The Owner's Odyssey
The Owner's Odyssey is a business podcast focused on exploring the unique journeys of real business owners co-hosted by Brook Gratia, Paul McCoy, and Zach Jones.
The Owner's Odyssey
The Gear Shift from Engineering to Entrepreneurship with Paul McCoy
When the curiosity of a young farm tinkerer merges with the tenacity of a Formula One aspirant, you get Paul McCoy's enthralling saga of passion driving a career from mechanical engineering to global entrepreneurship. In our latest episode, Paul regales us with stories from his varied career, from the adrenaline release of rugby, to leading teams in Rolls Royce's engineering department, to the cultural shocks and delights of working abroad. His musings on strategic career moves—renting out his house, quitting a steady job, and embracing international opportunities—showcase a man who's not just chasing dreams but catching them.
Crossing continents and careers, Paul shares the stark contrasts and surprising parallels he's encountered. Where one might see an engineer, we see a maestro of adaptability, guiding us through his transition from corporate executive to consultant and coach, illuminating the financial and cultural nuances along the way. His anecdotes range from navigating the economic downturn to empowering team members like Becky, a disenchanted colleague whose business transformation underscores the profound impact of leadership and coaching.
Tune in for an episode that intertwines lessons on mental performance with hearty laughs about networking faux pas and fashionably late arrivals. Whether you're looking to enhance your business acumen with continuous improvement strategies or seeking personal growth tips that align with the teachings of Napoleon Hill, Paul’s journey through employee engagement and the art of hiring will leave you inspired. Join us for an expedition into the heart of entrepreneurship, painted with the broad strokes of business truths and the finer details of workplace professionalism.
Hello and welcome to the Owner's Odyssey, the podcast where we delve deep into the transformative stories of courageous business owners who have embarked on an extraordinary adventure. I'm Zach Jones and I'm Brooke Gattia. We're here to explore the real life experiences of entrepreneurs.
Brook:Each episode, we'll embark on a quest to uncover the trials, triumphs and transformations of remarkable individuals who dared to answer the call of entrepreneurship.
Zach:Like all adventurers, our guests have faced their fair share of challenges, vanquished formidable foes and braved the unknown.
Brook:Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, a seasoned business owner or simply an avid listener hungry for captivating stories.
Zach:The Owner's Odyssey is here to help you level up. So join us as we embark on this epic expedition. This is the Owner's Odyssey. Let's start our adventure.
Brook:So today we're going to chit chat with Mr Paul McCoy. Huh, we are, we are. I met Paul through a guy who said, hey, you need to meet Paul, and I said, okay, reached out to him. No, I think you reached out to me and I kind of ignored you. I didn't really mean to ignore you, but life was crazy, ghosted me Kind of like a couple times and you were consistent and persistent and it was great because then when I met you, we went out to Starbucks. Um, you have fantastic stories. I was totally like I kind of like this guy. He's kind of cool. Um, yeah, and you do. You have a funny accent, which not really. Um, but give us a little background on Mr Paul McCoy. You are not from the U S, you are from down under. No, not really I'm kidding.
Paul:Give us your little background how you got over here all of that stuff?
Brook:Probably not.
Paul:Okay. So I keep on being asked where I'm from Originally. I sort of looked at when I first came across here. I saw the UK on some t-shirts and they were really good basketball players at college and went they're not from the uk, it was university kentucky. So my joke is I'm from kentucky, which is where a lot of british and irish immigrants came, went to, and that's the irish bit is probably why, um, there's the anger in this, in that part of the country, and the mccoys in the hat fields um were from Kentucky and that's why they fought. Okay, the mountain people. So anyway, I am not from around here. I was born in the United Kingdom, in New York. A Roman and lastly found out it was a Viking town, so lots of history there Moved to the original Boston, boston, lincolnshire, where we'll be going in a couple of weeks, where my parents still live went to Nottingham University or University of Nottingham and did mechanical engineering.
Brook:So why did you choose mechanical engineering?
Paul:Because I love fixing stuff.
Brook:I love you know, did you drink it with cars and stuff like that?
Paul:Yeah, my father was. My father was originally he was born a farmer's son and had been farming for a lot of time. And then there was some juncture where he and my grandfather who I never met they decided to part ways, and in doing so, my father then became a sales guy for agricultural equipment, and then, when I was born, he was managing multiple facilities or facilities, and at one point we lived on a farm. That's full of stories, starting a combine harvester at five, with everything moving.
Brook:So you're big into the engineering of it all? Yeah, engineered, engineered.
Paul:So I've always been very good at mathematics and I've always tried to. You know, I like to see how things work. I'm always inquisitive, like I look at stuff and go, oh, how does it work, how can I apply that little idea to something else? Maybe that in my life or whatever. So my, my house, I'm sure, is full of stuff that's got, little things that I ought to try and commercialize because I've hacked a system that pulled it from one system to another.
Zach:You're an inventor in this. As an engineer, can you think of an example of any of those things? Just out of curiosity.
Paul:It will come to me. I have invented certain things within my work. I'll go through my workspace and then try and remember something that I've, that I've invented, that should have been commercialized. Um, so mechanical engineering, um, ended up with a bachelor of engineering honors, which I hear is really important and during that, during that process, the education phase of things were you did you know what you wanted to do yet?
Zach:Or I mean, obviously you knew the kind of field or you know the the focus that you wanted to be in. I mean, obviously you knew the kind of field or you know the focus that you wanted to be in, but did you have any kind of sense of kind of what your role was going to be in that yet?
Paul:I was going down the design, the mechanical engineering design route, um, I looked into motor racing. Um, you know, formula one was something that I'd been introduced to and basically, you know that was a route. It was, you know, sort of and sort of throughout, when I did a placement within my four-year degree for a few months at a pharmaceutical company and I was commissioning you know part of it was noise commissioning plant and that was very well paid but boring, you know, because it was just drugs. You know, cause it was just just drugs. You know it's just me, just drugs.
Brook:I think a lot of people think it's more than just drugs, but you know, but that makes sense from the mechanical, you know engineering standpoint. It's not a machine that you have to get to do things Right.
Paul:There's no gizmo to play with. There were machines to package and what have you, but it was was. It was not as you buy that from someone else and you just make it, make it work, um, so I, I did that and I went. No, I really don't want to do that. So in the uk they do, the companies do what's called the milk round. They go to a university and they'll every single company will go for that week or weekend or that whatever. That's an apparent amount of time and you look at all these people coming and you'll just have application forms fill out and then they'll invite you if they think you're good enough, um, for an interview. So I went into british petroleum, um, which is working on oil rigs. So I didn't want to do that. I, I think I got the job and went. Nah, I looked into some of the race teams but they wanted experience, so it was okay. How can I get experience in something that's very unique and very technical and probably the most complex I think it's been known to be the most complex rotating machine in the world which is a jet engine or gas turbine. So I applied to Rolls-Royce and that was funny. I was sat there in the interview and the alarms went off and a phone rang in the room. This guy had got borrowed an office from someone. The phone rang so he picked it up and said oh, there's been a bomb threat in the university. Oh, wow, and it was someone. It was a fake and we were far enough away from where this person was going to do the speech, this politician who got lots of egg and flour on him as he walked from his car to. But it was far enough away. The guy looked at me and I should have probably responded differently. He said you good with the interview. Carrying on, I knew risk-wise it was pretty low that something was going to happen and we were going to be impacted. But Rolls-Royce is a very risk adverse business, so maybe I should have thought differently. But anyway, I carried on.
Paul:Um, I got the job and uh started with uh, excuse me, started with rolls royce in uh, coventry and uh did graduate training for about a year, uh, which was basically you weren't really at work, you were playing outbound, you're doing courses to get your knowledge up on gas turbines, looking after a kids' camp, which was leadership. It was really fun doing it. We had I think it was, we had three people who were the overseers and there were probably around 10 graduates and then there was a gaggle of kids and we had to look after them. We had to feed them, we had to entertain them. That was you talk about.
Paul:You know, there was a guy who took on the entertainment thing. He says I know kids, you know, I went to school with them or something like that, but he was a Sea Scout leader. Kids, you know, I went to school with him or something like that, but he was a sea scout leader. And uh, he said, okay, hour one we're going to do. We'll do three activities and break them into three groups and then they'll all swap them, swap apart. Within five minutes of doing activity one they got bored, the kids got bored, so activity two had to go out. Within 15 minutes he was shot. He had a nervous breakdown. This guy literally had a nervous breakdown and left the camp. So it was reaction mode. So about four of us got together, we just worked and we basically had to pull this camp together and put this program together and we just….
Zach:What is the mindset behind setting you on that task, in that…. So your graduate training training is really pulling you, trying to understand your demeanor individually um your ability to work in groups so there was still an element of like analysis, oh yeah, in terms of you like still a kind of qualifying element in terms of candidates. Okay, right.
Paul:so there were three people who were from this leadership group and then there were graduates that were running the camp, but they were helping with direction and making sure that we met all the rules and stuff, and then the kids. So we had to basically put a plan together, present the plan.
Brook:This is your first coaching experience. Yeah, pretty much.
Paul:Those kids, yeah, I tell you that was tough. These were from Bristol in the United Kingdom area that had a lot of riots around the same time. These kids had seen a lot. They didn't have a lot, purportedly, and some kids had cash, hundreds of pounds in cash. Others didn't have a penny. Some of them were dressed in rags and some dressed like today's the Kardashians of Bristol type of thing. But they're all from the project type of council house areas, probably divorced parents that the mother was looking after them, living on welfare and the father was wherever he was not supporting probably. And these kids, you know, needed, you know this was a vacation for them, yeah, and I got to listen.
Brook:So this is your first big thing in rolls royce was kind of pulling them on. And how long were you in the uk before you moved over to the us? 10 years, 10 years, yeah, and what did they recruit you for? Over here, you're still in rolls royce, right?
Paul:right. So what happened was, um, I did a rolls hads had this thing with a university and I wanted to get a master's in of all things gas turbine technology but it really was an MBA. It was between Warwick and Cranfield Institute of Technology, so Cranfield's like the MIT of the UK, and then Warwick was more the sort of business side which was in Coventry. So anyway, I jumped onto that program and it was really good and after I finished that I went okay, rolls has got to do something with me. I want to work, work abroad. I've been working on this program and it was great technology but it was just taking a long time to develop and it was. You know, I'm, I'm good, I want to move on yeah.
Paul:so I said, okay, I'll give. You know they invest a lot in me. I'll give them a year, a year to the day that they, if they, don't want me, then I'll be looking. And it was about nine months. I went, oh, forget this, they're not going to do anything with me.
Paul:And I started looking abroad. So I got a job in had two months then to turn the house that I had into something that could be rented out and then give a month, you know. So I had two, two month window to do all that. And then I had to give a month's notice to roles. I did my notice and my my new boss had just gone on, had been on this course as well and understood and he said is this what I think it is?
Paul:I said, yeah, I'm just one abroad. You know I've been telling people that and he didn't particularly know. And later on that day someone came up to me and said are you upset with Rolls-Royce? I said no, I just want to move on and do something different. Because Indianapolis, who I'd been working with on another project well, the guy that I'd been working with was moving back to Connecticut where his mother was from going to look after her and when he left they said who could take over Paul McCoy, perhaps? Okay? So they'd asked and my supervisors had shielded me and said nope, he's too busy, and I had my notice in.
Brook:Dang, I'm going to lose them. I should probably send them Right.
Paul:So literally the next day I was on a flight here to lose them, I should probably send them Right.
Paul:So literally the next day I was on a flight here to India. Wow. So I had to go home and pack my passport wherever it was and jump on a plane and I came here. I got a couple of job offers there were three jobs and I sort of took one and came across for that was November of 98. I took a couple of, had a couple of months where I was just coming across for meetings and they raced through get my L1 visa as a specialist, and then in 99, I started work over by the airport. Was it Executive Drive? I think it was.
Brook:It's interesting how, sometimes, when you have a dream for yourself or a vision of like hey, I wanted to be international, you put it out there and no one bites. And sometimes you have to force it, um, but even when you like really put it out there, how sometimes the doors just open, um, and so it's. It's that concept of like, voice it, like, tell the world, um, because you never know what potential pieces can happen as a result of you. And I put it out there, I want this.
Zach:There is something to just the raw mathematics of like who wants this more, or you know who wants it to be a certain way more, and you know the traction behind that has a serious power to it, being flexible in it, cause your picture was just international, like you could have had a I want to live in paris or amsterdam or some european or maybe over in japan.
Brook:But you're really flexible, of being like I have a dream that's bigger, but I'm also able to morph it a little bit. Um, right, and I mean, if nothing else, you got to meet me over here, so it had to have been awesome, but I'm kidding, um the pinnacle of my life. Totally joking. So what made you decide to stay and not continue your?
Paul:international. I did A lot of my work was international.
Brook:Okay, so I got to travel even more.
Paul:Yeah, yeah, a lot too much perhaps. Sort of you know, let's go through the journey. I was working on a project it was an international collaboration with Taiwan, japan who else was there? There was another partner somewhere and we were working on that and I basically was looking after this one low emissions project that I had to work with the Japanese and satisfy the criteria for them. So it gave me that sort of, you know, the ability to travel and be in a place that you know a safe place. I think, if I look at you know, financially Indianapolis is a cheap place to live, affordable, it's very affordable.
Brook:Cheap makes it sound not good, but affordable means it's still nice, but it's not.
Zach:It's evolving from cheap into affordable Right. We all hope to be here when it makes the switch into unaffordable.
Paul:Yeah, it's. You know, in the UK I. So I'll give you an idea of financial. I had 10 years of experience and I led a team of probably a dozen people in the UK. I moved over here and I was leading a team of probably a similar number and my pay in the UK the exchange rate at whatever it was then was the same as a graduate coming out of Purdue, a fresh graduate with a GPA of three and a half or above.
Paul:That was the disparity between the two countries and I'd see a lot of friends move on and I was pretty loyal to roles and there wasn't the remuneration coming through. It was a union environment, even as an office worker, and you had to join it. There was no option. It was a collective bargaining and you got whatever pay increase you did a percentage and then the pot for bumping anyone up was very low. So financially I knew I was falling behind.
Paul:And that whole historical thing was during World War II. The owners of the factory said look, we can't afford to give you a pay raise, so we want to give you a pay cut, but when the war is over, and we'll keep it flat throughout the war, but when the war is over, and we'll keep it flat throughout the war, but when the war's over we'll bring it back up to where it should be and make you whole. And apparently no memo was written at the start of the war because it never happened. So the disparity of, certainly, engineering bodies and people were poorly paid, other areas, banking and what have you became a little bit different. And from the money you earn as an individual this country, I don't know is it 25%, 30% of your revenue or your income, your cash that you receive, net income maybe puts your dwelling or something In the UK it's probably 50% to 60%. So it's subtly different. And maybe that's just part and parcel of because you're lower paid, you have to put more into, or you want to put more into a nicer, nicer dwelling.
Paul:So financial, you know, recompense for what I was doing. But the international piece, like, even when I was at college, um, I had the opportunity to come to boston, actually for um, for a summer, um, but some paperwork didn't get done by a, by a, uh, a professor, and it didn't happen. So I was always wanting to come to America. It's just the opportunity. I did apply to a couple of jobs, but the first opportunity was in Zurich, not just outside, and that's when I took, but then didn't.
Brook:So you were in Royalist Boys here in the US for how long?
Paul:17 years 17 years.
Brook:And what made you choose to step away from the corporate environment and into a? Because right now you're a coach.
Paul:Coach, consultant.
Brook:Consultant, however you want to title it, but you literally work with businesses to help improve their processes or their people dynamic so that they can hit their goals that they're looking for. And so what made you go? Okay, I want to step, and it's just you right, you don't have per se people underneath you. What made you decide, hey, all right, so I'm part of this giant organization, worldwide, international. I get to travel all over the place. I have seven people, ten people, whatever, underneath me. I want to step away from this corporate which is a definite different mentality into a like I'm owning my own space and my own thing. What made you do that?
Paul:Okay, so roll back to 2008. My wife and I both worked for roles and her job went away. Well, 2007,. Her job went away, so she was looking for another role. Her job was literally drawn back. The whole of the organization she worked for went back to the UK. So she said do you want to go back to the UK? I went no, I'm good it was.
Paul:You know, at that time I was doing business improvement, had a small team and it was really good fun. I thoroughly enjoyed it working. You know, for a guy that was fantastic. And I went no, I'm good at the moment, so look at your other options. And so she was offered a role to open up a plant in Virginia, just south of Richmond, virginia, and a brand new site, greenfield. Rolls-royce had never not done one for 100 years. Literally their growth had been through accumulating other businesses. I went that would be a pretty cool thing to do. So ultimately I said go for it, but obviously if you go, then I'm going to need a role, and so I was the program executive across there program. Then I'm going to need a role, and so I was the program executive across there program managing infrastructure site development. What have you? So my role from a corporate perspective had just blown out and it was one of the top 10 economic development deals in the US of 2007. It was some $43 million.
Paul:I think that Virginia was. Rolls had done this little beauty parade between lots of different states. They were going to build this new factory. It's going to be business continuity, so duplicate factory with whatever, there'll be five plus factories at that time. And, uh, they were going to just test the water and the guy running it wanted a thousand contiguous acres and of land. It was just a number he made up, but that's what he wanted. And Virginia happened to have 1,035 in Prince George, just south of Richmond there's Prince George North as well and they won it. I think Georgia were in there, I think a few other places, indiana had a little stab at it as well, and so long behold June of 2008,. We moved out there and we had this massive, massive role, didn't know, you know, making these new facilities.
Paul:And then the kind of economic crash happened and Lehman Brothers went down in November or September, october, and all of a sudden all the factories went away. We kept on doing what we did, but we were trying to find what our first factory was In parallel with that this economic development contract was. We had a couple of things that we were doing. One was working with University of Virginia and developing this guy, larry Richards, professional Larry Richards, who got these teaching kits for schools. I went oh, that's pretty cool. So I got in touch with him and then the local chamber of commerce went and reached out and said hey, rolls-royce, would you like to you know, we'd like to know what's going on. We'd like to you know, create an ad hoc board member for you to join. So my boss went here, you go. So I joined and within a month or two months they said would you like to be on the board? I went okay, and then, 10 months later, would you like to become the president? Okay, so I, I became the president for um prince, uh, prince george chamber of commerce, and it was a small business, 120 000 business, couple of employees, and in my first meeting with the executive director, becky, she said we got two choices on your watch we can close it or we can grow it.
Paul:I went, we got one choice, really, and that's what we did, yeah. So so she she was a little bit downtrodden, I would say and I said okay, what are we going to do? How can we do this? We changed the board, we got structure in place, we got the mission vision, we got it sorted out, we got people working on the thing and ballooned the whole organization to. You know, massive revenue increases, numbers I keep on forgetting, but you know it was a great thing, but my job went away just towards the end of my tenure so I went. Okay, I'm good with that.
Paul:So I was looking for another role, ultimately moved back to Indianapolis because my wife's mother was ailing and we can't go anywhere else other than we had to come back to Indy, because my wife's mother was ailing and we can't go anywhere else other than we had to come back to Indy. We could have gone to Savannah, georgia. Could have gone up to Duluth, although I'd have been by myself because my wife didn't want to go there. But we looked at different options. I said, look, the easiest thing for your sanity is being back to help with your mother's issues and stuff. So we moved back and I moved back into a role. That was just it was.
Brook:You didn't like it Nah.
Paul:It was, yeah, working with people remotely. I was remote in this role, but the people were not that great. There was a lot of animosity, the person who I succeeded who was pushed out of the role. There was still animosity with the role itself as opposed to anything else, and then they sort of took it out on me and I went I don't like this and roles at this point was going through restructuring from the top down. They got a new CEO and they said you're too top heavy, you've got to consolidate organizations. So there's a chopping from the top. And around the same time, when we moved back, my wife was just tired of every year having to chop 10% of people within you know she'd moved back and within HR and she said I don't want to do this. So she looked. I said okay, you go and find another role On a year. To the day that you find this role and have been there for a year, I'm going to start looking Stability of income and stuff like that.
Brook:So she did that Engineer Times it all out.
Paul:Engineered, so I went okay. So I started looking and it was a lot of the roles were. You know I got offered roles that were fly out on Monday and usually in North America. You know it's Canada, maybe some in Mexico, that had plants and you'd be running plants and just, and I got a seven-year-old daughter at the time and it was just eh no, this isn't going to work.
Paul:So I said what can I do? That I can stay put? And I sort of got him, got to talk to someone through LinkedIn that basically sold franchises. They said, you know, and I, well, my wife said, why don't?
Zach:you run a.
Paul:Starbucks you know, they're franchises, aren't they? You'd be good at that, you could do that in your sleep, type of thing, and I went, okay. That got me thinking and it was sort of okay, what can I do that I can stay and control my environment in Indy, you know my hours, or whatever they are but be there for my daughter, be there, you know, for whatever she needs and and, uh, you know, be a stable position for her. She really struggled moving from virginia to here and I also made the statement, um, that whilst you're at high school, you will not, we will not, move, you will stay put, we're not gonna. I'm not gonna do that to you again, which I have, as of sunday she graduated, I've done. Um, so I, I looked at different things and, uh, you know, I started talking to different people and there's one book it's a really cheesy book by Ron Fry, I think it is, I forgot the name of it, but it got you looking into your past and one of the questions was what did you really enjoy in the last few years, you know, 10 years, 20 years what have you really enjoyed that?
Paul:You thought I could do this and I go back to the Chamber of Commerce. It was my first turnaround business. Look at it. And Becky was just a great lady, very intelligent lady, but she was just downtrodden because of situations and what have you, and she was probably ready to sort of jack it in, using a British phrase. But stop, and I brought energy back to her and said, okay, let's do something different. And I empowered her. And that's my ethos in life is just to help people look after themselves and empower them. And that's what we did and I went. That was really fun. So what can I do?
Paul:And this guy that I got involved in he said how about coaching? I went, tell me more. And you know, I look at my past. I think I've done coaching all my life. You know, starting with roles. Whenever I you know, even a year in graduate trainees that came in, I'd look after them because I knew that no one else would. I knew how I was treated. I went to get the most out of them. You've got to do something different.
Paul:And then I was on a project and there was a guy that was probably the worst, probably the best technical drafter of, but the worst attitude, and I said you need to do something different. He said, yeah, I want to earn some money. I said, well, contracting, go contracting, drafting. He says, yeah, I'll do that. I said, but first you have to get your mind right and you've got to come into work and work your socks off and you've got to prove that you can do that to yourself and to other people, that you can. You know, come in and be effective from day one, because if you come in like you are now, you're kicked out. That week you're going to be kicked out. They're not going to accept you, okay. So what do we need to do? So I got this kid working his socks off and, uh, getting making changes. I went gosh, this is fun, you know, make making a change to someone. And uh, he left roles and made a ton of money doing contracting in different parts of the world and I love for you that the.
Brook:It's very interesting because I had similar thing where you have the person who knows you the best and you're going through this like hey, maybe not knows you the best, but knows you significantly. You're going through this, say what should I do? Like I need to change, I just don't, and they throw out this random idea that pushes you down a space. And so there is the listening to random thoughts people have and then having a book or something that says sit down and reflect on something, and that just component of like what am I strong in, what do I love?
Brook:What gives me energy, and stepping into that side of things and going hey, but it's very interesting that I also went through a whole part of reading books and reflecting. And having someone else speak into you and just taking the time to slow down and think through that for yourself empowers you to go okay. Now I want to jump into something else in the midst of that, and almost you inspired yourself. As you're like, I can inspire other people. This is a lot of fun. I can inspire myself somewhere in there too.
Paul:Yeah, I, the thing I love and this is with coaching kids for rugby or whatever when they get it, they go. Oh, I see what you mean. Now you know you can tell it to them 10 times that in different modes and operations, but eventually you know when they, when they get it, they go. This is really cool.
Zach:I think that's a rewarding moment when you realize that you can teach people things without that light bulb going off in the moment, whether it's somebody that disagrees and you're having an emotional conversation, or whatever. It's rewarding when you realize or can perceive that your impact has been made, when it's, you know, fractional or, you know, incremental in terms of actually shifting somebody's behavior or perception.
Brook:So what were you? You jump, you choose, say I'm going to be this coach. Were you scared?
Paul:Um, I have a very high tolerance to pain and probably um a stupidity towards being scared. I wasn't. I was apprehensive at points. There were certain things that public speaking was just this good, oh, you know, kill me now, type of thing, Don't, don't put me in front of. But you overcome that, you get.
Brook:How did you overcome that?
Paul:Repeatedly doing stuff that was uncomfortable. It's it truly. You know, if you you've got to go through that hurt of and not caring, you know, recognizing that you know more than anyone else out there and and it's really slowing down because, you know, sort of my mode was I want to tell them everything I've got and I'll trip over and make a mistake and go, oh, I've got to go back. Nowadays it's sort of you know what you want to know and you know, and asking questions and then listening. You know the the big piece is listening to understand, not listening to respond. I think too many people listen to respond one up, you know, and if you're drinking with your friends and you know it's, you know it's one up and ship and it's just you know crazy guy thing or family thing or whatever. But when it's one-upmanship and it's just you know crazy guy thing or family thing or whatever, but when it's in businesses, you've got to listen, to understand and be more inquisitive, find out what the problem is, and that works for family as well.
Brook:Did it also help you that you were methodical in your engineering of like? My wife will have a stable job and now I can do this, so the financial security was in place for you. So you're like I could flounder and make nothing for a year and test this out and, if we hate it, go somewhere else. Did that play at all into your like? Can't create it a little?
Paul:I. I got multiple buckets. I could financially. I got severance for a year or thereabouts.
Brook:So that's nice, that makes things yeah, that was easy um I've always find it I'm impressed by those people who don't have another half that they're leaning on for finances and they jump out and they say I'm going to start this. The bravery to do that is very impressive.
Zach:And I commend people who do. That's interesting that you say that, cause I feel like I see things from the other side, not necessarily always, but just the perception that once you have responsibilities and you've got children, or you have a significant other, or these other people and these other dogs, whatever it is that are dependent on you.
Paul:No, I mean really your pets they got to eat right.
Zach:So those kinds of things that makes it almost harder because and maybe it's a personality- type thing, Because for me it's like you know, it's easy for me to live off.
Paul:Chef Boyardee, and you know, lentil stew.
Zach:Yeah right, peanut butter jelly sandwiches, but you know, subjecting other people that you love to those kinds of things are an interesting kind of juxtaposition.
Brook:I don't know if I thought about it from that perspective, because for me it was very much of a like okay, the end of the day I won't be homeless, like I have a few backup things and I'll be fine, and at the end of the day I can go back to my other you. I never thought of the fact that for some people. They need to not have the burden of I'm taking care of kids and family and all of that piece of it, so everybody's journey is a little different.
Zach:It's all different, yeah, somewhere in there. So, paul, I feel like you have many times mentioned the fact that imposter syndrome is an inevitable part of the business owner's journey is an inevitable part of the business owner's journey, and yet I sense zero imposter syndrome from you personally, so I'm curious where you felt that. Oh, absolutely If anywhere.
Paul:I've had it, I think, probably right away through school. Even grades you get and you go. I know I made some more mistakes than that, but they gave me an.
Paul:A and it's sort of why am I being treated differently? Obviously, I sort of think a lower, more sort of modest thought pattern, as opposed to the other way, where you're completely in charge of you, know I'm brilliant, I'm great and you're not. So I've always put that modesty in place. But I think every time you take on something new, until you get the, until I get my personal validation and it's not other people saying you did a great job, because that doesn't necessarily fly, because sometimes I don't, I know I don't have, I haven't done a great job, it's my knowledge and my ability to do something and say, okay, I think I've got it now, I think I've got, you know, a mastery or a level of learning that I can, I can say this is good in, you know, this is a good foundation and how how?
Zach:because I know just from hearing you talk that you're kind of working from the opposite side of things. How, when is enough enough in that setting?
Paul:I. I don't think there's ever a point that you get to. I think you've always got to keep learning, you know, going back to why I wanted to leave roles, I wasn't learning enough, I'd stagnated and I could have been very well paid for a long time, but I didn't want to die mentally and that's where I was, you know, I wasn't learning and growing and I needed that for my own psyche. So I will keep on looking at stuff and keep on rehashing and sometimes by doing that you've got two component pieces that then go. Oh, that's why they're like that and they mesh and you go. Why didn't I know that before? Because it never clicks.
Zach:That was kind of my next question. Do you find yourself going back to previous work with that kind of mentality of ever improving and, you know, have like not a regret, I guess, but you know, do you kind of fixate on things that could have been done better in those spaces from a mentality standpoint, does that stress you out or it doesn't?
Paul:stress me out more. You know I've learned a little bit more and I go back to something and I go okay, I didn't understand it then as well as I do now. So now applying it would be subtly different and I can apply it and take it a little bit further, maybe take it in a better direction. Um, you know the the business improvement meant. You know, when I did that that role, I've applied that through everything, everything. You know it's one of that was probably the most impactful roles I've ever taken on, where you, you know it's all six sigma, black belt, green belt, all that stuff.
Paul:And you know, in a manufacturing, maybe paperwork system wise, right the way through to making stuff wise, you improve it and then you walk away without the knowledge of looking at it and it will demise over time. A system isn't going to be unless you keep an eye on it. That's why KPIs are. You know, key performance indicators are very important to keep the idea eye on it. That's why KPIs key performance indicators are very important to keep the eye on it so that you can see when it's starting to drop. And that's my mentally. For me it's sort of okay. What's causing that problem to or how can I change the direction of this to improve it? So it's always in my mind.
Brook:So what would you say are the best things you've learned being your own business owner? At this point in time, you just list one or two, whatever you want.
Paul:I think, uh, from the coaching pieces, keep your pipeline full. You never stop selling yourself, you never stop marketing, you never stop. You know when you, when you think you've got a bucket full of clients is the worst time to stop doing anything, because things will always change.
Brook:I read something somewhere where they talked about everyone is selling. We get scared of the term selling, so we're not going to go into business.
Brook:We're not going to go through that because we don't want to be salesmen, used car salesmen bad rap that they have. But realizing that ever since my child, since he was born, has been selling getting what he wants, and it's an exhausting negotiation at times but then other, but he's, he's learning the art of selling and learning the art and I mean you did it to start with, when you're like, hey, I want to be international, like kind of had to learn the art of selling was being a little bit of a hardball, like I leaving sorry, and that got you what you wanted in the midst of it and that even being an employee is selling an idea to your employer, that you're part of the team and so not being scared that being a scare point of having a business, because every you are selling is life like you are always doing that, and so, um, and yet we forget that too.
Brook:Yet when you're running a business, it all could be falling apart. You could have massive issues that are going on, but while those massive issues are going on, you have to still be selling. You still have. I'm working on a project for someone you probably feel this and it's taking five days worth of focus and you've got no marketing done and you're like, dang it, I don't have it. Now that job's done, and now what do I do? Now I have to wait and mark it. It'll take me months to find another person until you get yourself into that balance of like work, market, work market, and it's exhausting at some level and yet, in my personal opinion, kind of fun sometimes too, to not only have one headset that you're in so totally resonate with you.
Zach:Like yeah, biggest thing learned is you have to keep your pipeline. Yeah, it's interesting hearing you talk about that in particular too, because it's just so clearly like a machine in your mind and you put a before b before c and just the way that you know. I think like a lot of times, um, I think business owners are making these decisions in real time and not really tracking them out time wise. We just have this kind of nebulous to-do list of you know the things that need to get done, but you, from day one, have been taking those tasks and actually allocating okay, this is, you know, when this needs to happen. This is when we launch this phase, like, this is when this needs to be completed. Yeah, I follow rules. That's incredible.
Paul:There's some rule breakers in this group.
Brook:Rules are not hard to pass, they're guidelines.
Zach:You get both sides of the rules line on this podcast.
Brook:Sometimes rules are not necessary. Sometimes they are. We should stop when the other car's coming at the stop sign. But you know.
Zach:That is the that's you know. That's the thing, though that's part of the formula is how much you know prep do you need, because some business owners you know have to do that run and gun kind of you know scenario to feel on top of it and like they know what's going on in that moment. But that's really interesting.
Brook:What's your next steps? You started a coaching program. You have your business.
Paul:Where do you want to take it? Um, I want to pursue the sort of get groups of masterminds. That was one of the big things I was trying to get moving is develop masterminds where people come in and we have masterminds, a system that allows people to meet peers, learn, educate themselves and get inspired. Yeah, that's one piece. The other piece is the mental performance aspect. I think that is huge. The other piece is the mental performance aspect. I think that is huge.
Paul:Pulling that from the sporting world and moving it into the business world. And, uh, you know, you see the figure skaters, you see the skiers. They'll stand there, close their eyes and they're visualizing their path, their route, whatever. Um, I think you can do the same in business. Um, the visual piece, visualizing the journey. It doesn't have to be a straight line, it will always be a rocky up and down, but really getting to employ that, that is an aspect. I think I've got a particular strength honed from sports rugby, golf, whatever but also in the business world you have to have that mental strength. Uh, dealing with high school kids who will want to press every button they can it doesn't matter if they're high school kids or four-year-olds.
Brook:They press every button. You have.
Paul:I think three-year-olds are better at it.
Brook:Truthfully, you know, it's because you you cave a lot quicker so, um, we are going to do like a few random questions to you yeah, that you have to answer in 10 words or less. Okay, first reaction of something um, you're at a networking event. What drink are you having your hand usually?
Paul:water ah very boring.
Brook:What drink do you want in your hand? Um, probably a beer oh, okay, see, okay See, learned something.
Paul:You didn't put a timeline. I know Well, that's part of it.
Brook:Like it's a networking event, a morning coffee or like an evening thing. So that kind of tells me what type of networking events do you kind of go to from that side? All right, so you envision a color as a business owner.
Paul:Like if you see a business owner?
Brook:what is the color you think of when you think business owner? My favorite color is blue. I think blue too, and I that's kind of I don't know, I don't know why it's just interesting. People talk about colors. You go to these meditative things. You're like close your eyes and like envision a color and what you know. What does that mean? And I have no idea.
Zach:See, I think I see red, but I have a different relationship with red than I think most people do. I think that's's like fire. Yeah, I think I've like cause we've done like content and stuff that I put red on and you're like Ooh, aggressive, angry. I'm like no assertive, like confident, yeah, you know, consistent. So definitely think it's a to each their own kind of thing, but that's interesting Perspective.
Brook:Yes, yes, how late is fashionably late.
Paul:Half an hour. Half an hour, okay.
Zach:All right, mine is however long it takes me to get there, she's got a different answer each day.
Brook:Yeah, it depends on the day. If I'm on time five minutes early, there is no such thing.
Paul:If it's going to the airport, it's what time we're leaving, not what time the flight's taking. Exactly I put my comfort zone. I don't want to be running through an airport like I've done before. Yeah, fashionably late to an airplane is not on the airplane.
Brook:So favorite person to follow Podcast, tiktok, instagram, facebook, entity thing Favorite follow that you do.
Paul:The one I listen to from a mental performance is Brian Cain.
Brook:He does the like sports mental side of things, and so I've talked about him a couple of times. I have not yet found him.
Zach:Right, what's yours, brooke? I don't think we got that last time. We should probably just do these for you and then I can patch them into the other episode, because I don't think we had them last time.
Brook:Um, we should probably just do these for you, and then I can patch them into the other episode because, I don't think we had them last time. Um. So if I had to answer that right now, I would tell you it's the bucket list family.
Brook:Uh, I, I enjoy them a lot because they encourage travel and community and family and life in a manner that is inspiring, and I'm sure it's not as uh, not that it's easy for them, but you put out there all the nice parts of it. But I like how they engage in life and I find myself inspired a lot from that aspect of things. And so, from a business mindset, I don't have any one person, it's just kind of who I'm in the mood for. So I usually listen to random audio books on different things.
Paul:My favorite business one is the Road. Less Stupid.
Brook:Keith Cunningham does make you think, and I just like the title the Road Less Stupid, stop being stupid.
Paul:Well, I think he's regurgitated the. You know I'm trying to think of Napoleon Hill when he did that 100 years ago or wherever it was. This is a refreshed, newer version of Napoleon Hill when he did that a hundred years ago or wherever it was. This is a refreshed, newer version of Napoleon Hill's.
Brook:Napoleon Hill's something about thinking, thinking grow rich thinking, grow rich. That's what it was, which I tried to listen to, that once. He wrote it a hundred years ago and it sounds like a hundred years ago and I couldn't quite get through it. But that might mean my focus level is poor.
Paul:But it's good but the concept is very concepts fantastic, fantastic, yeah, but I think keith has just taken it and refreshed it and renewed it so, and sometimes and he's funny, he's he does it.
Brook:He kind of laughs somewhere in there was that all the those?
Zach:are the questions um oh, my last one was uh biggest pet peeve people judging others.
Paul:that's hot off the press. It's not understanding. I think that's a huge part of the disparity in this world is people not understanding others and not taking the time to understand. You know, even incredibly educated people that I know have made rash decisions that are completely and factually wrong and they just haven't bothered to understand, and I think that's society at the moment.
Zach:I think, yeah, I think societally we are very interested in putting things in their proper category and deciding whether things are one way or another, and I think we ignore the fact that things often kind of sit in that quantum state, particularly when you're talking about interpersonal things of you know, everybody's having their experience of the moment. So you have, you know, whatever validity is tied to the fact that you're there in that moment. But everybody has their own version of that. So the more we kind of respect that and avoid those concrete you know you were right, you were wrong. You know those kinds of things, Everyone can be right.
Zach:It's just a different perspective. Yeah, I mean even that simple, the way you know. You phrased that there, like it's. Either you can attack somebody's identity and say you are a this or you, you know you are wrong, you are these things. Or you can focus on the idea and say what you said is xyz or what you think is, you know, I think, is xyz. That's a very different kind of uh level that you're engaging with somebody as well.
Brook:Yeah, okay, last question what's your personal motto?
Paul:personal motto Personal motto Do good.
Brook:I like it. It's very simple Two words, not even ten.
Zach:Do good. I thought after our last conversation it was going to be do what you say, do what you say you're going to do.
Paul:That's huge. That's a huge piece from history and from having had things promised to me that have never been delivered family and wherever to? I'm not going to be like that. If you ask my daughter one question, have I delivered 90.9.9% of things I said I was going to do? She'd say yeah, no question.
Brook:See, now I could get into the philosophical thing of what happens when you promise something that wasn't good and now your later time life goes out to play. So now I'm conflicting your two mottos. Well, one of them wasn't your motto, it was inferred upon you, but the like okay. So is there a space and time where you can step away from a promise or something out there? And and I'm not sure that there is, and that's not the platform for it. I'm sorry, I totally went into it, that's right um, but I think truth is time dependent, that is truth.
Paul:Is time dependent, your perception of something happening you have all this information and then all of a sudden, someone comes up with new stuff. Your truth is what you have and your moral code and your values all rolled into one. And this is what your truth is. And then someone comes in with something new and it's sort of whoa, this is more relevant and maybe I was wrong there.
Brook:And life happens. You get caught in trauma, yeah, and things that are not mean, but there's a car accident, there's health issues, like trauma comes into play and it changes. It changes perspective changes the truth for you in a moment, and so, um, yeah, you know sorry you get totally in some philosophical touch points there. Some people would say truth is truth and you can't change it. What is is is but um I. And then others would say what was the impact?
Zach:Yeah, you know, truth is discretionary and so it's that's truth is an interesting topic, to be honest. That's a good question If you fumble along and everything that you do is a mistake, with a positive impact.
Brook:Is it still good? I did good, I do good.
Paul:I think so You've made 1% improvement in something in someone's life. Why not? And you didn't do 100% destruction in someone else's Right, you do more good than harm and you're going to do stuff that's negative and hopefully you do more stuff that's positive.
Brook:Which is truthful for a business owner and owner of any sort of type of thing of I'm going to mess up. I just need to accept it and can, in the midst of the mess, I step into good to things that are right, things that improve things, and just know that it's a steady, slow improvement. It's not an overnight boom. Here I am. I make no mistakes. Part of that improvement is a little messy.
Zach:And that's another good question for both of you From the business owner perspective is what is your responsibility when a promise has not been kept? Let's say, a promise has not been kept due to something that is out of your control or an unforeseen circumstance. What, then, is your responsibility?
Paul:I think you've got to come clean. You've got to come clean and explain a situation, not be the victim but say this happened, I didn't do something, I will make it right.
Brook:Communication is probably a very big thing. So this is not the same thing, but this is a story. We went to a restaurant this past week and it had an outdoor seating space, but it was in this space that could be hot gold and it had greenhouse effect in there. It was really hot, a fancy little place, and they brought out the menu and I didn't like any of the stuff on there and they served this little complimentary champagne to start with. So we got the champagne.
Brook:The waitress came out and was like hey, give us a second. And I'm looking at my other half and I'm going. I don't want to be here. I don't know why the heck I chose this place. We had to put reservations in. I'm hot, it's uncomfortable, the food doesn't look good and she's like all right, I'm going to go to the bathroom and I'll sneak out and you do whatever the heck you need to do and I'm like no, like, I'm going to talk to the waitress. Like I made, I sat down at a meal and I made a reservation and I kind of made a promise that I was going to engage with this restaurant and I don't want to be here. And so I literally looked at the waitress and I was like, so I'm really sorry.
Brook:It's really hot and stuffy in here, and none of this food is calling to me at all, and so I'm really I'm going to be a jerk, I'm going to probably leave. Can we pay for this champagne? She's like no, it's complimentary, you can go. And she's like thank you for telling me versus just leaving, and so many people would just leave. Then I threw my other half under the bus because she was still there and I was like she wanted to just leave.
Brook:She was not happy with me, but it still is that concept of like, it's all about the communication, the you know, hey, to me I can't, I can no longer do this and here's why I no longer can do this. I know I said this, I'm sorry. I know that as a result of my sorry, you may have to make a different decision that I might not like because you want that space. So if I was back in Paul's time period and he goes, I want to go to an international thing and I go, I can't meet that. I know. I told you I could maybe move you to there, but I know, and I have to accept, that he might go, I'm going to go take this other job, like.
Brook:So I think it's. It's the honest, just like you're saying, the honest, transparent conversation versus the ignoring of the conversation. And I have done both. Um, as a business owner of where I'm just like I don't have the energy, I'm just not going to have it, we're just going to pretend it doesn't exist. And I've had times where I'm very transparent.
Zach:And it's funny too, because it seems like there's you know it's kind of a long form, you know chemical reaction that's happening here with business people and salespeople too, of like that averse reaction constantly. And you know I don't want to eat here. Why don't you want to eat here? Like those kinds. You know we don't let people have autonomy in those spaces and we're so exhausted by that constant barrage of you know, why aren't you engaging with my product? What's wrong with you?
Paul:So, going down from a business perspective, the Patrick Lencioni, the CEO, has to make a decision and all their workers give them inputs, but a lot of them are diametrically opposite. They can't all be incorporated. So the way to and I've espoused this to quite a few clients and they've thanked me, I stole it from Patrick and it's okay stand in front of all your people and say I've taken all this input and I thank you for all that. With other information I have that I can't divulge I'm going to take the business in this direction. If, at some point in the future, I don't think it's going the direction, or we don't think it's going the direction it should be, then let's revisit these things.
Paul:But what I need from each one of you is to get behind this idea. So, on your personal commitment. So, zach, are you committed to being behind this initiative so that we can see whether it works or not? I expect you to say yes, and if you don't say yes, then we have a little chat and we'll have you and Brooke. I want you to get behind this.
Brook:We're leaving the restaurant.
Paul:Right. But if you don't do this and I've seen this before, where the CEO says we're going to do this and everyone's going my idea is brilliant. Why is it not? And you know? And then two people on the side say just watch this burn, it's never going to fly anywhere. And they never get behind it or they scupper it and that's why you've got to go around that tactic, that piece of like.
Brook:I mean I felt it where I've had employees feel the arm crossed like you're going to fail.
Zach:Right, there's no way we're putting this in place, kind of.
Brook:Well, they're just like. I'm just going to sit back and watch because I don't like anything you do. I don't like how you do it, like all of these components of it and getting them on board, I don't. That is probably a hard thing for me as a leader. Just to be frank of, like, if you just are sitting there with your arms crossed, I just distance myself from you, like okay, like I, I don't need this, like I, there's so much stuff that needs to happen and that's not always the best. It's probably not. The best thing is to not sit down and go. Okay, what, what is blocking you? You?
Brook:And yet I still eventually do get into those conversations because you have to. But oftentimes, if you're so in that spot, I kind of have to say you're not on the right bus. I need you to move on, because I can't have you sitting in the back corner with your arms crossed going, it's going to burn. I kind of told you so. And even if they're not thinking, if I had to have that conversation with them, I'm like, even if they're not thinking, if I had to have that conversation with them, like, oh, I never thought like that, everything in you is portraying this. It is hard to navigate that as a business owner to be willing to sit down and vulnerably say you don't like my ideas and where I'm going and I'm not going to do what you want to do. Can I get you to get on board that process? That sale internal sales to my own staff of ideas is a harder sell for me than selling my services to someone else.
Zach:You also have to understand structure.
Zach:In that case too, it's like you know.
Zach:There are businesses out there where it makes sense. There's very little kind of gateway or gatekeeping or very little entryway into being part of things, because the structure is such that you know, tasks that can be allotted to you are simple no harm, no foul kind of things and they expect a bunch of people to fall off and the people that make it to make it kind of a thing. But with a management style like yours and a structure like yours, there almost needs to be a very rigorous kind of gatekeeping process at the beginning of things, because once people are on the team, they're on the team and they're running free and you know you basically are saying I need this to happen in this amount of time and I, you know, trust you to know how that, you know, plays out from a step to step kind of way. So you know that's a challenge, that's a product of um. You know the kind of environment you want to keep being one that probably needs to be selective about the people that are sitting inside.
Brook:I mean they talk about that. Hiring the wrong person can usually cost a business. It depends on the type of business, but about a hundred thousand dollars plus to hire the wrong person.
Paul:Two to 10 times the salary.
Brook:And so that's it. That's costly. It really is, and so it doesn't matter how much money you're making or little money. And yet I'm also a proponent of you. Sometimes just try stuff. You make mistakes, you keep moving.
Paul:You spend $100,000.
Brook:You try again. You eventually find the person you have the right relationship with.
Zach:When it comes to that, I hear that statistic a lot about how expensive it is to hire the wrong person. What is hiring the wrong person look like Like if you have somebody that is around and does their job for 18?
Brook:months.
Zach:They burn customer relationships.
Brook:So I hired the wrong person. I let them run free with a job with a client. I get back in and I'm like, oh my God, everything you did was wrong. Now I paid for your time. Now I have to pay for all of the time to fix what you did and, by the way, I lost that client. So now I've lost future revenue that's associated with it because I couldn't fix the damage that they did. So there's just paying for. Okay, I paid for you to be employed for me for three months. Great, there's that lost money. They did nothing during that time period, or whatever that it is that I have, but it's the damage they do in the meantime. Plus, if I had a recruiter fee that came in to get that person, I have that cost out the window. I have to do it again.
Paul:That's probably 30%.
Brook:Yeah, 20 to 30, depending on the.
Zach:I was just curious if there was a certain span of time that somebody needed to stick around, or what the KPIs are on this was a good hire, or at least we broke even on this hire. You know what I mean.
Brook:I'm usually letting go my bad hires. My bad bad ones are within a six month time period of when I hired them that I'm letting them go and those are the usually the ones that cost me. For me, maybe other people, it's a lot longer of a thing. If it's longer than that, it's not a bad hire, as much as it may be something that it went sour for a reason or another. Like we started to disalign on stuff and usually I'm not burned as in like I have lost money, lost relationships. It's just we've gone two separate ways. The bad hire is within a six-month time frame and it usually is pretty dang costly.
Paul:And it could be a cultural thing where the person comes in and they do things that are just anti Inflammatory. You've got a harm in your office, you bring someone in and they're doing stuff and it's not caught quick enough by whoever the owner is or the manager, and it manifests itself and it starts affecting the other people. So if you start at 9 o'clock and they're coming in at 10 past 9 and then eventually 10 o'clock, that's really late If there's an agreement that they come in at a particular time your customers are calling and there's no one there.
Brook:That's not good. It doesn't know what you're asking for Very good, all right. It's a good conversation guys.
Paul:Thank you. Yeah, thanks for sharing. Thanks for having me See ya, thank you Bye.
