Mark Winters: Rocket Fuel, Visionary & Integrator Leadership with Dan Kuschell

Now here is your host, Dan kushel. Welcome to growthtofreedom.com, the show that helps you get inspiration, leadership, mastery and growth and a whole lot more. Thanks for making us part of your day. We have got an exciting show for you today. We're going to talk about this book, Rocket Fuel with best selling author, entrepreneur, certified facilitator of the EOS worldwide system, Mark Winters. And we're going to delve deep. Let me ask you a question. Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you felt like the relationship or partnerships you've been in had some friction, right. Or had some tension or over tension or overreactive type situations going on that no matter how hard you seem to work at just didn't seem to work itself out? Well, have you also seen this to be true in business where maybe you had this big goal, big vision overall and you just were wondering why was it that you felt like you were stuck in the mud? Well, this book and our topic today and our conversation with Mark Winters is going to help you uncover how to be able to go out and break through those barriers, break through the friction, break through the noise to build a friction free relationship, partnership and business. I know that's a big promise. We'll get into that in a second. By the way, if you want to join us, join in on the conversation. You can hit us up on Twitter. We're at Danchel. That's Danchel. We'd love to hear from you. A lot of chatter going on over there. You can also send us your questions@infogrowthtofreedom.com Infogrowthtofreedom.com the show, of course is brought to you by doneforyousolutions.com to help you get the things done that you need to get done. And you can outsource it with a great team like doneforyousolutions.com so with that in mind, are you ready to learn how to be able to take your business, take your relationships, take your partnerships to the next level? Well, today's guest is an expert. He's got this best selling book. It took the one essential combination that will get you more of what you want. Is that what you want? More of what you want? We're going to learn how to be able to do just that. Mark, welcome to the show. How are you, my friend?

I'm doing great, Dan. It's great to talk to you.

Same here. I know you're on your way from Dallas back to Michigan, which is where you live. We got a chance to meet several months ago. We've had some ongoing conversation. We met through Genius Network, Joe Polish. We were out at a strategic coach event. We ran into each other, had a great chat that evening. We got all liquored up, I think, Right. And we started talking about this fascinating book. And I've had a chance to deep dive into this and it really has created a new level of awareness for me. And I'm going to, I guess, be like an expose case study as we have this conversation today. Mark, because what works, what doesn't work, what you can do to make it better, all those kind of things. But before we do that, let's, let's give our audience, our viewers, our listeners, just a little better feel for who you are and your expertise, your wisdom. Who is Mark Winters and what the heck does he do?

You know, Dan, I guess I'm sort of a freedom fighter and I really want to help entrepreneurs get that business that they've started to do what it was they meant it to do when they started it in the first place. And it's, it's sort of rooted in my own experience of starting businesses through the years that I just hit that point where I felt like it was stuck. I had these great, great, you know, visions of all the freedom and impact I was going to be able to have. And then it just got myself feeling like I had almost the worst hourly job in the world and wasn't making a difference. Kind of stuck in the thing and what was the key to breaking through. And once I kind of figured it out, then that became really my focus is helping others figure that out, get past that ceiling and get on to getting their business to do what they really wanted to do.

Yes. And you are really good at what you do. I know your partners with Geno Wickman who runs EOS Worldwide. That's Entrepreneur operating system worldwide. Eos Worldwide. You can learn more. You can also, by the way, I'm just going to throw the plug out there right now. You can go to rocketfuelnow.com to check out more on this topic and this conversation we're going to have today. Mark but before we do that, you talked about the breakthrough being stuck. Right. I want to go back just a little bit. Throw you a little bit of a curveball here in your business career. I mean, you've run several businesses. You've worked with a lot of entrepreneurs, hundreds in fact, if not thousands by now. What has been your lowest point in your business path, in your business journey overall? And or maybe your biggest mistakes you've made in business. And then what'd you learn from it?

Well, there's, there's been a number of them, so lowest point, I mean, I've had businesses that failed. And so I've had to stand before a team that tried and tell them it's all over and we're not going to make it and button a thing up and shut it down. And that is extremely painful. It's painful because you see, you know, the impact that you're having on them. It's painful because in some sense that's like your baby, your child that you, you started or you were running with. And when you're not able to see it come together the way that you had envisioned, it's just, it just hurts. And so that really fueled in me a fire and a hunger to learn and to figure out, gee, what can I do to avoid. Avoid the same mistake at least that I made that particular time and not repeat the same sins of the past. And, you know, there's more sins out there, there's more mistakes to make. And so, you know, you never learn it all, but you always try to get a little bit better. And some of the mistakes that I've made and fallen victim to and that I see clients continue to make, frankly, is one is this drive to kind of try to do it all yourself. Oh, yeah, right. You felt that, you've seen that, you've probably done some of that, you know, yourself. And we feel like we can, we feel like we need to. And in the beginning, maybe to get the thing started. That's true. But if you hang on too long and you don't accept help, it can really become a hindrance. So that's one.

And that's a, you know, and that's a big issue, isn't it, Mark? I mean, at the end of the day, that's an old program that just doesn't work. I mean, it worked maybe two generations ago, right? My grandpa, your grandpa, that probably was a good way to go. You know, work hard, work your way up, all those types of things. If you want something done right, do it yourself. But today that paradigm has just shifted. Things are changing, you know, so fast. I mean, imagine walking out of our building today and instead of an automobile, somebody's getting picked up in a horse drawn carriage. Right. As their main mode of transportation. Right. That'd be just be. It wouldn't fit. And that's how I see a lot of people are really taking that approach of, you know, I've got to do it all myself. And they let, they don't let go of control. So anyway, do you think it's programming? Do you think it's just because of old social, I guess, impact of peer, you know, the peers and who we grow up our previous generation, or what do you think accounts for that false belief or that limited idea?

So I think that's part of it. I think another part is it is still a real common approach to starting a business. So out of the gate, you know, when the entrepreneur doesn't have all the resources, they don't have all the money, you know, they can't get somebody on board, you know, early on with what they're trying to do. They're. They're sort of forced to do it themselves. And it's almost this brute force. I mean, they get their arms around the whole thing and they drive it. They hold it together, right. And they make it happen and it works. And so they see it work. And so then that becomes the imprint is, okay, when I did it all myself, it worked. But what they don't account for is the world changes and the situation changes and the complexity changes. So at this new place they're now at with their business, they can't get it to the same, to the next level by doing it the same way they've been doing it.

Yeah, that's so good. And you. So I cut you off, by the way. You had point number one, which is, you know, do it all ourselves. And then you started to go into. Before I kind of jumped in on this idea of, you know, the mindset or the programming. So speak to the next point. You were going to make about the second biggest mistake you see people make.

Yeah. So I think the second one is this idea that you can, you can wait to get the books in order and, you know, sort of the financial matters, you know, there'll be. There'll be time enough to kind of square that away later. And so I see people really, you know, put off getting a good, clear financial picture of what's going on. And so they don't really understand, they don't really know. And as a result, the financial, you know, monster can kind of sneak up on you and all of a sudden you're in trouble. And if you see that too late, it really can inhibit your ability to react, your ability to deal with it, the ability to correct it. So that's one is just you gotta be sure early on to put the foundation in place so that you have that visibility. And the third piece, Dan, which is really related to that is teams just tend to react too slowly. And when the world's changing, when the situation's changing, when there's a, you know, something that needs to be dealt with, they don't move as quickly as they should. And sometimes it's because they don't see it, sometimes it's because they don't want to accept it, and sometimes it's because it's just hard. And you know, that idea of accepting help, that can be hard. Dealing with just the tough people, situations and conversations you have to have on any kind of a team, when you have folks, other folks involved can be hard and people just, they want to put it off.

Want to put it off. You know, have you ever found yourself saying that to yourself or have you ever found yourself going, well, you know, when the finances are in better order, then I'll make the choice to add X, whatever that might be. Maybe it's a team member capability, skill set, productivity tool. Or do you find yourself in a situation, well, if I, if I'm going to do it, I got to do it myself. Well, you know what we're going to talk about the magic of chemistry of this VI combination that Mark has hit upon. He's built an entire team, an entire organization around helping the V's connect with I's and what that really means. So speak to that Mark. What is the VI combination? How does it work?

So the V is the visionary, and the visionary is that traditional entrepreneur that had this urge to start something and the vision to see some kind of an opportunity, some kind of a need in the marketplace and the spark to kind of get it all going. So we know these people, we know that they spit out ideas after ideas. They're just a bottomless fountain of ideas, if you will.

Yes.

Right. They see the future, they see kind of where things are going and they have good ideas about where best to position the business along that path to take, to take full advantage of it. They're great at the big external relationships and they're great at kind of the big puzzles, dealing with the big complex, interesting puzzles along the way. And the counterpart, the I is who we call the integrator. And the integrator is this other leader that we find at the top of an entrepreneurial business that is much more get it done focused, much more execution focused, much better at the details and the follow through and kind of pulling all the pieces together in an executional path that actually makes it happen, makes it real. And the combination and you know, this idea of the power behind Something like Rocket Fuel is when we can bring those two together, when we can bring those really two very different types of leaders together in a combination. Wow. I mean, it's just a really powerful thing. And everywhere that we've done this, everywhere that we see this, we see the business just like hit the turbojets and it just takes off and jumps forward and into a whole new trajectory, a whole new level of performance and production and really realizing what they were trying to do with the business in the first place.

And speaking of the first place, would you like to hit massive momentum, Rapid business breakthroughs, rapid achievement. I believe that this VI combination can work not only in business, but in your personal relationships. And when we come back, we're going to talk about a unique assessment from pages 24 and page 45 that I actually had a chance to do going through the process of Mark's book here on Rocket Fuel. We're going to talk about that and how you can get more breakthroughs right after this on growth to freedom.com welcome back to growthtofreedom.com wow. Let me give you a quick summary of the first segment of the show. We've been talking with best selling authority Mark Winters of RocketFuelNow.com that's Mark Winters of RocketFuelNow.Com he's an entrepreneur. He's a certified facilitator of the EOS worldwide system, which means he can help you be a better entrepreneur. We've been talking about the big problems most companies face. You know, number one, they fall into the trap. It's a success trap, right, Mark? And that is we want to do it ourselves. We want to wait till our books get in order, our finances in order, before we make the leap. And, and, or three, our teams react slowly. And then we left off talking about the idea of leaders, two types of leaders in an organization. Which, number one, the visionary leader, the one that makes it up, as Dan Sullivan calls it, or the integrator, which is the one who makes it real. And having both in your organization at the same time allows things to run more friction free, less stress. What Joe Polish calls elf easy, lucrative and fun versus half hard, annoying, lame and frustrating.

Right, right, right.

Yep. And you know what was fascinating is I had a chance. I', book, by the way, earmarked with all my notes and different things and I took your assessment. So I'm going to start off with the integrator assessment, which is in chapter two, starting on page 27. Your assessment starts on page 45. And here was my score. Overall, I was a 62 integrator. So what does that tell you? Is that a surprise? Is that a shock? What does that tell you? And most importantly, how does it translate to our viewers and listeners as well, and what this assessment will mean for them too.

So, Dan, after spending some time talking to you, I would say that's not a surprise and it's not bad or good. There is no pass fail in our assessments. So it's just sort of a relative gauge of how much of the integrator DNA based on our survey, based on all the folks that we've looked at and kind of what we see as the, the key ingredients we're looking for. How much of that is kind of present in you and how much of that do you really enjoy and get fired up by? You know, there's a lot of folks that can do, you know, many of the integrator skills, many of the integrator capabilities, they just don't want to or it's just harder for them. Right. It just requires more energy because it's not their unique ability.

Yes.

What we say is just sort of a general rule of thumb is if you take that assessment and you score 80 or higher, that's a pretty good indication that you've got those core ingredients. That integrator stuff is really kind of part of your sweet spot. It's part of your unique ability. Anything less than that, again, it's all kind of relative to the situation, and it's probably less so in someone like that.

Makes sense. And what I found in going through this DNA process, call it your integrator DNA process, you know, I've run, I think Now I've run nine or 10 companies. Right. And so as an entrepreneur, you learn certain capabilities. Right?

Right.

You learn, you know, operations, you learn finance, you learn sales, you learn marketing. And then as you talk about it, Dan Sullivan, you brought up the term unique ability. If you're watching or listening, what that is a short version of it, Mark. I'd love to get your take on it as well. My version of a unique ability is those capabilities you do better than anything else, and you do them effortlessly and. And they're enjoyable.

Right.

And fun. And the other ones, like, there are a lot of excellent capabilities that we all develop in all the things that we do, but there's just a little more friction to them. That was one of the key things I noticed in your integrator DNA questions and assessment is it had enjoy, enjoy, enjoy in it. And that's where I found myself going, well, yeah, I'm actually excellent at it. But do I really enjoy it? And again, part Dan Sullivan's statement from an AA process, which is the first progress starts by telling the truth. I was like, no, I don't enjoy it that much. So that's where it came in. Now, on the other side, I scored in the visionary DNA assessment. Right. That's on page approximately 25 in chapter two of your book. I scored a 92.

There we go.

What is that? What does that tell us?

Well, that doesn't surprise me a bit. And again, from the. From the conversations that we've had, you know, it does. It just taps into your unique ability. It's much more closely aligned with the visionary stuff. And I can imagine looking at yours and you probably scored very highly on things about generating the big ideas and liking to figure out the interesting puzzles and down the road, see the future, all that kind of stuff, you know, probably really resonated with you. And, you know, back to the unique ability, the definition. One of the key pieces for me, Daniel, is this idea that it's just. It's just more of a energy pump than an energy drain. When you're working in your unique ability, you don't get tired. It's like you can just do that forever. And it's, you know, time slows down. It's just, you know, you get in this flow state because that's what you're wired to do. That's what you're meant to do. So it just comes so easily. And like you said, these, these other things, we may have, you know, been forced to develop the capabilities over the year or just, you know, just done it through whatever set of circumstances, and so we are capable. It's just harder. It feels like work right where when we're playing in that space that we're. We're meant to play in, it just feels great. It just feels right.

Yeah. Now, if you're watching as you're listening, you might be saying to yourself, well, how does this apply to me? So, you know, in chapter one of the book, you talk about the visionary DNA, and there's common roles, there's traits, there's challenges overall. So can you give our audience a snapshot of, you know, some of the characteristics, roles or traits or challenges of a visionary DNA to give them a perspective?

Yes. So again, the visionary is the one that is this. This endless stream of ideas. So they're coming up with stuff all the time. They see the big picture. You know, they're really dialed into what's going on in their industry and their market. You know, they like thinking about the next thing, whether that's, you know, new offerings, new products and services, the big external relationships, whether that's a big client, somebody in the community, somebody that's a big vendor, or someone that's just big in the industry. They're great at connecting and working those relationships. Often organizationally, they're almost the inspirer or the spark plug. They get people fired up about the bigger vision and the direction that things seem to be going. They like playing with the big puzzles, not the little kind of trivial ones, but really the big interesting ones, the ones that, if we can figure that out, it's going to make a huge difference. Sometimes they're great salespeople. Sometimes they're the hammer that you can bring in to really close the big deal and bring the big deal over the threshold. One example, Steve Jobs, sort of a pretty famous visionary. People described him as having a reality distortion field. And what that meant was when he's looking at a situation, he has the ability to kind of not presume the obstacle, not presume the why we can't, but sort of get everybody to buy into, well, maybe. Well, maybe, Maybe it is possible. And the next thing you know, they're figuring out a way to actually put the pieces together and make it happen.

Put the pieces together and make it happen. And here's the thing is you're watching or listening right now is Mark's been outlining the visionary DNA. Where does it apply to you, right? Where does it hold true? Do you see yourself being captivated, compelled, inspired by being that energy charger, that spark plug, if you will, being able to go out and look at the big problems, tackle those big problems, those big opportunities? Or do you start to go, well, maybe I'm more fit to be in the supporter role? Well, guess what? There's a place in this world, in Mark's world, in RocketFuelNow.com's world, in EOS Worldwide's world, on how you can bring the two together to create an amazing chemistry, an amazing match. And when we come back here right after the break, we're going to talk about one of the most important, unsung heroes. The important roles that the integrator and why your opportunity as an integrator may be better than it's ever been in the history of business today and how you can capitalize on it and the place that you can go to to team up with the visionaries to make that happen. That and a whole lot more with Mark. Renters on rocket fuel on growthtofreedom.com right after this. Welcome back to Growth to Freedom. What a fascinating conversation we're having talking with Mark Winters, best selling author of this book here, Rocket Fuel. You can go learn about it@rocketfuelnow.com We've been talking about the difference, the combination, the sexy combination of the vision integrator connection and how it can help create a friction free business, or Joe Polish calls it an elf easy, lucrative and fun business versus a half stay out of being a half business, half hard, annoying, lame, sometimes lucrative and fun business. And this combination, I mean, I feel like this book was written for me quite frankly. Mark, as I went, I mean, just lifted my awareness about what makes me tick, what doesn't. So we left off at the Visionary DNA and I'd like you to dive in just to give our viewers and our listeners a snapshot view of what, what are some of the characteristics, roles, outcomes, obstacles that the integrator DNA looks like for them to have something to attach to.

Yeah, so let me kind of lead into that with referring back to the unique ability discussion we were having. One of the things that became apparent to me when Dan Sullivan first introduced me to that concept was, wow, there are people out there who actually love the stuff that I hate that are actually really great at this stuff, I think, yet, and they love it. And that just blew my mind to think that, you know, this stuff that I think is just who would want to do that. There's somebody else out there that just, that's what they live for, right? Yep. And so as a visionary, that's the way that you kind of look at the integrator. And what's interesting is integrators kind of look at visionaries that way too. So when you think about what's on there in their DNA and that integrator DNA, you know, one thing they're really good at is creating clarity. So where the visionary, it's all very clear in their mind, many times it doesn't come out of their mouth clearly. It doesn't translate in words that the rest of the world can kind of understand as clearly as they do. So the integrators are sort of a great translator. They can hear that come from the visionary and they can translate that and communicate that in a fashion that becomes very clear for the rest of the team. They're great at driving towards resolution. Right. So instead of leaving loose ends and things kind of hanging out there, they drive it all the way and nail it down. Okay. This is what's going to happen, this is what's going to get done. They're great at focus, at convergence. Right. At bringing things together. Instead of scattered all over the place, they bring it back down to, okay, this is what it is, this is what it's about, this is what's going to be next. They're great at holding folks accountable. You know, they'll ask the hard questions, they'll remember and keep the notes on what promises were made and hold people accountable, create that culture, that environment of accountability throughout the organization, which has this great unifying effect on the team. So it brings people together all in the same purpose, going the same direction. They're great at following through when the conflicts arise. They're great at stepping in and breaking the ties, knocking down the obstacles and barriers that come up along the way, helping reset priorities where necessary and keep things at the top of the list that should be atop of the list. Some people call a band the glue. And you know, it's just kind of the substance that holds all the pieces together. They set a nice cadence for the organization so that we're all sort of rowing at the same, at the same tempo, you know, organizationally or business wise. Ultimately the P and L comes together with them. So the results that we're getting on the P and L are a direct result of all the efforts of the integrator pulling this stuff together and keeping it moving. They're the ones really executing the business plan. So they're harmoniously pulling together all these different leaders that are in place on the leadership team.

Yeah. And as you describe that piece right there, and as I was reading the book, that one word really jumped out at me. Harmoniously, Right?

Yeah.

And I had a discussion about this with my wife over dinner the other day and I was talking and I feel like I do a lot of these things that you described as an integrator. Right. Learned. Not like in my unique ability, but I've learned them, I'm excellent at them. And at the same time, not always harmoniously, it's more like a bull in a china shop.

Yeah, you're the bulldozer. You just make it happen.

Right. And so with that, why is the opportunity for integrators probably at an all time high today? More than most people would ever imagine? You went through some statistics as I read in the book. Talk about that just a little bit before we go to break.

Yeah. So one of the things that we found when we started looking at how many folks in the general population are wired to be A visionary as compared to those that are wired to be an integrator. We found that the ratio is actually 4 to 1 in favor of the visionaries, meaning there's more visionaries out there than there are integrators. So if the ratio is four to one, that means that if one of those four visionaries gets an integrator, there's three left standing there that there's not one left. And it's sort of further complicated by the fact that they're not all just a direct perfect fit for each other. We describe this two piece puzzle where we look at the unique edge of a given visionary and we need the integrator to have a edge that fits and complements that particular visionary. So it's a tough search. They're the scarce commodity. They're the scarce resource that is greatly needed out there.

A scarce resource that is needed. You know what that means? You, as you're watching, as you're listening, there is a place, whether you're a visionary or an integrator, you know what? Mark and his team have actually built an organization where he brings these people together, where you can find them the talent. We're going to talk about that and a lot more right after this on growth to freedom.com. Welcome back to growthtofreedom.com we are having an incredible opportunity to spend time with one of the smartest people on building teamwork, combining talents, connecting what is called the visionary integrator. Capability to essentially be able to go out and drive more direction, more clarity, more focus and more outcomes, more transformation. Heck, in many cases, done right, Mark, it probably helps create transcendence in the industries they're in, doesn't it?

They can certainly change the game when it's rocking.

I mean, here's something I want to ask, right? What if you bring a visionary and a visionary together? What do you find typically will happen in an organization where you bring a V and a V together overall, what's the outcome?

Yeah, so there tends to be confusion, right. Because there's not a perfect alignment between what the vision of each visionary, if you will, has. And so they're kind of focused on different things, they're drawn to different things. Their things should be the priority. So they're kind of competing for resources and the folks in the rest of the organization begin to get confused and they kind of feel a little bit of this whiplash where they're kind of yanked back and forth from one to the other and they're never sure kind of who to look to for direction. So there's a little bit of. Of chaos that tends to show up when we see a situation come together like that.

Yeah. And on page 81, in fact, which is chapter five in your book. Right. You know, as a visionary, I'm just going to read a couple of these as you're watching, as you're listening right now, maybe, you know, can you see yourself in these roles? And then you have an amazing amount of tools in your book that I think a lot of people underestimate the power of the tools that you guys have created at EOS and also in Rocket Fuel here that I want to make sure that we get a chance for you to talk about, Mark. So as a visionary, I see things that aren't there or haven't been seen before. Visualize all possible scenarios and identify the probable outcome. Think sideways. Live in the what if space. Right. Drive strategic business development. Open doors and influence key sales opportunities. Champion core values and focus and the face of the organization. Drive big deals. So those are a few of. I mean, there's a bigger list, but those are just a handful. As an integrator, I act as a filter. I prioritize, I provide direction. I keep everyone on the same page. I collaborate with the visionary on his or her vision. Right. Hold the leadership team accountable to the vision, coach the team, and again, a whole lot more. So, by the way, I want to encourage you to go get Mark's book, Rocket Fuel. You can visit the site@rocketfuelnow.com by the way, Mark, we'll dive into this now. This just seems like a good time for it. How can people reach you? How do you prefer they get the book? What do you want to tell them about the book right now?

Yes. So the preferred way to get the book is any way you can get it. It's on Amazon. You can go to our website, RocketfieldNow.com and order it. It's in a hardcover version. It's in all of the ebook formats. It's Also in the audible.com version if you like to listen. And just a side note, Dan, that's my latest preferred way to listen to books because I can actually speed it up a little bit and I can listen to more books that way. So check that out. Best way to get in touch with me is you can get in touch with me through that site@rocketfuelnow.com. you can also reach me via LinkedIn at Mark C. Winters, also via Twitter, arkc winters. So those are all fair game roads to connect with me.

That's Fantastic. Now, what is the big vision of what you're focused on? What is it you're passionate about? What brings you a lot of joy and meaning right now?

Yeah. So I really am fired up about how this message seems to be spreading and resonating with people. So it's getting me in a lot of conversations with entrepreneurs and folks that I probably wouldn't have had a chance to talk to otherwise. So I'm learning a lot about all different kinds of business situations and different challenges that they're facing and how it relates to this visionary integrator concept. And really, Dan, you and I have talked about this a little bit, but what Gino and I are on a mission to do is really create or help create the most powerful visionary integrator duos on the planet. So we recognize that there is a scarce resource in play here. So for those visionaries, that they can get their thinking clear on it, they see that they want it, we want to get them plugged in together and let them start realizing the power that that relationship can bring to an entrepreneurial company.

And in fact, you're actually creating, if I understand it correctly, it's in the beginning stages right now, of course, but you're building a platform to be able to do that, to bring visionaries and integrators together so they can essentially recruit and source each other, isn't that right?

Yeah, that's exactly right. You know, one of the first things that we see click once in a. In a visionary's brain, they. They see the model and they see the opportunity. They go, great, how can I get one?

Yes.

And so we want to be able to plug them into resources that can help. And what we're doing right now, we actually have a private group on LinkedIn. You can find out about it through rocketfuelnow.com but for folks that have just bought the book, they can get into this private group and it's full of visionaries and integrators already that are talking about a lot of these issues and challenges and sharing stories. And they're also literally kind of putting their sign up or holding their hand up and saying, hey, I'm a visionary. I'm looking for an integrator. Anybody want to talk? And people are responding. We're seeing matches made right there in the group. And then likewise, there's another thread where it's integrators saying, hey, I'm an integrator. I'm looking for that right visionary that I'm going to be able to help make it happen. And so we're seeing those folks get paired up already. So we're looking at even better ways, even more efficient ways, so that we see a day where you'll be able to come into our site, come into our program and go, okay, I take this assessment. I'm looking for an integrator. And we can come back and go, okay, great, here's four or five or some number that you should talk to that appear to be a really good fit for you.

A good fit for you. I mean, think about it. What if, you know, whether you're an integrator or a visionary, you could put yourself in a position to team up with that other, complement that magic chemistry. You know, some people will call it the number two, the gel, the glue that holds it all together. Right. What if you could find that? What would it do for you? How much more would you be able to get accomplished either as the integrator or as the visionary, being teamed up with the right person? Well, there's a group like RocketFuelNow.com, gino and Mark with what they're doing that you can find access to a group of people who are committed to be able to make that happen. I want to encourage you to go Visit them at RocketFuelNow.com, a question I have for you that just popped in my head. Can someone be both a visionary and an integrator at the same time?

Yes, that's a great question, Dan. And we get that from time to time. And what we see generally, so looking across the population that we've had exposure to, is, yes, it can happen, but it's extremely rare. So we feel like it's less than 5% of kind of the visionary integrator population is truly capable of being both performing both at a high level. It is their unique ability, and it's going to work. More often, what we see is somebody is sort of using that claim as a deflector for facing the reality or being, like you said earlier, completely honest with themselves about what they really are. And it may be just unclear to them because they've had to do this stuff in the past. They know they can do it, and there's other issues that are keeping them from it. So when we came into this project, one of the. One of the ideas that I had, for reasons visionaries wouldn't recognize that, okay, I am visionary, I do need this integrator counterpart was about control. Right. I thought that there was some concern about letting go of, you know, because they wanted to control everything. That's why they were hanging on so tightly. But through all the conversations that we've had, what I've learned is it's really about trust. It's not about control, it's about trust. And these visionaries, somewhere in the past they've handed something off to somebody else that was something important to them. And then they watch as that person didn't handle it properly and dropped it and broke it. Then the visionary's left stand there going, ah, that was my thing. You just dropped and broke. And so they've sort of learned to be afraid and not trust people. And so a lot of the structure that we provide in the five rules and the five tools is to help the visionary get past that trust issue. See that? Wow. If we're doing these things, I will be able to trust, I will be able to, to let go. I will be able to have this relationship with someone else who's really great at all this other stuff that an integrator should be doing.

Yeah. And that's so incredible. And it reminds me to a degree, you know Tony Robbins, he has his three S's which are state or story? State and strategy, right? And most people, they buy their story, they go into a state and then that's the strategy they stick with. Whether it serves them or it doesn't. It just, that's what they do, right? And they keep doing it. You know, definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result as it relates to control and trust. Right. And I found myself there and I look in the mirror in these things, right? And at the end of the day, if you want a better result or outcome, number one, start with changing the story. Well, what if you could find that integrator that would be a great match to complement your capabilities and abilities to allow you to work and do the things you really enjoy. That passion fuel you, that charge you up. Like Mark's been talking about the other part. And now you are in a state that you could just be in that state more often than not and create the strategy to stay there. And that's essentially what you've done with rocket fuel and rocketfuelnow.com and your community that you're building to match these people up. You know, it made me think when you were talking about finding integrators, you actually, in the book, as I recall, you have a six step process to actually go through and actually hire somebody, right? How to, I mean, go out and do the interviews, how to screen them, the questions to even Be able to think about and ask. You've got it all in the book and a whole lot of other tools. I know our time's running short here. What is something I should have asked you that I haven't asked you yet, but we should get out there to our audience. That would be of value.

Additional, you know. You know, I think just the thing that I want folks to do is go take those assessments and really be honest with themselves. So one of the hardest parts of the process, we've touched on it, I think tangentially, but you talked about that, that connection process, the seven step visionary integrator connection process. We lay it all out for you. What's interesting is the first four steps of that process are all introspective. So it's all the visionary looking at themselves, looking at their business, looking at their industry, and truly trying to get clear on what all that stuff looks like so that then they can understand what their edge, what their shape of that two piece puzzle I mentioned really looks like. And that's the piece we got to nail down before we can really be effective at the next step. And that requires brutal honesty. I mean, you really got to take a good hard look at yourself and understand where you're coming from, where you're coming from.

And speaking of which, Mar, how does this make you better with your, with your family? I'm curious.

Well, you know, I mean, family is a huge, huge part of my life. And so I see lots of crossover between business stuff and family stuff. And one of the things that I've learned being a father, I have three boys, is I have to be careful not to project myself onto them and really recognize that they are their own people. And the things that are most important to me may not be most important to them. And my role is to kind of help facilitate that and bring that out so that they can understand themselves and then go be the best version of them that they can be. And that really, I think that plays very much in the entrepreneurial business as well, particularly at the leadership level. If we can get you in that spot where you can really be yourself, not what someone else wants you to be, not what someone else told you you should be, not the thing that you had to be to get you just to this point, but the thing that you really want to be and were meant to be, everybody's going to benefit.

Well, that's so powerful. And I'm going to repeat it. Be yourself. Be who you want to be and who you were meant to be. And that's where magic happens. And, you know, I want to encourage you. Go get the book. It's rocket fuel. You can get it on Amazon, you can go to Audible, you can order it online. Go visit their site@rocketfuelnow.com they've got an incredible community that they're building up where you can not only find visionaries, you can find integrators. Start getting in the conversation, Mix in. I'll tell you, Mark, it's been an absolute pleasure and absolute honor to have you on the show today. I'm just really grateful and I hope we'll do this again really, really soon.

Anytime, Dan. Thank you so much for having me. It's been a blast.

Awesome. So go check out the book. Follow up with mark@rocketfuel.com he gave you his Twitter account. He gave you access to reach out to him. I would take advantage of it, guys. He's worked with hundreds of entrepreneurs all over the world and his organization, EOS worldwide as well, helps. We didn't even have time to go into the tools in this book, by the way, near the end of the book, which are incredible resources in and of themselves, like building an accountability chart, building effective team hud. Do you know people that have ineffective team huddles, team meetings? Well, guess what? How would you like to have a blueprint to be able to counteract that? Well, it's all in here, so I'd encourage. I'm a big fan of not only this book, their previous two books as well. I just can't say enough about what they do. But now is your time. As you're watching, as you're listening, I want to challenge you to take action with what you've learned. You know, how can you apply the idea? First of all, you need to identify where you're at in order to decide where you want to go. Take the assessments, the visionary assessment, the integrator assessment, and find out, are you a visionary, are you an integrator, or maybe are you building both? Right. Once you have that blueprint, you can go visit their community, start figuring out how to team to get greater results, outcomes, and start setting the stage, as he mentioned, to be yourself, who you want to be and who you are meant to be, because that's what it's all about. And if this show's resonated with you in some small way, I hope you'll repeat after me. I'm a winner. I'm a champion. I'm the best. You are. You deserve it. You're a champion. It's a pleasure. It's an honor to be able to serve you, to be with you today. I want to challenge you. Take action with what you've learned. Make the first step. And it always starts with that first step. We'll see you next time on growthtofreedom.com and in the meantime, make sure to hit us up on Twitter. Go visit us at the site@growthtofreedom.com and we'll see you next week on another edition of growthtofreedom.com make it a great week and seize the day.