A Founder's Life
Join me as I explore the powerful intersection of entrepreneurship, health & wellness, and parenthood. In each episode, I’ll be interviewing inspiring individuals who excel in one or more of these areas, sharing their stories, insights, and lessons. My goal is to provide valuable takeaways that can help you thrive both personally and professionally.
A Founder's Life
Building a Career Without Burning Your Life - Jimmy Zipursky - S5 - E15
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Websites: www.cfaw.com and www.cfaw.com/omaha
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What does a balanced life really look like after decades of entrepreneurship?
In this episode, Jim Zipursky, Managing Director of Corporate Finance Associates Omaha and Chairman & CEO of CFA Worldwide, shares his unconventional path into investment banking, growing up in a family of entrepreneurs, navigating bankruptcy, building a global M&A firm, and learning over time how to slow down and enjoy life.
We talk about family-first culture, long-term thinking, health, travel, and why founders don’t need to sprint forever to build something meaningful.
What you’ll learn:
• Why Jim says he was “the least qualified” for his role and why it worked
• Lessons from family businesses, failure, and resilience
• How CFA works with founder-led companies on M&A
• Why family truly comes first in Jim’s life and firm
• Slowing down, health, travel, and long-term balance
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It's just a matter of understanding that there's other things in life. And also, if I'm going to Ireland for a board meeting, take an extra day, enjoy the sights. Don't be so worried about getting back and forth as quickly. And take the extra day, slow down. Life is too short. And enjoy some of those wonderful places I get to go. And used to only see the inside of a hotel room or an office. And now take that extra half a day and do some exploring.
SPEAKER_00Welcome to a founder's life. I'm your host, Leo Gastetna. On this show, we dive into the real stories behind the highs and lows of entrepreneurship and how we pursue a more balanced and meaningful life along the way. This podcast is sponsored by Thanks, helping founders like us scale with reliable remote talent. Email founders at Thanks.com. That's T-H-A-N-K-Z.com with the subject line A Founders Life and you'll receive preferred pricing. Now I'm excited today to be joined by Jim Sapaski. Jim, would you please introduce yourself?
SPEAKER_01Absolutely, thank you, Leo. I happen to be the managing director of corporate finance associates in Omaha, Nebraska, and also the chairman and CEO of CFA Worldwide, our global organization.
SPEAKER_00Excellent. So do you want to talk to a little bit about the journey that brought you to where you are today? And then a little more about CFA.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. And Leo, I I joke with my colleagues that I'm probably the least qualified, least capable person to be in the position that I'm in today, given that I did not follow the traditional background into investment banking, because CFA worldwide is a boutique investment banking firm focused on mergers and acquisitions advisory.
SPEAKER_00And what was that journey of yours?
SPEAKER_01Well, I actually started my career in all things in college athletics. I was the marketing promotions director for Seattle University, a Jesuit institution in Seattle, Washington, promoting the athletic department there, which sports has always been a love, as you can see over my shoulders. Um and it's always been something that I've been I've loved and been very much interested in. And then a few years after a few years of doing that, and I enjoyed it. It was great, but there wasn't a whole lot of money to be made. The hours were very long, which is okay. And then a friend of mine said, hey, I've started working for this company called Electronic Data Systems. A guy by the name of Ross Perot started the company and they're looking for people. I get a bonus if you take an interview. So, you know, can you help me get some beer money and take the interview? So I took the interview and I ended up getting hired as a recruiter for EDS. So as a corporate hathunter for EDS. I was hiring engineers to go to work from California and Arizona to go to work for our GM facilities in Detroit, which was an interesting experience. As the start of the journey, what was interesting about it, Leo, is that taught me about dual-sided selling. And in dual-sided selling, in recruiting, I had to convince Leo that EDS would be a nice company to come work for, but I also had to convince the hiring managers at EDS that Leo was the right person for that position. So that was dual-sided selling. And I worked for EDS for about three, four years. And working for a big corporation wasn't for me. And I had grown up in a family of entrepreneurs. Both of my grandfathers and my mother and father's side were both entrepreneurs. My mother's father, here in Omaha, Nebraska, material entrepreneur, had started a scrap metal business, then graduated to manufacturing furniture, brought his whole family into the business. And as these things happened, had a disagreement with his brothers about the future of the business. So he left and then started another business manufacturing mobile homes. And he brought his son, my uncle, and my father into the business. And they built that up into the eighth largest manufacturer of mobile homes in the world, publicly traded, ran into some issues. We went through a corporate bankruptcy. So I know what that's like. And that was a change in my path because when I was, until I was 15, I always thought, I'm going into the family business. I'm going to be in the mobile home manufacturing business. And then my father left that and took his journey to CFA. So I come from entrepreneurs. My mother owned her own retail business here in Omaha, Nebraska that she started with her two sisters, sister and sister-in-law. So again, you see the theme of family business, entrepreneurship. And there were some certain situations at EDS that led me to start my own business in Washington, D.C. We were doing consulting in the HR area. And then I ended up acquiring a couple of businesses and we got into the staffing industry, permanent and temporary staffing. Having a great time. Business was growing like a weed. We were doubling sales pretty much every other month. It was great fun. And I enjoyed living in Washington, D.C. And then in 1989, 1990, I was speaking with my father, and he was telling me about the growth of CFA here in Omaha. And he mentioned bringing in a partner and that he was looking to bring in a partner in the business. And I remember hanging up the phone and thinking, wait a second, I'm supposed to be his partner. I'm his son, family business. I don't know anything about mergers and acquisitions, but I'm supposed to be in business with my dad. That's what family business is all about. And so I thought about it over the weekend and I rang him up and said, hey, dad, I think I'd like to be your partner if you'd have me. And five months later, I moved back to Omaha and got into CFA with my dad. So my qualifications to be an investment bank were I've made a payroll, I've written payroll checks, I've bought and sold businesses for my own account. I've done dual-sided selling, but I don't have a finance degree. I've never taken an accounting class in my life, although I teach classes and how to value businesses, and I teach that to CPAs, which is always ironic. But my my background was learning from my father, who had done this for 10 years, being in family businesses, having empathy and sympathy. And that's why I say my path into this industry was truly not very well qualified, but at the end of the day, it's worked out okay.
SPEAKER_00Perfect. And what's a typical CFA customer look like?
SPEAKER_01The typical CFA client, and I need to bifurcate between sell-side clients and buy-side clients. We just did the study for our team in the office. Over 94% of the seller clients are either the founder, the founding family, or the owner-operative of the business. Generally speaking, the first outside capital coming into their business is the transaction we're completing for them. Generally, it's companies that will transact, sell for something between 10 to 20 million on the low end, 200 million on the upper end, more manufacturing, distribution, construction services, those type companies. Within CFA globally, we will do a good deal of software, technology, et cetera. But our team here in Omaha is more focused on the bread and butter. And we do do work out of the Omaha office coast to coast and internationally. Working for buyers, those tend to be either employee-owned companies, ESOPs, and we're doing a lot of work with uh European buyers looking to work in the United States and acquiring the United States. And we end up operating as their outsourced MA office here in the United States. The same thing for our ESOP clients. We may look for a little bit smaller or a little bit larger deals for the buyers. And generally it's buyers who are looking to do multiple transactions over five to ten years. Even on the buy side, what I find interesting is disproportionately, the target companies we're working with are those entrepreneurial-led businesses.
SPEAKER_00Talk a little bit about family for you. What does family look like?
SPEAKER_01Family for me personally, I've been married successfully for 34 years to the same woman, my wife Sally, who I met when I moved back here to Omaha. We are blessed with two wonderful children, 30-year-old twins, Aaron and Naomi. Uh Aaron is a software engineer, manager in a high-tech company. And Naomi is back in graduate school studying to be a rabbi. And so she's living in Boston and doing that right now. Extended family as well, sisters, nieces, et cetera. And our business is a family. Most of our team has been with me for more than 10 years. And our credo in our office is family first. Truly family first. No one here ever gets in trouble for saying, I need to leave early. I've got my daughter's dance class or my son's dance recital or band practice. Because for us, family is truly first. We we walk it and we live it.
SPEAKER_00Lovely. And what do you like to do for health? Whether that be nutrition, fitness, sleep, mental health, whatever that looks like for you.
SPEAKER_01All of all of the above. My wife and I start every day with about an hour walk with our dogs wherever we are in the world. We love walking. We love seeing the world from walking. We do, and I've learned one of the things that happens is you get a little bit older, and Leo, this probably hasn't happened to you yet, but as you get older and your metabolism changes, then your health does need to change as well. So we do try to eat healthy. Sally is a wonderful cook, and we probably eat at home five or six nights a week. By the way, as a backtrack, we always insisted, right, wrong, or indifferent, that we had family dinner together every night. So as long as I was in town, and I do travel a good deal of the time, as long as I was in town, the four of us or extended family sat down for dinner together every night. And if I had business colleagues in town, they all knew that if they were having dinner at our house, they had to have dinner and they had to do the best part of the day and worst part of the day, because that was always the start of the discussion. So uh Sally and I try to eat healthy. Our one vice, our two vices are probably a glass of wine with dinner and a bite of dark chocolate in the evening, but some things are hard to give up. But truly walking, mental fitness, reading quite a bit, trying to make sure we're in bed earlier in the evenings, trying to get a good night's sleep. Our dogs help with that since they're great little snugglers with us. But really just understanding that there's also a period in the evening where I need to unwind. And I know too many of my colleagues, too many of our clients will literally be working until 11, 12 at night. I try and have a deadline and say what, and there are many evenings where I'm working, but I always like to have at least an hour to two hours before bed when I'm just unwinding, reading, talking, watching a show with my wife, playing a game, whatever the case may be, just to unwind. The walks, by the way, are wonderful thinking time. It's a great time to see the sights and just not have any interruptions. My phone's turned off. I'm not listening to music, I'm not listening to podcasts. It's really just thoughtful, thought-provoking, mind-stimulating time.
SPEAKER_00I agree 100%. I think it's a great time to really connect to your level. Yes.
SPEAKER_01Yes. It's fabulous. And uh, what do you like to do for fun? Well, travel is very high on Sally's in my list. We are fortunate that we spend one month a year in Carmel, the Monterey Bay area of California. Take a house out there, lots of walking. It also allows us to combine a second passion, which is wine. And when we travel, and we travel Europe quite a bit, every time we travel, we try to make at least one day about going and visiting the local wineries and the vineyards. It's wonderful to talk to the vineyard owners, the winemakers, how they do it, what they do. I come from Nebraska. I come from an agrarian state. And at the end of the day, wine is a crop. And so we do like to visit that and learn about those different things and sample the wine, and it gives you a great idea to the culture of the area. We'll do that in the United States as well. Obviously, I'm a sports fan. We love going to volleyball matches, basketball matches. Leo, you and I talked about this. I happen to be a Tottenham Hotspur fan. So do enjoy English football, American college football as well. Because of age, I've had to give up playing soccer, as we call it in America, but that was a passion. And I've given up golf for a little while, but we'll be taking it back up here shortly. So for fun, that's it. And spending time with family, getting together with the kids, doing things with them, playing games. My wife and I are card players. She kills me in cards. I beat her in backgammon. It's just sort of the way it goes.
SPEAKER_00What's uh a balanced life look like for you? So, you know, you've got these different aspects. How how do you sort of make sure that there's a good balance in your life?
SPEAKER_01Well, I think that's what your life partner is also for, is they make sure that you stay balanced and crowded. And Sally will remind me when I'm working too hard or working too much. And thankfully, I've got a very good team here at CFAW who also will remind me that I may be taking on too much or that I don't need to make that trip, that they've got it covered. So work-life balance for me is it changes with time, obviously, Leo. Family always comes first, but with age also comes understanding that staying up to midnight to get that last email out when I can get it out in the morning isn't going to be any better. So understanding the priorities, understanding that your brain needs to take a rest, your body needs to take a rest, and just ensuring that you are slowing down. I don't run for airplanes anymore. I don't sprint for airplanes. I will do things like if I know it with kids, being important, and I always wanted to have meals with the kids and be there for them. I would do crazy things like have dinner at, you know, have dinner, put the kids to bed at eight o'clock, and then drive six hours across the state for a meeting at six, you know, at eight o'clock the following morning. Well, the kids are moved away. So now it may be I'll say to Sally, come with me. We'll, you know, we'll drive tonight, whatever the case may be. It's just a matter of understanding that there's other things in life. And also, if if I'm going to Ireland for a board meeting, take an extra day, enjoy the sights. Don't be so worried about getting back and forth as quickly, and take the extra day, slow down, life is too short, and enjoy some of those wonderful places I get to go. And used to only see the inside of a hotel room or an office, and now take that extra half a day and do some exploring.
SPEAKER_00It makes sense. And uh, what's been a pivotal moment in your life?
SPEAKER_01Two pivotal moments in my life. The first I mentioned when I had the epiphany speaking with my dad and said, This is what I want to do. The second for me, and this may sound silly, is Sally and I were on vacation. We're in the Caribbean and in the crystal clear waters in Anguilla, and she looked at me and said, I really don't want to work anymore. She had been a banker, a very successful commercial banker. I don't want to work anymore. And what was interesting to me, and it was a bit scary because in my business, our income is variable, depending upon how successful we are. And she had a very nice income with very nice benefits. So we were going to be giving those up. But for me, the reason it became a pivotal moment is prior to that, she and I would have to balance each other's schedules because my job wasn't more important than hers. And if I needed to see a client or needed to travel, it was always, what do you have on your calendar? Where are you going? What work commitments do you have? And now with her wanting to be a full-time mom and a very heavily involved person in charity and philanthropic endeavors, it allowed me to perhaps focus even more intensely on work, be more responsive to some client needs, and perhaps because I didn't have the safety net of her salary and benefits that I can actually trace to when she stopped working and the trajectory of our business and the success of CFAW were interlinked. So for me, those were the two, I know it sounds crazy, but those were the two pivotal moments for me. And what's what's a piece of advice you'd give to an aspiring entrepreneur? Wow, what a great question. I can't go a day without my father was this wonderful storyteller, recontour, and he had all these pithy phrases. So I can't go a day without saying, as my father would say, or as morally my dad would say. So to quote my father, Leo, for entrepreneurs, I would remind them that the business has to eat first. The thought that you're going to be an overnight success doesn't happen. Most of our clients really didn't start doing very well financially for a number of years. It's a struggle. But enjoy it. Enjoy those times because with money comes complications. And so enjoy the times, enjoy the ride. The business has to eat first. Final thing is have to have work life balance. I I'm seeing now that in uh the tech world, they have this new mantra. I don't know if you've heard this, nine by nine by six, which means start at nine, nine in the morning to nine at night, six days a week. And I just don't know how that's healthy for anybody. And these are entrepreneurial organizations. I don't know how that's healthy for your people. I don't know how that's healthy for the entrepreneur. So you have to have some work-life balance, even though the business eats first.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's very true. And I think a lot of that comes from uh I believe it comes from uh China, the 996. Really? I think that mentality. Yeah. You're right. I mean, I think it it's fine if you're in your early twenties, but beyond that, I think it's not the most healthy. And uh thank you for joining us today. It's been a good thing. My pleasure, thank you, Leo. And how can people find you?
SPEAKER_01Well, they can certainly find me on LinkedIn under uh James or Jim Zapersky, whichever I'm listed. Uh and our website is www.cfaw.com. Very easy to find us.
SPEAKER_00Perfect. Well, thank you. And thank you for listening to today's episode. If you enjoyed the conversation, don't forget to subscribe to the channel, tell your friends, and please leave a review.