Life to the Max Podcast
Welcome to 'Life to the Max Podcast,' where resilience meets inspiration!
Join us on a transformative journey through the life stories of remarkable individuals, including Quadriplegic Army Veteran Maximilian Gross. In this empowering podcast, we dive into tales of triumph, courage, and the human spirit's unwavering ability to overcome obstacles.
Our show is a celebration of diverse narratives, from awe-inspiring achievements to the darkest of traumas. 'Life to the Max' is a testament to the power of living authentically, no matter the circumstances. We believe that everyone has a unique story worth sharing, and we invite individuals from all walks of life to join us.
Discover the profound meaning of living 'Life to the Max'—a concept that resonates differently with each storyteller. It's a journey of perspective, resilience, and finding joy amidst life's challenges. Tune in to be inspired, motivated, and reminded that there's strength in every story.
Ready to redefine what it means to live life to the fullest? Share your story with us and become a part of this uplifting community. Because, at 'Life to the Max,' every story matters.
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Life to the Max Podcast
Medical Tech CEO: Brian Murphy Trailblazing with NanoVibronix
Unlock the secrets to entrepreneurial success and innovative medical technology with our fascinating guest, Brian Murphy, CEO of NanoVibronix. Join us as we journey through Brian's rise from his modest beginnings in Morton Grove, Chicago, to his achievements in the sales industry. Discover how Brian's unorthodox sales approach and perseverance in the medical device sector have not only shaped his career but also empowered him to lead a company at the forefront of groundbreaking health solutions.
Brian shares invaluable insights on the art of sales, emphasizing the importance of understanding client needs and the role of personal growth in achieving success. With anecdotes from his college sports days and career milestones, he illustrates how perfecting a core strength can translate into a powerful sales strategy. We also explore the life-changing potential of NanoVibronix's innovations like the UroShield and PainShield, which offer promising alternatives to traditional pain management, enhancing the quality of life for many.
From entrepreneurial risk-taking to the power of mentorship, our conversation with Brian delves into the dynamics of building a thriving career and the significance of maintaining momentum. Learn from his experiences in launching revolutionary products, managing corporate transitions, and turning challenges into opportunities. Whether you're a budding entrepreneur or intrigued by medical advancements, Brian's journey and insights provide a wealth of inspiration and knowledge for carving your path to success.
I.
Speaker 2:And welcome back to another episode of Life to the Max. I'm your host, the Quadfather, aka Maximilian Gross, and today I have the CEO of NanoVibronics.
Speaker 3:NanoVibronics.
Speaker 2:NanoVibronics, so NanoVibronics and his name is drumroll, please, brian Murphy thanks, max how are you man?
Speaker 3:I'm great, it's good to be here and, by the way, first thing I've got to say is thank you for your service.
Speaker 2:I appreciate it. Thank you for supporting me. I really do you're great. I'm happy to be here we've been talking about it for a while. Definitely, I mean it's an honor to have you here, because you have a lot of insight on things that can help people with spinal cord injuries, so I'm super excited to get through it super, so, uh, super excited to uh get through it.
Speaker 3:Well, I I'm sure that I can't beat tim terrell's podcast but I'll do the best I can, did you listen to it?
Speaker 2:I did yeah, he's, he's uh, quite, quite a guy man, oh my god, he's amazing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he's an amazing guy, he can uh, he, he uh. He led the show for that, for that one well, and, by the way, that's without coffee or any stimulant he's like he's a.
Speaker 2:He's like he's a nonsense. No, nonsense-nonsense, hard-nosed defender. And I'm like damn Tim. And we see the clips of him and he's just wrecking himself.
Speaker 3:How he's still upright. I have no idea. So I guess, to all your viewers, if you haven't seen that podcast, take a look at it. Tim Terrell is one of a kind, no doubt. Aboutrell is one of one of a kind, no doubt about it he is.
Speaker 2:He is one of a kind but um. So I uh kind of want to bring it back to your beginnings, so like you know where you came from. So where did you uh grow up?
Speaker 3:so I grew up up in Morton Grove, north side of Chicago, middle class family. You know it's funny that my dad encouraged me to be a manager at McDonald's and that would kick off my career. I elected to go more of an entrepreneurial route and, uh, it really. Um, I just got into sales. I mean, I, I literally went to college only to get a degree so that I could walk in and interview for a sales job. I knew that that's where I wanted to be, that was my life's mission and uh, and the rest is uh, history yeah, so when you had your first sale, was that like, just like a drug, was that amazing?
Speaker 3:no doubt about it. Yeah, and I was so bad at it right in the beginning. Nobody trained me. Nobody. You have to. If you're sales, you're either born for it or you're not going to be. You're not going to do well in sales. You've got to have the instincts and things like that. But you've got to be trained very early and but learned on my own and and develop my own style and ended up excelling.
Speaker 2:Can you elaborate when you said you were thrown to the wolves?
Speaker 3:so my first sales job was for a medical device company out of Colorado and I took over Northern California. So I was their first rep and this was part of their grand plan to go direct reps nationwide. And I sat there and my first customer, I had features and benefits on a page, on a piece of paper and I went down through the features and benefits and there was really no open discussion. Um, you know, obviously with sales you've got to connect with somebody and the connection was not there. So, being thrown to the wolves, meaning that I had no sales training, it was all done off the cuff. So in that first meeting I realized that no, this is this, is this just really went poorly and uh, and from there, uh, develop my own style and um, and just learned how to, how to dance somebody into a corner where they couldn't get out and had to buy my product.
Speaker 2:Okay. So when you said you developed your own style, are you talking about, like, that list of questions they give you, Like? Is that what you're talking about? Because I know there's companies that say, like telemarketers, I know there's companies that say, like telemarketers, they say, okay, if we reel them in, we have to follow the rule, the guidelines of the questions. Is that what you're talking about?
Speaker 3:Yeah, a little bit. I think my success was out of learning their business, understanding what they were up against, understanding their business down to the product level and then offering a solution. I later figured out that in a sale, nothing is sold without a problem. So you've got to find a problem that they have, then you've got to make the problem bigger than life and then you've got the solution to their problem. So that was really how I kind of created. The way that I sold was just to understand them. Understand the problem, highlight the problem, make the problem bigger than life and then offering a simple solution. And it works. It works today, still today.
Speaker 2:That's amazing man. So we'll let you down to the past Medical technology to the past, medical technology.
Speaker 3:Well, I won't lie money. Back in the 80s, medical was the place to be. No doubt about it. Technology was growing, the market was always going to be there, it didn't matter. We were recession proof, um, and you know, I just, uh, I also wanted to help people and and I had to really believe in the product in order to and believe that it was going to help somebody, in order for me to be passionate about it and really believe it and um, and sell it effectively.
Speaker 2:So you physically created the product.
Speaker 3:I didn't physically create it, no, Um, they. I was always, uh, an employee and other than a couple of uh entrepreneurial stints, but other than a couple of entrepreneurial stints. But the bottom line is that I worked for medical device companies and you know, in sales it's the easiest place to get promoted because it's very quantifiable. Your quota is X, you do X plus whatever and you overachieve, you're going to get noticed. On the downside of that, if you're under quota, uh you're, you're always going to be noticed as well so let me ask you a question.
Speaker 2:I had a guy on here and he told me, if you're this big time salesperson, you're always replaceable. Do you think that's a true statement?
Speaker 3:I don't think so. On the, on the, depending on what you're selling, but products don't sell themselves. And if you excel, I don't see that you're replaceable, okay, so?
Speaker 4:What do you think sets apart a good salesman from an exceptional salesman?
Speaker 3:You know, I learned something through college, so I had 44.
Speaker 2:Where'd you go to college?
Speaker 3:University of Southern Illinois University.
Speaker 2:Let's go.
Speaker 3:Salukis.
Speaker 2:Salukis.
Speaker 3:So played football there Really First year and then I quit and started the boxing team. So I ended up having 44 amateur fights total. I won 42, lost two. But in my first fight I fought in the Golden Gloves in Springfield, Illinois, and I got knocked out in the first round.
Speaker 2:What year was this?
Speaker 3:Oh God, you're going to age me 1976. Wow.
Speaker 2:How old were you?
Speaker 3:um 18, 19, 19 wow so you guys, you, you weren't even thought of in 1976. I, I get that, yeah, but um, I thought I was all that, you know, and I go to this Golden Gloves tournament. I get in the ring and within 30 seconds I'm on my back. I don't know what state I'm in, I don't know who, my, what, my name is Nothing. So I backed up from that fight. We go back to school and I thought, you know, I could either hang it up or figure out what to do going forward. And I figured out something that has really served me well throughout my entire career, my entire life, and that is that you got to be good at one thing. So in the boxing ring, what I figured out was I could throw a left hook like nobody else.
Speaker 3:And in amateurs. Nobody ever saw it coming. My next 11 fights I had knockouts in the first round, all with a left hook. So I perfected the left hook. I went on to win another uh 30 fights after that. I only lost my last fight because I broke my hand in the second round. When I put him down it was the uh, the semi, uh, semi-final before the national championship for college. So my point is that you always have to have a strength that you can go back to. So, in other words, what is it that you're really really good at? What is it in your sales pitch, in your career, in anything that you do it, you got to pull the left hook out yeah and if it's been perfected, you're always going to succeed, because you know that you can't lose with that left hook.
Speaker 3:whatever it may, whatever it may be, it may be, you know something totally, totally different. That's just an analogy, but it worked it. It served me well because it was something that, um, I was insistent upon perfecting.
Speaker 2:Is this a like the selling point like the left hook. Like the selling point, like the left hook.
Speaker 3:Is that the selling point? So you know, like in sales, if your strength is building a relationship, always build a relationship. If your strength is selling the product, sell the product. If your strength is selling the financials on a product, sell the financials. But you have to be able to perfect something and always go back to it.
Speaker 2:So, Brian Murphy, what is your left hook in sales?
Speaker 3:I would say understanding the problem and then making the problem bigger than life.
Speaker 4:All right, create a problem, sell a solution.
Speaker 3:No doubt about it. That's you know, very simply said, but very accurate.
Speaker 2:Okay, so let's talk about your company, Nano Vibronics. What exactly is it?
Speaker 3:So we're a public company Traded under the symbol NAOV, traded on NASDAQ, and we're based in both Tyler, texas, as well as Haifa, israel. Haifa is about 20 miles from the Lebanon border. We manufacture primarily two products. We've got a couple of other products, but our two primary products, uh, they use one platform technology. It's called surface acoustic wave. It's a?
Speaker 3:um, you've heard about ultrasound yes so ultrasound in a clinic is very high energy um. It's used for pain, uh in a different frequency or waveform. It can be used to image an unborn baby. We use a different frequency. We use a 93 kilohertz wave, which is low-level, low-frequency ultrasound and it's applied to two products called pain shield and euro shield. On the euro shield it's applied uh externally what is your shield?
Speaker 2:what is your shield?
Speaker 3:euro shield. Uh is a product that's used with a catheter okay, so I have a super pubic catheter. Suprapubic or urinary catheter, either way, okay, it sends a low-level, low-frequency ultrasonic wave down the catheter. You would never detect it, and what it does is it actually serves, as it creates, like a trampoline effect on the catheter and it prevents bacteria from docking onto the catheter, which is the first step in a urinary tract infection.
Speaker 2:Whoa.
Speaker 3:So, if you can prevent that first step, what normally occurs is the bacteria docks onto the catheter, it then creates a colony. The colony is a number of bacteria that colonize together, and then it creates a biofilm, and the biofilm is resistant to antibiotics. So what we're trying to do and we've been effective at doing it is to stop that first step in the cascade of events that occur that lead to a urinary tract infection.
Speaker 2:So I don't know if you know this about me, but about two years ago I went into septic shock. I don't know if my father told you, but I went into septic shock I don't know if my father told you, but I went into septic shock.
Speaker 2:It was because of a urinary tract infection. I almost died. I almost lost my life. My organs were failing and they were able to you know, get me better. Thank God, sherman Hospital, shout out to them. You know what I mean. Thank God, sherman Hospital, shout out to them. But if I was wearing a Euro shield, do you think the possibility of that could have decreased?
Speaker 3:It would have eliminated the well it would have eliminated the events that occur that led to your urinary tract infection. Yeah, my mother actually died of a urinary tract infection, uh, five years ago so, and I the most painful thing was that, because the fda hadn't cleared us, uh, I couldn't even put the product on my mother.
Speaker 2:That's terrible.
Speaker 3:So there's, you know, a little bit of a passion there that wouldn't normally exist given those events.
Speaker 2:Well recipes to your mother. And if the FDA is listening, allow EuroShield to be on the shelves. We need it, I need it.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, like if that could have like stopped me from going into septic shock, if that could stop a lot of people because that is the leading factor of, you know, people dying in spinal cord injuries. It's either a pressure ulcer or it's a urinary tract infection and they die from septic shock. We are still human, so give us a chance to live with the products that you're creating.
Speaker 3:It's such an amazing product. The most use is in the UK and it's reimbursed in the UK. Um, but you know, I just need to uh, uh in this next administration, uh work my way up again and uh try to get the FDA to recognize it. And we had temporary approval under kind of COVID guidelines and we just lost the registration a couple of months ago.
Speaker 2:I remember you actually giving me the product and you said like Max, uses, uses, uses.
Speaker 3:and I had to ask my doctor.
Speaker 2:My doctor was like yeah, we can use it. And then I remember you said you got in with the va and I, for everybody listening, I, I get my care through the va and I was super excited for you. And now hearing this, this backlash with the FDA, that's absolutely like terrible yeah, it's, uh, it sucks.
Speaker 3:To be honest with you now, the other product, uh, that we do a lot with the VA is called pain shield. Pain shield uses the same technology. It's that surface acoustic wave, low level, low frequency ultrasound, delivered through just a small little patch, and then the device the same device in size that you saw about the size of a cell phone just fits into your pocket. It's an opioid alternative and the intent of that product is to cure what's causing the pain, not just like an Advil, not curing the symptom, and then your pain is going to come back the minute the.
Speaker 3:Advil wears off. All these products that are on the market are all symptom oriented. They don't really address what's causing the pain, and what we're doing is sending a low level, low frequency ultrasonic wave into that area of pain, whether it's muscle, tendon, nerve and it increases blood flow. First of all, it's a very powerful anti-inflammatory, so you get the inflammation down and then from there the product increases blood flow, increases oxygenation to that part of the body, and it's angiogenic, which means that it effectively encourages the body to grow new capillaries, which increases the blood flow to that area.
Speaker 2:So, as a salesman, how do you know all this scientific like medical? It's just, you know all this scientific like medical, it's just, you know, it's not.
Speaker 3:This product is pretty simple.
Speaker 2:It doesn't sound simple.
Speaker 3:No, it's. I mean, you've seen the product, you've seen the other product. It's the same size, it's just an on and off button and you put the patch on, uh, where the pain is, and um and uh, the patch where their pain is like.
Speaker 2:Is that like putting a band-aid on, or is that like actually helping?
Speaker 3:no, it's.
Speaker 2:It's about the size of a large band-aid I meant like, uh, metaphorically, so, is that like putting a bandaid on? Or is that like because, like I think about this, okay, big Pharma wants me to take my Oxycontin and all this stuff and I don't take opioids anymore because of the septic shock, you know but they want me to take that because it's just gonna help me with my pain in quotation marks, do you know? I mean, yours is basically trying to, like you know, slap a band-aid on it rather than having people come back for refills yeah, it's not well.
Speaker 3:The band, the Band-Aid would be temporary, but this is intended. It doesn't work on everybody, you know it's.
Speaker 4:Is it a cumulative therapy or does it just? It works as you put the patch on and it works while the device is working.
Speaker 3:So the device works for six and a half hours, um, before it's got to be charged again. Uh, it's what we call dose related. So dose related means the more you use it, the better it works so it's not like opioids, it's the exact opposite it's the exact opposite.
Speaker 4:Wow.
Speaker 3:So, for instance, I had a shoulder problem and I wore one of the versions of PainShield which has two transducers and it worked incredibly well. And I mean, I don't know what I would do personally without it, because I use it so often Between my back, my shoulder, my knee.
Speaker 4:Is it for muscular pain or nerve pain or all of the?
Speaker 3:above. It's indicated for muscle tendon and contracture tendon and contracture but it does work on well. I got to be careful because the FDA requires me to say that, but I've had good experiences with nerves.
Speaker 4:Personally.
Speaker 2:That's amazing. Because I have fibromyalgia, I think that's what. Because I have a fibromyalgia, I think that's what it's called fibromyalgia. I always get it wrong always it's a tough word.
Speaker 4:I'm not going to lie fibromyalgia.
Speaker 2:I have that in my like trigeminal neuralgia in my under my jaw and it's just these pins and needle pain and I've had that since 2018.
Speaker 3:It's constant. I'll get you a pain shield.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, we'll see if it works. Man, you sold me.
Speaker 3:It's an amazing product. I mean the VA is just eating it up. We've got probably 50 of the 150 VA hospitals prescribing. We were just approved for active military, so it's doing very well in the VA.
Speaker 2:So in your 25 years of senior sales operations and general management experience in medical device and medical technology companies, how have you seen this industry evolve over time?
Speaker 3:Ooh, big pharma, big pharma gets bigger, big Pharma, big Pharma gets bigger. And that's probably the biggest change Well, not change, but progression of the industry. Big Pharma is more powerful now than they've ever been. Medical device there's just some amazing technologies out there. However, uh, there, um, there's the saying uh, more than one great technologies have have uh, gone broke because they couldn't sell it.
Speaker 3:So the the reality is you still got to get somebody out there to tell them the story. And it's just like when you brought the euro shield into your doc yeah, she hadn't heard anything about it. No, so she was reluctant to use it. You know, she had to read the 30 studies that were on the product that showed that it was effective. Doctors don't have that kind of time. We've got a study going on right now at the University of Michigan and it's a 306-patient study, pivotal study, and when a big institution like University of Michigan, with that many patients and they draw a conclusion on the product, they will be able to just go down and look at the results, and every other study we've done has had miraculous outcomes.
Speaker 2:That's amazing. That's amazing. You know. What really strikes me is the progression of technology from, so you said, the 70s. Did you ever think you would have a little computer in your hand like a little tablet? A tablet wasn't even a thing back then yeah. Do you ever think so, like with the AI and technology, like do you think that's helped Big Pharma a lot?
Speaker 3:You know, a great example of that is I left the company to come to work as ceo of nano vibronics, um, and their technology was placenta technology, stem cells. So, uh, no, actually it was dehydrated, so they actually killed the stem cells. But it treats wounds. So what they found was that when placenta is placed into a wound, it encourages the stem cells from your own body to hyperproduce and then be drawn to that one area. Well, you know to your point 20 years ago, who thought we'd be using placenta to heal wounds and be able to commercialize it and put it on the shelf for five years?
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's crazy stuff.
Speaker 2:Well, it's amazing that they find out through like studies and like constant, like research. For people like me and people in other situations, like I'm hoping to God that I walk one day again, you know I do my therapy, I do everything right. I've talked to a few scientists and doctors that have promising studies, but again, the FDA always gets in the way, man.
Speaker 4:Why is that? Why does the FDA I feel?
Speaker 2:like. You know how women say your body, it's their body, their choice. I feel like it's my body, my choice, like if I want to do this study, that has good merit, very good. Like. It has good merit, very good merit on what it's supposed to do. Why can't I do it? Why are there laws?
Speaker 3:against that. There are stem cell companies out there that are on the cusp of being able to help you, and you know, adam, yeah.
Speaker 2:Adam is connected to one of them. He's a chiropractor.
Speaker 3:He is. But some of the technologies right now are just, they're amazing and you know, when you talk to them it sounds like they're mixing a cocktail for a specific injury or a specific indication. But you know, I don't know where that's going to lead, but it's certainly not going backwards.
Speaker 4:Do you think that medical technologies, like companies, and big pharma are like working together, or you think that there's a bit the FDA called Section 361.
Speaker 3:Section 361 is where it's human cells and tissue that is minimally manipulated. So you can get a product approved and stem cells are not illegal. They fall primarily typically under Section 361. So Section 361 would allow them to bring it to market, but they can't make any claims or their claims have to be minimal.
Speaker 4:So the FDA dictates what you can and can't say about your product.
Speaker 3:It does.
Speaker 4:Okay, interesting.
Speaker 2:But they're allowed to have these infomercials of commercials of Ozanpig and all this other stuff. That makes no sense.
Speaker 3:If you listen carefully, yeah and a four-page side effect of a pamphlet you get.
Speaker 2:Because of this, you might have a heart attack. If you look at this, make sure you do contact your doctor immediately. I hope RFK Jr gets rid of that.
Speaker 4:I'm super glad I agree.
Speaker 2:I really do, but you have an impeccable, impeccable resume, one of the best resumes. I've seen besides Tim Terrell. I mean, what was it like to speak at the United Nations, to speak there?
Speaker 3:You know, I'll give you the quick version of that. So our company was selected as one of seven Israeli companies that had the best cutting edge technologies edge technologies. So, as a result, during the United Nations in 2016, the CEOs of each of the seven companies was expected to give a speech and the event was called, I think, it was showcasing Israeli technologies for the benefit of African nations. So they were trying to build their trade relations with Africa based upon the technologies of Israel, and Israel is very inventive and creative in their technologies.
Speaker 3:So the CEO at the time I was a consultant for the company, for Net-A-Vibronics, and our CEO was, to put it lightly, he was not a he was not a great public speaker. So he got up there to give his practice speech and danny denone, who was the ambassador to the united nations, called our biggest stockholder and said if this is the guy that's going to be representing you, we can't do this. You're out. He said give me one hour. He called me on Wednesday. He said what are you doing tomorrow? I said um, nothing, I'm yours. If you need me, he goes. You're giving a speech at the United Nations, I said is this in sweden?
Speaker 3:no, this is in new york during the general assembly okay and uh, I said what's the speech about?
Speaker 3:he said I don't know. I said how long is the speech? I don't know how many people are going to be there. No idea he goes. I'll give you the name of the conference off of the general assembly and you figure it out. So I he told me what. What it was. It was about, you know, introducing new technologies to Africa. So, um, uh, at the at the United Nations, the speech was in front of Benjamin Netanyahu, dandi Danone, who was the ambassador, 13 African presidents and 880 delegates from the UN. So you know, a bit of a pucker event.
Speaker 2:Were they all like sitting at their seats with the nation?
Speaker 3:flag. Uh no, it was more of a uh kind of an auditorium. So I gave the speech and the chairman of the board, uh, approached me outside of the uh, the conference and he said approached me outside of the conference and he said you have to take the new CEO role. So at that point I was really not intending to go to work for him. I was happy being a consultant for him. And he said no, you have to take it. And so you got promoted.
Speaker 3:I got caught up in the moment and I took it. So I like that um and uh, he said job number one was to get the company to go public. Uh, up on nasda. So I was able to do that in the next year. Rang the bell with my daughters at my side, rang the NASDAQ bell on Wall Street and you know, in the interim, I mean it was just a whirlwind. I was at the White House a couple of times. I went to the Knesset, which is the equivalent to the government in Israel, met with their health minister. I mean it's just been a whirlwind.
Speaker 2:That sounds surreal.
Speaker 3:It was.
Speaker 2:Is Israel. So, with everything going on with Israel, right now is it hard to talk to your partners in Israel.
Speaker 3:It's. You know they're doing fine. The government has allowed them to work from home if they're nervous about coming into the office. We're. We're only 20, 20 miles from hezbollah. Uh, you know it's the lebanon border. So a little bit, you know, there's a little nervousness there, but uh, my last scheduled trip to go there was october 9th of last year and you know what happened on October 7th. That was the attack, so I didn't go. So the only limitation freight comes out of there. It's business as usual. Israel's used to this. But the only thing that has been different is I can't get there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, hopefully that changes in the near future. I'm hoping. Yeah, dude, I'm like blown away right now. I mean like and I say that a lot on the podcast but I've never heard someone that got promoted on the spot to CEO to speak at the United Nations to get your, basically to get you guys, your stock on the NASDAQ. So it was basically what it was for. What was that like? What was the feeling?
Speaker 3:you know, um, I honestly it was surreal. Standing in front of the nasdaq headquarters, where we had just rung the bell, I had a couple of my really good friends on stage with me, a couple of employees, a couple of NASDAQ people. But as we're standing in the park right in front of NASDAQ, on this 30-story marquee, they're flashing pictures. 30 story marquee, they're flashing pictures. And to see my daughters up on this 30 story marquee was you talk about surreal? That was surreal and I mean it was incredible. My son-in-law later, on a cigar bar afterwards, as we're all celebrating, he looked at me and he said you've now given me the mission, I know what I want to do. And he said I am going to be ringing that bell.
Speaker 2:Wow, hopefully that works. Hopefully it did work. I don't know.
Speaker 3:Well, he's, he's on a great track, man the guy. If anybody can do it, he can do it.
Speaker 2:You sound like a, you sound like a family man. So, uh, you have two daughters and a wife. How's your family life?
Speaker 3:Two daughters that are the most amazing people I've ever met in my life One granddaughter, son-in-law, who's a rock star, and you know Denise, my partner, and she's amazing and life is good.
Speaker 2:That sounds pretty good for someone coming from a middle-class family dictating your life. To climb the ranks of the medical technology industry, to become the CEO on the spot at the United Nations. That's a United Nations press conference. I mean, that's just unbelievable man.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that United Nations thing was probably the highlight of my career. Ringing the bell was it's neck and neck.
Speaker 2:What does that mean? Mean ringing the bell?
Speaker 3:so if you, if you watch, uh, cnbc, uh, the opening bell is rung, um, you're up on stage and you've got this little monitor in front of you and they do a countdown to the opening day of trading and the the open of trading. And then, on the closing bell, which we did, um, you ring the bell to close the day of trading, but it's nationally televised, and um, it's uh, your company name, your closest confidants are up on stage with you and you literally ring the bell. I'll show you a video of it.
Speaker 2:we can, we can we can actually incorporate it into the podcast, if you like that it's.
Speaker 3:Uh, it was filmed off of a tv, so it's nothing, it's nothing that's professionally done, but I can definitely send you some pictures.
Speaker 2:That's amazing man. That's a good family, good things, and it seems like you like helping people, like giving back. You know, like you want to help people with the UTIs, you want to help people with pain.
Speaker 3:Like, how does that go into your life? No doubt about it, and you know I spent 30 years in wound care. You know you mentioned wounds. Yeah, um, I launched a product called the vac the wound vac. I don't know if you've ever seen it or heard about it I've definitely heard about it. Yeah, you launched that I launched it in 1996, that's where I was born.
Speaker 2:God I hate you.
Speaker 4:So what is that product?
Speaker 3:yeah, uh, it's a negative pressure wound device that typically, all through time, doctors would slap stuff on the wound and they'd uncover it and they'd go, okay, well, nothing's happened. They'd slap more crap on it and cover it up, open it up in a week. Nothing's happened. And this product when a chronic wound won't heal, this product will heal it within days.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:And what it does is it's kind of a vacuum on the wound. It's vacuuming out all the excess fluids and the bacteria and drawing blood to the wound site. We brought it from $0 to $2 billion in revenue in a matter of, I think, eight years, nine years.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I saw that you're 25 years experience, so you've generated over 500 million dollars in sales that was, um, we went from.
Speaker 3:So, uh, I actually left the company and I went to. I went to work for eastman kodak when they had 73,000 employees. This is when they were huge and about a month into it I realized the most dangerous place in the world is not Afghanistan or Iran, it's standing between the front door of Eastman Kodak and the parking lot at 501. Because people were running to their cars and they were there for their pensions and I couldn't understand that mentality.
Speaker 3:And every company I've worked for has been more entrepreneurial, oriented, oriented, and you did what you needed to do until and you know you may be there until 10 o'clock at night and you're taking phone calls on the weekend, you're, you know there is no rest, um, but Eastman Kodak was a bit of, it was a little comical, because you'd see this horde of people and you just don't want to be standing between them and their car. So so I ended up going back to KCI, the wound vac company, and I took a uh, a role as VP general manager over their smallest division. We were doing about $10 million a year in revenue. They had just added 30 people and sales declined from the time that they added them until the time I came back and I they, they were frustrated, so I took it over in 2000. Took it over.
Speaker 4:How did you turn it around?
Speaker 3:Well, I realized that the way they were conducting business for this segment of the business, which was home clinic and home and wound clinics, was the same way that they were conducting business on the acute care or hospital side, and everything had to be changed. So I changed everything and I'll never forget. The CEO walked in my office and he said what did you do? What the hell are you doing?
Speaker 3:And I said I will in by die by my decision and in so I took it over a 10 million. We ended that year at 30 million. The following year we did 90 million. The following year we did 156 million. We made it to 500 million before he ever came back to me and said okay, you were right so, uh, and that same guy is our chairman of the board today where uh, where uh, was this all based?
Speaker 2:you Same thing, tyler, texas. No, that was in.
Speaker 3:San Antonio, texas. Okay, so I commuted from Sunday night until Friday night for two years. It was hell, but it paid off. I mean he worked hard and uh, and, like I said, the the um president of that company is now my chairman of the board, and for there's a bond that will never be be broken it's because you you doubled down on your decision got out of the trenches yeah oh, he was so mad what he?
Speaker 2:was so mad I mean because this guy's probably got a lot of like balls, you know like what. What was he like when he found out that you are actually adding more revenue to the company?
Speaker 3:um well, uh. He's the smartest businessman I've ever worked with in my entire life. So I I would be lying to you if I didn't tell you that when he walked out of my office that day with his red face, fists clenched, that I didn't have second thoughts. And I thought man, I better be right. So, uh, it turned out lucky. Lucky for me, it turned out that I was right.
Speaker 4:For people who are in, you know, higher corporate positions, I feel like risk, risk management is is difficult for people to navigate and especially for those of us who, you know, aren't in an entrepreneurial type of setting. What kind of thought process when it comes to taking those risks that you go through, to make those decisions to you know, to pull the trigger or not?
Speaker 3:You know a great question. I've always had a plan b, so out of the corner of my eye, I always see that there's a window open for me to jump through, and hopefully it's not on the 10th floor, um. But you know, the bottom line is that you always have to have plan b and if plan A is crashing and burning you know, entrepreneurial or not you better have another way. And it's got to be thought through. You've got to have a plan in your head at least to enact plan B.
Speaker 4:That's an interesting philosophy. A lot of people will say let's jump headfirst into it or don't do it at all, but having a plan B just in case plan A doesn't work out. That's interesting, Max, what you were going to say.
Speaker 2:I was going to say so. Basically, our generation, my generation, is all about entrepreneurship. They want to sell merchandise whenever they think they become a brand. So what I'm asking you is what advice would you give to all those entrepreneurs out there that are listening to this?
Speaker 3:You know, I would say run as fast and hard as you can, but if you see a cliff in front of you, slow down and so you're not running off the cliff, reassess. Um, you know there's uh, nobody's right 100 of the time, but momentum is key. You know it's's nobody's right 100% of the time, but momentum is key. You know, it's not about what you made today or what you make tomorrow, but if the momentum is going in the right direction, I mean you're like a poster child for this.
Speaker 3:When you and I were talking earlier. You had 130 followers. The last time I talked to you yeah, that was a year ago, and now you're at 5,700?.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:That's, I mean, you talk about momentum.
Speaker 2:That's on steroids. It's, I mean, mean I'm very blessed for the people that listen to the podcast and for the people that come on to the podcast, you know, because otherwise there wouldn't be a podcast. What we're looking for is people who face adversity, you know, and it sounds like you had to face adversity when you took over that company. You know, like, okay, well, either I'm driving this company into the ground or I'm gonna excel them to the top, which you did it was um, it was definitely an adventure.
Speaker 2:I mean, it's all been an adventure, yeah, I mean your life's crazy man, but let's like slow it down. You're very successful. You know very. You seem very happy. You have two beautiful daughters. You got a son-in-law that's driven as hell, probably by you. You know what do you do to, like you know, kick back your feet. Like I know. You hang out at Fort Lauderdale. My dad says you have a place there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so explain what you like to do for fun now. Well, your dad is part of it. It's what we call the river rat crew.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:Yeah, river rat crew. Yes, yeah. So all the, uh, all the folks who live on the river uh are part of one little sorority, fraternity, whatever you want to call it, and, um, we all have a great time together. That's my, that's my escape, you know just get on the river, listen to some music, but it's just being with good friends and you know, just not having to, having to think about the the craziness of your day, you know do you uh go to fort lauderdale for the winter?
Speaker 3:fort lauderdale is my legal home oh yeah, so I'm legal down there and I live there, not full-time, but um.
Speaker 2:I don't own anything in illinois and I think I have a reason, I think I know why?
Speaker 3:yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 4:But um, you know, I I grew up here, I still have family here, so I'm still here occasionally but how does the ceo deal with stress, the the stress of of working your job as intense as it is?
Speaker 2:especially medical, yeah right that's what I'm thinking I don't know.
Speaker 3:I you know I don't drink a lot, so that I can't do yoga deep breathing maybe the gym, the gym golf golf you know in the minute you step out on the golf course. You know after the first hole whether the golf round is going to be more stressful than your day so but usually just the gym.
Speaker 2:You look like you're in good shape. Man, really good shape man, I'm old well for being 18 in 1976.
Speaker 4:You do look, you do look great for your for that fact.
Speaker 3:Still got that left hook probably, oh yeah you know, in uh, one one little side story from that 1976 fight. So I'm up in Springfield, illinois, and you know they lay out kind of a chart of who you're going to fight. If you win this one, you win. You fight this guy. And, uh, the guy that I was, if I won the fight, the first fight, the guy that I was going to fight, his name was Ronaldo Snipes. Ronaldo Snipes um became the first guy to knock down Larry Holmes in 1987. He was two seconds away from being the heavyweight champion of the world. Ronaldo Snipes is my closest friend in New York and we still laugh about the fact that I tell him the best fight I ever lost was the first fight I ever fought to prevent fighting him Because he would have killed me, and we became best friends.
Speaker 4:What an origin story. I love that.
Speaker 2:Start of an era. That's awesome. Do you still hit the bag? Oh God, no, I've had four broken hands.
Speaker 3:If I hit anything, you might see bone chips coming out of my hands.
Speaker 2:So I'm not going to like expect this answer to be answered, but like they say that making your first million is the hardest, would you say that's true?
Speaker 3:Yeah, the hardest. Uh, would you say. That's true. Yeah, you know, um, my goal when I, when I first got into into business, it was around 1980, um, and my goal was, uh, by 1990 I wanted to have made my first million dollars and I think I made it by like 30,000. It was, it's right there, and um, which you know it was a goal. But working for people, it's harder to meet that goal, you know you. And again, in sales, it's harder to meet that goal, you know you. And again, in sales, earnings are unlimited, so it's easier to do in sales. But, uh, but I actually did it, um, and I've adopted a policy that basically it's better to own a small piece of something big than a big piece of something small. So if, for instance, the Wound Vac Company, I had a small piece of the ownership of that company, which turned into a lot of money, now if I had a large piece of something that was very, very small, it would have turned into nothing yeah or next to nothing.
Speaker 3:So you know you don't right now you don't. You don't get rich doing the nine to five. Um, you've gotta. You got to do the nine to five to prove yourself, to be able to interview, uh, and justifiably interview and get the job for the next step up. But stock options you make, you can make a lot of money and I would encourage everybody to just follow a path that has that in mind. It's like a small part of something big can turn into something really significant.
Speaker 4:Can you elaborate on that? Because we've had business moguls on the podcast and some of them have the opinion of don't work the 9 to 5, you'll never get rich doing the 9 to 5.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no W2ers, that's what they say. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no W2. It's like your gen pop Shut up, john.
Speaker 4:But we. My question is how do you, how do you climb the ladder? How do you follow that path? If you're getting into the business, as you know, salaried on on nine to five, how do you, how do you make that jump to higher management?
Speaker 3:So you know the way to get promoted is to be in something that's quantifiable. So if you're judged based upon you know I hate to throw out a specific job in a company, but let's just say human resources where is that quantifiable? Um, how many people you you bring on board, or you know what is, what is the value to the company? So if you're quantifying, if you're trying to, uh, to elevate yourself, what value do you bring to a company and how can it be quantified? So sales is obviously the best way to do that. Product development is another way to do that.
Speaker 2:Business planning, m&a, you know things like that. Where do people get stuck?
Speaker 4:Great question.
Speaker 3:Where do they get stuck? You know, I think it's. I have a philosophy about that. Yeah, but I have a philosophy about that, yeah. Um, so think about human nature instincts. Human nature instincts are what we all have right, yeah. We're generally lazy, um, we uh don't eat. Well, we eat what's good and not what's good for you. Yeah, we want the quick fix, we want quick cash. Quick cash immediate gratification. All of those human nature instincts are in all of us.
Speaker 3:human nature instincts are in all of us, the people who succeed are the five percent that fight those human nature, instincts, and win meaning that if everybody if human nature is telling you that, you know, lazy is the way to go, which all of us are innately lazy and therefore, if you succumb to the laziness you're going to be part of the 95%. You're never going to be in that 5% elite, elite. So if you can beat your human nature instincts, you know, I, you know, I would encourage everybody to, like, sit back and and make a list of what drives them. Um, what drives them? Uh, what are your driving human nature instincts, what are your driving forces? And you know, maybe people won't admit that they're lazy.
Speaker 2:But, the truth hurts.
Speaker 3:The truth hurts.
Speaker 2:You know it really does, but I feel like my generation has gotten more lazier than ever. I feel like my generation has gotten more leisure than ever and I can't imagine, if you had our technology, our like access to like technology, how easy it would be for you to make like money in a business.
Speaker 3:You know I've got a great story. My daughter, my 32 year old daughter, lindsay she we've got a good friend in the city of Chicago who's very prominent, knows everybody, and she was invited to dinner one night and she sat next to this billionaire and he had just sold a staffing business for $800 million, something like that, and she had a conversation with him and she took his business card and she went home and she wrote a note, she wrote a handwritten card to him, you know, appreciated your insights and really enjoyed dinner, really enjoyed the conversation with you. Blah blah blah Sent that note, uh to him. He called her and he's like nobody has done that in 15 years for me.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:So, uh, If you think about the human nature aspect of it, somebody might take that business card and text him hey, nice to meet you. Yes, you know what she took the extra step wrote the card. I tell this story to so many young kids that that's amazing. She stood out.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:She was different Today, he would know who she is. This billionaire in Houston, texas, would know who she is.
Speaker 4:That's great advice Standing out.
Speaker 2:Stand out exactly. Don't do what the status quo is. Be different, Right Be different. Right Be different.
Speaker 3:Another great example is my older daughter went to apply for a sales job and she told me at about 9 o'clock at night you know I've got an interview tomorrow morning at 10. And she said you know any advice that you can give me? And I said, well, do you have your business plan ready? And she said what are you talking about? And I said, well, your business plan. Do you not have a business plan to walk into the interview with? She said, well, it's a six person interview, it's a committee interview. And I said you don't have six copies of your business plan to hand to each one of the interviewers. And she's like, well, nobody does that. And I said exactly, Nobody does that. So 9.
Speaker 3:PM and 9 AM the next morning. Uh, she and I worked on a business plan together. She got a business plan done, made six copies, we choreographed it. She said you know, I'm right out of college Not a lot on my resume so I want to share my business plan with you. And they all sat back in their seats and they went wow, Wow, You're like Yoda.
Speaker 3:So she was supposed to hear from them. There it was, you know, like 20 people interviewing and she said that, uh, she called me after the interview and she said it went really well. She said I'll know this afternoon whether I'm going to make it to the next round. She got the call that afternoon and the lady said um, I have good news and bad news. She goes what do you want to hear first? And she goes give me the bad news. She goes. The bad news is he didn't make it to the second round and she goes okay, what's the good news? She goes. Well, we canceled the second round. We were offering you the job.
Speaker 4:Wow.
Speaker 3:So fast forward. My second daughter gets her first sales interview, so she tells me about it. She goes. I got an interview Tomorrow and I said do you have your business plan done?
Speaker 2:She goes, oh, my sister already helped me with it.
Speaker 3:She got the job that day without. Before she walked out the door she said they looked at her and they said we've interviewed 10 people. Nobody had a business plan. Nobody had a business plan. She goes. They were so impressed they didn't even open it, they just knew that she had the piece of paper and it was about a five-page business plan with her personal mission and her development plan and things that I've taught my older daughter that were all incorporated into this. She got the job that day. That's amazing. So what?
Speaker 2:I would tell your listeners anybody coming out of college man, if you don't have a business plan, walking into an interview, you lose do your due diligence, your homework, everybody do it, and for you it looks like the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, because you used to knock people out in the first round.
Speaker 4:It's true.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, I got to ask you a question. This is going to be a big one, but when you wake up in the morning, morning, do you think you've fulfilled your purpose of life?
Speaker 3:no, god, no, no. The next, the next stage is going to be, uh, mentoring kids well yeah, um, and exactly that story. I've taken a lot of my daughter's friends and some family members and just friends, kids that are coming out of college and you know college Great, you get the piece of paper. What do they tell you about getting a job?
Speaker 4:Yeah, exactly, tell us about college, mr Murphy. Tell us what you think about college, please.
Speaker 3:So you know you go to college and you get that piece of paper and you know you're good to go, and then they shoo you out. They cashed your last check and they're you know you're good to go, right? Well, they never told you how to get a job.
Speaker 4:They never told you how to get a job.
Speaker 2:She's part of this.
Speaker 3:They also never told you that your first job leads to your second job and it's likely going to be in the same category of job that you got the first time. So how do you get the job that you want and how do you get what's your vision for 20, 30 years from now? Where do you want to be? Do you want to be in the medical industry? Do you get what's your vision for 20, 30 years from now? Where do you want to be? Do you want to be in the medical industry? Do you want to be in the financial markets? You know where do you want to be, because my dad's advice of becoming a McDonald's manager would have you know, today I'd be maybe running a Chick-fil-A Right.
Speaker 2:They're closed on Sunday. That's a plus.
Speaker 3:I would at least get one day off. But you know, it's that old analogy. You know, if you're leaving on a plane from la and you're heading to new york and your plane leaves just two degrees to the right, to the south, you're gonna end up in miami well so think about that. You get on that plane, make sure that it's facing the right direction for where you want to land new york.
Speaker 2:Wow, absolutely amazing so would you uh? Would you, would you uh? Would you urge people to read a lot? Read books?
Speaker 4:Business books sales books. Business books sales books.
Speaker 3:I haven't read a book for 20 years, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Different strokes. It's been amazing having you on. You have stories for days.
Speaker 2:I'm so happy you came on I'm so happy to be here anything I can do to support you yeah, and this one, this one's gonna be a good one, man, it is. I think a lot of people are gonna get a lot of insight, a lot of like, um, like, background knowledge of, like how it was in the past and how it is in the future, how gluttonous and lucky we are compared to you who comes from a middle-class family, and so making this first million after a decade right, it took you a decade, yeah, 1980 to 1990.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, it took you a decade, yeah 1980 to 1990.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it took you a decade, and you had grit, you had determination and you did it, man.
Speaker 3:You know, there's a couple of things that I would change, but in general I think I would have stayed the course. I'd repeat it.
Speaker 2:I think I would have stayed the course. I'd repeat it I'm inspired by you and I'm going to make sure I keep that in my notes. I am going to continue to read books.
Speaker 3:Just make sure that when you leave LA, you're heading in the right direction, absolutely.
Speaker 2:LA. We're going to Miami, we're going to New York, all right, so give that left punch. Ryan, there's a camera one. Tell the people what you got coming. You said you're going to be a mentor. I would love to be well, you would be a great mentor for everybody out there like this freaking episode this is a great episode I've had so much fun, yeah, like comment, comment what you think also we can tell when you're not subscribed, so subscribe comment.
Speaker 2:Comment what you think about big pharma. Comment what you think about the fda turning down this amazing opportunity for people to not have a urinary tract infections with euro shield. Comment. Turn that notification bell on so you can always see when the next podcast comes out. Brian, it's been a pleasure pleasure is all mine. I'm paralyzed from a neck down, breathing through a machine, but that doesn't stop me from following my dreams and doing what I love to do. I don't got an excuse, and neither should you. We'll see you guys in the next one.