1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,560 commercial break. We'll come back and talk about the vision right after that. So the 2 00:00:05,560 --> 00:00:11,840 good, the badly, the good, the badly, the good, the bad, and the ugly of outsourcing. 3 00:00:11,840 --> 00:00:18,200 I said hiring, right? And we've got an opportunity to look at both of those entrepreneurs listening 4 00:00:18,200 --> 00:00:22,760 in, visionaries listening in, you're in for an absolute treat. We are going to crush this 5 00:00:22,760 --> 00:00:31,160 subject and pulverize it to get all of the or and awful stuff off to create an absolute 6 00:00:31,160 --> 00:00:37,240 pile of gold for you. That's mine and Sean's goal today. Why, why outsourcing and not hiring? 7 00:00:37,240 --> 00:00:43,640 Teach me Sean. Speed generally. I mean, if you've got something that needs to get done 8 00:00:43,640 --> 00:00:48,080 and you don't have time to hire, you generally outsource. If you don't have the expertise 9 00:00:48,080 --> 00:00:53,160 in house, right? I mean, outsourcing could be an accountant. It could be an advocate. 10 00:00:53,160 --> 00:00:57,320 Let me take that up a notch. I'm going to refine already. You said generally, generally 11 00:00:57,320 --> 00:01:03,760 businesses fail 96% of the time within 10 years, 4% survive, but they still have the 12 00:01:03,760 --> 00:01:09,960 same problems as the 96% have failed. Most people never make it successfully in business 13 00:01:09,960 --> 00:01:16,400 and at least the stats from the SBA. And another side says only 60% fail. Either way, I would 14 00:01:16,400 --> 00:01:24,560 never send my kids to a school where the failure rate is that high. Hiring outsourcing. Let's 15 00:01:24,560 --> 00:01:30,440 refine it further outside of general. Why outsourcing? Because you don't have the expertise 16 00:01:30,440 --> 00:01:34,720 and you need it. You know, not every, you can't be good at everything. You have to know 17 00:01:34,720 --> 00:01:40,800 your weaknesses, know where your gaps are. And sometimes you hire that in, but hiring 18 00:01:40,800 --> 00:01:45,040 is a slow process and you need to be sure about it because you're going to keep that 19 00:01:45,040 --> 00:01:52,400 person in the company for a long time. Sometimes you need a jolt of something. Maybe it's an 20 00:01:52,400 --> 00:01:57,240 advertising agency that'll help you get to the right market. Maybe it's an accountant. 21 00:01:57,240 --> 00:02:02,400 But in my case, my expertise is outsourcing for engineering and the do's and don'ts of 22 00:02:02,400 --> 00:02:09,640 that, which is a massive issue because you're getting hit with your inbox is loaded with 23 00:02:09,640 --> 00:02:14,240 engineering companies offering to build you a web application or a mobile application 24 00:02:14,240 --> 00:02:20,000 or whatever. You never know who to trust. So here's what I hear you saying from my past 25 00:02:20,000 --> 00:02:24,400 experience, right? And we're trying to build Zoho out with one of our companies a long 26 00:02:24,400 --> 00:02:29,720 time ago. And I start consulting with all the engineers out there and they've got, not 27 00:02:29,720 --> 00:02:33,480 only do I have to pay for Zoho at that point and all the complicated that it is to try 28 00:02:33,480 --> 00:02:37,080 to get that in order, but now we have this fee of this engineering firm that might come 29 00:02:37,080 --> 00:02:43,320 in and their quote was around $8,000. It was pretty small. It wasn't that significant for 30 00:02:43,320 --> 00:02:47,520 the size of the entity we were working with. Fast forward years later and I'm building 31 00:02:47,520 --> 00:02:53,440 with the same types of engineers and go high level, which is far cheaper than Zoho. And 32 00:02:53,440 --> 00:02:59,360 I've got engineers around the $700 point. This was again, a couple of years ago and 33 00:02:59,360 --> 00:03:04,960 this firm built some amazing, I got 50,000 square foot house for us basically. I mean, 34 00:03:04,960 --> 00:03:12,280 it looks so good, but our company in hindsight needed about a 1000 square foot house. Now 35 00:03:12,280 --> 00:03:16,320 we've got the maintenance problems of a 50,000 square foot house and all the costs associated 36 00:03:16,320 --> 00:03:21,120 with it. We can't use any of the rooms because we're not at scale. And so they came in and 37 00:03:21,120 --> 00:03:29,600 made this giant coffin for us that pretty much ate us alive. That challenge of engineering, 38 00:03:29,600 --> 00:03:32,440 that's kind of one of the angles you're talking about. Am I correct? 39 00:03:32,440 --> 00:03:39,300 Yeah, you're absolutely right. So you have to be set up for outsourcing before you do 40 00:03:39,300 --> 00:03:46,480 it. And either through great advice from a constituent of mentoring friends who know 41 00:03:46,480 --> 00:03:54,040 technology well, that can filter things for you if you're not an engineering founder or 42 00:03:54,040 --> 00:03:59,840 having an in-house lead engineer at the very least. What I'm talking about outsourcing, 43 00:03:59,840 --> 00:04:06,840 I'm talking about really scale up and Buddha as opposed to build out. If you're building 44 00:04:06,840 --> 00:04:12,800 a proof of concept, you've got an idea and you want to get a company started. The traditional 45 00:04:12,800 --> 00:04:22,600 way of doing it has been to go and get a co-founder engineering partner. And that works some of 46 00:04:22,600 --> 00:04:26,440 the time, but a lot of the time it will work. 47 00:04:26,440 --> 00:04:33,160 Let's look at the stats. I'm with you. It is not working. It is not the way that again, 48 00:04:33,160 --> 00:04:40,400 I don't want to bet my life and my legacy on a process with odds that say 96% chance 49 00:04:40,400 --> 00:04:44,360 of failure. I'm not going to follow the way that people do this. I love that you talk 50 00:04:44,360 --> 00:04:50,680 about lead engineer. Those of you who are like, I don't need a lead engineer. I understand. 51 00:04:50,680 --> 00:04:55,440 You may have a pool company and we're talking about a right-hand man who understands the 52 00:04:55,440 --> 00:04:59,160 areas of business that you don't. So this still is applicable, these principles. I'm 53 00:04:59,160 --> 00:05:04,360 going to pull the principles out, but we are going to dive deep on the engineering side 54 00:05:04,360 --> 00:05:08,760 and whatever needs to happen on the backend, my friends, I'm going to pull other resources 55 00:05:08,760 --> 00:05:14,620 in to translate this into universal language because Sean is right. And this is not an 56 00:05:14,620 --> 00:05:20,640 engineering problem. This is an entrepreneurial visionary problem. We are not experts when 57 00:05:20,640 --> 00:05:26,880 it comes to hiring, unless that happens to have been our core focus for the 10,000 hour 58 00:05:26,880 --> 00:05:33,960 rule, then you should not be handling that yourself or just trying to wing it and hope 59 00:05:33,960 --> 00:05:39,120 you win it. That is not a recipe for success. So thank you for being here today, Sean, and 60 00:05:39,120 --> 00:05:46,800 for being willing to share your expertise. I hear it in that you keep this conversation 61 00:05:46,800 --> 00:05:52,240 far simpler than most tech gurus do. I can hear the fact that you speak both languages. 62 00:05:52,240 --> 00:05:56,680 So you've done a lot to get to where you are as a visionary leader for all the visionary 63 00:05:56,680 --> 00:06:00,920 leaders out there. What are three resources that have helped you get to where you are 64 00:06:00,920 --> 00:06:03,920 today? 65 00:06:03,920 --> 00:06:16,760 Stupidity. No entrepreneur would do it if they knew what they were getting into. And 66 00:06:16,760 --> 00:06:22,080 I keep seeing business problems that I think I can solve. I'm curious and I like to solve 67 00:06:22,080 --> 00:06:23,080 problems. 68 00:06:23,080 --> 00:06:28,360 Power of starting something stupid. 69 00:06:28,360 --> 00:06:32,600 And so you get into these things and then you realize, well, it's not the real, the 70 00:06:32,600 --> 00:06:38,320 problem you thought it was is not the same problem that the market really needs. So you 71 00:06:38,320 --> 00:06:44,480 gain intelligence through experience if you listen. So I would say the highest value you 72 00:06:44,480 --> 00:06:51,600 could get out of it is being a good listener and not taking your ideas, having strong ideas 73 00:06:51,600 --> 00:06:57,160 loosely held is a really good expression. And so going in with open eyes as to what 74 00:06:57,160 --> 00:07:01,680 the market really wants versus what you think is the best idea is a way better approach 75 00:07:01,680 --> 00:07:08,080 than going in and building and trying to figure stuff out and then finding out that everything 76 00:07:08,080 --> 00:07:10,400 is not a nail because you got a hammer. 77 00:07:10,400 --> 00:07:15,340 Correct. Two of my favorite realities. One, I love that expression that it is so easy 78 00:07:15,340 --> 00:07:20,080 to fall victim of once you're selling the hammer, seeing everything as a nail and then 79 00:07:20,080 --> 00:07:27,400 you need people who can help you be more self-aware. Two, I hate the quote, strong opinions loosely 80 00:07:27,400 --> 00:07:35,880 held, but I love my rendition of it, which is opinions delicately held. 81 00:07:35,880 --> 00:07:37,600 Oh, okay. 82 00:07:37,600 --> 00:07:43,160 I would never hand you my baby loosely and I am strong and I will always hold my child 83 00:07:43,160 --> 00:07:48,780 with great strength, but delicately so that you do not squish it. And if I hand that child 84 00:07:48,780 --> 00:07:53,120 or opinion to you, I'm also going to make sure that you're not the type of person who's 85 00:07:53,120 --> 00:08:01,520 going to drop the child. And that is the strong opinions delicately held concept that again, 86 00:08:01,520 --> 00:08:06,800 I hope all of you out there listening, if you have opinions, don't give them to people 87 00:08:06,800 --> 00:08:11,440 who are going to tarnish them or throw them to the ground. Make sure that you are sharing 88 00:08:11,440 --> 00:08:16,280 those with people who are going to honor your opinions and don't strangle your opinion to 89 00:08:16,280 --> 00:08:22,760 death because that's also, it's just not good to be that arrogant in life. What's number 90 00:08:22,760 --> 00:08:23,760 two? 91 00:08:23,760 --> 00:08:26,040 Well, actually I'm going to challenge you a bit on that. 92 00:08:26,040 --> 00:08:28,280 Challenge me on it. Let's do it. 93 00:08:28,280 --> 00:08:32,960 I like the expression. I like the language of it. I have to think more about it, but 94 00:08:32,960 --> 00:08:40,360 I'll tell you why one of that holds true for me at least. So my first company, I'd been 95 00:08:40,360 --> 00:08:46,680 in the sponsorship business. I raised the bank. I raised the money for Vancouver's Olympic 96 00:08:46,680 --> 00:08:52,440 bid. So I knew a lot of people who are chief marketing officers and pretty big brands. 97 00:08:52,440 --> 00:09:01,400 And I had an idea to transform the way advertising was bought and sold in television specifically, 98 00:09:01,400 --> 00:09:05,920 which is where most of the money was at the time. And the idea was pretty disruptive. 99 00:09:05,920 --> 00:09:13,920 It was really to become the Expedia of that business or the E-Trade. Those two industries 100 00:09:13,920 --> 00:09:19,320 were disrupted because the travel agent was the only person back in the old day, probably 101 00:09:19,320 --> 00:09:22,440 a lot of your audience doesn't know what a travel agent is, but it was the person who 102 00:09:22,440 --> 00:09:26,640 you'd go to to ask, where do I go and can you book my flights? Because it wasn't available 103 00:09:26,640 --> 00:09:31,760 online. And all of a sudden it became available to the end user. Same thing with stock trading. 104 00:09:31,760 --> 00:09:37,600 You used to pay a broker 15% for every trade because they were the only ones who knew live 105 00:09:37,600 --> 00:09:43,400 trade data and they could execute for you. So those two industries, big same thing with 106 00:09:43,400 --> 00:09:50,760 the advertising industry. And my idea was to give that data to the end user, the brands, 107 00:09:50,760 --> 00:09:56,760 so that they knew what to buy and when instead of paying their agency 15% for all the media 108 00:09:56,760 --> 00:10:03,680 buys, and we're talking $250 billion industry, so it's a lot of money. And everyone said, 109 00:10:03,680 --> 00:10:07,400 great idea, Sean, great idea, great idea. And one person said, that is the stupidest 110 00:10:07,400 --> 00:10:14,000 idea I've ever heard. What are you talking about? And because nine out of 10 had said, 111 00:10:14,000 --> 00:10:19,040 yes, I could have said this person's an idiot, but that person was telling me the real truth, 112 00:10:19,040 --> 00:10:24,360 which I really like. And his response was, look, hey, I'm the chief marketing officer 113 00:10:24,360 --> 00:10:29,280 of a multi-billion dollar brand. How do you think I got here? So you're good at it. He 114 00:10:29,280 --> 00:10:35,000 says, yeah, I'm pretty good, but I don't make a lot of mistakes. I don't take a lot of risks. 115 00:10:35,000 --> 00:10:41,360 Okay. And so when I'm doing a campaign, I've got my creative agencies and then all that 116 00:10:41,360 --> 00:10:46,520 creative content is sold through or bought through or distributed through one media buying 117 00:10:46,520 --> 00:10:54,040 agency and they do the campaign. So what happens when the campaign fails? I guess, you know, 118 00:10:54,040 --> 00:10:58,760 you tell them they failed. No, I fire the agency. In your scenario where I have all 119 00:10:58,760 --> 00:11:03,480 the people buying the media for me, if the campaign fails, guess who gets fired? They 120 00:11:03,480 --> 00:11:11,080 do. No, no, I do. So I'm not going to do that. It's not going to work. And it was true. And 121 00:11:11,080 --> 00:11:18,760 so really it's, you know, great ideas, technology, technology engineers, you know, we, people 122 00:11:18,760 --> 00:11:25,120 in the tech sector tend to design and build stuff and hope that it sells. And they don't 123 00:11:25,120 --> 00:11:31,160 think that the truth is the friction is always people. And the friction in introducing a 124 00:11:31,160 --> 00:11:38,960 product is going to be the, the, the behavior of people as opposed to the new technology. 125 00:11:38,960 --> 00:11:45,040 Right. So you really have to look at that. And the line at the, so the other lesson is 126 00:11:45,040 --> 00:11:49,960 follow the path of least resistance. And, and that is different from the straightest 127 00:11:49,960 --> 00:11:55,960 path. So you think about, you know, mathematics and logic, the straightest path is the best 128 00:11:55,960 --> 00:12:01,000 way to go. No, then you have to get to Starbucks and you realize there's U-turns that you have 129 00:12:01,000 --> 00:12:05,920 to take and there's walls that you run into if you don't go the right way. So the analogy 130 00:12:05,920 --> 00:12:10,640 is nature, right? You look at a river, a river doesn't, where was the juxtaposition though? 131 00:12:10,640 --> 00:12:15,400 Cause I heard alignment, but where was the juxtaposition? Where was the, where was the 132 00:12:15,400 --> 00:12:20,720 conflict of the strong opinions delicately held? 133 00:12:20,720 --> 00:12:25,800 Oh, because I had a strong opinion and it had been reinforced by all these people. And 134 00:12:25,800 --> 00:12:30,760 I had to loosen the hold on that because somebody had come up with a better idea and it actually 135 00:12:30,760 --> 00:12:33,560 transformed the business I went into, which was, 136 00:12:33,560 --> 00:12:39,640 I still see that as delicately held. So I like it though. I like the example and the 137 00:12:39,640 --> 00:12:44,480 reality. I'm hoping too, that all you visionaries listening in, the idea behind this or both 138 00:12:44,480 --> 00:12:51,020 of us is make sure that you're not suffocating your opinions. You know, that you are able 139 00:12:51,020 --> 00:12:57,360 to hear and receive the opinions of others. My other end of that was a more of a Dan Martell 140 00:12:57,360 --> 00:13:02,680 or Gary Vaynerchuk inspired reality that if you're in an environment and actually Taylor 141 00:13:02,680 --> 00:13:08,180 Welch, here to give him credit, if you're in an environment where it is a weak environment, 142 00:13:08,180 --> 00:13:11,480 people are going to tear you apart or they're going to hate your opinions and persecute 143 00:13:11,480 --> 00:13:15,800 you or kill you for it. Then again, that's not necessarily the environment where you 144 00:13:15,800 --> 00:13:19,480 want to share your opinions. You might want to find yourself surrounded by people who 145 00:13:19,480 --> 00:13:23,520 are going to support you, challenge you, you know, they'll help you see things differently, 146 00:13:23,520 --> 00:13:28,640 but they're not out to get you or hurt or harm. And some of us are blessed to have more 147 00:13:28,640 --> 00:13:34,000 good people in our lives than, than, or people with appreciation for us than others. What's 148 00:13:34,000 --> 00:13:37,260 the second resource you recommend? 149 00:13:37,260 --> 00:13:47,880 So it's really, if you're talking about, obviously these businesses run out of cash. I mean, 150 00:13:47,880 --> 00:13:53,800 you talk about that 96% and they run out of cash. Absolutely. And for a while you didn't 151 00:13:53,800 --> 00:13:58,440 need to worry about that. I mean, there was so much cash floating around in the market 152 00:13:58,440 --> 00:14:01,640 that- Who? Who didn't need to worry about that? 153 00:14:01,640 --> 00:14:06,100 Help me understand that. Venture back companies. I mean, they would get overstocked with cash 154 00:14:06,100 --> 00:14:12,480 and get lazy about business fundamentals. And you know, really a good business should 155 00:14:12,480 --> 00:14:17,960 be profitable. There may be an investment period where you need to raise cash, but you 156 00:14:17,960 --> 00:14:24,360 should be targeting some activity, the activity that will actually deliver some profit that 157 00:14:24,360 --> 00:14:29,400 you can reinvest in the business and therefore not necessarily have to get it out. But eventually 158 00:14:29,400 --> 00:14:35,680 you'll get to a point of where you've got a fantastic formula that can scale. In other 159 00:14:35,680 --> 00:14:40,240 words, you know, for every dollar you're going to get in, you get $10 out. So let's get $10 160 00:14:40,240 --> 00:14:45,120 now. If you don't have $10, that's a good time to go. But if you don't have that formula 161 00:14:45,120 --> 00:14:50,440 and you're not, there's no path to profitability, maybe not such a good business to be in, especially 162 00:14:50,440 --> 00:14:52,800 now where money's a lot tighter. 163 00:14:52,800 --> 00:14:57,120 I got it. That makes sense. And there's a, you know, let's look at the stats real quick. 164 00:14:57,120 --> 00:15:01,560 The Google stats, right? The real quick ones, not the, not the end all stats, no stats are 165 00:15:01,560 --> 00:15:07,000 end all by the way, my friends, approximately 30% of startups with venture backing end up 166 00:15:07,000 --> 00:15:13,200 failing, right? Well, you got to think about timelines on that around 75% of all FinTech 167 00:15:13,200 --> 00:15:20,900 startups crash within two decades. So they have a much stronger chance of survival than 168 00:15:20,900 --> 00:15:25,160 other companies that are not venture backed, right? There's important variables to look 169 00:15:25,160 --> 00:15:33,000 at that. And one of those big variables is exactly what Sean said, cash. I'm a huge believer 170 00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:37,560 in you've got to have a treasury in order to win the battle and in order to witness the 171 00:15:37,560 --> 00:15:42,040 effect of like the benefits of the compound effect. If you have a hundred dollars in a 172 00:15:42,040 --> 00:15:47,720 savings account and you're in 3% in a year, you made $3 and it doesn't feel like a victory. 173 00:15:47,720 --> 00:15:53,040 You have a hundred million dollars in a savings account, you make $3 million in that savings 174 00:15:53,040 --> 00:15:58,120 account. And if your expenses are lower than that, then you'll never run out of capital. 175 00:15:58,120 --> 00:16:03,480 So cash is a very, very important aspect of growth. And I'm grateful that you brought 176 00:16:03,480 --> 00:16:10,240 it up. Any other thoughts on cash before we move to resource three? 177 00:16:10,240 --> 00:16:14,340 Even though you get, you can get lots, you know, windfall from like, you'll get money 178 00:16:14,340 --> 00:16:18,920 from venture. If you've got a good idea and you've got a good market to get into and you've, 179 00:16:18,920 --> 00:16:24,880 you've got the right team to execute on it. Just be careful about overburnt. Like still 180 00:16:24,880 --> 00:16:30,200 be a boot, think like a bootstrapper. If you're experimenting beyond what you've experimented 181 00:16:30,200 --> 00:16:34,960 to get to the cash, if you're executing on a scale up on what you've got to get to the 182 00:16:34,960 --> 00:16:42,260 cash, then do that, right? $1 in $10 out. That's awesome. But if it's, if it's to go 183 00:16:42,260 --> 00:16:48,000 and get distracted and other, other new initiatives and shiny objects, that's where cash starts 184 00:16:48,000 --> 00:16:51,320 to burn out. But it's still important to have other adjacencies. 185 00:16:51,320 --> 00:16:56,960 But it's a, it's a vehicle and the vehicles, just like if I get in the Lamborghini drunk, 186 00:16:56,960 --> 00:17:00,480 you know, and, and also put beer goggles on or something too, it's like, I'm going to 187 00:17:00,480 --> 00:17:05,720 crash into a wall and probably die. Right. You can use your vehicle for a lot of different 188 00:17:05,720 --> 00:17:11,480 realities. We teach our entrepreneurs that they, they should forecast to where they're 189 00:17:11,480 --> 00:17:16,040 going. You know, so if you're playing monopoly before you actually spend the money and you're 190 00:17:16,040 --> 00:17:20,280 actually like looking at where you might be going, you can put yourself in a great position 191 00:17:20,280 --> 00:17:26,400 to use it. And yes, make sure you get the cash. Also entrepreneurs, I wish more of you 192 00:17:26,400 --> 00:17:33,160 would set aside a cash reserve and understand the value of having that cash reserve responsibly. 193 00:17:33,160 --> 00:17:37,700 If you were going to take that and put it into a casino, then don't keep a cash reserve. 194 00:17:37,700 --> 00:17:42,320 Have a business partner, keep the cash reserve who's responsible. But, and you might not 195 00:17:42,320 --> 00:17:46,080 want to let your spouse know that you have a cash reserve, but when spouse is pissed 196 00:17:46,080 --> 00:17:50,480 off at you for never being there and she's tired of making dinner or he's tired of, 197 00:17:50,480 --> 00:17:55,580 of doing that, do a staycation, put yourself in a position to where you can be there properly 198 00:17:55,580 --> 00:18:01,480 for the family while also being there, you know, for your team and moving the business 199 00:18:01,480 --> 00:18:08,800 forward. So I think cash is a very important resource that gets under talked about and 200 00:18:08,800 --> 00:18:13,000 we, we aren't very wise stewards in our lives. We've got to, we've got to be better about 201 00:18:13,000 --> 00:18:17,320 that if we want to truly win with it. So Sean, those are great. What's number three? This 202 00:18:17,320 --> 00:18:18,960 is, this is awesome. 203 00:18:18,960 --> 00:18:25,600 Well, it's, it's always people, you know, people are the, I would say 80% of that failure 204 00:18:25,600 --> 00:18:33,920 rate is people, either the wrong people or battles between them. You know, co-founders 205 00:18:33,920 --> 00:18:37,520 battling each other when things get up and one founder thinks they're not contributing 206 00:18:37,520 --> 00:18:44,320 enough typical case of failure. Not having, you know, the people that you get you to a 207 00:18:44,320 --> 00:18:48,080 certain level are not necessarily the people that get to the next level and you have to 208 00:18:48,080 --> 00:18:52,680 recognize and realize that you're going to, you're going to change your team as you go 209 00:18:52,680 --> 00:19:00,320 along. Some of them will stay. I'm not saying that's universally true, but you know, a lot 210 00:19:00,320 --> 00:19:05,520 of like, like I just said, a co-founder who's a technical expert, if you give that person 211 00:19:05,520 --> 00:19:11,560 30% of the equity, instead of spending a little bit of money to get to pay them. You might 212 00:19:11,560 --> 00:19:16,560 find that that person who bootstrapped your product to get it to product market fit is, 213 00:19:16,560 --> 00:19:20,040 was great till there, but they're not the person who can organize an engineering team 214 00:19:20,040 --> 00:19:23,760 and they're not the person who can hire and scale the product and the product needs to 215 00:19:23,760 --> 00:19:30,200 be scaled and they're really good at firefighting, but they're not really good at architecting. 216 00:19:30,200 --> 00:19:36,960 Those kinds of changes as the company evolves, you know, you want people who are generalists 217 00:19:36,960 --> 00:19:40,440 at the beginning because you're always, you're going to be, have to be pretty agile and move 218 00:19:40,440 --> 00:19:44,920 around with what you're building. And then as you get to a scale up, you need to have 219 00:19:44,920 --> 00:19:49,720 people who really know what they're doing and specialize in certain categories of business. 220 00:19:49,720 --> 00:19:55,880 I do love how softly you talk about the dog eat dog world, you know, of business and it 221 00:19:55,880 --> 00:20:03,360 is not personal, it is business. And I think it's shit for leadership. If we don't understand 222 00:20:03,360 --> 00:20:10,640 that, that it's one thing to point our fingers at one person in an equation that might not 223 00:20:10,640 --> 00:20:16,040 be a fit long-term. It's another, if we're doing that over and over and over, and we 224 00:20:16,040 --> 00:20:22,740 might be in a better position to look at the three fingers pointing back at us as a leader. 225 00:20:22,740 --> 00:20:29,640 And so, and I see Sean, you've got the emotional intelligence to care about people and the 226 00:20:29,640 --> 00:20:34,520 demeanor to say that you really do appreciate and respect people. I speak more concerned 227 00:20:34,520 --> 00:20:41,520 for the bro marketers and the people out there, the boss babes that love to kind of control 228 00:20:41,520 --> 00:20:47,040 environments and lead with this top-down mentality of, well, they're just not a great fit, let's 229 00:20:47,040 --> 00:20:52,960 cut it and go. And it's going to lead to a very nasty feeling someday where, you know 230 00:20:52,960 --> 00:20:58,960 what, maybe we could have figured out a different type of transition, you know, rather than 231 00:20:58,960 --> 00:21:04,480 just being pragmatic, logical, AI-driven robots about it. One of the great leaders who does 232 00:21:04,480 --> 00:21:10,000 this well, in my opinion, is Craig Hanley of ListenTrust. He wrote a book called Hired 233 00:21:10,000 --> 00:21:18,680 to Quit, Inspired to Stay. And that process of creating an environment where if we create 234 00:21:18,680 --> 00:21:23,840 an environment where people, one, they don't become addicted to their titles, right? And 235 00:21:23,840 --> 00:21:29,040 the authority or ego associated with that, but they are more flexible. And we also honor 236 00:21:29,040 --> 00:21:34,520 people's true ambitions or passions, then there may be an opportunity where it makes 237 00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:39,320 sense for them to jump into a different vehicle and move on. You know, and now they move on 238 00:21:39,320 --> 00:21:43,920 with our blessing while continuing to love and be happy for the time they spent in our 239 00:21:43,920 --> 00:21:49,040 vehicle, or maybe there's an opportunity for them to come back too. So I think a lot of 240 00:21:49,040 --> 00:21:56,120 the challenges that exist in the business world is we're so fast to stick to the vice 241 00:21:56,120 --> 00:22:06,240 of expectations and set, you know, do things harsh and quick versus realize that, you know, 242 00:22:06,240 --> 00:22:11,120 who can be a little bit more like Greg Popovich, a true champion, right? Multiple time champion 243 00:22:11,120 --> 00:22:16,880 who, yeah, Jay Crowder didn't fit three months in, gone, I think three weeks in and gone. 244 00:22:16,880 --> 00:22:21,720 I can't remember. But there's other circumstances like when he traded George Hill, who was one 245 00:22:21,720 --> 00:22:27,080 of his best friends, even though he's much younger on the team, got Kawhi Leonard. Kawhi 246 00:22:27,080 --> 00:22:31,480 Leonard was the key to San Antonio's next championship. That probably hurt the relationship 247 00:22:31,480 --> 00:22:37,800 a little bit of George Hill and Greg Popovich. But from what I know about their relationship, 248 00:22:37,800 --> 00:22:43,380 he didn't sacrifice the relationship and the process of making those moves. We as leaders, 249 00:22:43,380 --> 00:22:49,360 if we dedicate ourselves to doing more to honor our relationships and those people, 250 00:22:49,360 --> 00:22:54,560 we stand a much greater chance to win much more abundantly. Sean, feel free to challenge 251 00:22:54,560 --> 00:22:58,360 that or feel free to double down. You've got a lot of experience in this space. 252 00:22:58,360 --> 00:23:04,800 Yeah, I think I'll double down on it. It's really important to acknowledge communication 253 00:23:04,800 --> 00:23:11,400 skills is really important to be trained on if you're not, you know, nonviolent communications, 254 00:23:11,400 --> 00:23:21,320 getting ego out of ideas and letting best ideas win. But you're also right about expectations. 255 00:23:21,320 --> 00:23:30,960 You know, we have when we build a company, we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to execute 256 00:23:30,960 --> 00:23:38,160 on that. And investors expect us to execute on it as well. And that can be scary. And 257 00:23:38,160 --> 00:23:46,520 so that fear of failure is augmented, which can create a violent environment where if 258 00:23:46,520 --> 00:23:51,040 people don't reach your expectations, you just get angry at them. 259 00:23:51,040 --> 00:24:00,480 I was really, really guilty though, for a long time. I led that for years and it was, 260 00:24:00,480 --> 00:24:08,240 it cost me some seriously great relationships. So I get it. Nobody's perfect in this process. 261 00:24:08,240 --> 00:24:10,040 But I love what you're keep going, man. I mean, 262 00:24:10,040 --> 00:24:19,200 So when you're like, and people see me when I'm on my team, they can tell I'm frustrated. 263 00:24:19,200 --> 00:24:24,200 But what I'm careful to do is not get mad at them. I say, look, I'm angry right now. 264 00:24:24,200 --> 00:24:30,200 I'm mad at the situation. I'm not mad at you. And there's a big difference in that 265 00:24:30,200 --> 00:24:35,760 because it relieves that emotional failure feeling of personal failure. And the key there 266 00:24:35,760 --> 00:24:42,200 is to learn what did I miss about the explanation of what need to be said? Because as an entrepreneur 267 00:24:42,200 --> 00:24:48,800 and visionary, I'm terrible at the details. My head's over here. And the rest of the 268 00:24:48,800 --> 00:24:52,760 team's trying to figure out what's in my head. And I just assume they can fill all the dots 269 00:24:52,760 --> 00:24:58,080 to get to there. That's a terrible assumption. I make it all the time. That's why I always 270 00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:05,200 hire somebody who's totally detailed, maniacally detailed oriented, who's an explainer and 271 00:25:05,200 --> 00:25:12,000 breaks it down into chunks and lets people build what needs to be built. And that's, 272 00:25:12,000 --> 00:25:15,280 that I learned over experience, not because I'm wise. 273 00:25:15,280 --> 00:25:20,760 Yeah. Well, wisdom comes from everything. All of our experiences are goods or bads or 274 00:25:20,760 --> 00:25:26,360 uglies or failures or successes. There's a lot to that. And you have that experience 275 00:25:26,360 --> 00:25:31,680 that goes along with the expertise. Visionaries, this episode is not about giving you the miracle 276 00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:36,120 cure or the magic bullet. It's about telling you, throw the magic bullet away, throw the 277 00:25:36,120 --> 00:25:43,480 miracle elixir out of your mind, because this is going to take working with an expert. Sean 278 00:25:43,480 --> 00:25:47,920 represents that type of expertise to me. You guys know I don't say that as boldly very 279 00:25:47,920 --> 00:25:52,800 often about the experts that we do have on this program. But if you're not going to work 280 00:25:52,800 --> 00:25:59,840 with us, then I hope you're working with Sean or somebody very similar to that vibes with 281 00:25:59,840 --> 00:26:04,920 your values and your core that understands the value of your culture, that understands 282 00:26:04,920 --> 00:26:10,480 the dynamics of leadership that you want to have. Don't approach this path alone. I see 283 00:26:10,480 --> 00:26:15,040 too many solopreneurs and entrepreneurs and people who think they're going to move a vision 284 00:26:15,040 --> 00:26:20,400 forward that are scared to talk to amazing leaders out there and include them in the 285 00:26:20,400 --> 00:26:24,380 process of creating a win-win. So we'll come back. We're going to dive in and talk more, 286 00:26:24,380 --> 00:26:27,780 not just about the good, the bad, and the ugly of outsourcing, but hopefully we'll dive 287 00:26:27,780 --> 00:26:33,760 into enough tips of how to do this right to where, once again, consider this a fast forward 288 00:26:33,760 --> 00:26:38,600 interview of both of our entities on this and saying, you know what, maybe these are 289 00:26:38,600 --> 00:26:43,920 people we should reach out to, or maybe you can use this checklist as you evaluate whoever 290 00:26:43,920 --> 00:26:48,360 else is coming across your path and learn some secrets about how to recognize who is 291 00:26:48,360 --> 00:26:53,160 going to help you win and who is going to be dead weight on your ship. We'll see you 292 00:26:53,160 --> 00:26:58,560 on the other side. All right. Welcome in to Vision Pros Live with Jackson Callum. I'm 293 00:26:58,560 --> 00:27:03,160 your show host. We'll be doing interviews for visionary entrepreneurs and guest leaders 294 00:27:03,160 --> 00:27:09,160 who are building fantastic visions out there. 295 00:27:09,160 --> 00:27:18,620 What's up, everybody? Welcome in to another episode of Vision Pros Live. I'm your show 296 00:27:18,620 --> 00:27:25,080 host, Jackson Callum, founder and CEO of First Class Business. And I'm passionately on fire 297 00:27:25,080 --> 00:27:30,400 right now about the guest that we have on the show. His name is Sean Langwoodock. That 298 00:27:30,400 --> 00:27:38,240 is a hard name for me to say, just as my last name is. But Sean brings an expertise, a tenure 299 00:27:38,240 --> 00:27:44,880 and energy related to outsourcing and hiring. And what we're talking about is expansion. 300 00:27:44,880 --> 00:27:48,840 Those of you who've listened for a long time know that vision is where I start my focus 301 00:27:48,840 --> 00:27:52,720 point with the companies who work with culture. We have to create a culture where people want 302 00:27:52,720 --> 00:27:57,640 to belong. And then that attracts leaders to come look and see what we're doing. Well, 303 00:27:57,640 --> 00:28:02,960 we all need leaders by our side if we're going to scale what it is we are up to. And so part 304 00:28:02,960 --> 00:28:08,720 of that process of vision and culture is figuring out the job descriptions, figuring out the 305 00:28:08,720 --> 00:28:13,400 types of roles that you need, reading books like Rocket Fuel or the E-Myth. All of those 306 00:28:13,400 --> 00:28:18,920 help you and put you in a position to not accidentally delegate this stuff by what they 307 00:28:18,920 --> 00:28:24,040 call abdication. I had to look that word up the first time I read that book. It was just 308 00:28:24,040 --> 00:28:28,520 three years ago, I believe, when I read the E-Myth. And it means to basically let somebody 309 00:28:28,520 --> 00:28:32,960 do something without knowing anything about that process. It puts your business or your 310 00:28:32,960 --> 00:28:37,160 vision in extreme danger. I don't want to see that happen to you. So pay very close 311 00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:41,960 attention to what we go through with Sean. And more importantly, be ready to reach out 312 00:28:41,960 --> 00:28:46,160 to somebody after this because you did not hear this episode on accident. There's a reason 313 00:28:46,160 --> 00:28:50,140 why you're here. We're going to go into some other opportunities real quick, too. These 314 00:28:50,140 --> 00:28:56,840 reasons are also important. One is our sponsor, hardtokill.org with Dave Marl. We do work 315 00:28:56,840 --> 00:29:01,800 with Dave on this. It inspired me when I saw he's helping a hundred thousand veterans lose 316 00:29:01,800 --> 00:29:06,880 two million pounds collectively. And he's created a community called Hard to Kill the 317 00:29:06,880 --> 00:29:12,080 Matches podcast. This is a award winning podcast. He's been at that podcast for five years. 318 00:29:12,080 --> 00:29:16,620 Today I would like to say, look up Dave Marl, Afghanistan. Take a look and see what he was 319 00:29:16,620 --> 00:29:21,480 doing in the New York Times to help people that were in desperate need. I'm not going 320 00:29:21,480 --> 00:29:24,760 to ruin the story. I'm going to let you go and check that out yourself. But definitely 321 00:29:24,760 --> 00:29:29,080 come and join us because he's expanded the program to civilians like myself and like 322 00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:35,520 some of you out there. And if we've got military friends that are feeling a little bit lost 323 00:29:35,520 --> 00:29:40,120 or haven't really been able to integrate back into society as well, I highly recommend getting 324 00:29:40,120 --> 00:29:44,560 them connected to somebody like Dave so they can get the community and support that they 325 00:29:44,560 --> 00:29:50,320 need in order to thrive. And there's O Protegais de Trabajo para Latinos, opportunities for 326 00:29:50,320 --> 00:29:56,040 work for Latinos. This is our own homegrown program. We help Latinos learn about LinkedIn, 327 00:29:56,040 --> 00:30:01,100 Canva, Upwork. Most of them have never heard of those terms before. And we help them learn 328 00:30:01,100 --> 00:30:06,040 how to become digital ambassadors or as a lot of you call them VAs. I don't like the 329 00:30:06,040 --> 00:30:13,380 VA process. I call it virtual abuse. I see far too many entrepreneurs out there not taking 330 00:30:13,380 --> 00:30:17,680 any concern for who they're working with and treating them like a pair of shoes from Payless. 331 00:30:17,680 --> 00:30:22,560 Guess what? I was guilty as charged as well when I first started hiring and trying to 332 00:30:22,560 --> 00:30:27,160 move into entrepreneurship. My hope is that I can save some of you from that reality and 333 00:30:27,160 --> 00:30:31,040 build amazing relationships. They have their own podcasts associated with this. If you 334 00:30:31,040 --> 00:30:35,280 know a Latino leader, please definitely send them our way so we can get them interviewed 335 00:30:35,280 --> 00:30:40,560 and inspire the world of people out there who we'd love to see them change their lives. 336 00:30:40,560 --> 00:30:44,840 And we're striving to bridge the economic gap between North America, South America, 337 00:30:44,840 --> 00:30:50,000 and the rest of world. Opportunities for Filipinos just launched and opportunities for Indians 338 00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:54,640 just launched as well with respectively, Ange Castro from the Philippines and Harry Vashiste 339 00:30:54,640 --> 00:30:58,800 from India. We're super happy to see that happen. So let's change the world. 340 00:30:58,800 --> 00:31:04,160 And there's the water project. We have no affiliation with it. I just know that I just 341 00:31:04,160 --> 00:31:07,840 for whatever reason, I couldn't let it go. When I found out about this project, I've 342 00:31:07,840 --> 00:31:11,600 never been thirsty in my life. And so when I saw it, I had to really focus in on what 343 00:31:11,600 --> 00:31:15,560 are they doing and how are they doing this and why. And I love that they set this program 344 00:31:15,560 --> 00:31:20,720 up to where you can actually contribute to a specific project. And you can see they send 345 00:31:20,720 --> 00:31:23,760 you the social media updates, they send you pictures and photos of evidence that they 346 00:31:23,760 --> 00:31:29,420 actually brought this project to fruition, whether it's a borehole well or a sand dam. 347 00:31:29,420 --> 00:31:33,580 And I just love everything that the water project stands for. And when I see these kids 348 00:31:33,580 --> 00:31:39,640 celebrating water the way that my kids celebrate Christmas Day, it reminds me that I cannot 349 00:31:39,640 --> 00:31:43,840 forget about the reality that we have this opportunity to help. So if you're not in a 350 00:31:43,840 --> 00:31:48,600 financial position to give back to the project right now, my hope is that you talk about 351 00:31:48,600 --> 00:31:52,360 this over a dinner with somebody or my hope is that you tag somebody that you feel inspired 352 00:31:52,360 --> 00:31:57,080 to tag because you never know if the person you tagged is going to be the person who ends 353 00:31:57,080 --> 00:32:03,420 up donating $50,000 to this and funding thousands of people's lives, livelihoods with water. 354 00:32:03,420 --> 00:32:09,000 This is a generational impact that will allow these nations to move forward in ways that 355 00:32:09,000 --> 00:32:13,440 perhaps some of us take for granted. I know with the microphone opportunity that I have, 356 00:32:13,440 --> 00:32:18,480 I get to do that. So I try not to. Without further ado, Sean, thank you for joining me 357 00:32:18,480 --> 00:32:21,640 on Vision Pros Live. It is absolutely an honor to have you here. 358 00:32:21,640 --> 00:32:27,240 Those are great sponsors, by the way. I'm also contributed to a water project called 359 00:32:27,240 --> 00:32:35,720 One Drop. What's amazing is not just the access to the water, but the distance and time it 360 00:32:35,720 --> 00:32:44,180 takes to go get water when it's not localized and that risks to life, to rape, to all those 361 00:32:44,180 --> 00:32:48,640 things that happen. Because in one country, it's mostly the woman who would go to the 362 00:32:48,640 --> 00:32:54,880 water and they would get raped on their way to these wells. I mean, it's just what we 363 00:32:54,880 --> 00:33:01,760 take for granted. Thank you for mentioning One Drop, too. It's one of the shout outs 364 00:33:01,760 --> 00:33:05,640 I usually do on the show. If you guys are thinking, man, that reminds me of this or 365 00:33:05,640 --> 00:33:10,080 that, share it in the comments. Let us know what projects you want to see supported and 366 00:33:10,080 --> 00:33:14,480 the causes because we're happy to talk about those causes on the show. We got 80 billion 367 00:33:14,480 --> 00:33:19,920 people out there to help. And so how do we do that? By joining forces. A bundle of sticks 368 00:33:19,920 --> 00:33:25,440 is stronger than one. So One Drop, I'm going to take a look at that afterwards as well. 369 00:33:25,440 --> 00:33:31,360 Sean, will you do me a favor and send me a link from their site that inspires you? That 370 00:33:31,360 --> 00:33:41,000 would be great. Go ahead, Jackson. Sorry. What is your vision for those that you serve, 371 00:33:41,000 --> 00:33:47,800 Sean? Well, in the case of the business, it is to make sure that nobody wastes time talking 372 00:33:47,800 --> 00:33:56,000 to an agency that is a waste of time. And that is easy to do. And for my employees, 373 00:33:56,000 --> 00:34:03,460 this is my give background. I've built five companies. So this one is really about teaching 374 00:34:03,460 --> 00:34:09,240 everyone who works for me how to be an entrepreneur and the trials and tribulations you go through 375 00:34:09,240 --> 00:34:14,880 and how to get on the right path when you're off the right path and get back on track when 376 00:34:14,880 --> 00:34:20,060 you're off track and how to stay on track and focused, all those things. And theoretically, 377 00:34:20,060 --> 00:34:25,640 in this case, they'll come out very well off as a result of this company being successful. 378 00:34:25,640 --> 00:34:32,360 So that's part two. Yeah. Back to part one. I mean, there are so many ways you can go 379 00:34:32,360 --> 00:34:37,600 wrong in outsourcing and everyone's heard a bad story. So there's two things I'm doing. 380 00:34:37,600 --> 00:34:43,300 One is whether or not you use our service or not, I'm writing the definitive guide for 381 00:34:43,300 --> 00:34:50,960 how to outsource. So all the key questions you need to ask an agency, who to talk to 382 00:34:50,960 --> 00:34:56,600 at the agency first as opposed to second, because most people talk to the leadership 383 00:34:56,600 --> 00:35:02,320 of an agency and guess what? Those people take your calls all day long and they will 384 00:35:02,320 --> 00:35:06,040 sound like they're the perfect agency. But it's really the people who they're going to 385 00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:10,720 assign to the project that are the most important to talk to. And very few people have the time 386 00:35:10,720 --> 00:35:16,760 to collect that data and get there. So we do help in that. But I'll give you all the 387 00:35:16,760 --> 00:35:22,440 key answers, quick questions and answers. I love that. If you didn't hear that, if you 388 00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:28,040 weren't listening and rewind 20 seconds and listen to what Sean just said, go ahead, continue. 389 00:35:28,040 --> 00:35:34,760 Yeah. So I mean, just as an example, you know, when you go to an agency and you say, Hey, 390 00:35:34,760 --> 00:35:40,280 we're a FinTech company and we're doing where we need a payment rails and we're in, you 391 00:35:40,280 --> 00:35:46,040 know, whatever tech stack you're in. Did you do that? Of course, of course we do that. 392 00:35:46,040 --> 00:35:52,320 Oh yeah. They all say the same thing. Yes, man. All the way. Yeah. So why? Because you 393 00:35:52,320 --> 00:35:57,400 ask them a leading question, right? Yeah, exactly. And they want the business and they'll 394 00:35:57,400 --> 00:36:01,200 scramble and try and find somebody. And if you go to your friends, you know, so most 395 00:36:01,200 --> 00:36:06,440 people go to their friends for an agency, because they're looking for trust. There's 396 00:36:06,440 --> 00:36:11,640 no trust in the environment, right? It's water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink. 397 00:36:11,640 --> 00:36:16,720 So you need a filter and the filter is your friend who's had a good experience with an 398 00:36:16,720 --> 00:36:19,960 agency. Sure. But that friend might be in a totally different business and that agency 399 00:36:19,960 --> 00:36:22,720 might know nothing about your business. So you're going to teach all that, spend all 400 00:36:22,720 --> 00:36:27,680 this time teaching about the business. Yeah. Or it might be the same business, but they 401 00:36:27,680 --> 00:36:32,000 don't have the right engineers when you're asking, right? Yep. Well, they had good engineers 402 00:36:32,000 --> 00:36:36,480 for your friend, but all those, they're not waiting for your call. They're deploying their 403 00:36:36,480 --> 00:36:41,480 engineers as soon as they can get a client. So their best engineers are gone and they're 404 00:36:41,480 --> 00:36:46,400 not being necessarily truthful about who they've gotten, what they can do. So those are the 405 00:36:46,400 --> 00:36:49,520 kinds of things you can avoid. And I'll give you all the secrets. I'm going to do it in 406 00:36:49,520 --> 00:36:54,920 video as well as book, but that's my goal is to make sure nobody wastes time talking 407 00:36:54,920 --> 00:36:59,600 to an agency that's a waste of time. That's amazing. We're going to be doubling down on 408 00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:05,680 that. I've got a guide that is in rough draft form. I'll put it out there. It's called the 409 00:37:05,680 --> 00:37:12,080 eight step checklist for identifying pretenders and contenders. When it comes to looking at 410 00:37:12,080 --> 00:37:17,880 clients you might work with and to the hiring marketing agencies for success, 301, 10 considerations 411 00:37:17,880 --> 00:37:22,440 to the right growth team. And so I'm excited to put that in your hands as well. Sean, you're 412 00:37:22,440 --> 00:37:29,200 welcome to R&D, rip off and duplicate anything you want from those materials, you know, and 413 00:37:29,200 --> 00:37:34,160 provide your scrutiny and feedback, right? It's iron sharpens iron. There's an opportunity 414 00:37:34,160 --> 00:37:38,760 to refine and everybody who's listening right now, again, I can't stress enough how important 415 00:37:38,760 --> 00:37:43,380 this is for the visions that we're striving to build. My mom, I trust her when it comes 416 00:37:43,380 --> 00:37:51,920 to recipes, 100%. When it comes to legal advice, why would I? You know, that doesn't make sense. 417 00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:57,000 So our friends are not usually our best source when it comes to understanding how to win 418 00:37:57,000 --> 00:38:02,640 in the business world. We are running low on time today. We've had such a great banter 419 00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:07,500 and we had a little bit of a late start. That was my fault. And I'm going to skip a couple 420 00:38:07,500 --> 00:38:11,000 of questions that I'd love to potentially bring you back for Sean, if you do want to 421 00:38:11,000 --> 00:38:15,040 come back in the future. I'd love to come back, Jackson. There's so much to explore. 422 00:38:15,040 --> 00:38:17,920 And then we can look at the guide. I mean, it was well, once that comes out, that'll 423 00:38:17,920 --> 00:38:23,880 be a lot of fun. I'm going to skip to our most powerful question. If this was your last 424 00:38:23,880 --> 00:38:30,360 chance to speak today for the rest of your life, what powerful lesson can other visionaries 425 00:38:30,360 --> 00:38:40,200 learn from your experience? Be vulnerable. Because when you're vulnerable, you're authentic. 426 00:38:40,200 --> 00:38:48,580 And we put, and it creates disconnection. Whereas you're as a leader, you think you 427 00:38:48,580 --> 00:38:55,120 need to be the leader and be the strong person all the time. And if that is not authentic 428 00:38:55,120 --> 00:39:02,840 strength, it comes off. It's the barrier. It's the barrier that goes through you that 429 00:39:02,840 --> 00:39:11,240 creates a disconnection to anyone else you're dealing with. So vulnerability is actually 430 00:39:11,240 --> 00:39:20,440 much more of an attractant and much more of a connection to a device than false pretense. 431 00:39:20,440 --> 00:39:26,560 My hope is that all of us, myself included, take the opportunity to just meditate on that 432 00:39:26,560 --> 00:39:33,160 simple truth of what does it mean to be vulnerable and what does it mean to be authentic? Because 433 00:39:33,160 --> 00:39:38,160 we could use elegance and words and try to pull it together. But at the end of the day, 434 00:39:38,160 --> 00:39:41,640 you finding out what that means for you is going to be very different than what that 435 00:39:41,640 --> 00:39:47,280 means for me. And I do think that's one of the greatest strengths that we can rely on. 436 00:39:47,280 --> 00:39:56,440 How do we do that in a way that's safe with the relationships that we have in life and 437 00:39:56,440 --> 00:40:04,200 into that strength of power? So that was awesome. We've got a little bit of time left. I mean, 438 00:40:04,200 --> 00:40:08,400 we're going to make the time, but I do want to be respectful of the hour that we have 439 00:40:08,400 --> 00:40:09,400 booked. 440 00:40:09,400 --> 00:40:13,560 Outsourcing. What do you want to talk about, Sean? What are the questions that I haven't 441 00:40:13,560 --> 00:40:17,920 asked or the things that you don't get asked in these interviews that people ideally would 442 00:40:17,920 --> 00:40:22,480 be considering that you're often not prompted to dive into? Let's hit that. 443 00:40:22,480 --> 00:40:27,360 Yeah. So where things go wrong tends to be similar to what we talked about earlier is 444 00:40:27,360 --> 00:40:31,720 communications of people. And some people, when they think of outsourcing, they think 445 00:40:31,720 --> 00:40:38,920 India, right? Outsourcing could be an agency next door. It doesn't matter where it is. 446 00:40:38,920 --> 00:40:44,440 And so when you're investigating these things, a lot of people look for technology and price, 447 00:40:44,440 --> 00:40:50,640 right? Do they have the technical skills and are they priced right? And we say there's 448 00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:59,640 a trilemma. There's price, speed, and quality. You can only pick two. And we solve for quality 449 00:40:59,640 --> 00:41:03,480 and speed because when you get quality, you're going to get speed. And that will actually 450 00:41:03,480 --> 00:41:10,000 lower your total cost of development. And we try and match with quality. And some people 451 00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:15,240 think you can match on country. Like, oh, here's Ukraine. Ukraine is a great place to 452 00:41:15,240 --> 00:41:22,040 do engineering work. So is Brazil and so is Argentina. And so are, you know, Latin and 453 00:41:22,040 --> 00:41:27,000 South America is very, very popular, especially with because of time zone. They're very different 454 00:41:27,000 --> 00:41:32,560 cultures as well. And Southeast Asia is very different cultures. So as you move into different 455 00:41:32,560 --> 00:41:39,820 cultures, you're going to get different cultural distances between how you work and communicate 456 00:41:39,820 --> 00:41:44,560 and how others work and communicate. There's nothing wrong with the differences, but you 457 00:41:44,560 --> 00:41:51,920 have to be aware of them. So Southeast Asians, cultures tend to be hierarchical. So they 458 00:41:51,920 --> 00:41:58,080 will be less inclined unless they work in North American environments to challenge what 459 00:41:58,080 --> 00:42:05,840 you're saying and be a sounding board. They're more doers and listeners. And they tend to 460 00:42:05,840 --> 00:42:13,480 work in a waterfall kind of sequence as opposed to agile. That's a sweeping generalization, 461 00:42:13,480 --> 00:42:14,480 by the way. 462 00:42:14,480 --> 00:42:18,640 It is. But it's okay. I get what you're talking about. You're talking about building at scale 463 00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:28,760 too. And at scale, it's hard to influence core route training. You can't force culture. 464 00:42:28,760 --> 00:42:35,000 Culture is something that takes a little bit of time, finesse, understanding to develop. 465 00:42:35,000 --> 00:42:39,120 So I think it's very respectful and fair the way that you're mentioning it. 466 00:42:39,120 --> 00:42:46,000 Yeah. And so different cultures will bring different vibe to your environment as well, 467 00:42:46,000 --> 00:42:51,960 which is phenomenal because it's diversity that brings in the best ideas. So there's 468 00:42:51,960 --> 00:42:57,800 disadvantage and advantage, but just be aware of cultural distance as much as the communication 469 00:42:57,800 --> 00:43:01,320 style. And if you can become aware of it, your communications can be better and you're 470 00:43:01,320 --> 00:43:05,920 going to connect better. That's a really important thing that people miss. And we filter for 471 00:43:05,920 --> 00:43:09,840 that when we do these filterings. 472 00:43:09,840 --> 00:43:11,880 Ask a Texan and ask a New Yorker. 473 00:43:11,880 --> 00:43:19,880 Exactly. Yeah. Just within your own organization, there's going to be distances in how you communicate. 474 00:43:19,880 --> 00:43:22,160 Imagine across different cultures. Right? 475 00:43:22,160 --> 00:43:27,560 All of you New Yorkers offended by my New York accent. You're welcome. I know I don't 476 00:43:27,560 --> 00:43:34,120 have it. I don't have it. So those, even within our own cultures, our own languages, it all 477 00:43:34,120 --> 00:43:39,440 exists. And that's why it's so important to understand and develop the leadership skills 478 00:43:39,440 --> 00:43:44,800 and to have leaders around you that are helping you navigate these types of territories so 479 00:43:44,800 --> 00:43:50,760 that you can focus on the fulfillment of the vision. If you don't have that ability to 480 00:43:50,760 --> 00:43:54,960 focus because you're trying to juggle everything, you're going to run out of the ability to 481 00:43:54,960 --> 00:44:01,160 juggle it all. And so why put yourself in that situation? That's like, what is the benefit 482 00:44:01,160 --> 00:44:05,680 of trying to do it all? And then becoming the person who's like, look, I can do it all. 483 00:44:05,680 --> 00:44:12,640 I've never understood that mindset. You said that we only get two. I'll challenge that. 484 00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:20,080 But you talked about price, speed, or quality. Is that a generalization or do you believe 485 00:44:20,080 --> 00:44:26,080 that it's an impossibility to, I guess, have your cake and eat it too? 486 00:44:26,080 --> 00:44:31,920 It's rarely not true, actually. So if you're focused on price, you're going to get subpar 487 00:44:31,920 --> 00:44:38,680 engineering generally. So our strategy is find the best engineering team and then let 488 00:44:38,680 --> 00:44:45,640 geography sometimes determine because of foreign exchange or cost of living in certain countries 489 00:44:45,640 --> 00:44:50,320 a better value. But don't start with the price. Start with the engineering team with the best 490 00:44:50,320 --> 00:44:56,200 quality and figure out. And then you will present like 20 options so you can decide 491 00:44:56,200 --> 00:45:04,600 which price and quality match. But if you're going for price only, you wouldn't want, and 492 00:45:04,600 --> 00:45:10,280 you talked about your baby and holding things delicately. This is your baby. You don't want 493 00:45:10,280 --> 00:45:16,360 to just give this to any old daycare. If you're having brain surgery, you don't want to go 494 00:45:16,360 --> 00:45:24,000 for price. So it's the same sort of thing. You want to make sure you're getting quality 495 00:45:24,000 --> 00:45:28,120 because you'll end up rewriting the code. 496 00:45:28,120 --> 00:45:31,960 What I'm testing for and looking for this, by the way, all you visionaries out there 497 00:45:31,960 --> 00:45:37,040 is one of the things that I check and look for checks and balances and leaders that we're 498 00:45:37,040 --> 00:45:44,680 talking to like Sean is flexibility. Right? Are they addicted or stuck on what they just 499 00:45:44,680 --> 00:45:51,420 said or are they willing to look at alternative paradigms that may exist? And Sean has done 500 00:45:51,420 --> 00:45:58,960 that all throughout our time today. And that to me is kind of the definition of an expert. 501 00:45:58,960 --> 00:46:02,200 Matt Cutts, the search director of Google taught us this when I was in a company that 502 00:46:02,200 --> 00:46:06,320 was a Y Combinator. And he said that the sign of an expert is not somebody who knows it 503 00:46:06,320 --> 00:46:12,600 all. It's somebody who will go get the answer, which means they also have to be vulnerable. 504 00:46:12,600 --> 00:46:18,400 You have to be authentic enough to be willing to admit when you don't know. And so I love 505 00:46:18,400 --> 00:46:26,560 that you led with stupidity, you know, stupidity, cash, people. And you've just been super real 506 00:46:26,560 --> 00:46:32,480 throughout this interview. And so we look forward to as well engaging further with outforce.ai 507 00:46:32,480 --> 00:46:37,360 as we continue to scale first class business. That will definitely be one of our goals that 508 00:46:37,360 --> 00:46:42,040 we will act on immediately. And in addition to that, those of you listening in will have 509 00:46:42,040 --> 00:46:47,520 below the video, the resources where you can take your next action steps. And below that 510 00:46:47,520 --> 00:46:52,040 will have all the resources that we talked about in this episode so you can dive in deeper. 511 00:46:52,040 --> 00:46:57,840 We're going to put together a couple of AI guides for some of the general ideas that 512 00:46:57,840 --> 00:47:02,540 were talked about. And as mentioned, I'll put both of the guides that we already have 513 00:47:02,540 --> 00:47:09,800 in place in the show notes, that A SIP checklist and the hiring one that I there's some things 514 00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:13,440 that Sean talked about on there that, you know, that I talked about in this that are 515 00:47:13,440 --> 00:47:18,820 incredible, incredibly important to me that so many entrepreneurs overlook back to one 516 00:47:18,820 --> 00:47:26,800 of them. Be careful not to lead the witness with your questions and ask for detailed answers. 517 00:47:26,800 --> 00:47:32,360 Don't do that. Instead, give the person the opportunity to talk about what they would 518 00:47:32,360 --> 00:47:37,520 do if they were to be hired by you. But I'm oversimplifying. There's so much that we've 519 00:47:37,520 --> 00:47:45,280 got to learn. And before you hire somebody on this, consider who do you know around you 520 00:47:45,280 --> 00:47:52,660 that you can trust that doesn't have a bias that can also protect you from making sure 521 00:47:52,660 --> 00:47:58,420 you don't hire and work with the wrong people. It's very important that you get those those 522 00:47:58,420 --> 00:48:02,800 answers correct. And I'll let you close out today, Sean. Final thoughts. 523 00:48:02,800 --> 00:48:10,040 Well, I just want to thank you, Jackson, for the way you do this podcast. It's you leave 524 00:48:10,040 --> 00:48:15,840 a lot of space for vulnerability and it's a safe place and it's and it's an exploratory 525 00:48:15,840 --> 00:48:20,040 place and I like where you go with it. So I want to thank you. That's what I want to 526 00:48:20,040 --> 00:48:24,160 do at my last moment. Thanks, man. I appreciate that. Vision Pros. 527 00:48:24,160 --> 00:48:27,420 We'll see in the next episode. Thank you for being here today. I'm really happy that you 528 00:48:27,420 --> 00:48:32,160 tuned in to Vision Pros Live. I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions as these 529 00:48:32,160 --> 00:48:36,000 episodes continue to move forward. This is going to get more and more fun. We'll have 530 00:48:36,000 --> 00:48:40,280 more and more engagement as well. We'll invite people to participate in the show. And thank 531 00:48:40,280 --> 00:48:44,760 you for giving us your time and attention. Have an excellent time building out your vision 532 00:48:44,760 --> 00:49:03,760 and becoming a vision.