own terms and timeline. ExitEngine helps founders grow smarter and exit stronger by providing diagnostics, roadmaps, coaching, community, and advisory support that reduce risk, increase value, and make their businesses buyer-ready. It is the first exit planning ecosystem in the world, and you can start for free right now. Just go to www.myexitengine.com.

So, John, you think building a business is stressful? Wait until you try to sell one. The emotional roller coaster is real. The pressure of negotiations can take a toll. Someone important is, you know, that isn't close to you at the business is going to get upset and leave. Um, the relationships you have with this, with this, these people that have been talking about your business, looking at your business, whatever, are now in a slightly different capacity, are potentially trying to figure out how to make the business worth less right now during due diligence, right? That can change the relationship of that thing and the roller coaster that you're on.

Well, some members of your own team are— that have an eye on another buyer, right? That happened in my case is that we had people that actively wanted one buyer over the other regardless of the terms. And we were like, wait a second, what's going on here? Like, we were just— we were in a rowboat And people are rolling into different directions.

So no question. And by the way, that's— those business relationships are one thing, but, you know, this can also test— even this period of time can test the relationship even like with your spouse, potentially with your kids if you're talking about succession and things like that. So this is a very charged, emotionally charged time. And, and this is not the thing I can talk about from my own experience, is this is the thing that most people are just not ready for. Okay, you might be ready for the negotiation. You may understand the business context of this stuff. You may even understand the earnout and how that's going to go to a degree. But I think one thing that people report back to us that they were not prepared for is having to lead a team of people through a very challenging time, right? Even if the end result is something that you want, it's obviously difficult to do. So if you, you know, we're going to talk to to Robin Sodaloff today. And Robin is an ICF-certified executive coach, former intelligence analyst, and leadership development expert with experience inside some of the most complex organizations in the world, from the CIA to Tesla to OpenAI. She's designed analyst training programs, advised on insider risk initiatives, and helped leaders of all stripes develop the clarity, confidence, and calm they need to lead with integrity and purpose, especially under pressure. She's also the co-founder of Converge, a platform that supports early career professionals and now focuses on helping individuals and teams navigate transitions, lead through change, and communicate with impact. So whether you're preparing your exit, to exit your company, or just a step in a larger leadership role, or just to figure out how to manage the stress that comes with building something big, this conversation is packed with insights you can use. Robin Sotaloff, welcome to the Exit Engine Podcast.

Thank you so much for having me.

Awesome. Robin, take us back. What is the thing that got you— let's talk about your background first because I think everybody's going to want to hear that. But what was the thing that kind of have— what are the things you can point back to about your earlier days and your time as an analyst with the CIA and things like that that kind of led you to what you're doing now?

Yeah, I mean, the agency is so good at— the analyst side of the agency in particular is so good at leadership, at teamwork, at creating an environment where people work together. We're all rowing in the same direction. We build trust and they take the ego out of it in a lot of ways. And that's not to say that analysts don't have egos. We do. And we're built up in that way. You know, you're the best of the brightest and all of that. But the papers that you write, the briefings that you do, your name's not on any of it. It's a team effort. Everything that you write is edited and coordinated upon so that it doesn't look anything like the first draft that you wrote when you first put pen to paper, fingers to keyboards, right?

Right.

And that kind of growing up in that environment means that you are really paying attention to what other people need. And that's the other thing is that The agency really instills in analysts to consider the needs of your audience, the people that are reading your papers, the people that are listening to your briefings. And so you build this really strong empathy, and that can really carry you forward. You know, for me, it bleeds into everything. And so it led me to coaching, and it led me to doing training later on at the— in my time at the agency and to what I'm doing now. And that is, I help people to think about the perspectives of other people when they are putting together projects, when they're asking for opportunities, when they are making pitches, when they're setting expectations. If you are considering the needs of another person, the other person that you're dealing with, when you make your approach, you're gonna be a lot more successful. And that leads through everything that I do.

When you take the assumptions, or when you take you know, the, the, your name off something, right? And you're part of a team, you know, you're— and you consider the audience. I love that part of it in the sense of, you know, either the reader or the writer has to work in, in what— when they're doing it. And you want the, the reader to work, or you want— you don't want the reader to work, rather, right?

Yeah.

So when you're, when you're doing— talk about like how you, when you're writing for different audiences, or, or when you're back at the CIA, how did you you know, plan for those audiences. You really have to understand what they want from that intelligence, right?

Yeah, I mean, you're really— it's audience first all the time, right? So a couple of kind of broad themes are use the smallest words you can possibly use. So you've got people with, you know, degrees out the wazoo and from the best universities and with work experience and lived experience and all of that, using the smallest possible words you can use, right? Because you're writing to the lowest common denominator.

Right.

You want everybody who gets that piece to be able to understand it. You also wanna use the least amount of words possible because you recognize that everybody that you're writing for is incredibly busy. So the way that you write is so that the title, like if they just read the title, they'll be able to get the whole story. And then if they just read the first sentence, they'll be able to get a better sense, but really the same story, right? And so everything is—

Burying the lead, right?

Yeah, no bearing to leave it. Bottom line up front. And there's a term that I learned in training back when I started called fractal, which is like broccoli, basically, which is you take any little piece of it, you're going to get the whole same story. You're just going to get like smaller amounts of it, if that makes sense. And so I actually take that into everything that I do, you know, helping people. Let's, let's say I'm helping somebody prep for a high-level interview. It's the same thing. You want to tell them what you're going to tell them before you tell them. And then you break it apart. And so you're giving people like mental models and roadmaps that they can follow as they're reading your piece, or as they're listening to your briefing, so that it's easy for them to put the information into context to understand what you're trying to say. And then the other thing is, is you just, you think about the audience and you think about what they need. Are you writing for Congress? They're going to need one thing. Are you writing for people, you know, senior people at the CIA? I did a lot of operational support Courtwork when I was there, and they need something totally different than what a member of Congress is going to need. They need details, and it needs to be pretty tactical because they're not writing to protect people, but they're going out and, and doing operations on the street. Um, and so, so it's a totally different need, totally different environment.

But look, this comes— this direct thing comes into play, okay, during the exit planning process, right? Because obviously what you're— one of the first things that we're Not— one of the first things that we're teaching people is to be able to understand, again, who, where they are headed. OK, so the idea is to understand that from what we provide a lot of times are roadmaps, right? And that roadmap requires you to know 2 big pieces of information, right? I got to know where I'm starting from, and I got to know where I'm headed, right, to be able to make those connections. And the same thing is true, obviously, when you're storytelling, right, or trying to get this information across, is to be able to say, You know, I know who my audience is and what, right? I know what the information, the point I have is. I know who my audience is, and now it's a matter of bridging that gap. It's how do I get from here to there? And this especially comes into play right during the, you know, when we're— I'm actually looking for a buyer, right?

Mm-hmm.

The communication of those, that stuff out into the world.

Who—

one of the biggest parts of selling your company is knowing the kind of buyer that you're probably going to end up with, right? And to be able to start speaking to that audience, right, well in advance of actually selling the company.

And having that realistic starting point, right? Like, a lot of people have aspirational goals and they think that, or they know where they want to go, but they often, what we find is they don't have an understanding of where they currently are, right? Their finances, they think that their finances are in order, They think that these things are in order when in fact they're just not. You know, it's like a starting point, like, oh wait, you think everyone's at the right starting point? But no, everyone doesn't start from the same point. There's all sorts of companies that are along different points in the continuum. They're all going for the same place, but they're starting from a different point.

Well, and one of the things that we did was you anticipate questions, right? So if you're thinking about what the policymaker or the reader is going to need, you're also going to think about what kind of questions are they going to have. You're anticipating them. So if it's a briefing, you're ready to answer those questions, and you actually coordinate language ahead of time so that you can answer the questions that you think are going to come your way. And if it's a paper, you're trying to anticipate those and answer those, any questions that somebody might have or— Sure.

Let me ask you a question. When did it go wrong? And I don't want to put you on the spot with like, when did it go wrong? But I can imagine that there were scenarios where You have meetings like everyone else. You have meetings that went really well, but do you have a point of, of a meeting where it went poorly or your briefing went poorly and you could pinpoint exactly sort of the reason why there's sort of— it came off the rails?

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This didn't happen to me, um, but I have friends— oh, actually I do have one, I have another one. Okay, but I'll tell you too. So I have friends who found themselves caught in political situations.

Mm-hmm.

You are trained from day one, we're not political, right? We serve whoever's in charge. And all of our analysis is not political. We're writing from the perspective of how would, you know, fill in the blank foreign leader react to X, you know, those kinds of things. That's how we framed everything because we're not policy prescriptive. And I have friends who did briefings on the Hill in particular, you know, who wrote a paper and then had a member of Congress walk outside and open it up to the press, you know, which is just gut-wrenching, right?

Right.

We don't do that. So that's a thing that you just kind of have to know going in. And that's where tradecraft is just incredibly important. And you just stick to the facts and you stick to what you know and you don't, You don't guess, you know, one of the strongest things you can learn early on is saying, I don't have an answer for you, but I'll figure it out and get back to you.

Wow.

You know, that, that is, we teach that immediately. So that, that's one thing. I had another situation in which I was preparing to do a briefing and I went to, I had to do like a pre, pre-briefing for somebody pretty senior. before they— I walked into the main room. And that person was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is all fine. But like, where's the good stuff? Like, we need the good stuff, you know? And I was like, totally put on the spot and had to kind of scramble and try to figure out how to make something sound like impressive.

Talking points, something that they can—

you know, you're just, you're just spinning and scrambling. Actually, things like that happened a few times where you're just thinking on your feet.

Make up an international incident just for—

And you can't— like, you're not gonna—

I'm not gonna make something up.

I have to, right? So then I'm like, OK, well, what are the other examples I can pull? What's illustrative that I can bring up that's going to be evocative for the person listening to this briefing, but not making something up? Because I'm never going to do that.

That's it. And by the way, those last 2 points are excellent points about where you are when you're dealing, right, with a buyer in the room, right? The first thing is that you mentioned was the, you know, you don't want to be— you want to be able to say, There are going to be things that come up during this, the questioning, right? During the interview process, during the discussions that you have during due diligence that are gonna be about specific documents, specific, uh, you know, uh, frameworks, processes, whatever. And you may not immediately, as the owner, have the answer to those things.

Right.

But that line that you just used is exactly the way you should respond.

Right. It's true in every scenario.

Right.

Right. If you are making stuff up, people are going to be able to read that. Right. Like, you know, it's— or they're going to uncover it pretty quickly.

Well, yeah. And also a lot of times people— and I imagine this happened to you— is they— people ask questions not for the answer, but they want to see your reaction to the question. Right. Like, I know I did this when I was buying— when I was buying companies is I would ask them like, oh, You know, what are— how many lawsuits have you had in the last couple of years?

And what—

and just describe them in general terms, because I, I know, like, in real estate there— when I used to work, buy companies in real estate, there was always slip and falls, right? It's the Northeast, there's bad weather, people slip and fall. There's, you know, of all, of all stripes, and, and, and, uh, and it just happens. And if it didn't happen, if it hasn't happened and they've been in business for like 10 years, you're kind of like, really? That's kind of weird. That this hasn't happened. So sometimes it's not about the answer. It's about how they react to the question.

Yeah. And, you know, we always, we always told our analysts, like, don't promise something you're not going to do. Right. So you can't just say, I don't know, let me get back to you. And then just like, like, that's not like your exit. Like, you actually have to do the thing that you've said that you're going to do and follow up with an answer.

And then, and then that's absolutely correct. And then the other thing that you said was that it's a matter of, like, being able to answer the questions before they're questions.

Right.

And so anytime you're putting any communication together, this goes right from the same in our philosophy on writing, you know, what are called confidential information memorandum, which is just a fancy way of saying it's essentially a deck that says this is what the company is, what it does, and why you should buy it. Basically, is that, is that make sure that what you're doing is to anticipate the questions, right? When you can look at yourself, and I call them, you know, we call them marketable inefficiencies. There's going to be things about your business that you know are not right, right, or aren't going to be maximized, or you didn't get to finishing. That's okay, but you got to call those things out. It's actually wiser instead of wait— don't wait till you get a question on it, right? Go out and basically, like, you know, get ahead of it and make sure that you're getting that information.

Yeah, yeah, go ahead. Sorry.

Oh no, it's something we would do in our papers sometimes is you know, you are really transparent about what you know and what you do not know. And so we would sometimes include like a box, a text box on what are our gaps? What do we not know about this topic, right?

Right.

So because if you are not transparent about that upfront and you have got a skeptic reading your paper and when you are saying, you know, X is going to happen or is likely to happen and you are not clear and they are like, well, what about this? And what about this? What about this? And you do not have answers.

You've lost the whole thing.

It kills the whole thing.

The only problem is it can also work the other way because I've had that similar— I've done that similar thing. I did it on Box. We had an asterisk about things we didn't know at the bottom of the slide. And it can work the other way, be like, well, if you don't know these things, why would I trust you to do it? It's like, look, you're sort of like boxed in either way. It's like you're trying to be transparent and honest about what you know, what you don't know. And if you put that box in there, I've seen it backfire. It backfired on me one time specifically.

But you just, you have to be able to explain then why you think what you think.

It's true. Yeah.

Yeah, either way. And even if those two work together where it's like, look, you're right, this didn't answer your question, whatever, I apologize for that. Let me go back and get the right answer to that question. I'll have it to you in 2 days or tomorrow or whatever the thing is. That's a perfectly acceptable thing to do, right? There, there, there, there— what you want to do is avoid the look of hiding, right? You want to avoid the, the, the— it's, it's not about knowing all the answers. It's being able to, it's being able to show that you're not hiding any answers.

Right.

Well, and that transparency applies even beyond just what you don't know. You know, this comes up again as I'm coaching people. You know, if somebody's going in for an interview or they're going to go do a presentation, you can address the problem area right up front and then talk about what you're doing to fix the problem. That's going to get you a lot more mileage than leaving it for them to ask the question and then you're on your back foot.

Right, right. Absolutely. No question about it. I think, again, it's a matter of— and I think it's a forward-looking way. It's an active participation, as opposed to a kind of like, I'm just gonna sit here and wait for them to ask me what they want to ask me, right? It's showing that you are, that you are willing to, that you're trying to partner, that you're trying to actually actively participate in this stuff, and not just sit there and wait for them to, you know, ask you your questions. Let's talk a little bit about, I want to go, I want to go back to the, your big thing is empathy.

Mm-hmm.

And I want to talk about empathy as a superpower. And in terms of how, you know, how do you use that philosophy to develop, you know, where does that philosophy come into play in kind of high-stakes environments?

Absolutely. Yeah, and I think, you know, empathy, I think, gets painted with a, with a negative brush of like, it's soft, it's not important. But I actually think it can be the most strategic thing you can bring into your work. So when you are considering the needs of the people that you're talking to, whether that be your boss, whether that be the hiring manager, whether that be the member of Congress you're sitting across the table from. If you're thinking about, you know, what is this person bringing into the table today? What, you know, what are their responsibilities? What are their competing priorities? What are their needs? What is driving this person? Then you can craft your approach in a way that's going to land a lot better. Right? And so if it's, if you're at work and you're looking for a professional development opportunity, you know, we do with Converge and with my coaching, I do a lot of work with young professionals, Gen Z. And if you go into a meeting with your boss, and you say, you know, hey, boss, I understand, you know, you're trying to do X this quarter, and the team has these needs. I have this opportunity that I thought of that will serve your needs and the team's needs. How do you feel about that? That's gonna go a lot better than, hey, boss, I want to go to this thing. Right?

Like, there's this conference I want to go to in San Francisco that I want to go to, as opposed to doing it the way you first talked about it, to say like, look, I'm gonna gain this skill to help you with this problem that I know you have and you need to solve next quarter. I can solve that problem for you.

It's the win-wins, right? And John, we talk about this all the time with the clients that we coach. And I'm thinking specifically about the deal that we did over the summer that was all about understanding what this buyer's motive actually was, right?

Yes.

Right.

And that's truly empathy, right? To your, to your point, Robin, and also, Jo, it's like, look, empathy is not soft, right? Empathy is, is, is understanding the— it's situational awareness, right? And I've never been in the military, but, but I, but I can imagine that when you're going into an area, you need to understand the lay of the land and where you're going to land, literally physically land, in order to, like, accomplish your goal. It's the same thing with the meeting, right? You have to understand What environment am I being plopped into? Like, my boss is going to have these challenges. She has these needs and wants. Like, why wouldn't you understand those needs and wants and try to address them sort of head on in a way that can, again, solve 2 problems at once? You know, kill 2 birds with one stone is just the way to do it and the smart way to do it.

Right.

But the only— you only get there when you're paying attention to what other people need, what motivates them, what drives them, where they grew up, where they're from. How do you connect with them on a personal level? You know, when I'm, when I'm helping people prep for interviews, I have them basically create like what we would call a targeting package at the agency, which is what is all the information you can find out about what makes this person tick so that you can find points of convergence and actually connect with them. Yeah.

And when you're—

yeah.

And when you're creating training, right, like you've created training for people, you must have empathy, right? Because these people are, to your point, they're very busy. They've done I can just imagine how much training goes on at the CIA and how many classes they've sat through and how many Zooms they've gone through and how much information they need to digest. If you don't put that, that information and that knowledge into a clear, concise package of words in the smallest possible words possible, as you said earlier, it's going to, it's going to be lost on them. You're going to have to— you're leaving them to interpret what you want them to know after the training. And that's just, that's bad for The government is bad for the CIA, I'd imagine.

Yeah, absolutely. And the empathy comes in not just in the training, but also in the leadership, in the directorate of analysis for the analysts. Managers are trained very well, and they're trained on leading by what their teammates need, or what their— what the members of their team need, right? So if you have somebody, you know, the first thing you do as a manager is sit down one-on-one with each person on the team and try to understand what makes them tick. You know, if you have somebody who likes to be praised in private, you're not gonna announce that they did this great thing in front of the whole group, right? You're gonna, if they want, you know, feedback written down via email before they talk about it, right? Like all these things, this all matters, and it will motivate or demotivate somebody on a day-to-day basis if you're not leading them how they want to be led, you know, really, and connecting with them on that level.

Yeah, I was gonna say empathy also comes into play when there's conflict, right?

Yes. Yes. And I've seen— I actually just did a post about this. I've seen this happen so many times, both in the agency and out in, you know, in the tech world, where people are reacting in their own heads and their, you know, their amygdala fires, something happens, and they are Reacting, they're getting defensive, and they're putting up walls, and they stop listening to the other person. And, you know, or maybe they go on the attack and just the wheels fall off, right? Instead of somebody says something that doesn't feel great to you, taking a beat, taking a breath, and then getting curious about, well, what did they— what made them say that? What are they bringing into the room today? You know what, maybe they had a stressful morning. You know, maybe they had a rough meeting with their boss. Right before walking into here. You know, maybe they've been giving marching orders that I'm not seeing. So like, where's this coming from? If you can turn it around in the moment and get curious and start asking questions, you can defuse a situation and turn it into a point of convergence, really, and connection. And, you know, move forward in a collaborative way, as opposed to a confrontational way. Well, yeah.

And how, like, learning, you know, you went from from the CIA to Tesla, right? So from the government to technology, just talk about that little trend, that transition a little bit in the sense of, you know, what did you learn about people? You know, obviously there are people in the CIA, there's people in Tesla, but how did that interaction, how do those interactions differ across those 2 entities?

Oh my gosh. Well, I mean, they're very, very different places. There are some points of similarity, and I will say one thing that I learned in that transition is that there is a grieving process. And I think this applies directly to the work that you guys do.

Mm-hmm.

There is a grieving process when you leave something that is your identity. You know, people don't work at the agency without feeling that really strong sense of mission. You know, we were talking about 9/11 before. Like, there is— you are saving lives, you're saving treasure, you're saving, you know, all of that. There's a mission. And when you, when you walk away from that, you feel like you've lost a part of yourself. So it's, it's part of the transition. Part of why I was successful in it is finding new, new mission and new motivations, right?

And having something to run toward instead of just running away from something.

Yeah. And filling that void with, you know, people in my personal life or activities, or, you know, for me, I moved to San Francisco. So it was establishing a life out here and all of that. And then finding, you know, going to Tesla, well, there's a mission at Tesla. At the time, you know, I felt like I was working towards global sustainability and the environment and all of that. So, so I, you know, I still had a mission. It was just, it was just different. But taking that time to grieve, I think, is really important.

Yep.

And then in terms of similarities, you know, people are people, right? And so if you can lead people, if you can connect with people, if you can coach people, That all really translates well. And I was doing, at Tesla and at OpenAI, I was doing a lot of training and awareness with the workforce to figure out ways to protect the valuable intellectual property that both of those companies had.

Yeah.

A lot of the, a lot of what I learned about training, successfully training people, successfully connecting with people, building trust with the workforce, that all applied from my time at the agency into tech.

Interesting.

Cool. Very cool. Let's just stay on this for a second because this notion of the transition, the going from, the leaving something behind, right? And we talk about this all the time. This was my experience with the company that I sold. I was prepared for the money part. I was prepared for the people part. I was prepared for, I was even kind of preferred, I was prepared for the idea of earning out over time. I think what happened in reality was that I didn't know what I was going to do next. And we spent so much time worried about the earnout and making sure that we got every dollar that was coming to us and the whole thing, that there was never really any time to plan what was next.

Yeah.

And we were already burned out, you know what I mean? And so now we're just burning out 3 more years in a different way. Anyway, the point is to bring up the fact that there is this very large emotional component that is directly tied to your identity. So let's talk a little bit more about that and how you actually coach people through those kinds of, like, leadership challenges that are, again, because now you're expected to still be the leader, right? And I think this is the key thing. It's like you are a human being as well. Yet, yet as you move through this transition, you're expected to keep everybody else calm.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's something I would imagine, as you're— well, not imagine, I'm doing it now. As you're building a business, you're putting your heart and soul into something, right? People don't build businesses that they don't care about.

Yeah.

Right.

Right? You care about every little thing. When you're especially a solopreneur or partnership, you're picking the logo, you're picking the colors, you're picking— every hire is a huge decision, right? And so you can't just focus on the payday.

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Because what happens the day after? And then what happens if it falls apart, to your point earlier, right? So being clear, you know, when I, when I do coaching, do executive coaching in particular, we always start with values, identifying our values, understanding how integral they are to us as a human being, and that being the driving thing. So if you're feeling off, if something doesn't feel right, it's a values mismatch. If you're feeling good, you know, it's, it's a values alignment, right? That I'm boiling it down very much, but that's—

Right.

At the end of the day, what we're talking about. And so if you can get clear on your values, why are you doing this? What is your goal long-term? You know, where do you see yourself in 5 years? And how do you work towards that? And how does this selling fit into that goal? You know, and understanding what are the, what are the key components of your life outside of this company, right? Are you a parent? Are you a friend? Are you a partner? Are you a neighbor? you know, what other parts do you have in your life that are going to sustain you and that you need to stay present for? And kind of keeping a focus on all of those pieces can really be key. You know, for me, I, I was running to something, right? I left the agency, I left the government because I have 3 little nieces in LA I wanted to be closer to at the end of the day. I mean, there was, there were a lot, there was a lot to it, but that was one of the big things.

Right.

So it was, okay, well, this is going to allow me to really, like, deepen my relationship with these 3 little people that were so important to me. You know, and then what are the other pieces of my life and the other components? And, you know, my friends are incredibly important to me. Okay, well, how do I maintain those really strong, close friendships, even if I'm living across the country?

Right.

Yeah.

But you've got those things. I mean, I think the idea is that the first step is identifying what are the other things.

And if you don't have other things, boy, Yeah, because you're gonna wake up the next day after the deal is done and be like, what do I do now?

Yeah, right.

And there's nothing I can tell you, so there can be, for some, especially for a founder and a mentality of sort of an entrepreneur, it can be, it can be a hard, the hardest thing. In my, my case, it sent me into a, like, a decade stupor.

Wow.

That was hard, really hard to recover from because again, it was about purpose and it was about mission and it was about finding yourself and realizing, you know, how you were It helped— it destroyed relationships. I mean, other stuff goes on because you just, you forget who you are, you know what I mean? Or, or maybe, and sometimes maybe you didn't even know, right? And the only thing that was keeping you together was the business. And I, again, I, I know this is kind of an extreme thing to talk about, but I think that the idea is that it's, uh, I think it's more common than we, than we realize. Um, and I think that if you're a founder out there who's experiencing this kind of stuff, this kind of dark night of the soul kind of thing, It's a good idea to be able to kind of step back a little bit and maybe get a little bit of coaching or something like that well before, well in advance of like thinking about selling the company and stuff, because it will be, it was not something that will be fixed by you selling the company.

Yeah, a couple of things. One is, you know, they always used to say you can do stints in dangerous places when you're in the agency and they always, always say like, whatever your problems are here, you're going to have those problems there. They don't go away just because you go someplace different. And I would think that would apply here as well.

Yeah.

Something else that you said that to keep in mind too is setting expectations and being expecting that you're going to feel a sense of loss, that there is going to be a mourning period, that you are going to wake up some days and really miss it or you know, forget that you're not in it. And that that's okay, that that's part of the grieving process. And it's just something to expect that you're going to feel. I wrote this post actually right after my last day at the agency talking about how, you know, I cried on my way out the door. I actually cried for probably the last hour that I was there. Solidly.

Yeah, I can imagine.

Of course you would.

Yeah.

I had, I had somebody who had been a mentor to me. She was my last meeting of the day. And I was chatting with her and then she said, you know, you're probably hearing this a lot today, but thank you for your service. And I just started crying and said I hadn't heard that. And then she started crying and then we hugged. And then I went downstairs to turn in my badge to the security guy in front of Where the Stars Are. And I just could barely choke out like, it's my last day. And I handed over my badge and he— it was December and he just happened to have a plate of Christmas cookies. Oh my gosh. And so he said, do you want a cookie?

Yeah, I want a cookie.

Took a cookie. And then I stood in front of the stars for a bit and, you know, walked by the seal and just kind of took it in. Because like I said, even though I was going to something, I was leaving something behind.

Yeah. Well, I want to ask you about, like, we talked about training a little bit, but I want to ask about risk. Right. So the risk, obviously, and the way you think about risk in at the CIA versus the way you think about risk in your, in your coaching and in your other careers? Like, talk a little bit about like how your, how your experience with dealing with risk at the CIA sort of informs your, your, your coaching clients now, if you can.

It's interesting because in some ways we're talking hugely different scales, right?

Life or death, you know, for real, right?

In large numbers.

Yeah.

And to that person, it's life or death.

Right.

Right. You know, and so it doesn't really matter. Like, the difference doesn't, doesn't really matter. You have to take it with the same level of gravity because it matters to them. But what you can do is you can— another thing that I really coach around is perspectives. And this goes to that empathy again, but it is, you know, okay, well, let's put yourself into somebody else's shoes. for a second. Let's look at this from a different perspective. Or, okay, it's 5 years from now and the worst has happened. How has that impacted you? Right? Just to get a little bit of distance from whatever the issue is so that you can look at it kind of from all angles. When you remove yourself from the feelings, you can, you can see it more clearly.

Yeah.

Yeah. But, you know, at the agency, it was, There were moments where that risk, that, that gravity of it, you know, really did kind of get to me. And I think get to people. There was a period of time, my favorite account I covered for a few years and it was nonstop. And I came in most weekends and worked all the time. And at the end of it, I switched off of the account in pursuit of something else I wanted to do. And after I changed accounts, one of my best friends said to me, oh, thank God you've been miserable for 2 years. I had no idea.

Right. Of course.

I didn't know because I was in it. Right. And because I was focused on the mission. And so having that, being able to have that perspective, like, that's where coaching can be really valuable. You have somebody who's helping you get out of yourself and kind of look at it outside in.

That 5-year timeframe, right? Like, what's the worst thing that can happen? And what's that look like in 5 years? I think that's a good way to put it. Right. It's like, OK, it really puts it into perspective and gets the person thinking about, OK, really, this is really the worst that can happen. OK, I can deal with that. Or, or I want to change that from potentially happening. So I like that.

Yeah.

And we're, and we're doing that all the time, right, with our work, because our work is, you know, is so much a long-term kind of play. And so being able to say, hey, look, what are the things that you're worried about upfront? Right? What are the things that would but that in your mind would stop you from being able to do this? It's the very first question, right? Because it's sometimes it's yourself, right? Do you as a person, as a leader, have the intestinal fortitude it will take to go through this? And not just at the end. I don't just mean the sale part. You know, we talk about that because that's the part everybody's nervous about. You know what I mean? But the reality is that there might be growth to do, right? What we're showing people how to do is to say, hey, look, here's where you are right now. Here's where you can be, and here's how you get there in this timeframe. Right? And so what we're opening up there is a whole bunch of potential uncertainty that we're trying to mitigate as you go. But a lot of it is about asking yourself, what's the worst that can happen? And understanding either avoiding the worst, meaning in our case, it's like, hey, look, what happens to the company if I die? Like, we can't teach you how to not die, but we can teach the company how to survive if, God forbid, you do, right? Or if you go through a divorce or if their partner leaves or if any of those other things, you know, those are the things that can ruin businesses. Talk about how you approach through your coaching the leadership idea of, you know, coaching through kind of uncertainty and, and, and, you know, how to kind of give people the kind of mental resilience to move through Yeah, I mean, well, again, this is where values comes in, right?

So if you understand your values, if you understand what makes you happy, what gets you into flow, what gets you out of flow, you know, if you understand what makes you tick, you can talk through and anticipate all of this and make smart decisions about how you want to move forward, right? If you are somebody who doesn't like putting in the work, right, and you look at this process and you say, well, here's what's going to be required for me to get through this process. Okay, maybe this isn't for me. Right? Like, recognizing that upfront is, is the key. Or if you're somebody who, who you thrive in the details, but you don't like getting up in front of a room full of people. Okay, maybe you need a partner who's going to do that part of it, right? You know, what's missing from your, your goals, and your working style, or what makes you happy, or your values? How do we fill those Those buckets.

Yeah.

So that it's not on you to do those, to do those things. The other thing with coaching that can be really helpful is, again, that perspective taking, but it's asking questions like, what's hard about that? What's the worst that happens if, what's the worst thing if that doesn't go this way?

Yeah.

Or, you know, those, those kinds of questions that really make somebody think. The worst thing you can do with coaching is lead. Right? So you don't want to like tell somebody what the answer is or what you think the answer is. You want to ask them the questions that they can come up with the answer that works for them. Because those aha moments, those like moments of inspiration, that's impactful. Someone's going to take action based on that in a way that they're not if you just tell them.

No, and that comes into play when we deal with our clients all the time, right? It's like, you know, again, We can tell them that they have to clean up their finances and they have to do all these things. But like, look, it's like, this will benefit them, right? We let them be like, look, like, think of this from the buyer's perspective. If they're coming in to buy this company and it's all dependent on Robin, like, and Robin's gonna move and go to another, you know, go to sit on the beach, like, do you really want to buy that business? Like, no. Like, and we let them come to that conclusion to say, oh yeah, it really can't be too reliant on me.

Well, and if the person in charge is not good at the finances, like let's say the finances are a mess, the finances are probably a mess because the person doesn't like dealing with finances.

Exactly correct.

Right. And so saying to them, you need to get your finances in order.

Doesn't help.

It's not going to help. Right. Having that coaching conversation to understand, how do you like to spend your time? How do you not like to spend your time? What's your worst part of your month or whatever? Okay, let's outsource You know, we need to get your finances in order. How do we get your finances in order in a way that's going to feel natural and good to you?

Right, right. It's an excellent point. It's an excellent point because, again, it is the stuff, to John's point, that stops people from moving forward. Right. They look for ways— they'd rather work around things than to go through them. And, you know, one of the things that we're teaching here, again, is the very first thing, you know, the very first segment that we're getting into people's heads is developing an exit mindset, right? Because you have to start looking at the company now in a different way. You were talking about perspective before, and the only way that I've seen, you know, that I— my formula for getting perspective, I think I've said this on the show before, but for getting perspective is by changing your perception, right? And so the hard— it's hard to change your perception until you change your perspective is what I meant. Right? So in other words, getting out of your shoes, having the empathy, being able to see this problem from another side, even if it's your own problem. And the idea is to be able to say, hey, look, if you want to— do you want to have a healthy, sustainable company that you can sell one day and create options for yourself all the way down the line? No. Nobody says no to that.

Right.

Nobody says no to that. They don't. What they say no to is, or what they're resistant to, is the change that they have to make. It's all up to them. I've done this already. I've tried, I've gotten it this far. I'm burnt. I'm burning out. I have no help. You know, that's what they see. And so to your earlier point, it becomes our job to say, hey, look, let's connect the dots here, right? What if we could find a way for you to fix things in the way— what you're saying is find the way to fix the problems that's right for you. In other words, right, your ability to deal with this stuff or not deal with this stuff is a bottleneck. Mm-hmm.

Right?

It is the problem. And so, but, but forcing you to do that is not going to solve it either, right?

Maybe it's outsourcing it or maybe it's removing other things from their plate so they have the time and space to do that thing that needs to get done. Right. It's understanding each individual person and their needs.

That's it. And look, just not for nothing, but again, you know, at ExitEngine, John, right, this is one of the things that we actually do is, is helping people figure out those decisions and bring the people to bear that they need to be able to fill the gap. Because the work needs to be done. If you can't do it as a founder or it's not in your bailiwick or whatever, someone should. And that's one of the pieces of value you're gonna get at ExitVision, just to say that. But so, Robin, back to, again, back to your work and the leadership stuff. Let's talk about Converge a little bit because—

Yeah.

We are— I think that the ability to help, especially, you know, whatever, Gen Z, you know, the younger generation, and we're talking about people in their you know, 20s, 30s, right? And to us people who are in their 40s, you're young. But the idea of being able to get this, this is a, this is the next generation, right? These are the people that are basically out there building the companies of tomorrow that we're all gonna hope, hope, hope, hopefully help them sell. But talk to us how you work with that founder mindset, especially early on, because I think a lot of this stuff is the people that we work with, they've gotten to a level, right? And that may not be all the way they have to get to, but they're generally stuck in this kind of middle ground where they have done the hard work of the founder, kind of getting the thing up and running. And now it's about the next level, which is kind of like, again, scale, really, right?

Yeah.

So talk a little bit about your work with Converge and what you're doing there and what are the things, the common things that you're seeing amongst the younger kind of founder set?

Yeah, so I'm not sure if this is younger founders, but the younger, younger generation entering the workforce is, you know, what we're hearing from their managers is that they're, they're coming in, they're really smart, they're really good at getting, finding information, they want to do a lot of different things. But there's a mismatch in expectations. And there's a mismatch in understanding how to kind of be a professional in the workplace. Some of that is COVID. Some of that is online generation. You know, you've got that like Gen Z stare thing that people talk about, you know, not understanding how to shake a hand or make eye contact, you know, that kind of thing. And so some of it's just like teaching etiquette, you know, how do you comport yourself in a Zoom call? You know, do you have to have the camera on? Yes, you do. You're going to want to build relationships with your colleagues. You're going to want to build relationships with your manager. You're going to want to set expectations early on, but understand, come into that meeting curious. You know, come into that meeting asking a lot of questions. What are the expectations? What is the working style? How do you want to receive, you know, bad news from me? And what kind of feedback should I expect? I mean, this generation expects instant gratification and a lot of feedback.

Right.

All the time. And A manager doesn't have the bandwidth for that.

Yeah.

And so it's about setting those expectations at the forefront. What kind of feedback do you need? Do you expect? Here's the kind of feedback and the cadence at which I can provide it. Let's talk about how to meet in the middle, right? People coming into, into the workforce right now don't want to be pigeonholed. they want to do a lot of different things, right? And so it's, it's making sure that you're understanding what is motivating, as a manager, what is motivating people, what is going to motivate them on a day-to-day basis, and then giving them those assignments and those opportunities and being open to their ideas of the different things that they want to do and the impact that they can make. But then having that generation approach their manager in a way that's gonna, you know, I understand that these, this is the stuff I need to get done and I'm going to get it done, but here's my plan to do this other thing. That's going to help you in these ways, right?

Yeah, it's so funny, the manager, because in the scenario you just talked about, the manager is really in a difficult position, right? They're the one she is dealing with. You know, she has to get these 6 things accomplished. She has these 4 people, and 2 of the people may not want to do those 3 of those things that need to get done, right? Because it's like, oh, I want to do something else, or You know, what about like sort of explaining to people like, look, you were hired for a role. Maybe it's a generalist role, but like explaining to new people that sometimes you have to do things that you don't exactly like. That's, that's part of the job. Like, that's why they're paid.

How do you coach that?

Right. Well, it's about being collaborative, right? So if a manager, if you're managing a Gen Z person, let's say you've got Mike on your team. And Mike is straight out of college. This is his first time, first full-time job. And Mike is getting bored at the day-to-day work that he's— you've given him. And he has this idea to do this other thing. But you need that day-to-day work done, right? Maybe you have a conversation with Mike and you say, OK, talk to me. What is it about this work that you're— that isn't as fulfilling to you?

Hmm.

What do you propose? How do you propose we get this stuff done And what, you know, how would you like to go about this other thing? You know, like, approach it as a conversation rather than, no, Mike, this is your job. This is what you need to do. You need to be, you know, butt in seat from 9 to 5 in the office and doing this in the way that we have always done it. And I don't want to hear you complain about it.

It's so, it's so the difference between, I mean, it's so different than my, like, I think of, and we can all have these stories about, oh, our first first job, and our first job was in the, you know, doing whatever. And, you know, again, I had a really great job to start, and I had a really great boss. But man, it is a challenge because the manager really is in a difficult position. She's getting sort of feedback and thoughts from her boss, and she needs to get these things done. And, you know, it's just a wild divergence of the expectations for jobs and by the younger generation, I think. It's just, it's a drastic change on what work means and what work is.

Right.

But if they can meet in the middle, if the manager can come to the employee and say, you're scrappy and you're resilient and you can learn how to do things faster than I probably can, what's your suggestion? Here's the work that has to get done. How do we do it?

It's great.

It's great. Yes, great, great point.

It's actually a great way to do it. And I, and I think there's obviously an entire, like, coaching thing around that for both sides. Right? Because there is a— I experienced it too. I mean, what, you know, I was suddenly, I was the Chief Operating Officer for a marketing analytics company. And all of our analysts and the whole thing were like right out of college. And they were like 23 years old. And it's their first job. And they're, and they are, you know, they're statisticians and things like that. And we're, for the first time, you know, basically asking them to not only put these things together, but then to go stand up in front of a client. Right, and, and present their findings, um, and stuff like that. And they've got— and like you said, they can't even manage eye contact, right? Like, let alone have like a stage presence, right? Um, but, and then worse than that, it was, it was, it was— the experience was kind of like, why don't you understand that this is work and that this is what— how work works?

Right.

Like, the generational divide and the way that people were raised and whatever across that 20-year gap was so different that they really do show up in a different way, completely different. And of course, if you're that middle manager, you're potentially— you're dealing with a boomer on one side and a Gen Z on the other, right? You are in— you are like, talk about the sandwich generation.

Well, but I mean, this is every, every time we're at the changeover of generations, right?

It happens.

This happens, right? And the shorthand that the people in power use is, oh, they're entitled.

Right.

They're not entitled. They just have a different perspective. They have a different way of working. They have a different, you know, and so you're going to get a lot further if you try to understand where they're coming from. And on the flip side, you're going to be a lot more successful coming into the working world if you understand that, that they have that perspective and they have these deliverables that need to get done. And this is again where that the leadership philosophy at the agency on the analyst side of the agency really comes in. Because if you're managing a team of new people, and you have to have data pulled together to pull together a presentation that then needs to be given in front of a room full of people, understand the team that you have. Let's say you have 5 people working for you on this. Well, is there somebody really good at the data? Is there somebody who's really good at putting together slides? Is there somebody who just is clamoring to work on their, you know, briefing? You know, in front of a room full of people, like, what are their goals? What are they good at? What are, what are good stretch assignments for them? What are they looking at? What's the next level that they're looking to get to and how are they going to get there? So how do we get them there? Right. As opposed to people being glorified individual contributors who happen to be leading a team.

Right.

And just want to get the work done.

Right.

You're going to be a lot more successful and you're going to be a lot less burned out if you can figure out how to motivate the individual people on your team and get them to where where they want to be.

And that's just on an individual level, too, right, Robyn? I mean, the reality is, is that there's, there's, there's team leadership, there's the, there's the team itself, right? And being able to take that same philosophy and now apply it to the team level. You know, wherever there's some people that talk about the hive mentality, some people talk about how, you know, groupthink, or the way that we kind of are merging, like, you know, into one kind of team brain, as opposed to just individual brains, things like that, you know. But the idea is that somewhere in there is the notion that in order for the company to move forward in the right direction, you've got to have all these people firing in the best possible ways that you can. Like any team, if it was a sports team, it was the CIA, if it's whatever, it's all the same. The goal is everybody rowing together in the right direction when I say row, right? Or whatever it is. And I think that's the— it's hard to— you have to do it. What you're saying is you've kind of got to do it on an individual basis in order to grow that team in the right way.

Yeah, I mean, it's both, right? You need, you need the vision and you need the motivation coming from above, right? Like, if everyone doesn't know what the direction is of the company and what the goals are of the company, it's hard to—

you're not going to be able to move in that direction, right?

So that needs to come from above. But then implementing on a day-to-day basis, that's where you need to be pulling From below.

Right. Gotcha.

Yeah.

Because in order to get the thing done, it's a matter of you guys are down here at the, you know, whatever, at the bottom of the hill. What is the, what is the view down here? And how do you guys translate these big ideas that are coming from the top of the mountain into the real thing that's happening right now?

Right.

One of the pieces that, that, that stuck with me that I heard from a senior, a piece of advice I heard from a senior leader at the agency and in one of the leadership classes that I took was you have to have spies, which is funny hearing that from a leader at the agency, right? But his point was, he was, he was like, you know, multiple levels up, right? And he didn't know that there was a manager under him that was just running roughshod over everybody below them until that manager moved on. And then all of a sudden, people are coming out of the woodwork to tell him, oh, this person was terrible. You know, all of our best people left. And, and it was, everybody's morale suffered and we didn't get anything done and things were great. We were terrible under this person. He didn't know because he didn't have spies underneath. Spies is a, you know, you know.

But it's a very good point that that same thing happened to me, right? We— I had that exact scenario happened to me where it's like, wait a second, you have no idea what this— you have a perception of what that person is, right? Because they're on your team, right? A couple levels down. But you don't know the implications of what they're doing and all the things they're doing to to run roughshod, in your term, over the team, have people quit, have people leave. And then they leave and it's like, oh my gosh, it's a, it's a new beginning, you know.

And you know even less what they're, what they're preventing from happening.

Very good point.

That's the, that's the worst case because the re— it's one thing to see them actively block things or not do it, or, or, or things aren't, you know, the work, the work product or whatever doesn't come out right or whatever. It's another thing to You will never know the things that aren't getting done that you just think are, you know, maybe—

Maybe they could be getting done that you're not because you're spending so much time. Everybody's spending time. There's whispering in the hallways. There's, you know, there was one, one time where, you know, my office had a pretty bad leader and there was like a meeting of all the senior analysts in the mezzanine in the cafeteria one day to talk about what are we going to do about this? Right? It was like multiple levels up for me. But if the person above that person had been paying attention, we wouldn't have needed to do that.

Right.

How much time did we spend on that?

Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. No, no, it's a lot of wasted time and a lot of wasted effort, and it's contributing probably to leaky profit somewhere, right? And that's the— that at the end of the day is a, you know, is a huge value killer. And that's where, you know, where a lot of our work comes in. Robin, this is just fascinating stuff. that we've been talking about this morning is so great. What's the best way for people to get in touch with you if they want to reach out and talk more?

Yeah, I'm pretty active on LinkedIn, so you can always find me there. I also have a website, rjleadershipcoaching.com, so people can find me there. Those are probably the 2 best ways.

Awesome.

Well, Robin, it was really— Robin Sodaloff, it was really, really great to have you on the Exit Engine podcast today. A lot of great information here. Guys, go check out Robin on LinkedIn. It's Robin Sotaloff at LinkedIn. It's, and at her website at RJ— sorry, sorry, say this website one more time.

rjleadershipcoaching.com.

Leadership Coach. Exactly right. And talk with— we're going to see more from Robin coming up too. We've got a webinar planned. We've got a bunch of stuff here. So we're going to— there's going to be lots more coming down, you know, from Robin specifically about your particular needs and things like that. She can really help with that stuff. She's got a great network behind her as well, just so you know that. And so it's something that when you've got a question about your leadership, you definitely want to have a conversation with Robin for sure. All right. Robin Soloff, thank you so much for being on the podcast.

Thanks for having me.

You're welcome. Hey, John, look, a couple of big ideas that we talked about today. Okay, the first was the resilience. is the idea that you're going to need some preparation, OK, and probably some help, some support as you move through this, just from an emotional standpoint, right?

Yeah.

That's the first. Second thing is you're going to need, when you're looking together, as you're building teams and as you're looking at stuff like that, you want to make sure that you're leading from a place really of empathy, right? And that is to understand Where whoever you're dealing with on a moment-by-moment basis, on a larger picture basis, whatever, is it— where are they coming from? And can you put yourself in their, in their shoes to kind of understand what their— where their head is? And then can you bring the things you need to get done and communicate them in a way that's going to naturally, right, that they're going to kind of naturally gravitate around, right?

Yeah.

And you don't want to be command and control, right? You don't want to be telling people what they should do and directing them what to do. I mean, that can only go so far. A lot of, you know, what I took from the conversation is, yes, you have to have empathy for people and you also have to have— let them come up with some of the solutions for themselves. Right. You can't come up with the solutions for them because, again, it's going to be your idea. It's not going to be their idea.

Right.

So, you know, to the extent that you can do that and to coach people and lead people, but let them You know, come up with some of the solutions, at least most of the time, so that they have sort of skin in the game to get things done.

Right. And I think the last thing that stands out to me simply is a matter of you don't have to do this alone. All right. And just know that no matter where you are in your business journey right now, there are so many people like Robin out there. It's a matter of personality and, you know, and right fit and how you resonate and all that stuff. But look, getting some kind of help for wherever you are is gonna, is gonna be the— it's going to benefit you so tremendously. And if you get help from people like Robin and you get help through Exit Engine, you're gonna get that help exactly when and where you need it. Not extra. It's not like, hey, we're selling Robin today. No, the idea is that Robin's here and Robin will show up for you. When you need Robin to show up for you.

Yeah, and it is certainly interesting, you know, to, you know, when you're looking at coaches, I would imagine that you want to look at someone with diversity of experience. And someone like Robin has— talk about diversity of experience— from working for the CIA to working for Tesla, and just coaching a wide variety of young professionals as well as older professionals. It's a, it's a, it's a wonderful range of experience for anyone looking for a For an exec, for a coach.

Absolutely. And I can't wait to do more with Robin. Robin, thank you so much for being here. We really appreciate you. John, as always, thank you for being my partner. I really appreciate you. And guys, right now, like and subscribe this podcast right now. It will auto-download onto your phone. Just say, I want to subscribe to it, whether you're on Apple or Spotify or wherever you get it. Do it right now. Just get it on there. And then it's just going to pop up on Friday morning every morning, just like, like automatic. It's kind of cool. Also, you can find John and I on LinkedIn. We're all over LinkedIn right now. Okay, we are, we are, we are attacking LinkedIn with all, with every, all, everything that we've got. There's content up there. There's a lot of good, really good free stuff to see and learn about what you need to do in order to be able to raise your value and salability and exit on your own terms. So go to, you can find John Kniff at J-O-H-N C-A-N-N-I-F-F-E on at LinkedIn. You can do the same thing here with Joe Stapleton, J-O-S-T-A-P-L-E-T-O-N, on LinkedIn. Send us an email. We want to answer them all the time. We'll answer any question you have. You want to set up a call just to discuss your particular situation? We can do that too. Send me a note, joh@myexitengine.com, or John, joh@myexitengine.com. Do that anytime. And most importantly, right now If you've got a— if you want to get a view for your future, if you want to get to understand exactly where you are from a value and salability standpoint right now and where it could be moving forward right now, you can, you can, you can get a view of that right now by going to myexitengine.com. Follow the prompts. There's a video of me and my ugly mug, but watch that, do that, set up a call. Let's talk. Let's figure out how to get you into the ExitEngine ecosystem as a founder and start helping you raise your value and salability on your way to an exit on your own terms. Thank you for listening to the Exit Engine Podcast. Have an awesome day, and guys, keep building to success.