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Kak

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Question for you guys... What do Tesla, Amazon and Bitcoin have in common?

What have the proprietors of them proven?

Ok I’m in. Aside from their crazy valuations from a fundamental/logical standpoint..

They are all 100% being driven by their leader, and a leader whos goal from the onset was to change the world.

None of them require traditional marketing to be the topic of conversation or to grow.

They have proven that there is virtually unlimited funding available in the world toward achieving a stated result.

They have proven that the worlds biggest ideas aren’t “new” just better.

And that humans are highly emotional creatures as mention of any of the three can practically start a political style debate.

After typing all that...honestly, I don’t know and I’m hoping I don’t have to wait long to hear the answer.

Agreed, but it wasn’t what I was going for, and it’s also why I tossed the oddball, Bitcoin, in there.

What is a customer? Who are you selling to? What are you selling? You need not just be selling product and services... but also selling your company.

The fortunes of Bezos and Musk PROVE that your traditional customer isn’t the only customer... The other is the market. There are years in both of these companies’ very recent history where they made less profit than a burger flipper... How can that be? How are the proprietors multi-billionaires then? They aren’t crooks, they are rich because people believe in them and put their money where their mouths are. How many people are you letting believe in you this way?

A traditional think small or even medium venture might look like this:
Product>Marketing and Sales>Customer>Profit=Value
It’s more linear.

A think big venture ends up in higher finance:
It has the above: Product>Marketing/Sales>Customer>Profit=Value
But the big hit is usually: Stock>Investors>Hype>Momentum=Value
Which fuels operations more which then fuels finance more.

And in the case of bitcoin, they did it without operations, just investment value.

These three cases prove personal wealth can be created by building things of great investment value to others.
 
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Kak

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This seems to be an ethics tangent more than anything. The reality is there are sh*tbag business owners who pray on people and exploit them. There are business owners like @Kak who offer viable plans for his employees to better their situation and their futures. Would the world be a better place if ALL business owners operated that way? Of course. It just is unlikely to ever be the world we live in given human behavior.

I’d argue the “shitbags” have a very short term horizon. No company that oppresses the hell out of employees will have employees for long. Ethics are paramount, you might as well do it right because then it won’t bite later.

It is good business to find the balance of what employees need or want... Or what motivates them.
 
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ChrisV

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I’d argue the “sh*tbags” have a very short term horizon. No company that oppresses the hell out of employees will have employees for long. Ethics are paramount, you might as well do it right because then it won’t bite later.

It is good business to find the balance of what employees employees need or want... Or what motivates them.

I love this. I wish there were a way to bookmark individual posts on this board

You can only get away with robbing people for so long. Sooner or later your reputation catches up with you. Honest business it key to long-term success.

And I will offer one example that I think actually underlines your point. There is one company on my city that actually does get away with it. How? That’s the insane part.

They literally have a constant supply of new hires. Craigslist always has 30 ads, every temp agency in the town is working for them. It’s totally insane. Every week they train a group of ten new employees. And they’re not growing. That means that they are literally losing TEN employees per week! Their employee turnover is worse than any company i’ve ever seen. Considering stats show that employees take 2+ MONTHS to reach full productivity, i’ve always seen this as retarded.

It’s a collections company, so their livelihood depends on their employees performance.

So rather than treating people right, and having a bunch of veterans that can get thousands out of their customers.. they just have a constant stream of frustrated newbies who can’t close and need constant attention.

They’re started shipping in people from nearby cities because they literally ran out of people in this city who havent quit or havent been fired.

Oh and if you’re wondering who it is, it’s a company that subcontracts for Comcast ;)
 
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Kak

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Too long, won't read - like everybody else does with my posts - apparently. I am saying that pretty much all leaders currently ARE messing with that concept. They all dine and dash.

Ok, now you’re jacking up a good thread. Start your own SJW thread.
 
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MTEE1985

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I’d argue the “sh*tbags” have a very short term horizon. No company that oppresses the hell out of employees will have employees for long. Ethics are paramount, you might as well do it right because then it won’t bite later.

It is good business to find the balance of what employees employees need or want... Or what motivates them.

No argument needed because we all know that this is true. Sadly, many of them will move on to the next batch of employees or the next “business” idea. This is obviously people who are looking on a micro scale acting like this and the guppies in the ocean are the ones who keep lining up to work for them.

I posted a job not too long ago for a position that required 25-30 hours a week and would’ve paid a decent employee about $60k. I got dozens and dozens of resumes but what stunned me the most was how many of them said “instead of any commission can I just have $15/hour?”

But yes, let’s get back on thread topic.
 

ChrisV

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Question for you guys... What do Tesla, Amazon and Bitcoin have in common?

What have the proprietors of them proven?


Oh, my reply didn’t post. I replied to this before and I don’t know where it went :(

What do that have in common? To me, they’re simply good ideas. They’re a better way of doing things. And the founders have billion of ‘points’ ;) to prove it (with the exception of possibly Bitcoin.. not sure if they profited heavily)
 

MTEE1985

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with the exception of possibly Bitcoin.. not sure if they profited heavily

Satoshi likely hasn’t (nor do I personally think he ever cared to) but you bring up a good point which circles back to thinking big. None of these guys started with profit in mind. It was so much bigger than “I hope to be profitable someday” and then as Kak described a couple posts back, they build momentum, gain consumer confidence and the financial aspects of their companies (and personal lives) explode.
 
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ChrisV

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There are years in both of these company’s very recent history where they made less profit than a burger flipper... How can that be? How are the proprietors multi-billionaires then? They aren’t crooks, they are rich because people believe in them and put their money where their mouths are. How many people are you letting believe in you this way?
Well the answer to that is because these guys have a vision. So every dollar they make they’re literally pumping back into the company to grow it. I think Musk said something like “To turn a profit all we have to do is stop developing new stuff and the money will pile up.” In other words, he just dumps all his profits into R&D of new stuff. Amazon i don’t think has turned a profit in years. Why? they just pump it back into the company.

These guys don’t care about the money so much. They’re big kids playing The Sims with reality.

I mean once you get past a certain financial point, it stops being about the money. Like after you have say... 25 million it’s like “Okay I can have basically whatever I want for the rest of my life” So why do people continue? Because they genuinely like changing the world. Maybe it’s about legacy. Maybe they just like to as Steve Jobs put it “put a dent in the universe"

I’m not sure if that’s what you were going for, but that’s at least another angle.

Edit:

Satoshi likely hasn’t (nor do I personally think he ever cared to) but you bring up a good point which circles back to thinking big. None of these guys started with profit in mind. It was so much bigger than “I hope to be profitable someday” and then as Kak described a couple posts back, they build momentum, gain consumer confidence and the financial aspects of their companies (and personal lives) explode.
Yea lol I was literally just typing that reply as you posted this.
 

ChrisV

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I’m hopefully going to use the same model for a monopolistic buyout of the two largest suppliers of a commodity in the same industry. One has a 60 percent market share and a website that was last copyrighted in 2007 and trust me, it looks like it was made in the 90s.

4862.jpg

I see what you did there

Now that’s how you get in the right mindset lol
 

MTEE1985

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So we were talking motivation. For me it is simple: “Memento Mori” My life is short, in the grand scheme of the universe my lifetime is about 1/100 of the blink of an eye. I’ll be damned if I waste time on frivolous sh*t and don’t think and execute to 100% of my abilities. Applies to my health, my business, my family and the experiences I want to have.
 
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ChrisV

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This is something I do frequently...

I list those things, but I follow it to the core of my beliefs. Why do I want a jet? Why do I want hundreds of millions instead of tens of millions? Why do I want the home in River Oaks? Why, why, why... My ultimate why ends up my true motivation..

Interesting.
I was just watching this, and it reminded me of this reply.

And admittedly you guys may have seen this considering Simon Sinek is popular, but on the off chance you haven’t it’s very good.

The clip not only relates to that comment, but also the questions posed about leadership.

It’s all about getting to why.

View: https://youtu.be/qp0HIF3SfI4
 
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ChrisV

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So we were talking motivation. For me it is simple: “Memento Mori” My life is short, in the grand scheme of the universe my lifetime is about 1/100 of the blink of an eye. I’ll be damned if I waste time on frivolous sh*t
What the quote someone posted. Was that this thread? Something about ‘if you ever need any motivation remember your time here is limited.’ Was it a Steve Jobs or Jeff Bezos quote? I’m going crazy running searches trying to find it and i can’t find it anywhere
 

amp0193

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I’m assuming you’re going to go after solving these issues and scooting up that 10 year minimum horizon to something more like 2.

Yes... In 2 years, this operation will be unrecognizable. Probably a team of 7-8 by that point and a much bigger warehouse. We'll be saying "haha, remember when..."

My suggestion, if this really has that 9 figure potential, get funded and stop pinching pennies. The hard work of proving the concept sounds over.

Yes, it's time. I think I made the right choice 6 months ago to wait. We had lots of stuff to work out. I've got a small team in place now. The product is close to right. We're expanding add-ons and up-sells. I've got so many ideas for new headline products.

What causes me the most stress and anxiety these days is looking at the damn bank balance. It's a big distraction from what I need to be doing. I'll start a "getting funded" thread soon.

I have a private equity firm in a holding pattern to buy me my 15 million dollar supplier on a moment’s notice and maybe the 5 million dollar logistics side too. The better we can prove it the more of these companies we can own.

F*ck yeah.
 
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amp0193

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how can you overcome the inventory issue?

More money to buy more inventory.


Could you be the manufacturer as well as the distributor?

I'd have to buy an Asian factory, but it's an idea. One that I never thought about until 2 min ago when I read @Kak 's post.

Virtually no one in my industry has done this though... and I'm not sure why.

There are some Chinese based companies that have gone big into u.s. retail and sales... that's kind of the same thing, just done in reverse.
 

ChrisR

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I love this. I wish there were a way to bookmark individual posts on this board

You can... At the bottom left of each post you click "Bookmark".
 
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MTEE1985

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Yes... In 2 years, this operation will be unrecognizable. Probably a team of 7-8 by that point and a much bigger warehouse. We'll be saying "haha, remember when..."

I love this. That’s the ultimate statement when it comes to thinking big in terms of scale. “Unrecognizable”.

It’s always interesting to me when you hear people say “being out of inventory must be a nice problem to have” actually...it sucks. Because you worry about what else your customers might be spending their money on, if they’ll come back and how long you may have to wait until you are replenished.

However, by doing all the little things in preparation while in this phase, you are no doubt setting yourself for massive success in the future. I’m looking forward to the progress and funding thread in the future.
 

ChrisV

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What the quote someone posted. Was that this thread? Something about ‘if you ever need any motivation remember your time here is limited.’ Was it a Steve Jobs or Jeff Bezos quote? I’m going crazy running searches trying to find it and i can’t find it anywhere
No one can remember where that quote was posted? I’m almost positive it was on this board. I’m going nuts trying to find it..
 
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Kak

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Yes... In 2 years, this operation will be unrecognizable. Probably a team of 7-8 by that point and a much bigger warehouse. We'll be saying "haha, remember when..."



Yes, it's time. I think I made the right choice 6 months ago to wait. We had lots of stuff to work out. I've got a small team in place now. The product is close to right. We're expanding add-ons and up-sells. I've got so many ideas for new headline products.

What causes me the most stress and anxiety these days is looking at the damn bank balance. It's a big distraction from what I need to be doing. I'll start a "getting funded" thread soon.



f*ck yeah.

Why not 20 employees? Why not 50? I don't know your business, so I am just spitballing... But why not bigger?

8 honestly seems LEAN.
 

ChrisV

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This is something I do frequently...

I list those things, but I follow it to the core of my beliefs. Why do I want a jet? Why do I want hundreds of millions instead of tens of millions? Why do I want the home in River Oaks? Why, why, why... My ultimate why ends up my true motivation..

Interesting.
I just came across this and remembered this reply

How this is relevant is that data shows that academic performance almost perfectly correlates with future life success, so the research can almost definitely be expanded to include success in general.

http://individual.utoronto.ca/jacobhirsh/publications/GoalSettingJAP2010.pdf
 
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amp0193

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Why not 20 employees? Why not 50? I don't know your business, so I am just spitballing... But why not bigger?

8 honestly seems LEAN.


haha, yeah, I've rethought that since I posted. I'm already at 3 employees, and 2 years is a long time.

I've got the 8 leadership roles I need mapped out, but there'd be low-level people to support them that I wasn't thinking about.

20 would be more realistic for a "balls to the wall" 2 years of growth.


Had a nice call with @Arun Siva. He's helped me realize that my manufacturing processes are not yet in place to enable me to handle that sort of scale. I can 10x the production I did this year without issue, but to go much beyond that, it's going to require some time and effort on my part getting things incredibly precise.

I kind of see it as:

2018 - MVP and proof of concept
2019 - The ramp up and streamlining
2020 - The growth explosion
 

Niptuck MD

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Just like the big dogs honed and solidified their process (from manufacturing, to supply chain to logistics) at their infancy stages, the same has to b done for up and comers. Once its done though, it will lay a solid foundation and framework for fluid operations in the long run thus saving you time money and everything in between.
 

Niptuck MD

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planning and the perfection of processes makes a pipeline of perpetual payments.
 
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MCBoots

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Great thread! (for the most part)

Never got around to posting much here since my original intro in the main forum and INSIDERS... mostly because I’ve been busy!

So I ended up exiting the (pretty successful) slow lane path about 10 mos ago. Behind schedule but finally pulled the trigger nonetheless.

My original plan was to consult enough for decent cash flow and in the balance of time pursue a $2-4M acquisition of a small/medium business in my industry of expertise.

Well one thing led to another and I decided to set my sights way higher.

It’s never done until it’s done so hope I don’t jinx it... but am about 30 days out from closing on a high 8-figures acquisition that I know in my heart of hearts is a steal. I truly believe we have the opportunity to build it into something we can sell for at least $300 million within 4 or 5 years. Even $1B feels achievable with awesome execution and favorable market conditions.

I say we, because the step change happened by taking on partners and taking on outside capital.

I won’t control this thing but I will get a sweet equity stake, a board seat, and preserve the capacity to continue pursuing the other 3 deals I have going in parallel. All without a cent of my own money in besides sweat/time and expenses.

Pretty awesome huh? There’s a lot in the here to there but the biggest thing was taking the blinders off, letting go, and swallowing hard.
 
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ChrisV

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GPM

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@ChrisV I know you love your video posts in every reply, but you are seriously clogging this thing up. It is nice to hear from the big players on the forum, and having to wade through pages of videos gets irritating in a hurry.

Loved that article @Kak Iron clad emotional control is huge. The most influence leaders I have ever dealt with have always had great control of their emotions. No one likes working with flighty individuals who get easily excitable. Fine for an employee maybe, but for a leader it can make it difficult.
 

ChrisV

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Lol is this guy serious? Not to be a dick but i’m definitely definitely definitely not going to change my replies in order to cater to your reading comfort lol. I’m making contributions to this thread that many find useful. I’m sorry you don’t. I mean I don’t particularly find any of your replies useful, so I simply scroll past them. But if it’s helpful, the board has an ‘ignore’ feature that makes it so you don’t see the replies of any user... one that i’ll be taking advantage of right now.

Screen Shot 2018-09-23 at 6.49.47 PM.png

(Just click on the user’s profile)

Certain things may not be useful to you, but many people message me and tell me they are useful to them.
 
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