David VS Goliath Podcast – S1 – Episode 21 – Tim Sawyer

Adam DeGraide:
Coming up today on David Vs Goliath.

Tim Sawyer:
You got to have one hairy eyeball on your business at all times.

Adam DeGraide:
No wonder you spend a lot of time out there with the seals. It’s going to get better and better as we go along. Thank you so much for watching.

Speaker 3:
Welcome to today’s episode of David Vs Goliath. A podcast dedicated to helping small businesses, leverage technology to not only help them compete against their large competitors, but win. Your host is currently the CEO of Anthem Business Software, a three time Inc. 500 recipient and a serial entrepreneur with a passion to help small businesses everywhere find, serve, and keep more customers profitably. Please join me in welcoming your host, Adam DeGraide.

Adam DeGraide:
Hey everyone. It’s Adam degrade with another great edition of David Vs Goliath where the small guy takes on the big guy and wins here at DVG. We are so glad to have you. I’m your host and what a pleasure and a great day it’s going to be because I have my business partner, one of my best friends, Tim Sawyer, timsawyer.com is his URL. Tim sawyer’s not only a fantastic business person, public speaker, trainer, he’s very educated on how things are done in the business world, has counseled thousands and thousands of businesses on how to grow. And he’s going to be here to talk to us today about what he’s doing today in his life and what he’s done also in the past. This is going to be a very educational, highly informative episode of David Vs Goliath. Today’s episode is brought to you by Anthem Software built specifically for small businesses to help you find, serve, and keep more customers profitably with their all in one software, marketing, and consulting platform. Take the tour at anthemsoftware.com. It’s about 120 seconds, you’ll not regret it.

Adam DeGraide:
Also, pretty big breaking news. That’s right. I’m now a published author. My first book, The Adventures of Jackson, the young field mouse just came out, available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. It’s a story I’ve been telling my kids literally for 26 years. The illustrations are awesome. Let me just show you a few pages, give you guys an idea. Look at that. Awesome. And what’s really cool about it is Jackson gets lost, needs to find his mom and dad, and it teaches children three things, bravery, attentiveness, and gratitude. So check it out today. It’s on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Just type in Adam DeGraide in the search bar. Make sure you spell my last name right or you’ll never find it. It’s D-E-G-R-A-I-D-E, and you’ll find the book. If you buy it and you like it, leave me a review. It would mean a lot.

Adam DeGraide:
I know I thought my first book was going to be a business book, but it just makes sense to actually make this a… This is a story I’ve been telling for 26 years to all my kids. So it’s awesome. And I’m just glad to be able to share it with everyone. Hopefully you enjoy it. Well, with that being said, make sure you could visit us today at davidvsgoliathpodcast.com, where you can subscribe and apply. And you can also ask DVG a question. Maybe you don’t want to be on the podcast, but you want some help in your business. Go there, type in a question, send it to me and I’ll make sure that I get back to you at some point with an answer, hopefully, and I might even feature you on a future episode of David Vs Goliath. Well, anyway, without further ado, let’s get right to it with Timothy Sawyer. Tim Sawyer, welcome to the David Vs Goliath Podcast.

Tim Sawyer:
Great to be here, Adam. Thanks for having me today, man. Great to see you.

Adam DeGraide:
It’s great to see you too. And for the watchers and listeners, Tim and I met, it feels like a couple of decades ago, but our daughters, Brooke and Abby, were best friends growing up. And I’ll never forget the day that Tim came to pick up Abby at our house in the Rhode Island. We stood at the front door together, we talked for, I don’t know, maybe 15, 20 minutes waiting for the kids to get ready or whatever. I closed the door. And I said to my wife at the time, “That is my next partner in business.” And she says, “How do you know that?” I said, “I just know it.” And Tim’s been my business partner for years, still is. We still own some things together. We don’t actively work together anymore, but we still own some things together. And Tim, what I love about your story is where you came from. I’d like you to spend some time briefly, over the four or five minutes, a little bit about your past and how you led up to meeting me and some of the things that you’ve done also in your professional life prior to working together and then some of the things you did together with me.

Tim Sawyer:
So depending on how far you want to go back, I’m actually working on a cool project right now. I’m in the middle of a book and should be done three or four weeks. And so as you know, for me, success in life is never a permanent state and certainly not a straight line. And so dealt with some stuff as a kid. And I thought it was important to share that with folks. So the book is going to be, no more hiding, the tale of two beasts. And it’s based on the Navajo proverb, as you know, that suggests we all have two beasts inside of us. One represents all things that are great. One represents all things that are bad. And the grandson says to the grandfather, “How do you know which one wins?” And he says, “It’s the one I feed the most.”

Tim Sawyer:
And so in my life, I’ve had certainly given into both. I’ve fed both BES at different times and reaped the benefits at certain times and paid the cost at other times when I fed the wrong one. So that’s really fun. I’m working on that. So obviously spent a little time in… I spent one year, learned the most, this will come out on the book page one, one year in a residential rehab, grew up more there than I did anywhere else. Got my GED in rehab then went on to Bryan University, spent 12 years working in a Federal Savings Bank right here in Rhode Island.

Tim Sawyer:
And also I’ll mention in the book that had the blessing of meeting you in 2000 at the tail end of working at the bank. And you were getting to wind down your third business at that time. And we spoke about putting a deal together. And so I spent seven years in the insurance industry, sold out to a private equity firm, started Crystal Clear, which is still going by the way. Patient Now, sold that obviously together and was grateful for that. Currently I am doing some work for them. I still work with some of the clients. I still do some podcast work. And what I’m up to now for the last six months or so is I’m actually working with high school kids on a couple different fronts. One is helping people understand that they’re not less than if they decide to go to trade school or no school and just go get a job. That’s a huge problem in our workforce right now is we make kids feel like they have to go borrow $150,000 to go to college. Then they only go for three years, they end up with a $70,000 loan and it’s a real problem.

Tim Sawyer:
Student loan debt is the second highest debt in the country, more than credit card. $1.7 trillion in student loan debt, it’s crisis level. So I’m doing work with a group called [inaudible 00:07:45] Institute. They offer electronic certifications for kids helping them. And then I do a lot of volunteer work with high school kids, working on personal finance and teaching entrepreneurial skills.

Tim Sawyer:
And we’re in the process of launching a company called Spark Money IQ, which we will be teaching three really cool workshops. One is around personal finance. So how do you spend your money on a daily basis? The cost of coffee and the cost of gas and the cost of car insurance. How do you get a credit card? Huge, huge, huge gap in the educational system right now. Only 21 states require any type of financial training for high school kids at all. So the second piece of that is going to be talk about the business model that you developed so many years ago. We’re going to take kids at their level around the wheel, find, sell, keep. So every business has to do three things. So we’ll talk about basic sales and marketing skills, and then actually going to use Crystal Clear in the third module as a case study for how to start a business, how to raise money and then give the kids a little test at the end. And that’ll all be sitting under my new business, which is profit for intent. So what I’ve decided, Adam, is going forward, I’m going to do… It’s got to have two criteria for me to get involved. It’s got to be a financial component, meaning somebody can make some money, and it’s got to be for good, doing something for good. So that’s where I’m at now.

Adam DeGraide:
And I think for the listeners and the watchers, you’re not quite telling the whole story of your past, obviously. And I think we’re going to save a lot of that for the book. I promise you, listeners and Watchers, when this book comes out, you’ve got to read at least the first few chapters, because it’ll blow you away.

Tim Sawyer:
The first page.

Adam DeGraide:
The first page. When you realize where Tim has come and where he is now and where he is going, it’s awesome. Now, Tim, when you work the Federal Savings Bank, I think it’s important for people to understand, you ran an entire call center dedicated to helping people get second mortgages. And you ran it like a machine, you learned a lot about hiring, recruiting, training, developing, and mentoring a team back then. Which led you to all that life experience that you brought into Astonish at the time. And then all that life experience brought into Crystal Clear, which is now Patient Now, because Patient Now acquired us. I know you’re still working with Patient Now and that’s awesome. We both still have financial interest in Patient Now, which is exciting. And at the end of the day, when you think about the thousands of people that you’ve worked with over the years, what did you learn specifically in that first job that you had in managing that many people? How many people did you manage? How’d you recruit them? How’d you train them? I think people would love to hear that.

Tim Sawyer:
So we had about 100 telemarketers. I spent a little time on that, not a ton. I spent more time on the loan officer side. So just for your listeners to understand, the bank’s business model was mail solicitation. So send out a solicitation across the country, across the US, suggesting that people can lower their credit card debt, refinance their mortgage and save money. So when I came to the bank, there weren’t a lot of systems in place. There was no training. Anybody could work there. There was no background required. It was a free for all, doing great, but it was a free for all. And so my third year there as a loan officer working on the phone, I realized that there was a better way to do it. And this is an actually really exciting part of my life, because of some of my life experiences as a teenager, I had really low self-esteem going into the workforce and I had a paralyzing fear of public speaking and which is why I took a job for two reasons. One, I had a criminal record and the other, they had no background checks. And the second one was I got to work on the phones. So I didn’t have to see people face to face. So it solved two problems and 23 years old.

Tim Sawyer:
And so I learned real quick that I was really good at selling, but I was also good at mentoring. In other words, people would just naturally gravitate towards me, “Hey, can you walk me through this?” And I really wanted to train people. I had this passion to train people as you know, and problem was, to train people means you got to get up in front of the room and give a talk. And I was terrible at that. So at the time I went to see a psychiatrist in Providence, told him about this fear and he said, “Okay, you’ve got this physiological response going on, Tim. So as soon as you think about public speaking, you get sweaty and you get prickly and everything goes wrong.”

Tim Sawyer:
My wife hates this because she adverse to any type of pills because of the work that she does. Bottom line is the guy gave me a pill and he said, “45 minutes before you speak, take this pill. And it’ll slow down that physiological response.” So I did it. And for all the crazy that the owner of that bank was, the first time I gave a talk, the words were great, but I had big pit stains and sweat and nervous and anxiety. And I thought I was dead as a public speaker, never was going to speak again. And he came up to me after we were talking, he goes, “Oh boy, didn’t go too great.” And I said, no. And he goes, “Well, when do you think you’re going to do it again?” And I was like, wow. And so he gave me another shot.

Tim Sawyer:
So my passion for training, I parlayed that into being the corporate trainer, the corporate recruiter, then the guy who goes to colleges and then putting systems in place that said, let’s guarantee these kids a certain amount of income because at 21 you’re recruiting the parent, you’re not recruiting the kid. So the kid’s got to be able to go back to his dad and say, “Well, I’m guaranteed $41,000 a year.” “Okay, that’s a good job, son. You should take it.” Or daughter.” And so we put systems in place. And then we focused a lot on the thinking around how to move someone, as you like to say, from red lights to yellow lights, to green lights. What are the words that you use? How do you string those sentences together? How do you overcome common objections? And we drilled on that like freaks. And so once we put the training in place, a loan officer used to be… We had to worst system in the world, Adam, because if you were a great telemarketer, you got promoted to loan officer. Which always meant we had the shittiest telemarketers. So I stopped that and said, “If they’re a good telemarketer, let them freaking telemarket.” And so I said, “Let’s hire people as loan officers. Don’t put them in the call center. We’ll train them on our own.”

Tim Sawyer:
So we did a lot of role playing. And then the way they had to test out is they had to sell me a mortgage. And so they’d be in a classroom for 10 to 12 weeks. They’d get certified. And then once they hit the floor, they were up and running. So we put some parameters in place around, hey, we were looking for a certain kind of background, a kid who played sports and had some debt and was a fighter, that kind of thing. And we just turned that thing into a freaking machine. And then of course I had the greatest manual in the world, stole it, got sued and sorted it all out. It’s fine.

Adam DeGraide:
We’ll segue with that in the next segment. I think this is important though, to stop for a second, you said something really profound. You’re teaching people how to have people that have red lights in their mind, turn into yellow and then ultimately to green to move to that next step. Even in your own life, you had a red light when it came to something, you sought some help turned to a yellow. First one didn’t go so good. You probably never would’ve done it again unless he saw something in you. He said, “Hey, you know what? You’re going to get back out there and do it.” The more you do it, the easier it becomes. Life’s some funny thing though, man, life is very cyclical. Things come back, they go away. They come back. It’s the nature of all of our, our beast and demons that we deal with.

Adam DeGraide:
But one of the things that I think is important for the watchers and listeners to know is not only did you manage that large group of people on that team, not only were you doing public speaking, but when you came to Astonish, that led naturally you helping us build a sales force and then ultimately build a training division, create the entire training manuals as to what an insurance agency at the time should be doing to help them find, serve, and keep more customers, everything from marketing to the way they answer the phone, to their people in process. Tell the listeners and the watchers, because you’ve worked with a lot of trainers, you’ve done a lot of public speaking. If you were looking… What is the one thing you would tell a small business owner that if they don’t have in their business right now, they’re in no danger of growing? What would that one thing be when it comes to training?

Tim Sawyer:
Well, it would start with a technology and I’m learning to appreciate that it more right now. Obviously having some way to manage client list be on a spreadsheet is super important. And so having some type of CRM tool, obviously Anthem has that and I use it myself. I recommend it. That would be the one piece of technology. But depending upon if it… There’s a lot of different types of businesses so if you’re about a retail store selling cigarettes or stuff, that’s something different than a tech startup. But if anything outside of a mom and pop retail store, people coming in, buying alcohol and cigarettes, it starts with who’s your customer, but then it’s the value prop. What’s the value prop? So if you’re a landscaper, why should someone hire you to mow their lawn or trim their trees?

Tim Sawyer:
And you taught me something a long time ago, I’ll never forget it, and that’s everything speaks. So even if you just want to, not just, but if you want to have a landscaping business making $100,000 a year, there’s certain things that need to go into that. So there’s the marketing piece of it, there’s the website and there’s what you email the community or what you drop in the mailboxes to solicit business. But then there’s also, what do you say when that person calls? And it’s got to be a uniform approach to that. So if it’s just a husband and wife, husband and wife are saying the same stuff. And why should they hire you? And I think every business needs to start with that.

Tim Sawyer:
We’re working on that at Spark Money IQ right now. Why should someone pay us to come speak at their school? I think there’s a lot of people that provide financial education. Why should they pick us? I think that’s a huge thing. And then how you telegraph that to the public. There’s a lot that goes into that. And so I think anybody that wants to deliberately build a business, meaning they don’t just want to bump into stuff and someday get some money, that they deliberately want to build a business, it’s got to start with what makes you unique. So got to start with having the right technology in place and then getting everybody on the same page. And if they do that, they got a good shot at a small brand and making some money.

Adam DeGraide:
There’s no doubt about it. Now, Tim, we going to take a quick break from a corporate sponsor here at Anthem Software. When we get back though, I want to talk to you about something that’s very personal to you and I think we’ll have a lot of fun doing it. So listeners watchers, you’re with Tim Sawyer. I’m Adam DeGraide. This is David Vs Goliath. Stay tuned. We’ll be right back.

Speaker 3:
Anthem Business software system is designed to specifically help small businesses just like yours, find, serve, and keep more customers profitably. We do this by providing you with the most powerful software automations and marketing services to help your business compete and win in this ever changing digital world. Take a short video tour at anthemsoftware.com (singing)

Adam DeGraide:
And we’re back with Tim Sawyer. Once again, Tim, welcome to DVG.

Tim Sawyer:
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. This is great.

Adam DeGraide:
It is. It’s a lot of fun.

Tim Sawyer:
I love your background. That’s a cool studio.

Adam DeGraide:
There’s no doubt about it, man. I appreciate it. Thank you so much. And you were a big part of me being able to afford it because over the years, Tim and I have worked together in several businesses. We’ve had several successful exits together, cheers to us and it’s been awesome. So part of this background is because of Tim Sawyer, part of your background, where you spend a lot of time, you’ve recently taking up kayaking quite a bit. As a matter of fact, we’re going to be showing some pictures right now on the screen of Tim kayaking. Tim, tell a the listeners a little bit about your haven. It’s become a Haven for you, right?

Tim Sawyer:
Yeah. So fortunately, it’s been my wife and I’s dream. We’ve lived in North Kingstown, Rhode Island for over 20 years and North Kingstown is situated on the water across from Jamestown and we’ve always wanted to live on the water. And so we saved a little bit and of course, a lot of congratulations to you and thank you to you, we were fortunate enough in our most recent transaction to feel comfortable to go ahead and pull the trigger on a waterfront property. So I’m actually, as you can see, I’m sitting, this is the top floor of my house. It’s actually a fully functioning pub in the back with a commercial kitchen and a dumbwaiter that goes from the catering area to the basement up here so the people make the food down, shoot it up and there you go. But it literally sits on the Atlantic Ocean.

Tim Sawyer:
And so actually, as I look out right now, I can see about quarter of a mile out from the shore there’s, they’re called the Seven Sisters, they’re rocks. And from October, that protrude from the water, from October to May, they’re filled with seals. So on any given day, there would be up to 100 seals out there. So it’s really cool, although you ruin it for people. And what I mean by that is this, it’s a local spot where guys will bring their kids. And I was like that jerk idiot, new guy on the street didn’t realize what I was doing. And I would literally paddle my kayak and go right through the rocks. And what it does is it scatters the seals, which is great because the seals bob up and down for half an hour and you can get the greatest pictures in the world. Problem is they don’t come back that day. So everybody that’s driving down in the afternoon to watch the seals is going to sit there and look at a bunch of bare rocks, screaming at me from the shore and won’t repeat what they say in front of their kids. So I started to put together, I’m like, “That’s not a good thing.” So you got to respect the seals a little bit. But it’s cool. And we got a little boat out here and go water skiing and stuff.

Adam DeGraide:
It’s awesome.

Tim Sawyer:
It’s been a dream of mine. It’s cool.

Adam DeGraide:
It’s great to see you doing it. And for the watchers and listeners, this stuff doesn’t happen on accident. Tim’s busted his butt for years, man. Traveled around the country. As a matter of fact, I think, Tim, you were speaking… What was the most amount of public speeches you gave for Crystal Clear in one year? Do you remember that actual number?

Tim Sawyer:
2019 was 42.

Adam DeGraide:
Wow. 42. Now just think about that guys. 42 weekends, and these shows that you went and spoke at were not just one day events. They were 2, 3, 4, 5 day events. So you add that on top of it. No wonder do you spend a lot of time out there with the seals?

Tim Sawyer:
Well, it’s funny because I was looking at this the other day because I was putting together my… And this is a good point for people to get, which is that again, if you want to be deliberate in growing a business, there is trade offs too. There is things that you’re going to have to sacrifice to get what you want. There’s no doubt about that. But we were able to take, and we had a guy working for us by the name of Audrey who was really good at this and get on the programs as faculty. So I was looking at it. Right now I have 36 faculty designations in elective medicine. So what that means is instead of us having to pay to speak, the doctors get continuing education credit to listen to us speak. And that was a big pivot for us because speaking is expensive in elective medicine. But if you can convert those into unpaid CME or continuing education, that’s where you get real credibility in that space. If you don’t have a great product, if you don’t have a great financial person and Crystal and you don’t have great service people, and if you don’t have passion for the business, you can be the greatest public speaker in the world, nothing’s going to happen. It takes good partners that work diligently and it’s people who believe it’s their life, becomes your life.

Adam DeGraide:
It’s interesting because I remember when Tim gave his first speech with me, I’ll never forget it, we were in Palm Springs and you were sitting at the table and you had a little bit of the flashback to nervousness, which by the way, [crosstalk 00:24:40]

Tim Sawyer:
I was scared. Forget about nervous, I was flat out scared.

Adam DeGraide:
And it’s funny because as you know, later in life, that switched for me having that issue, which has really been weird for me. Because I never had that issue, but I’ve been coming out on the other side of that too, which is really great. But I’ll never forget looking over at Tim and you weren’t eating the chicken and I’m like, “Tim, are you all right?” And you’re like, “No, I’m not okay.” I said, “Whatever you do…” Do you remember the advice I gave you?

Tim Sawyer:
Yep.

Adam DeGraide:
What was it?

Tim Sawyer:
Follow my energy.

Adam DeGraide:
I said match my energy and, man, did you match it, and I remember that was a craziest speech of the world because after my talk, I remember I walked out with my briefcase right after my session, you came on, you continued the energy. But when I watched back on that video, there was something that Tim did because Tim doesn’t just, and this is important for those of you thinking about bringing Tim in to speak at high schools, into these students, Tim doesn’t just teach people and educate people and train them. He wants to call greatness out of them. So I’ll never forget Tim at the end of his talk, getting on his hand and knees and begging these insurance agents at the time to heed what we were telling them, because it literally was the difference in them being stagnant and shrinking or being expansive and growing.

Adam DeGraide:
And you said to them, “I’m begging you. I begging you.” And that became a signature feature of a lot of your talks, not all of them, but many of the talks, there’s usually an ending that Tim Sawyer brings to the table that is unforgettable, I promise you that. And it was always awesome, man, to watch you take control of a room most importantly, to really care. Because I think when you share the truth that you and I have learned over the years about people, process tools, courage, belief, all these things we talk about ,when you’re up there and you’re portraying that to somebody, you’re hoping it’s translated. Right now you’re watching this podcast and I’m hoping that my energy and Tim’s energy is translating to you so that you can get up today and be the best you can be. So Tim, when you prepare for public speeches, even the ones that you’ve given routinely over and over again, you have a routine that you do beforehand, but when you’re in the moment and you’re on at the end of it, when you’ve been on your knees and you’ve been imploring to people, what are you hoping happens to that business owner? And you and I have seen it.We’ve talked about it for years.

Adam DeGraide:
So often we felt like we want their success more than they want their success. And I know your heart has always been to this isn’t just about me giving a talk, this is about you being successful by heeding what we’re saying. When you’re finishing that talk, what do you hope happens in the mind and the heart and most importantly, the actions of that business owner are that guy or girl now who’s in high school and they’re getting ready to enter the workforce?

Tim Sawyer:
The way I’ll respond to that, it’s before you go into the room and I believe that you’re the one that gave me this concept and I’ve talked about it a lot, is before you give a talk to anybody, you have to ask yourself, what do I want these people to think? What do I want them to feel? And most importantly, when it’s over, what do I want them to do? And when you’re doing the type of speaking that we were doing, it’s a dual purpose. It’s education, but it’s also education and get them to come to the booth. In modern marketing, if people feel a sense of, you’re not being authentic, you’re trying to manipulate them, you’ll be in trouble. Right. Because most people will see through that. And so it starts with a genuine intent to help them.

Tim Sawyer:
And I’ll say to them, “Listen, you don’t have to come by the booth or buy anything, but just do this.” And it’s really caring. And if you go back in life, where does that come from? First of all, getting banged up as a kid. I have an appreciation for what it means to be not in a great spot, to not have money, to have your freedom denied, I’m aware of all those things. Which is great because in business you get a big, tough guy who threatened you to sue you. I’m like, “You’re going to mail me something and you’ll send me something in the mail. Had my freedom denied. It’s like, I’m not afraid of you.” That helps certainly. But in terms of wanting to help people, it’s like, I understand that it is hard. It’s hard to go from A to B. And so if there’s something that we can…

Tim Sawyer:
One little thing that you can motivate that person to do, even if it has nothing to do with what we’re talking about or selling, that they all have these two or three things, this is how I’ll answer the question succinctly, they all have two or three things that they know they need to do that have been sitting on a desk or in a drawer or in their car. And they need to do something with that, whatever it is. Just to get them to do that. One thing to go okay, to get me to advance a ball from here to here, just go do that. And if they just see that we care about them and we want to help them and they go, “You know what? If that guy can do it, I can do it too.”

Tim Sawyer:
And it’s relatability. And if they relate to you and they think you’re genuine, then those people will be moved. And in my career, that’s how I keep score now. It’s like, did I connect with that person? Did I move them to do… And it will be liberating in this next round of learning education because not every talk I’m going to give will have a profit motive, which is a… You’re just inspiring people to make change without buying anything from you. And that’s a twist.

Adam DeGraide:
It is a twist, but you’re going to be great at it, man. It’s fascinating. I remember, I think there was one speech you actually said something, where you said, “100 of you are raised in your hand right now, next year, when the 100 of you come back to this event, the sad reality is only 10% of you will have actually done something with what I’m saying. And 90% of you will be in the exact same place you were when you came in before this talk, having the exact same problems, the exact same concerns and my implore you to not be a part of that 90%.” And I think that’s so profound in life for all of us, is that you could only speak to the listening of somebody.

Adam DeGraide:
When I took expository preaching classes years ago when I was going to be a pastor, one of the things I learned is that you try to keep something under 22 minutes if you’re giving an actual speech, because after that you’ve lost so many people. Within 35 seconds, Tim, of somebody hearing you speak for the first time or me speak for the first time, they judged us. They either like us or not. So self defacing humor has always been good. I always tell people which one of you 65% of people or 35% of people don’t like me. Because that breaks the ice a little bit. Some hands go up hands, “I actually don’t like you.” And that’s okay, in order to be loved, you have to be equally hated. My brothers taught me that. And at the end of the day, when you’re trying to change people’s thinking and behavior and the fact that we all know we’re creatures of habit, you have to do something.

Adam DeGraide:
I’ve been saying on the show on David Vs Goliath, that action is the life of an entrepreneur, but hesitancy is the death of an entrepreneur. And what I love with what you’re doing right now, with what you’re about to do is you’re stepping out into the unknown, which takes a lot of courage to, Tim, to do this next stage. We’re going to take another break from another sponsor. But when we come back, I want to talk to you about that courage, of how you get up every single day and say, “I’m going to go change the world today.” And how you’re going to muster up the energy to have a nonprofit motive in this, which is going to be fascinating. I want to hear all about that.

Adam DeGraide:
But you’re listening to Tim Sawyer. You’re listening to Adam DeGraide. This is David Vs Goliath, the greatest small business podcast in the world. You get better advice here than just about anywhere else. Everyone knows it. Anybody who watches this show knows it. You know it, you can feel it. I feel it every time. I am so grateful to have Tim Sawyer. Stay tuned from another important message from another great sponsor right here on David Vs Goliath. We’ll be right back.

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Adam DeGraide:
And we’re back with Tim Sawyer, amazing entrepreneur, great business partner, amazing motivational speaker, trainer, educator, father, philanthropist. What else do you do? You’re amazing. It’s unbelievable thing. It’s so great to have you on the show. I want to shift now to something that I love to talk about. I believe that David, even though he had five smooth stones, it only took one to slay that giant, Tim, and I call that stone in business called courage. So as you looked at your life transitioning, you’ve had some successful businesses, successful exits, and now you want to start giving back in life. You want to bring education to places where you believe there’s a lack of this particular thing and this market, tell people about the courage it takes to A, start this business and then to get you up every day, get out there, create the curriculum and then go make it happen.

Tim Sawyer:
You know what’s funny? It’s a little tougher right now and I don’t say this because I’m on your podcast. Doing it alone, so I don’t have a business partner in this, doing it alone is definitely a different twist because it’s all self-motivation. And what I’m learning about myself is that I’m much better when I feel like if I don’t do it, I’m going to let somebody else down, if that makes sense. So finding the courage right now is actually… So I meet twice a week with high school kids and we’re actually working on the curriculum together. The kids are doing it. And so what I’ve had to do is to in my brain say, “You know what, Tim? You’re doing this as much for them and as much for the kids you’re going to help as you are for yourself.”

Tim Sawyer:
And so, in other words, I’ve got to create this purpose beyond, “Hey, maybe we can go get a little bit of money and help people.” Which is not insignificant, don’t get me wrong. But definitely harder going alone. And so I need to start surrounding myself, and there are some great administrators that I’m working with now that are getting super excited. I actually had a guy tell me the other day that I sparked, this is a 30 year administrator, principal, teacher, guidance counselor, he said I sparked an entrepreneurial itch in him that he didn’t realize he had, and that he spent 15 hours the other day working on curriculum that he wants to share and do some stuff together to supplement the work that he’s doing as an administrator. And I was like, now you start to see… That’s the hardest thing is connecting, my energy, my courage, my motivation with, now it’s starting to make a difference. And that’s my fuel.

Tim Sawyer:
As soon as I see, “Hey, wait, other people are going to benefit from this too. It’s not just me [inaudible 00:37:09] It’s connecting those dots. And it’s different. And I’m sure I’ll sort that out pretty quick, but it’s an exciting time in my life, man. And for the first time, I feel like I have a little bit of time to do what I’ve always wanted to do, but have been so hyper-focused on… You live a lopsided life. If you’re trying to get a business to be worth more than other businesses, you can get, for me anyways, your life can get out of whack.

Adam DeGraide:
Totally.

Tim Sawyer:
Totally. And so now trying to focus on the courage to get up and do it, whether it’s myself or developing partners, but it’s also having balance so that you do have time to… I don’t want to let this next thing consume me, I guess would be my… Because I’m an addict at everything. So it’s all McDonald’s.

Adam DeGraide:
It’s interesting you said something fascinating there, that you felt the pressure in the past to do it for others. I think one of the things I’ll tell you and just give you a little insight, maybe this might help you. Maybe it won’t, you said something fascinating. Years ago I thought about this, that God gives us each unique gifts and talents. There’s a purpose and a reason why we’re here and it’s bigger than just ourselves and our immediate sphere of influence, I believe. And for me not to use my gifts, whether that’s music or storytelling, or speaking, or advising, or leading would be to rob, not just myself of what I was aid for, but others that I was given that gift to benefit. And so you’ve been given amazing gifts. You’re very real, as people could tell, you’re down to earth, you’re rough around the edges, but that makes you beautiful because you’re not so polished. Everything that’s polished can be he sometimes fake. And you’re very real.

Adam DeGraide:
And I think when you go to speak to these kids, Tim, and you share with them from the heart, the gift that you’ve been given to share with them is not just to fulfill yourself and reward yourself, for you not to do it would be stealing from them. And I think if you see it that way, when your eyes open up in the morning, you can say, “I got to get to work because people still need me.” It’s a different way, but they might need you even more than somebody else might need you, that you think might need you now and give your time to them and your attention to them. So that’s my encouragement to you. I think…

Tim Sawyer:
Good way to look at it.

Adam DeGraide:
It’s one of the things that I have to tell myself every day, too. Because how many times can I run the bases? Well, if I didn’t run the bases, I don’t know what else I’d be doing. So it’s like I was born for a purpose. I want to make sure that when I leave planet earth, that I’ve done everything I can in my power with God’s help, I believe to help me fulfill that purpose. And I think you’re doing the same thing. And so kudos to you. Now, Tim, you’ve got great advice for people. You’ve given amazing advice to people. You’ve set multiple business owners in a room once and actually asked them, “So which one of you people are in charge? Because it seems like nobody’s in charge. If all of you are in charge, there’s nobody in charge and nothing’s going on.” But right now we have an aspiring entrepreneur man or woman, or a successful business that’s struggling, or a business that’s struggling to get off the ground successfully, what is the one piece of advice that you would tell them that if they’d implemented this in their lives, it would make the biggest difference for them?

Tim Sawyer:
Take inventory and be brutally honest with yourself. That’s the hardest thing to do is to… For a young entrepreneur starting your business, one of the things that I suggest and talk about in speeches all the time is acting like your business is for sale. You and I were both very good at that. And so whether it’s, like I said, a landscaper or a dentist or whatever, ask yourself, if you were going to buy that business from yourself, what would make you nervous about doing that? That’s how you take inventory and you go, “Well, I wouldn’t like the fact that we don’t have this. And I wouldn’t like the fact that we don’t have that.” So once you’ve taken inventory, once you’re brutally honest with yourself about what needs to be fixed then set about the task of fixing those things.

Tim Sawyer:
And like Adam’s mom told him, how do you clean a room? One corner at a time. So it can feel overwhelming if you go, “Hey, there’s 20 things wrong with my little business or my big business.” And that usually is the case. There’s no business that’s perfect. And so once you take inventory, once you’re brutally honest with yourself, then set the task, make a list, start knocking those things out. Don’t procrastinate about it because if you’ve got 20 things wrong, in six months, you’ll have 25 unless you start working on the 20 you got wrong now. And I think what a lot of people do is they let things… They know at a conscious level that things need to be fixed, but they just don’t do it. It’s like, “If I don’t look at it, it’ll go away.” And in business, guys, that’s not how it works. It never goes away. It gets worse.

Adam DeGraide:
It always gets worse.

Tim Sawyer:
[crosstalk 00:42:56] gets worse. And we’re living in messed up times too. Forget about your political affiliation or whatever, in my business alone, Adam, I want to get into the schools. What’s delaying that? The freaking government’s all freaked out. The world’s all freaked out and about, whatever you think aside. Well, that’s a thing that I’ve got to do deal with. And so if that throws my business, and it has, it’s a monkey wrench in my business. I can’t get into those schools right away. So what are we going to do? We’ll create virtual modules. I got to look at this brutally and say, “Okay, that’s what we’re going to have to do.” And so that’s my encouragement is just to be brutally honest and tell yourself you’re doing good, that’s fine. But you got to have one hairy eyeball on your business at all times.

Adam DeGraide:
That’s the greatest line. That’s going to be the name of this episode, by the way, one hairy eyeball. You got to have one hairy eyeball on your business, folks. You got to take inventory. Don’t bury your head in the sand. Look at things for what they are. And always begin with the end in mind, which is to Tim’s point, if you’re building a business that one day you want to sell or even hand down, what would you want fixed if you were to buy it? Fix it now, don’t wait because today is the only day that matters. Yesterday’s gone. Tomorrow’s not here yet. The only change that can happen is right now. And you’ve been on watching the David Vs Goliath Podcast with my guest Tim Sawyer. Tim, have you had a good time so far today?

Tim Sawyer:
I’ve had a blast. This was great. Congratulations on the podcast. Congratulations on your new children’s book.

Adam DeGraide:
Oh, thank you. Hold on. Good segue. Hold on. Right here. There it is, The Adventures of Jackson. Tim, I don’t know, you’ve probably never even heard this story, but it’s a pretty cool story. It’s right here, The adventures of Jackson.

Tim Sawyer:
I’ll be checking it out. I think that’s awesome.

Adam DeGraide:
Congratulations on all of your success, Tim. We wish you the best. People can check you out at timsawyer.com, correct?

Tim Sawyer:
Spark money IQ will take you there. S-P-A-R-K moneyiq.com. Give us a look. A little quick plug, if you know someone, if you’re a mom or dad, own a business and you got high school kids and you’re concerned about their financial IQ, it’s not taught, it’s ignored a ton, we make it fun. I would be grateful to have the opportunity to come out to your school spend some time with your kids and their friends and get them all fired up about money, how money works. We’d love to do that. So I’m grateful. Take a [inaudible 00:45:30] sparkmoneyiq.com.

Adam DeGraide:
I love it. Spark Money IQ, there’s your pimp out, Tim. Great job. Everyone, I’m your host, Adam DeGraide. That was Tim Sawyer. Another amazing edition of David Vs Goliath is in the can. Stay tuned next week. It’s going to get better and better as we go along. Thank you so much for watching. Everyone have a fantastic day.