The Anti-Hustle Path to Sustainable Success with Trevor Blake

Here's the uncomfortable truth. A lot of business operators are not building businesses anymore. They are building very expensive cages. The cage may have a nice logo. It may have a decent website. It may even have a team, customers, revenue, and a coffee machine that only works when Mercury is in retrograde. But inside that business, the owner is exhausted. The managers are reactive. The team is confused. Decisions are being made under pressure and stress is being treated like a badge of honor. And somewhere along the way, success quietly became the code for, I've not had a full weekend off since 2017. And that's what we're talking about today on Experience Leadership.

Welcome to Experience Leadership, A podcast that challenges small business owners and entrepreneurs just like you to dare to be the exception. Join our host, customer experience expert Marc Haine, as he uncovers relevant and timely content to help you script and direct your business and teams to create jaw-dropping experiences your customers and staff deserve. Here is the host of Experience Leadership, author of Lights! Camera! Action!, customer experience expert Marc Haine.

Welcome to this episode of Experience Leadership, the small business podcast. I am your host, Customer and Employee Experience Strategist Marc Haine. I'm happy that you are here with me today because my guest is Trevor G. Blake, physicist, serial entrepreneur, and international bestselling author of 3 Simple Steps. And today, we are exploring how business operators can build sustainable success without sacrificing their health, relationships, clarity, or sanity on the altar of the hustle culture. So, stay with us. And if you haven't done so yet, please make sure you're subscribed to this podcast. There is a point in business where busy stops being a season and starts becoming The operating system. At first, it feels noble. You answer every message, you solve every problem, you stay late, you skip lunch. You tell yourself, this is what it takes to be successful. And for a while, it may even work. But then the cracks start showing. The scary part is that many leaders do not see this as a problem. They see it as proof that they are committed. And that brings me to— Our Question of the Day. So, where is stress, overwork, and constant pressure quietly lowering the quality of your decisions, your leadership, and even your life? I'd love for you to be part of this conversation. Why don't you go ahead, share the link to this episode on your favorite social media platform. Put down your comments. Hashtag it #ExperienceLeadership. and we'll make you part of the conversation. Love to see your comments and your ideas about this topic today. My guest today is Trevor G. Blake, and he is, as I mentioned, a physicist, a serial entrepreneur, international bestselling author of the book, 3 Simple Steps. Over the course of his career, Trevor has built and sold multiple companies collectively valued at more than $600 million. But what makes his story especially powerful is not the scale of the success, it's how He's achieved it. While many entrepreneurs are taught to worship the altar of hustle, Trevor took a very different path. He challenged the idea that success requires endless stress, heroic overwork, and the occasional emotional collapse conveniently scheduled between meetings. Instead, Trevor built businesses around clarity, focus, discipline, emotional awareness, and high-leveraged action. His work blends science, psychology, entrepreneurship, and practical leadership principles to help people really build success that actually improve their lives. Trevor, it is such a joy to have you here today. Welcome.

Thank you, Marc, and thanks for the introduction. I appreciate it.

So can we dig a little bit into who your customers are and how you serve them?

For me, a customer is anyone who's the recipient of a message or a conversation I'm having right now. So right now you are my number one customer.

Woo-hoo!

And for you, everyone who's listening to you, they're, you know, they're your number one customer. So it just depends who I'm talking to. I just got off another Zoom call with one of my other companies And that person was my most important customer in that moment.

In that moment.

Yeah. That's my philosophy in that we don't segment them. We don't say this is a, this is, this is important customer. This one isn't. Anyone who connects with us is, is the most important in that moment.

In that moment. And it's the same thing even with your employees and such as well. Right. It's like if an employee comes to you, it's like they become your most important customer right here, right now.

Yeah. But here's an interesting thing. Cause when you were doing the introduction, you were setting up, uh, you know, I do things differently. I like that phrase. Right. I like, I like the, Let's do things. Why do the same thing all the time? Do it differently. So I've been building my own company since 2001. Yeah, we're 2026. I'm on company 7 now. The company I'm running or spending most of my time with right now is a $3 billion company. I own it. So, you know, we're talking decent sizes, decent things, but in all of that time, I have never hired a single employee. Not one.

Wow.

And so what I've done is I've used the hub model and I've done it for, because I What you're talking about is that I'm the anti-hustle person, if you like. I don't believe in hustle.

Yeah.

And one way to avoid hustle is to build a hub model, which consists of vendors and contractors. And I like that because typically vendors and contractors, so long as we select carefully, know what they're doing and they don't need supervising and they don't need encouraging because they're on a contract. They have to achieve what they're contracted to do. And then if we work well together and we like each other, the contract renews automatically. All my companies have been built with this hub model. And when I first started it in 2001, people told me that's impossible. You'll never get away with it. And it was so successful with net profits of 76% that I just kept going and plug and play. I do the same model each time and it works each time. And the advantage is for me that I can focus on, you know, using my intuition and coming up with great ideas. And I work more like the conductor of an orchestra rather than having to play all the instruments at the same time.

Right.

Or having to know how to play each of the instruments at the same time.

Yeah, most of the time I haven't got a clue what I'm doing. That's fine.

What I love about that model is that what you're basically doing is working with other entrepreneurs who are dedicated and proactive to support their success as well.

I am. And we enjoy working so much that typically we'll come back together for a new idea, a new company, their idea or my idea. And we'll, you know, we'll get around the table and say, okay, we'll do it in this, in this way. Most of the vendors that I work with, or that I've worked with for many years now, talk about their interaction with the companies that I've had and that I currently have as the best times of their lives, because they take such ownership in it. There's no politics.

Right.

We are adamant about reducing meetings to the bare minimum. You know, a meeting typically will last 10 minutes, 20 minutes, and it has to be because there's an absolutely essential reason to take people away from what they're doing and all gather in one space. That's the opposite of the corporate world that I grew up in, where I spent 75% of my working time in meetings, talking about how to keep employees happy, completely ignoring the satisfaction of the customer, completely ignoring ideas to improve or upgrade our product. It was all internal whirlpool, as I call it. And that's why I started my own company back when I did, was because I just— that to me became a sort of self-fulfilling egotistic prophecy in that, you know, we're a company, we know what we're doing, we know better than the customer. Let's sit around and talk about how many snow days to take. You know, it was just nonsense. And so when I started my own company, the number one rule was you only meet if it's essential.

Yeah, I love that. Many business owners believe stress and sacrifice are just part of the price of success. Like, where did this belief come from? And why is it so dangerous now, especially in today's economy?

I take a different approach to it in that, you know, we have to work, most of us at some point, we have to do some work. And if we're going to do some work, we should probably do it smartly. And so, why not figure out how the brain works? And so, I figured out a long time ago that the brain can only really fully concentrate and focus for 2 hours maximum. And for most people, 2 hours is even too long. And then, we fool ourselves into thinking, oh, we're in the zone and we know what we're doing, but actually, we get diminishing returns. So, I have a program called The Practical Magic of the 5-Hour Workday, and I've never worked more than 5 hours a day my whole life. Right now, I only work a couple of hours, and I'm including this as part of my work, by the way. As much fun as this is. And so, what we do is we do a switch-on, switch-off program. So, you switch on for 2 hours of productivity, and then you completely switch off for 2 hours, completely. So, in those 2 hours of switch-off, you will go to nature, take a nice walk under the trees, or you'll take some quiet time, or you'll do something that has nothing to do with what you were just trying to crack on the computer or in your meeting room. So, it's 2 hours on, 2 hours off, 2 hours on, 2 hours off, 1 hour on, off. And when you're off, you're off. No cell phones, no interruption at night, all of these things.

And so, the idea being that you're refocusing because a lot of leaders would just tune into this and say, I don't have time to slow down like that. What are they misunderstanding about this idea about clarity and decision-making around kind of how they drive their businesses?

So, one of the tests we do is when I go into a company and they say, you know, we're not growing and people are— the turnover of the staff is high, you know, and it's hurting us a lot. And I look at the way that the company is sort of structured and how the day is structured. So much of the time is spent feeling that you just have to be there. So much of the time is spent feeling, you know, I've gotta be seen to be doing something, I've gotta be seen to produce. And when we're honest with ourselves and we take a look around that environment, and we look at how much time is actually used, all of the studies show that in the average day in a corporation, an employee works you know, predict— productivity-wise, an employee works for 2 hours, 53 minutes out of a 10-hour day.

Wow.

And the rest of the time is around the coffee part. It's searching the internet for a better job. You know, it's going into ridiculous, stupid meetings they don't even need to be attending, but they have to because it's politically correct.

Right.

It's all of those nonsense that goes around the corporate world. So when we, when we leave the corporate world, typically, you know, someone starting as an entrepreneur has had some corporate experience. And when we leave the corporate world, The temptation is to repeat that because it's what we know.

It's what we know.

Yeah. It's a habit. No one's at fault. No one needs to beat themselves up about it. It's just to start to think about, hang on a sec, I had to do that because I wanted to impress my boss. Well, I'm the boss now, and I'm not impressed by me at all yet. So, I'm going to structure this differently, and I'm going to follow peak brain performance. That's a neurological program. And so, I'm going to work for 2 hours now, and then I'm going to switch off no matter what and take my dogs for a walk. And it takes a while to get used to that. At first, you feel like you're cheating. You feel like, maybe I'm doing it because I don't know what I'm doing and I'm supposed to be busy. But the funny thing is, when we're not distracted by all that nonsense stuff around us, we are really productive for 2 hours. We do more in 2 hours than we were able to do in a week previously. And so, once we— it takes a while to get into the habit. So, what I coach people to do is don't try and switch from the way you're working today to only working 5 hours tomorrow. Just start to build in tomorrow. Look for a point tomorrow where you say, I actually don't need to hold that meeting.

Right.

And then, and what I'm going to do is I'm going to leave my office and I'm going to go for a walk. And let's see how I feel. Well, I guarantee one thing will happen. As you're going for a walk, you'll get this magic moment, like when you're in the shower, and you'll get this idea and you'll go, oh my God, I just spent 2 hours trying to figure that out. And I've walked away from it and the answers come to me like that. And that's how all my business ideas have come. But not just the businesses themselves, but, you know, the, the, the smart stuff we did in the business came when I wasn't actually doing business. I was doing something completely different off the track, off the radar. And so you build that in, you know, just start with 1 hour and just enjoy the benefit of it. And then you'll want to do it more. And eventually you get to the point where you can structure your day a bit like, like, like I've suggested, you know, the on-off switch.

Yep.

And of course I learned this not out of any genius. I learned it because I started off in the military. And the military do their shifts, right? They do the watches. I was in the Royal Navy. So, 4 hours on, 4 hours off, 4 hours on, 4 hours off, 2 on, 2 off. And so, they do that for a reason because it's very bad form if a young officer falls asleep on the bridge in a fully armed warship.

Right, right.

It's not going to end well. So, they know how the brain works in the military, and they require this on-off all the time. And I brought that into the corporate world, but I used to have to cheat because if I told anybody that I'm going for a walk for 2 hours, they'd have fired me. So, I had to do developed these little tricks whereby I looked like I'm really intent on something important, and I'd walk really fast through the office. I'd go out the fire escape and go for a walk, and then come back 2 hours later looking like I've solved the company's problems. I, I had to cheat in order to repeat what I'd learned in the Royal Navy, which was you're no use to anybody when your brain's tired.

Yeah, well, it's interesting because casinos figured it out with dealers, that because dealers are so focused on the game, so in the game, Um, that after an hour they pull them out. They, they go for a 45-minute break before they get put back on the floor to, because they've realized after an hour of this constant repetitive task in dealing blackjack or whatever, that after a while it just becomes almost brain-numbing. And because of that, the dealers may end up making bad decisions. And so they figured it out.

Yeah. You know, there's, you could, there are lots of examples where, where you have to, you know, you're on and you're off.

Yes.

NASA requires all of its pilots to take a nap after lunch. It's not a choice. It's, you have to nap now, and you nap for 45 minutes after you've had whatever break you have. And they did a test and they found that their reaction times in the afternoon were 34% increased just for taking a 3/4 of an hour nap.

Yeah.

Now, you know, I'm not suggesting to any of your clients or your listeners that you immediately start napping if it feels uncomfortable to you. But just so you know, I am authentic. I don't just say this stuff and don't— and then don't do it. I take a nap every day after lunch, every single day, and I come back from that nap just so focused, so, so refreshed, but also with new ideas.

We've all faced that post-lunch kind of down where, you know, we're exhausted and we're just forcing ourselves to stay focused on everything else. And to your point, you know, this matches up with kind of Stephen Covey's sharpen the saw idea. Right. Take that 45 minutes, sharpen the saw. So when you're back at it, you're aware and you're focused and it all starts to make more sense.

Yeah, that's a great analogy. I actually hadn't— you're the first person I've heard say that. That's a great analogy for what it is.

Yeah. So for the people tuning on, any early warning signs that a business operator is not just busy but actually burning out? Because again, we tend to wear this as a badge. It's like, I'm exhausted. I have no time. You don't understand how busy I am.

Well, first of all, you'll see it in your relationships. It's a pretty easy place to go and look and say, I must be messing up here because this is not fun and it's not going well.

Yeah.

And then you'll— and then you'll see the dogs look at you as if they've never seen you before. Like, who are you taking me for a walk? You know, I haven't seen you for 2 years. No, you see it all around you. So, you know, as a physicist, one of the things that I was lucky enough, blessed enough to learn early is how to interact with energy in ways that are more beneficial. And so energy can neither be created or destroyed. We can't make new energy and we can't destroy the energy that we have. All we can do is convert it. So when we just stay at the wheel the whole time, the energy that we have, we convert it into different types of energy and we're left with very little. We have nothing left.

Mm-hmm.

And if we then go home at night and we're there with our family and we fall asleep within 20 minutes of getting home, or we've just had such a stressful day that we numb ourselves with some alcohol or something, then, you know, the first thing that— the first strain is going to show in those relationships, those family relationships. And I think when people see that, that's when they start to panic and they say, what am I doing wrong? Because I feel like I have to work even harder to maintain this now. And, and they are, you know, the opposite is the truth. Now is the time to get balance. So, at, uh, at, um, The Science of Making It is, is the business coaching course that I have that I think is probably of most interest to To your clients. In The Science of Making It, we talk a lot about how to use the same approaches that we use in business to be successful in business without burning out, to also build really good relationships without straining the relationship. And then also, the benefit of both of those things is our health naturally improves because we're— I've worked with cancer patients for 40 years now, and every situation, every patient has those stressful stories to tell me before they tell me what's wrong with them. You know, this happened in my life and now suddenly I've got cancer. What else can go wrong? Well, they're not unrelated. They're just not unrelated. And so, so one has to start to take, you know, command of this vehicle, this, this body. So, okay, I'm not doing the right thing. I don't feel good. I'm maybe I'm overweight, maybe I'm not eating well, maybe I'm just not getting good quality sleep and everything. And what those are the signs we have to look for. Like, there's a reason for that. So what can we change in our lives? Well, we can change obviously our lifestyle, the way we And then the exercise we get. But we can also change our workday so that we introduce into our workday these moments where we get to chill out a little bit. Okay, I've just worked really hard for 2 hours. That was a tough meeting. My boss was giving me a hard time. I'm gonna chill out now. I'm not gonna rush my lunch. I'm not gonna, you know, stand up with a bag of food and shove it down my throat. I'm gonna go for a walk, and then I'm gonna sit in a cafe, and I'm gonna have, you know, a nice quiet 15, 20-minute lunch. And you, you have to be a little bloody-minded and selfish to do that because everyone's going to give you a hard time at first. Like, where have you been? You know, you're supposed to be here 20 minutes ago. But no, you have to take your time.

It's interesting that you say that because I, I assume that there's a semblance of guilt that creeps in because you're gonna have people— and, and I think it was Sheryl Sandberg who said, you know, when she had a child Right. Then she had to leave the office and people would look at her and, and it'll be like, oh, well, aren't you special that you get to leave at 4:30 while the rest of us now are stuck on this project until 9, 9:30, 10 o'clock? And so how do, how does one overcome kind of this? Number one, it's programming from how we were brought up. But then it's this idea that it's like, am I actually a fair contributor to this business if everybody else is staying late and working through lunch and I'm insisting on taking care of this?

Yeah. And it's a great question. And I think that's something that everybody thinks about, you know, and you feel like you're cheating or getting away with it or privileged in some way. The benefits of working this way far outweigh the criticism you'll get while you're doing it. And the best example I have is when I worked in the corporate world, I went from— I worked— so after the Royal Navy, I worked in a hospital for a decade and then I couldn't afford the mortgage. So I had to get a job that paid better. And so I started, I didn't want to start in the corporate world, believe me, but I told my wife at the time and we— and talking about relationships, We were married for 40 years until she died in 2020. Wonderful, incredible, happy, inspiring marriage. They go together, right? Working the right way, relationships, health go together. But I said to her, you know, I'll work for 2 years as a pharmaceutical sales rep. I'll make a ton of money. We'll get out of this debt and I'll come back and work in the hospital. Well, it turned out I was quite good at it. I had no idea. I didn't think I could sell a rope to a drowning man, but it turns out I was pretty good at it. Because I listen more than I speak, because I'm quite introverted as a person. I prefer to listen to people than actually do what we are doing here. And so I started and I went from sales trainee, right? So trainee sales rep to vice president, corporate development in 6 years. That's a fast-track career.

Yeah.

How did I do it? I did it by working less than 5 hours a day.

Wow.

And so I taught all of my sales reps. So I got promoted within 18 months to regional manager, then within 2 years to national sales manager, et cetera, et cetera. I taught everybody who I was responsible for how to work a 5-hour workday. So I don't just talk a good game. This is the good game, right? So this is what works. And so they all did the same thing. My sales representatives, the first time, won Sales Rep of the Year. There were 5 categories. They won all 5 categories. I won Regional Manager of the Year 4 years running. I got all these amazing prizes, free holidays, an extra week's vacation, all of this kind of stuff. It was wonderful. So the benefits far outweigh The criticism you would take if people knew you were only working 5 hours a day.

Right.

I— because of the corporate world and what you're saying is like we're sort of indoctrinated to work harder and hustle more. So we feel guilty if we stop doing that, even though that's crazy because the brain doesn't work that way. The corporate world doesn't really tolerate thinking outside the box.

Right.

And so I had to, like I said, those things I told you I did, I did all of those things and taught all of the people I was responsible for. to do the same thing. And the results proved themselves. And those people now have gone on to be very successful entrepreneurs. And they don't work anywhere near 5 hours, let alone 5 hours a day. They probably work 2 or 3. And we hang out every now and again in one of my masterminds at Science of Making It. And it's so much fun to see everybody being so successful doing less. Yeah.

Amazing. Hey, you know, for the people tuning in who goes, that's good for you, but what about for me? I'd love to dig into How leaders can turn the tide for themselves. And we'll get to that right after this. When the spotlight shines on your business, are customers applauding or yawning? In other words, how is your business performing? Make your business a star with a new book, Lights! Camera! Action!, Business Operational Excellence Through the Lens of Live Theater by Marc Haine. Marc uses his business and acting experience to help you see your business like A live show so you can create a performance your customers will never forget.

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today at your favorite online retailer or directly at marchaine.com. Welcome back! I am speaking with Trevor G. Blake. Trevor, why don't you tell us about your book? I just flogged my book. Tell us a little bit about your book.

So, I actually have 2. One specifically for entrepreneurs called Secrets to a Successful Startup. And it's completely different. This one is a New York Times bestseller. This is 3 Simple Steps, and it's a map to success in business and life. So it's about what we've been talking about, how to get that balance right. To get the balance right requires that you learn some different habits, which are, you know, how— going back to taking mentality control, understanding how we make decisions using not just our brains anymore, but our brains, our heart, and our solar plexus. And so bringing that into the regular workplace makes all the difference in the world. So the funny thing is I wrote 3 Simple Steps after selling my first company. I started it with a few hundred dollars, sold it for $105.5 million 6 years later. It was a great success. It's how I learned the hub model. And so I was going to take a sabbatical and Lynn, my wife, sort of raised her eyes thinking, no, you don't, you don't, you never stop. And after 2 weeks, she lifted a kitchen knife and she held it up to me and she said, if you don't write that book you've been going on about for 2 years, I'm going to kill you. And so I wrote 3 Simple Steps that I've been talking about for years, you know, and everything we're talking about is included in there, but it's not just a textbook. It's, uh, it's actually has a beautiful arc. I also write movies, so I know the importance of arcing. And so, uh, one of the— chapter 1, if you read nothing else, read chapter 1. Uh, it's a very inspiring story with a lovely twist at the end of it, and it tells you everything you need to know. Or you can get it, you can get chapter 1 on the website. Sorry, I should, I should— Oh, okay.

So, and we do have the link to your website in the show notes. You know, for the people tuning in that says, you know, in their kind of mindset, they're thinking, well, that's good for you, but you don't understand my business. You don't understand what I have to do. What's, what's the one mindset shift that they need to have in order to turn the ship around?

Yeah, it's not about what you think. It's about how you react to what you just thought. That's key, right? So we're all like that. We're all self-doubters. I have doubts. You do as well, Marc. You have doubts all the time. It's natural. It's part of being human. Nothing wrong with that. It's what keeps us safe and secure. If we think, I think that person's texting while they're driving through this junction, you've got doubts about whether to step into the road. It's a survival mechanism.

Mm-hmm.

But sometimes we have these self-doubts. Can I do this? Can I be my own boss? Can I do a 5-hour workday? Or is it feasible? And when we have that, it's not about the thought. It's about how we then react to the thought. And that's the key thing. So we change the way we frame our— because As a physicist, I understand that everything in the universe is made of this thing we call or give a label to called energy, everything. So, you and I, Marc, are made of the same stuff. Although to other people, we might look differently, if we go microscopically, you and I look identical, right?

Right.

The screen we use, the screen is made of the same stuff, the fermions and bosons. And so, when we know that and we understand that, we also have to figure out, you know what? That means that thoughts and words are also made of energy. They're just as powerful. They're like silver bullets, and we use them without thinking. And oftentimes when we use them, we use them against ourselves. You know, we look in a mirror and go, oh, I look tired. Well, and as soon as you do that, you start to feel tired.

Yes.

And so, we have all these exercises at Science of Making It where we can— I share them mostly for free, but you can look in the mirror and you change it. And so, you know, you go, oh, I look tired. See how you feel now, see how you look now. And then you step back and you say, I could use more energy right now. And you lift up automatically. You can't help but do that.

Mm-hmm.

And you start to lose age in front of yourself. So we learn the tricks and the hacks, and then it's just a question of practice and making it more of a habit. We don't try to become saints in this, by the way. Everyone's as flawed as everybody else. But every now and again, we catch ourselves doing something or thinking something or saying something that's not going to be in our best interests. Like, you know, I'm no good at this, or, you know, I hate being in debt. Well, you're just going to get more debt because everything's made of energy.

Yeah.

And whatever you think about, you get more of.

I think society helps lend to that as well, right? Like, I just turned 65. Well, I'm getting all sorts of stuff from the government that says basically, now that you're old, here's— it's like, who says I am old? I'm just getting started.

You have to protect yourself from that. I use the bell jar technique where I imagine this bell jar coming down. And so all the things I see in front of me that would really irritate me or make me feel old or make me feel unwell or make me feel overweight or make me feel that being bald is wrong or something, you know, and all you have to do is drive up the freeway where I live and it's like every billboard is telling you there's something wrong with you. Well, so if you have to protect yourself from that and say, you know, I'm okay. I do the best I can. I'm okay. I'm a good guy. You know, whatever it is, you just have to change the way you think. Because, you know, if I, if I, I don't drive anymore, I have a driver, but if I'm, if I'm, you know, in the old days when I would drive from where I lived up to say the airport, you know, 45-minute drive, I'd be really depressed by the time I got to the airport.

Right.

Because of all the things they say that's wrong with me or that could happen to me. You know, the number of lawyers I'm supposed to have called along the way that's going to save me from something, you know. It's, it's, we have to be very diligent today, more so than ever, I think. And there's nothing wrong with it. It's not, there's not a problem with any of it. It just exists, but we have to sometimes protect ourselves from being influenced by that, especially with, you know, social media can be a force for good, but also can be a negative influence. You have to, you have to protect yourself.

Like, it just sucks my, my energy. It sucks my mental state. Just, and you can't help it because people in your industry and stuff are posting, you know, the success that they're having and, you know, they're not talking about all the negative stuff. Nobody's— you know, I, I found that in social media, people post things if they want the result to be, oh, I'm terribly sorry, how bad for you. But most are posting, you know, how wonderful their life is and look what I just did. And, and everybody's comparing themselves to that and going, well, what about me?

The last thought, the last thought anybody I think ever has is I should have spent more time thinking about myself.

Right.

Yeah.

Trevor, for the people tuning in who this is really resonating with, if they wanna work with you, how can they get hold of you?

So, just go to scienceofmakingit.com and then everything's there. The 5-Hour Workday freebie's there. I think I have a backend team like you probably do as well, Marc. So, I don't know exactly what the latest is, but I annoy the devil out of my backend team because I give so much stuff away for free, which they don't like, but I think it's right. And so, you can grab a bunch of freebies that you can use tomorrow, tools and techniques that will change your life tomorrow. And you'll see the benefit of that. And then I know you'll want to come back and I love that.

How should leaders think about this idea of working less without confusing it with avoiding responsibility or not fulfilling their job duties? Or how do they change that mindset?

Well, you know, the American mindset has to change because it's slightly out of step with some other countries that actually have introduced a 3-day and a 4-day workweek because they find that it's more— they find them more productive. I mean, everyone knows in Europe, you know, don't bother going to Europe in August and try and get some work done because everyone's gone. They're off on vacation for a whole month, but you know what? They're no less productive. They're no less successful and they don't work while on vacation. They're on vacation and you cannot get ahold of them. And so, uh, there's other, other countries and other cultures have figured out a way to, maybe we shouldn't use the phrase work less, uh, work more, work smarter, perhaps, uh, understand the power of, of silence and understand the power of slowing down sometimes.

Mm-hmm.

America is a very different culture. I can talk about both because I've lived in, in, in and out of America for the last sort of 35, years. I love it here. I'll say hand on heart, there's no way I could have had the success that I've had in America anywhere else.

Right.

Because in America, there is this, you know, can-do attitude that you don't find anywhere else in the world. And I thrive on that. You know, I thrive on trying something new, like the 5-Hour Workday. And if it doesn't work, no one's going to say, ah, you were wrong. I knew you'd get it wrong. Everyone's going to say, well, so what's next? What are you going to do next? You know, no one condemns you for having a go. So, I would say to anyone who's listening, go to scienceofmakingit.com, play with some tools. What do you have to lose?

Yeah, yeah. Experiment a little bit. Get curious. Yeah.

Yeah. And I say that to all the leaders I work with in the masterminds that we have and all that I have. And I say the same thing, you won't know till you try.

Yeah. Are there ways that leaders can begin to identify the internal patterns that drive them back into their past behavior? Is there any way that we can have like a check and a balance if somebody is trying to make the change that— because I know that one thing that happens is we try to make changes. As soon as we get into crisis, we revert back to our past behavior. And then that becomes the big suck-in, right?

I totally agree. And the biggest culprit for that is an unbalanced balance sheet, right? Debt panic sets in. So, you know, profits are down this month by 20%. Got to work harder.

Yeah.

Gotta push more.

Yeah.

And it's actually because you're pushing too hard, probably, that they're down.

Right.

So I would say the number one thing is to try this for a period of time and then check your balance sheet at the end of that period compared to the beginning of the period. You'll never go back to the old way, ever. It's all about profit, right? Without profit, we don't exist as entrepreneurs.

Right.

And you can't— look at, look at the— so 76% net profit, who doesn't want that? I've had that in every single company.

I love that. I mean, that's, that's a model that we need to learn. That's a model.

Well, then it frees you up because if you put the model in, if you get it right at the beginning or go back to it, redo it, go back, say, okay, I'm going to do this hub model. You'll find yourself sitting next to computer with nothing to do. Right.

That would be terrible, Trevor. Nothing. Look at, we're going to have to rehash the old solitaire game. I'd like to— for the people wanting to make a change, I'd like to talk a little bit about some cautionaries and pitfalls that we should be aware of as we try to rewire our brains to start making sure we're moving ourselves into this direction. And I'd like to get to that right after this.

Attention meeting and event planners! Is your company or association planning a live or virtual conference, seminar, staff retreat, Are you looking for a fresh, energetic perspective on what it takes to put on a jaw-dropping experience for your customers or staff? Book customer experience expert Marc Haine for your next group event. Past participants have said, Marc kept us in stitches while teaching us how important and powerful actually designing our customer experience can be. Read more testimonials and find out how Marc can serve you and your group at marchaine.com. That's marchaine.com.

Welcome back! I hope you're getting a lot from today's episode. As you can tell, Trevor and I are on a mission to support leaders just like you. If you belong to an organization that could use our help or You or someone you know might be planning a leadership retreat or a conference and you need some expertise. You need some speakers. Drop us a line. Our contact information is in the show notes. We'd love to explore how we could be of service to you and your people. Trevor, is it fair to say that most leaders confuse this working less with doing less?

I don't think most. I think it's common. But you don't have to look far to see the evidence of of good and bad practice, I guess you could say, the best practices. So there was a way of working, but it worked in a different time. And so if you look out at the strip malls or the high streets and you see all of these companies that were household names that don't exist anymore, you see them boarded up. You know, the average age of a company, especially publicly traded company, was 75 years. It's down to 15 now.

Wow.

And it's probably going to be down to 5 very, very soon. And that's because Everything changes so fast. Technology changes, the marketing attitudes change, and people have great trouble adapting to the new thing, the new fad, whatever it is. And one of the reasons they have great trouble is that they're in hustle mode and they're so busy they don't notice. And that's tragic for companies. And if you look at the history in one of my books, I have some of the histories of some of the biggest companies that were in books like Good to Great, Built to Last. Well, they didn't. Yeah. Because they don't exist anymore. And when you look at the history, if you do a forensic analysis and you say, okay, why did that one go out of business? They didn't notice things changing around them and they didn't adapt quickly enough because they're so busy, so focused on their issues, their internal problems. So there's actually, you know, there's a physical and a financial responsibility to slow down and start to observe better, start to look. And therefore with that comes the natural evolution of companies getting smaller and leaner. Because lean companies have the ability to do that. You know, you have the ability to look around and see what's going on and say, we need that platform, or, you know, we're gonna be out of business in 2 years if we don't change the way we're doing things.

Yeah.

So, it's a necessity for leaders to do it. I don't think it's something like we have to encourage leaders to start to think in a different way, or we have to sell an idea to them. It's not about that at all. It's about, if you're a leader, you want to be cutting edge always. And if you're so busy with the hustle mentality and encouraging that amongst the people you're responsible for, Because I have this pet hate that when I hear leaders say, people who work for me, they don't work for you. They work for them. You're responsible for their success. And so if you take that attitude, then you should always be looking at what's the next best thing. Well, how do we grow faster? How do we get bigger quicker? And the way to do that is to follow what the communication trends are of the day. And the communication trends are not, you know, let's work 10, 15-hour days. That doesn't work. I mean, unless you're a very particular personality who can kill that, like an Elon Musk, then— and, you know, you— I cannot argue too. Elon Musk, hugely successful, has created all amazing things. But why not read his biography and investigate his personal life? I don't want that. I don't want that personal life. I don't, I don't want that lifestyle. I don't want—

Right.

I don't want that stress. I don't want to be projectile vomiting in the early hours of the morning out of stress, you know, which, which has been his signature tune most of his life. You know, I want, I want to be able to sleep well. I'm very lazy as a person. I want to be able to watch my soccer when it comes on. I want to be able to have a nice leisurely breakfast. And I also want to enjoy a modicum of success. And for most people selling companies for over $100 million or sitting on one now that's $3 billion, that would be enough success for most people. And you can achieve it without having to do the hustle thing.

I love that. So for the people wanting to make the change, they tune in, they go to your website, they want to make the change. Are there any cautionaries or pitfalls they should be aware of as they try to change not only themselves, but the culture of their businesses?

Yeah. So, so when you change, when you change yourself, everything around you changes too, because it's energy, everything is energy. So, so energy is resonant. So, if we change even just the words we use, or the way we behave, everything around us changes accordingly. And so, we have a choice of what direction do you want it to change. And, you know, everyone's, I think everyone who's listening has worked for a boss that inspired them, but also a boss that drove them up the wall. And the re— and, you know, so you, you go with the best practices. And so you follow the boss that inspired you and bring that into your environment, and that will help tremendously. But it goes back to the same thing. You have to have the courage to change. And that's not easy for most people, because most people, even the top leaders, can't make a decision to save their lives. But you have to make a decision. You have to say, okay, I'm going to change something, because I don't want to be feeling like this. I don't want to be waking up at 3 o'clock every morning. And just try it. And you try it on for a day or a week. And the pitfall is, That everything around you changes too. And it's going to shock you. It's going to make you laugh and smile. It's going to make you— you're going to have people come up to you and say, have you had something done to your face? You look 10 years younger. What happened? Have you been Botoxing or something? You're going to have all these amazing benefits. So that's the pitfall, is that there's no downside to using your brain smarter. There's no downside to slowing down. There's absolutely no downside to taking Quiet time. I don't— I try not to use the word meditation because it conjures up all kinds of crazy stuff, but taking time for yourself, quiet time. I take 20 minutes, half an hour just to me every morning. Have done since I was 16 and had this amazing adventurous life. You know, you would be shocked at what my actual age is, but I still have another, you know, 25, 30 years to keep going and keep going. And I can do it because I'm relaxed and I am You know, after this, I'm going for a nice long lunch. What's so hard about that? And then this afternoon, I'm talking to a wealth management company. That's pretty nice. That's a pretty nice lifestyle. So why wouldn't you want to try that on for size? The downside is that everything changes, not just you.

I love this, Trevor. This has been fantastic. Could you remind everybody one more time how they can get ahold of you?

The Science, or just scienceofmakingit.com.

scienceofmakingit.com. Thank you. As we wrap up, do you have any last thoughts about what we've talked about today? Anything that we've missed or anything you want to highlight?

No, I enjoy it. I love these chats. I just say to anyone who's listening or watching us, if you're cynical, you're in the right place because there's no bigger cynic than me. But try it one time. Just try it and see what happens. And then share your results. And that way, you'll encourage everybody else because it's all about leading by example.

Yes.

So if I suggest this and you try it and it works, you'll want to share it. If I suggest this and it doesn't work, and that's not going to be possible because 'cause it's based on science. But if it didn't work, then you'd have a right to come back with me. But if it didn't work, I wouldn't be here and neither would Marc, right?

Yeah.

You know, we'd be doing something completely different, hustling away somewhere in, you know, in misery.

Yeah.

But we're not. We're both— you can see Marc smiles all the way through this. He was smiling before we went on air. He's just having a good time. He's enjoying life. So why not give yourself the chance, the opportunity to experience it the same way? scienceofmakingit.com. It's all based on fact and science. You don't have to believe any of it.

I appreciate it. Trevor, thank you so much for being here today. I really appreciate you sharing your knowledge. I said offline before we got started, I said this was going to be a really important conversation I think for the audience. And you nailed it hands down how important a conversation this really is. So, thank you so much for doing this for us today.

My pleasure. Thank you, everybody.

If you have any questions about today's episode, or maybe you're thinking, hey, we could really use a complimentary 30-minute brainstorm charming session with Marc or with Trevor? Well, good news. You can snag a spot on my calendar. Just hit the link below the one that's marked meetwith.marchaine.com and you are all set. As always, I am at your service because as Trevor said, you are my customer and nothing is more important than you. And if you haven't done so yet, why don't you subscribe to the podcast and follow me on social media? It's been so great having you along for the ride today. Thank you for joining us. My name This is Marc Haine. I hope you stay safe, stay healthy, and I hope you dare to be the exception. See you next week.

Thank you for joining us this week on Experience Leadership. Make sure you visit marchaine.com for a full directory of available episodes. While you're at it, if you found today's If you found this content valuable, please share it and tell your friends about the show. As Marc says, knowledge is power, but only if you share it. Be sure to tune in each week for the newest episode. Please stay safe, stay healthy, and dare to be the exception.