The Power of Purpose | Matt Hullander | 572

And welcome, welcome, welcome. This is Peter Winick. I'm the founder and CEO at Thought Leadership Leverage, and you are joining us on the podcast, which is Leveraging Thought Leadership. Today, my guest is Matt Hollander, who has a really interesting background. He's an entrepreneur from Chattanooga, Tennessee. He's got business interests in Tennessee, Florida, Alabama, Ohio, and Arizona. Broad range of businesses, real estate development, e-commerce, private equity. He is a partner with a real estate development company. He's got a whole bunch of other companies, and he's written a book fairly recently that we're going to touch on, which is The Daily Climb: 10 Principles to Change Your Life. He's kind of a, what I would call an accidental thought leader, if you will, in that he'd probably describe himself, and I'll leave it to him to do that. More as a business person that happened to write a book than an author that became a business person. So welcome aboard today, Matt.

Well, thank you, Peter. I'm glad to be with you. You made me sound really important with that introduction. And you're right, I'm not an author. I just happened to write a book.

There you go. So you've got a lot going on on the business side. I'm going to guess that you didn't wake up one day and said, you know what, I've got a lot of time on my hands and I want to fill it with a project. Therefore, I'm going to write a book. So how did the— why and how did the book project come along?

So I had my own home improvement company, remodeling company. We were one of the largest in the Southeast and covered the whole right side of Tennessee, some of Kentucky, western North Carolina, Alabama, Georgia. And in 2021, I sold that business. And shortly thereafter, I had a cancer scare. I went into my primary care physician, and he asked me to see an oncologist because I had really low white blood count and neutrophil levels. And they tested me for every virus and genetic anomaly. They couldn't find anything, so they ordered a bone marrow biopsy and they said it would take 5 days to get the results. And those 5 days really changed my perspective and outlook on life. I won't draw out the conclusion. I, I was diagnosed with Felty syndrome, which is something I can live with. But the real diagnosis I got was that I wasn't living life on purpose. And I felt like at 50 years old, I had enough life experience that I wanted to put that in stories and help other people. And so I went on the journey of writing a book, and now I appreciate your help. I'm out promoting it. Uh, I'm donating all the proceeds to a foundation my wife and I are active in that helps raise awareness for teenage suicide prevention. So I'm not making money off the book, but I hope to get it in enough hands that it impacts them.

Got it. And what would you like that impact to be? Because I'd imagine those 5 days that you spent between getting tested and getting results were not fun and easy days on the golf course.

You know, I think in this one principle in the book, we talk a lot about mindset. And, you know, I'm a Christian and the Book of Luke says, to whom much is given, much is required. Required. And I started waking up every day with a new mindset of what's going to come to me today. And I, I go walking every morning. Uh, we live on a dead-end street. I try to do 5 miles, and, um, that gets my day started. And I realized with the right mindset, it's the principle of what goes around comes around. And, and then I challenge the one principle in the book. I challenged the last 100 years of self-help gurus and in a sense I say screw goals. And I started doing research on, on why we have goals and how they work and how often people achieve goals. And so I went to Google and it said that 8% of people keep a New Year's resolution for a month and 90% of those 8% keep it for the whole year. So I tried taking a new approach at that and say, have a vision. I'm big— when I had my business, I'm really big on vision, mission, and values. But vision and having the end in mind, and where do you, where do you want to get? And as an individual, what does that person look like? What habits do they have? And if I just take my— what I— it's the reason the book's called The Daily Climb— those steps to act and have the habits like that person would have, um, I think we can achieve more. I heard another podcast recently when I was walking this morning, and it described a The gentleman was a runner and he wanted to run a 6-minute mile, but he was currently at a 7-minute mile. Well, if he set a goal of running a 6-minute mile, it won't just happen. He still has to eat the right way and train the right way, get enough sleep. So I guess the big principle around the book is what goes around comes around. There's of course 10 principles in the book, and then, uh, have— having a new way of looking at goals.

So I love that. So the book is, is really an authentic expression of self that we don't often get to do in business. Right. So I would imagine when you had your contracting business or any of your businesses now, most of the customers or vendors or the employees that you deal with wouldn't know any of these things about you prior to the book unless maybe they have personal relationship, conversation, cocktail, lunch, that kind of thing. Is that fair?

Yeah. I tell a lot of stories in the book. I don't mean for the book to be all about me, but I do reference stories to help explain the principle in that chapter. But yeah, there's a few things in here that most people didn't know about me, but I wrote it for just the common person. I've been asked many times, who is your audience? And it's anyone. My, my, my daughter's friends are reading the book and my parents' friends are reading the book. So it's been well received and I really just wrote it to help make an impact, give people a different perspective. I consult with a lot of small businesses,, you know, and from my former industry, which was home services. And I'm often surprised that they don't have a vision and they don't know their numbers. And so I like knowing the score of the game. We talk about that too. Um, one of the principles is about having— one's called find a guide and one's called find a tribe. And having a guide, like I go fly fishing and I always try to get the same guide. He does a great job. He knows the time of year it is and the tide and the fish and what they're eating. And a business owner also needs that business coach. And as an individual, I even have a life coach I talk to once a month, and that would be a guide. A tribe, it would be more like a peer group. So when I had my home improvement company, I was in a National Association of Home Builders peer group for about 15 years, and I wouldn't have achieved the success I had or been able to sell my business like I did had I not had the relationship with the other guys in my peer group. I mean, I learned so much from them. And they—

if you're enjoying this episode of Leveraging Thought Leadership, please make sure to subscribe. If you'd like to help spread the word about our podcast, please leave a 5-star review at ratethispodcast.com/LTL. And share it with your friends. We're available on Apple Podcasts and on all major listening apps, as well as at thoughtleadershipleverage.com/podcast. I want to touch on something you and I talked about a week or two ago, getting, preparing for this recording today, which was sort of unexpected opportunities that have arisen as a result of the book. So you didn't write the book to say, oh, I'm gonna write this book because I want to grow this business 3% or find new clients. Clients or whatever. You wrote the book, it's more passion, it's more vision, it's more mission, which is great. But then you told me a story and we don't have to get in all the details of, you know, you, you're out there speaking and doing things for your other businesses and it gives you a strategic competitive advantage because if there's 10 folks that want to speak to an industry conference, yes, you've got the been there, done that credentials. But then there's this other thing, whoa, you wrote a book. Like not a lot of people in your space have done that. And that really gives you an edge and openings and opportunities that others that might be, you know, just at that same level of success in your profession wouldn't get that. You know, it's a tiebreaker, if not a huge differentiator. Talk about that for a little bit, because I think people lose sight of sort of unexpected benefits that one might get from putting your thought leadership out there.

Sure. The book's helped a lot in that way. You know, most people have a big personal brand. And then they write a book and they sell a lot of books because they're well known outside of Chattanooga, Tennessee. I don't have a huge brand, but I'm trying to promote the book. And so as you alluded to, I've been in several meetings. I was in a private equity meeting out in Scottsdale, Arizona a few weeks ago, and I got to do a book signing there and I gave away almost 100 books. But I met some people that are very influential in fundraising and One of my businesses, we're fundraising now for a hospitality group. So it's opened the door for me to now go have meetings with these folks that might want to invest in one of my companies. Well, another example, I'm getting my e-commerce business. We're working with Nashville singer-songwriters and country music stars, and I've met with a couple of their agents and I got to give them a book, which shows that I have a little more credibility than who's this guy from Chattanooga. So it's definitely helped open doors for me.

Yeah. So now once you— it wasn't the intent, it wasn't an objective when you started down this road. How do you think about that as it relates to the business? Because I love that you're giving away all the profits and all those sort of things. But if an outcome of writing this book is it can help you raise funds, put deals together, get access to deal flow, build relationships, people want to talk to people that are interesting. And quite frankly, it's more interesting to talk to someone that wrote a book than someone that's, you know, no, you know, like running a contracting company. Like, that's only mildly interesting, right? Relatively speaking.

Yeah, it's, it's opened a lot of doors because of that. And, you know, it wasn't the intent when I wrote the book. And honestly, most people— you can Google this too— people don't sell books and people don't make money. They don't make money from books. But people write books and to help raise awareness for their brand, and then they're selling you a course or a program or a conference.

Yeah.

That's, that's all great. And I speak at some of those, but that's not my intent. I really don't want it to be a full-time job. I've got other jobs, but, but it has been very helpful in opening the door. And I have been invited to speak at certain events because I wrote the book, but it's more about relationships and just being in a room. I went to an event in Nashville with other authors, and now we've connected. There was a lady that wrote a book from Hawaii, and she's reached out to me, and there's a relationship there that might help in one of my other ventures. And the same for her. It's the whole principle in my book about what goes around comes around. So I think my wife asked me, she's like, we've spent more money on this book than you've made. And I'm like, well, maybe, maybe not. But you never know the opportunity that can come around because of it.

Well, but that maybe, maybe not is really the question, right? Because maybe if your wife says, well, we invested this in PR and get the book done and whatever, And then the ROI is strictly measured by number of units sold times some marginal profit level per book. I hate to tell someone their wife might— their wife might be right, but your wife might be right. Now, your counterargument is, yeah, that's right, dear, but here's some other things where we've made back, you know, 10, 100, some multiple of the investment in ways that we never thought possible. And then the other variable might be time. Right. There's nothing, you know, the book that you wrote, as are most nonfiction business books, what I would call evergreen, right? Whether I read that book today or in a year or 5 or 10, I should have that same aha, that same, you know, moment of, of like, wow, that makes a lot of sense. You're not writing about an election cycle or something that's cyclical. So you could get benefits from this book that we couldn't even predict. Like, what's— what is the benefit of that book going to be for you in 3 years from now? Who knows? But it could be there. Peter Winick.

And there's always a new audience for me. There's another country, and this book will be around when I'm dead. And I wrote it in a way where all the principles would apply, like you said, no matter what year it is. And I agree. She— my wife also, you know, I take a lot of lunches, probably more than I should, and often I pay for the lunch, but it's people seeking my advice. And she's like, you know, you always go to these lunches and you end up buying. And, um, but we also— I, I explain how blessed we are and where we live and what we have. And yeah, I think, I think it's a combination of giving back and, you know, that's just the mindset that I talk about in the book. And I've met no one that has that mindset that's not been successful in many ways, but I've met a lot of people that don't have that mindset that are still whining about the poor old me and same old attitude. I just saw a guy from high school recently and I still think he was in 1991 and he hadn't had a reset since. And, you know, even though I had that cancer scare, I wish he could have had an awakening like I had and it would change that perspective.

Yeah. And then finally, as we start to wrap, does it always, in your opinion, does it always take some sort of an external awakening, right? Like if you didn't have the scare, I doubt the book would be here. Maybe it would have. Maybe something else would have popped in your mind. But you were busy running the businesses and driving this and driving that and didn't have that time, that forced time or moment or opportunity to really reflect. So does it always take— and it doesn't have to be medical— like an external shock to the system?

Well, it did for me, but I don't think it does for, you know, a traditional author. I'm sure they go into the next book and it's not for that reason. I had many reasons. We've had some— there's one principle in the book that talks about failure. I actually, after I sold my business, I had this aha moment, decided I would run for mayor of Hamilton County. And it's in the chapter Plan to Fail. So that tells you how that race went. But there's many things. There's many things that could be that external factor that gave me the motivation to write the book. And a lot of times it is that for other people. But I think for your traditional author, they typically probably put a lot more time in it and have a more systematic approach. But I still think in the few months it took me to write mine that there's enough nuggets in there that's beneficial to everybody. And at least everybody that's— unless all my friends are giving me these 5-star reviews on Amazon, I think it's been impactful.

That's great. Any final words on someone out there thinking about taking the plunge? Like, hey, I'm on a boat, but some— yeah, or, well, it doesn't have to necessarily be writing a book, but really diving into some thought leadership in a way because you're, you're passionate about it, even though it's not part of who you've been or what you've done. Sure.

You know, and I'm not overly educated. I've been, uh, I've worked hard and learned from others and been successful, but I went to a local county high school and got a 2-year college degree So I'm not your typical author, but there are traditional publishers and then there's what they call hybrid publishers, or you can self-publish. But if you find the right person to help you, they'll often— like the company I use, Foresight Publishing— I just took all my thoughts and got them out there. I wrote the book, but they give me help in which principles should come first, what order are the chapters. This is how you go get an ISBN number. Here's how you can get it uploaded to Amazon. So, and you know, cover design and that sort of thing. So it's not all that expensive for someone to do that and to have somebody guide you along the way. So I would encourage folks that have been nervous, that always wanted to, to just find the right person to help them get through it.

No, good advice. Well, I appreciate your time. Thank you for sharing your story and your journey and all the best.

Thank you, Peter. I appreciate you having me on, and keep climbing.

To learn more about Thought Leadership Leverage, please visit our website at thoughtleadershipleverage.com. To reach me directly, feel free to email me at peter@thoughtleadershipleverage.com. And please subscribe to Leveraging Thought Leadership on iTunes or your favorite podcast app to get your weekly episode automatically.