The Real Secret to Generational Wealth & Legacy

Legacy isn’t about the money you leave behind—it’s about the people you leave ready to lead, build, and succeed beyond you.

In this episode of The $100M Entrepreneur Podcast, Brad breaks down what it really takes to build generational freedom and a business that outlives the founder. He explains why true legacy is built through multiplication—not just of wealth, but of people, values, leadership, and systems.

Brad shares the three Ps of generational freedom—people, purpose, and process—and how entrepreneurs can create successors instead of replacements. From documenting culture and mentoring future leaders to building governance and succession plans, this episode is a blueprint for building a legacy enterprise that thrives for generations.

Because the real measure of success isn’t what you leave behind—it’s who you leave ready.

About Brad Sugars
Internationally known as one of the most influential entrepreneurs, Brad Sugars is a bestselling author, keynote speaker, and the #1 business coach in the world. Over the course of his 30-year career as an entrepreneur, Brad has become the CEO of 9+ companies and is the owner of the multimillion-dollar franchise ActionCOACH®. As a husband and father of five, Brad is equally as passionate about his family as he is about business. That’s why, Brad is a strong advocate for building a business that works without you – so you can spend more time doing what really matters to you. Over the years of starting, scaling and selling many businesses, Brad has earned his fair share of scars. Being an entrepreneur is not an easy road. But if you can learn from those who have gone before you, it becomes a lot easier than going at it alone.

Please click here to learn more about Brad Sugars: https://bradsugars.com/

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Transcript

Legacy Is Who You Prepare

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Legacy is not what you leave. It's who you leave ready to succeed you and do better than you and build more than you did. The mentoring and the education is more important than the money. Generational wealth is about the wealth of knowledge that you can give them, the skills, the values. How do you build a legacy enterprise? What's the point of freedom if it ends with you? Yeah, I'm talking today about generational freedom. How do you build a legacy enterprise? See, legacy is not really about money, it's about multiplication. If we look at the most successful generational wealth builders on the planet, they understand it's not just about building money, it's about multiplying the people, the systems, the money, the investments. They understand the difference. Leadership succession, sort of creating successes, not replacements. I want to explain that one quite uniquely because your next generation should be better at it than you. Your next generation needs to be set up to be able to take it to the next level. Now, that could mean family, or it could mean team members. I look at the way the Japanese over the years, because when you look at some companies in Japan that have been running for thousands of years or hundreds of years, and they talk about it's still a family business, well, the family has changed over the years. There was one family that started it, and now that seven families later, uh, it's still running, but they keep it in the family type thing. So if we think about legacy being about multiplication, that we allow our next generation to do better than us, to take it to the next level, to do it better, to do whatever they focus on, that's what we've done is set them up for success, then we're doing a great job. And again, when I talk about the next generation, uh, it could be the next generation of team members, the next generation of leaders, or the next generation in your family. Okay. So when you think about creating successors, not replacements, I like the word successors because it means that we're thinking about them being more successful than you. So in if you're, let's say you were the CMO in your own business and you moved on, the next CMO should be able to do better than you did because you've set it up for their success. They're your successor. And that's the focus that I want you to be thinking about as you build and grow. A generational business. See, think about it this way: if you are building a business uh that can outlive the founder, that's really where we're looking for the success level here. Building something that outlives you as the founder. When I wrote the vision of Action Coach, World Abundance Through Business Reeducation, I sat back and my team at the time was only very small, said, Wow, this could take a hundred years or 200 years. I said, I know the company has a vision to do something bigger than me. The company has a vision to outlive me, if that makes sense. So the three Ps of generational freedom uh people, purpose, and process. Let's start with people, because obviously that's where you're going to create a great uh organization. And part of that is by starting with a culture that survives beyond you. So documenting the culture is very important. If you've never seen a documented culture, you could jump on actioncoach.com and take a look at our 14 points of culture, where we actually define the culture of the organization and we declare who we are because your vision is why you do what you do. Your mission and vision are why. The how you do it is really your culture document or your agreed core values. They are what will outlive you between the core values, the vision, the mission. And then in many cases, uh I look at the fact that in an organization or in a great organization or a great team, there are things that keep the culture alive. There's routines, there's um let's just put it this way. Um, I like to think of the rituals in our company as part of that culture, the rituals that state who we are and why we do what we do so that we keep moving in that right direction and we keep growing and we keep learning together. So when we think of people, it's it's our team, but also in the family. Now, I'm very blunt on this subject in that someone said to me recently, you know, well, I'm not sure we should be talking about money and politics and religion and things with our kids at the dinner table. I'm like, well, if you're not teaching your next generation or the third generation, if you're not mentoring and educating your kids and your grandkids, who is? Where do you want them to get their ideas about money if not from you? Where do you want them to get their knowledge around business? You know, and these things, when you're helping them build values, the the wealth transfer isn't just the money. Let me put it that way. Wealth transfer in the generational wealth is the transfer of the knowledge, the transfer of the values, the transfer of the work ethic, the transfer of these things. The mentoring and the education is more important than the money. I was asked recently on a podcast, how much do you want to leave to your kids of your wealth? And my answer was hopefully I don't leave them any wealth. Hopefully, they've gone on and built their own success, they've got their own money, freedom, time, freedom, relationship. Like they've gone on and done the things that I did. I don't need to leave them any money. And given that we're living, you know, I guess at 54 today, the way science is going, I'll probably live to 100, 140. Who knows? But the ultimate that I want my kids, when you say generational wealth, it's not about the money. Generational wealth is about the wealth of knowledge that you can give them, the skills, the values, all of these things is what you're actually transferring. So the second P of generational freedom is not people, it's purpose. So giving them purpose above and beyond just making a wage, just getting by. Having them fulfill purpose means they're going for something bigger than themselves, which means in most cases, if you're working towards a great purpose, you'll achieve great success in your life. Now, that doesn't mean that my kids all are going to go and be great entrepreneurs and build things and do what dad did. That's not what I want for them. What I want for them is to find something that is a great level of purpose for them. Now, if they can work out a way to monetize it, fantastic. Build a business around it. Do something that makes you successful and happy. That's a phenomenal thing. So that brings us to the third P of generational freedom, and that is process. Now, when we sit down and start looking at business, you have a cadence of meetings, quarterly planning, weekly review sessions, weekly lion and frog meetings, all of those sorts of things, right? Well, if you're going to build generational success, you've also got to build a cadence of meetings. How often should you have a board meeting with your family and discuss where you're investing, what you're investing in? Well, how often should you have a board meeting with the shareholders of your company? Now, ultimately, your kids are a shareholder of your business in some way, shape, or form. Whether that's in the will or whether you've given them shares now, it doesn't really matter. What matters is this, okay? The process by which you manage that generational shift is really important. The process by which they get their mentoring, the process by which they get their learning and education, all of these things really do matter. Okay. So turning values into operating principles that last generations. If you think about the role of that family education and that mentoring, it's about taking the values and the operating principles and helping your family get it. Now, again, family could mean team members in this situation if you don't have it. But if you want something that lasts generations, the what got it successful was the work ethic, the values, the methodologies, the processes that you use to get there. Teaching people that. So I'll give you an example of this in my company. The younger team members, when they're on the management track, they come into the board meetings and they'll just sit in the back of the room in the board meetings. Now, they're not there to participate, they're to learn and listen. So they're there to take in. How was that decision made? What do they discuss? How do they debate? How do they brainstorm? They're watching and learning. Your kids can do the same. You know, when I look at family businesses that survive, uh, it's it's a great thing. But family businesses that thrive past the founder is where the founder sets them up with a culture and processes and things, but he creates a successors by giving them the knowledge, education, and mentoring. Now, I'll use another example. So I was recently working with one of our clients here at Action Coach, and they're a family business, and the father was ready to hand it over to his daughter. But a part of it, because the father had been being coached through Action Coach for quite some time to get to the level of success, he asked his daughter, Would you like to continue with my coach, or would you like to choose a different coach? And she came in, she met with the coach, and hey, Presto, she said, Yeah, I want to work with your coach, Dad. What he is giving her is beyond measure of what will add to her success. Allowing her to learn through coaching, mentoring of a guide that guided the previous owner, the founder. These are some of the things that are very important. You know, when for a founder to get out of the way of their kids, out of the way of the next generation, they have to have the trust that the next generation will move forward. And again, whether that's your kids or your team members, allowing them to have coach or coaching and/or mentoring or group coaching or whatever it is definitely moves you in that right direction. So keep that in mind as you do it. So now I do I do understand that in coaching multi-generational families, okay, in coaching family businesses, I've noticed that the ability to leave home at home and work at work is very tough. The ability to define who is the CEO, and I'll I'll tell you an example of this. I had a husband and wife team. Uh, their kids were part of the business. And uh let's just say that in a board meeting that I was present at, I asked the husband and wife to step outside with me of the board meeting. The kids were in there, there were other managers in there, and I did ask them the question. I said, uh, tell me who is the CEO of this company? And the husband said, Well, it's me. I'm the CEO. I I've built this thing. My wife joined me and she's a part of the company and has been for 20 years. I said, fantastic. If you're the CEO and a team member in your company uh berates you in front of other team members in your company, how would you normally hand that? How would you handle it? And he said, Well, that person would be immediately taken outside and probably fired. Huh. So what I just witnessed in there was the CEO being berated by another team member of the company. And at this time she looked at me and said, But hang on, I'm his wife. I can I said, At home, you are. But in this instance, what you're showing the team is that he's not really the CEO. He doesn't really get to make decisions. It has to be. So you need to make a choice. If you want to be CEO, then great, apply for the job. But if not, when we're here at work, he's the CEO. Your role is you're the CFO. Great, be the CFO, but be respectful to your CEO in that manner. Now, admittedly, they were not, let's just say, excited to have that conversation. But here's the thing: unless you are clear about what are the roles and responsibilities, and yes, you have clear governance, unless you have the hard conversations beforehand, you'll be stuck in hard conversations the whole time. It's like a marriage, basically. In a marriage, unless you're willing to have a thousand hard conversations, you're going to have a thousand fights. You get to choose, okay? Have the hard conversations, create the board, create the governance, create the rules of the game, or don't. And you'll pay the price one way or the other. So be clear on that factor of what we're doing. So I like to think about a legacy charter. Okay. What I love about a great legacy charter in a business is that we have the values because, see, when you look at ownership distribution, trusts, governments, governance of the organization, when you look at all of those things, you need to sit down and have the tough conversations. Now, normally it takes a coach working with you. You can 100% get templated documents out there, or you can have AI even build you a templated document around governance for a family business. Give it all of the details of your family and all those things and get it to give you suggestions. And you can bring a coach in to have the live conversations with people so that that does happen. Now, I'll give you an example from my business. Now, my kids have just most of them are too young at this stage, but my older kids have fairly clearly said that, Dad, we don't want to be in the business that you're in. We love business and we have our own areas that we want to go into. Fantastic. So I have to look at succession in place with my existing team. Who are the people on my team? Who are my C-level executives? Now, that legacy charter has to be documented. The legacy charter that tells people this is how I want things handled should anything happen to me. Now, of course, touch wood, knock on wood, all those things. I don't want anything to happen. But if you haven't thought through generational business succession plan of what happens without you, you need to take the time to do it this week, this month. You wouldn't have your life without a will, or you wouldn't have your life without a living will telling people what should happen if you're a vegetable type thing. You wouldn't have that in your life. So don't do it in your business. In your business, I want to see a succession plan. I want to see a legacy charter. What are the values that uh you have? What are the goals of the transition? Who are the successes in the business? And I like to think of at least three main goals documented, three successes documented. Well, I want to know that that's going to be in place. Um, if I can put this really bluntly, legacy is not what you leave. Your legacy isn't what you leave. It's who you leave ready. It's who you leave ready to succeed you and do better than you and build more than you did. Great founders build successes who take it to the next level when they're gone. Whether you're gone permanently, unfortunate, or whether you just step back from the company. Your successes are what you leave. The people that you leave behind able to build a generational business, that's what shows real legacy. Thanks for joining me on the Hundred Million Dollar Podcast. 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