Transcribed for business coach program Thrive15.com
Clay – lead business coach: Former SBA Entrepreneur of the Year and recovering disc jockey. I am telling you what, I could not be more excited to be here with you. It’s not possible. And I’m telling you what, the guy next to me … If you’re on Facebook Live, on the far left, it’s ecstasy when he is next to me. It is Dr. Robert Z. Sir, how are you?
Robert Z – business coach program CEO: Happy Monday Thrivers. I hope everybody had a great weekend. Clay, rumor has it that the wall around the Clark compound has started.
Clay: Yes. I will tell you. This is the deal, business coaching clients and Thrivers …
Tim – executive business coach: Are the Mexicans paying for it?
Clay: Okay, here’s the deal. Here’s the deal.
Robert Z: That’s a different channel. That’s a different channel.
Clay: Different channel.
Robert Z: Different channel, Tim.
Clay: My wife and I, we’ve decided to live off the grid and we just kind of like … I’m a guy who I love people as long as you’re somebody on my like list. And so here’s the deal. I think that a lot of us, we work so hard to achieve financial freedom but for what?
Robert Z: Yeah, but for what?
Clay: Time freedom, financial freedom. For what? Well I was reading a notable quotable from Phil Libben, he’s the guy who started Evernote. And I remember reading this, it was about six or seven years back. He says, I define happiness as my ability to limit the time I spend with people I do not like. And I was like ohhh! Phil!
Robert Z: Say that again!
Clay: He says, I define happiness with my ability to limit the time I have to spend with people I do not like. And I thought …
Robert Z: Powerful.
Clay: Oh my gosh this is a move. I was talking to my wife and I had to kind of sell her on the deal. I was selling her, she’s kind of selling me. We’re realizing this is a thing where we both agree. We’re 100% into this vision that we should go off the grid. We should have chickens and we should have trees, so we’ve since planted. I think we’re up to 44 trees. We planted fruit trees this past weekend. We planted four new trees. There’s peach trees. There’s apple trees. They have to cross pollinate, so you got to get a certain number of them.
Then Z and we started thrive15.com and the business coach program. You know I had been about a year into it. I asked Z to team up with me. He’s been sort of my business hero for a long time. I remember one day we were walking by the front desk there. The counter, the downtown office at 1609. I’m like hey, I really want to pick your brain. You said something to the effect of how much of the business do I own? I think 2%.
Robert Z: Yeah. Back then you know I was just an investor. You shark tanked me on the idea of scaling business coaching. That’s what thrive15.com does. I’m telling you what folks, Clay Clark is arguably the world’s best business coach. Been doing it now for awhile. He said, listen, I can only do one dude, one business at a time. We need to scale this, because people are failing at too high of rate. I mean 8 out of 10 businesses that start are failing according to Forbes. That’s 80% failure rate.
Clay: Not good.
Robert Z: That’s unacceptable. He said, we need to get to the message out, because it’s not rocket science. Unless of course your business is building rockets.
Clay: Actually, Steve Jobs says that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. William Shakespeare said that brevity’s the soul of wit. The idea’s that you keep it simple.
You ask me as a challenge though. You said to me … I remember you looking at me. We went out to dinner.
Robert Z: Yeah. You said, Z, I need more of you to help thrive go to the next level.
Clay: We went out to dinner at Bluestone and you said to me, you said, what’s your big goal?
Robert Z: Yeah. That was another thing.
Clay: I’m like, my whole goal was to mentor millions. That’s the business goal. Your personal goal …
Robert Z: Yeah, I get it. That’s what you want to do with that, but what are you doing it for?
Clay: I told my wife, that’s it. We’re doing it. We’re moving off the grid. We’re making this thing happen. Part of the vision was to plant trees where I cannot see humans that I do not invite over to the casa.
Robert Z: Okay, check one.
Clay: Then, move number two is to build a big wall. The wall construction begins this week. I’m so excited. It’ll be eight feet tall. There’s cinder blocks. I’m putting barbed wire on the other side of it so you can’t get in. I’m only giving the gate code to people that I invite over and I will change it weekly. It’s just a move. It’s going to be a sanctimonious thing where there’ll be fire pits. There’ll be various infractions that we’ll be doing that might or might not participate with the local rules of the certain municipalities. We’re going to burn some stuff. I have some fire wood. We have the chickens. I had a bobcat in the woods. I had a random goat the other day show up. It’s an awesome thing and I’m telling you what, I could not be more excited with the construction of the walls. It’s exciting.
Robert Z: That is exciting. Are you going to do something on the outside of this?
Clay: Vanessa wants to do a pho stone. I’ve planted three trees on each side of the wall. There’s six trees and pine trees. Each one is supposed to grow … You know within year five, it’s supposed to be about 25 feet tall and 15 feet side. Black it out. Then, I’m planting … Was it crepe myrtles that you’ve planted before? Crepe myrtles are those the kind of bushes that grow?
Robert Z: It’s actually in the tree category. Yes, and a full grown crete myrtle will get 14-15 feet.
Clay: They’re kind of evergreen-y though right? They keep going all year?
Robert Z: Well they do really well in the direct sun. They need a lot of heat.
Tim: It’s more seasonable, but it is a beautiful flowering tree.
Clay: There’s something we planted. I don’t think it’s crepe myrtle, but something kind of similar where it kind of looks like that. It works all year. We planted a row of those. We’re building another wall there. Long story short …
Robert Z: I like that you’re such the outdoors-y, such the green thumb. It works all year. It works all year. They’re out there just working away. I’m a tree and I’m working today.
Clay: Another thing is we added on, it’s a man cave. It’s about a 1300 square edition. My wife’s recently approved an edition that’ll be about a 10,000 square foot edition that’s going to be the ultimate man cave. That’s what I’m building that’s going to be an enclosure of just all things man. It’s going to be in the woods. When that starts construction …
Robert Z: I bet you get gate code at that point.
Clay: No, this is like where billiard tables begin. It’s like where dudes like us hang out. We talk about meat, guns, just business. That kind of thing. Then we allow the sophisticated women to come in from time to time and talk about things that really matter in life. We’ll be talking about guns and …
Robert Z: To educate us of the finer things in life.
Clay: Like relationships and caring for others.
Robert Z: Our feelings.
Clay: Feelings.
Robert Z: Can we talk about our feelings in there too.
Clay: It’s three topics. Meat, guns, and business that’s the only topics allowed.
Robert Z: Accoutrements we got to talk about …
Clay: Accoutrements.
Robert Z: … and condiments. What do you like on your meat?
Clay: Yeah.
Robert Z: That’s really what you talk about.
Clay: What kind of seasoning.
Robert Z: What seasoning is that.
Clay: Now inside the box that rocks, we’ve captured the unicorn here for day number two. I’m super excited. This is Tim Redman here. Unbelievable.
Speaker 4: Broadcasting live from the center of the universe, you’re listening to the Thrive Time Show.
Clay: Now Tim’s resume it’s unbelievable. He helped grow a company from two people to 450 people. He actually even featured in 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership by John Maxwell. He’s coached some of the top brands all around the country. Really an honor to have you on the show here Tim. How are you doing today my friend?
Tim: Well, I’m doing really well. Talking about hanging out with a couple of unicorns. I’m right in between two of them.
Clay: Now we’re talking here from the Boom book, which is the 13 proven plays for business success we teach at our workshops.
Tim: This is an absolute awesome book. Because it’s got incredible nuggets in and it’s got pictures in it.
Clay: Lots of pictures. Here we go, this is step number three from the book, establish … Was that My Heart Will Go On? Were you teasing that up there a little bit there? That little Jack, gross.
Robert Z: Little preview of something coming.
Clay: Every night in my dreams, I … Anyway. Establish the number of hours you are willing to work on your business. Let’s talk about it Tim. You work with business owners all over the country. Small businesses and big businesses. Why is it so important to be real with the business owner. For the business owner listening right now to actually know and commit to. This is how many hours a week I’m actually willing to work on my business in addition to working in my business.
Tim: Yeah, unless you’re intentional Clay, you can get caught up in the whirlwind. You can get caught up in the everyday demands here. You want to. You talk about it. You even lecture to other people you want to work on your business. Unless you intentionally say, I’m going to set this a time on a time block this out. I will give it the 1 hour, the 3 hours, the 5 hours. Whatever. Then, it doesn’t get done.
Clay: You know what I did this morning at 3 am, Z, that was kind of business coach related? You want to know what I did this morning?
Robert Z: What did you … Did you feed the chickens?
Clay: No, our thrive business coach program is working very, very well. I’ve been working on a noncompete contract for all the employees here. Setting up all the finer details of the employee handbooks. I’m going hey, listen. I talked to one of the coders today, I said here’s the deal. You’re a great coder. Without me, you don’t have any clients. You told me that when you started. Without you, I don’t have any coders. I can find another coder and you can find another me, maybe.
As long as you’re here, I want you to be fully committed to our team and our system. We’re going to be pushing through this noncompete. Just like I have with all my other businesses. The thrive system for the business coach program is working so well, we want to make it a deal where we’re building our squad. It’s like on a football team. You have a left tackle if you’re a quarterback. Your left tackle, man. You got to have that guy guard your blindside. Because when you hop back and throw the … People listening aren’t football fans. When a quarterback, the ball’s hiked to him. He steps back … Typically a quarterback is right handed. If the guy blocking his back side where he can’t see, he can really get himself hurt. The left tackle’s a big position. The left tackle isn’t really needed unless he has a quarterback worth blocking for. It’s a symbiotic relationship.
I had to write a noncompete agreement to kind of keep our left tackles well paid, but also so that I know they’re not going to be competing with us. Writing a noncompete … I mean yeah, we paid an attorney to write a formulaic one and to use kind of a template. See, it’s awful. I mean, I honestly I can’t stand looking at a noncompete. You what the best time to do it is? Never. For me I do it from 3 a.m. to 5 a.m. Get that crap done. Because I don’t freaking want to do it, man. a business coach can help you write a noncompete.
You back in the day when you were making your noncompetes. When were you doing your noncompetes? At midnight? When were you when you were first starting the business.
Robert Z: In the evening. My move was a lot of times was you start a business and you get in there. You’re thinking, when I go there today I’ve got these things I need to get done. Then the business when you’re there is so busy, you know and stuff happens that day you didn’t foresee. Next thing you know, you look up it’s 5 o’-clock, 6 o’-clock, it’s 7 o’-clock. It’s time to shut down the business. You’re looking down at your list, and you got, I didn’t get any of my stuff done because I was busy in the business. Then you say, well I got to go home. I got to do the dinner thing. I’ve got to do the this thing. I got to do the that thing. The kid’s thing. The play thing. The … that thing.
Then the next thing you know, okay now here are my options. I can A …
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