So you're over there on that camera.
Yep.
This is a camera right in front of me
and I have a monitor there,
but it's all of my different cameras
and everything like that.
It doesn't have you,
so I'm not gonna actually be looking at you
or pick up cues from facial expression.
So everything's gonna be verbal,
like we're doing an actual just audio podcast.
But I think I'm gonna keep it on this screen
instead of this screen.
What are your thoughts?
I mean, you're welcome to change it up.
I think it's pretty cool.
It'll be fun for the audience,
anybody who catches a visual,
just to kind of see how things work.
People are so interested in reality
more than, wait, where'd you go?
That's a fun trick.
Chris, are you there?
I'm here.
Oh, you're there, okay, cool.
Yeah, it's gonna be fun, man.
So we'll, how long you been doing podcasting?
You look like you had to set up for quite some time.
So no, so the one that I did with you
was at my home office
and we were in the process of building this one.
I've been doing podcasting for probably three years.
My podcast has been out for one year
and this is the first season that we're doing it here.
This is about a $30,000 setup in this room.
But what I'm doing, Jack, what I'm doing, man,
is so we do a lot of pop-up events here at the office
where we're teaching people about social media
and how to get more organic leads
and all that kind of stuff.
And this is for my clients.
So I have three levels.
At level two and level three, they're gonna come in here,
they're gonna have their own logo up here.
I'm gonna teach them how to podcast,
how to become popular podcasting.
And the cool thing is this is the Frank Kern method.
I end up helping so many people become successful
that I have unlimited leads into iconic from it.
And that's exactly what we did inside of Apex
to the tune of about 24 million bucks.
And it works.
It just takes a little bit of time
and this idea of this kind of studio,
it's like, hey man.
And you got the virtual golf thing coming in too, right?
Wait till you see it, bro.
We can't wait.
I'm so excited about it.
Hold on one moment
and I'm ready to get going whenever you are.
Yeah, well, we are live.
So we're totally, everybody's joined us.
This will be a little backstage time right in the get go.
But yeah, it's gonna be, I can't wait to,
I'll just talk about your fire, where it came from
and hit it.
So you ready to dive in?
Let's go.
Awesome, man.
Well, let's talk about that.
So why did you start everything, Kris?
As far as iconic?
Everything.
Yeah, where did you take off?
So when I found the brand name,
did the feeling come before the brand name
or did the brand name inspire the feeling?
Just, yeah, hit that story.
Okay, so the first thing is I just turned 50
and I started business at 24 years old.
So I'm officially now longer as an entrepreneur
than I'm not.
And my first business was me simply not wanting other people
to tell me when I could go to lunch
or when I could take a bathroom break.
I also did not like the limit that was put on my income.
I felt like I worked harder than the people
that were around me, but I wasn't receiving
much more benefit.
And so I started a business.
And Jackson, I had no idea what I was doing.
And the thing that I'm most proud about
is that I suffered for about 20 years,
mainly because I wasn't willing to seek outside information.
I thought people were gonna rip me off.
I thought, all of you gurus that know stuff about stuff,
it's just, there's not a good deal.
And I just came from a place where networking
was foreign to me until I joined a mastermind
of high level people.
And by the end of the first year,
I became the director of executive coaching
for that mastermind.
Then we helped that mastermind 10X
and they were already at $3 million.
So I mean, we really grew it.
Nice.
And in the process, what ended up happening
is that I started to realize that my calling,
my passion was to help entrepreneurs,
especially live a more harmonious life
because on these four pillars of faith,
family, fitness and finance,
and the fifth one maybe being fun,
I realized that my fun was all wrapped up in work.
I realized that I'd gone from being in the best shape
of my life to starting to get a little bit heavier.
I realized that my family at home appreciated the benefits
of me owning a business, but they were missing me.
I wasn't around very much.
And then as far as the finances go,
what was happening is I would make money
and then in the winter we wouldn't make any.
And so I wasn't able to build something
that sustained me to the point of excess financially.
And I realized, why am I doing this?
I could have a job and then let it all go
at the end of the day and then go spend time
with my family to make this kind of money
or so that I could maintain this lever
that I'd been building for 20 years,
I could learn to get smarter.
And that's when Iconic came
because the flame inside of Iconic that's burning,
and this is after talking to thousands of clients
and I'm talking clients that have just started a business
up to clients that are making 30,
$40 million a year take home.
I started to realize that there are no real business problems
but there are people problems.
And I also started to realize very much
that every single person I come across
has something inside of them, a seed of greatness.
And a lot of times they just need the encouragement
and the know-how, the simple know-how
to start getting their message out there
so that they can start to shine brightly.
And I believe in go giving,
I believe in being a servant-based leader,
and I believe that we're at a place in life
where we have to create more leaders
in order to sustain future generations.
And so that's why Iconic is here.
And honestly, I've put a lot of money into this.
And it's a legacy business.
And so it's more important to me
to build something with integrity
that's here for my children,
that's here for other generations to feed from.
Because like I said, I was one of those guys
that for 20 years I suffered
all because I was not willing to take a real chance on me.
And once I did, I was able to accomplish in two years
what I couldn't do in 20.
My goal is just to help people shrink their time
so that they can live a life worth living, man.
Oh man, beautifully said.
And Kris, who's your best mentor?
My best mentor.
All right, welcome in to Vision Pros Live.
With Jackson Calame, I'm your show host.
We'll be doing interviews for visionary entrepreneurs
and guest leaders who are building
fantastic visions out there.
58 an
Hey, and what's up Vision Pros?
Welcome into another episode of Vision Pros Live.
My name is Jackson Calame,
your host, founder, and CEO of First Class Business.
I'm excited to have Chris Whitehead on the show today.
What an awesome introduction.
In case you missed it,
definitely catch the replay of this episode.
Chris is the author of Becoming Iconic.
an iconic, he's got a brand name iconic, he's got an excellent podcast that I was honored
to be featured on as well. We became really good friends through that podcast. And while
we live in different parts of the country, that's the beauty of online relationships.
And if you're kind of, I don't want to say new to that because, because anybody who's
listening to podcasts probably has some, but there is no difference between your ability
to build phenomenal relationships with those who are close to you, proximity-wise physically,
and those who live halfway across the country. Some of my best friends are people who I've
been working with online for a very long time and I rarely see in person, but when the moment
happens where we get together, it's like being with your kindergarten best friend again.
It is such a cool experience. So with that said, I would challenge you to find out how
do I cultivate relationships in that capacity to that degree, even when you don't have that
physical proximity, because once you do, it opens up a whole new opportunity for you in
life. Now we're going to be talking about unlocking the fire within to become iconic
as that's what Kris has done for his own life. And before we do that, I want to introduce
a couple of our sponsors. Coldclick, for instance, this is a solution that we use for LinkedIn
automation. I believe it's, it's possibly how we actually connected with Chris. In addition
to, if not, I might need to give matchmaker credit for that. It might've been matchmaker.fm
as well, but Coldclick this weekend, just to give this a perspective, an idea from Friday
through Monday, I'd not touch my LinkedIn account. And I came back on Monday to 39 messages
of people who wanted to learn more about being on the show. And I'd have to do anything because
I had already designed phenomenal messaging for our business, just like we do for other
brands. And then we use this tool and our Hoffman's guidance as well over at Coldclick
to make sure that we're abiding by the algorithmic needs that LinkedIn has. It's all about connecting
with more people so that we're also connecting with the right people who are in a position
to reciprocate relationships with us and not forcing that issue. You never want to be forcing
relationships, allow them to come forward naturally and allow people to marinate with
the goodness that you put out in the world. Those would be my tips and tricks for you
for today. In addition to that, I have another sponsor up there and Simply Fast websites.
Man, I'm off today with my finger point. Simply Fast websites is a creation of Shane Michael.
And I don't use this. I don't need this. I've already got a website that we spent thousands
on. What really struck me was when I saw that he's building websites at $179 starting at
that. And I was like, man, when I first started my website, if I could have had the attention
of a web designer or a web developer to help me understand what the heck I was doing at
179 bucks, I would have been all in. So I'm really happy with his mission to want to empower
the small business owners out there, the people who are incubating their ideas. And he's one
of many solutions that you should consider looking at, consider working with. But as
you, as you perhaps start to create a website with Wix and Squarespace, you know, or WordPress
themes and consider doing that for free, just consider as well protecting your time as entrepreneurs
and as people in life, we don't get our time back. That's the one commodity that we just
constantly lose unless we're super intentional with realizing how can I leverage my time
by investing in tools that are smart for where I'm at and where I'm going. I'll leave that
at that and we'll move on to the water project. The water project is near and dear to my heart.
If you haven't heard of it, this is an amazing opportunity to give back. It's also a crucial
and critical need in the world. We have millions of people who don't have access to clean drinking
water and I cannot imagine what my life would feel like, how bad my heart would hurt as
a parent of four if I had to worry about when my kids are going to get their next glass
of water. And we've got so many other things that we love to worry about as Americans in
my case. And I don't have to worry about this. I get this every day in abundance. But these
individuals, you can see the communities, you can learn about their circumstances. And
while that's kind of hard and heavy, I would invite you to embrace hard and heavy in life.
Also look at the joy of these kids on the screen. They're just over the sake that they
now have access to water. You can give $1, you can give $10,000. If you're not in a position
to give, you can be in a position to share. And that's what I would recommend that you
do. Now, if you have a project that you'd also love to see a support or like Jackson,
this project's better. Don't hesitate to drop that in the comments and just say, Hey, can
you guys look at this too? I might feature it on the show as well. We're all about giving
back. There's 8 billion people in this world to help. And we're never going to miss an
opportunity to go ahead and do just that. So with all that said, I'm going to give a
little brief introduction of Chris. We're going to check out his website for just a
minute. Let me go to the screen share and hit that. There we go. So Chris Whitehead,
again, founder of Iconic Alliance, he's a business coach. Go to his website. You can
see some of his coaching style through his videos. He grew a company called Think to
Succeed. As I mentioned, he's a published author as well. He's had three successful
businesses, has grown over five in the last 17 years. And like I said, he's just become
a really good friend as well. He's been featured in many different channels as well. And he's
got his own podcast to check out. I do recommend, if you're looking for more mentors and more
leaders, you have all sorts of people who are now rocking the mic and finding your rich
dad, poor dad, or finding the think and grow rich person that you gravitate towards. Or
if it's as a man thinketh, because you like old school stuff like me, there's so many
opportunities for mentors. There's so many people who have built my path. I think Chris
would be a phenomenal one for you to check out. But let's hear from him yourself and
see what you think, guys. Chris Whitehead, welcome to Vision Pros Live.
Jackson, thank you so much for having me on your show, man. I'm ready to rock and roll.
Awesome, brother. And with that, let's dive right in then. So my first question for you,
you know, as I defined it a bit, who do you feel should be listening in today? And why
should they listen to you? Well, you know, I was, I've had the opportunity
to not only coach thousands of people that are entrepreneurs in all sorts of walks of
life, but I also have the opportunity to have been around in 2009 when the internet was
truly becoming something that I believe through social media was going to explode. Then we've
had some really strange things happen vis a vis 2019, where people started going home.
And then people started rumors started about so about the mass media, maybe putting out
propaganda. And I was talking to my wife, who now does live radio in the town right
next to ours. And it was a really interesting fact. We now have more people doing podcasts.
And we're starting to we the people are starting to control the narrative. So we have the opportunity
to get our version of the truth out, not just someone else's that's looking at a bottom
line, or maybe has a political agenda behind what they're doing. And I think people should
not only just listen to me, I think you should find subjects that you're interested in, and
go through and invest the time to listen to other people based upon the goals that you
have, because then you'll get a really good cross section. The best part, Jackson, and
I know you know this, I'm not saying anything new, I might be saying it a new way. But I'm
not saying anything new, which means if you implement the things that we teach on our
podcast, or in our programs, or you listen to other people like you, Alex Hermosie, other
people that are doing well, you're going to start finding that we're literally for no
cost dropping to you things that will not only add value to your life, but they'll work
to help you get to your goals. And that's what allows you to develop a tighter relationship
with somebody. I just know this, as an entrepreneur for 25 years, I just wanted somebody to tell
me the truth, I was willing to do the work, I was willing to invest the money for real,
but I wanted to make sure somebody was telling me the truth before I risked my entire life
on it. And I am committed to bringing relevant, practical and valuable information to people
so that we can shrink their timeline to their level of success.
Wow. I love I couldn't help but let out a noise when you said I just wanted to find
somebody who would tell the truth. And there's there's so much value in being able to recognize
that. And also being aware of searching for that. You talked about other podcasters. I
agree. Pat Flynn is a massive influence in what I do. John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneur
Fire, massive influence, social media examiner. The reason why I'm listening is my friends,
those who are listening, is I love what Chris said and the no ego approach to understanding
that there's multiple people that we can learn from. It took me hours and hours of listening
to those advisors, if you will, those mentors to realize how authentic they are. You can
just can't just take somebody's word for that. You have to see are they are they putting
down what I need to now after investing those hours. My greatest secret for for listening
to podcasts once you have your lineup is let's say you're looking up a subject like how do
I do email marketing? Right. Or email marketing case study, right, would be the better search
on Google. But even better than that. Now I say email marketing case study, Pat Flynn.
That's when I go listen to Pat and then I'll change the name to John Lee Dumas. And that's
when I go listen, if I'm in the need of the specific subject, I'll search for the term,
search for the words case study, and search for the guru of choice, the person who I know
isn't going to be asked me about the process. Do you find yourself if you're done up for
or you know, is there any other other people that you'd recommend in the podcast world
that you gravitate towards?
I'm not going to give people suggestions because people need to take the time to go research
their own no offense. But I will say this, because because you said something that I
believe is really, really cool. So our podcast room is not only for me, it's for all of our
clients. And we were talking about that just a little bit ago. Well, one of my clients
actually happens to be one of my business partners. So I own 5000 square feet here.
And 2500 of it, I have a business partner that you know, I let him utilize that side.
And this morning, we were talking about him starting a podcast, he's really excited to
do it. And he's a he's an immigrant to the US. He's Brazilian, and he's, and he's has
an incredible story. But he was like, I don't know what to name the podcast. And I was like,
Well, don't name it the construction company that you have. Because I think you're gonna
run out of content there. And I asked him, what is what is it that you want to do? And
he goes, Well, I really want to help people that have gone through what I've gone through
to get the results faster. And I said, Gotcha. I said, Here's what you can do, man. Why don't
you go on chat GPT and actually ask for what the best podcast names are right now, for
the subject matter that you want to do. And that's basically what you did. I had a mentor
one time Jackson, that I would not say good morning to him. I would wake up and throw
him a text message going, How do I do x, y, z, and he would send me back in the kindest
way possible a Google link. And that's when I started realizing he was gently telling
me that I could go do that research instead of asking him basic questions and not think
for myself. And that's what I was imploring my guy to do today. You have all of the answers
now on the internet that you ever need to do just about anything you want. You don't
need to find the answers. You need to learn how to ask better questions, which is exactly
what you were just saying how to do.
I'll said Chris, very good. So let's talk about these, these clients that you're serving.
Sure. What's your vision for those that you serve?
Oh my gosh. So the first thing that I know that a lot of clients are dealing with, and
especially right now, is how do you get more leads? And so there are a couple ways that
I know how to do it. One is free and one is paid. The paid, which I do sometimes, can
take care of itself. You need to find somebody of integrity and quality and you need to be
able to, again, get the timeframes of how that'll work so that you make sure you have
enough money until you actually get a viable lead that you can go close so you can keep
paying more marketing dollars. But when I first started, I didn't have that money, nor
did I have the knowledge and I knew that I would probably burn through it trying to find
the right people. I was too ignorant. So I started learning how to build organic leads
through social media. In fact, we've done it with three businesses total, one brick
and mortar, one online, and then a hybrid version that we built to eight figures. And
so I know the techniques to help people slowly begin to brand themselves, use systems and
ways of communicating online that start dripping in new leads between 120 and 180 days. And
from there, we can start scaling. So the first thing I help people with, because most people
want this, is they want to grow their business. But I've been in business for 25 years. We
could turn on leads tomorrow and drown somebody's business in about a month, they're out of
business. Because if you if you can't get back to the people, if you don't have the
systems in place, and you know all this. So the next thing that we focus on as we start
helping them make more money is what are you going to do with that money so that your money
can be used to make more money instead of you trading time to make you more money. And
that's where the mindset training starts coming in. So then we start focusing on your health,
we start focusing on business tactics and principles, tips, tricks, things and ways
of looking at things. We also help you identify what your short, medium and long term goals
are. And then we then also start bringing in your family values. How much time are you
investing with your family? And then at the very end, after we look at mindset, which
I call faith, we look at your finances, and we help you get that we look at your family,
we help you get that we start talking about your fitness level, because we know that a
fit body and a fit mind can produce more clear output. We focus on this last one, which is
called fun. Because a lot of us entrepreneurs, our only fun is building our business. We
often end up working in a silo alone and feeling the stress of that. And I know from personal
experience, there was almost a decade where I was in my head so much building business
that I lost relationship with my children, I lost relationship with my wife, because
it can become overwhelming. We just help put everybody in the right pillar at the right
time to help them find the most harmony so that they can live a life of purpose.
Here's what I heard you say, Chris. And of course, feel free to battle me on this, by
the way. Sure. But one of the things that I heard you talk about was Maslow's hierarchy
of needs. And as you did, so here, anybody who's listening, that before we can transcend
or before we look for higher aspects of life, we have to have oxygen. We can't survive without
it. If you're hungry, you're no longer hungry. If you don't have oxygen, you just need to
be able to breathe. Well, the oxygen of entrepreneurship is lead generation. And so I hear you keying
in on that and saying, hey, if we can get entrepreneurs established where they've got
their basic core essential needs met, then we can start looking at the transformation
process with with a far greater purpose. Is that correct? It is correct. Yeah, I love
that. And the other thing that we do, and this is really something that I learned well
over a decade ago from one of my first mentors. He said something, Chris, you need to focus
on the result of the result. And I pondered that for a really long time, Jackson. And
what I've understood him to mean, he's he's passed away now. But what I understood him
to mean is number one, if I shoot for the stars, I might land on the moon. Number two,
what he was really asking me is what is it that you really want? And what I started to
identify are my core values. Because as a as a business owner, my business is an extension
of me. That means the clients that I attract have similar core values. It means the employees
I attract have similar core values, or they don't. And I realized that I was attracting
people to me that didn't have similar core values. So now we start teaching people not
only what how to find their core values, but how to communicate about them to start attracting
the right kind of people. But the result of the result is not making more money. After
your basic human needs are met, money does not make you any happier. So the idea is that
we bring people of similar core values together, we start making money together, we start helping
you make money, then we as a community start making money. And then we start living our
life together. We go on trips together, we hang out as friends together, we celebrate
the the spoils and the riches of what our effort has brought us. And we do it together
to create memories and to create traditions and again, eventually create leaders that
can help other people become more leaders so that we can start to win back not only
our country, but also our world. Because we the people have the ability to do that. We
just have to get organized together. And that's why I talk to people just like you. It's why
I'm willing to be a go giver with somebody like you. And you're willing to be a go giver
with somebody like me, because this is an abundant world. There are 8 billion people
in the world, I don't need point Oh, 1% of those to be highly, highly financially successful.
Right. And if that's the truth, then why wouldn't I help other people of similar core values
become successful too, it just makes sense to me. And I believe that we're at a time
where it's necessary. Absolutely, it's necessary. And it's just it's just such an opportunity
to be able to shift the mindset to see things that way. So you know, let's dive in a little
bit deeper on that exact reality. What's your vision for you, Chris? So you've you've laid
that out a lot too. But what where do you see yourself 510 15 years from now? Well,
the cool thing is, is I don't believe you ever retire from being an entrepreneur. I
plan on continuing with iconic and other business ventures, you know, I have four of them now.
But I plan on doing a lot of real estate development. We already are putting the success team together
for that. I plan on helping people with iconic because again, we have children now that are
21 and getting in another one getting ready to turn 20. We have three we have two, we
have twins and then we have a younger son. And the time now for us is we're starting
to realize that in five to 10 years, they're going to be in charge of everything, not just
our children, but people of that age. Yeah, and I'm starting to feel the pressure to make
sure that we help them become the best leaders they can be not only for their success, not
only for our grandchildren success, but as examples to other people out in society, so
that they can track the same way. Look, in our home, we listen to audiobooks all the
time. We eat dinner together almost every night as a family, even though our kids are
21. Our daughter will come home from college Thursday or Friday. Every weekend, we're eating
dinner together, we make sure that we have family discussions. They're not always fun
either, by the way. Right. But we make sure that we are showing up as parents in the way
that we want our kids to show up as well. I make sure my son works. I make sure that
my son is watching me not only live in integrity to the best of my ability, but have the guts
to admit it when I mess up and then watch me make that change because I know that in
a few years, he is going to be dealing with some stresses that he's never dealt with before.
And I want to make sure that he makes the best decision not only for himself, but for
all the people that are attached with him. Because I know that the best way for me to
get started is to just get started. And I know the best way for me to win is to never
quit. So that's where I'll be in 20 years continuing to support this idea of creating
not only a country, but a world that I grew up as a young man truly believing in that
we can live in peace, that we can bring order and harmony, and that we collectively can
help one another to live the best version of our lives. And you talk about that with
some ultra strong conviction, which I love. I'm super grateful for your vision. And I
look forward to seeing other parents step up. I know you have that ability to make that
effect on people. And it matters so much that we, that we the people, as you mentioned,
who believe that, start taking the actions accordingly. So Chris, I think it would be
very easy for people to look at you and say, you know, he's in shape. You know, he's got
it together. He's obviously never had a problem in his life. We sometimes paint people in
a and you alluded to having struggles. And I'm going to ask you about your worst business
experience ever. Because, you know, I would say one of the most important moments of my
life personally, was when I actually found my dad's journal. And the last two pages of
the four or five pages he had filled out, second to last said, I'm depressed. And that
was it. And then the last page said, still depressed. I was 17. I started crying. And
I realized that the giant of the man who had so many demons and struggles, I now understood
behind the scenes and realized he wasn't, he wasn't superhuman. He actually felt the
challenges that he was facing in life. And it didn't, it didn't make me look at him and
say, man, this guy, this guy sucks. You know, he, ah, it helped me see him in a whole new
light. What's your worst business experience ever, Chris?
Well, I really appreciate that you made the assumption that I'm really in shape and that
nothing's ever gone wrong. And you know, like all the other fake internet gurus out there
that act like they've never done anything wrong. I don't believe that. I think there's
so much smoke and mirrors out there. The thing I'm proud about Jackson is I've never quit
on me. And it's not because I haven't wanted to. Of course, I'm human. I've made so many
mistakes. It's not even funny. The only thing I'm proud about is that I've never quit on
me. And the truth is, is that's the ultimate commitment that any of us can make to ourselves.
My worst business mistake, this is humbling to talk about. 2019, I get an email at the
office at about five o'clock in the afternoon that says home Depot. By the way, I own a
remodeling company as well. For those that don't know it, um, multi seven figure remodeling
company. Um, I get an email from home Depot and they say they're not going to be delivering
to home owners addresses anymore. And even though I was an essential business, I realized
that that what I assumed by reading that email is that my business was going to stop. The
reason that was so impactful to me is in 2009, I shut my business down because of the great
recession. And I was like, Oh God, I worked 10 years and here we are again. What am I
going to do? I got really scared. I hadn't eaten food all day because this whole COVID
thing. And I'm trying to figure out what's going on. And I made a huge mistake, man.
In my stress, I decided to drive up to the local liquor store, buy a little bottle of
liquor and just sit there and nip on it while I've read news and did stuff. At about 1130
at night, I pulled my head up from my seat, looked at the, looked at the time on the computer
and was like, Oh my gosh, I gotta go home. I made it to a half of a mile from the police
station and I crashed my truck into a tree. I ended up getting a DUI. I ended up having
to go home and talk to my family. And my daughter was crying and saying, just once you hear,
you know, I don't know why you're doing this to yourself. Well, because I got the DUI,
I couldn't drive my vehicle around and I was not going to be one of these contractors that
his wife's driving him around for him to get out and do an estimate. Cause everybody knows
that guy got the DUI. I never saw myself as that kind of person. I was lying to myself.
So I hired a salesman. My salesman sold $1.4 million the next month. And I thought, my
goodness, we are rocking and rolling Jackson. He sold it at cost. Oh, in construction, we
never do anything at cost. There's always slippage. So besides paying him commissions,
I was $400,000 in debt by the time we figured out that he had sold everything at cost. I
had to go get an SBA loan because I wanted to make sure that I paid all the subcontractors
off, which I did not have to do because we never signed paper. He never got the subs
to or we never signed the paperwork authorizing the subs to do it. So I could have played
the game at court and I would have won. But there was something karmically to me that
said, you know what? I used to be a subcontractor. They've done the work. This is not their fault.
This is ultimately my responsibility because of that DUI. Number one, I would have never
sold at cost. I'm the owner of the company. But this guy did it. But that's not his fault.
That's my fault. But we paid every subcontractor off. And then over the next two years, we
started three more companies. So I believe that I turned one of my greatest weaknesses,
one of my greatest mistakes, because I was willing to take ultimate responsibility for
it and to do something about it. We were slowly and then much more quickly over time, able
to turn that around. Here's another note. That was $400,000 to subcontractors. It cost
me almost a half of a million personally with the truck, the court system and everything
else I had to do in the process. So it was almost a million dollar mistake. And that's
okay, man. I learned a lesson. That's right. That's powerful and way to way to way to see
all the opportunities to rise up. It's it's sometimes in those moments where we choose
the opposite. The good news is if you've done that recently or in the past, it's there's
still time to change. Today. So let's let's move into the exact opposite category, which
you kind of did with the bounce back. This might you might even say, let's just skip
this Jackson. That was a bounce back. But do you have another best experience in business
you want to talk about? Oh, my best experience in business. I've had over 300 employees in
the last 25 years. My best experience in business was seeing me finally build a team of people
around me of very similar core values, because we each take responsibility as if we're the
owner. And I started bringing people in at my level and above into my business because
my self image was strong enough to realize they weren't going to take from me. In fact,
they were only going to enhance me. You know, it's only 25% more money usually to hire an
A player instead of a B player to get five times the result from them. And I started
understanding that and I started bringing people in that I'd always treated my employees
like family, but they didn't always know how to be in one. And, and so you know, it was
it was a hard road. But when I started really leaning into my core values, the people that
I have with me now, they're ride or die people. And it's it's not nearly as big as it used
to be my circles not as big, but the 12 or 15 people that we have in our company, they're
committed, they're not involved. And I can't tell you how good it feels to have someone
covering your back. Because they know that I'm just as committed to their personal success
as they are to mine. And that was one of the key elements is, dude, I started asking my
people not why they wanted to be working with me, I started asking him what they wanted
to do with the proceeds they were making working with me, what are your dreams? What are your
goals? I found out that one of my guys, I was talking to you, Diogo, he had never owned
a home, he just wanted to own a home. So I started talking to him about what he could
do and how simple it actually is. But he had been listening so much to me that the first
home that he bought was a multifamily home. He didn't buy a single family home, he put
renters in there. And then two years later, he went out and bought his own home. And what
I know that he's doing to set he and his family up for the rest of their lives. Now he's talking
about doing a podcast. Now he's talking about bringing people over and train them how to
grind concrete floors and put the epoxy on it. And I see the ideas and what's going on,
dude, these are successes in my business. Because as I help my employees live the life they
want, they're not going to only help me, they're going to help everyone that I make commitments
to like my clients. And that makes me proud as a business owner that I have people at
that caliber surrounding me.
Chris, this has possibly been my favorite vision out of all the episodes. And that's
on the record, of course, you know, live for everybody. It's just so in line with what
and so well articulated with what we strive as well to help visionaries catch the vision
of this clarity of purpose that exists for every single life that gets touched in the
process.
Give me goosebumps.
Good. Well, let's level that up. Maybe we can make them even visual, make them bigger.
So the next question, if this were the last opportunity, the last lesson that you could
teach, what powerful lesson can other visionaries learn from your experience?
Learn how to be selfless by giving yourself permission to be a go giver and a servant
base leader, take your eyeballs off of yourself, love on other people, learn how to become
an active listener, and then do whatever it takes to help them achieve what they want.
When you help enough other people get what they want, you truly will get what you want.
So the next step is to ask yourself a real question. What is it that you want? And that's
what I would leave real entrepreneurs with. What is it that you really want?
The result beyond the result as well. Right. Making sure to incorporate that as you ask
yourself that question, being able to combine these formulas for ultimate success. Well
said.
Yeah. You think you want a Porsche or a Lamborghini or a multimillion dollar home. I've got that
stuff. I'm telling you, it's like Christmas day. You get it, you open it, you look at
it, you play with it, you esteem it, but it goes in the corner. And what you're on is
the next journey to get somewhere. The question is, is what do you want from that journey?
Because it is so important to realize the ladder is against the correct wall. You don't
want to look back 30 years later and realize that you have wasted your life because you
were not willing to ask yourself truly what you want from this thing. Do you want freedom?
Do you want to go see other countries? Do you want to help your family out, your mom,
your dad, your siblings? Do you want to be able to help people at the end of their life,
not have to stay in a nursing home, but instead you can care for them? Do you want to buy
your mama home? Do you just want to spend time having great conversations with great
people? You need to find out what it is you're suffering for because business ownership on
some levels is a little bit of suffering. What is it that you're suffering for and what
result are you willing to go beyond your comfort level so that you can receive it? Because
the worst thing on earth is building something, getting what you thought you wanted only to
realize that you were so far away from what you really want that you actually have to
start over from scratch.
Dude, I love it. I just wanted you to, I'm just going to let you keep going on that note.
We can do this for another hour. You just keep hitting it, preach and no, but let's
talk at the end here. How can people get in touch with you? What's the best way to reach
out? What events you got coming up, Chris? Anything of that sort, any invitation for
the audience? Where should they go next?
The easiest way for the audience to find out anything I'm doing, we literally are getting
on stage every single month now. I have some events at the office. I have some events in
Boston. I do some events in Dallas, some events in Florida, New York, Connecticut. We're going
around that area. The easiest way to find out anything that's going on or to connect
with me on socials or to buy my book or to send a request to me that you want to have
a meeting with me and have a conversation is to go to iconicalliance.com and you'll
see under the resources tab all the different ways to connect with me. And I'm a real human.
If you pitch me in the DM, I probably will pretend I don't know you. But if you have
a serious question, I'm happy to connect. I'm happy to connect you with people that
can help you even if I'm not the right guy. And I think that that's really, really important
is to be as a leader and as we grow to be available for those people that are hungry
for the next step in life and be able to hear it from the horse's mouth too.
That's right. So vision pros that are listening in, if you have any questions or comments,
don't hesitate to drop them in the channel that you are for convenience. Make sure to
connect with Chris as well. But if you drop those in the if you drop those comments, we'll
make sure to forward them to Chris and tag him so that he's aware of those. You might
get a loom video response from one of us. You might get invited to something as well
to participate. And like we like we said, you'll be able to access those links and the
show notes as well. So thanks for tuning in, everybody. Chris, this was an amazing opportunity.
I really I really look forward to doing this again. I think we should pick a subject at
some point, something that that you're maybe do some type of virtual online event where
you co collaborate on it. There's so many opportunities. And because I'm in San Antonio,
my city got excluded from your list of tours, I'm gonna have to make my way over to Dallas
or or make a trip to one of these states you mentioned. But it's been an honor to have
you on the show, man.
Dude, thank you very much for having me forgive me the freedom to speak my my heart. And yeah,
I think that people that are like minded should take the time and should go through the efforts
of making connections just like you're doing. Because if nothing changes, nothing changes.
And I appreciate you being a part of the change, brother.
Likewise, my friend Vision Pros, you guys have an excellent day. We'll see on the next show.
Thank you for being here today. I'm really happy that you tuned in to Vision Pros live.
I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions as these episodes continue to move forward.
This is going to get more and more fun. We'll have more and more engagement as well. We'll
invite people to participate in the show. And thank you for giving us your time and
attention.