Why Most Small Businesses Fail After 2–5 Years | With Laurie McNaughton

In this episode of Career Coaching Secrets, host Pedro sits down with business coach Laurie McNaughton, founder of Scale Up Business Solutions, to talk about the real challenges small business owners face when trying to grow their companies.

Laurie shares how continuous learning, accountability, and the right mindset can help entrepreneurs survive the dangerous 2–5 year phase where many businesses fail. From cold calling 50 people a day to helping companies scale from thousands to millions in revenue, he explains why business success is not just about systems—but about how owners think and lead.

If you're a business owner, entrepreneur, or coach looking to scale your business without burning out, this episode is packed with practical insights and real-world experience.

Connect with

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/businesscoachedmonton/
Website: https://lauriemcnaughton.com/

Transcript

Laurie McNaughton 0:00

I'd say learning. You know, when I've talked about that sort of that two to five year being a dangerous place for young small businesses, the ones that get through that dip, if I could call it that, that valley is the ones that start learning. You gotta know you don't know what you don't know and be okay with that. And also lots of times you know, but you don't do, right? That's why coaching is so flipping powerful, is because I'm there as a reminder, either on a weekly or bi-weekly basis and holding you accountable to learning. It's like, you know, Tony Robbins talks about this as you can change in a moment, literally, because you fire a new set of neurons in your brain and you go, oh man, that feels good. I think I like that. I'm gonna do that.

Davis Nguyen 0:40

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets, the podcast where we talk with successful career coaches on how they built their success and the hard lessons they learned along the way. My name is Davis Wynne, and I'm the founder of Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to $100,000 years, $100,000 months, and even $100,000 weeks. Before Purple Circle, I've grown several seven and eight figure career coaching businesses myself and have been a consultant at two career coaching businesses that are doing over $100 million each. Whether you're an established coach or building your practice for the first time, you'll discover the secrets to elevating your coaching business.

Pedro 1:12

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets Podcast. I'm Pedro, and today's guest is Laurie McNaughton, a business coach and founder of Scale Up Business Solutions, who helps small and medium-sized business owners scale profitably while avoiding burnout. His mission is simple build businesses that work so owners can live better, focusing on systems, strategy, and a leadership that creates sustainable growth. Laurie works with owners and leadership teams to clarify vision, strengthen accountability, improve profitability, and build high performing teams. The result is smoother operations, stronger results, and businesses that create freedom for their owners instead of constant stress. Welcome to the show, Laurie. Thank you for having me. Yeah, I'm excited that you're here. And before we get into what you do now, right, I'm curious how this all actually started. So, what was going on in your life when coaching became more than just an idea?

Laurie McNaughton 2:23

Yeah, so just a little bit of background. I'm somebody that's done a lot of personal development. You can see there's a bookshelf back here. There's 300 plus books on that bookshelf I've read over the past 40-some years. So I was always somebody that was interested in performing at the best that I could perform and figuring it out for myself. And I also spent 15 years as an outside sales rep traveling up and down the highways of Alberta, stopping and calling on small businesses. If you can imagine, over 15 years, I saw a lot of businesses come and go. You get to know these people because I I called on them on a regular basis, and then they're closing up and going off and getting a job. And so I knew that there was something there. And you know, I kind of got into the place where I could kind of tell because people that were more worried about saving a dime than they were about making a dollar. And so, you know, and it it's heartbreaking. I mean, you get to know these people. And so uh 2003, I'm looking for a business to get into myself because I figure I'm I'm a smart enough guy. I'm certainly somebody who's you know driven and motivated to be do and have more. And I checked on several different businesses, didn't really get my interest. And then one day I was at a trade show and I came across this uh company, I won't say the name of the company, but they had a vision, and it was a business coaching franchise, and they had a vision of world abundance through business re-education. So that caught my eye immediately because you know, how many years of university or whatever do you need to take to become a business owner? You don't need any you don't even have to have graduated high school. Um that doesn't mean that you can't succeed at a high level. So that was their their vision, and I thought, okay, that's got my interest. And then they had the they called them 12 points of culture, which were all around learning, success, motivation, teamwork. I just forget off the top of my head the rest of them, but it reminded me of when I was really ensconced in the uh Tony Robbins sphere, if I could call it that. I went to his master university, so date with destiny, financial mastery, and the life mastery, unleashed the power within. And for those who are curious, yes, I walked on fire twice. So so, anyways, I started doing my due diligence around this franchise and thought these guys, first of all, I'm I was smart enough to know that I didn't know everything there was to run a successful business. I thought these guys are gonna teach me how to do that, and I'm going to get and go and teach and coach and mentor other people to do the same. So that's how I ended up in the business coaching business. Uh, it's something that's near and dear to my heart because I really have, like I said, I spent a lot of time working on myself to be the best that I could be, and I just want to help people do the same.

Pedro 5:09

Interesting. So when you mentioned the sales rep and the trade show, I was like, okay, this guy walked through fire, definitely, right? And then you literally did it by went to a Tony Robbins event. So yeah, that's super interesting. And I really liked the how organic it you became a coach, right? You're just always thinking about ways to improve yourself, how how I can't move the needle in my business or for myself, and eventually got into coaching. It was just the next best thing to do. So that's very interesting. Now, Lori, at what point did it stop feeling like a side thing or a calling, right? And it started feeling like an actual business you were responsible for. You know, that leap when you're feeling like, hey, this is this really is a business now?

Laurie McNaughton 5:57

Yeah, so that probably happened in year three, maybe a bit into year two, because the first year was like very stressful. You know, it wasn't working the way I thought it was gonna work. And I thought, you know, I've got all this tools that I've got my toolbox to manage my motivation to manage the stress and anxiety and all that kind of stuff. But that first year amped that up to a uh a volume that I've never experienced before. And I was really questioning if I had done the right thing. But quickly the next year, I tripled the what we call bankings or earnings, whatever you want to call it, in the second year, and did that again in the third year, and then settled into a nice rhythm of healthy earnings over the next uh I guess, well, it was I was with uh company for 16 years and I was an award-winning coach. There was 800 to a thousand of us at any given time, and I was often in the top 10%. Uh so you know I started to go, okay. And when I think I think of what what I do as more of a practice than a business, and I'll tell you why. I define a business as a profitable enterprise that thrives and grows even when I'm not there. So because I'm a coach, I am the person that drives revenue in this little organization. Business owner who owns an electrical contracting company or a drywall contracting company or any number of construction or service industry businesses, for them, they're gonna build a team of people. And so their focus needs to shift away from being like for me, um being a as I said, a pract a practice rather than a business, because if I go away for six months and don't talk to anybody, I'm not gonna make any money. Now, the beauty of what I do is I literally could go to Mexico or Europe and connect with clients via the internet, so it's not that big of a deal. But anyway, that's where it shifted for me, and where it became something that I was um, you know, really doing well financially with, and the the sort of stress and anxiety went away from um that first year. And yeah, I hope I answered your question.

Pedro 8:08

Oh, you did. I'm just wondering, you know, I'm thinking out loud here. It's like to serve our audience in a way, it's like picture this. You're listening and you're Lori, right? Listening to that time when things weren't going that well. Do you see something that changed for things to actually start moving forward at a point of time or you just kept doing the same thing and eventually it hit uh the target, you know? Just trying to serve past lorry here.

Laurie McNaughton 8:37

Yeah, that's a good question. I went from doing a medium amount of activity to a massive amount of activity. When I've started, I had hired some people to do some marketing for me and getting that sort of limited amount of results that I felt like I should get. And so I really thought, okay, I need to figure this out for myself so that I can coach somebody else to do this for me. Picked up the phone and started calling people, and I'd make 50 calls a day, and it worked. It got me to that point where I could go, okay, now I'm gonna focus more on the on the coaching end of things, less on the generating lead things. I'm gonna um uh delegate this off to somebody else, and then I'm gonna really focus in on getting results for my clients.

Pedro 9:20

I love that the sales rapped rap finally rised, right? It's like, okay, Lori, you got this. Start calling people. Okay. And once you were out there, right? And you were helping people, especially with the let's call it code outreach, right? Who did you naturally end up attracting? When when did you realize, okay, these are the the the people I work best with, you know?

Laurie McNaughton 9:42

Yeah, that's a another good question. I started getting in contact with a lot of people in the construction sphere. So, like I said, whether you were an electrical contractor, a drywall contractor, or a roofing contractor, siding, whatever, those guys were struggling um emotionally, uh, you know, because it's difficult to build a business, especially if you sort of get stuck in what you know neuroscience calls their survival. You're thinking more about surviving rather than thriving, and so you end up doing everything because nothing can be done without your oversight. And so, you know, I naturally started to attract a lot of people in the construction industry. Now, I've also worked with engineering firms, I've worked with manufacturing and and wholesale distributors. So I've touched a lot of different areas, but the vast majority of people were in that construction industry. I like to call them my people because I'm kind of a hands-on kind of guy. I like building things myself, so I kind of have some familiarity around that. But I could see, and I, you know, you work with somebody who's working seven days a week and you get them down to a regular five-day work week, and also, you know, boost their revenue by double and then increase their profits by a few percentage points. And all of a sudden they're making more money and they're going home for dinner and taking weekends off, so um, and and taking vacations. So I gravitated towards those those folks there.

Pedro 11:10

Interesting. It's not it's like you're gonna help the business, but you're gonna end up coaching the entire person, right? Eventually it impacts their entire life. Okay, now I want to zoom out for a second, right? So you mentioned code outreach, you mentioned also referrals, right? And as you start building your practice. So if someone ends up working with you today, right, how do they usually find their way to you in the first place? I I mean those construction people, right? How do they find you today?

Laurie McNaughton 11:38

Yeah, so I'm reasonably active on social media. I also have a couple of different telemarketers working for me and to get referrals from from past clients. So that's primarily how I keep my funnel full.

Pedro 11:50

Okay. And now about uh let's talk about the behind the curtains a bit, a little bit, you know, the mechanics. When someone decides to work with you, either through referral, the telemarketing guys, eventually they want to know what working with you actually looks like. So, what does that experience look like from their perspective? I'm being on boarded today. You say, okay, Pedro is going to work with Lori, how does or scale up, right? How does that work?

Laurie McNaughton 12:14

Yeah, so the first thing we would do is have what I call a welcome to, and that's about an hour and a half meeting, and it's really outlines the relationship. So you will know exactly what you can expect from me, and I will know exactly what, and you will also know what I exactly expect from you. So it's really clear on how this relationship works together. And then we're gonna sit down and do uh what I'd call an alignment day. If I'm working with uh a small company, so not really much of a team, I'm gonna do the alignment with just the owner. But if they have a team of people, I'm gonna do it with their leadership as well. But uh the gist of it is is I want them to I want to clearly understand their business from the perspective of what they're doing and what's worked, what hasn't worked, the challenges that they're having, so that I clearly can recognize the causes because I always think uh cause and effect. I kind of think of myself as a bit of a doctor, right? I'm I'm gonna ask questions, I'm gonna diagnose the symptoms. So if you're working too many hours or your business isn't all that profitable, or you've got a bit of a dysfunctional team, those are all symptoms of that are caused by something. So I want to identify what the cause is. And then I also sit down and get really clear in their mind what success looks like for them. Because if you can't see where you're going, I I like to use uh Alice in Wonderland. If you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there, but it won't be where you want to want to be. And so, like typically what I hear from a lot of business owners is they want to have some more freedom. They want to be able to, you know, not be working all the time and it not have the kind of stress that they have, because it as you can imagine, as anybody can imagine, I'm sure is if you're working seven days a week and oftentimes like I've worked with people that were working 60, 70 plus hours in a week. Yeah. And uh all of a sudden they're down to a 40, 45-hour work week and you know, making more money and they're trusting their team and relying on their team more, then their life starts to change. And you made the point there, like this is not just about turning their businesses uh around. This is life. Business is life. Tony Rom said this is business is a spiritual thing. You know, there if you have 10 employees or 20 or 30, these people rely on you for their uh livelihoods, for their life, how they see life, how they experience life. You go to business, you go to your a job every day, and if it's like this stressful, crazy, chaotic place every day, that affects you emotionally and mentally. And so when that business owner gets out of that space in their mind, that chaotic space in their mind, and start to create some peace and tranquility in their business, everybody feels that at every level in the business, as do their customers ultimately, whether or not they, you know, experien they experience it through their through the employees. And so I really like to think of what I do as being life-changing. I don't really think of it so much about I mean, I guess I do think about it as being a business coach, but what I really want to do is change people's lives. And um, you know, like I'm off to do a strategic planning session here next weekend or next uh Friday with a team of guys that I've just seen evolved over years and just change and it's just fun to watch.

Pedro 15:39

Yeah. You know, well, I would highlight the alignment call. I'm gonna call it alignment, okay? You can name it whatever you want to name it, but I I love the fact that you level the playing field, right? What's expected, what success looks like. I think that's so important. So we have expectations on both of the on both ends dialed in, you know, so people can understand where they're coming into and what you expected for for them to deliver as well, because sometimes they gotta put in the work too, you know, more often than not. So yeah, I think that's key, that's crucial, crucial. And I also something got my attention, right? We're talking about uh an hour and a half meeting, we're talking about the coaching sessions, like your work seems pretty involved, right? We're talking about a lot of work. And my question is how do you think about managing your time and energy so the business doesn't start owning you, right? So it doesn't backfire you and you're not the one doing the 60, the 50 hour week, you know?

Laurie McNaughton 16:38

Yeah. Well, I limit the amount of people that I typically work with, and I also limit the amount of meetings that I have during the week. I can coach. I mean, I've talked to coaches that are and I don't even know how they do this. They work with 30 people. Like, I don't know. Maybe if you're talking to people for half hour once in once a month or something, you can do that. I don't know. But you know, so when I like I start with that first initial meeting, which is the welcome to, so we know what we're expected of each other. And then I do that alignment session, which is if it's with a team, it's an all-day event. If it's with just the business owner, it's just the three, three and a half hours. And then I will only coach them one hour per week or one hour every other week, depending on which program fits them the best. And so, you know, typically I'm working anywhere from six to seven, eight, nine people at any given time, which really allows me a lot of freedom. I'm not overworked, let's put it that way. That's not my problem.

Pedro 17:37

Gotta practice while we preach, right, Lori. So, but I I want to tap into your experience a little a little bit here. Um since you did code outreach, right? You start from scratch. You were like calling people out of the blue. And and this is a point I think can serve a lot of our audience, which is the pricing factor, okay? Especially in the early days, because that's such a self-worth path, right? We're talking about sometimes am I charging enough? Am I charging too much and placing myself out of the market? And in the service-based industry, we see a lot of that happening, right? So, my question to you is, and we're not talking about hard numbers here, okay? It's like, how do you approach that now? Pricing, structure, and and what did you have to learn the hard way to get where you're at right now?

Laurie McNaughton 18:21

I learned the hard way is that my time is worth a lot more money than I was charging at the outset. But really, what I look at, because this is a return on investment business, it's not time for money. So, you know, if I'm working with a company that say doing like I'll pick uh one guy that I worked with, he was uh a renovated renovation contractor, doing $100,000 somewhere in there. That's when I first started working with him. And he was working seven days a week and paying himself a pittance, and the company wasn't profitable. We worked together for about 17 months somewhere in there, and in that time he grew that business to three million dollars. I don't remember the exact amount of net profit increase it was, but he was able to give himself a very healthy raise, and he was got back down to working like a 40-50 hour work week, which is you know pretty acceptable. I mean, I've got clients that work a lot less. You know, another guy that I think of, he was working seven days a week. He's a drywall contractor, and I think he's working three days a week now.

Pedro 19:21

Wow, that's why the impact you can make and just by coaching, right? Not just by, I mean, sometimes it's what's going on inside here, right? And and the blockers we create for ourselves. Now, looking forward a bit, right, Laurie, what's the direction you're aiming this business towards? Are you thinking more about growth, leverage, building a team, or refining what already works? You know, what feels most exciting right now?

Laurie McNaughton 19:44

Yeah, it's uh I there's a few eyes I want to continue to dot and T's I want to cross. Um, you know, I'm I don't want to say I'm in the latter part of my career because like I think about this and I've talked to a lot of people about it. Um I love what I do and I don't work overly hard at it. Uh and it allows me to the freedom to enjoy life as well. And so I want to continue to serve I don't know, maybe for another ten years. I don't know. I don't know what it is. As long as I feel young, as long as I feel like I do today, I'm gonna just gonna continue. Um because I just want to have an impact. Uh you know, whether that's uh a hundred businesses or a thousand businesses, I don't know. But uh like if it's a a thousand, it's a ten year ten year uh well actually uh it's not gonna be a thousand business hours. Um I mean I can affect people in in uh through groups and stuff like that, but one on one, there's no way I'm gonna do that many. I would like to have like I don't know, six to eight clients at any given time. And just make a difference, change people's lives, have some fun. You know, I I uh did a team alignment with a group here, and uh the the feedback you might have if you were on my website, you might have seen a uh testimonial from them. The guy was just like he couldn't believe his eyes. And what I love about it is like people that normally do not talk at all were engaged in the process. Like the the there's a uh patriarch and a couple of s and two sons, and the dad says to me, I don't know how you did that. That girl never talks, never talks. And she was like, anyway, so I love that. That's what I love most of all. So, you know, do I want to build a team? I don't know at this particular point in my life, I don't know that that that's part of the equation. I just want to continue to uh you know I'm not gonna say I wouldn't do it given the right circumstances. I just it's not really on my radar. Right now, it's just like to continue to add value to eight ten people on at any given time.

Pedro 21:50

Interesting. I mean if there's no it's like you said, it's not about the clock, right? It's about the outcome, the ROI. And if there's no reason for you to stop or The fact that you're still being able to deliver, I wouldn't pinpoint a time frame as well, you know, it doesn't make any sense. So if you're able to deliver, which you're you're currently are doing, right? I wouldn't see like a reason to stop. So that makes perfect sense. Now, you know, even when things are going well, there's always something under construction under the hood, like they say it. So what's the main thing you're actively working on or trying to improve in the business right now?

Laurie McNaughton 22:24

Yeah. Um, well, I do want to get the like I want to have a more steady flow of ideal client leads into my funnel, meaning at the highest level, I want to be really focused in on uh businesses that, you know, probably in the one to ten million, maybe twenty million. I mean, I've worked with companies that are 30 and 40 million dollars. That's it's a little different game. It's more about leadership and communication at that level. But I really want to get my marketing so that it speaks directly to those people that are most frustrated and need to get out of thrive survival and into thriving. And so I I'm working on that and working on that with what one of my marketing people to really get the messaging clear so that you know business owner A looks at this and sees this and goes, that's me. And I want to change, I want that to change. Like I'm doing a speaking engagement here in a couple of weeks, and it's really about putting a mirror up in front of their faces so that they can look at and say, if things are going to change, I have to change. Because I think you've mentioned this earlier, uh maybe I said something about it, but I'd say when it comes to what I do, 80% of it resides between your ears. It's the gray matter, and 20% is what you do. So the systems, the processes, the hiring, the leading, um, all that kind of stuff. But if you don't have this right, you don't even get to that 20%. You know, you're running around if you've used to use the 80-20 rule principle, 20% of what you do gets you 80% of your results, and 80% gets you 20%. If they're spending too much time in the 80, then they're only ever gonna get 20% return. And so, yeah, I don't know if that was a long-winded answer, but I yeah, you're you're getting me to a rabbit hole here.

Pedro 24:17

I'm thinking, right, in today's age, we're talking about a lot of AI, right? So it's about the right prompt. If you don't, if you don't have that dialed in, it's like asking Chat GPT what's the best way to punch a wall. It will give you the top three best ways, but it won't ask you, hey man, should you really be punching a wall? You know, that first intention behind it. I'm not sure if that made any sense, but it's like get that dialed in and then the systems will flow, right?

Laurie McNaughton 24:44

Yes. Yeah. Figuring that out and figuring that out. You said I talked about Chat GPT, which is an interesting thing because I'm uh I don't know if you could tell I'm a little bit on the older generational side, but I have to say that I've I don't I haven't jumped in all the way into the AI pool because you know I don't want an avatar of me doing presentations that look like an avatar. So I like to do my own stuff, but I do use ChatGPT, and ChatGPT knows my business inside and out. And uh I do like using that because it's certainly I think it makes me smarter personally because of the I mean I use it daily for a lot of different things. Like I was doing some research on meditation and hormonal changes and all that kind of stuff as a result of meditation. So yeah, I like it. I like learning, and I think that I I kind of look at this as a similar thing to what Facebook was when it first came out, and it's like this is coming, so get on the front side of the wave, not on the back side of the wave. Because otherwise you're gonna be, you know, paddling uphill all the time. And so yeah, I'm I've kind of embraced it. I like it. I like it, I think it helps me learn. So yeah, I'm using Chat GPT to to help me create my whole marketing messaging and all that kind of stuff. And I really like the direction that we've gone in. I I like the questions that it asks me and you know gets me to think more deeply about, like I said, I this we call it a I ideal client profile, right?

Pedro 26:15

Well, we're talking about trends, right, at the end of the day, and they come and go. Like I'm almost 40 and I've seen a lot of technology die out, you know, like C D, VHS. I can only imagine that you've seen a couple. Now, people give business advice nonstop, especially online, right? So, what's something you hear repeated a lot that you think people misunderstand or maybe they overvalue?

Laurie McNaughton 26:45

You know, that's a good question. I'd say that what too many business owners get stuck in and thinking is too valuable is themselves. And I say that in from the perspective of nobody can do it as good as me, or if I want it done right, I have to do it myself. And I have to check on everybody. I've gotta be have my finger on everything, otherwise it won't get done right. To me, that's the one thing that gets them stuck. And if they don't get past that, they don't ever get out of there. And you know, in my when I talk about you know, scaling your business up more profitably without burning out, like a vast majority of businesses fail, right? 80-90% in a five to ten year period, something like that. My own personal experience, I'd say somewhere between year two and year five is when a lot of people just burn out. You know, you've you're an electrical contractor, you get excited, you started this business, and you're gonna change the world when it comes to electrical contracting business and you know, make a lot of money and change, you know, build this great business for all these people. And then year one, you're still working every day of the week, and you're kind of the questions start to flow in. Is this gonna work? Can I do this? And year two, you're still working that now. You're getting into this place space where you're just in pure survival, which so you're in your brain is functioning at a low level, you're not able to access uh you know, your creative thought processing processing, and so you get stuck in there, and that's when they go, you know what? I've had enough. I'm going to go get a job. I'll have benefits, I get paid vacations, I don't have to think about work when I go home. Oh, you know, uh now I forgot exactly what your question was. I'm not sure if I answered it.

Pedro 28:36

I think you answered it's like sometimes if there's sometimes there's a down there, there's a perfectionist or someone who wants things to a certain level that's their own bar, and they're like not accepting anything under it. But at the same time, that's impossible, right? It's not like employees will love the business as much as you do, you know, as the owner. That's just a mind-boggling idea. And and I think you nailed it, you know, it's something that it's just part of human nature. And sometimes I see a lot of I also uh work uh with a landscape business coach in the back in the day when we talked about this, and I saw a lot of people also that were like the ceiling was themselves. They hit like an X, Y, and Z mark, and you can you can right off the bat tell that they were they got to a point that they were working 60 to 70 hours, they're gonna get divorced down the line. You can see the future telling, and you can see the business is not going anywhere better, not even worse. It's just hitting the ceiling until they break. And eventually it gets worse because they're you know burned out, like you said. But yeah, that makes perfect sense. I mean, at least with my experience, so I can resonate with that. Now, on the flip side, what's something boring or not as hyped that you wish more people actually paid attention to?

Laurie McNaughton 29:56

Yeah, uh I don't know if it's boring, but I'd say learning. You know, when I've talked about that sort of that two to five year being a dangerous place for us young small businesses, the ones that get through that dip, if I could call it that, that valley, is the ones that start learning. You know, you gotta know you don't know what you don't know and be okay with that. And also, you know, lots of times you know, but you don't do, right? That's why coaching is so flipping powerful, is because I'm there as a reminder, either on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, and holding you accountable to learning. It's like you know, Tony Robbins talks about this as you can change in a moment, literally, because you fire a new set of neurons in your brain and you go, Oh man, that feels good. I think I like that. I'm gonna do that. And then, you know, Monday morning the phone rings and uh you got an unhappy customer, somebody doesn't show up for work, you look at your calendar, you look at your 100 emails, and you all of a sudden you're just right back in that mode of survival. And so when Laurie McNaughton shows up on your Zoom Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday or whatever time it is, and says, Okay, so how did you make out with uh what you had on your plate yesterday? What worked well, what didn't work so well, what do you need to focus in on this week? It brings them back to working on their business and taking them out of survival and into, I like to say, just thriving. When you understand neuroscience, Pedro, it's and you probably understand it for sure. A lot of people do spend some time learning about that, but understanding how your brain works is powerful because you kind of go, okay, it's working the way it's supposed to work, but uh if I want it to work a different way, I need to input the data differently. And if I'm gonna input the data differently, I need to get myself in this clear, calm space of mind where I can actually think my way through this. You know, I meditate every day. And one of the things that blows my mind when I'm meditating, because um, you know, meditation is not completely clearing your brain of thoughts, it's being aware of what the thoughts you are having. And I come up with the most brilliant ideas while I'm in that really calm, quiet space that there's no way I would have heard that voice being in the the noise of the day if I could call it.

Pedro 32:18

Yes. And um to your point, I think the accountability, the accountability factor that a coach brings to the table is crucial, but also the fact that he is not emotionally attached to your situation. It's like you can cut through the noise, you can see a person that's struggling with something that from your point of view, Lori, I imagine is like sometimes basic and simple because we also get caught up in situations like that. But the coach is so since he's not involved, like, oh, that's the reason. And you're like, Oh yeah, I haven't thought it that way, right? Sometimes do you see something like that happening on more often than not?

Laurie McNaughton 32:54

Yeah, yeah. It's like you, I guess to use that analogy of peeling back the onion. It's like any business owner has a minimum of a hundred things on their mind. And you gotta peel back and get to what's important. And that comes back to what I was talking about before with the with the welcome to what I'll expect from you and what you can expect from me, and then the alignment process because we peel back the onion and go, I heard this in a lot of different places. Like, we overestimate what we can do in a month and completely underestimate what can happen in 12 months. Like I see businesses completely transformed in 12 months, completely transformed. But if you're sitting there in your day-to-day and, you know, like I said, the phone's ringing, your calendar's full, your email basket's full, somebody doesn't show up for work, you gotta you can't think your way out of that problem when there's that kind of noise going on. And so being able to sit back and calm yourself down and get clear, and that's part of what I help them do, is create that level of clarity so that they can say, Oh, three years from now, I want my business to be double the size that it is. I want to see like a 10 to 15% net profit. Uh, I want to be paying all my people at the top of the scale. I want to have a really good team of people. One of the things I got to share this because I love this. This guy's awesome. Construction company. They were when I first started working with him, he was about $8 million. He's at $21 million now. And he was like 4% uh net profit. Now he's crowding 12% net profit at $21 million. And they all these people that work for him are being paid at the top of the scale. So not only was he making a healthy profit, but the people who are working for him are well compensated for what they do. And so they're highly engaged in his business. Like you were mentioned earlier. Nobody's gonna love your business as much as you love it, because you it's your baby and your owners. But if you can get them to love their job and love working, you change everything.

Pedro 34:58

That's exponential then. Yeah. Laurie, before we close this out, and I love that story. If someone resonated with what you shared and wants to follow your work, where should they go?

Laurie McNaughton 35:09

Well, I go to my website, Scale Up Business Solutions. Or they can find me on LinkedIn, Lori McNaughton. Or they could uh well, they could call my office. You know, I would just have them reach out through my website. There's a link in there that if they go, I'd like to talk to this guy, they can book a I start every connection with what I call a discovery, which is 15 minutes. Pedro, do we hit it off? Can we communicate well together? Do I see the challenges that you're experiencing as something that I can help you with? And if so, then I say, okay, you know what? I like you. Um I think you like me, and I believe that I can help you solve this. So let's book a complimentary coaching session, which is about an hour to an hour and a half. And that at that point, that's when I become full-on doctor and start asking questions so that I can really discover what the cause is, and then I'll share what the solutions are. And if they go, I'm gonna do that on my own, I go, I'm happy for you. I want you to succeed. But you know, those people who want to go there quicker and faster and with a lot less stress and anxiety, they go, Lori, let's get started. Go to my website and then they can just uh read, watch, whatever, and then just click on any of the links in there and they can book a discovery call with me. And uh yeah, we'll spend some time talking about what it is that you really, really would like to accomplish.

Pedro 36:30

Nice. You know, Lord, there were a few moments from this chat that really stood out to me. I would say, first of all, that saving a dime while tripping on a dollar, right? It's the scarcity mindset versus the abundancy mindset. It's like I'm gonna try to do low value tasks on my job or my business because I want to compensate the fact that I'm trying to look productivity. I'm doing something, you know, I'm trying to look like I'm doing something, then at the end of the day, I'm working 60, 70 hours a week. Yeah. And we both know that doesn't work out at the end of the, you know, at the end of a business. So in the bottom line, now also the definition of your business, right? How you define a business like being profitable, an activity that needs to be profitable, and you're not there, right? It's the opposite of a hobby, I would say. So it's well definitely guys, if if you're not generating income and and revenue, and if you're constantly involved, I'm sorry to tell you it's a hobby, you know. And last but not least, you have like this business mindset clearly, right? It's about the ROI and not time when you mention about where we're talking about pricing, right? It's like it's not the outcome is not tied to a clock, it's tied to a result. And uh this is my long way of saying thank you, you know, Lori. I really appreciate you taking the time being open with this. It was great. Way it was great having you on, okay?

Davis Nguyen 37:58

Thank you very much. I really appreciated the opportunity to be here. That's it for this episode of Career Coaching Secrets. If you enjoyed this conversation, you can subscribe on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to this episode to catch future episodes. This podcast was brought to you by Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to $100,000 years, $100,000 months, or even $100,000 weeks, all without burning out and making sure that you're making the impact and having the life that you want. To learn more about our community and how we can help you, visit join purplecircle.com.