Founders' Forum

The Hidden Key to Business Success: Alan Claypool on Market Fit

Marc Bernstein / Alan Claypool Episode 98

What if the key to business success isn't just working harder but choosing the right market? Alan Claypool's journey from IT project management to entrepreneurship is a powerful lesson in the importance of business models, demand, and strategic pivots.

After two decades managing complex IT projects, Alan founded TAC4 Solutions with a commitment to delivering results with integrity. But despite his expertise, his business was stuck in an unpredictable cycle—some years were highly profitable, while others left him without clients. The turning point? Realizing that a sustainable business depends on three factors: high market demand, low competition, and recurring revenue.

Alan’s initial business—IT project management for insurance companies—wasn’t built for long-term stability. However, he had already started offering statutory accounting services, an area that perfectly fit his criteria. Every insurer needs this service regularly, there are few qualified providers, and the work never stops. By pivoting, Alan transformed his business into a steady, thriving company.

Beyond strategy, Alan emphasizes the power of organizational culture. His approach—establishing clear behavioral ground rules—helped create high-trust, high-performance teams that outpaced competitors.

Key Takeaways:

  • The right business model is more important than talent or effort—look for high demand, low competition, and recurring revenue.
  • Pivoting to a sustainable niche can make the difference between struggle and success.
  • Company culture directly impacts business success—clear behavioral expectations lead to better teamwork and outcomes.
  • Entrepreneurship isn’t just about sales skills; it’s about finding the right market fit.

Tune in to hear Alan’s journey, the hard lessons he learned, and how you can apply these principles to build a resilient, profitable business.


About Alan Claypool:

Mr. Claypool is the President of TAC4 Solutions, which runs successful project implementations for insurance companies by instilling organizational health into a cohesive project team. Alan is also President of ARC Strategic Services that performs statutory accounting for insurance companies.

Connect:

Website tac4solutions.com

arcstrategicservices.com

LinkedIn linkedin.com/in/t-alan-claypool-6834205


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Announcer:

Entrepreneur, founder, author and financial advisor, Marc Bernstein helps high-performing business owners turn their visions into reality. Through his innovative work and the Forward Focus Forums, Marc connects entrepreneurs to resources that fuel their success. Founders Forum is a radio show and podcast where entrepreneurs share their journeys, revealing the lessons they've learned and the stories behind their success. Join Marc and his guests for a mix of inspiration, valuable insights and a little fun. Now let's dive in.

Marc Bernstein:

Good morning America. How are you? This is Florida, on 103.9 HD2, and also Fort Myers 96.5 FM, bonita Springs 101.5, and Naples 105.1. And we were also heard in Philadelphia during most of the year on WWDB. All part of Beasley Media Group and happy to have with us today again Roger Marley as engineer. He's a great collaborator, a great guy to work with, and in the studio we have Alan, who I'll introduce in a few minutes, and Alan and I met because of where I live when I'm in Florida, which is Babcock Ranch, and I've mentioned it once or twice on the show before.

Marc Bernstein:

So this show is all about looking forward. You know, in my mind, entrepreneurs generally are visionaries to some extent, or they're always visionaries to one extent or another. And the idea of forward focus our brand, my brand, is Forward Focus Forums, of which the Founders Forum is one of the programs that we do, and we're always forward-looking. And I am so excited about Babcock Ranch that I talk about it a lot. But I want to have another perspective on it today and for that I'm going to ask Alan your take on that, how you find Babcock Ranch as a forward-looking. It's officially promoted on its website as the home of tomorrow, and what's your take on all that?

Alan Claypool:

I very much believe that's what it is. I mean, they've got Innovation Tower, for instance, as the most visible place on the lake, and it's just a fantastic community. I love living here. I'm so glad we made the choice.

Marc Bernstein:

What do you like about it? I love living here. I'm so glad we made the choice. What do you like about it and what is forward-looking that you see about it?

Alan Claypool:

Well, I've certainly drank the Kool-Aid of Babcock Ranch. They've got a video in the sales center that we informally call the Kool-Aid video. And I totally drank it when I watched the video.

Alan Claypool:

I wasn't even looking to move to Florida or to really anywhere. I was in Nashville at the time and loved Nashville and a friend of mine was down here and he was interested in moving and so he said, come, just look at it with me. And so we did and we toured the whole community, the whole city. I love Founder Square. I think Founder Square is just a happy place, which is kind of the downtown area where it's on a lake.

Alan Claypool:

It's got a band, shell restaurants, a lawn, big lawn area where there's, as you know, food trucks every Friday night and band every Friday night, and just nice community. And then I watched the Kool-Aid video and I totally drank it and you know it feels everybody's smiling, everybody's riding their golf cart and waving at each other and it can be a little Truman Show if you wish, if you will, but for me it's like Truman Show. That's real. It's truly a happy place for me. I'm super glad, in fact we've sold the Nashville place, our clothes on it next week and we're going to be here permanently. I just love it.

Marc Bernstein:

Well, it's a happy place for me too, but I should add some of the things, so some of that could also almost sound like the villages you know, which is a whole different kind of place.

Alan Claypool:

It is yeah.

Marc Bernstein:

In Ocala, but some of the things that are obviously different. It's the first solar power community in America. It was built to be hurricane proof, which really attracted my wife and I.

Alan Claypool:

Which has proven to be the case as well. You know, Ian was terrible in this area and Babcock Ranch survived it wonderfully and even the two more recent hurricanes. Babcock Ranch was the place people evacuated to right, because we were thought to be a couple thousand people in the field.

Marc Bernstein:

Yeah for a week for several for quite a while they were yeah and uh. Also, I don't know if you're around for this, but I know they experimented with autonomous like cars. Um, that wasn't no, no and um. I've heard talk of autonomous boats down the road to take you across Lake Babcock.

Alan Claypool:

I've seen the beginnings of that.

Marc Bernstein:

Have you, yeah, which look wonderful. So that is a real thing, well and even the park system.

Alan Claypool:

It was in the advertisement for a while and I was like where is this park system? It's because it wasn't there yet. It just got finished or it's almost finished. Most of it's finished by now, but around November they finished the park system, which is really this two and a half mile walking trail with six very nice and unique parks along it and they're not just very nice, they're crazy nice.

Announcer:

They're beautiful.

Alan Claypool:

One of them is an outdoor gym, a lagoon for fishing. It's just terrific. It's really really nice.

Marc Bernstein:

I'm at the park system all the time. I need to have grandchildren, just so I can go there.

Alan Claypool:

I go there on my own, without grandchildren. Do you really?

Announcer:

yes, I really do my trainer and I work out on the hill.

Alan Claypool:

Oh, really yeah, and and at the outdoor gym and even the little parks for kids. There's this little spinner thing that I get on, just you're gonna have to show me that sometime yeah, it's ridiculous, I go to the dog the the park, the bark park, yes, it really they had a dog park and it was just like, okay, it was a dog park, this one's beautiful.

Marc Bernstein:

It's a great place to hang out, meet people and have the dogs meet people seem to really appreciate it like it's.

Alan Claypool:

It's I'm not crowded in the way that you don't want to be there, but it's always got people there, you and they're all friendly and it's. It's a great place, it's amazing.

Marc Bernstein:

So, arlo I talk about arlo because he's sort of the mascot of the show and he loves the bark park. You know this is a big anyway. So so my guest today. Let me formally introduce him as alan claypool. Alan is here because he's founder and president of tack for solutions and arc strategic services I almost said arc because it's in capital letters, and Alan is the president of TACFOR, as I mentioned, which runs successful project implementations for insurance companies by instilling organizational health into a cohesive project team. He's also president of ARC Strategic Services that performs statutory accounting for insurance companies. So all of that. You know I've spent a lot of time in the insurance industry. It could sound boring. The interesting part of this, though, is how Alan created real-life, successful businesses out of sort of a boring necessity. You know, was that a good way to put it?

Alan Claypool:

it's very true. The insurance. You think of systems. Sometimes people think that's boring. Uh, you know, like accounting systems, for instance, accounting, some people think that's boring insurance you think that's boring. So put all this together yeah, that makes for boring and it's not at all boring, it's actually very hard and energizing, and new things every day.

Marc Bernstein:

So let's start with your sort of humble beginnings. You know, I always say I don't know how humble they were, but you know what you were doing, um, and your experiences that led you to starting the business.

Alan Claypool:

They were definitely humble.

Alan Claypool:

My beginnings were certainly humble my dad's a farmer and yeah, we had humble beginnings. I worked for about 20 years as an IT project manager it was in the utilities industry and it was for a consulting firm. We did financial software for utility companies and I was a project manager for those usually large companies, the Fortune 500 companies, and so very complicated projects, very long projects, usually two, three, four year projects, and I was in charge of running those projects, so there'd be two, three, 400 people that would be on the projects and you know, and.

Alan Claypool:

I'm in charge of every single thing along the way, which is hard. It's very, you know, it takes a lot of skill, a lot of communication, and I worked for a company that was it's a good company. It's very, you know, it takes a lot of skill, a lot of communication. Um, and I worked for a company that was it's a good company. It was leader in the industry.

Alan Claypool:

And um, but they didn't sell things the way I would prefer them to sell things, you know, sort of like the typical uh, dilbert, if you will, vendor, um, that just over-promised, and you and I, as a project manager, would have to be the person to deal with that inconsistency of what was promised versus what we were going to deliver. That was always hard for me and I thought I think I could go out on my own and do something better. Little did I know I'm a very good project manager. Little did I know that entrepreneurship and being good at what you do those almost have nothing to do with each other.

Marc Bernstein:

Just before we move on, though, it was really like your values weren't aligned.

Alan Claypool:

That's correct, right, right, right. I mean I, I now, in my current world, we are very dedicated to only deliver, only selling what we know we can deliver. Um, we are a very high trust consulting firm, meaning our clients trust us to the max.

Alan Claypool:

We sell things and they absolutely know that's what they're going to get and that is what they get, and so that was my value deliver what you promise, keep your word at all times and not to malign my prior company, they are like most every vendor, they just sold what they could sell and did whatever they could, but usually didn't care as much about that word, and that's how I think most vendors are, and we are sort of a boutique specialty firm that cares a lot about trust and we, we trust our clients, our clients trust us.

Marc Bernstein:

Um, by the way you mentioned I love that you said keep your word. Um, I, I, you and I have talked about this a little bit offline and you can't always keep your word because some things come up you just can't do it. But I call my sort of definition of integrity, which very much intersects with yours, is, you know, do what you say you're going to do, do it, it on time and if you can't do it on time or you can't do it for some reason, to honor your word by getting out in front of it and, uh, which is just an interesting.

Marc Bernstein:

I know we share that value very much, and yet a lot of the business world does not, and I and I understand you know it's, it's part of our success is that.

Alan Claypool:

So what I? What I ended up doing? I left my prior company to start a firm that did IT project management. So we would run projects. My first project got sold into the insurance industry and I've actually niched down into the insurance industry and so on. Our very first project, we had a. I was at a client, a company that just was sort of a cultural nightmare. I was at a client, a company that just was sort of a cultural nightmare. People talked behind each other's backs all the time. One department would blame another department. It was just a mess. It was just sort of a cultural mess and it started impacting our project. This culture impacted the project and so I said why don't we try something different? Like to the core team? I created a set of behavioral ground rules.

Marc Bernstein:

Core team of that company.

Alan Claypool:

Yeah of client people that were helping with the project. I was leading the project. They were helpers and support team for the project and their culture was starting to impact our project negatively, and so I created a set of behavioral ground rules that said how about we? Live this way instead, and it's things like don't complain, but take action instead. When you're frustrated with someone, care about their needs. Don't just try to slam them and get your way.

Alan Claypool:

Instead, care about what they need as well as what you need and very much what you said always keep your word and we've got a whole presentation.

Alan Claypool:

We'll honor your word, yeah, honor your word and so keep your commitments. And if anything comes up no less than halfway from when you promise to when it's due, you're going to show up and say I'm not sure I'm making it. In fact, I just did this 10 minutes ago outside here, while I was waiting for this to begin. I knew that I'm struggling to meet a deadline, for very normal reasons. So I contacted the person that I had promised and I said here's what I'm struggling with. What are the needs of that deadline?

Marc Bernstein:

So you couldn't keep your word. You honored your word.

Alan Claypool:

Well, I'm not sure I might be able to keep my word, but I am definitely honoring the word, like you're saying.

Marc Bernstein:

That's right, because you can't sorry about that. I just pushed my water bottle over, so I don't know if you heard that on the radio, anyway, but you're you know, there are times you just can't keep your word. Sure, but honoring your word is something I think it's a healthy way for people to think about that and I admire and love that you have that integrated, because I know that's a big part of your company today.

Alan Claypool:

It is, and I think a lot of people just sort of believe that they keep their word all the time, but if you ask them more details, they're going to miss deadlines and not mind it. So bad, and not just that Other ways of not keeping your word.

Announcer:

And we really go for a high bar of integrity.

Alan Claypool:

On making sure. And this has been part of why our projects are successful because we instill these ground rules on the project team, and so people are behaving well and producing good results and staying very trust-oriented and unified on a project which produces success.

Marc Bernstein:

So we have a break coming up, but before that, I do want to just follow up on that. We're going to go back to your story afterwards, because we haven't really talked about the story of how entrepreneurialism began. But I know that culture is a real important part of your company today, and I also know that you help other companies even when you're not doing your project work in that.

Alan Claypool:

So why don't you?

Marc Bernstein:

just talk to that for a minute, and then we'll take a break and come back to the story.

Alan Claypool:

Sure, we were doing these projects and it was very successful projects, but we were in a company that maybe didn't have that behavior throughout the rest of the organization, and so our clients started asking us do you do corporate wide culture change? And we didn't at the time, so I've begun doing that as well. So we've also got a program that works with executive leadership teams helping to instill these behaviors and other good culture aspects at the executive level and throughout the rest of the company doing culture change.

Marc Bernstein:

So after the break we're going to talk about the evolution of TACFOR and the challenges you had, and also ARC and how that came about, because it's a very interesting story. So we'll be right back on Founders Forum.

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Marc Bernstein:

We're back on Founders Forum with our guest today, alan Claypool and Alan. We touched on this lightly, but let's talk about the beginning of TAC4 and how that happened.

Alan Claypool:

Sure, I started the business, or actually I left my prior company without any clients or even knowledge of how to get clients. Probably a very stupid move. I advise not doing that. I did some prep work. Yeah, that's how many entrepreneurial businesses, I guess.

Marc Bernstein:

Don't do that if you're listening.

Alan Claypool:

Yeah, so I did some prep work with no income, which is fine. I had some savings. But I did some prep work as to what I would sell, how I would run projects, that sort of thing. And I just happened to have a friend who was a controller at an insurance company, so he was able to get me in for a sales call and we were able to sell it to leadership, and so that was our first project it was the culture one that I was just talking about and it went well. And then, after that project finished, I did a second project that I also sold because I knew someone. So there was someone else, I knew a relative that introduced me somewhere and we were able to get another project going that went on for about a year.

Alan Claypool:

Also went very well and I thought great, I know how entrepreneurship works, I know how to sell. This is wonderful. And then I ran out of friends and so I didn't sell anything else for a little while.

Alan Claypool:

It was really a long stretch and difficult and I realized and I'd already been in sales training and many other things and it was a hard knock when I went about a year without selling anything after a project had finished. Then we sold something. It was not a direct result of all of the sales processes I had. It was just sort of like Providence dropped in my bucket, a client, and so we worked that. And then I went another year without a client and then sold something and then went another year without a client and it was this roller coaster of every other year.

Alan Claypool:

I'd make a lot of money, and every other year I'd make zero money and and I just didn't know I thought I was a terrible salesperson I didn't know, um why I had this major financial roller coaster and not just financial, it was operational roller coaster in my company. Um, and a few years ago, maybe four years ago, I went to a conference where I was it conference where it had a piece of it on entrepreneurship.

Marc Bernstein:

I want to back up just for one second. I don't mean to interrupt, but part of the reason it was difficult because we've talked about this several times is that it was the nature of the work that you were doing too, because it's a kind of compliance thing for insurance companies that they only do every so many years.

Alan Claypool:

Yeah, Well, so it's. It's about putting in systems, new systems and like new accounting systems. People keep their accounting systems for 30 years, and so it's only every 30 years that they really need somebody like me to run a very complex project. Um, and even when they decide it's time to put in a new system I am not their first thought they know that they need a vendor, someone that comes with software but they don't know that they need a client-side project manager, which is what we are Now. They do need us.

Alan Claypool:

Statistics show that 70% of complex projects fail, and so they need someone like me to guide it.

Marc Bernstein:

well, but they don't know that, and you also have a limited pool of customers Insurance companies about 3,500.

Alan Claypool:

They only need me every 35 years and when they need me, they don't know that they need me Right.

Alan Claypool:

So there's the dilemma it is, and so I thought I was a bad salesperson. And what I learned at this conference was that there's well, this guy gave a definition of good business and he defined good business as high market demand, low competition and recurring revenue. And he he also said good business trumps good management. And in that moment I just it was like God was telling me you are a good manager in a crappy business, because I met, I'm extremely low market demand, and even when there is demand, they don't know that they need me, so it's not even perceived market demand. And so I was in a very low market demand. There's no recurring revenue because once they're finished with the project, they don't need me anymore. They love me, they trust me, but they don't have big projects and they've got people on staff that can do the easier projects, so they don't need me anymore.

Alan Claypool:

So no recurring revenue. Competition wasn't really much of an issue. But such low market demand and no recurring revenue, I was in a bad business and thankfully, a client of ours, probably a year prior to that, had come to us and asked us to do insurance statutory accounting work. That's probably not a term most people know, but the insurance industry knows what it is because it's basically reporting that every single insurance company has to do to the government every quarter, and it's complex. It's not just standard accounting, it's specialized accounting for insurance, and so a client had asked us to do it. We started doing it just haphazardly.

Alan Claypool:

We weren't trying to sell it, we just knew how to do it, because we were putting in accounting systems for insurance companies. We had people that knew how to do it, so we had a couple of clients by the time I went to this conference and in the moment that I realized I'm in a bad business, if you will by that definition I realized I had a good business already begun, because it's recurring revenue Every single quarter. They need it. It's high market demand because 100% of insurance companies have to do it, or they go out of business, and they know they have to do it, or they go out of business. And it's low competition because there's a shortage of accountants. There's especially a shortage of statutory insurance accountants, and we had access to them. And so I, on that very day I went to the conference, I called my salesperson and I redirected all of our sales efforts away from the project side over to this good business definition and within two months we had sold two new clients.

Alan Claypool:

And then a month later, we sold a client. A month later, we sold a client. A month later, we sold a client. A month later sold a client. A month later sold a client. A month later, we sold two clients, two clients, two clients. Almost every single month. Since then we've sold two new clients. So it's building, it's recurring revenue, it's covering all of our costs and we're a growing business and I'm just so grateful to have learned this definition that I like to scream it from the mountaintops.

Alan Claypool:

And if you're an entrepreneur out there, make sure it's in a high market to be in business.

Marc Bernstein:

By the way, we hadn't said this before I was thinking about. We were talking earlier this morning about, um, you know, the advent of satellite radio, and who would ever thought you'd pay for radio? Right, but there's reasons why, because if you want to listen to what you want to listen to, you can't really find it on radio anymore. No no offense to our listeners on b103.9 or anywhere else, but it's very, it's become very segmented, so so basically, you're in the subscription business. You don't call it that, but that's right.

Alan Claypool:

But we are, but that's what it is. And subscription business is recurring revenue. That's great business, right? That's the goal, right I?

Marc Bernstein:

imagine not that you'll get all 3500, but if you get 3500 companies on that subscription, you would never have to turn back again.

Alan Claypool:

Oh, absolutely. I mean we've got I don't know 40 clients right now after several years of building it and we're doing very well and that you asked earlier. You talked about what my three year goal might be, and really it's just to double down on what we're doing, because the growth rate that we've got right now is very nice and I don't think we've really tapped into the ultimate market cap. We're nowhere near that, probably, so I don't think we'll ever get even a thousand companies.

Alan Claypool:

I don't need a thousand companies, but a hundred or two would be fantastic and it would be a really good. It's already a really good business at the 40 or so that we've got.

Marc Bernstein:

So we've talked about challenges you've had getting to this point, and we all know that entrepreneurship in general is can be a roller coaster kind of ride. Yes, and you're trying to level that out, but what challenges in terms of if you want to double or triple the number of customers, what are your challenges there in looking ahead?

Alan Claypool:

I'm embarrassed to say this. I don't think there are a lot what Meaning when you're in a good business. What this conference guy said was, when you're in a good business, things that had been hard before become easy. So, for instance, on the prior business of doing project work, I worked for years and years on messaging, paid tons of marketing, people spent so much effort on messaging and a slogan and we never got a slogan that was really good In the good business. I spent five minutes less than five minutes coming up with the slogan and it's perfect. Same thing with the logo Perfect. What is the slogan? We remove your statutory burden. And to someone who doesn't know insurance, that doesn't mean anything. But if you are in insurance, you absolutely know what that is. And we remove their burden and it resonates to them and I'll never have to think about that again. And in the same way, to your question of what are my hurdles of doubling the business, I mean I'm sure there are some but I'm telling you, just do what we're doing and it grows.

Marc Bernstein:

One thing is people to do the work and I know right now you don't have a supply issue with that, because we do not lots of people out there. However, most of those people that know how to do this kind of work, it's because they've they're aging and they're maybe not working for the big corporations, so they may not last forever, that's true.

Alan Claypool:

The people that I've got are mostly former CFOs or controllers of insurance companies, but there's always going to be CFOs and controllers of insurance companies, so I kind of feel like who are timing out or whatever, yeah they're aging out.

Alan Claypool:

So they want to hang out with grandkids. But then they find out hanging out with grandkids every minute of the day is maybe not what they want, but half the time great. And guess what? We offer part-time work. Most of our people are part-time, Some are full-time, so even the supply of people. It's been really good. When you're in a good business, things get easy. It's not simple. I mean, it's hard work, both for my consultants and for what I do managing the business.

Marc Bernstein:

It's hard, but it's not hard like what I used to be beating my head against the wall. I understand, so I know it's a much brighter future. But when you say it's hard work, what kind of? Where's the hard, where's the difficulty coming in now in terms of looking forward?

Alan Claypool:

Sure Well, just the hard work itself to be a statutory accountant is you've got to be extremely experienced. You probably have to have sat in the seat of a controller for at least a decade before you would be good at what we do.

Marc Bernstein:

And I imagine the regulations change over time, and that's the other part I was going to is absolutely.

Alan Claypool:

The regulations change all the time, and so we've got a process to keep them up to date on that, but it's not simple and yes, the regulations change all the time, and so we've got a process to keep them up to date on that. But it's not simple and, yes, the regulations change all the time, so that's a hurdle, but it's also an opportunity for us. If the regulations change all the time, the insurance companies have to meet that and they may not know how, but we can help them with that.

Marc Bernstein:

And coming full circle back to your company culture, because I know the things that you do for insurance companies, you do for yourself. Internally, yes, how will your culture be a strength in terms of that forward movement?

Alan Claypool:

Yeah, as you grow. I mean, people are hard right. In general, everybody is flawed, and put two people together and flawed people are dysfunctional just by nature of who we are, of who we are, and so as we grow, without a very directed culture, that could become, you know, create people problems all over the place. People step on each other, not like in the way one person dealt with an issue or whatever, With our ground rules that we have in place inside. It just makes people issues pretty good.

Alan Claypool:

Now, my people are pretty great anyway, because they're former CFOs and controllers of insurance companies, so they've already had a lot of training and managerial experience, some very self-starter type people. They're very solutions-oriented people by nature. And then we add on these ground rules and culture and other good parts of who we are on top of it and it's really a pretty happy place to work in that live in Babcock Ranch, so I'm actually a really happy guy at the moment. So I'm in a happy business, in a happy place.

Marc Bernstein:

I'm happy, you're happy.

Alan Claypool:

It's great to see that.

Marc Bernstein:

But it hasn't been easy getting here. Oh, my word, it was quite the roller coaster.

Alan Claypool:

I'm telling you and by the way, we also, by nature of being in insurance accounting departments, we still get project work that comes to us now, I'm sure.

Announcer:

So it's more easy.

Alan Claypool:

It's almost no selling because we're already in there. And oh, by the way, we do this work and so we've gotten some ancillary work on the project side thanks to having this, so it's a really good lead in.

Marc Bernstein:

So we have about one minute left, so I've got 30 seconds per question. I want to ask you, number one if you could speak to your younger self, what advice would you give you?

Alan Claypool:

Wow, Well, if I was going into entrepreneurship, it would certainly be learn these basic rules of high market demand and recurring revenue early, early, would I even tell younger self to start a business? Probably so. Yes, I would say, do start the business. I wish I had done it earlier. Um, I think there's a lot of character development that you get when you're in entrepreneurship. You kind of become the best person that you could be as a business owner.

Marc Bernstein:

You have just so many ethical challenges and other personal, real quick question what book are you reading and why? And we have like 30 seconds. It's a book called Choice.

Alan Claypool:

The subtitle is Cooperation, Enterprise and Human Action by Robert Murphy. Robert is a scholar at the Mises Institute. It's basically an economics book that's a survey of another economics book called Human Action by Ludwig von Mises, and so this is a sort of simplified version of the economy. It's sort of trying to explain the basics of economy. It's so good Economics should be something that everybody understands. It's a great book.

Marc Bernstein:

Excellent Thanks, alan, for being here. It was great. We're out of time and we will continue this conversation offline, I'm sure, and thank you all for listening. Thanks for being here with us at Founders Forum and we'll see you next week.

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