One Focus

This Week’s Summary:

Learned: One goal

Planning: Priorities

Business idea: Exit prep

Vet Opp: F—k suicide

I met: Gerry Lalonde

Stoic Quote of the Week

Stop wandering about! You aren't likely to read your own notebook, or ancient histories, or the anthologies you've collected to enjoy in your old age. Get busy with life's purpose, toss aside empty hopes, get active in your own rescue--if you care for yourself at all--and do it while you can.

-Marcus Aurelius

What I learned this week:

I’ve read a lot about the principles of goal setting and the key metrics to success. One of the things that jumps out at me is to watch all the different goals you may set. I saw a video that said to have a new hire write down 10 goals they want to accomplish in the next 12 months. Wow! 10! When you think about it, that really isn’t that many. That really isn’t that many goals for a hard-charging person to accomplish in 12 months. Except it is. Yes, we teach and live by our life categories for managing our lives. Except there is only one thing that can be number one. I’ve had this conversation with team members and clients over the years. Only one thing can be most important. If you aren’t clear on what is most important, then you are bouncing from area to area, category to category. Think of it like this: does one category of your life support or rely on another category? I bet it does. It reminds me of the chapter about personal values in Brene Brown’s book Dare to Lead. Her mentor talked her down from six or more values in her life to just two. Because, in the end, all the other values were subsets of the two, which she held true. It may not be that obvious to you right now how your goals for 2025 really just rely on one single goal. I bet they do, no matter where you are in life or business. There is one singular goal for 2025 that, if you accomplish it, the other ones will fall into place. There is one goal, and if it is not successful, you will not be successful. This may sound like an oversimplification of setting your goals within each of your life categories. Or, counter to everything we’ve talked about for life management. It isn’t. Focus on one thing. Make that one thing your priority of effort and priority of work. Accomplish that one thing, and all the other things will fall into place. Don’t get lost in the hubbub of an equally weighted, unmanageable list of goals.

Planning thought of the week:

Companies continue to sway their priorities with the wind. If you don’t know what the most important thing is in the company, then you aren’t working together as a team. Establish the priorities and move out. Can they change? Will they change? Absolutely. The art of it is knowing when to change and why. Then, share those reasons with the team so they know when and why the change of priorities has happened.

Business idea I heard about or thought of:

New year, new business? Or do the same old thing over and over again and hope to get something different. Yep, it is time to wake up and get to work. Quit making excuses about being too busy for this or that because you know you are only lying to yourself. It is time to prepare your business for an exit. Cause you know one thing is true: you will exit your business whether it is a planned activity or you die. Yep. That is still an exit. If you care about your business, then why not prep it for a successful exit of YOU?! I won’t go into all the steps and procedures, and it isn’t about finding a good M&A bubba (I have a few I highly recommend). It is about running your business properly. Capturing the processes, procedures, and SOPs. Right them down. Follow them and make sure you are doing it the way you wrote it down. What happens to your business when you go on vacation? Does revenue continue? Well, that is another thing to address. Here is another one: you know all those tax right-offs you take advantage of to lower your taxable income? That lowers your EBDITA and the value of your company to outside buyers. If you are expecting to sell your business and retire on the money, you better start putting things together now. Here’s a little secret, your business will be more efficient and valuable even if you don’t sell it.

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If you want to learn more about our newest tribe, Steel Men Tribe, Reply with Steel Men, and I will add you to the list of men interested. This group is limited to 12 men. Feel free to give me a shout if you want to learn more.

Veteran opportunity of the week:

I’m not going to dive into the terrorist act by an Army Vet in New Orleans nor the elaborate suicide or whatever the f—k that was in Las Vegas by an SF Brother. It does bring one thing back to the forefront again: SUICIDE. All I can say is DUDE WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU THINKING! Both incidents validate the need to be part of something that you feel provides value to you, and you provide value to it, whether it is a tribe, a group of dudes, or something else. The bottom line is that we can overcome the struggle alone. Buddy checks are great and should continue, but nothing will change until we change. We have to be willing to open up and say, my shit ain’t right, and I want to talk about it. Plain, simple, and to the point.

Someone I met this week:

I had the pleasure of talking with Gerry Lalonde yesterday. Gerry is the guy who planted the seed about prepping your business for exit in my head, and he couldn’t have been more spot on. Gerry has great business acumen and understanding of not just the OP side, Gerry knows the finance side because he worked his way up from accounting to CFO. He’s been there and done that when it comes to the ins and outs of businesses of all sizes. Gerry works with business leaders and owners to help them make sure their business is ready for an owner exit. The bonus you get is a great running business before you exit. Ping me back if you would like to talk with Gerry.

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