Episode 181: Agency Culture by Design with Patrick O’Neill

Welcome to the Unstoppable Profit podcast. This podcast will give independent insurance agents all of the tools to grow your business and live life on your terms. Wherever you are today, if you're starting with nothing or well on your way to the success you desire, with the right people, processes and promotions in place, you will be unstoppable. And now I'd like to introduce your host, Mike Stromsol.

Foreign.

Welcome, everybody, to the next episode of the Unstoppable Profit podcast. And I've been excited about this podcast since I finally reconnected with my longtime friend and colleague, Mr. Patrick O'. Neal. And in that conversation, something came up. And anytime I hear this word. Should we tell them what the word is, Patrick?

You may tell him, Mike.

Okay. Thank you. Culture. Patrick was talking about culture and the things that have happened in their agency since they intentionally made a choice to address their culture and to make it better. Great things have happened. They have been recognized nationally, among many, many other things. But before we go, there is my honor and privilege to welcome my longtime friend and colleague, Mr. Patrick O', Neill, to the podcast. Patrick, welcome. Mike.

Thanks. It's great to be here, and I'm really grateful for this opportunity. You know, that's. That's something. That's. Gratitude is important to you. I know that, and it is to me, and it's a great way to live our lives, you know, with. With gratitude. It just opens us up for a lot more opportunities and to see things differently. So. So thanks for the opportunity. I'm grateful. And we have been longtime friends, and I've been inspired by you for. For many, many years. And we share, you know, shared a lot of business successes together, but also we shared our personal lives and our families. So, you know, since. Since we first met, you know, we've. Our children have all grown. We now have seven. Three married, four. Seven grandchildren. And we're really blessed and really grateful to have all seven of our grandkids living within, really, a few blocks of us. And so that fulfills our lives in ways that I never imagined. And Pam's just, you know, she's a great wife, mother, and grandmother. So anyways, that's. That's. We have a lot to be great grateful for and thankful, and that's. That's one of them.

So, yes, we do. And. Go ahead.

Sorry I said, just. I've been in the business, you know, a little over 30 years. It's amazing how time flies and it's fun. Now our oldest son, Pat's in the business and has been A great addition to the team.

Yeah. And you. Strategically. I remember a number of years ago. Strategically and intentionally. And that might be a big takeaway for anybody either watching or listening to this. Strategically and intentionally. And Patrick o', Neill, in learning about his incredible business mindset over the years, he thinks about what he wants the outcome to be and then does something about it. And in bringing Pat into his business, I know that was part of his plan, and he took the actions that were necessary. So Patrick o' Neal and his family, personally and professionally, are one of the best of the best that I've ever been privileged to get to know. Pam and the kids and the grandkids, I believe I've met all of them and just phenomenal. So congratulations to you, dad. But let's go back in the insurance industry. Your family also has a history in the business, right?

It does. My father worked for regional insurance company here in Ohio and had a really strong influence on me. I graduated from college with a degree in accounting, went on to become a cpa and. But really had the itch to get in to find a business. And thankfully, I followed somewhat in his path, and he helped me find an agency in our little town, Wadsworth, Ohio, which is about 30 miles south of Cleveland. And really, the rest is history. And so I owe a lot to him and to his contacts that really helped me get started.

Yeah. So I guess I. I'm. I knew your dad was in the industry, but he didn't. He wasn't in the agency business.

Nope.

Okay.

So he. He introduced me to a gentleman that was. My dad was his mentor, and he was looking to sell his agency. And you reached out to my dad, and my dad said, well, gosh, coincidentally, Patrick's looking to buy an agency. And so he put us together, and we made a deal. And I worked with Mark for about two years, and he said, okay, you're right. And I knew nothing about insurance. Right. And he said, okay, you're ready. I'm ready to go. So I bought him out, and then we bought another small agency that same year, and, you know, the rest. You know, we bought a few other agencies through the years and then grown it mostly organically.

Yeah. And you've done a phenomenal job. And again, intentionally. Patrick was growing up, and you saw an opportunity to possibly bring him in, and you had a plan in working with one of your top carriers. He actually went to work there for a couple of years.

He did.

To learn the business, and then came back to the agency after they taught him the ropes so to speak. And now you are doing phenomenal things. So great stuff. Congratulations.

Yes, thank you. Yep, that, that worked out. That plan has worked out really, really well. He's super engaged. He's now, he is now the president of the agency. That happened about a year and a half ago and I just became, you know, was the CEO. He's the president. He's the visionary now in the agency and just really doing a great job and really well respected. He walked the first day he came in, he said, hey, so what do I do? I'm like, well, I'm not going to give you any clients, so you're going to have to like, get your own. So he went to work. And I said, plus the. Once you do this and once you start going out and selling and really building it on your own, when you bring in new people, you'll be able to show them how to do that as well. So that was part of the intention of him having to do it on his own. He picked a niche, he went after it and grew it and it's really, it's phenomenal to see his, his, his growth.

So very smart being a niche player as well. Great job, dad. Well, you led him to that, but not also not enabling him in any way, letting him learn his own lessons, which is truly important. Would you agree?

Right, Absolutely. You know, I felt that if he wants to be respected by the rest of the team, he needs to really come in and earn that and show, show them that there's no entitlement factor here.

That's right.

It is. You know, hit the ground running, work hard. And he, and he did. And he does. And just like the rest of the team, you know, I will, I will brag about him just like I will brag about any other team member once we're inside the, inside the office, I'm known as Patrick. I'm not dad. Right. Or have been from day one. So we, you know, that was. We just really want the team to know that, you know, you really can get what you earn here and for anybody and everybody.

So goals and expectations, well done. So let's fast forward to current times and recognitions I recently noticed because of what you have led. And by the way, I thought about this three times since we started talking this morning. Vision is the art of seeing things that other people can't see. So you set the vision many years ago and Patrick has picked up your talent of being a visionary as well. So that's fantastic.

Well, thanks. Yeah, yeah, he, he, yeah, he's really it's really fun to watch and see. And, you know, part of my role is just to help coach and teach and, you know, let him make. Make decisions.

Right.

And. And that's how you continue to gain, you know, success in those areas.

So 100. 100. So fantastic job. And speaking of visionaries, I know that you guys participated in a program that is specific about having a visionary within an organization, and then other people in the hierarchy, if you will, making sure you have the right people in the right seat, etc. Etc. So that's really been super helpful to your progress and success. Correct, Correct.

You know, I think I'd mentioned to you at some point, you know, it didn't seem like there was a blueprint for this for our business. It seemed like every agency that I know does it differently. Right, right. Everybody had their own way. And then we found EOs, and. And it's like anything in life, once you start looking for things, then you find a lot more. So I got really involved with Michael David Friedman in. In his culture program, and they had someone from EOS come and present at one of the culture summons. And I'm like, that's it right there. So brought it back to the team. And like most of us that are entrepreneurs are like, oh, I'm going to read the book and I can do this myself. We can do this ourselves. So. Well, we tried that for about six months. We said, this is. This is ridiculous. We're either gonna take a lot more time or spend some money. And I said, I don't have as much time as I used to, so let's spend the money. Let's get a coach and an implementer. And we did. And it's been the absolute best thing that we've done. We've been running on EOs for over four years, probably five in that range, so. Super helpful.

Yeah, yeah, we. We too. Same kind of path. Four or five years, implementer in place. Phenomenal. And it keeps everybody on the same page rowing in the same direction, right?

It does, yeah. That's the key. Yeah.

Yep. And. And the other thing that I've learned, I went through a leadership course last year. I facilitated a group and one of my key takeaways out of that program, in addition to the fact, and you'll identify this, and we haven't even talked about this, you know that we're operating within five generations of people right now, right, Patrick? I mean, think back to the silent generation, the baby boomers, etc. Etc. And I was talking with a very. Another high achieving entrepreneur recently. And they said, mike, it's probably six or maybe beyond that. And I say, I don't disagree with that. But why is everybody not able to effectively communicate and get along and you know, this and that. Because we're operating within five to six generations of people. How crazy is that? Right? And different beliefs, different ways of communicating, etc. Etc. Etc. So it's, it's in a very challenging time, but it's a huge time of opportunity. But the other thing that I learned from that program, the law of familiarity. And it hit me like a ton of bricks when I lose it. Learned it. Excuse me, When I learned it. Because I mean, Pat, we'll take Patrick as the example, right? I mean, he grew up under, you know, Pam and Patrick learning, et cetera, et cetera. But unfortunately, after a period of time when he got to be what, seven, eight, nine years old is like, okay, dad, whatever. And he wasn't truly listening because it's the human aspect. But when somebody else from the outside comes in, like aunt, uncle, grandma or grandpa, it's like, wow, that's awesome. And you're thinking, I've been telling you that for the last year.

Right?

But it's the same thing with having somebody from the outside come in, like your implementer, Right, Exactly. Or somebody influencing the culture like had happened to you. And that's really what I want to dive into now, Patrick, so thank you for sharing. Oh, by the way, I also want to publicly praise and recognize you and your organization and the president. I'll see if I can get my regards to him as well. But you have been recognized. Is this your first time or is it a repeat? Your first time?

First time. Yeah.

Yeah. So recognized nationally as a. Am Best Agency.

Big eye.

Big Eye. Big Eye. Forgive me. As a. Go ahead. Yeah.

Reagan Best Practices Agency.

Best Practices Agency. That's what I meant.

Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, it's something that we hadn't really even focused on or, or even had ever even applied for, you know, giving them the information. And we just thought, well, this is the year, let's do this. Why not? You know, this is, you know, we get, you put your head down, sometimes you just work hard and things happen and we need to come up and say, well, wait a minute, what, what does this make sense for us to do? And we did it. And it's really, really rewarding. And we were sharing that out yesterday with our team at the State of the Company. Our quarterly State of the Company. That. That's just one of the things that's, that's a real success for our agency. And, and it just, it just means that it's not just obviously us, it's the whole team that's contributing to our success. And we just want them to know that and share that with them. And so, yeah, that was, that was pretty rewarding. Really, really was.

Well.

Agree, however, it was earned. And you guys have done the necessary work to reach that plateau because I, I, I'm very familiar with the best practices agency program. Forgive my miss earlier, but. And people that you and I know well, that we've known for a long, long time, have also reached that plateau. Only about, roughly 200 or so agencies out of all the agencies in America are recognized as a best practices agency. So it's an elite group, the elite of the elite. And to your commendation, your agency that you have built, now, Patrick is building has that recognition. So congratulations.

Thank you.

Not too many can earn the right to say, we are a best practices agency. So congratulations. Super, super proud of you guys. Great job. Now that's why you should listen to every word that Patrick's going to share about culture over the next few minutes that we have together on this subject. And that's what I wanted to pull out of Patrick's incredible mind. Business mind, visionary mind. Okay, so Patrick, before they launched into eos, they were working on their culture, right? Because we all know that culture eats strategy and everything else for breakfast. And you have other thoughts on that. So dive in. Why did you, what started you thinking about culture and making sure that you had your finger on the pulse of your culture?

Great, great question. And I think it really has to do with, you know, everybody rowing in the same direction. It's just a lot of good people that we were missing something. And this all came about with some, we were looking to, we hired a recruiter search firm to find a producer. And he said, well, before I do that, I want to get to know your company, I want to know your culture. And he asked a question that stuck with me. He said, what are the values that you live out every single day in your agency? And I was like, oh, Those are the 10 things we have listed on our wall. And wait a minute, we're living them out every single day. So that really struck me as we need, we, we've got some work to do. So that began, that really began my, my culture journey and reached out to this, this guy some more, and he shared a book with me called the Three Impossible Promises, and it was all about this woman from Ohio. Actually, in Cincinnati that transformed the way gymnastics was taught in the United States, which is crazy. But anyway, that's her whole book, and it was fabulous. So I got really, really intrigued and then began that journey and through another organization I'm a part of, got introduced to David Friedman. And he had written a book called Fundamentally Different. And it's really. It's really based on the Ritz Carlton approach to really the. They called their basic. So everything revolves around. First step is to define. Define the behaviors that drive success. It's all based on behaviors. Values mean things to so many.

Mean different things to each of us. It's really hard to define a value because my value in Akron, Wadsworth, Ohio, is completely different than a value for somebody living in California or living in an inner city. So whole approach is defining behaviors that drive success. So we spent a lot of time coming up with our fundamentals. Fundamentals, because they're fundamental to success. So we have 30, believe it or not, 30 fundamentals that are part of what we call now the o' Neill way. Like, and so once you define them, you got to be really clear on what are those behaviors that drive success. Then you have. Then you really have to find ways to ritualize those behaviors. How do we practice them, how do we do them over and over and over with enough repetition that they just become part of who we are. And so that's what we've been doing now for the past.

Many seven or more years. Really practicing our fundamentals.

That is phenomenal. So I heard you say that you went through.

Identifying the behaviors that drive success, working on the values. Give us an idea. How long did you invest working on that as an organization? Week, month, probably over a couple of months. Okay.

Yeah.

So it's not an overnight thing.

It. It's not.

Yeah.

We worked with a consultant that helped us really define those behaviors.

Awesome. So it took about from the time we had our first meetings and it was really myself and Jody and Pat and. Oh, no, it's before Pat. It was.

Pat. No, Pat was here. Yeah, and. And Tom and other, you know, we. We spent a lot of time as leadership really defining the behaviors and that we decided we're going to be the culture we want. So it's really a top down thing. These are the behaviors that we want to see that will drive success.

So that's a great point. Let's talk about that for just a minute. So the leadership team, if you will, are the ones that started, you know, creating the values that you're going to live out every Day defining the behaviors that drive success. But it was the leadership team that were putting those together, right?

Yes.

And so talk about how you transitioned what you learned and put together for the future of the organization and caused that to trickle down to the team. How did you get them to buy in and how did that develop out through your entire organization? And I know that was a big multiple question. Mouthful.

Yeah, right, right. So I think, I really believe that people want to be led, you know, that people want. They want to have good leadership and they want to know that there's. There's space at the top and that they're going somewhere and that we stand for something. So we just. That's really part of it is for us to define the culture that we want. And then you attract people to be a part of that. And you really hope that the people that are already in your organization are the ones that are going to stay, that are attracted to that. But it became very clear that this was not something that was going to go away. I think people can relate to the fact that we go to a seminar or we go to something, we hear all this stuff, we're like, this is great stuff. Let's go implement it. Then it dies out.

Why do you think that happens?

Because I think we get busy, we hear a great idea, we're all, you know, as, as leaders, we, we hear things, we're like, that'd be great. And then we don't. We. We get busy and they just kind of fall away. That's it. So the key to this is, is the ritual. Ritualizing it, making it real. Every day, every week, 52 weeks out of the year, you know, all the time. So we can talk about that in a little bit. But so the buy in comes from, you know, we had a whole rollout. We defined these. We came up with our. We call the O' Neill way with the 30 fundamentals. And then we rolled it out. We took the team off site and we, we had a lunch and a meeting and we shared all the fundamentals and we did a few games to help people kind of connect with those. And then we just started in week, week one. One of the rituals that I did was write what that fundamental means to me. So on Monday I wrote, if you took fundamental number one, which is do what's in the best interest of our clients. And I wrote about that.

Right.

And then each week we would talk about it. We start every meeting with the fundamental of the week, and we start client meetings, prospect meetings. We actually picked up some clients they were like, what is this? And so you get to tell them what we're doing and how we're building culture. So.

Wow. So where were you putting this out when you wrote about it?

Was your blog or in an email? Yeah. Okay. Internal. Internal email just to the team. Yeah.

Wow.

And then we. We had each of the leaders do that, and then we had team members do it, and now it's evolved into something different from. From that. From that time.

And I love that idea. So let me make sure that I repeat that. So everybody was paying who may or may not been paying attention. Heard what Patrick just said. It's an absolute gold nugget. And by the way, Patrick, these are gold nuggets that we have when somebody drops a gold nugget. Here's your virtual award of a gold nugget.

Thank you. I'll look for it in the mail.

It's coming your way. But anyway, we. With that being said, Patrick wrote about each of the. Correct me if I'm wrong. Core values or behaviors.

Fundamentals.

Fundamentals. Thank you. All right, so that's another one for my takeaway notes. Fundamentals. So Patrick wrote about one of the fundamentals, and you sent it out to the team based on what you felt that fundamental meant to the organization.

Correct. Okay. Yep.

Yep. And so you would continually send that out to the team. I'll suggest one of the teammates got a hold of it and said, this is awesome stuff, and shared it with a client or was telling or a prospect about it or something.

Well, I'm sure that's what that. That's happened. But intentionally, we start every meeting within a, you know, a client meeting, prospect meeting with an agenda. And number one on the agenda is fundamental of the week.

Awesome. Fundamental of the week.

Fundamental. Our fundamental of the week. We have 30 of them, and we do one a week. And we've been doing this now for, like I said, seven years. And so once you get to the end of the 30, you start all over again. We've been doing it over and over and over, and we have not changed. There they last. I mean, they. Even with all the changes in business, just this week, I was the fundamental of the week. This week is let the appearance. Make our appearance a reflection of our quality. Quality. And then there's a little, you know, paragraph about that.

Right.

Everything. You know, that's. That. That used to mean something different back in the day when clients would come to our office, we'd visit clients. Well, now we show up on zoom. Right. Well, what does our office look like, what do we look like? I mean, these are all important things. So they kind of change. They can change with the time. So thought, well, that's still a very good, good fundamental. So we go through these one a week for 30 weeks and start all over and disc. Right. Repetition, repetition. As I was. I think I mentioned that earlier how important that is.

100%. That is amazing. And we were talking about before we started, seven to welch. Right. So.

Right.

People need to hear things at least seven times, if not until they want to give it up, so.

Well, exactly. And that's the idea. This. This goes until I retire. And then hopefully it'll be a legacy that will continue, and it should. But that's. It has some permanence to it.

So there is so much that can be built off of just that one practice. That is phenomenal. I hope everybody picked that up. Thank you for sharing. So you talked a little bit about the repetition. This is happening on a weekly basis. You take a fundamental and you talk about a different fundamental every week, Right?

Correct.

So why do you think this is important to anybody on the o' Neal team? And maybe bigger than that, why is it important to who the o' Neill Insurance Agency is?

Great question. Because I think they. They, first of all, they define who we are. We have this, I always say, you know, we have like, it's like the. The railroad, the track going down. We know where we're going. And if we get off track, we can look at our fundamentals and say, wow, this is why we got off track. We weren't. One of them is be positive. And we weren't really positive. We're kind of. So let's get back on track. So it really gives us that. That path to go on. It gives us a common language. It really. And it impacts us not just in our business, but. But our personal lives. That's the thing that I've heard, you know, a lot from the team over the years, is how it impacts them personally as well as professionally.

So you're leaving legacies within the households of your team members because of this culture work that you've done and the fundamental foundation of behavior that you've set within your organization.

Yeah.

And then go ahead, please.

Just let me just one thing on that.

Yeah, yeah, go ahead.

Thing I love about the fact that they're. They're behaviors. And you can see behaviors. Right. You can't really see value so much. They come up with behaviors you can observe, you can coach, and you can teach around those. And that's how We've used it to help really coach and teach our team and, and all. And us too, as leaders, you know, we have to live this. That's one of the foundations of, of culture by design is to lead by example. And.

That'S really challenging because people are watching all the time. But, but it's, it's, you know, when you do it with people's best interests at, at heart, they know we're human and we're going to screw up and, but team has embraced it and it's been a just, you know, a way for us to continue to strengthen our culture every day, every week.

So.

I'm not going to ask you to go into great detail, but this is a question that may be going through the minds of our listeners and, or viewing audience and of myself. So let's say because my good friend Fred Kramer taught me about a year ago, things are good, never perfect. Right?

Yeah.

Let's say one of our team members falls off track, as you mentioned, and continually falls off track and they've been reminded, AKA warning, this is not acceptable.

Do you, is this your basis for not only hiring, but termination? Maybe.

Yeah. I mean, it's so critical. It's a great question because. And I want you to find your behaviors once you ritualize them. We talked about fundamental of the week, talking about starting meetings. Those are all the rituals we, we brought into it is to really select the right people for your team. And it's always culture first. Culture first. Now if someone has the experience that is absolutely. That we're looking for, that's critical, but it's also culture.

Right.

So select and then. Yes, absolutely. You, the term that's used, you get the culture you. That you tolerate. The, your cultures are the behaviors that you tolerate the most. So if we continue to tolerate those behaviors, the other team, the other team members can see it. Oh yeah.

Oh.

We coach, we teach, we encourage. We're not quick to fire, we're quicker. It's all circumstantial. But yeah, I mean it's. If you're not a good culture fit, you're just, you're going to self, self select out, actually. Right. We've seen that happen. So.

But by setting this path that you've set and this is just what, you know that little natural buzz you get when something awesome happens. I've got that going on right now because of what you're sharing. Thank you, Patrick.

You're welcome.

So because this platform that you've set of continued repetition of your fundamentals and behaviors and all That I have found in my journey of 35 years in this industry, this awesome industry, that. And you talked about impacting people's lives personally and professionally. I have found, when I dig into it, that a lot of times people have things going on personally that we don't know about. Right. And so now you have set the platform to be able to have those conversations because you're consistently sharing the behaviors and the fundamentals and the values and everything that you feel are important, and you're able to enter into that conversation maybe a little more easily. Right?

Yeah. I mean, and help. And help them personally on maybe some of the most critical decisions of their lives.

Yeah, I. I wouldn't say maybe other team members get into that a little bit more, but, you know, because the foundation of all this has to be trust.

Right.

And. And that's exactly. The people know that. That. That we can be trusted and.

We can be vulnerable. That's key. And so it's. It is rewarding. And then people do open up and they'll talk to other people and get. And get the help. But we. I. I can't brag about our team enough, Mike. It's really. We got a phenomenal group of people. They really are engaged. We. We. It's just. It's so awesome to see them do things that. That as an owner, it's like, I don't have to do that because we got awesome team members that are doing these things, so it's really cool.

Speaking of that, how many team members do you have, roughly?

We have 20.

Huh.

We're international now. We just hired our first Filipino.

Okay, fair enough.

Yeah. You know, one of.

Yeah, yeah. Awesome. Congratulations.

That's new to us. And we've got people now that are remote. Remote employees in other states that we never had before the pandemic. And it opened up an opportunity for us to attract some people.

And so that's. That's been awesome to have how we run our business on eos and have our culture to. To integrate somebody into that. That's remote and more challenging, but it's very, very doable because you'll love this word. We've. We've really institutionalized our culture. We made it a process. Culture can become a process, like a sales process, like a finance. Finance process. You know, we have all these plans, but you can also make culture that way. And that's what we've done. That's what I've learned from, you know, the genius behind all this.

Yeah. By the way, your title is, among other things, CEO Chief Culture Officer. Chief Culture Officer.

That's my most coveted title. I love it. Yeah, so I love that, too.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So two things that you just said prompted another thought. I'm reading a book again because I got so much out of it the first three times. Going back through it again, and they talk about in that book, invisible Architecture.

Which, you know, what you were just talking about, kind of lend to that thought. I mean, it's something that's that fog around your agency in a positive way that's good. Which is your culture. Right. And what you don't confront, you condone.

Right.

Back to something you said a couple minutes ago, so.

Absolutely. Yeah.

By the way, do you have your off sites out at Seneca Lake?

We. We. We did just this past week, as a matter of fact.

Yeah. So that. That's a place that we invested time together, grew together, learned together, and we met a fella out there at Seneca Lake one time called Sven.

Great times.

Yeah, it was. It was great times. Get our families together.

Yeah. As we wrap it up, Patrick. I mean, phenomenal share. Let me just drop three things, and I want to let you, you know, anything you want to wrap up with to help everybody either listening or watching. We got three books on the table because people are constantly asking me, mike, what are you reading? What are you reading? What are you reading? Well, you mentioned Three Impossible Promises is the name of the book, right? Yep. And then fundamentally different, which is by David J. Friedman.

Right.

And then Culture by Design. Is that also David J. Friedman?

It is.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

So there's three opportunities for everybody to learn more about what you just learned from Patrick. The absolute gold nuggets that he's dropping Patrick as we begin to wrap it up today. Thank you for your time. Anything else to add?

You know, if people that are listening have questions on this, I'm happy to reach out to me. I'm happy to engage with them personally and ways that I could possibly help them. So just want your. Your audience to know that. So thank you. Happy to help share more because there's this. There's a lot more to this, as you know, and it can go a lot deeper, but it's. It's been transformative. And thank you. And, you know, knowing people like you, Mike, in my life just enriches my life. And I'm so happy that we reconnected just a couple of weeks ago after a short hiatus. But, yeah, thank you so much.

Yeah, you're welcome. And I. I noticed behind you in the visual, Patrick also recognized as the National Agency of the Month on the COVID of Rough Notes again, because of who they have become as an agency business. So congratulations to you, to your family, to your team. And I know you're just getting started back to day one, right?

Yeah, right.

Which is what we talked about this morning. I mean, we learned it from some guy who's had a little bit of success in his industry.

Exactly. Exactly.

So anyway, Patrick o'. Neill. Thank you, sir.

Michael, thank you. I really appreciate it.

My pleasure. Give our best to Pam and the family and we look forward to reconnecting again soon. And I heard what you just said, so I won't forget about that. So anyway, very generous. It doesn't surprise me at all. Patrick o', Neill, one of the best out there, personally and professionally. And if this is your first time joining us on the podcast, welcome. My name is Mike Stromsel. I'm widely recognized as a leading author, speaker and coach for the independent insurance agency industry. You can learn more about us @unstoppable profit producer.com if you're interested in attending one of our virtual or live events, you can find out more at. UPPFastStart.com is our virtual event or be unstoppable Boot Camp.com is our live event. Both trainings are designed to share with everybody some of our best money making strategies developed over 35 years of research in our industry as a proud independent insurance agent 100% of the time. Again, all designed to help you grow your business, create wealth and have more freedom so you can live life on your own terms. And please make sure to subscribe to our podcast. Just go to unstoppable profit podcast.com go up to the top hit. Subscribe so you don't miss one valuable episode learning from the likes of Mr. Patrick O'. Neal. Great takeaways. All right. You don't want to miss one episode. And we're out there on all the channels, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, now Amazon, and our YouTube channel, where you can see this visually as well. So again, Mr. Patrick O', Neil, thank you for joining us today.

Mike, thanks again. Really enjoyed it.

Yeah, me too. Hey, thank you everybody for joining us. And until our next episode, get out there, make a difference, be unstoppable and leave no regrets. And remember, a decision in action, that's all you need to do. Take action today. We'll see you again next time.

Can't get enough of the Unstoppable Profit podcast. Come join our next live three day boot camp in warm, beautiful San Diego invest in your ticket today at Bnstop. Unstoppablebootcamp.com that's be Unstoppable Boot Camp dot com.