Lasting Impact
Welcome to "Lasting Impact," the podcast that dives deep into the stories and insights of extraordinary individuals who are leaving an indelible mark on the world. Here, we'll explore the transformative power of their actions and innovations in the realms of business, ministry, and community. Our guests are the change-makers, the visionaries, and the unsung heroes whose unwavering dedication and passion have not only made an impact but a lasting one. Prepare to be inspired, informed, and empowered as we explore the stories behind the lasting impact these remarkable individuals are creating.
Lasting Impact
From losing a Job to Entrepreneurial Success
Evan Uyetake went from a frustrating job search to an 18-year journey from sales representative to CEO. He discovered his true strengths lay in relationship-building, problem-solving, and leadership. Evan shares lessons about empowering teams, focusing on progress, and the importance of avoiding micromanagement. When unexpectedly let go, his strong relationships and faith helped him view this setback as preparation for his entrepreneurial journey. Evan's experiences offer valuable wisdom on navigating uncertainty and turning challenges into opportunities.
You're always finding solutions for stuff. That's, that's that's you have to be scrappy, you have to find ways to solve problems, because the reality is is if you don't do it, your customer is going to go someplace else.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the lasting impact podcast. I'm your host, mark Marquand. Join me as I sit down with remarkable individuals making a meaningful difference in business and ministry. We'll explore their stories, challenges and successes, all with the goal of encouraging you to go out and make a lasting impact. If you love what you hear, don't forget to rate, review and share. Welcome to Lasting Impact, evan Uetake. What's up, big dog? Hey welcome to the podcast, man.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Thank you, it's exciting to be here. You guys got a really great setup.
Speaker 2:An honor to have you. For those listening that don't know you, tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm a father of two. I have two boys, a 16-year-old and a 15-year-old. My 16-year-old will be 17 very soon, but it seems like they're a little bit closer than they actually are.
Speaker 1:I think our kids are probably in close proximity to age, lived in Oklahoma since 97, moved here from Michigan and graduated high school here and graduated from University of Tulsa and jumped into the marketing field and basically I've kind of worked my way from cold calling sales all the way to leading a company and all doing that while trying to raise a family, be a good husband, be a leader in my community. So it's been a windy path but it's been a fun journey.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, and we're going to talk about some of that today. Well, you and I have been kind of tracking together for a little while now. Our connection is we go to the same church, we send our sons to the same school, but ministry really brought us together Brotherhood and I would say mountain men. But we serve shoulder to shoulder together in the brotherhood ministry through our church and here in Tulsa, through our church and here in Tulsa, and so. But speaking of University of Tulsa, you're a really smart dude. You've done a lot of things. You've served in a lot of areas. Your career path has been marketing and branding, and so how'd you get into that? What drove you to that area?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's. It's kind of a funny story. I, whenever I graduate high school, I had this idea that I wanted to go to college. I knew that I wanted to do that, but I didn't necessarily know what I wanted to do, and whenever I went to identify what my major was going to be, I just literally opened the book and started reading stuff and then in the back of my mind was like what can I make the most money doing? Right, you want to go to college and get a good career where you can be financially set, and so one thing that I found kind of over time was that I was pretty good at working on computers, and so I just looked at like what are potentially some computer related degrees that I could get into, and so I went and ultimately found MIS, which was management information systems, and at the time it was a really good field to be in.
Speaker 1:It was a growing field and they're really kind of the, they're the, the liaison between, like a client and somebody who's actually coding, somebody who's like building software. And so I thought, man, that'd be perfect for me. I'm good at computers, I'm pretty technical, I'm relatively smart, and so I jumped into it and man went all the way through college, graduated, was feeling pretty good about myself, got good grades, I think. I graduated like with ABE, like a 3, three point something, 3.5, I think it was, and so I'm feeling pretty good about myself.
Speaker 2:And that's at TU.
Speaker 1:Just wait.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Kind of falls off quickly after that. So so yeah, so.
Speaker 1:I graduate and I'm like, man, I've got a really good degree from a really good school. I'm pretty excited about this and I go to enter the job field, and I'd already kind of seen some of my classmates jump out into the field and had seen some success. So I'm like, hey, you know, these guys are making pretty good money. So I put myself out there. I just can't find anything. Like the market had turned in the short period of time from when I started to when I graduated, and so I was just starting to look for anything and finally I found this.
Speaker 1:It was like a placing agency. And so they're like hey, come in, we'll have you take some aptitude tests and then we'll put you out in front of our clients and we'll see if there's some potential workplaces for you. So I'm like okay. And so they asked me what coding languages and stuff I knew, and so I told them well, what I didn't realize was what college had really prepared me for is understanding, like the principles of things. But I was not a coder by any means. That was not something that I really knew how to do. So I took like a test on one of the programming languages and.
Speaker 1:I failed it. It was. It was not good. I literally got my score back and I was pretty embarrassed and I was really faced with a decision Like what do I? What do I do next?
Speaker 1:I have a degree that you know on paper says I can do something, but reality was kind of giving me a different story and as I kind of started thinking about a little bit more, I'm like I'm not necessarily the kind of person that just wants to sit behind a computer for a long period of time, like I'm more relational, I'd like to have conversations, and I had done a lot of sales leading up to it, and so I just said you know what let's start to look at maybe a bridge between the two, maybe it's a sales that's in the IT field or whatever else. And so the the kind of next part of that story was I met a guy and he connected me with a guy that had a small business and he was doing sales for high-speed internet. So it was literally you got to think back a little bit because this really seems foreign now, but at the time if you went to a hotel, there was not high-speed internet in your room, it was not an amenity, it was literally new at that time for them to have something like that Same kind of idea. You probably went to a hotel before and it didn't have a pool. Now all hotels have pools.
Speaker 1:Well, this was back in early 2000s. I'm really dating myself here. But yeah, these, yeah, these holiday ends didn't have high speed internet, so I represented a.
Speaker 1:I ended up working for a company that represented a uh, a group that would do the installs to get the holiday ends compliant, and so basically had this contract and I started cold calling every single holiday and across the country.
Speaker 1:Really, and it was about 2,500 and I had never done cold calling before I'd done sales before, but I'd never done cold calling before and just I didn't really know anything different, so I just lit them up, I just called them all and just was myself and uh, hammered the phones for about three months and ended up getting a sale. It took me a long time to get a sale. Did your boss give you a script?
Speaker 2:No, no, it was just kind of call these guys on there or just figure out what was working, what wasn't working, and just you know throw them, throw them to the wolves Um but it was. I mean, it was just people, it was just me.
Speaker 1:It'd be like me and you talking, you pick up the phone and I'm trying to figure out who your manager is and who runs the property and just kind of figure it out from there.
Speaker 1:So, anyway, long, long story short, to get into it, that whole thing doesn't work out. But that company at the time that was like a another vertical of their business and the real core of their business was doing direct mail, and so that's where, like, the marketing part would actually come into play. And so as I was sitting there working with them, they literally just watched me like call all these people. They saw all my notes, they saw all the work that I was like I was always the phone and they're just like all right, this guy we don't have a product Like. This product is probably not a good product for him to sell, but let's put him on the core product and see if that turns into something. And so inevitably I switched over to that, which was a way easier sale, specifically for me, because people actually wanted to talk to me because I was selling them something that was going to help their business grow.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so I just started learning and I was in a really cool environment where it was a really small company and one of the he was one of the owners at the time, but he was also the president of the company just kind of took me under his wing and I started learning a ton of stuff from him and obviously I had success in that. So for me it was interesting because I got into that role being more of like I'm trying still trying to cling on to how am I going to incorporate my degree into this? And by the time it was all said and done, I realized that what my degree was in was not something that I was passionate about, nor was it really an actual strength for me. So like if you have you done your one degree with Dave Jewett.
Speaker 2:I have.
Speaker 1:So I was not operating in my GW threes at all. I was probably in maybe a yellow I was good at a yellow or maybe it was a green, but it wasn't like like the most energizing thing for me to do is it was actually probably more draining than anything else.
Speaker 1:Wow, and so the the lesson that I learned from that was you can be successful at things or you can be good at things, but it's not in line with your passions, it's not in line with, maybe, your design, as as Dave would say it, and so I just really started paying attention to, like, what are the things that are getting the most results, what are the things that either bring me life or I enjoy, or whatever else. I'm pretty competitive, so in sales.
Speaker 1:Obviously the competition side would kick in. You want to be the best, you want to sell the most. But the relational side was always good too, because I've built a lot of really great relationships with companies all across the United States. A lot of it was on the phone and so inevitably in that company. As I was more and more successful, I started getting promoted, which the irony is if you get promoted in a small company there's not like a ladder per se.
Speaker 1:You're building the ladder as you're going up it, and so I just kind of continued to work my way into sales leadership, been into operations and then a product development, and inevitably I worked my way into essentially like a leadership role to where I was a chief operating officer and then eventually CEO, and while all that was happening to, the owners of the company had different projects that they wanted to do and so I had had their trust and had the success to where they felt comfortable having me be in that role to pretty much run the company, which is what I did. And so I was at that company for about 20, no, 18 years. I was there for about 18 years.
Speaker 1:And it went through some ownership changes and eventually turned into more corporate and just kind of went through that whole evolution. So I started in a small business environment with just a few people and by the time I left it was a part of like a very large corporation that had, you know, 800 employees.
Speaker 2:So it was a pretty big change.
Speaker 1:So to get back to like marketing and branding and all that other stuff.
Speaker 2:I actually fell into it. Yeah, it's the origin story.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So it wasn't necessarily an intentional thing on my part. I would say that I would do it differently if I were to kind of go back and give some advice to myself back then and say, hey, let's figure out what your strengths are, let's figure out what you're passionate about and try to incorporate those things about and try to incorporate those things. But through one degree and through working with some mentors, I've been able to kind of look back and really kind of see how God has steered my life to where I was young and didn't know, and through his grace he was actually able to point me into a direction that when I did finally identify my strengths and I did identify the things that I was passionate about, I was literally doing that job Like it wasn't something that I sought out, it was something that, through fate or through God's direction, really kind of guided me into something that allowed me to be creative, allowed me to have relationships, allowed me to sell, be competitive, to grow things, and so all of that has just been part of the journey and to the extent now where I've actually started my own company, yeah, and really kind of honing in on specializing on parts of that business and utilizing my gifts and talents in that capacity.
Speaker 1:But now it's that entrepreneurial spirit which I think has always been in there and that's been something that's kind of slowly awakened in me to the extent now where I'm really energized and excited about what I'm doing. There's a lot of there's a lot of fear, there's a lot of uncertainty involved with it too. Year there's a lot of uncertainty involved with it too, but I think because of the last 20 years of my career, I can look at it and say, okay, I have, I have the confidence to know that I can do this and I also know from just the trials and tribulations of just life that come at you that.
Speaker 1:I can trust God through that and work my way through that too.
Speaker 2:Well, man, that's awesome. That's a lot there. I want to kind of rewind a little bit, and something that stood out to me was where you started on the phones and cold calling and you know, that kind of that product wasn't working out, but the but management saw that you, you were a grinder, that you were a grinder and that you were smart, or they saw you taking notes and you tried to figure it out. And I mean, first of all, if you're thrown into something like that, whether you own and you're in sales, you do have probably some sort of entrepreneur spirit, like entrepreneurial spirit in you of like, well, if it's to be, it's up to me, like, if this I eat, what I kill, or and I'm not saying you're on a hundred percent commission, but obviously you were driven to like, hey, your job here is to sell something and you, you got to get after it.
Speaker 2:What I love hearing is that when a couple of things that I love hearing one about you is that if this little lane right here wasn't working, but you're the right person, we just well, let's just put you in a different seat, because this is exactly what we're looking for, do you? And then that's the one part of it and then the other part of it is um management making a way like we, we see someone here that's special and we let's, let's cling on to him and see what we can do through him. On that work ethic, on that hustle is was, was that built up since you were little, or through college, because college was tough, or because, I mean, a lot of people bail on jobs like that. Yeah, like one week straight, this, uh, and I'm out, you know, and you, you kept going and kept grinding and working. Where, where would you say that that grit came from?
Speaker 1:yeah, it's probably a combination of things. Uh, looking specifically at the like why I dug in as much as I, did yeah I'd actually worked through high school and even through college and the first job that I got um my pay from that was essentially like the base pay was what I had been making before.
Speaker 2:So I was thrilled. Yeah, I was.
Speaker 1:I was pretty excited because I'm like, listen, I don't even have to do anything and I'm already making, you know, more money than, or the same amount of money I was before.
Speaker 2:And then there was all the upside right Like the commission and the bonuses and all that other stuff.
Speaker 1:So to me like there was a lot of energy behind that. And so I in the beginning, like when you're young, right, you feel like you have all the time in the world, you have all the energy in the world.
Speaker 1:You don't have, like all the responsibility and commitments as you do, and so really you can really pour a lot of your time and energy into that, not necessarily feel like you're wasting that time or energy, because you have an abundance of it and so you're not as selective per se on that. And I also knew too like I was building something, and I think when you're starting out, or even when you're at the age that I'm at today, if you're building something and you can start to see that progress, that is really energizing.
Speaker 1:It's not super exciting to build a house and be stuck on the foundation stage right? Like you're just like a lot of dirt work, a lot of you know concrete being poured, the plumbing, but it doesn't feel like anything is happening. But once you start to see like oh hey, I got that first commission check, or hey, I got that first yes and that yes potentially can be a reoccurring yes.
Speaker 1:And how do I cultivate that relationship to where I become that person's go-to for those things? Because then a referral sale or a residual sale man those things into like a much bigger thing? And so I could see that probably early on Last year my dad passed away and the work ethic side of it not probably came from him. I didn't necessarily realize it until last year. Last year, whenever we were faced with essentially kind of how everything went down, there was a lot of reflection, but there was also the fingerprints of what my dad had done for me throughout my life. I didn't see them until after he had passed. And so I know, I know we're going to talk a little bit about lasting, uh, legacy and those kinds of things here, so I'm sure that'll get into it a little bit. But uh, yeah, I honestly like I always felt like my dad was.
Speaker 1:He was there, but he was just, he just worked hard, like he he had this mentality that he could provide for his family if he worked hard. And a lot of my childhood was not necessarily him overly present. I don't have a ton of memories of him being there all the time because obviously he worked and did those things. But I knew he was there and I just never really was at maybe the perspective to see what he was actually doing.
Speaker 2:But when I had my first kid.
Speaker 1:I do remember sitting down with him and just kind of reflecting on a little bit of just what he had done for me and I just I took him to dinner and and basically had written him a letter because I was just like how do I, how do I communicate this?
Speaker 1:Cause my dad didn't talk very much he was he was pretty quiet into himself, but through really the last year I've been able to kind of dig up some of like his mentality towards, towards what he was doing.
Speaker 1:And it was interesting because I could hear my sisters talk about him too and just how he really was determined to provide for his family and to be successful.
Speaker 1:And I think there was some times where, like I'm sure he had people kind of speaking to his life like, hey, we don't really see a mountain too much, um, and I think he just he took it personally and just said you know what, I might not be the smartest guy in the room, but I will be one of the hardest working guys in the room and honestly, my family really, or my childhood and my growth was never at a point where I didn't feel like we had enough or anything else, like we were always provided for, we were always taken care of. And so I think just intrinsically that just through how my dad modeled it for me, I took it on and just was never going to be in a position where I didn't necessarily have control of, you know, being able to provide or whatever else. I was really more focused on just doing a good job and just working hard, and I think I got a lot of that from him.
Speaker 2:Man, what a testament to your dad. That is awesome and it's a reminder that our kids are watching us and it's going to going to ref. You know they're not going to tell us hey, I'm watching you, but it's going to reflect later and the you know I've been in small groups before where a dad talks, a guy would talk about his dad. It's like, man, you know, my dad was always tired.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:He worked hard and then he never came home and he never played with me and and so you know, all that stuff's a good reminder and uh, yeah, I bet you got your, your grit from your dad. Um, you're, you're a strong believer man, we're, we're. We do a lot of ministry stuff together.
Speaker 1:Was your dad a born again Christian? See, the one that led you to the Lord. I grew up. I grew up, uh, in the church. Um, my, both my parents um at from early childhood memories. We actually live really in close proximity to the church that we went to and my parents did a lot of children's ministry, so I was always in close proximity and um, so in that regard it wasn't like a like, a singular like really memorable event.
Speaker 1:It was more of just like that was kind of how things were, uh were for us.
Speaker 1:It was it was part of our routine, so I did over time have the opportunity to kind of pull back from the plastic bubble that I was in and kind of see a little bit of the differences of the two things, and so that's where I think I was in a position where I had to really kind of decide for myself. But I did grow up with a lot of that stuff and I'm sure, like if they're taking you to church.
Speaker 2:They have. They have. They had a role, they had a, they had a role. And whether it was like them saying, raise your hand or you know, maybe you didn't do in the bedroom with with your parents, but if, if, if they're leading you like this is our lifestyle, this is how we live, or we're trying to then they definitely played a major role yeah, I definitely grew up in it. In that capacity, I'm working with the. I should say I'm working with the dad. That sounds like heavy heavy lifting there not really.
Speaker 2:I mean I'm friends with the guy right now that I'm encouraging him to go to church yeah he's up, he's, he's going through some difficult times and my heart goes out to him and and I'm praying for him and with him and um, I really believe his next step is just getting back into church and letting his little boys see that like, oh, when I'm with dad on the weekends, we go to church and um, like it's a big deal, you know, like you know he might not be in a spot right now that he's telling his boys, hey, let's do this devotional together, uh, let's go through the book of John together and or let me walk you through the gospels, but just the fact of, like, when I'm with dad, we do these things and uh, I think that's the next step for him and so it is important.
Speaker 2:And I could say that about my folks, like my parents, just they put me at the right places. They weren't perfect, I wasn't perfect, but when I look back, yeah, that's the stuff I'm gonna be like, man, bottom line is you got me to church on Wednesday nights, you know, and there was someone that was prepared for me, and weekends we went. Whether we were a struggling family, we were a struggling family, but whatever was going on behind closed doors, you folks, you guys made a decision every weekend to take us, um. Well, I want to get back on on some of this, this career stuff that's made you who, who you've become, um, and I think I mean what are you? How old are you?
Speaker 1:right now'm going for it, I'm going for it, because I feel we're similar in age. If you'd like to know my weight too, I wait, yeah, you're, you're 40. I'm 44. Okay, all right.
Speaker 2:So you're, you're 44, 40s yeah, you're in your 40s me too, mid 40s and it's like well, let's go back to dave jewett. We, a lot of the stuff that we have done is has started to like um. It's kind of framed, I mean through our, through our nine to five. A lot of times it's like we start becoming um, our, we start developing our skill, our skill sets we start developing our skill sets.
Speaker 1:You had d Dave on this before right, Like early, early in the podcast.
Speaker 2:No, I haven't had Dave yet.
Speaker 1:I'm encouraging you to reach out. Yeah, I will I had.
Speaker 2:I know who I had. I had John Starr.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, john Starr. Yeah, we've had John Starr, and I know you had Kirby too. We've had Kirby.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and we'll we'll bring those guys back. And, yes, love Dave. Dave's a super close friend, I mean. I know he could say that to a lot of people and and that's been. I've I've been fortunate to spend a lot of time with him and um, anyway, let's get back to you and and who you are and the skillset you have.
Speaker 2:Um, cause I think when you're taking the path that you have taken of going into a small company and when you work at a large company like there's, you usually have a lane Like this is this is what your assignment is, this is what you're going to do. And just to keep it very simple, you know, if we have someone new starting at our office at a, at a entry level position, it could be like, hey, this goes over here, you're going to just check this email, you're going to check this, and it could be very simple and just do that for a long time and then we'll um and you. You're working on a small spot and you're good and reliable. You can start taking on a lot of tasks faster than you normally would and through that, yeah, you can start developing skillset and finding out what you're good at. So leadership is developed in there, obviously, good with relationship is developed in there too.
Speaker 2:I mean, I look at your resume, dude, you're like on, you've been on the board and major things, a director, your podcast, host two different podcasts and you're, you're taking over a peril for a ministry. There's just a lot that you carry. What has drawn you to the leadership side of a lot of this Cause you can be awesome at sales and awesome at the bottom line you know like hey, we're going to, we're going to generate a lot of revenue Doesn't necessarily mean you're awesome at leadership, and so when you're catching, when you're, when you're, when you're a guy, that is good in business and good in leadership it's. It's not always guaranteed, but you've served your community you really have at a high level. So what has drawn you to that leadership stuff?
Speaker 1:Well, first of all, I've been a sucky leader too, so it's not necessarily something that you just kind of walk into. And I'm glad that you brought up the podcast stuff, because I could tell I'm starting to get you talking more than I think you want to.
Speaker 2:So I think it's just natural for me.
Speaker 1:I'm used to being you talking more than I think you want to, so I think it's just natural for me. I'm used to being the guy asking the questions.
Speaker 2:Yeah, in my head I was thinking earlier. We got a couple two podcast hosts?
Speaker 1:Yeah, we'll just.
Speaker 2:Wrestling for the mic.
Speaker 1:No, no, I will defer. No, no sure.
Speaker 2:You're the guest. That's true. You get to be the guest.
Speaker 1:I'm not used to being the guest role for me, so, yeah, the going back to leadership. So when you're a part of a small company, there's. What I never wanted to do was give a customer a reason to leave, and so, inevitably, if I had the trust of that customer and I felt we could do it, I would find ways to create a solution.
Speaker 1:And so I think in some capacity it was out of necessity to really just invent or create solutions to customer problems, because from a business standpoint, if you're solving a problem, there's value and people will pay for that If you're not solving a problem and they're tolerating you and it might be a commodity or whatever.
Speaker 1:They can go wherever they want. That's not necessarily going to be a sustainable business for you and I think I just starting out in a small company it was that's how you survived, was you just had to continually fight for that next sale, for that next thing that would drive revenues, so that you could keep doing it. And if you really liked doing it, then you are willing to do those things, because that is what created the means for all this to happen. And as a company grows, especially when it comes to people and payroll and expenses and everything else, you just somebody's got to sell more, I mean that's kind of where everything goes.
Speaker 1:And so I was. Because I was in sales, I knew the importance of sales. But the challenge was and I don't know if you've ever experienced this yourself, but if I have something that's a really good product and I'm talking to a potential customer, inevitably they're always going to talk about the thing that my product doesn't do. That's like the one thing that I'm always trying to figure out how to overcome that, and so in some capacity they could be just trying to trip you up. But in other times, if I'm compared like my product's product A and my competition's product is product B Product B does this thing that they want, my product doesn't I've got to really work and massage that relationship to identify like, how important is that for the customer, or what can I do over here that provides more value, that they're willing to overlook that piece that we don't have? And so I think in that regard, we just constantly had to look for ways to do stuff. On the other side from my company leadership the people that I was working for inevitably we would be in sales meetings and they would sell things that didn't exist, and it was very frustrating for me. But I think in some capacity I learned from that and it wasn't necessarily like we're we're we're like straight up lying to customers, but it was like something yeah, we could technically do that, but we didn't have the product at that time. And then usually what would happen is that we end the meeting, go back to the office and in that meeting recap is like all right, evan, you need to go make this product and make this happen so that we can do what we said we were going to do. And so I just, I just constantly had to find ways to do that.
Speaker 1:But from a leadership standpoint I want to say it's called the Peter principle. You do have to be careful with leaders that you don't over-promote them, you don't promote them into a role beyond what they're capable of, because what you could have is you could have a really good salesperson and go hey, this is a guy that we want to reward, or this is a person that we want to reward and we want to move him into this role, and maybe we can help. Maybe that person can help bring up some of the newer salespeople that aren't as good, and maybe, if he helps them get better, then we sell more and we do more and we can and we can grow, but there's some people that just aren't aren't really good leaders but they're really really good salespeople.
Speaker 1:And so you really have to, from a leadership standpoint, be very tuned into what's going on. And again, going back to you know one degree and those kinds of things is identify what your strengths are of your team and find the best place for them. And what you don't want to do is over-promote them, because if you over-promote them they're actually going to get frustrated in their job and they potentially could leave to go someplace else because they don't feel they're not getting celebrated anymore, they feel like they're failing all the time and you get a really competitive salesperson who probably sells a lot. They might leave your company and now you've taken intellectual capital, you've taken knowledge, you've taken a really potentially good employee and you've promoted them out of the company and that's that's not anything that you want. No-transcript tolerated them.
Speaker 1:I, I, I always try to look for the best in people and assume that people will do good, like if I hire you and you want to work here and I'm paying you, like I'm assuming that you want to make money and do well, and I've seen people not care at all about that. And so I'd say in the first, probably the first 15 years, there was a lot of learning curve that, luckily for me. I was working for a company, an organization, that we had the luxury of training up people. In some cases we had to because we couldn't afford, like a really good person, yeah.
Speaker 1:So we had to get people that were rough around the edges and in some cases we were able to help make them better, and Other cases it just didn't work out and so I was able to learn. Some cases you have to move quickly and other cases you can Take your time a little bit. Give them opportunities to grow, try to identify progress All well, creating and crafting your culture to where everybody around you like, let's say, your good employees, the people that you don't have to spend a lot of time on they're confident in you making that decision, that this is the right thing to try to keep this person, to try to develop them. Or, if you keep them too long, they're going to start questioning you and they might leave because they're not happy, because they're seeing you tolerate something that is just constantly hurting the company and it's because you are afraid to make that decision.
Speaker 1:So all of those different things come into leadership and trying to identify, like what's the best way to move forward, what's the best path for the company, what's the vision for the company? How are we walking through that? What kind of company do we want to be? What kind of product do we want to have? And in the healthy environments and I love it. It's a rare thing In the toxic environments it's. Everyone's just looking for a way out.
Speaker 1:And that's, you're not going to be a successful business if you have that. So leadership for me has been a lot of real world, um, playing in the sandbox and on the other side of it too, like I've gotten lucky and I've seen that. And then I've also been able to, you know, identify that I didn't have all the answers. And finding mentors, and finding people that, uh, are a little bit further along in their, in their career that I was able to talk to and learn from them and say, hey, well, what are some things that I need to invest in?
Speaker 1:What's what's some things I need to look out for? What are my blind spots? And just be willing to have those conversations and have trusted people that you can have around you that will be able to tell you the truth.
Speaker 2:Well, I, you and I are similar in the, in the fact that we, you know, we, we believe in mentorship. Um, we need mentorship. What can you? Can you think of some best advice that you've received from, from mentors, and that could be related to relationships or related to leadership? Is there anything that sticks out to you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, not like directly, in terms of like a real beautiful quote that I can put out there. But I think it is probably like one of the ones that stands out to me right now is just kind of the traction mentality. I don't know if you read that book before, but it's having the right people in the right seats of the bus.
Speaker 1:And in some cases you have to really take a look at the people that you have and again going back to one degree in that stuff, are you putting people in a place where they can be successful? Because if they are, then everybody's happy. But you might have a situation where somebody's frustrated in their job and they're just going through the motions. They're not super productive, maybe they're only given about 30%, 40%, they're not fully optimized and they're probably looking for another job too. That's not going to do you any good. I think the other thing would be is learn to trust people.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of times where I've seen people micromanage and I've always seen that as a bottleneck. But when I was in a position actually one of my most recent positions I managed half the country and I had a sales team that was all remote, they traveled and they went and saw uh, customers all across you know, the Western half of the United States. So I couldn't really micromanage them. I could force them to log things in Salesforce, I could force them to be on every call, I could force them to just take a ridiculous amount of notes and run all these reports and do all this stuff, but ultimately that would be me trying to justify my existence as a boss, as opposed to empowering my team to go out and sell and go out and cultivate and develop relationships.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so I always tried to approach it from like how can I, in my conversations with the team, help them and help solve the problems that they have? Not what can I get the most out of it. What can I do to get the most out of the, what can I do to get the most out of this team?
Speaker 1:because if I was going at it from from that standpoint, I would end up burning them on both ends and they would end up quitting because they weren't being trusted, they didn't feel empowered and, honestly, it would show up in the numbers. So I would see it eventually. Yeah, but I would much rather approach it from the perspective of I'm going to help you, make your job as easy as possible and, as a byproduct of that, you're going to be able to do more and you're going to be more effective, because you are able to do things without having to wait on something, and so there's an energy behind that momentum you want to tap into.
Speaker 2:What's the best practices for the balance and if balance is the right word between accountability and empowerment? You know the micromanagement stuff is could some manager could be like, well, I'm just like holding them accountable because they got to do steps one through 10. If we're going to hit quota, if they're going to, if it's my, it's up to me to draw the best out of them, and so I'm going to show them how to do it. They need to do it. I'm going to stay on top of them and I'm going to push production.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That guy's boss is probably really happy because he's just looking at production. But you said you're going to have some people that are just like dude, get off me, this is too much, or whatever. Trust me to do my job. So you know, accountability is praised in leadership conversation. Empowerment is key and praised in leadership conversation. Where do you find a good place for both of them or a good balance for them when you're working with the team.
Speaker 1:That's a big question there, mark. Yeah, any other world?
Speaker 2:problems you'd like me to solve. Yeah Well, what's worked for you when you're leading folks.
Speaker 1:Well, just as you were trying to lay that out, I think the first thing that I thought of is hire. Well, if you can really do a good job on the front end, finding the right person, that helps really set the foundation of what you want to do. I would also take a look at like proven people. So in my past role I had a couple of employees that have been with the company for a very long time and I could see by the fruit of what they did that they were successful that they didn't, honestly didn't need me.
Speaker 2:It wasn't with the guys that I had to win over because they were like who's this new guy coming in?
Speaker 1:that's going to just tell me how to do my job or whatever else, and so for me it was like listen, I can already tell from the numbers that I see and from you know other people in the company. They told me you're a rock star, so I'm going to get out of your way, I'm going to let you be a rock star and you can go do that those are the people you can trust, the new employees.
Speaker 1:If you've hired them well, those first 90 days, that first year, really is super important and that's where you're going to really try to spend a lot of your time and energy with them. So it's being in the field with them, it's being around them, it's being available to them, answering those questions, giving them opportunities to learn it themselves.
Speaker 1:So not necessarily, you know, spoon feeding them, but really giving them an opportunity to learn how to do it, and then there is accountability in the sense that it's there. It's. You know, I I actually am a strong proponent of finding ways for people to fail, not necessarily to where, like, the cost the company a lot, but I would like there to be a situation where they are potentially putting themselves out a little bit beyond their comfort zone and it doesn't go well, and for me, if that happens, I usually go to myself yeah, I don't want that to happen again.
Speaker 1:And so that's like motivation for me to say, okay, how can I be better prepared? Or what are the? What are the questions that I didn't ask leading up to this that I should have asked? And so I think that giving them an opportunity to fail, giving them an opportunity to kind of spread their wings and test things out, I think is good too. You're going to have guardrails up in anything that you do and you're going to say, hey, probably for a new person. You're not going to have the same amount of freedom that a tenured person does.
Speaker 1:That's proven, yeah person you're not going to have the same amount of freedom that a tenured person does. That's proven, um. But if you are tuned in and you do start to see that progress, I was a huge proponent of celebrating milestones and celebrating progress or just celebrating my team in general, probably to the extent that, uh, you know the the other people in the company didn't like it because I always nominated an employee for employee of the month and I would say I was about 50% of the time. One of my guys won in my time there, which was kind of funny to me. I'm like either I'm winning because nobody else is submitting anybody, or I'm just, I just have a really good team and I I choose, chose to believe that I had the really good team.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so we were always looking for ways to celebrate them. And you know, I think a lot of times, if you're an employee, you're looking for that positive feedback, you're looking for that appreciation, recognition and encouragement. And so, again, I knew that I was in a place where I could appreciate them, I could speak them, I could speak life into them yeah and then I would watch and kind of see how they responded.
Speaker 2:I like go. I like how you said the the hire well, yeah and uh. And all of this is depending on the position. You know, if you're pretty intro level, you need a lot of information on what to do, right. But if you're, if you're coming in and when you hire, well, it's really exciting because most of the time they're, they're surprising you and they're bringing an arsenal full of awesomeness that you didn't have, yeah, and you're like, ah, this is why you're here. But I have the experience, I have the reps and I have the relationships, so now I can help you be awesome.
Speaker 2:So I like when we have someone new and they're just they have bright ideas, they have energy and they've done something before, that are like we did this over at some other place, and they're like, oh, this is awesome. Yeah, their, their knowledge is only goes so far, because it's a new system, it's a new culture, it's a new environment. But, man, we just added an awesome a player and this is going to go great. Um, I love when someone's helping me and I'm not pulling them along. They need my guidance or something. But when they're just yeah, I can do this, I can do this, I can do this, or I've already done that. I've already done that and like awesome, great, how can I help you? I'm here to serve you. Um, it's funny. I always think of uh, like, uh, I used to watch uh, the reality show, the ultimate fighting championship.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay.
Speaker 2:You know, and they're all stuck in a house. All the fighters are stuck in a house, right, and then they get champions that coach them every day. And it always stood out to me like one of the first seasons and I saw one of the coaches say like you're already a great fighter. You know, I'm just here to help you develop. Just make you a better fighter. I'm not going to change your style. I'm not going to change what you are.
Speaker 2:You're already a wrestler. You know you're already a great striker. But again, I have the reps. I know the system better than you. I'm going to watch you, I'm going to help you, I'm going to train you and I'm just going to make you better at what you're at already and maybe give you some new. You know tricks and some tips to help you. But I'm not going to change what you are because you're already here for a reason. You're already a great fighter and I'm just going to add to it. I was, I remember like. That has just stood out to me just like eating popcorn yeah, I mean, that was, that was 16 years.
Speaker 1:That was 16 years ago because my something like that.
Speaker 2:My oldest is about to be 16. And I remember that's. You know, those were the days I was like watching that series or whatever, and as I was like yeah, that was brilliant. You know, it was really brilliant and that's. That was leadership, yeah, and you're like hey, man, let's talk some ministry stuff. Well, actually, evan, before we go to the brotherhood stuff, I was wondering if you were going to circle back.
Speaker 2:Well, I want to go to. We've been talking about you starting at this company and becoming all the way up to CEO or whatever, but you're not a ceo there and starting, uh, your own company, um, without something happening. So walk us through your journey between being at the top at this, at the company you are at, to your own startup yeah, you just want to rip the band-aid off, don't you? Yeah, I'm like what kind of podcast is this? Everybody listen to this right now it's like this guy evan.
Speaker 2:He's pretty awesome I think uh, I think he's got it all together you're gonna get some job offers after this hold on, let's, let's go talk about maybe some of the yeah the ebbs and flows of
Speaker 1:business. Yeah, so the business that I was in I actually I'll see if I can do this like abbreviated but I'd been the president of the company for about it was probably about five years and for me I had just kind of gotten, I had lost the passion for it and so I didn't know it. I just I was like I'm a president of a company, I'm successful and like on paper, right, you know, things are pretty good. But I just didn't feel like I was growing. I had a good team, but in order for us to really kind of grow beyond what we were, it was going to take a lot of additional resources that we didn't have.
Speaker 1:And what had happened was I was when the company had started. It was privately held and by the time I was running the company, the ownership group that I had begun with had left and we had merged into a large company that had a bunch of employees, and so I was a president with about at that time. I want to say it was like 13 other companies under this umbrella, and so I just um, just kind of looked at it as like, well, maybe I want to grow in this enterprise and I want to kind of grow there and as I started to explore that a little bit, I just got a check that said, yeah, this is, this is not where you want to be, this is not what you want to do.
Speaker 1:So I've kind of felt stuck. I didn't necessarily know what I wanted to do and so I just that's when I had tried to really dive more into podcasting and community stuff and just trying to grow other ways.
Speaker 1:And so I think that was kind of the start of it a little bit. And then I actually was. I was on LinkedIn and I saw this job posting, for at the time it was called 36 Degrees North it was. They were getting uh, they were going to hire a new director, executive director and I just couldn't get it out of my mind.
Speaker 1:I just was like I need to apply for this job. I think I'm really well qualified. I'm an entrepreneurial, I've been a president of a company, I've I know marketing, I know you know leadership, mentorship, all that stuff. So I just couldn't sleep that night and so I was like all right, god, I think this is you trying to tell me something. If this is kind of my next step, then that's what I'll do. So I applied for the job. I did not have a resume at the time because I'd obviously been with the company, I hadn't been planning on even going anywhere, and so I put a resume together and started researching and all that other stuff. Applied for the job, get the first interview. I feel like I crushed it. It was over the phone.
Speaker 1:It was a hiring firm that was asking me all these questions and I'm just rattling off all these answers just like, oh man, I got this in the bag, let's get past this first interview so I can start talking to some people.
Speaker 1:And yeah, then I just waited because I didn't really know what the next step was because I hadn't applied for a job in years, and so, inevitably, I just kind of kept checking in with my point of contact and eventually I got a notification that I didn't make it past the first round of interviews.
Speaker 1:And so it was like a dagger to my heart because I was like okay, like this is. I feel like this happened for a reason, but I don't understand why I got shut down so quickly. I thought I would have made it further, and so I had to wrestle with it for a while, but I think, as time has gone by, I've really been able to look at it and identify God was preparing me. He was basically saying hey, you are not a person that's going to do something quickly. You're going to want to make a calculated decision, you're going to want to see all the angles and do all those different things. And so one of the things that happened as a result of that is I identified that my time there was limited, and so I changed my perspective and my role to trying to find a way to delegate more and work myself out of a job to where I could leave.
Speaker 1:And at the time, my biggest concern was making sure that my team was best set up to exist without me, because leading up to that, I was the company, I was the culture, I was the leadership, I had all the relationships, I had all the processes in my head, we had some stuff, but we hadn't really done a good job of documenting everything and specifically things that I did. I just didn't hand them off because I was like you know, this is part of my job, this is what I do, so you know, these are the things I got to do. So that kind of created that path for me a little bit, but nothing really ever popped up after that, and so I just was never never at a point where I felt that compelled to apply for anything else, but I'd started talking to people. I had really started engaging. I think that's when I first really started engaging with One Degree and just kind of digging in a little bit more. I'd started One Degree but I didn't finish it, but I had started with it and so, anyway, as all of that stuff was happening, the industry that we were in was continually getting more and more competitive and shrinking, and so the company was getting kind of stagnant despite what we were doing.
Speaker 1:While all that was happening, I was actually trying to diversify the company, which was actually growing, what we were doing, but the core business that we had kept shrinking. And so what had happened was it didn't look like the company was growing, but what was happening was the company was growing in new verticals but wasn't growing in its core vertical, and as that core vertical shrank we looked stagnant. And so I think what ended up happening is kind of twofold. One we weren't able to hit the metrics that corporate was putting out in front of us because we were shifting and changing, but at the same time corporate was really getting set up to where. They haven't gone all the way there yet, but I fully expect them to go private equity, so they started consolidating down.
Speaker 1:And as they consolidated down, they wanted to make all the companies look more profitable, be more sexy, and I was the longest tenured, most expensive employee. And so what ended up happening was I had a new boss I was basically working with to kind of take the company to the next level. I had met with him for probably three or four months and just kind of giving him the lay of the land of what I was doing, the vision where we were going, what, how I saw it all, and, uh, he came into town and fired me.
Speaker 1:And so I was just like, uh, it was funny cause I just watched uh hard knocks and it was like right, when they were making cuts to all the different um people that didn't make the team.
Speaker 1:And I was it was like the night before I was shocked about how well people were taking it and I was like man, if I ever got fired or let go like I don't know how, I don't even know how to respond. But I just looked at that and I was like it was like it was no big deal to them. It was just like, okay, like I'm a free agent, I'll go someplace else and you know, I'll take my talents over here. That next morning I went and had a breakfast. I was supposed to have breakfast and it was my boss and the director of HR. There was no food on the table and they handed me a piece of paper and and I was just like, oh man.
Speaker 1:But I think the grace of God was that I didn't. I wasn't like destroyed over it, whereas probably if I had not mentally decided that this was not going to be my identity, it wasn't going to be my end-all, be-all career, I wasn't going to be here for the next 30 years. I was able to kind of be like man. We had a good run and I just want to make sure that my team stays together and the company continues on and I'll go on and do something else, and so that was really the first kind of kick in the butt that I think God was giving me is like I got something bigger for you. I've been preparing your art for this, and so let's kind of go out there and see what happens. And so you fast forward a little bit on that.
Speaker 1:I had really gotten to the point where I had, you know, at that point, 18 years of relationships with companies all across the country, and so I just started kind of letting strategic people know what had happened. And I ended up talking to this guy that I'd known for a very long time, and he was just like who all knows that you're not at this company anymore, yeah, and I was like you're probably like the second or third person I've called. He's like, don't call anybody else. I was like what do you mean? He's like I'm going to go talk to my boss. So he talked to his boss. So he talked to his boss and I mean, if you base that conversation on from when I was unemployed to when I essentially had a job, I was unemployed for about two days.
Speaker 1:But, the reality was it took a lot longer than that to kind of get everything put together, but he just basically said, hey, we need to hire this guy and next thing, you know, I was kind of on a accelerated path to essentially starting another career and that's the company that I managed half of the country with and going that direction. So in that regard it was, I think, part of God's plan for me. But it was one of those things where I had to already begun the process of separating my identity from my career. And I think a lot of guys get into a mindset that what I do defines me, my success defines me, my family defines me, like all of these accomplishments or things that I've done that my name is tied to. That's who I am. And I think if that whole situation had gone down and I had not separated that, I would have been crushed because I wouldn't have.
Speaker 1:I wouldn't have been able to reconcile in my mind that I was not a failure and that I wasn't uh successful anymore. And and everything that I had done up to that, to that point, and the teams I had built, the products I had created, all those other things were at that point flushed down the toilet, and so it was difficult. I'm not saying that like I was just like. Oh, you know rainbows and sunshine.
Speaker 2:This is all great.
Speaker 1:But my mentality in that entire situation was I'm a free agent and I can go take these talents and I can go take you know, everything that I've learned up until this point and that's very valuable to bring to another company or to whatever I do next.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:In that regard. There was an energy behind it and excitement, and I was able to take about three months off to spend time with my kids, spend time with my family, work on projects and just kind of enjoy what I call almost like a halftime in my career. So it was, uh, it was fun, Um, but also very, very difficult to kind of walk through.
Speaker 2:Well, I think that, um, well, one being able to hit the phones and right away someone say, hey, just stop calling testament to your relationships that you've that, because, again, someone could be awesome at at sales and terrible at leadership and communication, or, or sales are probably great at communication, but that leadership side, that, um, selfless stuff, and so that's a testament to what you've built, just like personally. So now they like you personally, I like you, evan, and yeah, that's again like someone could have. People could have just been like laughing About time they let go of that guy or whatever and not had any relationships, but they were there and that's amazing. You're a competitive guy. Um, I'm sure there was some wrestle in there, a little bit of a blow to the ego of, maybe, just like you know, anybody, nobody, would like the whole.
Speaker 2:We didn't do an extra strategy for we didn't talk about an extra strategy. You just like let me go one day, yeah, yeah and um, but I'm, uh, but without God preparing you indirectly through. I mean, you had already called another company Like you, like you would have been left first if they, if, if that other company hired you Right, so you're in God's, our loving father's way, indirectly, was preparing you and helping you get through that, and this is a season that's helped you, I would imagine, to where you're at right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's all been preparation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, god's developing you. So right now you have launched your own company, sticking with um, branding, marketing. Um, there's gotta be excitement to it. There's probably gotta be some nervousness to it. What's, what's your hurdles right now with this? With?
Speaker 1:everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Well it's back to back to your, your, your origin story, your origin story. Man, you know you become a problem solver. You become a solver of everything when you're at a small company and you're the one helped building it and now it's your baby. So you're not just serving that company like, oh, this is mine. So you're probably back to some of that beginning stuff of lots of hurdles, lots of problems to solve, but you got the reps underneath your belt.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's really just taking everything that I've learned up into this point and being faithful with it. There is nobody else I can blame it on.
Speaker 1:So if the company is if it fails, I can't say it was somebody else's fault. If if it was, if it was successful, or if it is successful or will be successful, I honestly still can't take credit for it, because it would be God leading and guiding me to really building it to what it is today. But when you, when you start a business and you build it, there is a couple of things that happen. One, I think the the group around you, like your friends and your community and your network, they do, they do want to see you successful. They do want to see you successful. And what I had found was I'd had businesses that had told me no before that I had called upon and I just never could crack them in terms of even having a conversation to talk about marketing or whatever else, they wouldn't entertain it.
Speaker 1:But when they knew that it was me and I was doing it and it was my thing, all of a sudden they were very willing to talk. And in some cases, that's all they needed to hear.
Speaker 2:They're just like.
Speaker 1:Hey, I want to help you, and so that was really cool to see I actually had one friend. This was before I officially decided to kind of start my own thing and he basically said I'll be your first customer. He's like I'll move on Like anything that I can send to you, I. He's like I'll move on Like anything that.
Speaker 2:I can send to you, I'll do to you.
Speaker 1:He's like you're my guy and I just said what Like? Yeah, I honestly hadn't even like, even asked him, but I think he knew that in here there was a desire to do something like that. But I I'm more of a like a slower moving, calculated decision type of person that I wasn't going to jump into something unless I felt like I knew what the result was going to be.
Speaker 1:And so in that that regard it did, it didn't happen as fast as it could have, like I mean, I probably could have started this business 10 years ago and potentially done well, but the reality is is I was using kind of the first half of my career for education, for knowledge and, honestly, to learn how to do stuff.
Speaker 1:Because, like even right now, like in starting my business, there was a lot of things that I had employees do that I never knew how to do, and so I've had to like I use accounting as an example, because I don't like accounting. Accounting is the worst. And so I've had to like I use accounting as an example because I don't like accounting. Accounting is the worst.
Speaker 2:You need that information.
Speaker 1:Like that's a big part of your business, but I had a controller and they managed all that stuff and the systems and how you track it and cash flow and all that. Like I would make decisions based off it, but I wasn't the guy in the weeds on it. When you're starting your own company, you're doing that yourself now, and so I'm having to teach myself how do I put all this stuff in, how do I go in and pay the sales tax and how do I manage my cash flow to make sure that with the money that I have not the money that corporate has, but with the money that I have can I make sure that I'm paying my vendors on time and doing the things that I need to do. And so, in that regard, like the education has been good, and I mean, even this morning, like I was working on something and you're just Googling cases.
Speaker 1:Like, I know I can do this, I just don't know the exact way to do it. So you're just like all right, I got to learn how to be curious and I got to give myself some grace to take a little additional time to figure out this one thing. Once I figured that out, man, it was rock and roll again. We're just we're cooking along. So a lot of that stuff is just the beginning of a business. The next step of that will be to document it, to define it, to create a process for it, so that, inevitably, when I will be to document it, to define it, to create a process for it, so that, inevitably, when I do get to the point where I'm adding employees and companies larger, that I can replicate that and really identify, like, what's the best use of my time?
Speaker 1:The best use of my time talking to customers and selling right now, it is for sure, but eventually it could be developing in another business vertical or it could be launching more businesses. Yeah, I get a person like me that I bring in and uh say, hey, I think you have the opportunity, the potential to be able to be somebody that can run this for me so I can go start more businesses, because that might still be where it goes. I'm I'm not 100 honeded in on what, what I'm going to do with the rest of my life. Um, I just know that my next step is this yeah, and that's probably right where God wants you.
Speaker 2:I like the path, man, to be honest with you, is if you you put all the reps, you, you, you have a lot of experience, and now you go implement and you really have the hard stuff down, which is the sales, the other stuff, like it's annoying and it's tough, but like someone could, even, if you like, contract it out or something. But the hard part is like going to go get those deals, the new deals and the new business and, like you said right off the bat, you're like people dislike me, so I know that I'll get. There is no problem.
Speaker 1:I know that I said that.
Speaker 2:Well, maybe they trust you, Like get, there is no problem. That I said, yeah, well, there's maybe trust you, like there's some buddies out there like hey, let me help you get started. I know we're trying to start a run long here, uh, but obviously we to not talk a little bit about brotherhood would be would be crazy. Um. So you know, part of my, my journey has been, uh, being a part of starting a breakfast 10 years ago with our good friend, johnny Hampton. And you know, at some point we started, we got out of a restaurant and went over to a church room and then bigger room that had AV and it just kept growing and they started, they as in us and the church and the room started recording the messages. And you know, like now we had a podcast and people could go back and hear what the message was at the breakfast. And then sometime down the road I just, you know, johnny kind of just kept tapping me on the shoulder saying, hey, evan has experience with podcast, he's talked about just taking it over and running with it, um, and we were like, okay, yeah, I mean that's, we're just thrilled that someone's interested in that would be, that would be incredible. So, um, you know, you join the team and have turned it into a real podcast of just like over, just like they played the once a month message.
Speaker 2:Now we have a host who has experience. You bring on Matt, our pal, who you know he's good, he has experience. You have the recap, obviously, we have the message and then you're adding, you're adding guests, brotherhood it's. It's interesting that it could be its own separate conversation from what is it exactly? And we have a lot of those conversations with our pastors and our key leaders, because it is been almost 100% volunteer, driven, like raised up from us brothers in a community and morphed into like the church adopting us and like, wow, let's run with this and get a pastor's hands on this to support you guys. One thank you for taking the role that you have with the podcast and the leadership role and just being a part of it. What has all this meant to you and what can you share about Brotherhood? On what it means to you, I should say, and what do you think this is and where it can go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we're a little long-winded on this.
Speaker 2:So this is this is, I think, part of part of that I don't honestly for me.
Speaker 1:I don't mind listening to like super long podcasts, so if anybody's like, made it this long into something hopefully that means that it's intriguing to them.
Speaker 1:I just don't think you can really communicate something in a short period of time, and so for me, like if I listen to a podcast, I jump in and out of it throughout the day on my commute, when I work out or whatever else, or if I'm working in the yard. So I definitely like more content than less content. It is more difficult and it takes more time, in my opinion, to really be concise with stuff.
Speaker 1:And so in some, some capacity like you know you could edit this down, or you could really try to like hone in on certain stuff capacity, like you know you could edit this down, or you could really try to like hone in on certain stuff. But my goal would be is like when you do something like this, you have an opportunity to learn more about the person. Um, selfishly for me, I become a better speaker, I become better at, you know, thinking uh, as I'm talking or as I'm presenting. So there's some sales in it too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm sure that comes into that. But then there's the creative side to it too. Like you know, having a having content from a speaker is great because you at 6, 40, 7 o'clock in the morning, you go and you listen to the speaker and they've spent some time right, they've. They didn't just get up there and start speaking from the heart, they've. They've prepared in some capacity for what they want to say. And I almost feel like the audience is not in a place where they're completely ready to receive and it's.
Speaker 1:It's not their fault, it's just it's early in the morning and it's really hard to absorb a message at that time. And so having that message to be on the podcast just in general is fantastic because it gives you the ability to kind of re-listen to it. But the recap that I do with Matt is where I actually will get a lot more out of the messages, because I'm able to dig in and try to see where they were going or maybe further develop some of the stuff that they don't have a lot of time to talk about, because I think at the breakfast you maybe have like 20, 30 minutes to talk. So you just can't breakfast. You maybe have like 20 30 minutes to talk, so you just can't.
Speaker 1:You can't get everything else like.
Speaker 2:Gabe Sherman is like a prime example.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he gets up there, he he's got a lot to say and he gets to like the first page of his notes and then he's got to close it up yeah, like there's three more pages of notes.
Speaker 2:This has been great like.
Speaker 1:I wanted to hear the other three pages yeah, and so in some capacity gives you the opportunity to dig a little deeper into that. But it's also like just giving me the ability to chew on something and I get more out of it. I grow as a leader, I grow as a man, I grow in my walk with God through that content, and so there's a lot of benefit for me in doing that and I enjoy doing that. But at the same time I'm hopeful that the people that listen to it are able to get some of that out of it as well and maybe add some additional insights into that. So the podcast is. I mean, it's probably been four or five years now that that's been going on.
Speaker 1:We have over 100,000 people or 100,000 streams of it, so it's reaching an audience and it gives us the ability to kind of take brotherhood beyond Tulsa being on the walls of the breakfast, which I think is good. I think you were kind of alluding to it like men's ministry in general, like what brotherhood is.
Speaker 1:I think it has a very, very small sweet spot, and so it's difficult to stay in there because in some capacity, you want to just be like this is a bunch of guys getting together having a good time, and then on the other side of it it's you know, it's well. Now we're it's a church service, right, like we're having pastors speak and whatever else, and it's like all right, like what's the sweet spot where we can get people to really come together and feel like they're a part of something and advocate a message. That's goes beyond like this is just a breakfast, this is just us getting together around a table and hearing from a speaker, and I think that's where we talk about it as like a capital B brotherhood.
Speaker 1:Capital B brotherhood would be like your community and it doesn't have to be like.
Speaker 1:Mark is in my capital B brotherhood. I have to be friends with Mark, I have to be friends with Johnny, I have to be friends with Lee. That's brotherhood and it's not that. It's essentially creating an environment for you to create your own lowercase B brotherhood, and that could be friends, it could be mentors, it could be people in your community and when you are intentional about seeking that out, I think that's where you start to really be more energized in life. You feel more supported in life.
Speaker 1:I think there's a closeness to God that comes with that, because he's really kind of designed you for relationship and he's designed you for community and brotherhood becomes an excuse to get together, to call your buddies and say, hey, I got a table, I want you guys all to come.
Speaker 1:Or hey, what did you think of that content? Or hey, let's get together and X, y, z, whatever that may be. I think that's kind of the importance of what it is and what I'm hoping is we are able to protect that and we're able to get to the point where it's not just about you know how many people showed up or like how awesome of a speaker we had, but more of the impact of the individual that comes to that and the inspiration that they have walking away saying I need to be more intentional with the people. Walking away saying I need to be more intentional with the people at that table. I need to be more intentional to spend time with my kids and the best of my kids. I need to be more intentional in seeking God and including him in my day-to-day life, instead of compartmentalizing God on Sunday and then, you know, the rest of the week I'm just living my own life, trying to solve things and do things my own way. So that's what I'm hopeful that brotherhood is and that's the direction that you know.
Speaker 1:I think the podcast helps us continue in that direction, but it's something that we all have to protect.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. And the last thing I'll say on brotherhood is, as I'm talking to you and thinking of Dave Jewett and stuff, is what I've loved about this ministry is we've been able to attract leaders like yourself and they get to apply their skillset and their gifts and use it for God's kingdom. And you know, I would have never thought of like when I'm building a team, podcast hosts you know, and well, those aren't like team podcast hosts.
Speaker 2:You know, well, those aren't like us on my radar. You know, like, well, who's going to be our content writer, like you just weren't thinking like, oh, matt's going to be able to put a newsletter together for us and start sending out newsletters. And you know Ron Tolbert and his gifts to be able to, you know, run a set up and tear down team. It's my gifts.
Speaker 1:Same.
Speaker 2:Well, man, we'll wrap it up. The podcast is lasting impact, and it's so. My last question for you is what does lasting impact mean to you?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I think, if I were to tie it back to some of the things that we've talked about today, there's been a lot of people that have had impact in my life A lot of mentors, a lot of people that have looked back at the next generation coming along and no business being in the room with, and those people were willing to pour into my life and willing to spend time with me. Now you have to be respectful of their time. You have to really understand the value of that whole situation. So I've had a lot of benefit from that and so I would say, for me, my lasting impact would be to continue to carry that torch, to invest in that next generation, or just you know, people that are, you know, maybe five years behind me, maybe 10, 15 years behind me, but to give them something to aspire to, but also be approachable in the way that I can say hey, I've been blessed by other people.
Speaker 1:I want to, I want to bless you, I want to, I want to be a person that you can go to, that is a trusted advisor, a person that can, you know, help, guide you and direct you, a guy that can help answer some of the tough questions that you may have, like specifically for me, like if, if I was in a situation where someone came to me he's like man, I just lost my job and I don't know what to do about it. You know, those are, those are conversations that I think are going to give that person an opportunity to grow, but they're not going to see it like that and I can help them shine a light on that. And so I think impact, impact, lasting impact is a very large topic and I think that you know, I think of legacy as being a big part of that too.
Speaker 1:And I think, for me, my legacy would be again being that person that's a mentor, and being a person that is striving to continue to point others to God, and I think if you're able to do that through those two things combined, it's like, hey, this guy, he's been successful, he cares about me, he's. I see christ when I see him. That's great those are.
Speaker 1:That's a person that I I want to pursue and I want to learn from, and if I can do that, then I think that's a lasting impact that essentially puts me in a position where I can go, you know, be in front of god, and he says well done. He's like you used your gifts that I gave you, you identified them, you found them and then you operated them and you gave them back to others and pointed back to me the whole time.
Speaker 2:Man, that's awesome. Well, thanks for being here, bro. We'll have to do it again. This is Evan Uetake, and he's making a lasting impact. If you liked today's conversation and want to hear more, hit that subscribe button. Don't forget to leave a review and share your thoughts. Your feedback keeps the impact going.