Episode 272: The Purpose of Being Organized is Freedom with Co-Host Jon Lavin

Welcome to this episode of the Million Dollar Mastermind. I'm Larry Weddell. And before we get started, if you want to know exactly how to win again and again, go to Wydell on winning.com webinar now to watch something I've put together for you. Now let's get going into this episode of Million Dollar Mastermind.

I am here with John Lavinia, million dollar earner out of Pennsylvania and Tampa. Which one are you in more?

I'm going to be West Palm.

Oh, really?

Yeah, yeah. Next winter, four months in West Palm at Ibis. Very excited about that. And I'm right now sitting at a beach house, a bay home that I've got in Margate City, New Jersey, which is about an hour and a half outside of my home in Philly. And so we, you know, during COVID I said, if I'm going to work from the house, I want to be looking at the bay. So that's what I'm doing. So that was one of my dreams there, Larry. I said, I've got to have the ability to just call that shot when I need to. So we did.

And building a business that covers 30 states allows you those kinds of luxuries. And John, that's what I wanted to talk to you about. And that is the purpose of being organized is freedom. Because, you know, you need, you know, if you're going to be successful, you're going to be organized, you're going to have self discipline, you're going to have some structure to your life, but you can overdo it because organization is not the point. Self discipline is not the point. Freedom is the point. The point is you're giving to get. And I had a cousin, H. Edward Roberts, and I'm sure I've told you he was the inventor of the first personal computer. That's where Microsoft came from, Bill Gates. And Paul Allen went to work for him at 19 years old out there in Albuquerque. And to go into now, this guy was a genius. He was a guy. Both Gates and Paul Allen, when Edward was dying at 69 years old in the hospital in intensive care, those two called on a conference call and they said, while you're still alive, we want to let you know you are the smartest. We both believe you're the smartest man we've ever met in our lives. And it was, you know, great to come up under your leadership and all of that stuff, which was a nice thing for him to do. But so, you know, you think, well, there's some kind of special thing the way this guy's minds work, if you went in, John, you would go into his office. Lord, I mean, what. It looked like a dump. It looked like a garbage, a disaster. It looked like someone the police had come through looking for something, you know, and they had just torn everything up. But did he know where everything was.

In that mess, though?

He knew where everything was, you know, and to him, it was perfectly organized. And so he got, he got, he remarried, he got another wife, and, you know, they moved in. They were in this house this time I was visiting him, and he used to drive in underneath the house. The garage was underneath the house, and that was his area, his sanctuary. He had his motorcycles and he had this and that, and this was his other mess, okay, his computer mess and everything. And Dr. Mess was upstairs. And it was. I mean, it should have been a national monument or something, but downstairs was his tinkering mess. And he told, he had told her never to touch it. So I happened to be there with him riding back from the office one day where she had gone in there, and finally she couldn't take it anymore, and she had organized it. And he got out of that, he got out of that truck. I've never seen anybody matter in my life. He's like 350 pounds. He was 6 foot 5, and his head is exploding and throbbing. And he looked up, he twisted his head around in red ball of rage. He said, if you ever hear that she died, it's because I killed her. He had touched his stuff because, you know, in his mind now I can't find anything. And so, see, organized doesn't mean it's neat. You know, your life being organized doesn't mean it's neat or that it makes sense to anybody else. What it means is that it works for you. So when you want to get things done, you can get things done. And the things you want to get done can get done. And you decide it doesn't matter what other people's opinions are, but it does matter when it comes to getting results. Because the whole idea of being organized is freedom, you know, to get as much done in a shorter period of time so you have the most free time to do other things. So anyway, John, what's your take on that?

Well, I, I. My life is completely scheduled. I mean, it, it's very organized. And especially Covid it really. I got very systematized in my daily routine from, from my exercise and hiring a fitness coach, you know, and doing that three days a week, taking golf lessons and revamping my Entire golf swing, literally online through video, originally. Really? Yeah, when he couldn't see anybody, said, all right, well if there's Covid, this is time to rebuild it, you know, and I'm already pretty good golfer. So people say, why are you rebuilding? You already got. Because, you know, if you're good at something, you know, when you're, when you're not doing it the way it needs to be done. So that my bid, our business, you know, we start on Monday morning at 9:00am with, with you. We're at 8:45 with your call and we have a managers meeting. And I have an orientation on Monday night that I run for new teammates. And I've got a meeting this evening, Tuesday night, that's my training night, you know, and I've got Thursday night is an overview where we introduce the company and that's been delegated out. Now I don't do it anymore. And then Saturday morning training, it's either I do it or it's delegated out. I don't need to do it anymore. Then I do a morning call with all my full timers every morning at 9am for accountability and coaching. And we get the numbers and where everybody's at and problems or successes. And I've run my entire, entire business. And then there's big events now that the world's opening up. We've got big events that we schedule for our people to come together. They will. And so I kind of revamp my office and revamp my schedule. And now it's, if I work that schedule for another five years, I'll be fit, I'll be healthy, my golf game will be better, I'll make more money, our people will be more successful and I'll have a lot of free time. Every afternoon at three or four in the afternoon, I'm free to go to the golf course if I, if I choose to do that and, or if I want to go first thing in the morning like I am tomorrow morning with a friend of mine from West Palm that's up here in Atlantic City Country Club where I'm a member. So. So I am free. You know, my logo, our logo says Lavin Team Lavination, Time, Money, Freedom, Legacy. And then at the bottom it says simplify to multiply. And that's kind of the way I've worked on doing, to create that finally. I wished I'd done all this when I was younger, but it's working right now for sure.

And the thing is, John, it goes back to when you and I got started. We Tried to design, you know, part of the ideal was to design a company where you could reach whatever level of financial success you wanted. But you could also do it in a way where you could build up, you know, you could build a business that ran on its own to a certain extent and you could create discretionary time where you could do other things. Really that's the key to longevity. The scheduling thing is the key to longevity and really enjoyment because it allows you to be in control, you know, because things will be in, you know, basically have boxes of time that ecclesiastes. There's a time for every purpose under heaven. And if something's supposed to get done, it's going to get done at this time. If it's important, the leader knows. And then when the leader has the schedule of events, necessary events, and for daily, weekly, monthly, annual, then it's easier to bring a new person in where they can get the lay of the land and the schedule imprinted in their brain. And it's really the only way you could build a big organization of people know what's going on and there's some kind of rhythm, there's some kind of structure. It's not that you can't do it another way, but like at this point of my life I figured the way I am, this is the best way I could run organization. And everybody else is going to go this way.

Yeah, I, yeah, I got to the point Larry, where, where I really said what do most people want? Like if you look at the universal desire for most people and you could, you could, it's financial independence, financial freedom, you know. Now financial independence, if you ask a young like 21 year old what it is, then you may get a very different answer from what I'd give. They may say, oh, if I move out of my parents house, I'm financially independent. And that's not my definition of it. But everybody's got their own. But you know, financial independence is really having passive income. You know, they say there's, there's really only two sources of passive income and that's money at work or business at work or both simultaneous. And so you know, that's your goal. Then you have to set out, okay, here's the goal. Financial independence. Well, let me get a business that makes me enough money where I can pay my bills. Then let me get a business that makes me enough money where I could start investing and then let me build a business. That's where I develop others to run it. And if it makes me enough money and I can Invest fast enough, I'm going to have two ways of freedom. A business at work and money at work, assets at work, you know, and then I've got, now I've got options and choices and a legacy that's going to be left because not only going to leave my assets, I'm going to leave a business that's operating for my family to have. And that to me that's just been what the goal became very, very clearly. It was, it was help and then helping others define that for themselves or what their wants were, what their goals were, what their dreams were. And then being in a position to coach, you know, and motivate and coach and mentor them so that the motivated would take that information and go do it for themselves with a track to run on. So that's really what we have focused on.

Hey, listen, there's a lot of information online, but there aren't a lot of people who have actually done something. In my case, I've actually built a successful business, has accrued over $5 billion in assets under management, and has done well even during trying times. Now if you want to know exactly how I've done this, go to whiteellumwinning.com I've compressed a decade of learning into five short weeks. Just for those of you who want to give yourself an incredible advantage and are tired of waiting and watching others move up.

Yeah, and you, you know, you're smart. You don't have to, but you're smart if you allow yourself to be flexible and take advantage. Look around folks and see what the super productive people are doing. And may you can get a clue for yourself. Now what I did, John, I had my model in the 80s set up like I'm President of the United States. President United States doesn't carry his bags. He doesn't have a pen, he doesn't have paper. He has people around him who are experts in all of these areas. And like I used to tell people, you're afraid of being President United States, it's too intimidating. Okay, let me, let, let, let me help you out on that. Okay, I'm going to get, let you have a staff of 30 or 40 people. They all average 3, $400,000 a year. They all have executive staffs, they all have teams underneath them. They're all experts with lifetime experience in their areas. Does the job starting to get a little easier for you now? You don't have to do all this stuff. You, you know, you know, you're like the coach. And so the thing is like that's how I wanted experts around me. I wanted, you know, super people around me in all areas where. And Bo Adams was one of those. Like, he had an office, a big, huge office. Nothing was in any of the drawers because he didn't want anybody to bring him any paper, any. He didn't want pencils because he didn't want to have to write on anything. He didn't want to have to take any note. And so he wanted the people to take notes, if it needed to be notes. He wanted someone in there who would take the notes and then type them up for him and then keep them in their office. You know, I went through a stage, John, in that stage, I would never even go to the office, because when I went to the office, as soon as I got to the office, before I got out of my car, it was like locusts leeching onto me. Hey, Larry, how about this? Meet this guy. Come here. Go here. What do you do about this, Larry? Larry? I noticed when I was on a vacation or I was on a company trip, somehow the world did not collapse when I was gone. So I. I made a thing, you know, when I go to the office, John, it would. I. All I would remember about the day is that I got there. 8:30, something like that, and then I was leaving at 8:00 at night. I did. Had. No. The day was a blur, you know.

Right, right.

What happened?

Yeah, well, that's what's happened with COVID Yeah. I've been working by myself in my. On zoom and on the phone without an office or a meeting and getting more done than I've ever gotten done and don't have to travel and have a lot of free time in the afternoon because I didn't waste a lot of time with the wrong people. And so I agree, it's. That's. I think one of the hardest things getting back into an office environment is I'm not planning to be there too much. You know, we've got it set up for my staff, and it's a great place, but I'm getting way more done this way, and do I have the discipline to keep doing it. It's a lot easier to go to the office and waste time hanging out with everybody, but it's not necessarily the most productive thing to do.

Well, when I got to the. Into the 90s, that had kind of run its course. But new technology came, the laptops that were getting more capacity on the laptops. And the first cell phone came out. I bought the first Motorola cell phone, and my world Changed because now I was untethered from the office. Kind of like Covid. We're in zoom. We're untethered. And you can stay. When you're at a distance, you can stay in control more. And it gives you a better vantage point for seeing what's important, what's not important. It's harder for the interrupters to get their hands on you. And I remember it. And this is me in 1990. If I needed something, I'd call the office. But here's what that turned into. I called the office. I'm asked for my assistant. I couldn't get. She didn't have a direct line. So, okay, we'll get Barbara and then, okay, where's Barbara? So I'm sitting there waiting for Barbara. And then I asked Barbara for whatever it is. And then I have to wait while Barbara goes and gets it. Or worse, Barbara couldn't find it. Right. Then I'll call you back. Well, how are you going to call me back? You know, when am I going to, you know, no cell phones. And so I'll call you back. Okay. And then when I call her back, I go through the same thing. Need to talk to Barbara. Okay, let me get Barbara. And then they have. Barbara gets on. He said, okay, I found it. Give me a second, whatever. And then, you know, I'm wasting all my time trying to get my hands on information. Then somebody told me the story of the guy. They said they went into an airport and they saw this little, very neat Japanese fella in a dark suit sitting there with a laptop and very industrious, waiting to get on the plane. And they said they went over and introduced themselves. Turned out it was whoever, but maybe Mr. He was running Toshiba. He was the President, CEO Worldwide of Toshiba Corporation, which at that time was much bigger than it is today. And he was running the whole thing off that laptop. And all of a sudden I said, I can get rid of 16 paid staff members. I could shut down my 5,000 square foot office. And I could see up till that time, I used to tell people, yes, I have computers in my office, but we've never been personally introduced. And you know, I have people who converse in those foreign languages, but not me. And I was real proud of that. But I figured, like, oh, if I get the computer, I've got it all right there. And so and then it was just a natural step to the. Eventually, within a matter of two years, that entire 5,000 square foot office was shut down. And, you know, the phone came along and that gave greater capacity. But the deal is you're not being organized just to be organized. You're being organized for freedom. And you should latch yourself on to the methods that make that the easier and compress the timeframes. It takes as much as possible so you can get that over with. Wash the towels, fold the towels, you know, stick the towels back on the shelf. Shorter period of time because there's no joy in doing towels, you know.

Yeah, you do it as fast as you can until you make enough where you can hire people to do the work that. That's really not productive work for you. Or you can pay in today's world, $15 an hour and you can go do the 102 and $300,000 an hour work. A lot of people don't see that. They don't hire staff and they don't get. They don't have the help and they're busy doing all the things they shouldn't be doing. Or worse yet, they ignore the problem and then everybody's aggravated with them. All their employees, all of their. In our business, our agents not serving and taking care of people creates another problem called production goes down. So it seems to me that staff is a critical way to make your life easier.

Well, I just remember, John, it was a big thing for me when I heard the phrase tyranny of the urgent. And like I'm running my life just putting out fires, you know, like I'm a fireman, I'm not a businessman, I'm a fireman. I put out fires all the time, you know, rather than. Because I just wasn't organized enough. And that's. Some people live their whole life that way, you know, it's the tyranny of the urgent and the maniacal last minute thing. And it's like the only thing that really gets me pissed right now is someone calls me up and because something they did of dropping the ball, I've got to be inconvenienced to run down and sign something and get it notarized across town. And this, that, the other where they could have sent it to me a week ago and I could have got it done in the normal flow of the week. But no, because they dropped the ball, they want to screw up my skin. It's like, no, you could live your life that way, but I ain't living my wife. And so that's part of taking control. And that's why you do it, so you can have some freedom. And you know, the other side of freedom is sanity.

Doing what you want, when you want, where you want, with whom you want, whenever you want. Right. I mean it's nice to wake up when you wake up based on your decision of when to get. I like to get up early but it's nice to have, I don't have I get to choose from the minute I wake up what my day is going to look like. No one else dictates that to me that that was the single most important thing that freedom.

Absolutely. Well said, John. Thanks so much.

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 and put them into something for you to watch. Go to whiteellawinning.com webinar now in order to move up as fast as possible. I'm Larry Wydell and I run the Million Dollar Mastermind. Go, go, go.