Episode 118: The Youngin' in an Old Mans Business World Ft. Kieran Lynch

And I have my regular.

Okay. Just talking the microphone, a few words.

Hello?

Hello. Okay, dude, I think. I think we're ready to roll. I. Oh, the timer. That's okay. Yeah, I'm ready to roll. Just like I am Fat Daddy Fat Back. That's right. That's right.

I was gonna ask. Hey, do you know who's gonna be on the show today? No.

Fat Daddy Fat Back.

Yes.

Yes, that's right. Fat Daddy Fat Back is here.

So excited.

Yeah. What should we do with that? Now that we know Fat Daddy Fat Back's going to be on Ruby, what should we do? Take note of that. Ah, yes, we will. We will. That's right, dude. I'm ready, bro.

Well, you somehow stumbled into the Profit first podcast, episode 118.

Yeah.

Oh, this is how it begins.

Yes.

And we forgot Daddy Fat Back.

I forgot Kieran to join us in the grunting. That was a mistake.

Oh, you wanna start again?

Nah, nah, that's okay.

All right, well, welcome everyone, to the show.

We're glad you're here.

We're happy to have some fun. Get this going, you know. This is the Profit first podcast. I'm Chris Curran, the founder of Fractal Recording and Pause youe Life.

Oh, yeah, we're gonna talk about that a little bit today. And I am Mike Michalowicz, the author of Profit first, hence the name of the show. And. And some other books, Surge, for example, pick it up at the local. Amazon. You know, Amazon is local. Now I'm joined in studio by. Hello, hello, hello. Christina Bulldog.

Thank you.

And you. You are listening to the Profit first podcast where, well, we discuss about all elements of profitability. I call it the Alpha and Omega. Today's no different. We have a special guest coming on who's going to discuss how it is to be the young guy in the old man industry, especially when. When you go by a nickname like Fat Daddy Fat Back. Yeah. And that's your nickname. How do the old guys respond to that? Profitably.

That's right. You can hear our show anywhere. You hear a podcast on itunes, Stitcher, wherever you're listening, whatever podcatcher you use. And of course, our website, profitfirstpodcast.com. that'll take you to Mike's website, where every single episode we've ever done is there. You can comment on the post, you can ask questions. You know, the three of us are going to talk about what we learned later in the show. You can go to the site and comment on what you learned. How about that? There you go.

Well, here's what else you can do. You can listen to what Chris Knife and do recently. Dude, what have you been up to, bro?

Oh, man, I've been watching more YouTube videos. Hey, have you heard of this mountain called K2? It's the second tallest mountain in the entire world. Like, Mount Everest is the highest. K2 is the second. But apparently K2 is like. Is the most difficult to climb.

Huh? Is it the letter K and the number two?

Yes.

Who named that?

Well, the letter K stands for a much longer word, and they just abbreviated it.

It's so difficult to climb that you lose your breath when speaking. So I'm sure just the short.

Oh, I bet you it happened like this. These two guys, they climb Mount Everest at the top, right? What should we name? The guy's like, Mount Everest, right? They climb K2. The guy gets to the top, he's like, how you doing? I'm okay too, right? He's like, oh, it's K2. And that's how they picked the name.

That's perfect.

Are you good?

You know how there's these things in your life? You see people do things and you're like, oh, I wish I could do that. I really want to do that. But you know that you could just never do that. Like, that's how it is with K2. I'm like, wouldn't it be cool to climb?

Sorry.

The highest, you know, the most difficult mountain in the world. And you see videos of these guys doing it. But it's like, you know what? I could never do that.

We had a guest on Zarek Boghossian who climbed a mountain. I don't recall what it was. He trained for six months. I don't remember. He injured his foot at the top of the mountain and walked back down on it. This is in Armenia. He was. I think it was traveling to Armenia, came back down. It took a day and a half to get down. His foot was soaked with blood. And it wasn't like a massive injury, but it was a nagging injury. And it was just disgusting. But he was like, when you're up there, it's not like you're like, hey, let's take a quick trip over to urgent care. You know, it's. It's. It's the real deal, man.

What do you guys been up to?

Oh, yeah, it's gross, dude. I did a triathlon with Art Muty, my neighbor here.

Really?

Yeah. We swam mountain lake back. And not the long way, but the. The short. I was out of the cheater way. I was exhausted yeah, so it was a lot. I was like, oh, I'm gonna do the crawl. I'm gonna kick his ass like within seconds. I'm doing like the, what they call the breaststroke. Yeah, the frog. I call it exhausted. Then we went for a bike ride, uphills and stuff for five miles to the top of the Turin park, which is. Which is the mountain, if you will, in New Jersey where I am. And then we went for a two or three mile run.

Wow.

It took 90 minutes. Exhausting.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

So I want to see video.

Don't. No, you really don't. You really don't, Christina. Yeah, I know. We got some shout outs. What's going on?

Yes, yes, we do. Well, first I want to shout out to one of our members. Her name is Karen Della Ripa. She is one of our Mastery members. She is killing it in New Jersey. So just big shout out to Karen.

You know, just adding that we created a post not poster, but one of those pull up banners for.

We did. Yeah.

And her profit con, which I think by the time this broadcast, profitcon will be over.

Yes.

But Kellen, Karen and Rich, her business partner, will be featured. Featured. That's the word. Featured at the event.

Featured. Yes. But we also do have another shout out from a fan. They labeled it just in time. This book saved me from a business disaster. This is from Susan Berkeley talking about the Profit first book. And she said, a few years ago, we had a bad year in my business. We were losing money. I was depleting my savings and was in a panic. I looked everywhere for help. And then I found this book. Mike's friendly entrepreneur to entrepreneur style of writing and his clear tell it like it is advice saved the day. So shout out to you, Susan.

Right.

Take note of that.

Yeah, right, exactly. By the way, that's our new cue listener. If you didn't catch it on anything, that you should be recording a lot or writing down a lot of people saying, I love the show, but I get so caught up into it, I don't know what notes I should be taking. Can you send us the summary notes? And I'm like, well, why don't we have a cue? So when you hear this, take note of that. You take a note of that. And when you hear this, you can skip over that section. Okay.

And when you hear this, just enjoy it.

Yeah, exactly. That's when you light. You light a cigarette, you take out a cognac and you sit back. Before we introduce our guest, whose name is Kieran lynch and he's Gonna talk about how to be successful as a young guy in the old man's business world. I want to thank our corporate partners that make this show a reality. So a big shout out to Fundera to Fundbox.

Oh, my goodness.

Nextiva. Oh, Receipt Bank. Oh, and the way I said that is clearly one more zero. Zero has joined the family. Yeah. Zero Ron likes to remind everyone starts with an X. It's X. Yeah. They're an accounting system. We'll give a little thanks and a little more details on all of our corporate partners who make the show a reality, but we want to thank them. His name is Kieran lynch, and he has over 10 years of experience in the construction industry. Kind of funny because he's 21 years old. So that means he started when he was 11 and he joined. That's a joke. But by the way, take note of that. Take note of that. Yeah. And he joined the. Take note of that. He joined the electrical contracting family business. They run out of Newark, New Jersey. And now he's the guy taking over. Right. He's replacing his father. He still works with his father as a partner, but now he's taking over. And it's a different landscape when you're the youngin in an old man's world. Kieran, welcome to the show.

What's up, guys? How you doing?

Good, how you doing?

I think you might have the wrong guest because I am not Fat Daddy Fat.

Oh, that's. Take note of that. Yeah. That's interesting. Yeah. So Fat Daddy Fatback. So, you know, Kieran is the new nickname that Ruby 10, a prior guest, gave to me. And, well, Fat Daddy Fat Back. That's what she called me. And so that's my new air or radio name. So, Karen, what is it like to be the young guy in the construction industry where you're dealing with, you know, seniors?

It's definitely difficult at times. I mean, sometimes it just straight up sucks because every single meeting, every single bid walk, I'm always the youngest guy. I'm 25 years old, and most of the people that I'm dealing with are in their 50s, a lot more experienced, and you could just see that they look at me and they're kind of like, who's this guy? Like, what the hell is he now? So there's a couple things that I try to do to myself. I try to always be prepared, organized and presentable before going into any of these meetings. Bid walks, Just anything where I'm interacting with a client or a customer. Yeah.

Now, do you. I mean, do you have to cater to this community. If you come in as the young wild gun, are you going to get rejected and does that hurt your business? I mean, is it necessary to cater to this market the way they.

Well, it helps because my father's almost. Not always, but most of the time, especially the bigger projects or bigger proposal walkthroughs, my father's always next to me. So he's the older guy in the room with the experience, with the knowledge. So he can always back me up or, you know, save me if I'm ever eating my words. So it definitely helps a tremendous amount to have my father next to me at all times.

But what if you're starting a business and you are the 25 year old guy and you're going into an industry that's 50 year old guys and now you got to go solo, you don't have that crutch. I mean, are there things you do, I'm sure you go out independently and meet with clients and stuff. Is there things you do to assure your customers that aging an issue?

Yeah, like I said before, I'm always the three things that I really try to hit home before any meeting or any anytime meeting with someone. I'm always prepared, organized and presentable. So on the prepared side, one of my favorite quotes from Winston Churchill is preparation is, if not the key to genius, then at least the key to sounding like a genius.

That's a good one.

That kind of goes with faking it, faking it till you make it, which I'm not a big fan of. But the, you know, the Winston Churchill, it's just being prepared goes such a long way and that. And then goes hand in hand. Also with being organized. If I'm ever running a meeting, I'll definitely have an outline, you know, just a simple leather bound book that does not have thousands of papers. You know, I'm dealing and competing against other contractors who aren't the most organized. I've learned organized people. So, you know, just being prepared, organized and then presentable, you know, making sure my boots are shined, I'm wearing a nice polo tucked in. I'm usually the only guy in the, in the room with hair, so you better believe I'm throwing some gel in.

It or get one of those fake rubber bald caps. That would be awesome.

That would be awesome. Yeah, buy that, buy that. Is the presentation though, detracting from who you really are? I mean, are you placating to a group because you need to, but it doesn't represent who you are?

No, I Mean, that's. It definitely helps that I am just a naturally organized person and my dad is kind of the opposite. He's more of a get things done kind of guy. When I'll sit around and want to plan something out for days at a time so we balance each other out. If I'm ever planning something too long, he's like, all right, let's. Let's get shit done. And if he's, you know, storming the battlefield with his sword in his hand, I'm kind of like, oh, let's. Let's think about this for a second. So definitely me and my father compliment each other very well.

You know, one thing I see when I work with family owned businesses, father, son, mother, daughter, or, you know, a mix thereof, is that sometimes the child will refer to their parent as mom or dad in the meeting. So it's like, oh, what do you. I wonder what my dad would say about this. Or I wonder what my father would say about this. In other meetings I've been to, my dad's name is John. I could say like, oh, I wonder what John would think about this. Have you found. Is there a better protocol for referencing your business partner who happens to also be your parent?

Yeah, there's always first name, so I'd always say Michael and he'd always say Kieran. I mean, unless we're super close and it's kind of like an offside meeting. But if it's in like a meeting with a lot of people and it's more of a professional setting, we always use first names because there's definitely an unprofessional vibe that you would get by saying, like, well, let's. Let's turn this over to daddy and see what he thinks.

Yeah, if you throw the E part in, Dad, E, that definitely throws it for a loop. Do you, because you're the younger guy here, do some of the clientele and the people you're working with default to wanting work with your father more or let him have the final word, even though you may have the better idea, or maybe you're actually running the meeting, but they're still defaulting to the senior.

Yeah, I see that a lot.

So how do you navigate that?

You know, a lot of them, especially the first meeting that we'll have with a new client, that's when they'll especially do it and divert the expertise to my father just because he's the older, more experienced person in the room, or especially between the both of us. So, you know, as the relationship grows, I kind of have to prove myself to the client and kind of show them that I do know what I'm talking about and do bring value to the project. So it's just a timing thing, and I kind of have to get the client comfortable with the trust, that they trust me, that I know what I'm doing.

And what about your father? Does he help facilitate that? Do you have a plan going in to these meetings saying, you know, I'm going to make sure. Kieran, it's very clear that you're running this. And I'm going to deflect those types of beliefs or communications from the client, thinking that I'm the. The lead on this.

Yeah. He's the first one to divert any attention that he knows I can answer off to me, because, I mean, at the end of the day, he's trying to get out of this business as soon as possible and, you know, be on a beach somewhere.

Is that how. Is that how he deflects it? He's like, I want to get out of here as soon as possible. Kieran, take over?

Yeah, basically. No. So he. But he knows, you know, especially if there's a question about, for example, I do all the finances for the business, so if there. If there's any. Any time. A question about pricing, I'll just be like, Kieran is 100% more able to answer that than I am.

And. Christina, your father runs a DJ business and you work with him.

Yeah.

How does that work?

That's funny. I was actually just thinking about that.

Yeah. How do you manage that?

Yeah. I have also noticed we've tried it both ways. I mean, that's a little bit more of an informal environment. Most of the time we're doing weddings or family functions, but there have been times where I'm the event coordinator and someone will come up to me and say, oh, you know, you gotta ask the big guy like my dad. But then when I say, oh, you gotta let me find out for you. Let me speak to David, it's a much more positive response.

Okay.

And. But then, you know, sometimes people like that family feel you gotta feel out the vibe of how professional the meeting is. As Kieran was saying.

Interesting. Interesting. Kieran, how do you figure out if they want that. That kind of family feel and they want daddy or they want that professional. How do you know up front what kind of group you're dealing with?

You could usually see it from the beginning. I mean, obviously, we never hide that we're father and son. And that's. That is kind of one of our selling points, you know, that goes back to our core values because it's really core values of our business. At the end of the day, he's still my father. And we do share the same values, even though we're different people. So we never hide that we're not a father and son. But you could usually see pretty early on if people are into that or if people are, you know, kind of like, well, a little hesitant toward two people that are so similar.

But I was saying, what are the indicators? Do you just watch the language they're using when they talk amongst each other or.

I mean, sometimes we'll say, oh, so we're a father son company, you know, eventually going to take over the business. And they'll usually bright up, lighten up right away and say, oh, that's, that's really cool. Or they'll kind of, you know, stay quiet. And if they stay quiet, that's when you know to pull back on the. On selling the family side of the business.

Gotcha. Is there ever an advantage to go in as a father and son into opportunities?

Yeah, absolutely. Like I said, we're. I mean, in general, I'd say it works just because, you know, the old young dynamic in itself is such a positive. But then for us specifically, it works because, you know, we do share the same values, but we're different in the way we think, in the way we do things. So we complement each other very well.

What about scenario where your client also has a parent, sibling? Like, what if you worked with Christina's business? Like they did some audio for you guys or something. You did the electrical work and now it's like, you know, the, the two senior owners and then the, the siblings, the. The child of the person. Have you ever run into a scenario like that? And is that to an advantage now? Because there's this commonality.

It's definitely an advantage. And that's usually the first thing, you know, the meeting would open with and be like, oh, man, it's such a pain in the ass to work with your dad. Right. So it's just something.

It starts with a bitch session.

Yeah. It's kind of commiserate together for a little bit.

Of a question. Because I grew up. My family has a contracting business as well, and I grew up there. I was doing a lot of the work for many years, and then I was selling. And when it came to selling, it was. I was selling on my own. So my question for you, Kieran, is a little more broad. Like, do you ever meet with clients by Yourself. And do you sort of. Is there ever, you know, do you ever feel like since you are so young, that. That the. That the prospective client might look at you like, oh, this guy's a young guy. What does he know about, you know, how long has he been in this business? What does he know? You ever feel that?

Yeah, because basically all the new business development is on me. You know, the relationships that my dad built up through the years, we. We have enough business and enough relationships to kind of stay where we are. But I'm the one who really wants to grow the business, and my dad's, you know, happy with being with it is where it is. So all the new stuff, I am on my own, but I have him to help me, and he has no problem coming to a meeting if it goes to that level or, you know, I have mentors to help me, but when I'm actually in the meeting, I just try to stay as professional as possible and, you know, fake it till you make it. And I've also learned that just knowing the vocabulary of the trade can go such a long way. It kind of helps, even though I'm not a genius in it, if I just know a couple key words and a couple key vocabulary words. You know, you kind of sell the client a little more, and it comes off like, you know a lot more than you actually do.

We're talking about keywords and words to say. Like if you use younger phrases, like, if you walk in and you say, here's my proposal. Mic drop, biatches. Oh, my gosh, that probably wouldn't go too well. Do you change the vernacular you use in just everyday colloquialisms to match the generation you're working with?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I never go into something I'm like, hashtag, here's my proposal. I try to stay as professional as possible. Since I am in the meetings. I have had a couple years of experience. I know how they speak. So I just speak like I'm speaking to my parents, really, because my parents are the first ones to say I'm talking like an idiot, because I know my generation does.

Do you find you get any backlash from certain clients who go to talk to you, say, it's nonborn. You're onboarding a new onboarding. I don't know what that is. A new client or customer. Do you find that some people don't want to talk to you because you are the generation? Because I've run it that where people are like, oh, you were raised in this business like, you. You Know, you just kind of were grandfathered in. Do you even know what you're talking about? Do you ever get that?

I haven't, not yet. But I could definitely see how that. Say, that would be a problem.

Yeah, but what about that prejudice? Like, oh, daddy gave you the business, like, do you. Maybe they don't say those words, but do you ever sense that prejudice that you don't know you're doing because it was given to you?

Not really. I mean, maybe a little bit from my friends, but then they see how hard I work, you know, like, oh, I can't go out tonight because I'm working until 12:00 clock at night. Like, none of my friends are doing that because they all have nine to five jobs. So they get that I am putting in the hours and working my butt off. But on a client side, especially a new business, like Christina mentioned, if it is a new opportunity, typically they've only had contact with me. So they would know going in. I mean, I guess I'm not, you know, in the first email, I'm like, hi, I'd like to meet with you, by the way, I'm 25. They would see it, but keeping it professional all the way up until they do see me and see that I am a young guy. Think that would that helps that I'm the only. The key contact. So they already know what they're getting themselves into and they could get past the youth.

And what about your father? Like, what's the next stage for him? You said he's trying to get out. Is he looking to transfer the business to you?

Yes.

Well, what's the, how's this gonna work then? Is there a day he just says, okay, you're on your own, or is he consistently peeling himself back more and more or pulling himself back more and more?

Yeah, I mean, he. Every day. But you know, every, every chance he get, he does shed more of his load on me. If we hire a new person taking off more of his load, I mean, I'd love to get the business to a point where we sell it and he could go live on an island somewhere or I write it, buy him out and he could go do whatever he wants because he has given me so much and taught me everything I know and I'm so appreciative of everything that he's given me. So that's my plan. And I know some days he kind of doesn't see it, but I see it and I have faith.

So for the folks listening that are either generation. Right, the incoming generation, or the outgoing generation for our business. If you could give advice to them on making this, particularly from the young person's perspective, making this as easy as a transition as possible. Not necessarily between the two of you, but from the client perspective.

What's the advice you would give from a client perspective? Meaning what? Like how the.

Well, yeah, so the clients, all of a sudden one day your father's gone. They're like, what's going on? Who's this young kid? We don't want that situation. How do you make it so that these clients are going to stay with you as your father leaves? How do you make it seamless so that you can take it over without a hitch?

I think it would definitely have to be a progression. It can't just be like cold turkey one day and my dad's like, peace, see ya. He wouldn't.

Would he say that? Would he say peace out and drop the mic?

Yeah, mic drop, mic drop.

Hashtag mic drop.

So transition just have to be. Yeah, absolutely. It would have to be over time. And like a lot of the long term relationships that we do have are they're my father's friends at this point. So I don't see that my father would leave and stop the relationship just like the friendship with those clients. So, you know, they'd still meet every once in a while and get lunch or something like that. So that would definitely help, just keeping him somewhat in the loop. And if there's ever, you know, a huge problem where he would have to come and save the day, I don't think you'd have a problem doing that.

And do you, do you have this discussion with your father on an ongoing basis saying, you know, how's the status of this transition? Are you phasing out or how do you address it with him?

I mean, we, we do have like the long term goal. We don't talk as often as we should about phasing out because we're just so busy. But yeah, that, that is a conversation we have to have more often. Especially because I want him to do whatever he wants as soon as possible.

Kieran, thanks for joining us. And for the people listening in that want to hire a young guy for construction, where should they go? What's your website?

Www.lynchcontracting.com. all our info is there. Anyone could ever email me. It's just k lynchcontracting.com we're out of North Jersey and someone just wants to meet and chat. I'm totally, totally fine with that.

Great. I know you do a lot of work in Newark, New Jersey. You got some big clients out there. So. Yeah.

Actually, one last question.

Yeah.

Okay. What kind of discussions, like, what has your dad passed on to you with in terms of profitability? Like, what has he taught you in terms of being profitable in the business?

Well, like I said before, my dad's more of a go in and get things done kind of guy. So before I came, I helped add a lot of the business with the help of Mike McCavowitz. Business Books, of course.

Nice.

I. I added a lot of structure to the business. You know, before I came, he was kind of writing checks. He didn't have an accounting system. He was still profitable, but he didn't, he didn't have any processes or anything in place. So I added a lot of that. And that's why, again, why we work so well together. So he never really passed along too much. I mean, he passed out along more of the client relationship and treat the person right. And I guess that that all that does translate into profit.

Right. And operations stuff. Because I remember in my family business, it's like the way you price a job, the way you handle the, you know, the doing the job, like a lot of things come into play that can really throw your profitability out of whack. So I'm sure he passed on a lot of that. But the actual financial stuff you're bringing in, with the help of Mike's books, of course.

All right, Kieran, thanks for joining us today.

Thank you for having me.

So we'll have us all in the show notes the LynchContracting.com website, but definitely take them up on his offer. Email Kieran and say, hey, here's my situation. My parents went away on a two week vacation.

Oh.

Oh, that's a throwback right there. Clearly I'm in my 50s. Okay, so in a second we're gonna recap what we learned. We also now we're gonna thank our corporate partners. But I want to do something super special.

Super.

You may have noticed if you're listening to GMA particular too, that Chris Kurten is on his way to. I won't say bigger and better things. I'll say bigger things. I can't be better than GMAP and Profit First Podcast. But Chris is going to stay here in the Profit First Podcast. But he's building his organization called Pause youe Life. And I thought, Chris, we would take a little pause for you to tell us what Pause youe Life is.

Yeah. So pausing is important. And you know, we talk about profit, we talk about Working hard in your business and putting in the hours and all that. And life is crazy. You got your family and this and that. And then you go on vacation to have some fun and you come back from vacation and you're more tired than when you left for vacation. So pause your life is an organization my wife and I started to. So people can just pause and just stop doing everything. Like literally hit the pause button on the world and just be a human being. So we organize retreats and meetups and you can find all you need to find out at the website pause your life. Org.

So hurry up and do it. Okay. That's like the anthem you. That'd be funny is your tagline. Hurry up and pause your life. Hurry up already, for God's sake. Move along, people. No, I think it's a great idea. Just, just, Chris, Just saying that I, I look at my own life saying, wouldn't it just be nice just to veg? Just to afford ourselves that time. Just to veg.

Can't remember last time about sleeping.

I do a lot of sleeping. I do a lot of sleeping. I'm a big sleeper. I'm a big sleeper. I get up very early, but I go to bed very early, so. That's a good point. All right, well, thanks for sharing that, Chris. And as we do future episodes, maybe you can give us little pause tips, like.

Sure, absolutely.

Okay, cool. All right, so now let's get on to our corporate partners before we share what we learned. Christina, you share their name, I'll share what they do.

Receipt.

Bank receipt. Bank. It's a productivity app, I guess. Because there's more than you guess. I guess. I guess. I guess. Yeah, I'll guess at each one. I guess It's a productivity app. I don't know. I don't know. It's. It scans receipts like so if you have a receipt for any expenses that you've incurred, you scan it in and it goes right into your accounting system. Which happened. You know, Xero is a great example of that. Oh, speaking of, duh, you've been using Xero.

I have.

And it's a cloud based accounting system. It's very simple to do. We have, as we do more and more invoicing collections and reminders and stuff is an issue. I don't even know if you know this. You don't do any of those because it's automated.

I know.

The system sends out an email saying, where's the money you owe us? And then sends out email to where is the effing money you Owe us.

Oh, geez.

So all automated. It's pretty cool.

Fundera.

Fundera. One stop shopping for any loan you need. They were at profitcon. Meredith actually had to speak early in the morning because you had to run to a wedding that she's the bridesmaid. But she still came to profitcon. That's a company I like to deal.

With because we love them. I wonder if she used her nextiva phone.

Yeah, well, I wonder if she did to call her bride to be friend and say. Or wife to be. I got bad news. I'm at profitcon. I don't think I'll be there on time. Start the wedding without me. You can even do that. Call from an exiva and then you. There's a mute button, very accessible right in the front. And you start tapping that on and off and it emulates like a bad connection. So the other person, like I can't hear you're saying you're. I want late to the editing. And then you hang up. That feature is available on next.

You master of that technique.

What about fundbox and Fundbox Invoice financing? They call themselves a cash flow accelerator. If you've invoices due to you.

Yes.

Like we have quite a few. And your zero sending out the email say where's the money? But you actually need the money. The client's not releasing the funds. And we have one of those clients that's doing it right now, call Fund Box. They release the funds to you immediately. When you then collect them through your normal course of action, you return the funds to fund a box. Yeah. Is that everybody?

And all these companies play into your profitability. So if you're listening to this and thinking, why are they talking about all this stuff? Because this is important stuff. Mike, you know all these companies, right?

We work with every single one. We use the nextiva phone system. Why? We used it because it was less expensive and more feature rich than the alternative. And now we live by it. We use. Actually we don't use Fundbox because we, knock on wood, have collection issues. But as we're growing, we are going to use them. But we have our members who are accountants and bookkeepers using them with great success.

And Fundera as well.

And Fundera as well, exactly. Zero. We live by this system now and it's an extraordinary system. Yeah, no question. All of them drive profitability because there's two ways to become profitable. Either you cut costs or you increase efficiencies. And that's what these systems do.

Or both.

Boom. Thanks for bringing back Profit. I was kind of going adrift, and you pull me back in with some profit talk. I like that. You dirty dog. That's right, that's right. Take note of that. Take note of that. All right, so we did. Oh, recap, recap, recap. Chris, what'd you learn?

Well, I just like the fact that he was stressing to be professional, and I really appreciate a younger person who's part of that, part of a generation, which kind of gets slammed a lot for being, you know, lazy and unprofessional. He was willing to say, look, that might be my generation, but I'm gonna stand up and be professional. And.

Yeah.

And dude, that immediate respect, right? Yeah, I respect that.

Yeah. So is that funny? It is the definition of prejudice. You look at someone, you're like, oh, too young, not gonna know anything, and you got to fight that prejudice. I like that. What'd you learn, Christina?

I really like you. Just, you have to get comfortable with your background and know how to use it to your advantage, especially from working in a family based business. Some clients aren't gonna like that you were grandfathered in and that you were raised in the company. Some people are. You need to know how to word things properly to be able to sell yourself and say, okay, yeah, I understand I'm young. I understand I'm new in this business. I understand. My father taught me everything I know, but I grew up in it. I watched him struggle, I watched him succeed, and I saw everything unfold. And now I can use all that experience and be beyond my years.

Nice. For me, it was. It was two things. He gave the triad the prepare, organize, and be presentable. Which, you know, it's so obvious, but it's not so common. A very good foundation for going into a meeting where, you know, this prejudice is going to be against you. The second thing I liked was he was talking about the transition with the senior in your family business. And he said, the role of my father going forward is to maintain his friendships. And I presume that's gonna go on till the day his father leaves this earth, but that he'll permanently have a role. So he's still linked into the company and he's maintaining relationships with the friends that he's established through the business. And Kieran can go and get the work done. I thought that was pretty, pretty meaty.

That's awesome. So if you're listening to this, and I know you're listening to this, what are your takeaways? So go to profitfirstpodcast.com and actually, find this post, it's episode, and write in the comments what you took away from this episode. And you can even ask Mike a question or ask Kieran a question. I'm sure he's going to be monitoring that post as well. Again, you can rate and review our show anywhere. You're listening to this podcast. You can give us a rating or review. And by the way, you're in business. You want to be profitable. You have an accountant, you have a bookkeeper. Well, there's a new breed that's coming along called the Profit First Professional. They are designed and bred to grow, to grow profitability. That doesn't make sense. No, it makes sense to drive profitability. That makes more sense, right, Mike?

That makes more sense. So. Thanks, Ruby. So, yeah, Proffers Professionals is a group of accountants, bookkeepers and business coaches who have trained with us to master Profit First. You know, two. Did two people join us yesterday? Two new.

Two.

Yeah, two New First Professionals joined us yesterday. You won't be. You won't be working with them for another 90 days or so because they're going through an extensive training process. One of them's on the phone right now with the Hawaiian lumberjack over there who's feeling a little under the weather. He's not even looking at me. No, he gave me. He gave me a shaka, whatever that's called, that hand. What's this one?

What's that called?

No, what's that called? What's that called? The hang loose thing. All right. And he's feeling under the weather, but he's still coaching people through. He's working with him. We're an organization of coaches, accounts and bookkeepers who've been trained by our team here. Myself, Halaj, Ron, Mo, Kebby, all of us. And we don't even have a nickname for her yet.

For her.

Yeah, we gotta get her a nickname. And they will. Drive properly in your business. Here's what you need to do. Go to profit first professionals.com right now, click on the find option at the very top, and we'll find you a Profit First Professional who will, as Chris says, grow profit in your business or drive profit in your business. It's that simple.

That's right. And we forgot to do this. But revenue is tremendous. But profit is tremendous, sir. All right, well, there you go. So look, we really thank you for listening to the show. We hope by listening, you become more profitable. That's what this whole thing's about. So go forth, be profitable. And next week. Mike, who's up?

Oh, my God. My favorite guest. This is his third appearance. This will be the second one on first podcast. It's been on gmap. His name is Roger Dooley. He is the master of all things influence. So.

And we will fade the music.

Oh, no. Get out of here.

Because we don't want to descend into hell. All right, thanks for listening, everybody. See you.

Bye. See?