Peer to Peer Forums with Mike Maddock- Mike Up In Your Business Podcast

Hey there, Entrepreneurship Elevated listener, it's Mike Michalowicz. I want to thank you so much for being a loyal subscriber to Entrepreneurship Elevated. You know, a while back I switched to an all new format and rebranded the podcast as Mike up in your business. You know, because I get up in people's business. I interviewed some amazing guests. John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneurs on Fire, J.J. virgin, the author of the Virgin Diet, and A.J. jacobs, the author of the Year I live Biblically became a TV show. Not to mention I throw in some special episodes where I have a bit of fun. If you haven't yet subscribed, I would encourage you check us out. It's www. Mm. Like Mike Mallow. It's podcast me, so it's mmpodcast me as in you, but not you me. And please subscribe to get notified of all the great interviews that are coming your way. I'll see you over there.

If you're looking for the idiot and you don't know who it is, it's probably you. I have had the same experience and I remember the first time I got into a forum, I literally in my head was going, loser, loser. Oh, I can learn something from him. Loser. And fast forward 10 years. I was so wrong. It was the people that thought differently than me that saw the world different. That was where all the goodness was. Because those are my blind spots.

Recording. I'm recording low.

You never chewed gum.

Yeah. What are you doing?

Oh, I'm chewing gum.

Hey, here's an idea. Before we do a podcast, let me throw some gum in my mouth.

It's true. Because it's obnoxious. I. I never chew gum.

Yeah.

But what they wanted to do, a private first professionals was a trivia day where for I can't remember how it works, but on one of the huddles, whoever gets the question right, Ron or I have to chew another piece of gum. So I have to have a pack ready. So I have this big wad. Potentially. Whoever chooses, whoever has five piece of gum is the loser. Or whatever do you guys do? When I was there, I bought some gum. I never have gum. I was like, oh, this is pretty good. Sugar free too.

Do you remember sugared gum?

Because sugar gum leaves a bad aftertaste.

Yeah.

And it, like, messed up your teeth. Like, the whole reason I chew gum is to, I feel like, clean my teeth.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. That's why. Yeah, that's why you do it. So. So bought a pack of gum.

You had the Juicy Fruit. Do you remember the Juicy Fruit commercials? Oh, man, those commercials were the best. It's like you pop.

What happened to zebra? Why don't they have a zebra on the package anymore?

Oh, right. It used to be that Juicy Fruit.

No, isn't that a Fruit Stripes one?

Yeah, that's Fruit Stripe.

Oh, what am I talking about? Juicy Fruit.

Amy, I was with y' all.

Thank you. I was thinker.

Do you remember? You like Papa Juicy Fruit? And then all of a sudden you can do like a 360 flip on your skis, you know?

Oh, these 90s kids.

I love those commercials.

I love this. They were the best commercial.

Those are Mentos.

Well, they took it to the extreme.

And the double mint ones were good too, with all the twins.

My twins. My cousins are twins.

Oh, no way.

Well, they're not my cousins. They're Christopher's cousins. They're. They're the.

And then we're not Christopher cousins. They're friends down the street.

No, no, no. They're really related to me, honestly. Their last name is Cartel, actually.

Okay. I think.

Kelsey, didn't we have a conversation about the twin thing? Yeah, we did. We did a one on one and we talked about. And I said maybe they just ran out of twins and so they stopped running the commercials.

And I was like, that's a logical reason.

Oh, you mean for double. For double.

For double. Yeah. Yeah.

I think it's bad marketing because at a certain point, like, was it only targeting twins? Like, what was the.

You know, you can only chew this gum if you're a.

So last week I revealed that Amy has two vaginas.

Today.

Let's perpetuate this into every time.

Today. I'm curious, Kelsey, your date.

You had a date.

I did have that date.

How'd it go?

I love this. Wait, can we just talk about the segue? Two vaginas. Hey, Kelse, how was your date?

Well, I just want to make sure that this guy doesn't like.

Wait, you had a date?

Yeah, I had a video date.

Okay, this is news to me. Oh, my goodness.

On Friday.

How was it?

And it was really good. I liked him a lot.

Yay. Really? So he could maintain a dialogue, first of all. Well, this is being recorded, so just be careful how you respond to things. Was he good looking?

Yeah.

Okay, that's. That's the first thing you gotta measure right now. What did you see?

Like, not the important thing in the. Like, at least on my radar.

Yeah, it's not a. It's not a deal breaker if it's.

Not a deal breaker, but it's a deal helper. But what did you see of him? Was he just like, down here? You just this part of his face.

Yeah. It wasn't the best angle. It was, like, below him. So it was like that.

Okay, so that's my flatter than anybody.

So I was gonna ask for the position.

I didn't critique him, though.

Why would he do that with his camera?

I know.

He's like me. He has no awareness, you know, just unaware. Some of us are just unaware, Amy.

Are you kidding? Your shot's great. I mean, listen, your angle's a little bit off. You totally look like you are a model for one of those commercials with the phone support or your support line, you know?

Yeah.

Thank you. Thank you.

Background. The blue. The shawl.

It's not a shawl. It's a blouse.

Kelsey, the most important question is the.

Worst looking blouse ever seen in my life. Let's get a shawl.

Does he have guns?

It looks like a shirt.

No, it doesn't. It looks like she's got now. It's like a blouse now. Let's go. When she shits. When she shits down. When she shits down. It looks like a blast.

Oh, my God. Oh, God. I just. Jerry, look at Jeremy. Jeremy knows. He's just shaking his head. He knows. Yeah. Shut up and chew more gum.

So what was the date like?

Yeah, so it was. I mean, it was just a get to know you session, but we talked for, like, four hours. Four plus hours on zoom.

One session.

One session.

Wow.

You had to take breaks. How do you do that?

No breaks.

Wow.

You must have been like. Were you sitting the whole time?

Yeah, I was sitting.

Did you lose, like, feeling in your legs?

No, but by the end, like, we didn't stop talking till after 12:30 at night. And you guys know I go to bed really early.

Yeah.

So I was like, I can't form sentences anymore.

I have to go to bed. And you were the first one to have to say that.

Yeah.

That's a good. That's very nice. That's very good.

Kelsey, how many guns does he own?

I know. I didn't ask the question yet. Usually that's like four hours.

What do you talk about for four hours with no guns?

How did you not come?

So are you going to go on another virtual date or are you going to meet in person? How you do this?

Yes. Another virtual date on Friday.

Awesome. Is it. Is it more intense, Kelsey? Because, you know, you're like, if you're at a bar, you can, like, look away. Yeah.

Exactly. And that was my fear with it was, you don't have any other diversion to talk about.

Right. Nothing else to.

Or just like, it's okay to have silence because we're just walking, you know?

Yeah, right.

Did you have drinks, like, while you were talking?

Yes.

So you should do one of our moves. You should have, like, you should mail him a little box with your favorite Milagro or something like that.

Yeah.

Did you wear green?

I did wear green.

Ooh.

Yeah. See, look. If anybody's watching the video, look how her eyes are popping right now.

That green makes her eyes pop. Right? Green.

So it makes my eyes pop more than this is like.

I don't know. Your eyes just pop. Kel screen. Great.

Thank you.

You're welcome. You're welcome.

Well, this is a perfect segue into the rest of our show. Well, we're going to talk about forum. We're going to talk about connectivity between people, particularly diverse people. So in this interview, I interview Mike Matic. He is the founder of a new business called flourishforums.com and what he proposes is that a collective mind is more powerful than individuals. So if you can get a collective. Collective thought on one idea, you're better served than one individual. But that's nothing new. That's what masterminds believe. But he says if you specifically and intentionally diversify the group through measurement, you can bring the ultimate diverse elevation around a concept or idea. You can bring perspectives and perception that wouldn't be there otherwise. So listen on in. Okay. So, Mike, how we do our podcast, we just roll into it. Why is your day worse than mine?

Because at one in the morning, my wife woke me up and complained about a stomachache that she'd been complaining about for, you know, the better part of the day. She's been giving some people some bad news about her health, which has been really bad news. She's highly empathetic. So she said, it's got me has my stomach upset. By 4 in the morning, she'd been throwing up all night. By 5 in the morning, she said, do you think my friend Jen would over and see me? Jen is an emergency room doctor. I text her and said, are you awake? Ruth has been complaining about stomach pain and she's not doing well. Jen text me back, I'm up. I'm on my way over. And my wife just got out of surgery about 15 minutes ago. Surgery, Appendectomy. So.

So it was. It was. It was not just her being upset about her other health. Health condition. It was.

No, it was an Emergency appendectomy that I would have kicked the can on because I'm like, oh, you're fine.

Puff it out.

Yeah, tough it out.

My God, man, fine.

But thank God for I have this thing about friends. They're the ones that show up in your driveway at 3 in the morning with a shovel. When you tell them not to ask any questions, they just show up. Jen is a good friend. It's kind of the New York gangster way of thinking about friendships.

Yeah, no, I like that. I like that. You know, a bad friend when they try to send something like a oversized fortune cookie and then after sending it, realizes it's really for couples. And it was called the big love fortune cookie I sent to your wife wishing her good health. And then the fortune I put in there had a typo.

Do you know the story of the fortune cookie? Do you know how on point that was? I forgot. So, okay, so my first day on the job, I show up, small company and hey, everybody, this is Mike Maddock. We want to introduce the new art director. This is Tom, this is Chuck, this is Joe. Everyone's around this circular table. This is Ruth. This is Ruth. And my eyes went like one of those cartoon characters, you know, it was a Pepe Le Pew moment. And I just. Time stopped. I went home and I said, hey, I met the girl I'm going to marry today.

Mom.

And my mom's like, that's nice, Mike. And I'm like, no, I'm serious. This woman is unbelievable. It turned out it was bad news for Ruth, who'd been dating the same guy for five years. For the next eight months, I made a complet ass out of myself. There's a phrase for this now, it's called sexual harassment. And so. And eight months in, it was Joe's birthday. We're like, what are we going to do for Joe? Let's order Chinese. So that. So that night I went home, went to a fort bulk food store, bought all these fortune cookies, tweezered out the fortunes, took an old fashioned typewriter and typed up all new fortunes. And the next day waited in the parking lot for the Chinese to be delivered. And I, when I got there, I took out all the fortune cookies and replaced them with my own. And at the end of the meal, I'm waiting around for people to pop open the fortune cookies and they start doing it and they say things like, dump John. Date Mike. Choose Mike. Mike would be nice. Everybody's looking at Ruth, her face is turning red. And someone said, I think he likes You. And she's like, you think so? You know, Ruth and I have been married.

You are the most romantic.

Well, you sent me a fortune cookie. And that was so perfect. You sent her a fortune cookie. But it's so perfect because that's a big part of our story.

Oh, that's good. Yeah. Well, good. I feel a little bit of. I've recovered from that.

It was a sweet, sweet gesture. Thank you.

Well, yeah. So, dude. So you started a peer to peer entrepreneurial support organization.

Yes.

What. What crack were you smoking?

I was trying. You know, the best coaches are always trying to work on themselves. Yeah, the best athletes. The best coaches were the worst athletes. So one of the things that I've noticed about entrepreneurs is there's this paradox. And it's what makes you really good at starting business, makes you really crappy at finishing them.

Oh, interesting.

Or a finisher. And so if you look at really successful companies, there's a Roy Disney, Walt Disney, there's a Zuckerberg and a Sandberg. They have this yin yang. And I've constantly been looking for my yin yang. So I wrote a book about it, Free the Idea Monkey, which is about Roy and Walt Disney and that tension between divergent and convergent thinking. But I realized that most of the forum experiences, most of the peer to peer experiences, most of our executive teams are reflections of us, the good, the bad and the ugly. So we wake up one day and we've got this great executive team, but they all kind of think like us under pressure. And that's what I was trying to solve. So Flourish Forums is an engineered approach to curate the right balance of expertise, passion, et cetera, so that when you attack a challenge, you get a balanced result.

Okay, so you and I met through a forum. Effectively, we're both EO members or YEO at the time. And then they had that adjunct event at Club Bursing Giants and that's where we met.

That's right.

I thought you were a total tool.

When I saw you, I was like, yeah, most people. Do I have that effect on people, particularly Norwegian women.

That you marry? No, I didn't think you were a tool at all. But, you know, I did. It was a tool was Brian Scudamore and Tony Lillios and Rob French. And the reason was they're the three that kind of sat around me in a horseshoe shape in the event. And I'm like, oh, I was so cocky. I'm like, I got a computer company. This guy Brian is a garbage guy. And then Rob French is doing Something with lip balm. Well, ends up, you know, Brian is 1-800-got junk. Rob French is the third partner in Burt's Bees. Sold the Clorox for a billion. Tony Lillios started spec.

Yeah.

And I'm like, oh, I'm the tool?

I'm the tool. Yeah. If you're looking for the idiot and you don't know who it is, it's probably you. I have had the same experience, and I remember the first time I got into a forum, I literally in my head was going, loser, Loser. Oh, I can learn something from him. Loser. And fast forward 10 years. I was so wrong. It was the people that thought differently than me, saw the world different. That was all where all the goodness was, because those are my blind spots. And, you know, most organizations, most, you know, pick one vistage EO ypo. It's like they're chopping a bunch, a bunch of ingredients. They throw in a pot of water and they put it on boil and they hope it tastes good. And it usually doesn't. It's out of balance.

Yeah.

So I've been super lucky with my forums that they're all different types of thinkers, but most people don't have that experience. And diversity actually creates balance. Like, if you look at the data, the more diverse your executive team, the more profitable you are. And yet we wake up one day and we're surrounded by idiots like us. Because that's who we attract.

Well, you know, it's funny. So if you're looking for who the idiot is, it's you. But also, if you think everyone's an idiot, the only idiot that would believe that is the idiot.

That's right.

So this is an interesting thing you do with Flourish Forum. So you investigate other peer organizations, and then you set up like a testing protocol to make sure there's that balance.

Right.

How's that work?

That's right. So I'm. We're most of the. Most of the entrepreneurs I know are kind of test junkies. You know, the disc, Myers Briggs Strength Finders, Enneagram. And I stumbled upon Colby, spelled K O L, B E. The reason I love Colby is that it doesn't change after the third grade. So it's a great parenting tool for all you parents out. There you go, what should I do? Well, you're older than the third grade, I'll tell you. And it also measures what you do when you're in flow and what you do when you're under pressure. And it turns out they're the same thing. And so it's a great way to understand because you want your executive team to feel like they're in flow and you also want them to be reliable under pressure. And my executive team were all a bunch of idea monkey, quick start. So under pressure, they're like, oh my God, we need a new idea. And in Florida, they're like, let's have a new idea. So we got really good at coming up with things and we, you know, we launched a 3 million, 5 million, 8 million $15 million business, but every one of them got to a certain point where. And the reason was because we never really got good at scaling that one idea. So idea Monkey ringleader. On Flourish forums, there's the visionary operator, idea monkey ringleader, then there's the strategist, the rainmaker, the tech futurist, and the orchestrator. And so now you can rely on people to be in flow and to give you a balanced strategy, balanced questions. The pushback is balanced, so the ideas are better.

So for entrepreneurs listening in right now is the big challenge is that we're so biased by our own opinion that we walk staunchly down a path without any other consideration or what need this in the first place.

So Elon Musk is famous for the last week because he did a. What's the new social media site that. Nope, no, it doesn't matter. It'll come to Clubhouse. Thank you. He did the first Clubhouse and did you see that? The stock of Clubhouse went through the roof. But it's the wrong clubhouse. But I digress.

No way. Are you kidding me?

Clubhouse isn't publicly traded. But some clubhouses, like what happened, asked what kind of encouragement entrepreneurs needed. And he said, if you don't, if you need encouragement, don't be an entrepreneur. So this is the paradox. You know what, Good at one thing makes us bad at the other. We have to be bold. It's like, you know, I've been spending a lot of time, unfortunately, with neurosurgeons. Guess what? They're jerks. They're cowboys. You know why? Because they're bold enough to think they're good enough to operate on someone's brain. So you need that. But that's what makes them kind of, you know, they don't. They lack the empathy. So to be a great entrepreneur, you have to be stupid. One of my first mentors, Tom Kane, God rest his soul, said, michael, you know how I know you're going to be successful as a business owner? And I said, why? What's that, Tom? He goes, because you're too God damn Stupid to know you shouldn't be doing this. Which is true. Like, you have to be like, oh, these people don't know what they're doing. That's how disruption happens. But it's also what gets in your way over time.

Well, let's talk about your prior business. So, Matic Douglas, I still exist, but you grew this to what I think, by the measure of most entrepreneurs, is pretty extraordinary success. But you went through a challenge afterwards. Why don't you just share that trajectory?

So I. I started Maddock Douglas in 1991 as a design firm. Our tagline should have been, sure, we can do that, too, because I just took any job, you know, like, sure.

Sure, we can do that too.

And eventually we, you know, we were one of the. We were the largest privately held marketing firm in Chicago. And then I had this Jerry Maguire moment. I actually had dated a woman in college who dragged me into something that Leo Burnett was doing called Idealab, which is really fun. And Josh McQueen had started that. His big idea was, what if we're a big advertising agency? What if we actually created things people wanted to buy? It would be. So they. Because of this relationship I had with Michelle, we started working with them. And I had a Jerry Maguire one. I'm like, this is the future. Innovation is the future. They came in one day and said, that's it. Now we're going to be about innovation. And half the company went. And half of them were like, that sounds okay. So at that point, we split it into two different companies. Split into two different.

How many employees did you have?

At the time, we would have had. At that time, we would have had. I'd say about 30.

Okay.

We started McGuffin Creative Group, which is still around, which is a great creative services firm in Chicago. And then we just went all in on innovation and grew it to about 80, 85 people at the top of the top watermark. And we did work with every company you've ever heard of, 25% of the top 100 brands in the world. We were competing with IDO in a site Fahrenheit. And then something bad happened. We missed the next wave. And the next wave was everything was turning into technology and software. We wanted to be agnostic. Now this is. Here we go. This is me being stubborn, going, no, we are agnostic. You know, we don't. What if it's not technology? So meanwhile, you know, people I know are starting these little technology companies that are now worth a billion dollars. And. And all of our competitors started to get acquired by Large consulting firms that are technology companies, Accenture, there's a whole list of them, Deloitte, etc. So we missed that wave. And I will tell you that the number one decision I think an entrepreneur can make is what wave are you going to surf on? The number two decision is who is your surfing partner. Because if you can pick the right wave and you can pick a yin for your yang, oh my God, you will look like the smartest business person in the world because that wave will get you to the shore, it's going to get you there. Whether you know how to surf or not. You're going to wind up on the shore, and if you have a good partner, you'll arrive in one piece.

But I think it's also about the selectivity of waves. I bet you you made a lot of non decisions which served your business extraordinarily well, but you don't think about because you decide not to pursue it, you know?

Yeah, I think that if I, if I had to make a prediction of what my life story would have been when I was first starting business, I think I would have said, why don't I own my own company and it'll be successful because I'll just work harder than anyone else and it'll grow and it'll be good. And what turned out was sort of, you know, it turned out that I've owned a bunch of companies and they've all turned out pretty good. I mean, I'm really proud of the, you know, the ripple effects, et cetera. But I wish I had learned earlier on that the right wave and the right partner really matter and spend a little bit more time thinking about it.

Yeah. You know, one thing, and I know I'm kind of rolling over the place, but there's so much I want to ask you about. One thing you and I are talking about privately was just preparing for the future. And then also the balance between living for the now and, you know, as you're. As Mac Douglas was in heyday and may return, a new form, flourished. Form, perhaps, but you also kind of leaned into living experiences of life fully. And when you and I last talked with your wife, being diagnosed with a, you know, a serious illness is. You're so grateful you did it. I'm just curious, what's your insights? Because you have a unique perspective on preparing for the future and living the now.

Yeah. So one of my, John Domsky, who is one of my coaches, you know, John, I believe I was talking to him about how I feel weirdly grateful in the moment. Because, you know, most people see problems. I think entrepreneurs see possibilities. There's a possibility. And I give my mom a lot of credit. And we could. I could have a hundred stories of how she made me. Like, in the worst moment, she's like, isn't this great? Isn't it great? I'm like, this sucks. No, it's great. So she kind of trained me to look for treasure. John told me a parable a couple weeks ago, and it was actually the parable that I used to talk to our two boys about, you know, my wife's illness, which is not good. And he said, you know, there's. And all parables start the same. There's either, like, someone that walks into a bar or there's a monk. This one has a monk. Okay, There's a monk walking through the jungle. And he turns around and sees that there's a tiger chasing him. And he panics. He runs to the edge of a cliff, jumps off the cliff, holds onto a vine. He's hanging from the vine. So he's got a tiger up on top waiting for him. And he looks down, there's another tiger circling on the bottom. And he's like, crap. And then, just then, he notices there's a mouse that starts to gnaw on the vine that he's hanging from. So he's just completely flummoxed. At which moment he looks to his right and sees a strawberry plant, a wild strawberry plant on the side of the hill. And he reaches over, grabs a strawberry and eats the strawberry. And in that moment, the strawberry and life are perfect. And so the. We can't control what happened. We can't control what's about to happen, but there are these perfect little moments all around us. And, you know, the saddest thing is when someone that you really love and care about is taken like that, when you don't have an opportunity to understand that every moment is precious. And, you know, not to get too philosophical, but none of us are promised tomorrow. We have this moment, though, and so we've been given the gift of just really valuing moments. And so that's what we're up to right now.

Yeah. I'm so proud and impressed by you. And, well, I don't want to dig too much further into that. I think there's a translation, perhaps, into business in that many entrepreneurs live reflecting on regrets of the past or success of the past, and kind of cling on to look at what I did or are concerned for the future or maybe are expecting an extraordinary Future and totally ignoring the moment. How do we get back in the moment and how do we enjoy the moment in entrepreneurship?

That's a good question. I mean, we're all guilty of it, right? We're like, okay, what's next? You just won this award. Great. What are we doing next? Meeting, you know, everyone to the conference room. Come on. Congratulations. Don't get back to work. I don't know the answer. I think that. I just think having. So I'm going to go back to my friends. You know, we started this with friends with the shovel in the driveway at 3am I've been surrounded my whole life by people like you. You know, like, you know, not to make your head any bigger because clearly you're very famous and important now, but you've called me and said, plane, do you want me on? When. When I heard the news about my wife, the first person I called was my buddy who's a forum mate and a doctor. And he said, what? What do you need from me right now? I'm driving to Michigan. Do you need me to turn around and come to you? What do you need from me right now? I said, I need the best neurosurgeons in Chicago. And by 7 the next morning, I had appointments with three of them. Wow. So being. It's so special and rare for people to be in a room or to be surrounded by people that call them for their and like, and love them for where they are right now without judgment and make them aware. So having friends that go, dude, are you noticing this? That, you know, this moment of goodness, are you noticing it? Wake up. That's so important. And lucky me. Lucky you. Because of the organizations, the entrepreneurial organizations we've been involved in, we. We have more friends than most that are legitimate. One other thing. Are you familiar with the Benjamin Franklin effect?

No.

Okay, so something about forum that to make a highly functioning forum, most people are like, I can help you. I can help you. How can I help you? But. And, and we think that by offering help, that's how you grow closer to someone. But Benjamin Franklin discovered something that when he asked for help, when he really needed it and someone gave it to him, they became bonded. It's called the Benjamin Franklin effect. It's actually if someone does you a favor, they're more likely to do another one. Another one. But I want to go a little bit deeper. When you truly are in a moment of despair and you have the humility to go to someone and say, dude, I need some help. Can you help me? That's how relationships bond.

Yeah.

And that takes a tremendous amount of trust and it takes a special room. So if you can. If you can engineer a room where people feel like they can be in flow and themselves and are feel comfortable asking for help, the bonding that takes place is immeasurable. And. And I've been in enough of those rooms to. To have benefited greatly from that kind of relationship, particularly in the last couple months. And it's been absolutely humbling.

I found there's extraordinary power to. When people don't ask me, how can I help you, as opposed to just doing it, because it does put a burden on the receiving end. Like, you're facing one of the biggest challenges in your life. And now you have to also navigate the administration component of help. I was.

Don't give me a job to do.

I know I forgot to say I went through a financial trauma. I mean, and this is not in a comparative way to anyone else's trauma, but for me, it was extremely significant. I was in my forum and we met and we did this thing, we called it getting financially naked. Like, just reveal all the numbers to help support each other. And the first person goes, and the second person goes. And they're sharing how they've saved and all these different things. And they were putting numbers on the board. I go, I think I was last. I just put a big zero up on the board. And I remember I started crying. I pointed to. I said, I wish I was worth that much. I had $350,000 of debt at my height in business and personal debt. And I said, I wish I was nothing. And it was just. There was so much shame and stuff. But releasing it to the forum was amazing. And here was the ultimate thing. I think traditional friends say, you've got this, cheer up, don't cry. Real confidants say, I get you. Here's my experience in that. And some of them, and this is above and beyond the call of duty, took action to support me. One of the people in the group said, hey, I need to hire a company. I'm going to hire you personally. And he goes, here's the prepayment for it. He was just in the position to do that. And he said, you're not going to miss paying your mortgage or your groceries. I was not in the position to do either. He says, you're not going to miss it. I never expected that. The support of the group alone was amazing. The ability to reveal the true self and not be judged by it was extraordinary. And then someone stepping up was Just mind blown. I know you've experienced that. How is it that a group. These are my friends in the traditional sense. I didn't go to school with them and I don't go to football games together. We just talk business. How come the bond there is stronger?

Well, I think that there's a song when you start with a peer to peer experience. So I was. If you're an eo, for example, you're the founder, co founder, majority shareholder of a business that has revenues of over a million dollars. Can you tell? I was the membership chair. So that, that's, that's. So when you put people like that, like so what you have in common. If I screw up, the bank takes my house. There it is in a headline. Yeah, well when you start with that, you have a head start. Like there's a lot of, there's going to be empathy in the room if you can ladder that up and get lucky or be in a room where you actually have people that are, that not only share that peer to peer experience, but then different levels of expertise and they trust each other to lean into each other. Well, now you're going to feel comfortable going, hey, I suck at this, but you're really good at this. What would you do? Can you help me? So it feels natural. You're a carpenter. I don't know how to use a hammer. Can you help me? Like that's, you know, that sets up that Benjamin Franklin effect and, and you know, it feels good. It's like, man, I feel totally bonded for you because you, you helped me. And, and then you get these secret guy, for example. So I had a guy call me and say, listen, I want to coach you. Someone called me wants to pay me to coach you. They think right now you could really use a confident. It would be my honor. And this person wants to be. Remain anonymous, but they want to pay for it. And I'm like, holy shit. And he goes, and I go, I wonder who that could be. And he said, you know what's interesting, Mike? It could be about 30 people. You know, you don't know who it is. And that is awesome. You know, like just, it's just such a privilege. If you look at the data, most guys have two friends that will show up in their driveway with a shovel at 3am and not ask any questions. And that's awesome. Yeah. Imagine having 30 or 40 like that. And that's what these forum like experience set up. And none of us are imagining it. I mean it actually is happening. So when you young entrepreneurs out there, when you get into a room and start going, nope, nope, nope, yes, you're probably wrong. It's probably the people that you don't think you can learn anything from that think completely differently than you. That when you. You have the courage and humility to ask them for help, it will come back exponentially, and you'll have a new best friend.

What about blind spots? Can a form identify. Speak to stuff we can't even see for ourselves?

So, you know, my favorite saying is, you can't read a label when you're sitting inside the jar. Which means that the more. The closer to a challenge we are, the more we know we know it works. We know it doesn't. We know why so and so got fired. And we know we know we know. And that's actually how entrepreneurs completely disrupt businesses. All of us have them. And so, yeah, having someone go, are you kidding me? That is not the way I see your world. I know you're making millions of dollars now being the expert, but I got news for you. You have a blind spot. So again, having people around that are willing to hold a mirror up to your face and you being able to see the reflection they're trying to show you is. Is. Is gold. And so I'm. I'm big into objectivity. There's all kinds of tools, et cetera, that you can use. But really, having a good friend or a forum mate that's willing to say that is pretty good.

When you're in a form, is there almost like a quid pro quo? Are you expected to give in order to get. How does that work?

I think that. And for the good of the whole, you know, channeling Verne Harnish is a really good slogan. I think that in terms of core values, some of the more important ones are that you're there to help others as much as you're there to help yourself, you're there for the good of the whole. I think that authenticity and vulnerability are really important, which, you know, you mentioned earlier how cocky we were when we first met each other. You're young, and we're young.

We're in our 20s.

Yeah, young 20. My experience has been that after about 10 years of getting your butt kicked sideways in business, you're willing to listen to other people. And the sooner you learn that lesson, the better. And then I think the confidentiality, you know, what's said in the room stays in the room, is super important because, you know, you need to feel comfortable saying really embarrassing things. Writing zeros up on the board Is hard, you know, And. And I'm sure that. I'm sure that your foreign mates felt really loved by that moment.

Yeah, actually, that's a great way of putting it.

Yeah.

When we first met up in Boston was our first meeting.

Boston.

Boston. We. There was, like, a party that night, whatever. In someone's room. It was.

The bathtub was full of alcoholic beverages, I believe.

Yeah. And maybe one dead person, I think.

And we promise never to speak of that again.

I know, I know, I know. We escorted them out, right? His name was Blue. My boy Blue. I was wearing a fake knockoff Rolex watch. Like, I went to New york, and, yeah, 15 bucks or something on the street, I'm like, whatever. I needed to watch. I didn't even really appreciate what it was until I had it. I'm like, oh, yeah, there's that party. Two guys come up to me, and they tap my shoulder and like, hey, man, we noticed your watch. That's sweet. And I'm like, this? And they're like, yeah, that Rolex is amazing. And in that moment, I'm like, oh, my God, people really care about material. And then I'm like, well, thank you. And then. And I started showing more prominently. Unbelievable how back then, at least for me, material success was important. And then I started to say, oh, my God, I got to really lean into this. It wasn't that moment, but very early on in my entrepreneurial career, I felt that the more effects I had, the more things, the stuff I could show. That was the definition of success. And that was just one moment from our mutual event activity that identified that. And it took me losing all my money to get a full restart. Like, oh, money is a vehicle. It's not a means. There's certain experiences I went through that I didn't have a forum for a group to rely on. I had to go through myself and ultimately through therapy for it. Does. Does a forum replace or can it support you through all life experiences, or is it. Does it only go so far?

It depends on the people in your forum. I mean, I have. We could sit here and. You know, I have permission to retell some stories because I've written about them in one of my books, so I had to get permission. But I think the right form can help you through the toughest moments in life. I also think, Mike, where I thought you were going with that story is the best kinds of people in the world, and they're becoming more and more valued are wysiwygs. What you see is what you get. These are the people that. That show up as the same person, whether they're in a church group or a conference room at work or at a board of directors meeting or at the baseball game with their kid, they're the same exact person. And you learn to look for those people because they don't surprise you. And they're just there with all their warts. And that's another thing that typically takes people a long time to realize, damn, I just have to be myself. I remember when one of my friends said, dude, dude, what's up with the suit? I was going for a big speech, you know, and I realized I. I was doing it. I was dressing up to speak. And I. And I'm like, why am I wearing jeans? Like, I'm wearing jeans right now every day of the week, except when I have a speech. This is ridiculous. So one of my favorite moments was we had a board meeting at Nationwide Insurance, and I have all these pictures that we were in the boardroom. So picture giant, big, big table with all these pictures of, like, hello, you know, dignitary of the ex CEOs. I have a picture, like, you know, of me sleeping in front of one of those pictures and Maria, our president, kind of looking at it, you know. And two years later, someone asked the CEO of Nationwide, they're like, yeah, you know, Mike Maddock, he worked on that project that his company, Maddock Douglas. He goes, wait a minute, was he the guy with the jeans? All we remembered was, I wore jeans in the boardroom. But that's enough, because I'd rather be remembered for who I authentically am. So I don't even know how I got on this, but you're a wysiwyg. You know, you've always been the same guy, and it's super appealing. And what I've noticed is that eventually it's the wysiwygs that win. So the sooner you can get in a room and with people that just love you for who you are, the. The, you know, you get better feedback, people glom onto you. You attract better people to you. And guess what? When you finally get to that room, that Nationwide room, you're going to find that three or four of the most popular people in that room, they're WYSIWYGs, too, and that's why they're there in the room.

I love that. And this absolute truth, I think it's a longer path because you gotta find that community and they gotta find you to build it. It's easier. I think more, I should say, it's quicker to fake it to put on an air of something because that's the community that is already in front of you.

So clubhouse. We mentioned it up on Clubhouse. How to be a millionaire. In less than 30 days. I've jumped into these rooms and there are these people talking and it sounds like. I feel like I'm in a conference room at a holiday inn 20 years ago and get rich quick. And the one ones that are rising are the people who are just like, hey, man, here's what I found. Like, they're authentic. They just tell the real thing and they shine like stars in the night because they're so much different than everyone else who's just wearing the Rolex, you know? I've got a Rolex.

Yeah, look, look, everyone, look. Yeah, that's fascinating. Yeah, I'm actually. Are you into that or have you experienced.

No, I've, I've. I like to talk, obviously, so it's a good platform. But. And I. I'm typically a late adopter on these things, which is. I've been. So I. So I think I'm gonna. I think we should do one together. It'd be fun.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking. We should do one together. We should have done this as well.

Well, this is. I. I like seeing you.

Yeah, I like seeing you too.

Like the motivational.

There you go.

You got this. You've got this.

Are you like that behind me, brother?

Yeah, it's very positive.

That was interesting. So as I was studying other people's presentations in this new virtual world for keynotes, that the backgrounds were absolutely consistent. It's a bookcase, always a bookcase with all these books lined up. So it's like, well, I want to display books because that's what I do. But there's your book. But don't have a bookcase. Have something different. So I got a. I got a tree of Life.

The tree of life.

Everyone has a guitar. So you have yours. I got mine back there.

Of course, yeah.

And then I started putting these words up here and this became the most appealing. When I'm doing something for myself, it's, you've got this. But when it's a client's event, I put their name like thanks whatever event, and they lose their mind. That differentiation attracts. I learned that. And we'll kind of go back to forms here and then we gotta wrap things up. I learned that by studying other people in a forum in a peer to peer group instead of having to go out there and learn one at a time. All these different ideas I've experienced that it expedites learning what's your feeling about a forum? And bringing new thoughts and new ideas to the table quickly.

So my latest thinking, the reason I started Flourish Forum was because I looked around and I saw that my forums and my executive teams were out of balance. I saw that I had had somehow managed to start four multimillion dollar businesses and they'd stalled. And I think deeply about why that is so I just thought, what would happen if I had not just a visionary, not just an operator, but a strategist, a rainmaker, a futurist, an orchestrator in the same room times two, what would that look like? And what I found is. So the best definition of creativity that I found is the ability to have lots of ideas and then to focus on the idea that matters most right now. You need to be divergent and then focus. So this mix of people actually naturally gives you divergent thinking because people have different questions and different experiences and expertise and so they come up with lots of questions and then when they punish those ideas down to, okay, this is probably the strategy that works. You have much more confidence so you get the lots of ideas. And here's what I should do first. So I think engineered serendipity is possible. And I'm making, I'm making up taglines. Tf.

Oh, damn it, damn it, damn it. I got it. Very quickly. Reserve it. Go, go online.

So that's what I'm to now. And it's just obviously, again, like everyone else, working on your own flaws every single day.

Engineered serendipity. This has been Mike Matic, a great personal friend. Not just to me, by the way. He's got 30,000 great personal friends. He's an extraordinary guy, a true mensch. Also, people know this. A failed, albeit minor role, porn career didn't go well.

It was very cold in that room. I'm just saying. I mean, for the love of.

And there was no one filming and you were by yourself, but otherwise an extraordinary entrepreneur. And the only thing that caps his entrepreneurial journey is just an extraordinary human. Michael, thank you so much for joining me, brother.

Love you, my brother. Thank you.

Okay, so that was Mike Matic. I gotta start off by saying WYSIWYG people was like the best I know.

First line on so much first line on my notes was WYSIWYG people. Can I say that? I just. I've never met Mike Matic. I like him. I like him. He is a good, solid person. And I have no way of knowing that, because all I did was listen in on one conversation of you and him. But there is just something so warm and humble.

And he's real, too. He's like.

I loved his humility.

I loved his humility. And yeah, Mike Wysiwigs, that was just awesome. People who are authentic, people who are the same, they show up as the same person over and over again, no matter where they show up or when they show up. And you do, you're drawn to those people. And I also want to say I'm so glad you had your form, Mike, when you are going through your rough times, because all I ever did was show up with. For you at Sharkey's with a beer when you were having really good times.

Let them talk about your vaginas.

Yeah, that's it.

Yeah, actually, I did. I did. I did avoid.

Yeah, we lost you for a while.

For a while. Yeah. So when I was going through the darkest period financially in my life, I started avoiding folks. And so Amy, Kristen, this guy Mark, and me, the four of us would get together, you'd say once every six months, sometimes even a little more frequently, but, you know, once a year, minimally. And I was taking the responsibility and Amy, too, because we're the great facilitators to make the group keep going. And then I just. I just stopped responding because of what's going through. And I think that's what a lot of people do is, is when we feel depression or when we feel an identity crisis of some sort, we remove ourselves from the people that we actually need the most. But for me, Michael Maddock, Mike Matic was there. And I do know well enough to say that, Amy, your first impression is spot on. And there are hundreds of people that he is close friends with who every one of those people say, he's my best friend. He's that type of guy. And I feel that way about him myself.

Yeah, I really liked him.

Yeah, I really like that, too. I loved when he said, are you noticing this moment of goodness? Wake up. I feel like, you know, as we go through our lives, we. We don't take stock of the amazing moments that happen to us. So I love that phrase.

Yeah, I wrote that down, too. That I loved that he was appreciating, especially with his wife's serious illness happening right now, that he was appreciating and telling his boys, too, that we're giving the gift right now of knowing what we've got. Therefore, we can appreciate it. Because so many other people might lose somebody in an Instant or whatever. And you don't get the gift of awareness of the gifts that are currently right in front of you. So he's just living in the moment and he's just being in the moment. And I love that he was able to do that and that he's able to convey that too.

Aim, did you change. Did your perspective of life change since you had cancer? The way you live life? Has that changed?

I want to say yes. I think I practice gratitude and being in the moment much more. Cancer kind of aligned with so many other changes in my world. My oldest son leaving for college in another country and my father coming into going into hospice and eventually becoming ill. So the whole. The whole time period seems like a big shit show to me. But it did give me the gift of whenever I was surrounded by things that comforted me, I was very much aware of them and very much appreciative of them. So there is that gift of recognizing the present, the moment that you're in.

When I was talking to Mike offline, his business, the Matic Douglas business, the marketing business, as he shared on the show, it was probably the leading. It was definitely the leading advertising agency in Chicago, one of the bigger ones in the nation, and his income reflected that. So he was able to buy a vacation home and do all these different things. But one thing that was interesting too is he could have waited. He could have said, we're not going to do the vacation home and let's pour more into the business to grow bigger and focus attention there. But I remember him back when he was getting the vacation home and said, no, I'm here to live. We're here to live. Then what he shared, and I don't think he said on the show specifically, but they had to sell the home due to the health considerations for his wife. It is that serious. And he goes, I thought you, Mike. He goes, the greatest thing ever was that we had that vacation over that period of time that we were able to do it. And he goes, I would have regretted saving the money, which is almost counterintuitive because I hear all the time, save, save for your future, save for your future. But the future isn't guaranteed. So there's this balance.

Yeah, exactly.

I love that. I also loved when you talked about the best definition of creativity is having lots of ideas from different people and then being able to figure out what should be done right. Right now.

I like to kind of his structure for. For a forum or mastermind. So there's empathy meets expert emphasis. Empathy. Empathy is mixed with expertise. Secondly is that there's an engineering of serendipity, which I thought was kind of cool. Engineered serendipity. And the last thing he shared, and I've experienced this too, is that the peer group becomes more supportive than your friends because there isn't that social context around it.

Right.

A scale to help each other. Anything else you guys take away? Jeremy, you've been kind of quiet.

Yeah. There was a quote that he talked about from Elon Musk that I love, and he says, what kind of encouragement do entrepreneurs need? And the response was, if you need encouragement, then you shouldn't be an entrepreneur.

Yeah, I love, I just love that that's the truth.

Yeah. Yeah.

Hi, my friends. We're going to go on to trivia here, but we would love to hear what you thought about this episode. Go to RateOurPodcast.com and give us an honest rating. Share what you thought about this podcast. And I'm asking sincerely because it helps us spread the word, but also I want to invite you to subscribe when you're there because I think it'll help you find new ideas as you listen to more and more episodes. So thank you for doing that. All right, Jake Sloan. I got my little paddle board here. I'm ready.

All right, so I'll try and relate the trivia to the guest somehow. Right. Okay. So this trivia is related to Mike because in his bio that he filled out with, with, we asked questions to all the guests and the question was, if you ever wanted to give up, why? What stopped you? And his answer was the ghost. I've never met a successful person who wasn't either chasing or being chased by ghost. So this is ghost trivia. Yeah. Little spooky.

The ghost was very active this morning in the office, by the way. I was alone from 7:30 to 9 and things were falling off walls, coming down off the shelves. It was a lot of activity.

Yeah.

In the MAD lab, the things came off the walls.

Okay, serious, serious question. Everybody needs to answer this. Does everyone here believe in ghosts? Honestly?

Yeah.

I do.

I do not.

You do not. I, I, I, I'm on the fence. I don't, I don't know. Because I believe in aliens, but I, I don't know. I, I feel like there's, there's a, there's a definite possibility. I feel like there's other dimensions. Right. And so maybe, like, it's the possibility that, you know, other dimensions are somehow interacting with, with ours, and then that's what causes an anomaly that we would Consider a ghost. But it's really fascinating. Fascinating. I don't know.

What's interesting is if. If you, the collective, you believes the universe to be infinite, which I do, I'm then being hypocritical because infinity includes everything. Which include ghosts.

Right.

So I believe the universe to be infinite, yet I don't believe in ghosts. So hypocrite.

Have you ever had any experience, Mike?

Yes. And here's why. Yeah. So my true story. My oldest son, Tyler, was totally into ghosts. I had a friend, his name is Garrett Husveth, who subsequently, sadly passed away. But he was a ghost hunter. He had all the equipment and stuff. We go to Cape May Amy's haunting grounds. And we go down there and there's some hotels that are fabled for their hauntings. And we go to this one room, you know, the obligatory room 666 type thing. Like 17 murders or 66 murders that happened here or whatever. And we go in there and he has the headset on. He's like, the noise, oh my God. Like, you know, he's doing the whole thing. And he goes, we're going to set the equipment, we have to leave this room because it's haunted that the devils are here. Well, I was ill. Like you are, Jeremy, like you're not feeling well. I was sick. I went because my son wanted to go. So I'm like, I'll set up the stupid equipment. I put down. I sit on the bed and like, I just gotta lay back. I fell asleep in the death room. I just fell asleep. I was in there for hours because they're all around over the hotel and. And then the noises that they heard were me snoring. I was like, this is so bunk. This is so bunk.

Real quick, I'll add a quick story. This is what I experienced. And this to this day, I. There's no explanation. So in my parents basement, there's like this alcove. And my brother, who's seven years my senior, was watching my cousin and I and we ran down into the basement and at the same exact time we saw a leg come out from this alcove. And we both freaked out and ran upstairs and we were like trying to collect ourselves and we thought my brother was messing with us. And then we go look and he's asleep on the couch. And there's only one way into the basement. And he would have had to pass us in order to get down into the basement. And both of us recall this story with like vivid, even to this day, very vivid. So it's just very weird.

I love ghost stories.

Yeah, me too.

They horrify me and terrify me, and I still love them.

If we do, in fact, have a ghost here, it seems to be not malicious, just trouble. A rebel rouser, but not.

Yeah, that's it.

Yeah. Yeah, he's been nice so far.

Oh, it's a he. I thought she. I thought the blue lady.

She.

I heard she has. She has two vaginas.

It's just me. I'm really old in the context.

All.

These podcasts are going to be. Explicit.

Question. Question one. How many vaginas? Sorry. According to folklore, what is the name of the legendary 17th century ghost ship that is doomed to sail the oceans forever? Is it Octavius, Mary Celeste, or the Flying Dutchman?

Oh.

Let me know when you're ready for numero Deuce.

Ready.

Ready.

Okay. The ghost of which president has been seen at the White House, including a sighting by the former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill? Is it George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, or Abraham Lincoln? And then finally, which wife of King Henry VIII has been spotted as a ghost haunting the Tower of London? Is it Catherine of Aragon, Catherine Howard, or Anne Boley?

Did we lose Mike?

Yeah, no, I'm here, but my camera died, so I got to reboot, but weird. Yeah, it's happened once before, too. I freeze and it dies. But I have the answers here. And then after this episode, I'll come back and reboot.

All right.

I can't show my paddle. I have my paddle.

I know.

He could be rewriting answers. This is all. But this is all just.

I know, I know.

Rewrite answers.

That's a question one. According to folklore, nautical folklore, what is the name of The.

The.

The 17th century ghost ship that is doomed to sail the oceans forever?

The Flying Dutchman.

Dutchman.

I put Octavius.

It is the Flying Dutchman. Yeah, that's creepy. And you know. You know what's really interesting is when I. When I did research for this trivia, I found stories about ghost ships. And, like, a real ghost ship is when there's a. An abandoned ship sailing in the ocean, which they're currently. Are just completely abandoned ships.

Just really?

Yeah, yeah, it's really creepy.

Like, does. Do militaries abandon ships and just leave them out in the ocean?

Sometimes pirates.

Maybe pirates too.

Oh, yeah. Sometimes there's a reason why they're abandoned, but other times they. They've lost communication with the ship, and then they find the ship and it's completely abandoned, which is weird.

Yeah, yeah. Boat can become crippled and they just abandon the boat out in the ocean kind of floats until it.

No, but I mean, but like, let's say there's a. A ship that's, you know, delivering merchandise or goods or something, and they're in communication with the ship. Then all of a sudden it goes through the Bermuda Triangle, for example, and they lose communication with it. Yeah, they can't get a hold of the ship. They'll send out a party to look for the ship, and then when they find the ship, there's nobody on board. It's completely abandoned, and. And they have no idea of what. What happened to it or why the aliens.

Obviously.

Could be pirates. Could be pirates.

Crazy. Crazy. Okay, number two, the ghost of which president has been seen at the White House, including a sighting by the former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, Abraham J. Abraham. What did you say, Mike?

Tommy J. Tommy J.

It is Abraham. It's Abraham. Link thinking, yeah.

We'Re two for two, Kels.

That's gotta be creepy. Imagine that being in the White House and you see like a ghost of Abe, like, and walk by.

I wonder if he'd fit through the door with a big top hat.

That's. That was my question is, does the ghost have the top hat on or is the top.

Yeah. Why did goes always close? Like, how does the. The clothing transition? Because when you see ghosts, right. When you saw that leg was a nude leg or was it with.

No, it like had. It was like jeans. Like he was like a gene.

Yeah. So why do ghosts. Why are they clothes? I don't understand.

Why would they want to be naked?

They don't want to, but I don't think they want to be a ghost in the first place. They're like, oh my God, man, I have to be a ghost. Oh, here's your clothing assignment.

Yeah. It's like, all right, you're gonna be a ghost. Oh, man. All right, well, I'll have jeans then.

Well, you're gonna wear period specific clothing. You know, you're gonna have a big top hat on.

That's actually a pretty good point. I never thought about that. Okay, which wife of King Henry VII has been spotted as a ghost haunting the Tower of London?

And Bolin.

I said Anne Boleyn too.

I was. I'm with Anne Boleyn.

Yeah. Ambalin. Yeah.

Three for three.

Woohoo. How many wives did that dude have, by the way? Seriously?

Yeah.

That's crazy.

That's not fun. I mean, who would ever want multiple spouses? I don't get it. Yeah, no, no, I understand getting a divorce and remarried. I'm saying simultaneous spouse. Like.

Like polyamorous.

Like polyamorous. Yeah.

Yeah.

You know what the trick is, Mike?

What?

You find one woman with two vaginas. There's a rim shot right there.

Yeah.

Did anybody get that?

Silence overcomes the end of our like, Jeremy.

Really? I thought that was actually pretty good. Too soon. That was pretty good.

Jeremy.

We stopped talking about it.

Why'd you have to bring it back? Too much too soon.

He's back.

Get out of the room. Look, he's kind of fading away there. He's gone now. He's off camera there. He's pushing away self way. All right, my friends, if you enjoyed that, here's a couple things we'd like you to do. First, go to FlourishForms. That's Mike Mannix website. And there may be a fit for you to elevate your business through a mixed expertise, empathetic, supportive group. Also, we'd love to get your feedback. I really do appreciate if you take the time to go to RateOurPodcast.com Any questions? Email to ask Mike Michalowicz.com so I can answer your question about business on the show. Thanks for joining us today and we'll see you next week.

Wishing you good times. Bye, jerks.