Dan Sullivan on Unique Ability, Purpose and Motivation with Joe Polish -Episode #8

I'm Joe Polish.

I'm Dan Sullivan and welcome to 10 Times Talk. Hello there, it's Joe Polish and Dan Sullivan. We're here for 10 times talk.

We're gonna tear it up today. Alright, Dan. Well, you've. At the last strategic coach I went to class, you shared a video, really awesome video. It's like a nine minute video and we're actually gonna put a copy of that video up on 10. So if you're listening to this on itunes, we want to remind you that after you listen to this episode, the video that we'll show is a nine minute video. Actually go to the website www.tentimestalk.com and you'll actually be able to watch a video that will accompany this. But you talked about a very important question which is the 10 times purpose and so I'll let you take it from here.

Why don't you explain what this is all about? Well, you know, over the years, Joe, I guess going back probably 25 years now, I put an emphasis on a concept which I call unique ability. Namely that every individual, if you really take a look at what they really love doing, in other words, they have a passion, they have the same activity where they're passionate, they can really be a hero to other people. And also there's a multiplier to it, namely that if they get really, really good at helping other people with their passionate activity, that they can, that they can really multiply both terms of money and also in terms of reputation. So I've been, I personally coach 6,000 entrepreneurs and our program has had over 16,000 entrepreneurs from all over the world. And you know, as I go along, I just keep trying to get simpler and simpler. And one day I was just in a workshop and I started talking, I said, I have a question for you. And the question is, what is the single focus and activity that would keep you absolutely fascinated and motivated for the rest of your life? And I put it up there and it was one of those just came out of my head and I put it up on, I have one of those smart boards. So I wrote it up on the smart board and you know, it just generated an enormous amount of conversation. And one of the things is it was a bit like looking at the sun for most people. They really couldn't look directly at what the activity was. So I got the idea that maybe we'd approach it through the back door. And instead of going directly after the answer to that question, what I said was, well, let's talk about what isn't the answer to that question, in other words, what. What are the things that you could absolutely say aren't the thing that would keep you fascinated and motivated? And what I found was, you know, that people could immediately put down the list. And I said, so why don't we start with what isn't, you know, what wouldn't keep you fascinated and motivated. And that way we can get. Start getting rid of. We start getting rid of everything that isn't that. And people have just made enormous progress. And then after they do it for, in my program, two or three quarters and they've knocked off about eight or nine activities and they've delegated them or just stopped doing them, period, all of a sudden it starts emerging in the center that there's an area of their entrepreneurial life that they would just have lifetime staying power with. They would just work with it continuously. And the more they worked with it, the more energy they would get, the more success they would have, the more inspirational they would be, and everything would just work. So I'm just very excited about this. And, you know, I've been at the Coach now for 38 years, and I kind of feel like I've hit sort of like one of those central points to the whole program with this question.

Right. Well, you know, when I was in the group, one of the things that I had mentioned, I grabbed the mic and I said, you know, when I first heard that question, at first there was a lot of resistance that came up in my mind saying, well, you know, I'm very high add. I like a lot of things. I have a lot of different interest. I mean, you know, a single focus and activity that would keep me absolutely fascinated, motivated for the rest of my life. I mean, there's many in your emphasis of, well, what is the number one thing? And trying to determine, well, you know, how do I link all of it together? And it took me a while to actually it was obvious, but it didn't seem obvious. And the thing is, it's so right there in front of people that a lot of times you just don't see it. I mean, it's like your nose. I mean, you just don't really see your nose out of your eyes. It's kind of hidden, but it's like right there. And so it's like trying to have a fish see the water. It's not in their frame of reference, per se. And so after going through the process with you, I realized that my single focus activity that not only was, but does keep me fascinated and motivated because I do it every day, is genius networking. It's what I call genius networking. It's taking knowledge and sharing it with people. It's interacting with people that are awesome and cool and not just networking, but networking with industry transformers, networking with the smartest people and bringing them together. I put that under the umbrella of genius networking, which covers a lot of different areas, but that is a single focus activity. It's kind of like if you're a runner, you're going to run. There's a lot of other things like putting your shoes on and dieting and everything. But the single focus activity for a runner is running, and everything else supports that activity for our listeners. What I'd like to do, because in the video that we're going to have up on the site, you have this great visual, which is why people really, after you hear this, you really need to go watch the video. Watching the video after we talk will make a lot more sense than before, but It'll be on 10 times talk. You have these great visual boxes that show. Not this, this. Explain that. Because you said starting with removing.

Yeah, well, the sort of story that I use to kick that off is the great sculptor Michelangelo, he was asked one time how it was that he sculpted such perfect statues, because there are some statues that he didn't finish. And we know how he kind of went about doing his statues. And there's kind of like no in between for Michelangelo. He. There's the block of stone and then there's the perfect statue coming out of it. So he went right from block of stone to these amazing forms. And so they asked him how he created statues, and he says, well, I get this block of stone, marble, and, you know, inside of it is a statue. So what I do is I just chip away all the marble that isn't the statue, and all I'm left is with a statue, statue. Now, whether, you know, he was telling tall tales or not, I don't know. But here's the thing about it, that inside each individual, if you take all their activity, you know, and in a busy world, people will have a lot of busy activities. And, you know, but really at the very center of it, there's something that they could just organize their thinking and they could organize their schedule and they could organize their support system. There's just one thing that if they could just focus on that, like yours is genius networking. And more and more, I've just noticed that you've taken your entire company, which has been in existence for decades, and what you've done now is that you're bringing everything into support of genius networking. And that's the whole point about it, is that you now know that there's a center to this whole thing that's just going to get better and better and better. And as a result of that, then your reputation, your impact, the kinds of geniuses that you're going to, you're going to attract to the, to the program is just going to go higher and higher and higher. So in the video, what I do is I just show a box, it's kind of like a rectangle. And I said, so if right off the bat you may not know what the actual thing is, that would fascinate and motivate you, but you could probably take half the box and you could say, well, it's not this. And then you could what's left over? Now you have half the box and you could take half that box and you say, not this. And then half the next box. So finally you just get down to one little square and that's this. And the moment you get there, then you can reverse the process, you know, and then you start saying, well, if this is the thing that fascinates and motivates me, why don't I have my whole company doing that? Why don't I have my whole packaging? Why don't I have my whole image in the world and my message in the world, why don't I just have it about that activity? And the neat thing about it is you don't need a Harvard MBA to do this. I mean, anybody who just tells the truth about the things in their past when they were just on fire, like I always say what that activity is, you start doing it in the morning and if you did it all day, by the end of the day you would have more energy than when you started with. It's an activity that actually generates energy instead of actually burning up energy. Yeah.

So as it relates to grunt work, I mean, you have an interesting. Let me just make a couple of comments. You have a very unique and interesting time system for entrepreneurs, specifically designed for entrepreneurs, not bureaucrats, not anyone else, but for entrepreneurs that live and work in what you call the results economy versus the time and effort economy. And part of this time system, which just occurred to me, although I've been in Strategic coach for over 13 years, is that unlike many other systems, I have a lot of friends like David Allen getting things done and Tim Ferriss Four Hour Workweek. I knew the late Stephen Covey. I've been through lots of different events Friends with a lot of people that teach productivity, time management, et cetera. No one quite looks at it the way you do. It occurred to me about a week ago, and this is after having literally attended so many productivity types of seminars and read so many books and stuff, and I'm always fascinated by the subject of effectiveness, I love Peter Drucker and all that stuff, is that this is going to sound weird, but when you have your act together, when you're a successful entrepreneur, when you really set things up the way that you take your strategic coach clients to do it, focusing on the single focus activity, identifying their unique ability, developing a unique ability team, your time management system doesn't need to spend a lot of the day processing. Because the real question is, do I need to do any of this shit? Because a lot of people that are very successful and it dawned on me that there are things that I find myself, which is why I go to strategic coach. But there are many things that I find myself thinking I need to deal with. When I sit and look at it from the frame of is this genius networking? Do I need to do any of this stuff? And if someone wants to bring an opportunity to me, does this opportunity, although it could make money, does it fit in this? It's a great filtering system. And so, you know, I think the reason that you have set your life up to have a lot of freedom, a lot of free time, more than anyone that I know and also running a multi million dollar business is because of your mindset, because you really have this sort of stuff figured out. So to go back to my original question, grunt work, what are your thoughts about grunt work? Because I could see someone listening to this going, okay, well yeah, that's great. But I have a lot of stuff that I just have to attend to.

Yeah, well, here's the thing, Joe, and you'll remember way back, you know, when you were like 20 years old, early 20s, and you started your business and you know, and you know, I was a little later, I was, you know, I was 27, I actually was 30 years old when I started my business. And you know, in the beginning when you're just entering and everybody, everybody starts out with some sort of industry, you started off in the cleaning industry and I started off in advertising. I was a writer with a big agency. And then when you go out on your own and I carried some of that skill with me, some of the early work, I could knock off copy, I could do this. And what you have to do at the beginning of business is that you really do have to do everything because you have to get a sense of all the activities that contribute to the business success, you know, and so some of that is just mainline stuff. I mean, selling and creating are mainline stuff, but a lot of it is just backstage work, you know, and until you have enough surplus income that you can hire a support system, you kind of have to do that. Besides that, you have to, you have to know what it is that you want other people to do. So you have to, you know, you kind of have to do it yourself. But the whole thing is not to hardwire yourself. And that's the biggest mistake that I see with entrepreneurs. They take the period when they're an entrepreneur when they're just getting started and they have to do everything and they hardwire it so that now they're 10 times bigger, they're 20 times bigger, and they're still hardwired that they have to do all that stuff or they have to directly oversee someone else doing it, you know, so that's big thing. I mean, the whole point for growth and getting surplus income. So you don't have to do any of that stuff anymore at all. And as soon as you can get rid of it, get rid of it.

Yeah. Well, I had yesterday I was at an event with my friend Vern Harnish, and he had one of the guys that was speaking at his event. It's a Fortune growth summit that he does with Chip Conley, who's also a friend of mine. And after the speech that Chip gave, me and my girlfriend drove him to one of the hotels that his company owns. They have a chain of really cool hotels with 60 different hotels. And he talked about in his speech that he had a calling for many years that felt like being the CEO. And so he was, when he was young, he was driven. He built up this multi million dollar, multi hundred million dollar hotel chain company and he was the CEO. And then he was literally going through a crisis, like a lot of anxiety, a lot of stress, and he realized that this isn't my thing thing. But it took him a while to unravel that. Now the reason I bring that up is because you have helped more entrepreneurs than anyone else on the planet that are successful entrepreneurs unravel these messes even when they're very successful. You made this comment to me a while back, which is great, that success traps are harder to get out of than failure traps. Can you speak to that? Because I think it has a lot to do with this question.

Yeah, well, it was kind of interesting because Just yesterday I started a new workshop and I had somebody there who, you know, he owns 50 restaurants and he's got about 800 employees. And you know, he's an immigrant to the States, so he came over here. I mean, one of the things about immigrants, you know, especially if you come from overseas and you come to the United States or you come to Canada or to the UK or Australia, those are my four main countries where entrepreneurs come for strategic coach. But if you're an immigrant from outside, say you're from Africa or you're from Europe, one of the European countries, or the Far east, there's an advantage to that over native born people. And the advantage is that when you arrive, you've left your past behind. And so to a certain extent you've left a lot of baggage behind. Right, okay, so, but, and the only thing you really have to work with is future. But the problem is that you're so desperate to succeed and you're so worried that you could fail that you almost have this sort of. All my waking hours are going to be vigilance to make sure that everything is right, you know, and so you can't turn it off, you know, and so even if you're on what other people would call free days, they're not free days for you. You know, you're emailing and you're calling and you're working on your computer and that has, that's for another discussion. But there's just tremendous strains into people's personal lives and their relationships that come from that. And so what the whole point is though, is that in all that activity you're doing, there's only a certain activity that's actually driving the progress of your company. And the other 80% is stuff that other people could easily do, not only easily do, but they would do it better than you because it isn't your unique ability, it isn't the thing that fascinates and motivates you, but for them it would be. So what I do, Joe, is I go looking for people and I watch them and I say what fascinates and motivates that individual and then I try to line it up with something that I need done. So I have four great project managers around me on a daily basis who just love doing about a dozen different activities that are totally supportive of me, where I don't have to motivate them, I don't have to manage them, I don't have to monitor them. This is the thing that fascinates and motivates them. And they can't get enough of it. And I just sort of have them carry me along so that I can just do the thing that fascinates and motivates me. I mean, yours is genius networking. Mine is just talking to successful entrepreneurs about growing 10 times. I mean, I plan to live a long time, and if for all the time that I still have remaining, I can just talk to entrepreneurs about growing 10 times, you know, asking them questions, you know, and giving them thinking tools, giving them thinking exercises and concepts that allow them to think about 10 times in a normal way, in an achievable way. I mean, that just fascinates and motivates me.

This is great too. And I think a lot of people as adults are still trying to fit into the picture the ideal that their parents wanted them to be when they grew up or that they think they need to be. And they're miserable in it. And they may be miserable with a lot of money, they may be miserable with a lot of advantages. And so what is the setup that people listening to this? What are some of the things, mindset wise, actions wise, that would be useful for them to partake in so they can get closer there? And I of course, will say go to strategic coach would be, if it makes sense to you and you qualify, that's a smart thing to do. But right now, after listening to this and watching the video, which they're going to do immediately when they're done with this, what should they do?

Well, I think that the easiest exercise I've ever come up with that really helps people here, I said just get a sheet of paper, draw a line down the middle of the and divide it into two sides, and on the left hand side, just write down passion, you know, passion, hero and multiplier. Okay. And what that means is this is an activity that you're very passionate about. When you are fully being passionate in doing this activity, there's a certain number of people outside of yourself. And Joe, one of the big things, you know, that a lot of people say, well, I have a real passion, but they don't think about the world. You know, your passion is really worthless unless it actually connects with the world and it actually really helps and transforms other people's lives, you know, otherwise, you know, you know, you're just, you know, I mean, it's just something you're doing with yourself.

Yeah, I'm really excited about, you know, what, juggling or something.

Yeah, yeah. But I mean, have an audience, you know, I mean, you know, or teach people. Teach people how to juggle but the. And the other thing is that there's a multiplier there. So passion, hero and multiplier. And then that side and then on the other side, none of these.

Okay.

And then just start looking at what you did yesterday, okay? And say, what did I do yesterday that was passionate? Well, this was kind of like it. And you write down something and you know, and then you think about being a hero. Well, I was really a hero here. And you write down what you were doing and where's the multiplier? Where, you know, you got a bigger check or you got the biggest check you ever got. You write that down and then you say, well, and then what about the other things? You'd say, well, no, no, no. And pretty soon you have two lists, okay? And the list on the right is incomparably longer than the list on the left. And you'll see that you don't have a lot of things that are passionate, where you're a hero and where you have a multiplier, but you have an enormous number of things where you aren't. And then what you do is just strategically, you know. And I do things on a quarterly basis because in 90 days you can really pull off progress. And I would just take one of the things on the right hand side and you say, 90 days from now I'm going to figure out how I'm not going to be doing that anymore. And you do it. And the moment you do that, you return time to the left hand side of the page and then you do another one, you return time and attention to the left hand side of the page. And that's literally in Strategic Coach how we do it over a three or four year period, people just eliminate the right hand side of the page.

Yep. Well, you know, here's something too that I really need to touch on because, because I think in today's world, and it's only getting worse by the minute, is that people don't stick with stuff they don't read. You know, the majority of people don't read more than the first chapter of a book, if they even read it at all after they buy it. And we live in a world where people are watching every, you know, from TED Talks, to all kinds of educational things online, to attending conferences, to, you know, whatever methods of learning that they do. And there's a lot of different ways and places to get data and wisdom.

And knowledge and stuff.

But you've never been in the seminar business. And I, although have done seminars, I've never liked just one Seminar Because I've never seen a situation where long term people get their act together from going to a seminar. It is always an ongoing thing. And you said, you know, 90 days, you know, we can first start with 90 days and then over a three year period someone gets to a certain stage. And I'm a big believer in that. Like at Strategic Coach, you know, first year foundation, second year growth, third year acceleration. It kind of works for 25k members, it works for a lot of entrepreneurs because they have these built in habits. So even 90 days to someone may sound like, oh my God, that's a big time commitment, but like really this is your life. I mean, what if you really spent just 90 days focusing on what is a single focus activity that keep you absolutely fascinated, motivated for the rest of your life. This could change their life. It will change their life if they took it seriously. So how, you know, what have you learned about that? I mean, is there, is there a quick fix?

Yeah, I remember, you know, back before wines were a big deal in the United States. You know, I'm going back to the 70s. You know, it's, you know, there were a few California wineries and one of them was a winery by the name, name of Paul Masson. And Paul Masson had a marvelous, marvelous line. And it was nothing great happens fast, you know, and the whole thing about wines, you know, they, they age their wines and everything else. And I just thought it was a great line because it's my experience that all the great people that I know in the entrepreneurial world, you can track it back 25 years, that they've stuck with something, you know, and you know, when I say 25 years, it may take them back to when they're 10 years old, but they, they latched onto something and it, and it had all three qualities that I'm talking about, passion, hero and multiplier. And they, they just stuck with it where other people were paying attention, what other people were telling them to do or what they were expected to do, or if, you know, if you're going to get a good paying job, you've got to do this. And you know, as I think a lot of our listeners know from previous our interviews here, you know, I was born in the 1940s and you know, it was a structured world when I was born. You know, there's a lot of conformity to existing models. And part of the reason was, is that when you were six years old and you started first grade and your teacher said, I'm going to teach you things and, and the reason why you should learn this is because 12 years from now, when you leave school, after high school, this is really, really going to be necessary when you get out there. And you know something, they were right. But that all fell apart. I mean, there's no first grade teacher in the world who can tell kids today that this is important today because this is what the world's going to look like when you're out there. So I think that's one of the things is that, quite frankly, I think it was easier for me to stick with something, you know, in the 1950s and 60s than it is very young people today. It's very, very hard. Yeah, there's just, there's so many distractions. There's so many, so many options, so many possibilities. But that's why you can't look outward for the answer to this. You have to look inward, you know, you have to, you know, I mean, you know, what turns you on, you know, and then people say, well, I can't get paid for that. And I said, well, no entrepreneur in the world, when they started it, could get paid for it. They learned how to market the thing they were doing. It goes back to your favorite subject, Joe. You know, I mean, yeah, well, you got to sell it, you know, I mean, and the other thing is, you know, that you can only do 50%. The world is going to do the other 50%, you know, I mean, that's why networking works so much, because you create an attractive proposition and that's your 50%. And then the world, through various networks, will send you opportunities and capabilities and resources. So it's really interesting. But until you're committed, the world doesn't care. The world won't respond until you're committed.

You have a quote in one of your little quote books, which is, never own anything that eats while you sleep. And you say, if you can't sell it to yourself, don't try it on others. This is really a sales job.

It's a sales job on yourself. Just. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. You know, I mean, I had. It's kind of interesting because one of the discussions comes up especially for entrepreneurs that, you know, this is, you know, this is a topic for another whole thing. He says, I'm always coming up with ideas, so I want to talk to my staff about my ideas, you know, and our experience is that, you know, the staff, it's like Star Trek. They put up their shields when your ideas come because you've already given them a full plate of things to do. And then every Day, you're kind of disturbing them with new stuff. So I have a rule and I have a little exercise which we can talk about, which is called the Impact Filter. And the Impact Filter, I have a rule and it's self censoring. And, you know, I have this habit that I've created that I never ever mention a new idea to my team members until I've spent a half hour totally convinced I'm sold on this idea. And the reason I do that is because they have precious time and I've already given them something to work on and therefore I've sold them before I'm doing something else. And if I want them to do something else, I better be real serious about it myself. And I have to be able to tell them why in addition to what I've given them, or instead of what I've given to them, this is more important. And you know, and where those ideas come from is that they're all extensions of what I'm fascinated and motivated with. And I'm not going to bother them or disturb them or distract them unless I'm really, really serious about it.

Yeah, well, it's because you actually do take yourself very seriously. And you also have a very much a lightness about taking things not too seriously because you actually know what's important and what isn't. And you know, what may initially start as like, oh, this is the greatest idea in the world. If you spend a few minutes really thinking about it, then you find, well, does this have alignment? Does this really fit in with what I'm doing? And so I guess to wrap up, I want to give everyone the question one more time so that you can leave this episode with this thought. It is about the 10 times purpose. Why do you call this question 10 times purpose?

Well, because if you get down to total clarity about the answer to this question and you do find that activity, then it's just total growth from there out. You know, I mean, it's like, look what's happening with Genius Network. Now that you've just hit on that, all of a sudden doors are opening and, you know, people are coming into your life, you know, which you may not have had time for before. And you know, and Joe, I know over the last year you've done a lot of clearing of the schedule so that you can just be open to this. And that's why it goes 10 times. Because first of all, there's a great, great attractor. When you come across someone who is clearly fascinated and motivated by what they do. It's enormously attractive. It's enormously persuasive, you know, and so people want to be around people who have that quality about them. So this is the greatest attractor in the world that once you get this answer, you know, Doors, you know the world, the world is going to come to you. And that's, that's why, you know, it saves an enormous amount of time. It saves a lot of hard labor. This is, this is easy labor. And the big thing about it is and then you start attracting other people who have already established themselves as fascinated and motivated. So you have like radio station talking to radio station in others. There's a like mindedness and you know, a lot of people until they get onto this track, you know, it's very, very hard. But once you get onto this track, it gets much, much easier.

And it is about getting on the track and then staying on the track. And so the question is, what is the single focus and activity that will keep you absolutely fascinated and motivated for the rest of your life? So take this episode. Really listen to what Dan had to say here. Watch the video@10timestalk.com you'll love the visuals that go along with it. It's a brilliant nine minutes. And share it. Share this episode with people because I have to remind everyone that is listening to this. However you stumbled upon 10 times talk, this is really a recording. Who we focus our conversations on are affluent entrepreneurs that have their act together in their business to a degree and want to grow their businesses. 10 times Dan does that through the Strategic Coach program. I do that through Genius Network Mastermind and we put this information out to the world as free. It is a marketing process. If you resonate with this, then you will probably check out our websites and look at that stuff and even if you don't, you still going to walk away with conversations and questions and really useful, valuable stuff. Even though I started the Genius Network interview series in the late 90s, it didn't dawn on me until recently, wow. Tied within all of this stuff. So there's a lot to be said about sticking with something. And if you're a startup company, you might have to get bloodied and beat up a little bit and do a lot of things you don't like doing because you need cash flow and all that stuff. But the quicker you can get this into your mind, no matter if you've been in business for many years or you're brand new, this is the most valuable thing that I know that could really not only give you the ability to grow and build your business financially, which will give you a great financial reward and payoff. But the psychological paycheck from getting linked into this and getting clear is in my opinion far more valuable than the money, although the money is needed and necessary. This is really about having an easy, lucrative and fun business versus a hard, annoying, lame and frustrating as we call it. So thank you for listening to 10 times talk. Check out the video and anything else. Dan?

No, Joe, I mean, I think it's just a fascinating subject and you know, there's a whole community forming around the world of people who are on this wavelength and it's, it's the difference between living in a great house and having no electricity and then getting power. I think that this just identifying this is like turning on the switch. Yeah.

Awesome.

Awesome.

Well, we will talk to you all next time. Have a great day. Sa.