Anyone Can Be Successful with Steven Pivnik

So I think I consider triathlons my midlife crisis. When I was turning 40, I realized that I had some bad genes in me. Between my parents and grandparents, they had it all— high blood pressure, diabetes, strokes, you name it. Those genes are going to be in here somewhere. So I just wanted to get as healthy as possible. Coincidentally, around that same timeframe, I found that— found out that somebody at work had just completed a sprint distance triathlon. And I was just blown away that a mere mortal can participate in this Olympic elite event. And I found out that yes, mere mortals can sign up for a race. There's plenty of websites available. You just, you know, you find a local race, you train a couple of months, you sign up and you race. So I did that shortly after my 40th birthday, and I just became hooked on, on the, on the sport and everything about it.

Steven Pivnik, welcome to the Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books Podcast. Before we get started, I just wanted to express my gratitude for you. What you've accomplished is so inspiring, and I can't think of a more fun way to spend the next 30 to 45 minutes to share a little bit about your story and give the listeners a glimpse into your book. You can see it here. And what makes Steven Pivnik great?

Thanks, Luke. Thanks for that introduction.

Yeah, super excited. So, tell us first about how you found triathlons.

So, I think I consider triathlons my midlife crisis. When I was turning 40, I realized that I had some bad genes in me. Between my parents and grandparents, they had it all: high blood pressure, diabetes, strokes, you name it. Those genes are going to be in here somewhere, so I just wanted to get as healthy as possible. Coincidentally, around that same time frame, I found that found out that somebody at work had just completed a sprint distance triathlon, and I was just blown away that a mere mortal can participate in this Olympic elite event. And I found out that yes, mere mortals can sign up for a race. There's plenty of websites available. You just you know you find a local race. You train a couple of months, you sign up and you race. So I did that shortly after my 40th birthday and I just became hooked on, on the, on the sport and everything about it.

What's crazy is you're saying mere mortals, but I look at you and I'm like, I don't think this guy is a mere mortal. So maybe like give our listeners a little bit of a glimpse into who you were before you started down this path of triathlons.

Yeah, from a sports perspective, my wife hates when I say this, but I consider myself a couch potato because I really never participated in any sort of sports growing up other than riding my bicycle around the neighborhood. I liked swimming, but I was never an endurance or long-distance swimmer. I splashed around in the waves on Brighton Beach in Brooklyn and occasionally in the pool. So I really did not have any endurance nor any sports-specific background. So other than skiing, I was a skier. So that was my one physical activity that I enjoy doing a lot of. So it doesn't take a lot to get into this sport as long as you're willing to put in the time.

Now, I haven't talked about this on the podcast yet. I've posted about it a couple of times on social media, but you've encouraged me indirectly by reading your book to sign up for my first sprint triathlon, which is coming up in June. And I just spent the weekend building my bicycle in the garage and testing it out because I decided to order one online and I didn't realize I'd have to spend so much time putting it together. But I'm happy that I did because now I understand how it works and why certain things are in certain places. But what I find more impressive about you is your business background. So let's talk a little bit about that as well. Who are you from a business perspective?

Yeah, sure. So I mean, my— I come from an immigrant family. I witnessed my parents and grandparents, you know, grinding it out from the second we landed in the United States. And I saw them, you know, work from sunrise to sunset, always putting food on the table, never taking sick days. That just wasn't a thing in my household. So I guess that's where I get some of my entrepreneurial genes from. And when I started my career in the computer field, you know, working for somebody else, you know, a couple of jobs, I started to realize that, you know what, I can probably do, you know, better for myself and for my family if I branched out on my own and started my own company in the same field, which is what I did.

And tell everybody when you were working for somebody else about a big problem, a big mistake you made, and how much it cost the company you were working for. 'Cause I always find that story fascinating.

Yeah, so back in the day, and we're talking like in the late '80s, early '90s, there wasn't as much— while, you know, computers were becoming a thing, there was no PC. There were mainframes back then. And the processes weren't as— there was a lot of manual processes to get things done, one of which was quality assurance and testing. If you were to write some code and if you wanted to move it into the production run, you would have to run it by multiple people in order for— you, Nick, would have to approve my code. And then after you approved it, Luke would need to approve it. And then and only then, Could it go into production and run this main billing program? And it was super easy to bypass that. So in an effort to try to do the right thing and make the program even better for my employer, I worked on something late at night and I snuck it into production and it ran. And without boring your audience to tears, it cost the company close to $10 million because of my error, because they had to restore from backups, which were expensive. Customer bills went out late. Millions of dollars of late fees weren't collected, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So me trying to do the right thing, but at the same time bypassing process and procedure ended up in a big oops for the company and for me.

So what is the underlying lesson there? Because as that story continues, your employer decides to keep you on. And I'm curious how that translated into your business leadership as your business started to grow as well.

Yeah, I mean, I was definitely fearful I was gonna get fired. I was not fired. I mean, I experienced the biggest example of grace ever. They saw, I mean, I was near tears. They saw how remorseful I was about the error that I made, both in the bug that I introduced into the code and B, not following process, which was worse than the first one. So, they saw how bad I felt, so they decided to keep me on. So, I guess I was doing other things right. And that taught me a humongous lesson. So, you know, further on, fast forward my own career and my own business, you know, 15, 20 years, there were some giant mistakes made. I mean, not to the tune of $10 million, but the tune of like really hurting our reputation in front of customers. And I exhibited the same, you know, example of grace that was shown to me by, you know, not firing the individual and making sure that there were some lessons learned. This wouldn't be repeated. And, and, and we moved on. So paying it forward, I guess.

Oh, I do. I love that story too. For someone listening, like, what are some maybe general tips around making mistakes? Like, a lot of people would make that mistake and just give up. Like, that would be it for them. What are some tips that you can give somebody that to maybe help them keep going once they do make a big mistake? Because it's inevitable.

Yeah, I think 100%, Luke. Look, mistakes are definitely inevitable. If you're not making mistakes, you're probably not trying hard enough. So I definitely made that first one that I just mentioned because I was trying really hard to do the right thing. So if you're trying really, really hard, you're going to make them. If and when they occur, or I should say when, not if, don't let them define you. Mistakes don't define you as long as you can learn from them, dust yourself off, recuperate, and continue moving forward. If you continuously make the same mistake, then that's shame on you. But, um, just don't let them define you. Move forward and turn that into a learning opportunity for both yourself and for others.

Such great advice that we could all use just a reminder of almost daily, because we do tend to make mistakes almost daily. I'm so curious, so you go on from, you know, you're doing some work in computers and all this stuff, and you go on to build this company that does hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue, which just Blows my small mind, to be honest. Did you set out to do that? Did you think that you were going to do that in your lifetime? Was that something that you expected or was it almost just like, oh, it happened to build into this thing?

Yeah, I mean, I wish I could say that, you know what, that was my master plan and I knew exactly how big this company was gonna get and how long it was gonna take to get there. Unfortunately, I did not. Being entrepreneurial, you know, I just wanted to do better for myself and for my family. By being in business for myself. That was kind of, you know, the immigrant dream, go into business for yourself. And then the harder, I love the saying, you know, the harder we worked, the luckier we became because we just created opportunities for ourselves and we continued to grow the business year over year over year to a point where it got into a, you know, substantial industry player doing, having over 200 employees across 12 countries. And doing north of $40 million per year in revenue, which translated into probably like $300 million-ish cumulative over its lifetime.

It's a big number, Mr. Pivnik. And Book Thinkers family, when I grow up, I aspire to be like him, both in terms of business and in terms of endurance sports. So, reading your book, there are these kind of 2 paths that you're going down simultaneously. You're continuing to build your business and you're participating in endurance sports. So, what are some of the similarities? How are they intertwined? What did endurance sports teach you about business and what did business teach you about endurance sports?

Yeah, I mean, I love talking about the similarities because there are just so many. Just to name a few, planning, preparation, execution, pivots, setbacks, stamina. Each one of those, I can talk for an hour about how that applies to endurance sports and the same in the business world. I love the saying, entrepreneurship is an endurance sport because it really is. And one of the things, another story I'd love to share, when I got really deep into my endurance hobbies, both from triathlon and then mountaineering and then ultramarathons, there was a lot of tracking that takes place when you do these things. The mileage, the pace, calories in, calories out, heart rate. Aerobic thresholds, so many, so much data. I was looking at these apps that I was using and I saw I had more reports about my personal performance than I had on my business performance. Not that we weren't doing anything, but there was definitely more on the personal side. So, I went report and KPI crazy at work. And we basically met with every single department head and came up with a better way to manage, monitor, and measure. things that they were doing, and it helped the business tremendously.

You know, that's fascinating because even though I've heard you say that before, it's hitting me in a different light right now, like as you're saying it. Because I mean, every single day, the first thing I do is I check my Oura sleep data when I wake up, right? And there's no business report that I'm receiving every morning about our agency BookThinkers, and there should be. So I'm going to ratify that. After meeting— after reading your book, I did meet with our bookkeeper and advisor, sort of like a fractional CFO. And we did put some monthly reports in place to map different KPIs. But wow, I need something daily. That's my takeaway.

If you don't mind, I'm gonna hold you accountable. I'm gonna check in with you on March 15th to make sure you have a morning dashboard you're looking at.

I love that. What, what are some— now, you know, my business is a little bit smaller than 200 employees and $40 million in annual revenue. But nonetheless, there are a lot of business owners just like me in the audience that maybe have a business with 10 people on staff. And maybe they're between the $500,000 and million a year mark like Book Thinkers is right now. So what are some KPIs that you would recommend I have in that dashboard?

Sure. I mean, cash is king. I love your shirt, king. Just put cash on top of there. Cash is always king. And it's amazing how a lot of entrepreneurs really don't have a complete handle on cash and especially cash forecasting. There's a lot of science to it, but there's also a little bit of an art, you know, based on accounts receivable and accounts payable. So, you know, cash and more importantly, you know, cash forecasting needs to be on there. Your sales pipeline and, you know, where deals stand from an opportunity perspective, you know, which ones are qualified, which ones are pending closure, which ones are you're at risk of losing, etc., etc. The next one would be, since all entrepreneurs, especially early-stage ones, want to grow their business, what does sales and business development activity look like? I deal with a lot of entrepreneurs that are hemming and hawing about the lack of pipeline. But guess what? Pipeline is a function of business development activity. Good old, you know, dialing for dollars or emailing for dollars or social media activity. Whatever have you. All those activities, I think, need to be tracked and monitored so that they're trending in the right direction. Calls per day, emails per day, contacts per month, social media outreaches per month, et cetera, et cetera. I think that's vital to see to make sure that that's all— that heart rate is active and the BPMs are increasing.

I'm not taking notes in the moment because I'm going to go back and watch this with Tyler. On our team and James on our team, because I think they both need to hear this from you. This past weekend, I was on a call with somebody on our team, and we were talking a little bit about your story where a sales associate wanted to give up and remove an opportunity from her pipeline, but you said no. And I'd love you to also tell that story. And then, Luke, I promise I'll, you know, hit the ball back over to you for the next question. But I'm just so curious, and I know the audience is going to love this.

Sure. I mean, we had— so we did a really good job of tracking our opportunities across multiple stages. And sales reps would continuously be measured and they would update management on their pipeline. And this one rep, she had a 7-figure multimillion-dollar deal in the pipeline for months, going on over like 9 months. And she came to me one day and she's like, Stephen, I'm taking this deal out of my pipeline because it's making my pipeline look significantly bigger than it really is. So my question was, did the customer ask you to stop contacting them? And she said, no. Then I'm like, you know what? Let's come up with a different contact strategy. And you and I are going to tag team this customer because I'm a firm believer that you don't stop contacting a prospect until they hit that unsubscribe button or they say, please get me off your pipeline. Get me off. Don't contact me anymore. So we did exactly that. We started tag teaming the opportunity. And long story short, it took another 3 months or so, but we closed that multimillion-dollar deal and she was about to remove it from her pipeline and stop contacting the customer.

Such a wonderful story because I think salespeople oftentimes assume a customer is not interested and that assumption has a lot of flaws in it. It's not based in reality at all. It's typically the case that the prospect is busy. They're putting out fires, they're running their own business. They have a lot of other things they're focusing on. And you just need that email or phone call or text or letter in the mail to arrive at the right place, the right time. And all of a sudden, boom, a multimillion-dollar deal. Just crazy. So perseverance, everybody. Just keep going. I'm sitting here today with Ken Rusk, who has done hundreds of millions of dollars in business. He's also sold tens of thousands of books and changed countless lives. We're sitting here today because he is sponsoring today's episode. So Ken, tell everybody about your course.

Well, thank you. I built I developed a course called The Path to a Successful Life. It's designed around trying to get somebody unstuck. You know, sometimes you're feeling like you're kind of stuck in where you are and you're not really sure what you want your life to look like or how to go about getting it. Well, for the cost of about dinner and a movie and maybe the time you'd spend on a weekend, you can know exactly what you want your future to look like and how to go about getting it.

You know the power of vision. That's why you watch podcasts like this. So click the link below, get signed up, and let me know what your experience is like.

Yeah, 100%. I mean, I do that all the time. If I get spam or solicitations, If I don't reply with, please take me off your list, that means there's some tiny little bit of interest in the back of my mind. Just now is not the time. So I respect a lot people that have been contacting me for like over 24, 36 months. I'm like, you know what? Your process is working because I haven't hit— I haven't said stop contacting me yet.

That's like, that is such powerful advice. Like somebody's going to listen to this and literally like just make tens of thousands of dollars because of that advice. I love that so much. I'm curious about your— and I don't know if we actually— we got the— we have the chance to do some content with you, which was really awesome, but I don't know if we actually talked a lot about the word passion. I'm curious what your take is on what passion is, if you should be passionate about your work, if you should be passionate about endurance sports. Like, what is your just overall take on what passion is and if When and if we should have it?

Yeah, I mean, I think passion is super important. I mean, it's very hard to succeed in anything that you're not really passionate about. And I mean, if I had to like pick a definition for passion, it's just something that's, you know, just near and dear and burning inside of you that you want to see happen. So when you're passionate about something, your mind will do— will help you make the right decisions to head towards that goal. And it goes to the topic of visualization, which I'm a huge fan of. So when you're passionate about something, it's going to make accomplishment of whatever that goal, whatever that something is, just that much easier or a lot easier.

Now, do you think passion is something that can be cultivated? Because when you started with triathlons, were you super passionate about it right away or I mean, because it wasn't a practice that was in your life. So did you cultivate that passion or did it like come about you like right away? Or how was that process for you?

When I crossed that finish line, it hit me like a ton of bricks. It was like, I love this feeling. I'm wearing a number, I'm competing, there's a crowd cheering, there's my family waiting, and I made it across the finish line in one piece. I'm like, I want to bottle this feeling and repeat it as often as I possibly can. And I have. So I got hooked. Some people are one and done, and there's nothing wrong with that. Nick, I hope you're not one and done, but if you are, congratulations. But I don't think you will be because I can't articulate enough how fantastic of a feeling of accomplishment crossing that finish line is.

Well, the same event is happening in June and in September, and I've I'm committing right now to do both of them. And then, you know, the first one, yes, some training for it. But I also, I even printed out this whole triathlete training guide for 12 weeks and everything that I'm starting to execute against because the planning piece is really important, just like you had mentioned. And then I'm really going to step it up and see how I can beat that same time, same course and everything like that. Here's my question. Have you ever been first And have you ever been last? And what are your thoughts on that?

I love that question. I have never been first and I have, I don't, no, I know I've never been last. So my motto, which is one of the chapters in the book, is not first, not last. And I think I attribute that philosophy to never being injured. You know, touch wood, I haven't been injured. I just, even though I push tremendously and some of these ultra events that I do, there's a lot of, you know, physical pushing that's necessary. I don't push myself to the point of— I've never pushed myself to the point of injury. So because I don't want to finish— if I really wanted to finish first, I would have to dedicate 40 hours a week to training, and I just can't do that. So I'm just happy crossing the finish line, not first, not last, because I love the journey as much as the destination. For me, the 3 to 6 to 9 months leading up to a race Training, staying in shape, you know, eating right, and being healthy is just as important as the actual event itself.

Yeah, I love that because it also highlights that you're in competition not with everyone else there, but with yourself.

100%.

Yeah. And so often, like, we get so caught up in what everyone else is doing and what they're accomplishing that we don't even start, which is crazy. So I love that. I love that mentality. You touched on visualization before, and I would love for you to share the story of you manifesting a sale. There's one specific one that I'm, that I'm thinking about, but maybe you can articulate a different one or the same one.

Yeah, I'll tell you how it started and I'll tell you how— well, not that it's ever, ever ended, but a big ending. When I was— we first started the business and I would go physically to sales calls because there was no Zoom, there was no Skype. It was face-to-face sales calls in the skyscrapers of Manhattan. I would literally, I would stop myself at the threshold of the door, look up at the skyscraper, close my eyes, and I would tell myself, next time I come into this building, this is going to be a customer of mine. So, even before manifestation and meditation was a big thing, it wasn't. Nobody really was talking about that in the late '80s, early '90s. I think I manifested, and that whole thing, I know I manifested sales for my company time after time after time. Fast forward to 2020, where I really started taking the sale of my business seriously, and I was on a path to get to the Ironman World Championship. I wrote myself out a check for a specific amount of money, and I printed out a poster of the Ironman World Championship, and I put 2 of them right here next to my computer so I can see them all day, every day. And that helped me manifest the actual outcome, which was selling the company for that specific amount of money and for crossing that finish line at the Ironman World Championship.

And it's so practical.

There's the medal right there. Yeah, there it is.

Yeah. Oh, I love that. So tell us about that. That story literally is like mind-blowing to me. The fact that you wanted to go to Kona. Kona is like the big Ironman challenge and there were so many obstacles in the way. Can you like maybe give us a rundown about how you went about getting there?

Yeah, the obstacles are huge. There's only 2 ways to get into Kona. You're either the fastest in your age group. So Ironman has about, let's say, 2 to 4 races every weekend someplace around the world. If you are the fastest in your age group, like the first 1 to sometimes 3 spots per race get a ticket to Kona. So it's a race of the best of the best in the world. There's also 100 spots allocated towards what they call their Legacy Lottery system. I call it their frequent flyer program. As long as you complete 12 full-distance events at any pace, not first, not last, doesn't matter, just completion, they let you enter this thing called the Legacy Lottery. And if you're picked, you get to toe the line with the best of the best in the world and be in the same race that they're in, televised on NBC Sports. And known worldwide. So that was my path because I'm not fast, not last, but I raced 12 full-distance Ironman until I got my lottery ticket to go to Kona.

12. It's like most people struggle with even the thought, the thought of just doing one. You went through 12 of them and that is just like the most incredible thing. I look at you with such admiration because I think that is So amazing, and it's also inspiring too because you know you've talked about it already. But like that, you had this idea of what a triathlete should be, which is this perfectly chiseled, amazing person. But somebody like you, and I'm not saying that you're in bad shape, don't don't take this wrong. But a normal person can in fact achieve great things, and that's why I love your story. Now I'm curious as to you know you've accomplished all these things. Why did you feel the need to write a book about it? Like, why did you want to write this book, Built to Finish?

Yes, great question. I mean, first, I wanted to memorialize my own journey, right? I wanted my grandkids— my kids already know this. I mean, they lived it with me, but I want my grandkids and their grandkids to know how crazy their grandfather was. So, I wanted to memorialize my own journey, but I really, really love just encouraging others and inspiring others to do great things. Just because I've proven that a college dropout and klutz and couch potato can sell a big business and go to Kona, others can do other similar big things in whatever space they're in and whatever really motivates and excites them. So, I'm hopeful and I'm asking for a ton of feedback. Everybody that gives me any sort of feedback about the book, I'm like, please tell me which new goal you set for yourself because of this book. So Nick, love the fact that you're doing a triathlon. I hope that there's dozens, if not hundreds of others that are doing cool things as a result of reading this.

Yeah, you've got me looking at a morning dashboard and signing up for endurance events. That's called implementation, people. Implement what you read. Will you participate in Kona again? And maybe what's the context there? How many people are entering into this legacy lottery every year? And do you only get to enter it once? Like, how does all that work?

If you are fast, there's no limits to how many times you can do Kona. So you basically earn your right because you're one of the fastest triathletes in the world. To go via this legacy lottery route, that's only once in a lifetime. So if I do want to get back to Kona, I'd have to get to the top of my age group. So as long as I keep doing this, when I hit that 60 to 65 age group, that's when it thins out a little bit and I'll have a better chance to be one top 3. At that point.

Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing. When signing up for my, my sprint triathlon, I selected the first timers group. So I'll be competing against them because I figured if I clicked my age group, then I'd definitely lose in a big way. But since I'm, since I ticked the first timer, I'm like, okay, now I can be a little bit more competitive. I think.

There you go.

You're already thinking, how am I going to place?

And now what's next for you? So you exited your business 4 times. Let's tell everybody what that actually means. I didn't know that was possible. And now what are you currently focused on?

Yeah, that's a really long conversation, but I'll just highlight it. And there's multiple forms of exit, right? So I did 2 really large licensing deals with industry giants like IBM and Microsoft. At the time, those licensing deals probably would've spelled the end of the company. It could have spelled the end of the company because they were so large in nature, but it didn't. We persevered and figured out a way to pivot and keep going as a business entity. One time it was an asset sale. So the acquiring company didn't want to buy all of my company. They just wanted a specific division, in this case, our consulting services division. So there was a really large asset sale. Leaving behind a small software company at that time, which almost went out of business, but it didn't. And then lastly, it was an all-out acquisition by our number one competitor called Quest Software. So I call that four exits because A they were large, B the company should have for all intents and purposes been out of business afterwards, and it was not. So there there were four exits. And to answer the second part of your question, I really benefited tremendously from advisors along my entire journey. Specifically at the last 5 to 7 years. And I'm, I'm really, really enjoying just giving back to the entrepreneurial community and helping other entrepreneurs just the way I had advisors help me get the company prepared for, ready, and ready for then execute the actual exit.

That is, that's amazing. I'm curious, what feeling was better, selling your company or finishing Kona?

Oh wow, that's a great question. I think Kona. Kona was just, you know, something maybe because even though it was 12 years, 12 years is still half of how long it took me to grow and sell a binary tree. So the actual, the genesis of the plan was more recent in my mind and it was super, super specific. I set out, I learned about this thing called Kona and I set out to do it and I did it. The company journey, you know, took so many different twists and turns and there was no telling, you know, how it was going to end up. It ended up great, but it was like one of these, you know, squiggly lines to the top as we see everywhere. Kona was, I know exactly where I want to be and I'm going to get there.

So with this next phase of your business journey, helping other founders exit their businesses, Who's the ideal customer for you? How, like, what metrics do you use to quantify them or to qualify them? And how do they get in touch? Because you never know, one of them could be in this audience.

Yeah, I mean, I would love to hear from audience members. I mean, my ideal customer company is doing anywhere from $10 million to $50 million in annual revenue, ideally in the IT space, because that's where my technical background is. But I have found in working with entrepreneurs, that many of the issues they face just range across all industries. So while my— I can go deep on the technical side, if it's a manufacturing company, if it's a healthcare company, if it's some other sort of professional services company, I'm 95% sure I can help there as well. So $10 to $50 million in annual revenue, and hopefully with a desire to exit sometime in the future. That could be 2 years away, it could be 4 years away, But there's got to be a desire to want to exit is my ideal customer.

Now, with that said, do you think there's anything special about you? Like, can anybody— do you think anybody can get to that point? Or is there something that makes you different from other people?

Wow. Well, let me answer Nick's other question. You can get in touch with me at stevenpivnik.com. That's the best way to get in touch with me. stevenpivnik.com has all my social handles including LinkedIn. So happy, hope to talk with some of you listening or watching. Luke, is there anything special? I mean, there's a lot of people that do a lot of really cool things. I mean, if you look around the triathlon community, it happens to be chock-full of entrepreneurs. There's just a lot of Type A personalities like myself that like to set big audacious goals and go after them.

Yeah.

Of course I'm different than the rest because I'm Steven Pivnik. But there's folks out there that just like to do big, cool things.

And you're certainly one of them. Tell you what, that's so cool. And by the way, we'll make sure we link that stuff all in the show notes for anybody listening to your website and all that fun stuff. I love that answer though, because I think it just speaks to the fact that it's like, Yeah, it's not necessarily like special, but anybody can have a big audacious goal and anybody can go after that. And I think we can get caught up and stuck in the fact that it's like, oh, but I'm, you know, I don't have this, I don't have that. But like you, your whole message is that anybody can do it. And I love that. Nick, we're kind of getting up to 30 minutes now. I don't know if you have any other questions. I have a couple more I can ask, but if you wanted to— To do some of your last ones.

Yeah, sure. Let me ask my last question. And I already know some of the answers here. But Stephen, what was the best book you read last year? And you can't include your own book. And you also can't include Rise of the Reader because I know you love that book, but I want to hear another title. What's something that the audience might not have heard of? What are some of your favorite books?

I love The One Thing. That's one of my favorite books. And it's one of the books, one of the few books that I reread And the premise of The One Thing is, what is the one thing that you can do so that by doing it, everything else becomes a lot easier or unnecessary? So, my favorite example is if somebody, if a customer's complaining to me about sales and the sales strategy is wrong, the people are executing incorrectly, there's not enough pipeline, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I'm like, has your sales leader ever worked in an organization of this size?

Yeah.

And if the answer is no, he or she has been with me since day one and he's learning as we go, just like all of us are. I'm like, well, that's your one thing. Get a sales leader that's worked at an organization double this size, and then I guarantee you're safe, that your problems will go away. So that's just, you know, one example of the one thing being implemented.

Yeah, I love that book. And we've interviewed Jay Papasan, who's a co-author on that book, on this podcast. And we'll have to forward this clip over to him afterwards. I also really love that book. And I'm really focused as a business owner right now on that one thing, which for me is removing myself as a bottleneck in each area of the business so that I can work on it instead of in it. And that happens by hiring coaches. And you just highlighted how coaches and advisors have been so important in endurance sports, but also in business for you, especially towards the end when you wanted to sell, like, It's your first time selling a business, you don't want to go at it alone. You want to hire somebody like you who has gone through the process multiple times before at a bigger level. And then all of a sudden, it becomes a little bit easier for you. So just, just a really cool reiteration of that lesson.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I mean, and a lot of people, and I was at first a little bit, people just penny-wise, pound-foolish. They're like, why should I pay an advisor? I'm going to get— I just— that's just going to increase my expenses for this exit. If the advisor isn't going to pay for himself or herself by their— with their services in terms of like an increased enterprise value, then don't get them. Most advisors will guarantee, myself included, that I will be free at the end of the day because of the increase in enterprise value that I'll get you.

Yeah. And if Michael Jordan and Tom Brady have a whole host of coaches and advisors, then I think we should too.

100%.

I always love that take too. It's like Michael Jordan, those guys, like they're just next level and they still have a bunch of coaches and advisors. So yeah, why not you? Absolutely. All right, Stephen, I will end it with this. We already got your information of where to find you, so I'll make sure again to link that in the show notes. But I love to ask our guests this question, and that is this: if all the things that you put out, the courses, books, social media content, everything, you put out disappears, but you can leave the world with a single piece of advice, what would it be?

Don't be afraid to dream big and go for it. And that's it.

Beautiful. Beautiful said. Yeah. Mic drop. Mic drop. Don't be afraid to dream big. Steven, this has been amazing. Thank you for your time today. I've enjoyed getting to know you. Like I said, you're a total inspiration. for myself and Nick. And I'm not running a triathlon yet, but it's definitely something that I am thinking about doing. And I'm like, okay, maybe if I start training this year, which I've started to run a little bit more. So I'm excited. Who knows, next year could be the year.

I love it. Keep, keep us posted.

I will. All right. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Nick. Thank you, Luke.