Epiosde 448: How to Unravel Complex Situations with Kalpesh Patel

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Of Million Dollar Mastermind. I'm here with Kalpesh Patel, and we're fighting our way to covering this subject of how to unravel the complex situations. And, you know, that's one thing that, you know when you're teaching, you know, people, you get to that point to where they're saying, okay, I get it now. How am I going to go about that? And to give them some clues and get them to where they have a sense that this is something they can do. How do you go about getting that in their mind?

Yeah. So I think that this is actually something that I'm realizing. I was doing it so subconsciously, I really wasn't giving myself credit for it. And also because of that, I wasn't being very overt in expressing this to my students. But the sheer determination and the sheer joy of solving the problem, I think is a big piece. Another piece is like understanding your role in the overarching thing. Why is it that you have to solve the problem? Oh, because there's no one else to solve this problem. Like, I'm it. I'm the last man standing. I am the wall, whatever that role is. I think it's very important to recognize what that role is that you play so that when you're getting tired, when you're getting wobbled, when you're dealing with failure number three of your, you know, trials, you can pick yourself up and dust yourself off because, well, it doesn't matter the particulars of what my problem solving was this time or how much it failed or whatever the else. This is my role, and it's still my role. No one else has come here and said, I'm going to spot you. So. So I got to keep on trucking here. So I think that's. That's a big piece.

That's the minds and the mindset. And the thing is, every leader has got to. Every winning leader has got to have that attitude. There's nothing no different than, like, the pregnant mom three quarters of the way through the pregnancy cannot say, okay, that does it. I'm not going any further. You know. No, you're in now. You got to hang. You got to find it inside yourself to hang through, because they come to the point you just can't back out of. But the people that get really clever about finding ways to shirk responsibility when a lot of people are counting on them are the people that never amount to anything and they never get that chance again. You know, like the farmer, he plants the crop, you know, it's in there all year. He's, you know, he's fertilizing and, you know, pulling the wheat. When it comes harvest time, it doesn't matter. You got to get the hay out of the field and the rain coming. It doesn't matter if he's got a.

Cold.

Daughter has got a piano recital. You know, the rain's coming, he's tired, he's staying out on the field, gets in the barn. You know, it's that type of attitude. Right, Go ahead.

So I was going to say that's where the role thing, I feel like the recognizing the role kind of helps people get to. To the point where they can see whether that's there or whether it's missing. Because, you know, the situation you just described, as you said, you know, my family came from India originally, and especially on my mother's side, an actual farming community. So even though I didn't spend a lot of time there, when I was there, I was there, and it was absolutely a farming community. And so one of the things that you learn in a farming community, like the sense that people have when they live off the land, is what we would call in English, husbandry. Right, right. It's not just that you own the land. It's not just that you reap from the land. It's not. The land is just there to be worked and then kind of like profited off of. You're responsible for this thing, right? Yeah, right. It's dependent on you. It can be fruitful, but it needs you to fulfill your role of husbandry in order to be fruitful.

And I know, I mean, I'll compliment you. I know that the guy who hired you, he was already an administrator type guy because he was the guy who hired you. And so as you got bigger, more and more clients and this, that, and the other, I'm sure he was diverted in his daily calendar of things to do, but you were still there, hands on. And for 20 years, you became the wall in that clinic. And I just think, Calpez, you should take some joy or some satisfaction of knowing that, because, you know, you've left that and now you got your own clinic. But the thing is that you were that wall where people came in and if they couldn't get results from any other place, they shuttled them over to Kalpesh. You got, you know, because you had that husbandry type thing. I'm responsible. You somehow took ownership of this whole clinic and whole project and program you operated. Your mentality of what you saw, your role was not a guy working by the hour, working on this thing. But, you know, you obviously could have had the cavalier attitude. Don't give me these tough ones, you know, I. I just.

Right.

You know, who needs this hassle, you know?

Right, right, right, right, right, right, right.

Let me just, you know, out of 10, let me have, you know, five easy ones, a couple of tough ones.

Right, right, right, right, right.

Rather than one right after another that comes in the door is a nightmare you never heard of. And nobody's ever had this before. But I do think the results that came from that clinic and the good reputation that rippled out. Cause you saw yourself in that role had everything to do with the growth of that clinic and becoming a magnet over time. But you, you. So I wanted to give you credit for that. But you also learned that in London, I think, going through experiences with your family and your father had a restaurant or something like that.

Yeah.

Let them know about that a little bit.

Sure, sure. Yeah. So my. My family, My parents both went to London when they were 18 to go to college. And they actually met there. You know, London, England, has a huge Indian community now, but that's because there's been different influxes. But this was. This was in the. In the late 50s, I think that my parents, when my parents went there, you know, it was a very small community, very, very small numbers of Indian, young Indian people going there. And what ended up happening with my dad is that he just kind of saw how much of a struggle it was to get somewhere professionally in those days for the vast majority of his fellow Indian students. And they were all work part time while they were in college. You know, they were making money, and they would all live very, very frugally. So he convinced them all to set money aside. They pulled their money and they started to do some sort of import export business thing where they would bring in materials from India. And that business kept growing to the point where dad eventually just went ahead and moved to London and kept growing this import business. And he was also the kind of guy that kept his eyes open and looked at where the needs were. And he realized that there was a contingent of very wealthy Indian people coming to London to do business who were all vegetarian, because that's Just how we were raised. And so they didn't have anywhere to eat that they could count on getting Indian, well, getting vegetarian food. There weren't Indian restaurants there then in London. And so he opened this little, this little diner that catered to these Indian businessmen, you know, and he just made home cooking, but he just, he knew how to cook and so he just made simple stuff. But it was stuff that everybody was familiar with. It's like going, you know, you're imagine like, you know, traveling in the 70s, being somewhere in France and being able to stop, pop in someplace, just get a burger and fries. Right. It was every American's dream. Like, oh, thank God, you know, yeah, I could have a no brainer meal, feel like home for a minute. You know, every day I'll be eating things I can't pronounce, you know, that sort of thing. So. And then that turned into he realized, oh, well, you know, these people are eating with me, they'd probably like to stay with me. And he saw a hotel for sale, a small little hotel down the road, bought the hotel. Now we had a little restaurant and a hotel. These guys are like, well, we eat with you every day, twice a day anyway, we're just stay in your place. So now he's got these fairly wealthy businessmen that are traveling from India all the time staying with him. You know, he just kept building it. My mom then decided to open a little grocery store. There were more and more events happening and so next thing you know, they were doing catering. Dad realized there was a lot of Indian people that were traveling that would prefer to do business with an Indian travel agent because. So that they could discuss the minutiae of their travel plans with somebody that's knowledgeable with India. And so he opened a little travel agency. You know, every, every time he opened another business, it was in collaboration with somebody else who was an expert. Yeah, right. That was good at finding locations and he was good at making connections with people.

Yeah.

And he could get, he could get capital because he already had things going. He already had going, concerns that were successful. So when he went to People for Capital, he just had to point at the already successful businesses and they're like, oh sure, yeah, I'll invest with you as an individual. I don't know about this particular concern, but you as an individual have already shown success in multiple concerns. So you're probably going to pick well and you're probably going to throw your shoulder behind it and all of those things. We can count on that. Right. So I just grew up in this small business environment, day in and day out, you know, my mom would just have me there in the grocery store. I had a job from the minute I could walk, right? There were little old ladies that would come in the store. My mom would, if I was sitting around doing something, she'll get up, go hold the lady's hand and ask her what she wants and walk her around the store and show her where things are on the shelves.

And how did you get evolved from that to where you're running his restaurant over there?

Oh, well, I mean that was all very long, long story. But during high school I did work in the restaurant routinely. Like I come home from school and that was my first thing. I come home from school, do a little prep work in the kitchen, then do homework, have a meal, then work the evening shift waiting tables, you know, talking to customers. And so of course, all this time I'm watching how business gets done, right? I'm listening to my parents talk to suppliers, I'm listening to my dad, you know, ask questions of customers and you know, get, get people to talk about themselves and tell stories and all of this stuff. Like I'm watching how all of this stuff gets done that's taking money from people. And if it's a big bill, right, and people are forking over a lot of cash, Dad's making jokes, he's making them feel happy while they're handing over money. He's taking a moment, right, to go like, let's not let them get stressed out in this final moment of their being in the restaurant when they're finally forking over a big wad of dough. Let's make them continue to feel happy, make them laugh a little bit, right, Like, And I was like, ah, yeah, you know, so all this stuff. And then many years later, it wasn't my plan to run the restaurant, but my mother took ill. She was diagnosed with kidney failure. And she was so committed to the business. She had so much writing on the business. And she was also so committed to the people that worked for her who were all family men. The idea of the business dipping in any way and not negatively affecting her staff was just horrific to her. And I was in one of those funny situations where things that I thought were going concerns didn't pan out. And I said, mom, look, I'm kind of empty handed right now. Let me just step in and run this for you, you know, because you can't do this right now. And I. And she said, no, no, no, I don't want you involved in this business, you know, And I said, so I had to promise her, I said, look mom, I promise you I won't stay involved in it more than five years. That's all I'll do. Five years. I promise in, in five years I will convert it so that it runs itself so you don't have to do it. So hands on, right? She was very mom and pop. You want to do it right? Do it yourself. You know, if she came across an error, she wouldn't go lambast somebody, she would just do it herself. Yeah, right. So I, I was like, okay, I'm gonna help it. I'm gonna help you convert it from that model to something where people have more, are, are delegated more responsibility. And when that's done, in five years, I will wash my hands of this, but it'll be a stable entity that you don't have to put as much effort into. And, and that's what I did.

And see the thing is that the reason it worked. But I'd like to point out, I don't know if you've thought about it, you were in essence grew up in a business clinic.

Oh, absolutely, absolutely, yes, very much so.

You saw all the different aspects all at once. Not just learning this and then learning that, but saw how they all evolved together. And of course, in over time, all kind of different situations come expansion, you know, business is booming, businesses flat.

Yes, yes.

Easy to get the supplies, then you can't find food, you know, so you learn how to treat people, you learn all that stuff. But then when the situation came, it was easy for you to take in. But I think the role there, and I think the lesson for people running this listening is it wasn't a five month plan, a five week plan, five year plan and make it automatic where it's not personality that you need to look at your business and say, you know, in X number of years, I want to be able to pull out of this thing. I might not, I might hang in, I might open, you know, I might do anything. But I want to be able to exit and pass it on and not have the quality drop. Because I don't want to build a personality driven.

Exactly. Yes.

I want to build a business and really only have a business when it will run without you there. And, and that's an extension of installing, identifying, installing the models in the systems, right?

Yes, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And there are a lot of very specific steps that had to be taken in order for that to happen, you know, and you know, it's funny, I don't know how much of it was just a function of logic, of just sort of looking at what the problem was and going, well, this is the obvious solution. And how much of it was being around other things. Because I know there are things I did that were relatively innovative. You know, one, one of the things that I did was during the off season, I made people cross train each other's jobs just a little bit. Yeah, right. Not so that they could necessarily gain a particular skill, but that number one goal in my mind, and I didn't say this to them, is to have them walk in each other's shoes for a minute.

Right.

Because one of the things I wanted to do away with was the way that they would fuss at each other when things got hairy, when things were really busy and then mistakes got made, they would start fussing at each other. Right. And they'd get grumpy with each other. And I wanted to eliminate that because in the restaurant business, especially if you're successful, it's going to get really busy a lot. Mistakes are going to happen. Often. You can't have this be part of the culture that people snippety, snipe at each other. Like, I just, I wanted to get rid of that. So I thought, you know, if they walk in each other's shoes for a minute, they'll know that, oh, when that other guy is not paying attention to them, it's because he's paying attention to some other thing that's actually important. And now that they've been on the other side of that counter and fussed, they're like, oh, I know what he's looking at. The guy's looking like this. I actually know what the object is he's looking at right now.

Right. And so as you did that, you know, what, we've talked about that. It just seemed like instinctively you figured out what to do, but you're following a path of logic, like, what is the obvious thing? And that is really an extension of this thing, how you unravel complex situations, things, you know, because if you're successful, you're going to be faced with things you've never been faced before. Pretty much the rest of your life, something. Well, then it grows. And now what are we going to do? The deal is, let's just talk about staring. Let's just. I just want to wrap it up with this. It's like as you go through life, you go along and then things happen, bumps in the road. I'm going to say how I remember us talking about it, and you said, when the bump in the road happens, it's like instantly a number of options occurs to you, but there'll only be one optimal, one best option. And that's kind of a way of thinking that you can use in all areas of your life. You know, there's lots of things you could do, but there's. If you think it through, this is the reason not to rush into a burning building. This is a reason not to run up on stage and slap Chris Rock. It's like, you know, something happened. You know, a guy, I think he insulted my life. Actually. It was a very mild joke. But anyway, the fire went off in his head. Will's head is like one option. Go up on stage and slap him and humiliate myself in front of the world. And there were other options, but he didn't give himself time to realize this is not the optimal choice. You know, maybe wait till the show's over and then go slap him, you know, if you still want to slap him, you know. But there's, you know, there's always an optimal. Always choices, but there's always an optimal choice. And that's why that resonated with me, because I was, I think, going through the process of writing the book at the time and I was talking about the. The fact that when you're solving problems or you're dealing with issues, things can be. You can always take a step forward, and you can always take a step forward that shifts the odds of success in your favor. Where you still might be behind the eight ball, you still might be this. But if you evaluate your options for your next step, you can. There, There will be a step that will help you improve your odds. And there's usually only one of those. And so talk about how you figure that out and how you look at is. So you might restate that in your own words.

Yeah, I mean, you know, I. I think one of the things is that I have the habit of visualizing something before I do it. Yo, you know, and I had realized that that often would get looked down upon by certain people really as it's not passionate enough. You know, it's not. It's like you don't trust yourself. You, you know, you should just flow into things, etc, etc. And I mean, I understood it at the time, you know, because from a young person's perspective particularly, it seems hesitant and by definition it seems without courage.

You know, that's an idiot. Who told you that and would. So you.

I mean, a young person, let's just say it's a Young person. Right.

As a young person, you know, and the people that are telling young people that need to be, you know, removed from authority positions because.

Sure, sure.

If the thing is, the smart thing to do is they don't just say, I want to build a hundred story building. Get the contractors, you know, dig a hole, you know. No, you know, anything, you know, if you're going to build a birdhouse, I guess, sure, just go do it. Be passionate. But.

Margin for error.

If you're going to build, you know, birds will put up with anything.

But wide. It's a wide margin there.

Yeah. But the thing is, if you're going to do anything substantial, it requires thought.

Yes.

And because you have to be specific to be dynamic. You can't just do a thousand things. You got to.

Exactly, exactly. You've got to be specific to be dynamic. I love that. That's great. Yeah. And so. Exactly. So I think what worked out in my favor is that I already had this work habit of visualizing things.

Right.

And so that gave me the opportunity to actually see how it's all going to play out, you know, even if I'm not. My visualization is my imagination. It's not necessarily always accurate, but, you know, it would give me a chance to actually go, well, how would this play out and make adjustments before I did the final thing, you know, and, and I was gratified that, you know, I've never, I never grow up playing golf and I didn't grow up knowing anyone played golf. So, you know, the first time that I watched a golfer do three practice swings before they stepped up to the ball, I said, aha, look.

Yeah, right.

Look at that. The precise. The one for whom the margin of error is meanie mean. No margin of error. That person is like, no, no, I better, I better work out my angles in that hoo ha before I step up to the ball. Because I can't just be doing any old thing here. So, you know, I realized later, oh, I'm an engineer, that's what I am. And people ask me, well, what do you do, Cape? So what's so special about your approach to, you know, dealing with people's bodies? It's that I have, I take an engineer's approach. You know, usually the people who come to me, their margin of error has already been exceeded, hasn't it? They're in the red already. So I don't even have anything much to play with in that sense. Right. I better think through what I'm going to do before I do it.

Yeah.

And the more they're screaming for me to hurry up and do something, the slower I go.

Yeah, yeah, smart. Because, you know, one of the greatest women's pro golfers of all time, Anna Sorensen, said she. Every shot, you know, she's very. She was like a metronome, you know, consistent. And she would go stand behind the ball. She called it the thinking box. Stand behind the ball about, you know, 4, 5, 6, 8ft and look at the ball and where she wanted to go, and then think about the visualization of this, that and the other, and the shot she wanted to hit. Then she'd walk up and she said, now I'm not thinking anymore. I'm in the hitting box. And she had her warm up routine that she repeated every time based off what shot and where she wanted to go, you know, and she'd have her practice swings, she'd go through a routine and she'd swing. But it's consistency and comes from having that type approach. You know, it's like playing your week. You plan your month, you plan. You know, you're always thinking about. And again, one thing you said there, making adjustments. Because the clear you are about what you want, the quicker you can realize if it's happening or not. Yes.

Yeah. And, and, and emotionally, you've got to be ready to accept the, the site of failure when it pops up. Even in your imagination. If you're, if you're failing, don't start telling yourself little stories about it. Just accept that. Yeah. Okay. Why? That looks like an F. Yeah, me. All right, well, I guess back to the drawing board. And I literally say that out loud in clinic just to patients. I'll be like, well, back to the drawing board.

Yeah.

You know, I'm not gonna try to save my ego and lie about something being successful or may try to make something appear successful if it wasn't. You know, I think owning up again, it kind of comes back to that whole husbandry thing, you know, like, are you responsible? If you're responsible, act responsibly.

Right. Well, thanks so much. This has been every bit as much fun as I thought it would be. And looking forward to you having incredible success with your new clinic.

Thank you.

Looking forward for me to get in the car and come see you sometime this spring.

All right, super. Thanks. Pleasure.

Is there a last word that you'd like to leave people with about navigating successfully through life and keeping their head on their shoulders?

You know, I mean, I got to go with my thing, which is think, think, think, and enjoy it. Enjoy your thinking.

Yeah.

Thanks so much.

Appreciate it.

Larry, if you enjoyed what you've heard and are dead serious about finding out for yourself exactly how this works in the real world. I've taken the most valuable business lessons I've learned over 40 years and put them into something for you to watch. Go to widelawinning. Com Webinar now in order to move up as fast as possible. I'm Larry Widell, and I run the Million Dollar Mastermind. Go, go, go.