forth on that. But we're good. We're good. We got it. So while we talk, I'm going to
make sure to adjust your title a little bit, just your banner so that that goes the mature
preneur maverick. Oh, I like that. So let me move that over here. How does that look
for you?
Great. Um, yeah. And I'm happy to do you is my sound okay? Or do I need headset?
No, your sounds fantastic. Okay, great. I think it's fantastic. Um, anyway, so awesome.
Well, I'm so excited we get to talk about this. So maturepreneurship. What is it? What
are we talking about today? Oh, let's jump right in. I know what it is, but I'm just
I want to bring the audience up to speed because I'm full term. All right. So I think it's
it's a term that I created. And I've also seen it out there in other places. So I don't
know if I was first, but it was me to me when I thought of it. The idea behind mature, maturepreneurship
is it is those people who are hashtag not done by a long shot. And there's this amazing
trend going on in the world that no one is paying attention to. That cracks me up and
dismayed me tremendously. There are literally millions and millions and millions of people
who are 55 plus. So boomers and late Gen Xers who are coming back into the business work
world either in employment. And that's very challenging. Not many people want to hire
a 70 year old. So they're turning to entrepreneurship and they're flooding into the business world
and no one's paying attention. It's the biggest cohort to enter the business world at any
time in history. And there's very little services, support, education or funding, et cetera,
for them. So I am here to say that that needs to change. Ageism is alive and well. And we
have this incredible wisdom workforce that is taking over entrepreneurship. So they need
and deserve some support. So that's what maturepreneurs are. I love that you're leading the way on
this. When I was in Uruguay, that problem you mentioned was exacerbated even further.
And I've seen that in third world countries that tends to be the case. There's no justifying
it. The reality though, when you're McDonald's in Uruguay and you're one of the very, very,
very few companies that exists in a community and you've got a workforce to hire, it just
so happens that all of the really, really good looking young kids that happen to speak
English as well get the jobs. And then as they get a little bit older, they lose the
job. For some reason, there's another young kid that comes in and gets the job. It is
something we need to look at and we need to figure out again, how do we spread the wealth
more? How do we make room for the wisdom of the past years and beyond? And so I love that
you're leading this cause. And the baby boomers, you said at Gen X, I didn't say it, the Gen
Xers that are now 55. I'm sure some of them are like, don't say that right now. I know
what it's like to get older a little bit, but that's just, you're leading the way. You're
helping them catch the vision and the hope. And I think that's absolutely amazing. So
what are the three resources that you would recommend to visionaries out there that they
should be paying attention to or read or pick up or join? What programs do you recommend?
Well, absolutely. There's a couple of, there's wealth. Let me rephrase that. So basically
there are not a lot of resources for entrepreneurial, older entrepreneurs. There are resources
about aging and ageism, but most events, et cetera, are about retirement and not about
what I call refiring. It's about retiring. And so there are events that talk about estate
planning and wills and buying your burial plot and getting into seniors homes and things
like that. I'm creating an event and a community that is about refiring. How do we go get funding?
How do we get VC capital? How do we get loans and insurance and build these businesses and
enterprises that these people want to launch? Some of them are social enterprises. Some
of them are nonprofits. Some of them are businesses. And it's for two reasons that this is going
on. One is either they don't want to spend the next 20 or 30 or 40 years golfing and
knitting or they can't afford to or both. And so we're living longer. It used to be
you retired at 65 and you died by 75. So you only had to save up for 10 years. And now
we're living to our hundreds and beyond. There's more a hundred year olds in the world today
than there has been cumulatively in history. And people that are being born now are going
to live to 130. So literally 65 is middle age very soon. So we need to rethink about
what it means to age nowadays. I call it how we're aging, staging and living at this stage.
So part of what I would say is there's not a lot of resources for people around entrepreneurialism.
There are some aging groups and organizations that are looking at how to get people back
into corporate or in the workplace. That's a challenge. Because like you said, it's cheaper
to hire younger people. There's all sorts of notions that older people are not tech
savvy, can't do the work, are going to leave in a couple of years. The reality is the older
demographic is more stable and more likely to stay with you than for instance millennials
or gen zeds who are going to leave in two years almost guaranteed. So we need to adjust
a lot of thinking in our society. There's some really good books. So one book that I
would highly recommend is called This Chair Rocks, Manifesto Against Ageism by Ashton
Applewhite. It's intelligently written. It's fascinating. There's so much information in
there. Things that I didn't know. Like I didn't know that only 2% of the population in Canada
live in seniors homes, like in assisted living. I thought that as you got older, you ended
up there. That was just inevitable. But no, only 2%. And I think it's actually 2% in the
US and 3% in Canada or something like that. But only a tiny percentage of our population
ends up there. The rest live unassisted until they die and they're reinventing themselves.
I've talked to people who are in their 60s, 70s and 80s, not 90s yet, but 80s, late 80s,
who are just getting going. Literally there was a woman in Calgary who was nominated for
top 8 over 80 for creating an award-winning app in her technology company that she started
at 86.
Wow. That's awesome.
Yeah. So This Chair Rocks by Ashton Applewhite is a great resource on ageism. And by the
way, ageism doesn't just affect older people. It's also ageism against younger people as
well. They're on both ends of the spectrum. There are issues and challenges. And it's
really quite subtle and insidious and condoned. There's this notion that it's okay to just
overlook people because they have gray hair and that it's okay that they're invisible
and it's not an issue. And that's like, yeah, no, it's not okay. There's also something
that Ashton created called Old School. And I believe the URL is oldschool.info.
He is a pun champion. I like this guy.
Yeah. And her oldschool.info site is a wealth of resources. She has events and podcasts
and groups and organizations and books and a ton of resources on there about anything
and everything related to being older, albeit very little about entrepreneurialism. So that's
again, because there just isn't a lot out there yet. So that's why I'm creating an event
and a membership community and a magazine and I have a podcast and I want to create
a platform where these people can come together, be seen, be heard and be supported in creating
amazing things in the world.
Have those relevant resources. You heard it.
Exactly.
That's it. Awesome. Well, I appreciate you bringing those up, Jeanette. And of course,
bringing up your resources in the process and understanding that if you don't go to
the library and you can't find, you go to the library, you can't find the resource.
How cool is that that you're creating it? I think that's amazing. So we'll be right
back after a short break. We're going to dive in further to maturepreneurship, talk about
Jeanette's dream and vision and continue with some of the best worst leadership experiences
and beyond.
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.
Hey, what's up, everybody? Welcome into another episode of Vision Pros Live. I'm your show
host, Jackson Calame, founder and CEO of First Class Business. I'm excited to have Jeanette
Anderson on stage today. We're talking about maturepreneurship, entrepreneurship for those
who are getting started, 55 and older. So if you're not 55 or older, I hope you know somebody
who is. If you don't, you need to get outside of your silo a little bit. But there's lots
of people who in the workforce are either struggling to find a job or they know they've
got a purpose to fulfill. This is a great episode to refer them to and have them come
in and learn from Jeanette's wisdom and how she's leading the cause for just that.
So before we dive in and bring Jeanette back on stage, we're going to talk a little bit
about some of the resources I've come across that I've been inspired enough to add to my
sponsorship. These are not paid sponsors. These are people whose programs I really like.
And I'm like, man, I wish more entrepreneurs in their cities were out there. So one is
the loss. But I guess you could kind of consider them paid because Melissa Gray is a client
of ours. But I would have put her up. In fact, they put her up here before she was a client.
Melissa blew my mind. She's coming on to our show. So you can watch that episode and find
an attorney who doesn't condescend at you, somebody who's also has the capability of
nurturing somebody who understands the human to human connection. And she helps business
owners understand that law doesn't have to be complicated. She's got a podcast coming
out too called Beyond the Goal, where she's going to be interviewing young athletes and
musicians as well who are on the rise about what is their vision and purpose beyond the
goal. So I don't think there's any... Look at the poetic irony between that and entrepreneurship
right now. That's fun. And in addition to that, I have been through some serious legal battles
with business. In fact, I bet any entrepreneur who's been in business for longer than five
years has had to face that, whether it was a $20,000 lawsuit to maintain our trademark
for our brand name or whether it was Apple patenting our software that happened to. So
when you find yourself in that situation, you either choose to put your head in a hole
like an ostrich and just pretend it's not happening, or sometimes you end up hiring
somebody and supply and demand's not in your favor when you're in the position where you
have that need and you haven't done your research well. So all I would recommend is take the
time, maybe interview Melissa as you look at your potential legal counsel, put yourself
in a position where you can know for certainty that you have been a wise steward about running
your ventures. It is so important to do, because once you... Especially once you get on the
map and you're really growing, people that aren't necessarily with the best intentions
might come along and try to derail you. It does happen. Then there's Andrew Sosin of
Recovery Unplugged. What a leader amongst men. This man has put together a team of over
400 individuals and he is helping people overcome addictions. And the way they're incorporating
music into this also hits home in my heart as a closet musician or a campfire. I guess
I can't call myself a closet musician with a guitar behind me, but campfire musician.
He used to be in a number of different states only with COVID. They were forced to bring
their program online. It became one of the greatest blessings for the world because they
expanded their capacity to serve people in a virtual environment. They have a 24-7 hotline.
If you or a loved one need help and support for some type of addiction, if you find yourself
feeling like you don't have purpose, the gurus who tell you that you don't know what you're
doing in life, I don't think that's necessarily the case. You find yourself feeling kind of
alone and without the support that you need. Once again, it might not be the best idea
to go to a bar to try to feel inclusion. You might want to find out what's going on to
where you can find peace, where you can potentially find happiness. I'm not the guru who can provide
that, but Andrew's program, he's dedicated so much time to that. If you're a Tony Robbins
fan, you'll especially love him. He's gone to the Tony Robbins events 22 years in a row.
The amount of dedication he's put into understanding self-mastery, self-discipline, personal development
and beyond just blows my mind. I really hope that if there's one person listening to this
helps, then I'll be at peace that we had the opportunity to put him on the show here too.
Then there's the water project. The water project is near and dear to my heart because
I've never ever had to suffer without water. I don't know if any of you know what that
feels like, but I just can't imagine what it would be like to have my children or myself
in a position where we don't have clean water. We have to go three to four miles to get it.
These people that you see on the screen right now, we're in just that position where they
were drinking from unsafe resources. Now there's millions of people in the world that face
this challenge and those of us privileged enough to rock the mic or listen to a podcast,
I would request that if you're not in a position to give back to one of these communities,
that you share it with a friend, share it with somebody who could give back. Or if you
know of another cause that where people have a lot of needs, don't hesitate to drop that
in the comments. We really want to help as many people as we can. There's 8 billion people
in this world to help. As we come together and do just that, it's amazing what type of
effects we can ripple effects we can have as they call it. Now these communities, if
you do donate, you get to see the outcome of the project itself. So if you get $5, $10,
they'll send you an email update of what's going on with that community and you get to
see that project come to fruition. And then I recommend going on a walk and meditating.
How might that have changed their lives? I'm going to leave that with you today. I hope
you get the chance to dive in and think about that, the power of meditation and internalizing
intentionally what it is your actions are and what the cause and effect of those actions
could be is a powerful way to tap into, again, just real purpose in life and understanding
your value in society. I hope none of you have any doubt about that. I love you all.
I appreciate every single one of you. I'm grateful for you being here. Jeanette Anderson,
we're going to go right back to you and bring you on stage. It is such an honor to have
you on the show.
Thank you. And I love your heart, Jackson. I love how you support in such an amazing
and I hate to use the word, but I can't think of another one, authentic way. It is because
authentic is just so overused now. That's part of the challenge. But I really, really
love how you show up in the world.
Well, thank you. I hope authentic is overused because everybody's leaning more towards authentic.
And we know the AI and online world's making that a little bit difficult to believe. But
I will hold out hope that there are lots of us leaning in towards our authenticity. Thank
you, JP Sears. I'll give a shout out to him for being one of the catalysts to help me.
The comedian, I don't know if you know him, but man, that guy, what a brilliant display
of somebody diving into their true self. So Jeanette Anderson, thank you for that. That's
beautiful. And I see you uplifting people in all sorts of different ways. Put you in
touch with Franklin Anderson, Franklin Parker. Mixed y'all's names up a little bit there.
Y'all didn't get married yet, did you?
No, not yet. I'm not sure he's into Polly Amory because he is married already with kids,
but he's lovely.
Yeah.
Oh, it was so awesome. It was fun to just sit back and watch you two connect and see
how that man, there's so much beauty in both these individuals. So thank you for taking
the time to do that the other day. And what is your vision for those that you serve? What
do you hope to see them achieve? What's on the other side or on the horizon for them?
Well, that's, there's two answers to that. One is I have been up until now working predominantly
with women. It was a calling I got about 10 years, 11 years ago. I had a meditation, a
meditation, and it was really the purpose of that is to shift the world from fear to
love one happy and empowered woman at a time. And I would love to say that I jumped right
into that vision, but I didn't. I resisted it heartily. I didn't think I was the right
leader. I didn't really like women at the time because I mostly worked with men. You
know, I have a lot of excuses. Anyways, I finally did go all in. And when I did, then
I understood why women, why now and why me. And a lot of that is about shifting how we,
how we do business in the world, because how we do business is how we do life in so many
ways to a more collaborative model, to a more co-creative model. How do we start to create
some real equity and sustainability in every area? And I think that it was time, it is
time for women to step up and truly partner with men because we haven't been and take
some of the weight off, off your shoulders and also create more of that true equity.
So that's been a lot of the work I've been doing. And how I do that is by helping them
figure out their purpose. What's their why? Why did they do what they do? And how do they
turn that into something that profits both them and themselves and other people? And
so that's one way that I serve is help them really figure out how to expand as a leader
and step into creating a really viable business that serves them and serves their community.
So that's the work I've been doing for the past, well, 40 years actually, but with women
specifically for the past over a decade. And now my focus is shifting to maturepreneurs
as we change our demographic changes often. Having been the brunt of ageism and literally
ignored at a business event a few years ago, I, cause you know, I'm, I'm a fairly visible
person. I have blue hair, I have polka dot glasses, I'm fairly loud and you know, people
don't tend to ignore me very often. I've never had that experience before until I got 60,
get 60 years old. And then it was like, oh, I'm now suddenly invisible. What, how interesting
is that? And so that really started my curiosity about this whole thing and my deep passion
to change this kind of condone prejudice. So how do I serve? The bottom line is help
them turn what their passion and purpose is into something that they can do as a business
or as a social enterprise or charity or however they want to live into that so that they can
be the difference that only they can be in the world. Cause each of us has our note in
the choir that we sing and their notes important. So I want to get that out into the world.
So how I do that is help them growing their business and being the solution that they're
here to be. Absolutely. Now, curiosity killed the host. I mean, I mean, Kat, but you mentioned
some, I don't want to, I don't want to say it's wrong, but I'm probably going to, you
said something about women and men. You didn't use the word equality, I don't think, but
you talked about something to do with women and maybe not carrying their load. Was that
what I heard? And I'm curious about that. I'm curious to context. Like I'm like, Whoa,
what's this? This is new. I haven't heard this before. And I'm curious about your paradigm
because you know, all perspectives, I was listening to tribal leadership last night,
great book by the way. And it talked about how, you know, when you get too many people
in your circle that all think just like you, that's a dangerous thing. You know, like you
want to have some external inputs and people who do think, you know, maybe, maybe they,
they carry the same values, but they have a completely different way of looking at it.
It talked about not being, not being in business with people who agree with you, but people
who are aligned with you or they still have the freedom to exercise their beliefs in a
completely different way. Teach me. I'm very curious about this.
Yeah. And my framing on that is they resonate with, you resonate with one another's why's.
You have a similar perspective from that way from the world, but you may be accessing it
or, or delivering or living into it in entirely different ways. So the, the thing about the
women thing. So when I got this call, I was very resistant and initially was like, no,
I don't even like women, which was when I kind of went through that, I had to stop and
think why is that? Like what, why am I not like women? And really it's a lot of training.
We are trained very consistently to not trust one another. And until I actually stopped,
stopped and dug down below that belief, I didn't realize that it wasn't really my belief.
It was just something that I had kind of been inculcated with and trained and, and, and
there's very specific reasons why we are taught to not trust one another, which is longer
conversation. But I then started to recognize that, no, it's not that I can't trust women.
And, you know, yeah, there can be some issues, but there can be issues with men as well.
And then I started to really ask why me, why this, why this direction? Why do women need
to step up and out more? Yes, we need economic equity. We're still 80 cents on the dollar
if you're a white woman to be paid for the same job. And it goes down based on, on, you
know, ethnicity to 50 cents on the dollar for Latina women. And so, yeah, we still have
a gender wage gap that needs to be addressed and gaps in a whole bunch of other areas.
But I wasn't really like, I didn't consider myself a staunch feminist, which is why I
like kept saying, I'm pretty sure you meant to call Gloria Steinem or someone like that.
Like, why me? What I really understood was that my perspective on this is that women
have been sitting on our power a lot. And what that means is we've kind of left men
to do the heavy lifting. And yes, we are, are kind of pushed into that position as well.
But the patriarchy is a system that doesn't work for anyone, including old white men.
It just is not, it's a broken system and doesn't have real equity. And that's the word that
I would use rather than equality. Equality means we're the same. We're not the same.
We're very different. And you're different than other men. I'm different than other women.
We're different than each other. But equity is fairness. Equity is that people are treated
appropriately. And that I do want to see. And I think that when we step up and step
into our power and start to lead, then you're no longer left to have to do all of that,
you know, on your own kind of thing. Now, men do also need to let go of some of that
control and power and so on. But there is so much benefit to us partnering to create
a new way of doing things and really partnering, really working together, not against each
other. And there's been so much us versus them sensibility throughout history, but especially
in the last five to 10 years, that's gotten turned up, especially, I think, a lot in America.
And therefore, that kind of ripples out. So I would love to see us partnering with men
to create real equity for everyone. And yes, that means women need to be appreciated and
treated appropriately and, you know, have parity and equity and equality. And we need
to stop being pissed off and start being part of the solution and working with men to co-create
a new way of doing things.
Nice. Well, very good. I appreciate you diving into that as a product of a home of five older
sisters and my mom. You know, it's one of those interesting paradigm shifts, right?
And I think anybody who comes from, you know, my dad's side on the same token, I've got
three brothers, you know, complicated family life. We were predominantly a patriarchal
at home as well and have that belief system. And at the same time, it's so important to
get out of our silos, you know, and to see the different ways that the world can be built.
And so I really appreciate you sharing and diving into that a little bit. We're going
to return to what is your personal vision? What do you see for yourself on the horizon?
Cool. And by the way, I just want to say patriarch, by the way, is not just men. It's a system
that's supported by men and women and needs to be healed by men and women. Okay. So my
vision, my vision. Oh, I have such a big vision. I am so excited about this. I am excited about
stepping into my leadership in a real way. I have developed lots of expertise and really,
truly haven't gotten myself until the like the older I get, the more I can sit in my
value without it coming from ego or from proving and just get who I am and then go be that
in the world in a bigger and louder way, in an unapologetic way, knowing and trusting
that I have a good heart and that I'm going to do my best. That's one of the biggest gifts
of getting older. I love it. And I'm super excited about creating this. I call it my
my mature printer empire in my head. I call it the mature printer world out there, but
I'm excited about the possibilities of that. I'm excited about doing a whole lot more speaking,
traveling the world and speaking about this, starting and igniting some, some recognition,
some passion, some inclusion, some functionality for this group. I, I'm excited by hanging
out with wise, cool, kick ass people all around the world who are up to playing a big game,
whatever that may look like for them. And I'm excited about really one of my secret motivators
that I don't usually share, but I am really excited about being the poster child of it's
never too late that you can go from at 63 having no retirement or very little or not
enough to sustain you to creating a million dollars plus an ability to sustain yourself
within a couple of years, because I know so many people who are in the situation I was
in of not having enough money to retire and being in that despair to know that you can
change that at any point that it's never too late to change your circumstances, change
your life, you are not done by a long shot. And so I'm really excited about being the
poster child of that transition. I'm, you know, a little scared that it won't work,
but I'm also really committed to making it work. So that's, that's really, that gives
me some juice because there's nothing more powerful than an example of something being
done to let us know that we can do it.
I love that. I love that you're willing to do something scary. And I think one of the
majestic feelings of being at the Grand Canyon is that unspoken fear that that scared nature
of like, man, you know, that's a long way down. You know, there's a bit of a perilous
danger that is not too far away. There are survival instincts are naturally going to
kick in and protect us from. So, you know, that's, that's a healthy fear in that regard,
right? As long as it doesn't consume us and prevent us from ever looking at the Grand
Canyon, right? There's, there's opportunity there. New segment today. Why do you think
leaders hide from funding their vision?
Oh, that's an interesting question. I think it's, it's comes back to that fear that you
were talking about the fear of going all in, you know, I got to say, one of the biggest
lessons I've learned in life is that 99% is a bitch. 100% is easy. When we hold back in
any way, whether it's putting our money where our mouth is, or, you know, having a back
door or kind of dipping our toe in, but not really diving in, I call it drowning in the
shallow end of the pool. Like either step, stand up, get out of the pool and go have
a Mai Tai by the side of the pool or dive in and swim one or the other. And I think
the, the hiding from funding their vision is that fear of going all in. And it's what
it does. I know what it's done for me in my life is it, it piddles away the money rather
than having that investment, whether it's time, money, effort, commitment, whatever
it is, rather than having it make a substantial difference because I go all in with it. Or
it just gets dissipated because I just kind of give 10% now and 10% and then 10%. And
it doesn't really have the impact. So what I would say is if you want to step into a
vision, go all in.
You just reminded me of the Zig Ziglar quote, one of his teachings that has made such a
profound difference. I learned it probably 20 years ago. And I continue to draw on it
often and that's that pumping the water at the well and how you just pump a couple of
times really hard, the water is not going to come out if you stop, right? If you just
keep doing that 10%, you're never going to get water out of the well. You've got to really
hit it. And then once it's flowing, you can't stop. But once it's flowing, as long as you
maintain a basic pace, the water is going to flow. And so that going all in aspect,
I think, is a very valid aspect of this. And I'm curious if you want to talk about how
leaders can dive in to funding for their visions because I imagine a lot of the maturepreneurs
are going to face that reality of like, man, how do I make this happen? What are my options?
I'm curious about your take on that. Yeah. And it is one of the things because of the
prejudice of ageism that is really hard, like good luck trying to get a loan from a bank
if you're 70 or 80 or 60, even 65 or venture capital funding. It's really, or even just
insurance like business insurances, like they won't, they just don't insure you, they haven't
caught up yet. So you have to get creative. I think crowdfunding and crowdsourcing is
going to be a big aspect of this market, getting funding. Things like being visible on shows
like Shark Tank and Dragon's Den is another way, coming with that vision to a group of
people. I really believe that the more of us that are going out and looking for funding,
the more that will shift the market. My goal-
You are totally spot on with that. I'm sorry, I got so excited because I haven't heard anybody
say that, but that's exactly right. You're creating a market.
Yes, absolutely. And my goal actually is to create a professional association, the Maturepreneur
Professional Association for the purposes of lobbying and advocacy and going out to
the banking industry and the insurance industry and VCs and so forth and say, hey, you guys
are missing a huge opportunity to make more money and more impact. Wake up. There are
millions of people that you are missing out on. So yeah, the advocacy is going to have
to come after I get some of the other pieces in place, but that's on my radar.
You're doing it right now though. You're already starting it. You're the perfect person to
have started these questions with it. Literally, it came to my mind as you're talking about
your vision, I'm like, new segment, we got to talk about this. You are the literal and
inspiration for those questions coming out of this podcast. So thank you.
And coming back to how do I plan to fund this? You know, one of the things that I've been
like really wrestling with is that I don't want to bootstrap this. Like I have all of
my businesses over my life. I don't want to do this on my own. Like I have done all the
businesses over my life. How do I make this? How do I get out of the way and make this
big fast? And so one of the things that I'm doing is creating an advisory board right
now. And one of their primary goals is to help me get money to fund this vision. And
we're going to do presentations. We're going to do whatever we need to do. We're going
to apply for grants. There are of course grants for young people starting businesses. There
are no grants for older people starting businesses. So I'll be doing some lobbying of grant organizations
that provide grants and governments that provide grants and say like, again, you're missing
out on a big market. How about some money over here? So a lot of it is going to be the
thin edge of the wedge and kind of leading the charge, which is challenging when there
isn't a market to create a market. However, I'm just going to ask a lot of people to fund
this vision if they believe in it. And that's how I'm going to do it. And that's how I assume
most of the maturepreneurs are going to do it is to let their passion lead the way and
ask. There aren't traditional...
That's the angel investor market. And it is overlooked by so many and the promissory notes
are overlooked and not talked about. And if we don't talk about it, we don't learn about
it, then how the heck are we ever going to do it? So very, very great. I love the plan.
I'm so glad that you're leading the way on that. Maturepreneurs will benefit tremendously
from it. And it's a matter of... I call it founding members as well, right? Bringing
in those founding members and helping them see the legacy that they're creating. So you're
leaning heavily into that process. And I think it's amazing. So thank you for talking all
about it. And I hope we're able to lead many more people to see the value of doing just
that. Let's dive into a dark subject. What's the worst leadership experience you've ever
had?
Okay. I'm going to answer that, but I want to credit you for an idea you just gave me.
The association is going to have the founding 50 and they get a reduced fee and so forth.
But I'm also now going to add a piece where they can optionally donate to the fund to
create this platform. So thank you for that.
You know what? Let's hit that one more time because I was talking to another visionary
the other day and she had 36 people on her board of advisors. And as we dove into the
reality of that, she had 36 people who were rah rah cheering and nobody was putting their
money where their mouth was. I was like, you don't need 36 people on your board. Not 36
people who aren't willing to participate. She's like, Oh, I might get a hundred dollars
out of each of them. And I'm like, not to be on a board. I was like, you don't need
36 distractions, 36 chiefs. You need people who are actually bought into this. You know,
and I didn't tell her she needs, I don't tell people what to do. I don't tell people what
to do. But point being, you know, we've got to have the real sincere conversations with
people who say they're following and who say they're founding, who say that's a founding,
right? That's talking about building a foundation that something stands on. And that that sometimes
takes some tough conversations. Either give me the feedback as to why you're not all in,
right? Or give me or give me the no so I can move forward and find the people who are or
help me build this. Yeah, I truly help me build this. It's not enough to just get enough
people to say yes. And I like what you're doing. You go do the work mother. Real little
red hen. We got some real board members. Thank you. That was that was a really contextually
expanding comment for me. So thank you. I am now shifting the membership and the advisory
board opt in process. So that's cool. Oh, I'm so happy to hear that. Well, me too. We're
always shifting, optimizing, upgrading a lot of people to serve, right? So, okay, now we'll
dive into the dark subject. All right. What's your leadership experience that you've ever
had? You mean other people are seen? It could be the one that's going to be most powerful
and beneficial. Okay. Looking to the scene of perhaps. I worked for a large corporation
that was a Fortune 500 company in Canada in 2001 and put together the largest deal that
they had ever had in their in their history of $1.5 million, $1.2 million. The second
phase was 1.5. And the short version of the story is rather than pay me the commission
due on that, they fired me because they were having a bad quarter and they didn't want
to have to pay out that money. And that and so not only did I not get that commission,
but I also didn't get paid the $20,000 in the expenses that I had accrued. And I was
fired by the phone when I had literally gone 76 days in a row without a break because I
was filling in two vice president roles while they found new vice presidents and had literally
for 76 days in a row worked 16 hour days and they fired me. So I can tell the story in
great detail about how I was victimized and how wrong that was and so forth. The accountable
version of that is I knew they had a history of firing people to save money when they had
about that quarter and didn't protect myself against that. I did have a lawyer that was
going to take it on pro bono and fight it for me because it was so clearly documented.
Like it was an it was a open and shut case that they owed me the money. But I would have
had to stay in litigation for probably a couple of years. It was from one province to another.
And I would have needed to stay angry for a couple of years to stay in that process
and stay in that game. And I just didn't want to. And I was completely burnt out. So these
leaders had a and it wasn't just one, it was a culture had a short term vision of immediate
solutions that had long term impacts. So to save themselves that hundred and twenty thousand
dollars, they lost a one point five million dollar sale. They have a bad reputation in
the industry. It had a huge impact on morale of my team and department. So what I would
say is bad leaders find short term solutions that they think are they're plugging holes
in the dyke. Stop. Build a better structure and then you don't have to plug holes in it.
And and they don't you know, this particular firm had four in-house legal councils and
a full time firm out of house because they were so litigious and because they did so
many things that required people to sue them. And like, don't don't try and get away with
in the short term what you think will save you. Do what will you know, and I don't mean
this. Well, maybe I do mean it religiously, but you will save your soul in the long term.
Do what will actually have you be the person that you want to be long term. And it's so
easy when you're struggling in the short term to make those those choices and decisions
based on that. But you pay big time for it later. So longer term vision, even when you're
struggling in the short term is going to keep you happier and healthier and whole longer
going forward. So it it what it did was from two for me, whatever, was precipitated a real
period of burnout and really, frankly, depression. I ended up having to declare bankruptcy. It
was quite devastating. But all of the fallout, it was such an incredible feeling of betrayal
that it took me literally a couple of years to process and work through that. And it did
cure me of my aberrant behavior of going back into corporate corporate work. Never do that
again. A story from that is, well, kind of funny. They fired me on the Friday. On Monday,
I got a call from HR and 911 on the I got a call from HR on the 13th saying, Are you
okay? I said, No, I'm not okay. And they said, Well, where where are you? And I said, I mean,
Calgary. And they said, Well, what's what's wrong? Are you physically okay? Yeah, I'm
physically okay. It took us quite a book five minutes to figure out what's going on. Road
Warrior and had been, you know, flying back and forth. They thought they were checking
to see if I was on one of the planes. They were checking if I was okay, physically okay.
On 911 or if I was okay. And I thought they were calling about having been fired. And
for injury. Yeah, it was it was really insult injury. And it was like, Yeah, no, I'm physically
I'm okay. No, I wasn't on any of the planes. And no, I'm not okay. How I was fired and
why I was fired was not okay. So that was probably my worst leadership experience ever.
Yeah, there's a there's a lot of lessons done back from that one. Yeah, we're gonna we're
gonna save the unpacking. We'll let the visionaries do that today. For the sake of time, we're
gonna move right into the opposite. Let's go to the light. What's the best leadership
experience you've ever had? Well, I would say hmm, I've had a lot of different experiences
with interesting different moments that have really been pivotal. But one of the people
that really impacted me the most was a man named Reverend Chunggu Park. It was a long,
long time ago. And he used to he would speak to this international student group that I
was part of back when I was 20. And, and he used to say in a very indomitable spirit Korean
kind of way, child, you must live a story life, a story life. After I got over being
intimidated, I went, you know, that's probably the best advice I had ever gotten. And, and
I heard it in two ways. One is be aware of the stories that I tell myself, because we're
making it all up. So we might as well tell better stories about what's happening. And
because that's just going to help us and empower us and telling crappy stories. Like I can
tell you the crappy story about that worst leadership and I can tell you the empowering
story. They're both true. So I might as well tell the empowering one because that actually
helps me more. So one, tell better stories. And the second thing was, live a story life,
have stories to tell about your life. And so I cannot tell you how many people say to
me literally, probably almost monthly, my entire life, man, you have to write a book,
you've lived such an amazing life. It's because of that piece of advice from him. I really
took it to heart and, and we don't really leave much behind aside from whatever that
legacy is, we might hope to, and the stories that we have lived, and that will be told
about this. And that is probably the best piece of advice I ever got. It's certainly
the thing that shifted the trajectory of my life the most. And he was also just an incredible
example of commitment, which I think is the most powerful thing any person or leader can
do. He had when he was giving that speech, he had cancer through 96% of his body. And
he literally was powerfully going around the world speaking at a pace that his younger
assistants could not keep up with. He was indomitable. And so I also really learned
from that example, energy is a choice, how we show up is a choice. There are always things
that we can have pull us back that have an impact. And certainly as human beings, we
have shit happens, right? But how we show up in the world is a choice. And he was probably
my biggest teacher by example of choosing powerful.
Wow. That is, that's amazing. Thank you for sharing that story. I'm going to let that
resonate with people to drive right into the opportunity for you to share one of these
powerful lessons. I want to put some context on this, Jeanette. So if this was your last
chance to share a powerful lesson with those who are listening, what powerful lesson can
other visionaries learn from your experience?
This question is kind of like the last lecture that they do at MIT, which I think is powerful.
And if you've never seen Randy Pausch's last lecture, go watch it. What powerful lesson?
I would say the power of commitment and choice are the two things we have control over. And
that can make us or break us. Lack of commitment, lack of being in the driver's seat is what
can help us live the lives we're committed to living or put us at the effect of our life
in the world. So I would say the most powerful thing that you can work on honing and developing
is your willingness and ability to commit, go all in, and the fact, the accountability
of being the chooser in your life. Two things that have made the most difference in my life
overall.
That was a way to double down on that best leadership experience. I love the way that
you revere the reverend. That is just awesome. Well, is there, in terms of maturepreneurship,
leadership or just final parting thoughts, is there anything else that you'd like to
share today before we wrap up? Because this has been super rich. I know we're right at
the top of the hour almost. So any final things you'd like to share with the audience?
The last thing I would really encourage is get some help in finding your why, because
often it's the thing that's on the end of our nose and we can't really see it or articulate
it, your purpose, your mission, whatever you want to call it. Get some support in really
seeing that, because there's nothing, there's very little more powerful in our lives than
having a compelling purpose. We are human, human beings are meaning-making machines.
So have a meaning that pulls you forward, that inspires you, that lights you up, that
gets you out of bed in the morning. And then have fun living into that. That's, I think,
probably the best thing that anybody can spend time, money, effort, et cetera on is having
that compelling why and then using it to help you in the market, to get you out of bed,
to enroll others. Yeah, that's what I would say.
That is what like great investors teach over and over and over and over again, that I see
so few people really listening to. It's not about the mechanics of the executive business
summary and the pro forma's and that it can be, if you want to track the wrong types of
investors, but if you're a passion-filled visionary, or you want to be, you yearn for
it, I love that advice. I had lots of help finding my why. And then you talked about
it too. You said not only just help finding your why, but also developing it so that you
can talk about it. If you don't, your vision is going to sound and feel and come across
to others like a shell of an experience. And people don't want an empty vessel. They want
something fulfilling, something fulfilled, something that's really driven by something
of extreme purpose. So once again, I know that's fantastic and wise counsel.
Those of you who are listening in, on the landing page, we will have the action steps
that Jeanette recommends taking. And then we're also going to have on there above that
a button that says, be our guest. If you have a vision that you want to share, do not hesitate
to come onto our stage, take the commitment, make the choice, take the action steps to
come and join us. And if there's anything we can do for you, if you just want to leave
a comment on a social media platform of your choice, we will get back to those as well.
If you have a question, don't hesitate to leave that for us. We are very much here to
serve you or we appreciate all of you coming and listening. We hope you subscribe. We hope
that you like the channel and share this with others as well. And visionaries, everybody
have an excellent rest of your day and week. We'll see you in the next episode. Take care
everybody.
Thank you for being here today. I'm really happy that you tuned into 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. Have an excellent time building out your vision.