Episode 288: Preparation is Separation

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 Stromso.

The year was 1998. January 1st of that year, I started my agency from scratch. About six months in, I was at the office before dawn.

Can any of you relate to that? There was a knock at the locked door. It was my bride. She had driven 20 miles before dawn to the office.

For those of you who know my bride, Cindy, she is not a morning person. The night before was not the best night of our marriage.

Words, tears.

Mostly because I wasn't present.

Physically or emotionally. Because I was so wrapped up in the business.

Cindy pleaded with me, let's figure this out together.

But something has to change.

I asked her to trust me.

More tears this time, some tears of gratitude and love.

Because we came together at that time.

And agreed to begin figuring it out.

In 1999, I went to an insurance conference. The speakers at that conference had it all figured out.

I thought, why should I recreate the wheel? I'm just going to become a massive implementer. And so back at the office, I took action, implementing their recruiting and hiring strategies, their processes and systems, and the marketing. Omg, the marketing. It's like somebody gave me a key to the Met and I was able to print money. The business took off like a rocket ship.

It was years after this life changing moment, which included showing up for all of my coaching and all of my mastermind sessions consistently that led to the massive growth and more importantly than that, the personal development.

It was during this time that I learned that preparation is truly separation.

You know, I bring this podcast to you, I bring content to you. And everything that we do at UPP is for one reason.

We want to help you reach your ceiling. Because I learned from the great Les Brown years ago, you all have greatness within you, he said.

And we want to coach you. And I want to coach you to achieve it. We want to help you reach your full potential.

Because when you get to this level.

It all comes down to the play of the leader. And through my own personal development, through my own growing the agency business.

It hit me like a ton of bricks one day. It comes down to the play of the leader.

And I've observed this across the industry. Across North America, there's a lot of people who play leader.

But there's not a lot of leaders.

So let me ask you, I ask you to consider this.

What is the lifetime value of your current leadership play?

What is it? I encourage you to think about that. And if you need to improve it, awesome.

The present is a gift. Open that gift and take action. There are lots of resources out there, including many resources that we have and others that I'm close to. So just let us know. We're here to help you in every way possible.

When you truly consider.

What I'm going to say next.

And your future legacy.

And really what's going to move the needle.

Because that's what myself.

Our UP team, and everybody in our UPP community.

Wants to help you build. You see, if you want to win.

If you want to win a championship, in business and in life.

Every play matters.

But here's the reality, and I'm going to share the truth like I always do.

It's your responsibility.

For each and every one of you. You are responsible. You are responsible for you. You're responsible for your family. You're responsible for your extended family, for hundreds of people on your agency team. And when this hit me like a ton of bricks the other day and I said, I've got to share this with everybody out there, I was working with an agency that has 27 team members. And so you're responsible for every one of your team members and their families. So we're talking about you, your family, your extended family.

All of your team members and their families, which could be hundreds of people or in some cases, thousands of people. And then I had the thought, well, how many clients.

Do agencies that I know have?

Thousands. And their families.

And you know what your care of all of these people comes down to?

It comes down to your preparation.

And your decision making.

Think about that for a minute.

The level in which you're leading all of these people, hundreds or thousands of people, comes down to your preparation and your decision making.

Every decision that you make, every action that you take will result. And the level that you live up to in this responsibility.

It all comes down to you. It's your responsibility.

And the level to which you prepare.

Will dictate how you lead these people.

And those who honor the level of preparation that it takes.

Whoever honors this vital, huge responsibility.

Will be the leader that people follow most.

You see, everybody that you influence, you touch, you communicate with, that you lead all of these people. They need to see this in you clearly. They need to see your level of preparation.

People are silently waiting to be led.

My great encouragement, lead them. People need your help. Help them see it in you clearly.

So my challenge for you today is how are you preparing? How are you preparing every single day to lead these hundreds or thousands of people? Or are you at all?

And when do you Prepare?

Back to 1999, when I learned how vitally important this preparation is.

And then I started taking steps on how to better prepare. And I'm here to tell you, it took me a while to get into the groove because at that point I still was making some bad decisions. But I didn't give up. And like my friend Rudy Reitiger says, never giving up lasts for the rest of your life. So don't give up if those days come. Just stick to your routine. And that word right there, that is the key. Your preparation routine you should.

Figure out, design, create a routine that works for you. Back in the day in 1998, we had kids at home. And prior to that I was a single dad with three kids. Could I have done the routine back then that I do today? No. So find the routine that works for you. If you have a dual occupation, career, household, it's going to be different. If you have two working spouses and kids and a lot of things going on, it's going to look different. But you got to find that routine that prepares your mindset because your mindset is your skill set. That's the first preparation priority, is your mindset. You've got to prepare your mind and your heart every single day. For me, it starts the night before. I prepare myself at least 30 minutes before I go to bed for the next day. I have a number of things that I do, including writing down my three games for the day. I intentionally write down how I'm going to win the next day. The night before, I write down how I'm going to win. I intentionally document that I have some reading that I do out loud. I read it out loud and then I review and update my planning, my plan sheet the night before. And I do a quick review of my Sunday planning that I did the Sunday before. And I check off my weekly rhythm register because I get to show up with my accountability partner every Friday at 6am Pacific to be accountable to what I said I was going to to do. And is it perfect? Heck no. But it happens. And so my preparation starts the night before. I have my planning, my plan sheet when I get up the next day and I get to the point where I'm ready to get something done it's already documented. I already know what I'm going to get done and what the priority is for that particular day. So when I get up in the morning, I stick to the routine that I've designed that works for me. And I'm not suggesting that mine is better or anything else like that than anybody else's. It's my routine. And my encouragement is design your own routine that works for you. Because you've got to prepare yourself, your mindset. It's something that I've been teaching for years, is the airline flight attendant analogy. When you get on an airplane and they talk to you about safety protocol, who do they tell you to prepare first? You. They teach you to put on your safety vest, get your own oxygen started first. Why? Because you can't help anybody else on that plane in the event of an emergency unless you are prepared first. So when I get up in the morning, I make sure that I prepare myself first. Now, mine's a little extreme, it's an hour and a half at least, but it's the routine that I'm in and it works for me and it prepares me. And there's some additional things that I do even after I get done with that and I get into it. So I get out of bed and I stretch. And I realized a couple of years ago, the stretching routines that I'm in, wait, I'm on my knees. So I go right into my own prayer time at that point. And then I get up and I get out the door into my exercise routine.

Depending on what time of day it is. And many times nowadays it's pre dawn. So I've got a 2.2 mile run walk around the block for me. And I got my headsets on, so I'm studying my audio during that time I get back to the house, I go into the house, I hit go on the coffee maker that I put together before I left. Actually right out of bed, I did that. And then I go to my stretching, I hit go on the coffee maker, and I get my shake together. I write my wife a note, and that note simply is a note of gratitude. I come up with one thing to say thank you about. I put it in her car because she's a night owl, she's not up yet, and so she sees that first thing. And so then I go back in, finish my shake, get my coffee, head upstairs, do my reading. My reading currently I'm reading three different items. And then I have a daily that I do that comes to me via video. And so at that point, I'm ready. I do a couple of other spot checks and then I get down to my priority list. And that's where I start, by the way. I'm not looking at an email, I'm not looking at my phone or anything else. I am working on the priority. Work on the first highest priority first. That's going to move the needle. That is pretty much what I do every single day. And as far as that early morning routine seven days a week for me, that's what works for me. I don't take any days off unless something extenuating happens. But generally I don't miss. I get to go to the airport in a couple of days. It's going to be a very early morning because I'm not going to miss. So that's the way it goes. That's what works for me. So the topic of this podcast, preparation, is separation. Preparation is separation. You are responsible for hundreds, if not thousands of people. And it starts with you. Learn to prepare yourself, your mindset, most importantly, because your mindset is your skill set. Then prepare yourself physically and emotionally to win the day. And you have to intentionally take the actions that are necessary to win the day. I hope this has helped you. And if you've got a routine that works for you, I would love to see some comments. And if you're watching this online on YouTube, I would love to see your comments in the comment section below. What works for you? And you can always email us at VIP.

Life.Com that's V I P@up life.com Shoot us a note. What works for you? What does your routine look like? How are you winning the day more often because of your routine? I would love to know and I would love to share it on a future podcast. It's something that is vitally needed out there. And remember this, people will only rise up. People that you influence.

That you're responsible for. They will only rise up to the level of your preparation. So vitally important. I hope this has helped you today. And if this is your first time on the podcast, welcome. My name is Mike Stromso. I'm widely recognized as a leading author, speaker and coach for the independent insurance agency industry. You can find out more about what we do@upplife.com if you're interested in attending any of our events, just go to upplife.com and you'll find out more. In addition to that, our goal is to help independent insurance agents everywhere grow their business, create wealth, and have more freedom so you can live life on your own terms. And if you'd like to jump on a session where we can talk about growing your agency like it's never grown before, shoot us a Note again@vippplife.com and put agency Growth Session in the subject line. We'll get back to you and get that set up so that we can talk about how we can help you grow your agency. Everything that we do is designed with some of our best money making strategies created over 36 years in our own independent insurance agency business. And please make sure if you haven't done this yet, go to our link unstoppable profit podcast.com go up to the top and click subscribe so you don't miss one valuable episode. And if you got great value out of this podcast, please share it with somebody else you know. Again, just send them to unstoppable profitpodcast.com and make sure you encourage them to also subscribe at the top so they don't miss one valuable episode. I hope this has helped you today. Thank you for joining us. And remember.

If you're a leader out there, you are responsible and your ability to lead people is based on the level of your preparation in leading them. So make sure that you are preparing yourself and consistently raising the level of preparation. It's so vitally important because people are silently waiting to be led. I will see you on the next episode. Until then.

Lead people. And remember, preparation is separation. I'll see you in the next episode.

Do you love the podcast but don't know where or how to get started? Visit www.upplife.com that's up.

To learn more about our coaching and Mastermind programs and how you can join our community of growth oriented agency owners today.