Gino Wickman Interview: The BEST Strategy To Transform Your Business This Year!

Hello, this is Joe Polish and this is Dan Sullivan and welcome to 10X Talk. This is going to be an awesome episode because we have a dear friend by the name of Gino Wickman on with us. We're all staring at each other right now on Zoom. We're about four months into, you know, give or take, since this pandemic started at the time of recording this. And so I think the conversation is going to be really appropriate to this. I'm going to give a quick bio of Gino and then me and Dan are going to get into some conversations with him. So here's who he is. An entrepreneur. Since the age of 21, Gino has had an obsession for learning what makes businesses and entrepreneurs thrive. At 25, he took over the family business which was deeply in debt and in need of help. After turning the company around and running it for seven years, he and his partners successfully sold the company. Gino then set out to help entrepreneurs and leaders get what they want from their businesses. Based on his years of real world experience, he created the entrepreneurial operating system eos, a practical method for helping companies achieve greatness. He's personally delivered more than 1900 full day sessions for more than 135 companies helping them implement EOS. He's the author of the award winning best selling book Get a Grip on youn Business as well as Get a Grip, Rocket Fuel, how to Be a Great Boss and what the heck is EOS? Which have sold more than 1 million copies. Gino is the founder of EOS Worldwide, an organization that helps tens of thousands of businesses implement EOS. With the aid of an international team of over 350 professionals and certified EOS implementers and an online support. There are over 100,000 companies using EOS tools worldwide. His next mission, Entrepreneurial Leap. Gino is now devoting time and energy towards helping entrepreneurs in the making get a huge jump start on taking their entrepreneurial leap. Which is why he created Entrepreneurial Leap. The mission of Entrepreneurial Leap is to find all the entrepreneurs in the making at any age, wherever they are, to help them realize their purpose and live their life they were born to live. So, Gino, welcome to 10X Talk With Me and Dan.

I am very excited to be here and looking forward to this.

Awesome. Well, you know, I brought up that we're four months or so into the time we're recording this. What perspectives about how entrepreneurship applies to not only navigating what's going on in your own world, but the world in general and who are the people that are going to help bring solutions to a lot of the chaos, a lot of the anxiety, a lot of the fear. I'd love to hear both of your perspectives on this. Sure.

I assume I'm going first, Dan, on that one.

You are. You're the guts.

Well, one interesting observation as a jumping off point is I find that you're either on the good side of this thing or the bad side of this thing. And so it's fascinating when I look at all of my clients and the entrepreneurs I talk to, because half are kicking ass and half are getting their ass kicked. So when you're on the good side, it's all about managing growth and capitalizing on these opportunities. The question is probably more about the ones that are getting their ass kicked. And I find the ones that are getting their ass kicked, they fall into two camps. One is where they just have to do what we call a reverse accountability chart. And so if they were once a $10 million company, now a $5 million company, they just have to go back to pretending and acting like they were when they were a $5 million company and grow back to 10 million someday. And some are having to completely reinvent themselves. I have two clients with 100 locations that went to zero revenue in that scenario. You're reinventing yourself. And so, you know, this is where the entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well. And if you are an entrepreneur at your core, which is one of the topics we'll talk more about when we get into entrepreneur elite, you will reinvent yourself. And it's all about taking a huge step back, helping lots of people, getting your ear to the ground, finding out what your customers and clients needs. I had one client that makes robot covers for painting robots that shifted to creating PPE equipment within days because they sew stuff. And their business went to zero because every automotive plant in the country shut down. So that's just one example. But there's my kind of long dissertation and jumping off point from a contextual standpoint. I like that.

That was actually a really great way to name it. So, Dan? Yeah. What about, what do you think?

Well, I've got sort of a one sided view of it, the positive side of it, because we flipped really quickly. Coach, that's strategic. Coach the company. And I remember we were in Chicago on March 13th and this is the last in person workshop that I did, you know, where I actually had bodies in the room and one of them was mine. And all through the day, Kathy Davis and Babs were looking at the attendance records from the previous 10 days, probably from the 1st, you know, 1st of March. And we were noticing we were already at 50%, we have 50% of people were not coming to their workshop. And we, you know, we call everybody when they don't show up. And it was mostly the pressure from their families, pressure from their teams saying, you know, you're going to have to be quarantined if you go off to Chicago. You know, already, you know, some of the states and some of the countries were putting in rules. You know, if somebody comes back across the border, you've been someplace like that and you've been flying, you've been in airports and that, then you're going to have to be quarantined. So after the workshop, we just had a brief huddle and Babs and Kathy said, you know, we're going to go back to Toronto. We have scheduled workshops for Monday and Tuesday and we're canceling all workshops from now until the 1st of June. So, you know, I took that in. I didn't, I didn't say much from it. And you know, then we, fortunately we had, we had, you know, no waiting for the flight. The fight took off when it was supposed to and we were on our way back to Toronto. I remember, you know, taking off and just pondering, you know, you know, what was life ahead. And by the time we landed, I said, okay, we're shifting. And I said, we got to get Zoom Zoom skillful, we got to get Zoom capable really, really fast because we got to get back out there really, really fast and connect. And we're going to probably have to do three times more connecting during this period. And so by the weekend, Babs and the EOS team, so kudo for Gino, that we had gone live with EOS as far as having an implementer September of. And so we had had one meeting, two meetings, and we're just coming to our third meeting that would have been in the middle of March. And so they, they decided that they wouldn't even, that they could get ahold of all the clients who are coming in for Monday and Tuesday right now and just say, you know, we're closing down. And three or four of them got caught in transit, but they were able to, it was okay. And they were actually relieved because they were getting the same kind of pressure. And then by Monday afternoon, our team had gone completely virtual. They were all at their homes. Everybody technologically was able to work as teamwork. And then a week later, we did our first two hour contact call and I did about 60 of them during March, April, and May. And then we went back to full workshop schedule. But Zoom and I just finished the first quarter and hands down, the best workshops in our 31 years. That's just terrific workshops, both from what the clients brought into the session and how we were able to handle it. So that's my report, and I would say 95% of our clients are just totally upbeat. And the ones who weren't and came to their workshop, they were upbeat when they left. So my view of the world is very, very different because I just celebrated on Monday two years without watching television, and I think that saved me a lot of bother.

You know, it's interesting what you had said, Gino, about having to reinvent, because a lot of how someone's kicking ass or getting their ass kicked, just some of its luck. I mean, some of it's the business you happen to be in, and there's some industries that, I mean, they just can't do it right. They can't do it right now. And who knows? I mean, all of the people that I know are that are in the fitness business, from gyms to yoga studios. I mean, even. Even when it comes back or how it comes back, there's a psychological fear that's instilled. So I want to ask you about your newest book, which is Entrepreneurial Leap, and what it's all about and why'd you write it and all that sort of stuff. What I want to do first, though, since it's the title of the book and what we're talking about constantly, is entrepreneurship, I always go back to defining what is it. So, Dan, I mean, I first learned from you the origin of the word entrepreneur. Let's start with you, Gino, and let's define what an entrepreneur is, what an entrepreneurial leap actually is, aside from just, you know, why are you focusing in this particular area and on this. This type of people? Because that's, you know, I mean, that's who we're really talking to right now. But a lot of people, I think, don't even understand there's different versions of what. What's an entrepreneur?

Yeah, it's such a great question. And I'm going to give, you know, three data points from my perspective, because there really are many, many definitions out there. And so the first, simply put, I describe it as a person who has an idea, takes a risk to start a business and bring that idea to the world, whether that's kind of reinventing something that already exists or creating something from scratch and then builds an Organization with people taking that to the world and making an impact. That's the first definition. The second definition in the book I talk about what I call the entrepreneurial range.

It's.

And so if you picture this arc and it says entrepreneurial range at the top, on the left side of that range you have the words self employed. On the right side of that range you have the words true entrepreneur. And so everyone that is self employed and owns a business is somewhere on that range. On the far left, the self employed, these are the one person shows people with a side, hustle consultants, somebody with a lifestyle business. You get the point there. Sole proprietors on the far right side of that range, true entrepreneurs. These are the greatest entrepreneurs of all time. Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Oprah Winfrey, Sarah Blakely. And so every self employed person is somewhere on that range. To me, a true entrepreneur is somebody on that right side of that range that literally goes out and builds a business with people. The third is, I believe a true entrepreneur has six essential traits. And so they are very quickly visionary, passionate, problem solver, driven, risk taker and responsible. And I believe you're born with them. And so anyone that has those traits, they truly are an entrepreneur. And at the end of the day, an entrepreneur is not something you do. A true entrepreneur is not aspiring to be an entrepreneur. They're people that just have a passion, pursue their dreams and their ideas, turn them into a reality and are considered entrepreneurs by the outside world. They're not aspiring to this destination. So that would be my definition.

Well, Dan, and you talk about John Baptiste, sake give the origin of that.

Because I think, yeah, this is the first time the word entrepreneur is used in, you know, how we understand it today. And it would fit in with, I think it would fit in largely with your definitions two and three, you know, and so Jean Baptist say he, if he was alive today, he would be called an economist, but there was no such designation back then and lived, you know, during the French Revolution and sort of in that period of time kept his head. So he was prudent or he had good connections. And he said that an entrepreneur is someone who takes resources from a lower level of productivity to a higher level of productivity. And then he was queried about that and he said, well, what kind of resources? And he said, you know, any kind of resource could be, could be visible resources, could be material resources, could be idea resources. And he was way ahead of his time because he was anticipating, you know, a lot of entrepreneurial, what I would would say entrepreneurial Successes which were just beginning, you know, he was seeing the full scope and very, you know, very brilliant man. And so my whole take is that what you call a lot of the self employed people, they don't qualify by the definition for me. And the reason is that they've essentially created their own job, you know, and, you know, and for one reason or another, instead of being employed by someone else, they're employed by themselves, but they're not actually improving anything, particularly the kind of job that you might get paid for working for someone else they're getting paid for and they work, you know, they're self employed, but they're very averse for the most part of having any other people working with them. They don't create a company. And so for me, I mean, just in terms of who I look for, my people are company builders and you know, and that's where we match up enormously well. Joe with our collaboration and also Gino with our collaboration between strategic coach and EOs, which is just a dream in heaven, I think, for both of us and Joe, the way that we collaborate. But if you don't have, if you don't have a team, I just can't see that you can really progress. I just don't think you can grow. So that's my own bias and it's my bias according to what kind of checks I like to get and from what kind of people I like getting checks. But that's my bias. So mine is really the right hand side of your arc and it's people who really, really use teamwork well and then they combine technology with it. Then they collaborate between their team and other teams to create even bigger multipliers in the world. And visionary, passionate, driven, all the above. And unless they were this, they would be misfits, they would be worthless human beings.

Exactly, yeah.

You know, in a lot of the ways these words are used, a lot of people fetishize the whole concept of hustle and be an entrepreneur and that sort of thing. And then there's a lot of, you know, attacks on business owners under, you know, way words are hijacked. What's the difference? Is an entrepreneur always a capitalist?

That's a great question. I mean, I'll go first. I know Dan's going to give a better answer so that I don't have to follow him. I'm going to go first. So I, I'll give my best shot at it because I think the short answer is. So your question is, is an entrepreneur a capitalist?

Right?

Yes. Or always a capitalist Right, Yeah.

Are they always a capitalist? First of all, I'm a capitalist, so I want to go on record. Most. Well, I shouldn't say most. All of my clients are capitalists. The world I live in, they're capitalists. So I think largely yes, but. So I want to give a quick yes, but I think it's a longer no, because, you know, I do believe there are people out there building great organizations with their entrepreneurial skills that are nonprofits. It's very, very rare, just for the record, because I never thought it was going to happen, but we have a lot of EOS clients that are nonprofits, and, you know, these people could go out and make millions, if not 10 millions for themselves, and they're focused on building those organizations. So when I see something like that, I want to say a longer answer. That is a no. But the world that I live in, most of the entrepreneurs I'm surrounded by are capitalists.

What are your thoughts, Dan?

Yeah, well, I guess it goes. What's the definition of capitalist? And again, there's definition that I favor, and this is by F.A. hayek, who was actual economist in the 1940s, 1950s, and he said the tragedy of capitalism is that it was actually named by the enemies. Capitalism isn't what capitalists called themselves. They would be more likely to use enterprise. They were enterprisers. You know, they. They created enterprises, and they were enterprising. But what Hayek said, if you really look deeply at what takes place in capitalism, capital in terms of money, is actually a byproduct of a much bigger process. And he says that capitalism is an ever expanding system of increasing cooperation among strangers. Okay. And what he meant by that is, in most places in the world, you can't trust people beyond your family, or you can't trust people beyond your friends. Economic matters, you'll get screwed by strangers. And in places where capitalism has succeeded, you can do enormous cooperation with strangers from around the world that you never actually meet personally. But both of you have rules and you have structures and you have processes that allow you to cooperate, and the outcome is so great that you're never tempted to actually be a bad guy in the process. It makes so much sense to follow the rules and, you know, be a good cooperator. And you and I, Joe, about a long time ago in 10 times talk, we did a series of three podcasts on social entrepreneurism. And I am violently opposed to the idea of social entrepreneurism, okay? And all the people who call themselves social entrepreneurs, I've always found, were either cowardly or they were phonies, okay? And the reason is because the word social itself takes the meaning out of any word that follows it.

Okay?

So you talk about social justice, it means injustice. You take social equality, it means talks about inequality just for our side, not for the other side. And it's. And so I, anytime I hear the word social in any context, I take my bill folded out of my pocket and I stick it under my, stick it under my armpit, you know, because somebody's trying to get something for free. And the difference is, and I'm going to use a different definition here, I don't think entrepreneurism is any, ever involved in an organization that's an input organization. Entrepreneurism is about output organizations. So what's an input organization? Foundations are input organizations. Government is an input organization. All organizations which pride how much money they've raised. Our input organization. Other people's money they've raised. Our input organization. Output organizations are those who create output that's measurable and can be improved. So our Prime Minister in Canada right now is involved in a huge scandal and I don't know if you've ever heard of the Kielberger brothers. The Kielberger brothers, Craig Kielberger, Mark Kielberger. And these are kids who got into social entrepreneurism when they were teenagers and now they have, they got a huge international organization and sometimes they're profit making and sometimes they're not profit making. Okay. And it's very, very interesting to watch them operate. They're only a profit making company when they're the ones who make the profit and they're a non profit organization when other people lose the money.

Yeah. You know, I would add. One other thought that I would add to this is, you know, it pains me that in some areas there's a negative connotation with capitalism. And I don't, certainly don't want to get political here. But you know, another way I look at it and I share this in this three page riff that I do in the book Entrepreneurial Leap, when I'm describing an entrepreneur in vivid color and one of those descriptions is that you want to make a lot of money. And it saddens me because more and more and more it's looked down upon if somebody wants to make a lot of money. And so whether you correlate with that, with capitalism or you don't, I kind of do. You know, I want to make a lot of money because of what it does for the people in my life and the freedom it creates. And the more money I make, the more people are employed, and so on and so forth. So the point I'm making in all of this is, again, the world I live in, my 137 clients I've worked with directly, the entrepreneurs that I know, these are people that make a lot of money. And I help my clients make a lot of money. And they are incredibly generous people. I. And they, we give a lot of money, we help a lot of people. And so it's, it's, you know, it's a misnomer that these entrepreneurs that make a lot of money are these evil people. It's just, I don't see it, I've not seen it, I don't experience it. And so maybe I'm one of the lucky ones and I'm in some kind of a bubble. But, you know, I've only seen that capitalism is good, making money is good, and everybody wins.

Well, that's the whole reason I brought it up, because there's a lot of it's real easy for. I do believe there's producers and there's parasites in the world, right?

And.

And there's a lot of people that are parasites that disguise themselves as producers and link onto entrepreneurs and people doing good. And there's, you know, the word gets hijacked continuously and business owners get vilified out of envy and out of whatever, for whatever misunderstanding. And so I just wanted to get some perspective on that, because when we're sitting there talking about the young people that listen to this or people that we're wanting to encourage and they're operating under this definition, that really is completely different than what you're talking about. Collaboration between individuals, exchanging money for value. And one thing I heard Dan say early on, years ago when I first joined Strategic Coach was all, money earned ethically is a byproduct of value creation. And the entrepreneurs that are truly doing great things in the world, I'm yet to see another system that works better than capitalism. And I've been reading a lot of stuff online where it's just these people attacking it. And they throw all of these business owners into this bucket because they might see some corporation that's exploited, or they may see someone using business strategy to take advantage or hurt people or whatever, but they throw everyone under that bucket. And the reason I bring it up, though, is, is because, as you both know, and Gino, you write about it in the Entrepreneurial Leap. It's a fantastic book. Is you're going to come across obstacles and there's many ways that people can check out or be Discouraged. And I want to more than anything right now. Entrepreneurs are the ones that are going to find the solutions and are creating the solutions and laying down the tracks for where the world is at right now. And when this resistance comes at you, I'd like to hear what you guys would have to say on how to navigate it as an entrepreneur.

You going first on this one, Dan? Yeah.

Well, first of all, I'd say that capitalism is the only value creation system that's ever existed. There isn't any other value creation system in the world where people are continually rewarded financially for creating value. And to a certain extent, their value creation comes because they are thinking about somebody else's welfare, not their welfare. In other words, you have to cross over and get inside the mind of a customer and say, what's this customer trying to achieve in his or her life? And I've got something that will help that person do it and do it faster, do it easier, do it cheaper, and I get paid for that. And as far as wanting to make. Wanting to have a lot of money, I want to have a lot of money because I want to have a lot of money. Yeah, I've tested the other side through two bankruptcies, and I much prefer the side I'm on. So I don't feel I have to justify anything that I do as an entrepreneur. I think people who would like to have my money without justifying have a lot to justify for. And the people are most opposed to entrepreneurs are the biggest robbers in the history of the world.

What I would add to that, and I'm not so sure we're answering your question, Joe, so re ask it. But you know what that prompts for me?

I'm trying to be subtle so that I don't have any political connotations. What I say here, you know, I don't want. I don't want to bruise somebody's political sensitivities here, but what it makes me.

Think of is you think of the 1900s and the first 50 years and the second 50 years. And in the first 50 years, I'm very fond of a lot of the writings and the success mindset from the early 50s and back then, everyone strived to be a millionaire and it was revered and respected. And so something happened in the second 50 years where all of a sudden now people have to whisper, I want to be a millionaire, where before you could shout it. So think and Grow Rich is a book that I recommend every single person out there read, especially if you're an aspiring entrepreneur in the making so for me, it's less about the money that I make because I believe you get everything you want if you help enough people get what they want. So for me, I get passionate about making millionaires. And so I'm hoping we can get back to shouting it from the rooftops. And I want to help these people that think they're entrepreneurs make lots and lots of money, become millionaires and multimillionaires. My goal is impact a million entrepreneurs in the making over the next 10 years. And I hope to create a lot of millionaires and I hope they are proud to be millionaires. And I'm confident certainly with the philosophy that I convey that they're going to help a lot of people and create a lot of jobs and make this world a better place.

Yeah, well, you know, look, I mean, so Dan uses eos. I use EOS in my own company. You've got all these companies that use eos. Entrepreneurial operating system. You talk about whatever business you're in, use even if you don't use our entrepreneurial operating system, at least have one. And so there is a way to make this work and there's many ways to make sure it doesn't work right. And that has to do with behavior skills, strategy, motivation, identifying a market, solving problem problems for a profit. You know, Dan has this great line of other people's bad news. Is your good news a lot of money that's made the world by transforming other people.

Right now, it's at all time high. I'll tell you this greatest entrepreneurial period of my lifetime right now.

So let's talk about how to make this work. I mean, I guess you went through the six entrepreneurial traits which are, you know, visionary, passionate, problem solver, driven, risk taker, and responsible. How does someone know if they're an entrepreneur or not? Because I can see a lot of people saying, yeah, I have those traits. But you got to have those traits in a certain way in order to make it work. So how does someone really. And you've sort of touched on this. I want to see if there's anything.

Else you would add. And I have. And with that, you know, to piggyback on Dan's comment, greatest period in time to be an entrepreneur and the greatest period of time to write a book on becoming an entrepreneur. So I feel like I'm in the right place at the right time. It's been very well received. So all of them.

And by the way, that's one of the skills of an entrepreneur. Being the right person at the Right time in the right place. It's, you know, and on that note.

You know, these are the times that spawn some of the greatest entrepreneurs of all times. 08 and 09. It's amazing how many clients I have that were spawned in 08 09. And we can go back through all of the decades of history. So with that, you know, you have all these displaced people now and many of them are going to become entrepreneurs. And because for many of them, they didn't realize they had these six essential traits. And so how do you know? Well, one simple answer is I've created an assessment. It's free online. I trust you'll put the website in the show notes. I'll only say it once, but e-leap.com anything I talk about, it's typically a tool. It's all free.

Oh, by the way, like we don't have an issue with people promoting their.

No, no, no.

Say it slowly. Gino, you can say it more than once.

Yeah, Gino, I'll just relieve your mind here. You cannot be too shameless on 10 times.

I'm a teacher at heart. Everything else is secondary. But yes, I'd love to sell a lot of books. I'd love everybody to go to the website.

So e-leap.com say it again. I didn't come quite. I didn't get the vision and the passion.

E-leap.com so there's an assessment there. It's free.

Take it.

Takes you 10 minutes. That's one way to know. Number two is when I say those six essential traits, scan your body. They've been with you your whole life. And so the people that are displaced right now, all of a sudden, they need to make a living. These six essential traits are going to show up. So again, visionary, passionate, problem solver, driven, risk taker, responsible. If that is you, you are an entrepreneur in the making. With that I strongly believe. So I take the reader through a process and I think we'll touch on some of this process in this conversation. But there's three parts to the book. Confirm, Glimpse and path. And confirm is all about, first and foremost confirming that you are and it's everything that we're talking about right now. Because the other side of this conversation is not everyone is an entrepreneur. Not everyone has these six essential traits. My personal belief is it's 4% of the population and there are, there's teaching out there that says you can teach somebody these traits and teach them to be an entrepreneur. I don't think you're bored.

The people doing the teaching are college professors and high school professors who never had the courage themselves to do anything outside of the system. Yeah. It's just that schools have found that they can make a lot of money with the word entrepreneur. Yeah.

And I, you know, I found that the professors and the teachers I'm talking to now as potential collaborators, it's right down the middle. Half believe you're born with it, which is refreshing. Half run for the hills and believe they can teach it from scratch. And so, you know, they shy away from this content. But this first part we're talking about, first and foremost, you got to confirm you have them. And if you don't, it's okay. There are like a thousand other careers. And being an entrepreneur isn't some ultimate destination in life. This is just a career choice, for lack of a better term. You either are or you aren't. And then glimpse is showing the life path is showing how to greatly increase their odds. So the last little point I'll add on this question is a lot of times it stems from a passion, a discovery, an idea. And that passion stems from pain or a wound or something in your life. And so my passion is entrepreneurs. I live to serve and help entrepreneurs because I help my dad as an entrepreneur, I helped turn his company around. There's something about that excruciating three years of my life that I just live and die to help visionary entrepreneurs. And so it's all about finding that passion, that thing that will pick you up every time you get your ass kicked on this 30 year journey you're about to go on as an entrepreneur in the making. So those would be a couple nuggets that I would offer.

That's great. That's great. You know, I want to hear your guys perspective on this. So what struggles, you know, do entrepreneurs face when growing companies and how do they overcome them? Because, you know, we've all been at this for several decades. Right. Dan's coached, you know, more entrepreneurs that are successful than anyone I've ever met. And you certainly have done the same thing with coaching and guiding and directing so many entrepreneurs. And there are times where it is brutal. I mean, I have, I'm yet to meet anyone that has not had, you know, one or numerous massive shit storms, some that just debilitated them. You know, from bankruptcies to so much loss to so much pain and angst. And then there's of course the joys and the, you know, the achievements and the ambitions, which is what everyone's pursuing in the first place. So to paint a Picture what struggles will entrepreneurs face no matter how much planning they think they're going to do, and how does one deal with them in the real world and psychologically, because this is also a mental game too.

Yeah, well, I'm happy to go first on this one because now you're into glimpse and path. And one of the biggest reasons I wrote this book is I'm trying to do what they say can't be done. I'm trying to imprint in an entrepreneur in the making's mind. I'm, I'm trying to help them see the future, to reduce half the mistakes they're going to make. I can only solve half for you. I can only head off half. You're going to make the other half. It's all part of the process. But in the glimpse portion of the book, I paint this vivid picture of a day in the life of an entrepreneur, both the dream and the nightmare, because I've seen both in vivid color in my life with so many entrepreneurs and help so many entrepreneurs live the dream. And sadly, most entrepreneurs are living the nightmare. And so once you see that contrast, I then share the eight critical mistakes almost every entrepreneur makes when they start their business. And I'm going to quickly share them. And if you want to drill down on one or two, we can. But where this comes from, in seeing that contrast of the dream and the nightmare is these are the mistakes that almost every client had made coming to me. And all of our EOS clients come to us. And so we're correcting these mistakes after they've reached their tenth, twentieth, fiftieth, hundredth employee. And so there's a way to head these off because I proved it when I started EOS Worldwide and built that to now 374 implementers sold it two years ago. But I avoided every single one of these mistakes, having been able to live it for 15 years. And so very quickly, number one is not having a vision. And so simply put, you've got to have and know your vision. And I offer a very simple tool for that. Number two is hiring the wrong people very quickly. That is the entrepreneur that starts the business, starts growing, needs a body and so grabs the closest one they can to them, throws it into the company, it's their brother, sister, mom, dad, uncle, next door neighbor, and has to fire that person two years later because then they find themselves surrounded by 2, 5, 10 people that should not be in this company. So hire around core values higher around skill. Number three is not spending time with your people. So the classic wild and crazy entrepreneur just goes forward, brings these people in. The organization is growing this on sheer passion. They have their followers that are just leading what they're saying. But at some point, you've got to spend time with these people. And so if you just meet with them weekly, quarterly, and give feedback often, you'll solve 99% of your communication problems. Number four is not knowing who your customer is. And so a classic mistake is wanting it all, thinking you need it all, and taking this buckshot approach to the world. Well, at the end of the day, if you can get really clear on who your ideal customer is and obsess about serving them and knowing them better than they know themselves, you'll get further faster and avoid a lot of mistakes. Number five is not charging enough. I use Dan Sullivan's quote on how to solve that in the book as well as a resource from Casey Brown. We can come back to that. But a classic mistake is they just don't charge enough. It's the difference between losing money and. And making a profit. Staying in business and not. Number six is not staying true to your core. And so they get distracted by shiny stuff and find themselves in five businesses, not one. Number seven is not knowing your numbers. And so that's simply implementing a weekly scorecard, reviewing a monthly P and L, and managing a budget. And if you're not good at it, hire an accountant for a couple hours a week or month. And then number eight is not crystallizing roles and responsibilities. While it seems so silly and simple, you must have an accountability chart in org chart when you hire your first employee. Everybody's got to know their roles and responsibilities. Even when there's only two of you, you'll be more efficient, more effective, and get there faster and create accountability right.

Out of the chute.

There would be my answer to your question.

That's pretty darn good. What would you add to that? Dan, you want to say something better than.

Yeah, well, I think he's covered, you know, a great set of checkpoints there. One of the things I'm going to look at sort of mindset, because I think, you know, life is about having the right mindsets. And I think entrepreneurs are great scientists in the realm of mindset. And but one of the things that a mindset. And I'll refer to you here, Joe, and I won't wait too long because I got to check this out. You got to have a fair dose of antisocial. You're antisocial. And I'm going to explain this in about five different Ways. One is whatever is in, you're out, whatever the in group is doing, you're, you're out of it. And part of it is because you're rejected. But the other thing is you, you choose to be outside of things. Okay? And the, the other, the other aspect of it is your passion for shortcuts. Your passion for shortcuts. And I would say a third one is you're very indifferent to the normal educational process. I'm not saying you're against it, I'm just saying you're indifferent. You don't see formal education as a crucial doorway to your future. Okay. And so, you know, you've kind of gone along because if, you know, in most places you have to go to school and you have to go to school and there are certain credentials, I mean, if you don't have a high school diploma, probably it's going to really get in your way. Probably. A college education today is what a high school education was worth 50 years ago. In other words, the only thing different is that high school graduates 50 years ago could read, they could write, they could spell, they could do math. And a lot of college graduates can't do this today. And so there are outliers. I think the best entrepreneurs are outliers. Whatever's average, there's somewhere on the chart. There's somewhere on the chart. And it's a particular skill, it's a particular insight that they have. I mean, Gino tells a great story, but he's one of the most antisocial human beings I've ever met.

Yeah.

You know what? So like.

No, no. And Joe, you got real, real anti hither on some levels. You got real antisocial. I do. You know, I'm only agreeable where it suits me.

Well, I heard the same from the guy that I learned marketing from originally, crazy copywriter named Gary Halbert.

And the world advanced, there was a first class antisocial human being.

Oh yeah, yeah. Gary was a character. So he said the world advances on the backs of its neurotics. And I always thought that to be quite interesting, funny and accurate in many ways. I mean there is, you know, when we do Genius Network, you know, it's the characters in the Star wars bar. I mean, they're all weird, they're all bizarre, they've all got different things. But you know, it is what it is. And so I have the whole list from both of you here.

Yeah, no, I'd like to add that to genes. That means to Gino's because I think, you know, at the center, you got to have a checklist. And his checklist is better. But outside of that, I mean, he talks about 4%. I've always gone on 5%. You go any country in the world, whether the entrepreneurs are legal, illegal. A real good country is where the best entrepreneurs can be. Legal Night States is a great country because the best entrepreneurs in the United States can do it legally. In Russia, the best entrepreneurs are criminals. Okay? Because you can't. You can't be a successful legal entrepreneur in a place like Russia, probably China is the same way. You know, you're a criminal. And so. But the reason why it's 4% or 5%, depending on what it is, that's all that's needed. Society doesn't need any more than 4 or 5% of this type of person because they, they create sufficient amounts of innovation. They create in amounts of shortcuts and savings that the rest of the population benefits from having 4% of their people like this. And so my sense is I, you know, I think it's really correct. And that tells you it's born. I mean, if it depended upon education, 40% of people would be entrepreneurs, you know, but it can't be taught. You can't, you know, you can't. You can't teach Outlier.

Yeah. Yeah. So it's kind of like batteries included. Batteries not included, sort of in context, right?

Yeah. And I can spot them. And you can spot them. I could spot them. Someone starts talking. You know, the one who really got me, I was Jeff Madoff. Had us at New York, you know, at the school where he teaches marketing. And Jeff is a longtime friend of our. I met him through Joe because possibly with the exception of you, Gino, everyone in my life I've met through Joe. But anyway, I met Jeff Madoff, and politically, we don't talk about it. Jeff is everything. Where I would be politically, Jeff is on the other side. But I really like him. I really like him. There's something just fundamentally I really, really like, like about Jeff. And so we find millions of other things to talk about, but he has this course at New School, I think it's called the New School in New York. And he had Kathy Ireland as an entrepreneur. He gets really great entrepreneurs. And Kathy Ireland started off, she was the tomboy model. She was on the front cover of Sports Illustrated 13 times. And she's quite tall and she's quite, you know, she's. You can tell she's got some muscle on her. And she, you know, started at 17, 32, 15 years and then she quit and she started her own entrepreneurial company. And she's got a $2 billion global company now. But she was talking about how she formed it and how she created it and why she created it and the tough times, the good times and everything else. And I was going down my checklist of what really strikes me home, that this is an honest story. This is a true story. And check, check, check, check. Everything she said about entrepreneurism corresponded to my experience. Yeah. And it's really entry. But she's an outlier. You can tell right off the bat she's an outlier. Yeah.

Well, so. So here's this. I mean, I just love what both of you said in terms of, you know, because my question was about struck what, you know, struggles do entrepreneurs face and when growing their companies now, do you overcome them? And, you know, so, Gino, I'll say this again because I think it's good for everyone listening. Not having a vision, hiring the wrong people, not spending time with your people, not knowing who your customer is, not charging enough, not staying true to your core. I thought that was great. Where you said, I wrote a note next to, you know, find yourself in five businesses, not one, not knowing your numbers. Because at the end of the day, we're in the arithmetic business. Whatever business we're in, we're in the arithmetic business. And not crystallizing roles and responsibilities. And so this, of course, requires needing to sell, needing to go out and say what it is you say, and that's a certain level of risk taking. So Dan says with antisocial, Whatever the in group is, you're out passion for shortcuts, indifference in normal educational processes, and then being the outliers. And so I think in a lot of ways, like a podcast like this or these books, these are all things where entrepreneurs seek this stuff out because, you know, it's not being given to them by the government. It's, you know, their parents aren't handing it to them. Maybe some entrepreneurial parents may try to offer things to their kids, but for the most part, you know, they're hunters. And so entrepreneurs go out and they hunt. They don't just hunt for customers and clients and opportunities, but also ways to do it. They look for recipes. They look for roadmaps. To Dan's point about a passion for shortcuts, I don't think anyone would be listening to 10X Talk or any of our podcasts if they're not looking for better ways to do stuff. Which leads to my next question then. So, because you Mentioned earlier, you know, you have a. A path is. So from your perspective, are there any proven paths to success as an entrepreneur? And I mean, the word proven like this. If you do this, this just works. And I know that's sort of a loaded question and stuff, but I wanted to, you know, that's. That's my question for you guys.

Yeah.

You want to go first, Dan?

Yeah, I will. I was reading, you know, I'm kind of a history buff, so I was reading about Napoleon and, and, you know, interesting, you know, interesting character. I mean, he born kind of poor, wasn't even born in France. He was born on Corsica, which is an island in the. Off the coast of France. And, you know, came up and, you know, within 15 years after he came up, he was the emperor of Europe. You know, I mean, and bright guy, very short, probably about five foot two. You know, five foot two and. But he was really interesting. And the one thing that he really comprehended is. And Joe, you've talked about a famous saying of his, that his life changed when he discovered that a man would die for a blue ribbon, for a piece of ribbon, and that he understood that people would dedicate themselves to something that was much bigger, that also recognized him as important. You know, he had this notion of giving people a sense of importance, but he had this thing about bringing up officers as fast as he. They could take command. And he would ask his senior officers, who all came up the same way, to describe why this person should be an officer. And Napoleon says, well, I know he's good. My next question, though, is he lucky? And I think that entrepreneurs have a keener sense for luck than the general population. What I mean by that, and you said it right at the beginning, Gino, I'm the right person at the right time in the right place. Well, that's what luck is. Luck is being the right person at the right time. And I think if you look at entrepreneurs who are really successful, they leave a very, very large part of their thinking to what is luck in this situation? What is luck in this situation? And luck is. You're the only one who sees this. You're the only one who understands the opportunity. You're the only one who knows how to organize it. And there's a window, not a. Not a wide open window, but a window that if you act right now and you take action, you're going to be the lucky one. And you have to be unlucky enough to know the difference. Joe, I mean, Joe, I was sitting, watching your documentary that Nick. Nick, Nanton did. And I was going through it and a lot of people said, oh, that's awful, that's awful. I said, outlier, outlier, outlier, outlier. Everything about you is an outlier. I mean, antisocial, you know, everything. I said, what else could he be besides an entrepreneur?

Yeah, exactly.

Or a criminal. Or a criminal. You should have a conversation with Andre Norman, something. You know, the line between entrepreneurs and criminals is not that wide.

Well, there's a lot. Yeah, there's a lot of. There's a lot of entrepreneurs that are in jail because they just, you know, they chose a different path to take.

Their entrepreneurial chose badly. It's like Indiana Jones. You, you chose wisely, you chose badly. You know, they choose badly. Yeah, we know. I mean, we know the characters. We know the characters. And one is they're great salespeople. I mean, they're what? Yeah, yeah, totally.

No, totally. Go ahead, Gino, what were you gonna say?

I was just going to say, and that's why I desperately want to get this book into jails and prisons, because it's, I mean, this is the book they need to read. I couldn't agree with you more. That many of them, if not most, are entrepreneurs in the making. They just use their skills for evil, not good, and now they have an opportunity to use them for good. There's an opportunity there. But in answering your question, Joe, here's what I would suggest. You know, is there a process, you know, for becoming an entrepreneur? I really believe that there isn't one. There is no. No perfect system, no perfect process, no perfect method, no perfect way. And if somebody's trying to tell you there is one, I think they're selling you a bill of goods, in my humble opinion. But I always say when asked that question, if there were a process, this would be it. It's a four step process. Step one, you have an idea. Step two, you take your entrepreneurial leap and start your business. Step three, you fight like hell for 10 to 20 years. And step four, you emerge a successful entrepreneur, hopefully because you've got a 50, 50 shot at best at succeeding. The odds are challenging. With that said, now we're onto the path part of the book. And in Path, what I do believe is that you can help an entrepreneur understand some guideposts, some awarenesses along their journey that again will greatly increase their odds of success and eliminate half the mistakes they'll make. And at a very high level, the chapters in Path are deciding on college or not. And I give all the pros and Cons and all the data for that entrepreneur in the making to decide the best path for them. How to discover your passion, because I believe passion is vital in you becoming successful. How to find a mentor, because having a mentor will get you there faster. Next is 10 year thinking. Dan subscribes to 25 year thinking. I am just trying to get him to think 10 years and then I will turn him over to Dan to get him to think 25 years. But there is power in that. I then share eight disciplines for increasing your odds of success and I share the nine stages. And devouring those chapters will absolutely give an entrepreneur in the making a clearer path, a better path. But there just is no perfect system or process.

Let me ask you this, Joe, he's really shameless. I mean in his pitching. I mean have you ever, I mean has there ever been a stretch in any 10 times talk where we just had a pure pitch for like two and a half minutes. I'm honored.

He's very sneaky about it. You know, all guys under trying to help people. But you know, what are those eight disciplines? What are the nine stages? You know, you got to read the book. So it's called entrepreneurially. Well, that's fine. So you mentioned, you know, the importance of having a mentor. And I mean we all have businesses that bring entrepreneurs together. I mean all three of us, we focus on the entrepreneurial world. That's, you know, Dan's got that, the great, you know, the great concept of who do you want to be a hero to. Right. Even wrote a book which is worth reading on it. And you know, we all want to be heroes and our heroes to entrepreneurs, those are the people that, that we, we go after. And so anyone that would be listening to this is all a potential client of all three of us. Right. Depending on where they come in.

And all at the same time.

Exactly, exactly. And so what I have found about entrepreneurs, the really smart ones, is they will pay for shortcuts, they will pay for results. And the ones that hem and haw about it, I mean I honest to God, I just see so many truly stupid people. And not that they don't have value, but just the decision making. I mean, some of the ways I will see people that will place more value on buying like $100,000 car than they will going out and joining a group that can teach them how to reduce the stress, make more money to buy 10 of those cars. Right. But they will belabor those sort of things. And you know, you guys are of the same thing. We all invest, getting better at our craft. As much as we want to, you know, say antisocial, is there one thing is we are, we're looking how to be better gold miners. Right. And so what, like, what would you say to that? Because I think that to me, one of the things I love about genius networking, about strategic, like, if someone's not willing to cut a check, it speaks volumes about their own future. You know, they think we're trying to sell them something and we certainly have things for sale. But they're investing. It's like what Dan said early on. He's like, you know, you make, this is your future. I mean, you're not giving, you know, the money you're, you're spending is you're having the question, should I give Dan the money? Should I give Gino the money? Should I give Joe the money? It's like, it's your future. So go ahead. It looks like you're going to say something, Gino, and for people, I was.

Going to ask you. What's the question in that?

Oh, no. So the question is, what would you say about the value of, of literally joining, like strategic coach or pursuing a mentor, things like that, signing up to hire an EOS implementer? I mean, these are things that all of us like, every one of us, we're clients of each other, right? Which is kind of cool. But we do it because it grows our entrepreneurial enterprises.

So, you know, the thought that comes to mind is this, like two contexts. If we go back 30 years ago, a mentor, because that's what launched this question, is that chapter on mentoring. And so 30 years ago, when I was coming up, mentorship was free. I had free mentors. I had people that took me under their wings, spent lots of time with me and taught me. And as time has gone on, mentorship has become more of a paid engagement. I'm a paid mentor to my clients. Dan is my paid mentor. He's been my mentor for 23 years. I consider him my greatest mentor. And I cut him a really big check every year for that. That. So my point in this is there's still free mentorship out there. And I teach a very specific process for how to go find a free mentor, which is a one on one relationship with someone who is where you want to be. But you know, paid mentorship is the way of the future and the way of now. And so you just have to decide, as that entrepreneur in the making, what is the education you're seeking? And I do share in this new book, Strategic Coach Program is one of the steps on the journey. I say once you reach the minimum qualification, get in that program, because I believe that will catapult an entrepreneur in the making at that phase. So I would just offer up two things to the audience. There's two types of mentors. You can find free ones and you should pay for the paid ones. And it's just a question of what you're looking for, where you want to be, and if they can get you there faster, it's a no brainer. I have spent hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars on my education. I spent 5% of my income every year on education. I've spent enough money and time to get a PhD three times over. I never went to college. I graduated high school with a 2.3 GPA. And I couldn't be more proud of that because I knew at 18, there's no way in hell I'm spending another minute in academia. That structure is not for me, but I spent a fortune in the last 30 years because education is so important.

And I would even say, when it comes to free mentorship, it's not like they're advertising free mentors here. I mean, you can listen to podcasts. This is a great way to get mentorship. Read someone's book, you can buy entrepreneurial leap, right? What I would say, though, is that anything that the three of us have gotten for free, we went out and we found it, we created value for someone, we had conversations, we did whatever it is we needed to do. You know, I've always loved the line, amateurs wait for inspiration. Professionals do it with a headache. And when I didn't have any money, and as a dead broke carpet cleaner, what I did have is I had time and I had energy, because you can spend time, you can spend money, you can spend energy. And once I got money and I learned how to make money, I just started reinvesting that money.

And.

And I love giving money to people that what I get in return, I can say, wow, you know, I mean, I've never regretted cutting a check for strategic coach. I love cutting a check for strategic coach. Right? I love cutting to check for eos. It's helpful. It doesn't cost me anything. It's a multiplier, you know, to use Dan's term. And so people that want to grow, but they're not willing to put any, you know, the whole metaphor, you know that you want heat, but you're not willing to put any logs into the fire, those are the people that I know if they're really cheap. You know, if they want to invest in themselves, it's not worth investing any time or energy with them. So if someone's broke, but I see the passion there and I see that they're trying to do something and they have the entrepreneurial attitude that Dan talks about, you know, no entitlement and, you know, they're not. Nothing comes to them without creating value for someone first. If they exhibit those and they're young and they're just starting out, I'm just motivated to, you know, to spend time with those people because that to me is encouraging. So let me give you a couple rapid fire things and then we'll wrap up here a couple of. So since you sort of mentioned it earlier, Dan, with mindset, how can someone best prepare to be entrepreneur and build the right business? I mean, meaning, you know, you're either an entrepreneur or you're not. But as they're starting in this venture, you know, anything that you've not said on how to best prepare them and going into the right thing, what could you say to that?

Yeah, it's, it's an interesting thing. And I, you know, talking about mindsets, I find that they, when you have time on your own, what you daydream about is really the key to, you know, there's some part of your brain that you're just going back over and over again. And it usually has several qualities. One is that it's unique in the sense that it doesn't exist yet, you know, it doesn't exist. You're thinking about a solution, you're thinking about a innovation. And your daydreams are really, really key here. And I've always dreamed about, you know, from a kid, you know, childhood, teenage years, early 20s. I always dreamed that the best source of education should be your own experience. Okay? And that was always with me as a kid. I, you know, I went to school. I went to school because, you know, everybody went to school. But I had another track that I was working on all the time. And your other track that you're always working on is what makes you kind of antisocial. Because when you're not doing what you have to do, you're doing what you want, okay? You're doing what you want. And so I always ask people, what do you daydream about? You know, what are your fantasies about? You know, that where you're performing bigger, where you're performing better, that you have the right circumstances and that, that really. And some people said, well, I don't have those kind of daydreams. And I said, well, that tells me something. You know, most people have status daydreams, you know, that they're in the right status, their thing. But some people have transformation daydreams. And I think it's 4%, you know, like, you know, I have zero status daydreams, have never had any status daydreams. And it disappoints me badly when I have an entrepreneur who's very ambitious that all of a sudden reaches their status symbols and they stop. Stop growing. And I can spot them early now. You know, I used to, you know, really encourage people, and then they just stop. And they wanted a certain kind of house. They wanted to belong to the right. They wanted their kids to go to the right schools, you know, and it's a deficiency type of goal. You're making up for some sort of deficiency in your life. So I always look for people who have some magical process in their head and they work on for years and years and years. And, you know, I never really got a handle on who I was going to be probably until I was about 40. You know, I was probably 40 before I got, you know, all the steps. And I needed partner. The one thing is I. I have to have a partner, and Babs was my partner. But it's. It's a. It's an interesting thing. And I will tell you this. I have role models, but for the most part, my. My. My mentors and role models don't know about me. And some of them are dead. They're, you know, from the past. And then there are other people. I see them from a distance and I say, you know, I really like the way they're doing that. I'll tell you one, and I think why it's all the trouble right now. It's the president, you know, the president right now. And think about it. Never played the game. First time he plays the game, he wins the gold medal, okay? And I think there's about 10 different kinds of envy buttons that other Americans can have. And I think every day he figures out which envy button he's going to because he enjoys seeing other people's head explode. You know, Hollywood celebrities, Silicon Valley, masters of the universe, Deep State, you know, deep state intelligence services, college professors and everything else. And he just knows how to get people's heads to explode. But the thing is, he's devoid of shame. I think Donald Trump was absolutely born without shame. Nothing shames him. You can say anything you want about him as long as you're talking about him. He's Fine. And the other thing is, I think that he's a pure innovator in the political world. I think he brought skills from another world, you know, the reality show world, the, you know, building a casino world, you know, owning worldwide wrestling world. And he puts all those skills together in a new mix. Plus he understands social media. You know, he came along when social media came along, and I just sit there day after day, and I just admire him. And it isn't, you know, it's not about the issues so much. He's got all the issues right, as far as I'm concerned, because that's the side that he chose. But he could have chosen the other side. I don't think he's a Republican or a Democrat. I think that he's an entrepreneur. And to tell you the truth, he's the first. You know, I think if you read the Constitution of the United States, great game plan. I mean, it's. It's almost intact from 1787, 1788, when it was written. And I said, you know, if you had this kind of game plan for creating a country, seems to me you're creating an entrepreneurial country, sooner or later, maybe along the way, you ought to actually elect somebody who's an entrepreneur as president. And I don't see anything strange about him at all. I said, this is how he's an outlier. You know, he's an outlier. He's kind of antisocial when he chooses to be antisocial, he's kind of a misfit. And I think it just drives people crazy who believed, you know, like Hillary. Hillary said, you know, if you just take the right courses for 60 years and you keep getting credentials, one day they're going to make you valedictorian of the United States. And I think people who think that you have to work and get educated and get your credentials or you won't get the prize, I think he just violates every cell of their body. But he's an entrepreneur. I mean, I don't see anything strange about him at all. I've seen stranger entrepreneurs than him.

Let me say this then to you, Dan.

I just want to say this, that the anger and the negativity towards capitalism right now, it's towards entrepreneurism, that without education and without credentials, you can go from here to here in a magic leap just because you know how to be the right person in the right place at the right time with the right offer. So I think that's what scandalized. We got an incredible number of people who are over educated underachievers.

Yeah, well, you know what? I've been doing a lot lately as I've been really.

I'm glad you gave the warning. Enough about not being political.

Here's what I'm gonna say, because, you know, I. What's been really helpful as I watch this is that some people get so tied into their ideology and their belief that they become. They're not able to hear the other person's side. And I have, you know, I frankly don't like party politics. It's like Mayor Hazelton, you know, Remember her? And years, you know, I asked her, would she ever run for, like, you know, a higher office? Yeah, exactly. She's like, yeah, I don't like party politics because there's always something on the other side that I won't agree with, and then I'll have to go along with it. And what I've been doing in all levels, not just politically, but I put myself to position if I had to argue for the other side, so I can. Because I don't think you change anyone's mind by arguing. I mean, you have to enroll people in things, and we have to constantly sell ourselves and unsell ourselves. In my entrepreneurial life, I have. What I've learned about myself just recently is I have had to claw my way out of many messes that I've gotten myself into, and I clawed my way into every opportunity that I've tried to get into. And so I want to spend less time as I cline and more time saying, yeah, you know, this is. This is either a hell yes or no. As my friend Derek Sivers said. You know, he actually has a new book called that. And so part of it is, like, when someone disagrees with something or I disagree with something, or I don't see their perspective. I always think, well, if I had to argue on their behalf, like, if I had to put myself in their shoes. And I'll tell you, it's brought a level of I can hear people who believe things and follow that I think is insane, but I don't seem to get as bothered by it. And so what I've learned as I've gotten older is that the treadmill of shit doesn't ever disappear. It's just my tolerance to it and my ability to navigate it. And that all comes from just years of being an entrepreneur. Literally learn how to deal with stuff. And, you know, so part of part. Part of the purpose of this conversation with Gino is you have written a really fantastic book. I actually love Entrepreneurially, believe it or not, because I'm always already a big EOS fan. And I'm like, someone writes a successful book, they keep pumping out books. It was way better than I actually even thought it would be. It's a really, really great roadmap, and I think it'll really help a lot of people. And I think what you said about Trump, Dan, early on, if people love him or hate him, it doesn't matter. He looks at everything from an entrepreneurial lens.

What's the deal? What's the deal?

He's a deal maker.

Bad deal. There's give and take on everything. Everything requires give and take.

And he redlines every one of those six essential traits.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, here's the thing about Trump. Over the years, he's hired 60,000 people for all his companies. Do you think the mainstream media could have found one of those 60,000 to tell a bad story? They couldn't find a single former employer, existing employee to tell a bad story about Donald Trump. I mean, I mean, yeah, he's really successful. He's really, you know, and the thing, you know, the thing I love about him, he loves being rich. He thinks rich is just the best rich. And I remember he flew in someplace and he's got the big Trump plane, you know, and then he parks it right in the background. So all you see is Trump, you know, and he says, you know, people say, I'm rich. He says, you don't know how rich I am. I am really rich. Then you got, you know, you got guys like Romney who are apologizing and, you know, John McCain, he's got seven houses and he's apologizing. And all these people, you know, who, you know, get into playoffs and they, you know, I mean, Nancy Pelosi, the one difference I will say there is about someone being elected a Republican or electricity elected a Democrat, usually all the Republicans, when they get elected, they take a pay cut and all the Democrats get rich. Nancy Pelosi, she's worth $180 million. She's been a politician for 40 years. How do you get 180 million doing it? So the whole point is that I'm an American. I, you know, the more I haven't been in America, so two thirds of my life, I haven't lived in the US As I've lived in Toronto. And the more I realize that it's just a wide open, wild, you know, kind of rodeo, circus, jungle. And the cultural heroes are entrepreneurs. They create new things. They create new Things for new people to do new things that they've never done before. And if you got any ambition at all, this is where you want to be. And I think, you know, I think, Gino, I think you are the first person who's actually written a handbook to actually check yourself out. And the worst thing is that you're not an entrepreneur. And you spend your whole life trying to be an entrepreneur. The other thing that's even worse than that is that you are an entrepreneur and you try your whole life trying not to be an entrepreneur. And I think you've given a chance just for people to sort out. If you're not an entrepreneur, you can do it with dignity because you learn something from the test. And if you are an entrepreneur, it saves you yours.

You're here.

Thank you for that.

What didn't I ask you that I should have?

So the thought that how many copies you gonna buy? How many copies should I buy, Gino?

You know, well, 10,000. I like to do round numbers, so just 10,000 at a time is a good round number. So the thought that comes to mind leading into this podcast, during this podcast is the audience and the context that the audience is listening from. And what I would offer up just to connect some dots is number one, the audience member that has someone in their life that they think might be an entrepreneur. This is the book to help that person and I'm compelled to share. David Berg is one of our fellow students and strategic coach, obviously and most people know him. During our session last week with you, Dan, he sends me this chat and it says just did last three Sunday evening book club hours with my kids and entrepreneurial leap, or with Entrepreneurial leap. Best conversations about business money thinking ever with them. Thanks for this, Geno. So obviously that made my day and hopefully David's comfortable with me sharing that. I'm certain that he is. But the point there is if you have people in your life that you think might be entrepreneurs in the making, this is the tool to help you help them. Number two, if you are someone who does want to mentor entrepreneurs in the making, there's a on the website, I call it the mentor track, a five step track to help you become great mentors for entrepreneurs in the making. If that's an interest by of interest to you. And then the third is Dan, what you taught me collaborators. So I built this incredible collaborator model around this. And so if anybody out there has an organization that helps teach, guides, mentors, entrepreneurs in the making, I give them my content for free to teach their People, their audience and become heroes to their audience. And so depending on what perspective you're listening to this out there, this is how this can help you and them. And certainly when an entrepreneur reads this, it relights them up. It will reinvigorate your entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial passion because you're reading your biography, quite frankly.

So that's what I would suggest.

That's really great that you said that like tomorrow we're doing our first genius youth call with young with the entrepreneurs of Genius network members tomorrow. And it just occurred to me that I'm going to buy a copy for every one of these kids and send them a copy of that. And as I sit and think about that, you know, we have a Genius network member, Scott Donnell, who's also in Strategic Coach, who's built one of the largest kid franchises. And he created a virtual event called My First Sale. And this is the first time that I ever spoke with kids that were as young as 8 years old. I was more nervous talking to these kids. But what they really liked is elf. Easy, lucrative and fun. They all like the ELF versus half concept that I teach. So I could see a lot of applications for Entrepreneur Leap. So the website for people to go to again is either-leap.com you can take a free assessment there. You can order the book, you can get a free chapter if you want. You know, when someone takes their whole, you know, life's wisdom and knowledge and they put it into a book, I mean, it should be a no brainer just to buy the darn book and then share it with anyone that you think would benefit from it. And certainly I, we appreciate the time. Anything else from you, Dan?

No, no, I just, you know, I've had great conversations with Gino for 23 years and I admire enormously the very elegant, simple process that he's created in eos. And you know, I'm not, I'm not the teacher of young kids, you know, it's not, it's never played any part of my daydreams. So I guess that's probably reason, you know, I, my big thing is that, you know, people who choose to be entrepreneurs always play offense, they don't play defense, you know, and so my whole thing is, you know, you have absolutely nothing to feel sorry for. You have nothing to apologize for, you know, you know, if there is such a thing as human evolution, you're at the cutting edge of it. Yeah.

Love it, love it.

Well, wonderful. So, Gino, great spending time with you here. We want to wish everyone the very best. No matter where you're at in the world, go take your entrepreneurial skills.

And I'm getting better at my punking skills, am I not, Joe? Since I've been around you for 10 years, that I. Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

From that standpoint, definitely. Definitely. I mean, I could. I could see, you know, you could probably have been a little bit more hardcore with Gino, but I think it's. I think it's good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

This was a blast and an honor, you guys. I am humbled to be with you. What a blast.

Thank you. Thank you.

Awesome, everyone. Read the book, share it, leave your comments wherever you heard this episode, and tell us what you got out of it. And be safe and be awesome. And we will talk to you next time on the next episode of 10X.

Talk.