00:00
When Moiz was selling native deodorant, he didn't own the trademark. And it was an issue? He's got the deal done, and they're, like, you don't have the trademark. He's like, yeah, but there's no other native deodorant. He's they're like, okay, junior. What are you talking about? That's not how this works.
00:14
You know?
00:24
Alright. Today, we thought it'd be fun to do a episode all about how we actually run our companies. So we've been running companies for, like, I don't know, ten, fifteen years now. And
00:33
like many people out there at the beginning, we did a bunch of dumb stuff. And so we're gonna admit and confess to some of the dumbest things that we did running our companies. And then talk about what we do now that's actually, like, we found that works. So the stuff that didn't work and the stuff that works, and this is around
00:49
you know, everything from, like, you know, mission statements, how we used to think that these are, like, super important and how we treated them versus what we do now or branding and naming our companies or goal setting,
01:00
these are kinda like the shortcuts that we use now. So what what actually that we found works
01:05
through the painful process
01:07
of making embarrassing mistakes.
01:09
That's what I think we're gonna do today. Yeah. We got about like five or eight categories of, like, on hiring on creating comp plans on having boundaries with staff. These actually sound like boring when we're, like, just when I'm just reading that off, but I promise you. It's actually we have, like, interesting stories behind each one and stuff we wish we would have done earlier
01:28
that I deeply regret that I didn't do now. Or that I didn't do then. But, yeah, it's we'll we'll go through all the stuff that we actually use on a day to day basis to run our companies. The touchy feely stuff is actually really important.
01:39
So I thought it'd be fun for us to share
01:41
shit we do when we run our companies. What are our almost like management hacks or shortcuts or like the methods that we use, which
01:49
As a disclaimer,
01:50
probably not the best. Probably not what they teach at Harvard Business School or what, you know, like, very polished, you know, seasoned executives would do. I remember when I started,
02:01
one of my early companies, it was my in my internal mission statement was to hire ten thousand people. And I then I hired, like, two people, and I was, like,
02:13
Shade. And is it we got a new racer?
02:15
Yeah.
02:16
Yeah. Like, how do I make this ten?
02:18
It was horrible.
02:20
And then it was, like,
02:21
And then the mission statement for the employees is like, look, like, we're gonna change
02:26
whatever, like, right now, the word is democratized we're democratizing
02:30
the financial markets or whatever. Yeah. Oh my god. Whatever that equivalent is is what I said. Like, we're gonna change the world. One newsletter at a time. And so my mission statement Did you really say that? No. But it was probably, like, as lame. I don't
02:45
it'd be the worst if I said that But, no, they're pretty late. Now they're way more.
02:49
So here's what I tell people. I go. Here's my definition for the business. This first one is very selfish, which is I wanna work on cool shit with cool people and have a dope life. Yeah. That's just what I tell people. I go. So it's very selfish. I just wanna work with cool people on interesting things. And that's more so the mission than anything. And then it's like, and if we are able to do this, this, and this, that will also be cool.
03:10
Versus
03:11
a far more grand thing. My mission statements aren't nearly as grand. Are yours? I am in the exact same bucket, so definitely used to be, like, changing the status quo, you know, on my Steve Jobs shit. And, you know, I because that's who you looked up to. Looked up to Steve Jobs, looked up to Elon Musk, and he's, like, you know, create an interplanetary
03:30
species.
03:31
It's like, oh, okay. Cool. What's my version of that? Like, you know, I'm I'm not trying to get to Mars and, like, make humankind,
03:38
you know, interplanetary,
03:39
but I was trying to do that. Do you remember that story of Steve Jobs? We tried to recruit the guy from Pepsi and Steve Jobs is like, You're just gonna sell sugar water for the rest of your life? Right.
03:49
Fuck you, Steve.
03:53
What a dick. Right? Now we're like Logan Paul. Genius,
03:56
puts sugar in water, sells it to children.
04:00
The, dude,
04:01
the audacity.
04:02
So
04:03
I'm like you now.
04:04
I hear it was here's the notes I wrote on my answer for this, my on my little cheat sheet. I wrote, I don't kid myself anymore.
04:11
I've honest.
04:12
I'm building a lifestyle business for me and my team, almost exactly what you just said, which is I wanna do dope shit with cool people. Right? So do cool shit with cool people. And in a way that leads to an awesome lifestyle. Meaning, I'm not trying to kill myself currently running the business, and I'm trying to have a financial outcome for me and my team that lets us all elevate our lifestyles.
04:33
Right? Like, that's that is the this business is a vehicle
04:37
to have an enjoyable lifestyle, which is really funny because in silicon Valley
04:42
lifestyle business
04:43
is the,
04:45
it's the equivalent of saying no offense.
04:47
To start a sentence. It's like lifestyle business
04:50
is how VCs patch you on the head and say that's cute.
04:54
Oh, Oh, one million of revenue. That that's cute. You know? You know, we we we don't invest in lifestyle businesses. Right?
05:02
If this is just a lifestyle business for you, we're not interested. Right? Your your low ambition, which in Silicon Valley is where I live is low status. However, for me, feel like I broke out of the matrix. And I was like, wait, what the fuck are all these people talking about? The point of life is to have a great lifestyle. What I don't want another I don't wanna do something else with my life. I'm not trying to have a bad life. Kind of a good life. For me, for my family, for my team, we all want the good life. Okay. Let's do a project that's fun and interesting. With fun and interesting people in a way that we all get rich. Is that so much to ask? It's, like, that is now the blanket mission statement on all of my projects.
05:35
And, I don't know if that's inspiring to the troops, but it's inspiring to me. And I hope that it just attracts people who are down with that. And, not looking for the,
05:46
the rah, you know, say payroll. I actually think I think that is a bit inspiring to be honest is to, like, the right type of person
05:53
and,
05:54
I I I at least when I talk to people, it seems like, yeah, that sounds wonderful. Another thing that changed with me is When I start new companies, I pick business models where I can afford to pay
06:05
hires
06:06
a lot of money because I remember when I was starting a lot of my stuff, I'm like, man, I don't I can only I I don't have enough money to pay a high quality person a lot of money it's a trap. Yeah. I'm like, I wish I could afford to pay someone three or two hundred thousand dollars a year so I could recruit a certain type of person. So I could spend time with them.
06:25
And so that has changed as well. Well, like, what's an example? So, like, the hustle, traditionally, you know, media companies,
06:32
when they start, obviously, they don't make a ton of revenue, but you're putting out free content.
06:37
And writers are typically not that well paid.
06:40
However,
06:41
like, so would that count as it was more in the towards the bad end of the spectrum, or was it on the good end? Cause you did hire people like, Step Smith and Trung and what he's great people eventually. Yeah. I hired great people eventually, but, like, for example,
06:54
a good media, like, You could, you could run-in your media company a few different ways. You could particularly first sellers for ad salespeople.
07:01
You could pay them sixty grand a year and say they have a quota of only four hundred thousand dollars, and they get they make a hundred and five grand when they hit their on target earnings. Or you could go hire someone who you're gonna pay two hundred thousand dollar base plus a higher commission, and their expectation is that they're gonna sell two or three million dollars worth of stuff And typically, those people who are more competent and capable, I find are more enjoyable to be around. And so, like, things like that where I'm building a business that hires less people who I pay more, because that setup, I think, is more enjoyable.
07:31
So I had the same problem because my first business was in the restaurant industry. And the restaurant industry is basically like,
07:38
you know, What is what what is the worst type of business you could you could select? I think it's probably I don't know if it's the worst, but it's down there. It's hanging out with the worst, whatever it is. Right? So
07:49
almost all of them fail.
07:51
Even when they succeed, they have, like, ten percent net margins typically. And you gotta open up, like, multiple locations to get to ever make it big or have enough cash flow from a business like that to higher high quality,
08:01
like, high you know, highly seasoned people. And so
08:05
I remember meeting the guy who ran Chipotle. I think he was a CEO or CEO of Chipotle at the time, and we were trying to create the Chipotle of sushi. And I was like, alright, you know, like, give me your advice. I didn't even know what question to ask, but I was like, give me your advice. And he's like, well,
08:18
think of it this way. Your entire product is in the hands of somebody
08:23
who makes nine dollars an hour and doesn't wanna be there.
08:26
And and every cost everything you're telling me right now great the user experience is gonna be, that's true for restaurant one.
08:34
It might be true for restaurants two and three. By restaurant four, It's no longer true because you're not there anymore,
08:40
to do the all those amazing things and give that amazing user experience. He goes, the trick in this business is whoever can figure out how to get minimum wage employees to give somebody a good experience.
08:51
They you'll get you'll get to win. That's the winning condition. He goes, so, you know, for, like, Chipotle, we ended up doing a bunch of things to try it try to improve that. He's like, you know, I don't I don't know if we did it fully, but, like, they did a couple things. Like, for example, If anybody
09:04
if you're a manager, Chipole, and anyone you manage
09:08
becomes a manager of a restaurant,
09:10
you get ten thousand dollars, whether you work at that company or not, just like ever. Because, like, you had a hand in Oh, that's sick. In leading that person to be a to I don't know if they still do this, but at the time they did.
09:19
They also changed the title. So, like, the manager was called, like, restaurateur or something like that, and they paid them above market. And they're like, you know, we're doing all these things try to fix it. Starbucks did the same thing, giving people benefits so that they stick around and actually stick with the job versus really high churn, but nobody's really figured that out. Point is,
09:37
I remember
09:38
it just wasn't a lot of fun to be in that business because I couldn't relate, you know, all the things I love. I'm an entrepreneur. I'm thinking about ideas or You know, raising capital. I got big goals, big dreams, and I'm coming into work every day with somebody whose goal and dream is to get off work early. That is the, like, There that would be the the best thing that could happen to them at work that day. And I was like, shit. That's not that inspiring every day to, like, kind of And I I don't mean that to knock anybody. It's just the truth. It's like you you're gonna hang around certain people when you run a business.
10:06
Ideally, you would be around people who are very, very like minded to you in the sense of They share similar values and goals and aspirations, and then it becomes contagious. And then they're sharing learnings with you. And, like, remember we interviewed. I remember interviewing people for, like, this position because we kept having people flake out. They would just leave or they would steal or stuff like that.
10:25
And, like, my buddy who was interviewing, he goes, well, I like this person. They had all their teeth.
10:31
I was like, what? And he's like, I don't know. He's like, I'm I'm just looking for Cymbals. I just he's like, last three people stole from us and that sucked. I just want somebody who's not gonna steal from us. Like, that's my new bar first. And, like, after that, I could figure out a higher higher level requirements. And so Did you see on, did you see on the TV show bear where they hire this you know, this guy. And on the first day, they catch him outside smoking crack. And they're like,
10:53
I think I need to fire you, but I should I should go but I should go ask.
10:58
And he's like, yes, chef. Fire him.
11:02
Yeah. And by the way, there's one lesson in there, which is my dad told me something. He goes, Look,
11:07
you're building a small business.
11:09
And he goes, but look, but think about it. You're still spending, like, every waking moment thinking about how to make this thing successful.
11:15
He goes, if you worked on a big business, you don't have to spend double the hours. You're still gonna spend every waking moment trying to think of how to make it successful. A big business and a small business both take the same amount of time, Why would you choose a small business? And that to me was the right advice for me, for who I was. That's not the right advice for everybody, but, like, Somebody out there needs to hear that right now, which is that, like, this idea that a a small thing is somehow easier or or less painful is just not true.
11:41
Is not true, and it it feels nice to be able to, like, pay people a lot of money or hire a certain type of person that makes your day to day far more enjoyable.
11:51
Talk about the naming thing. My opinion has changed on that to align with yours. So one one thing we have here is branding or naming at the beginning. So
12:00
I've evolved my philosophy. So I I used to try to get the whole thing right right away. I was very precious about my idea, and I wanted it my baby to be cute and be ready for its first day in school. And then I realized that nobody cares about my baby and that I have no and nobody's paying attention, this thing could be called dog crap. You know, it doesn't matter,
12:18
until it matters. And so now here's the balance that I figured out for me.
12:24
In most cases, I try to get the name right off the bat because changing the name is kind of annoying. You lose the brand recognition.
12:30
And I try to get the trademark. Because I made that mistake before of not owning my trademark and having to change my name
12:36
a year or two in because
12:38
I realized, oh, I'll never be able to sell this without owning the trademark. So that was a big mistake. But I don't know if that's true, dude. What do you mean? I don't own I I sold the hustle without owning that trademark. You didn't a trademark for the hustle as a media company. You didn't own anything? Because I know they have it now. We looked it up. They have it now. But but what happens is if they look and they see that they can't get it because it's taken.
13:00
Now you have a problem. Now you're either gonna get negotiated down. Is that true? I see, I didn't even know that. Like, when Moiz was selling native deodorant, he didn't own the trademark. And it was an issue? He's got the deal done. And they're like, wait, you don't have the trademark. He's like, yeah, but there's no other native deodorant they're like, okay, junior. What are you talking about? That's not how this works.
13:20
You know, and so then he's like, okay. Who the he he's I'll just go file for it. They're like, nope. It's taken by some guy, some woman or some guy sitting in Palo Alto, doing nothing squatting on it. And he goes to that person. He's like, hey. I'd like the trademark. He tells the story on the on his episode of the pod. I think, is, like, one of the first ten episodes of this podcast. But the short version is he goes and he offers the person some, like, you know, he's like, hey, can I have it? And they're like, no. And he's like, okay, I'll buy it, like, you know, for two grand. And they're like,
13:49
No. And then they figured out that he's selling his company and then that the price went, like, way up. And I think he ended up having to buy it for, like,
13:57
Either, like, a quarter million dollars or, like, one or two million dollars he had to buy the trademark at the last minute. That's so crazy. It's fine when you're he's selling the company for a hundred million, but, like, very painful process,
14:08
you know, to to do that. Better off just having it. You taught me something. I I thought that they were nonsense. But I but I also used to think me I mean, look, I my company was called the hustle. That's a horrible name. One time I had this conference called Concon, the content conference.
14:22
Like, I'm,
14:23
I'm I I I my first first business that I started making money online, it was called itch juice, maybe. Like, I, like, I'm horrible with names.
14:32
And, but now I do actually think they're way important before. I was, like,
14:36
names are bullshit. It doesn't matter what you call it. Someone's gonna come.
14:39
Now I'm, like, on board with naming and branding is is very valuable. So I don't think a bad name kills you, but a good name lifts you. I completely agree.
14:48
I think great design
14:50
is A huge value add and cost almost nothing. To have great design versus okay to bad design, it's not actually more money that it takes, it's taste. You just have to have the right people to do it. You can pay for that taste. Like, you can pay a fancy agency because you know they have the taste, but you can also just have taste yourself or find somebody that's cheaper that has taste. My feeling on design is I don't start with fancy design. I start with, like, you know, whatever simple design, and then I set a milestone almost as a reward, which is if we get to x, then I'm gonna fancy pants my design because it's more for me than it is really for anybody else at that moment.
15:27
But, you know, if you're if you're a consumer package good or something like that, then the packaging obviously super important. If you're a SaaS tool, for whatever your design, you know, doesn't matter as much.
15:37
Before I I launched Hampton, I paid an agency. I found an awesome agency overseas. So it was, like, I think fifteen or twenty grand. And we did a whole branding thing. And I'm like, I can't believe I'm doing this, and it was totally worth it. Did I send you that presentation? It was really good. And I liked it. I was like, oh, this is cool, and that's different. You wouldn't have would have never done that before. I have I never would have done that. It was totally worth it. We both were very,
15:58
cheap with things before. I was I wasn't cheap with spending money, but I was cheap with my time, meaning I placed no value on my time. And I think you were cheap with spending money even though you had a bunch of cash in the bank. Not anymore.
16:11
Then when I saw you spend twenty k on your branding before, and I was like, oh, that makes sense. He's got a killer name for his community Hampton. And then he's got, like, a really classy design that makes it feel elevated, which is my word of the year.
16:25
Then I was like, oh, yeah. What are the areas where I've been cheap? One of mine, for example, was in recruiting.
16:30
So
16:31
I used to take pride in just recruiting myself by hand, hunting,
16:36
and I would just be like, yeah, I'm gonna go find people, and I'm gonna, like, message them, and I'm gonna cold email them, and I'm gonna convince them, and I'm gonna interview them, and I'm gonna
16:44
And now I hire recruiters.
16:46
And I'm like, oh, for which roles for every role? Anything. If I if I need to hire, first thing I do, I just text my recruiter. This guy Carson. I'm like, yo, Carson. I need x. And, he's, like, a great e com recruiter. And so I'm, like, Carson, I need a I need x. And he's, like, on it. And he's, like, super aggressive. And so he's just like, instantly, we'll start sending me LinkedIn. I'm like, yes, no, yes, no. He does Is he a full time employee or he just he's got his own agency?
17:10
He's his own recruit he's his own solo shop. And so,
17:14
so I use him to hire for these roles And it just saves a ton of time, and then I'm able to and I have him sometimes I'll be like, yo, join this call so that you see what I ask so that when you're screening candidates, you just ask these questions before me. Right? And I'm getting a way better result using recruiters, and, yeah, you pay the commission when, when, when you hire the person, but, like,
17:35
hiring a great person faster is,
17:38
is totally worth it. So how do you without blowing up this guy at Carson spot, How do you pay them? Do you pay them a percentage? Yeah. It's the same as all recruiters. You pay a percentage of their first year salary. And if they don't And then do you pay them, like, six months later?
17:50
I pay him up. I think I what I do with him is I pay him, like, thirty days after they join, but if they don't work out, like, like we had one person who didn't who didn't work out three months in, So if it if they don't make it three months, then he just reimburses her credit to back or whatever. Alright. And then do you,
18:05
do you do it for all, like, even an entry level position? Everything. Anything we need. Anything I need now. I'm like, whatever I would spend the time doing, this guy is going to spend all of his time doing. And,
18:16
it just moves faster and he's better. And I'm like, why the fuck wasn't I using a recruit? I used to I used to take pride. And I was like, what am I trying to save here? The, like, you know, let's say you used to hire somebody for a hundred grand, let's say the recruiter fee might be fifteen or twenty percent. So you're gonna pay fifteen and twenty grand. That's a lot of money. Yes. But I do it
18:33
my biz if your business is working,
18:36
then it makes total sense to be using recruiters
18:39
to increase your pipeline and and save time and get the get good butts in seats faster versus
18:45
trying to do it yourself. That's time you're not focused on the business that takes longer.
18:50
The biggest thing that's changed with me with hiring is,
18:53
reference checks. So, like, for example,
18:56
I, messaged someone two days ago. I go, hey, I'm thinking about hiring this one person.
19:01
Do you think that they'd be
19:03
decent at managing a small team? And it says, I don't think they could manage anyone, let alone themselves.
19:08
That was the reply.
19:10
And my reply to my rep or my reply to that was,
19:14
alright. Thanks. And I don't hire that person it's so easy. That should be. Thank you so much. What's your address? I'm sending you something because most reference checks will not give you honesty. The when somebody goes out on Lemma's like, yeah. Let me save you some pain here and give you my honest truth, even though it doesn't feel good to take out opportunity away from somebody. It's like, you know, sweet baby Jesus. Thank you so much. I I I owe you one.
19:37
So, like, yeah, I was, like, over the top, like, nice to this guy, but
19:41
reference checks are so important, and I do two things differently. The one, I always ask for, like, three, I know I called those three and I go, who else did this person work with? Yes. Exactly. I don't give a shit about the three that they gave me. I'm just trying to, like, I'm trying to, like, figure out who I can refer who I can speak to that they didn't provide, but also I won't blow up the applicant spot, where if it's, like, know, it's like someone who I that will be a little bit secretive and not tell their current employer.
20:07
And then so I do that like crazy. And then here's what I ask consistently here's how the basically, the point is is I wanna hear bad shit about the person, and I wanna figure out if the bad stuff is I'm okay with. And so I say, what are they out of scale one to ten? They always say an eight or a nine. And I say, alright. How can they be a perfect tenant? Like, what's missing? And then that's typically when they'll tell me, like, bad stuff. And I'm always looking for that bad stuff. And I'm like,
20:31
well, you know, they've made, like, mistakes doing x, y, and z. Like, okay. I could put up with those types of mistakes or they,
20:38
they,
20:39
they, like, missed deadlines all the time. I'm like, well, I I'm not gonna put up with missed deadlines. That's I'm not willing to put up with that. So I, like, I do a shit ton of reference checks now. So someone taught me a good way to do reference checks. I don't remember the exact question, but it's something along there's there's two things that I do on the reference One is you're just trying to figure out, is this person
20:57
one of the best people that they worked with at that company? And so I'll ask you a question. I ask the following types of questions. I'll say. You know, my experience is that at every company, there's, like, you can look around the room and there's or three people inevitably in every single company who, like, they just have the team on their back. And you're just you just look at them, you think, man, if we didn't have this person, we would be in a rough spot, or, like, you know, these things these good things that are happening just probably wouldn't have happened if not for their force of will.
21:23
And I would be like, you know, who are the people, and I I use this to to him? Like, who are the people like that at your company?
21:29
Or I'll be like, would would you count this person as one of those people? And, I would I'm just trying to see how much conviction they have of being like, Oh, yeah. For sure. Or, like
21:38
yeah. You know, they're good. Right? It's like you could say, yeah, two different ways. I'm looking for which one of those it is. The second thing I'll ask is I'll be like,
21:47
you know, I'm thinking about hiring this. Like, I'm leaning towards hiring them. Because I'm kinda trying to disarm them. I'm trying to not make them feel like what they say is gonna, like, mess it up, but I'll be like, but, you know, but what I don't, but I don't feel comfortable with this. I don't know what they're not good and everybody has things they're not good at. I'm not sure
22:03
what I well, you know, like,
22:05
I know that they must have things that are gonna disappoint me or are gonna be
22:08
things that they're not strong at. I just don't know them yet. What are they for this person? So I can kinda feel like I have the full picture before I before I go ahead and pull pull the trigger and hire them. And that's how I get them to kinda tell me those things. Why'd you write paid tests? What's that? So my thing with hiring is,
22:25
I would say two things have improved my hiring. Number one,
22:28
paid tests instead of interviews.
22:31
So
22:32
I will spend the time
22:34
I'll spend three, four
22:36
hours creating a paid test. So I create a doc that's here's a brief, and I'll say I'm gonna pay you. And then depending on the role might be two two hundred bucks. It might be two thousand dollars. I'll pay you to spend a day on this.
22:49
Because I wanna see what you do because I just wrote words equal lies. It's like, I don't really I'd I'd rather just see your work than hear you tell me that you're good at work. And so paid tests is now I lean towards that. In the end, that saved me a ton of time. The second thing I did,
23:04
I have a buddy who I let invest in one of my companies that I didn't really need as an investor.
23:09
But I kinda thought I I kinda realized that, like, as a CEO, your job is just decision making, good judgment over and over a year. Are you the CEO of your ecomm business?
23:19
No. I'm more like a chairman. So I'm not active day to day now. But,
23:24
I will
23:25
I don't, what so what I'll do is I'm like, oh, CEO's job is just decision making or any leader. Let me just forget the word just any leader's job is decision making.
23:33
How do I get my decision making be better? And, like, the difference of making ten to twenty percent better decisions
23:39
every single month?
23:41
Adds up. That that creates a very different outcome. So I brought this guy in. And I and what I told him, I go, you know, I really want your help hiring. And he's like, yeah, sure. I'll, you know, see if there's anyone in my network. I go, no, no, no. I want you to do three interviews for this one role for me. I'm hiring a CMO,
23:54
and I, chief marketing officer, and I think this is the make or break hire for this business.
23:59
I want you on the call, and I want you to lead the interview, and I wanna listen. And so we did two things. First, I would interview them separately. You you the an investor, you you let an investor do that? He's my one of my best friends, and, yes, he invested my company. And he's he's himself a founder and and and whatever. So he's just got a lot of experience, and he I've seen him make great hires. And so What happened was I would interview them, then he would interview them. I would like them. And he'd be like, no, trash. And I'm like, what? Interesting.
24:25
What makes you say that? What did I like? What did you what not like? And the thing for him was always like, yeah. I pressed him for specifics, and he didn't
24:33
have any. He's like and what I realized was he presses for specifics way more than I was previously doing. So I would say, like,
24:42
I would try to figure out, do you have experience doing this?
24:45
You know, how would you rate yourself in this? Tell me a story. They would tell me one story. What he would say is, like,
24:52
Cool. What are the re what was the revenue when you started? What was it, you know, and then how did it grow in the first eighteen months? And they're like, he's like, if they don't even know that number, then they're out. Know, if you're if you're CMO, you don't know how much of the revenue change from day one to day, you know, month twelve or whatever, you're out. Then he's like, they would say the number. He'd be like, cool. What were the three things that you did? That most impacted that.
25:12
And he's like, you know, if you can't tell me three wins you've had in the three years you've worked there, that, like, most
25:17
impacted the the the and then he would say, oh, you did that thing? Okay. Cool. Can you screen share real quick and just show me, like, you're saying you did this. Can you just show me how you think about this? I wanna hear you talk out loud. And I was like, oh, okay. There's a different level level of specificity here that I need to be doing in my interview. So a very useful thing was seeing how a master does it so that I could up my game.
25:39
That's kind of an interesting thing because I've changed I did the one eighty. What was your before? What you're after?
25:45
I would create my before is I would create, like, the most ambitious goals,
25:50
because it was just like it was like mental masturbation.
25:53
Of, like, just using this spreadsheet and, like, saying, like, yeah, we're gonna three x this year.
25:58
And then, like five. Look at that. Yeah. I'm, like,
26:01
I'd be, like, Yeah. Can you, like, change that three to a five and change this zero to a nine? And, like, it's like, boom. We're there. Alright. Get after it, guys. I'm, like, And I didn't understand that, like, A ,they're the one doing the work and so it's kinda bullshit that I'm creating these crazy goals that there's no math behind it. I also thought that, like, really ambitious goals were inspiring.
26:22
I I actually think,
26:24
achievable goals are inspiring. And I try to hit, like, seventy five percent of the goals that we set. If if I'm if I'm not hitting about eighty percent,
26:33
my goal setting was quite bad. So I I hitting goals
26:36
hitting
26:37
hitting goals that are not that ambitious,
26:40
I think gets you a better outcome than missing incredibly ambitious goals.
26:45
I Like, he creates more momentum. I agree with you. Momentum is momentum is key.
26:52
Our software is the worst. Have you heard of HubSpot?
26:56
See, most CRMs are a cobbled together mess, but HubSpot is easy to adopt and actually looks gorgeous. I think I love our new CRM. Our software is the best. HubSpot,
27:06
grow better.
27:08
My goal thing now So every time I start a project, whether it's a company or inside of a company, just like a initiative, I got this thing called the kickoff doc. It's a one page doc that I fill out religiously,
27:19
And it's basically, like, starts as just like, what are we trying to do here? We're trying to do this in plain English. What are we trying to do? Then what does winning look like? And this is where I set two goals. So I have a floor goal and what I call the F-Yeah goal. The floor goal is basically, like, you know, if it was below this,
27:36
I'd be surprised, and I'd be a little disappointed.
27:39
And then the FIA goal is, what would have us running around here, chest bumping, being like, oh my god. I can't believe it happened. And now I have this rage, and I have kinda like my men in my dream.
27:52
And of course, we're gonna shoot for the dream, but we're gonna make sure that we also understand that, like, a win is a win, and anything above this floor is a win. And we have the two targets. So we ask ourselves, what would it take to get to the floor? What would it take to get to the to the to the F-Yeah goal, to get to the ceiling? And so that's the first thing I do. The second thing I do is I set an anti-goal learned this from Andrew Wilkinson, which was Yeah. That was smart. You could achieve, you know, you could double revenue,
28:16
but if I wake up every day and I'm stressed out or if I doubled revenue, but profits went to zero because I spent so much on marketing.
28:23
Well, then I kind of lost while winning. So anti-goals, like, you know, I'm not trying to work so hard. I don't see my kids. Right? Like, in life, I think anti-goals are really important to counterbalance. What and what are the the specific thing here is
28:35
what are the
28:38
understandable
28:38
traps we could fall into while trying to achieve those goals. So, for example, with this podcast, you know, I wanna double rev a double downloads. Great. What's a trap you could fall into? Every day, I'm on the algorithm trying to figure out what
28:52
clickbaity
28:53
shit I could do where I'm knocking on neighbors' doors asking them how they made their money, and then I pants them, and then I put a pie in their face. Like, yeah, that would do it, but
29:03
I would sell my soul and lose some dignity and not have that much fun doing it so that's, like, losing while winning. So I think anti-goals are really important to start doing those. The next thing on goal setting is
29:13
I realize that much more important than the goal. Like, it's like I would do these, like, big bursts where it's like we do this planning and set this goal then, like, three months later,
29:21
it's like, hey, what's the goal? And then, like, it's not even on the tip of anyone's tongue. And I'm like, oh, shit. This is backwards. Like, First of all, I shouldn't be the one setting the goals.
29:31
Because, like, you know, in Game of Thrones, the opening scene where Ned Stark has to, like, execute the guy, And his son is like, oh, do you have to do this? I can't someone else do this? And he says, no. Like, he who speaks the sentence must swing the sword. And it's like, I can't expect you to go do all the work. For some goal I set sitting in my boxers in Excel. Right? Like,
29:51
now it's like if I'm gonna set a marketing goal, I'm gonna set it with and really, like, the CMO has to own that goal. They have to know that that's what they want, that that's what they think is achievable.
30:00
I'm gonna
30:01
push back or hold the standard, but they're gonna ultimately speak the sentence because they're gonna be the ones who swings the sword. So I make them do it. And then the second thing I do is
30:09
I enforce that it's how do we keep this top of mind and at the tip of our tongue? And that's, like, creating rituals where we're seeing things daily and weekly
30:18
that,
30:20
tracks to it. Cause it's far more important to
30:23
regularly look at the KPIs
30:25
and ask ask the right questions versus
30:28
trying to set a great goal once and then never thinking about it or not really looking at
30:32
on a religious basis.
30:33
Do you lose your temper and yell have you ever made someone cry? Like an employee? Have you ever made an employee cry? Cause you yelled at him? Not because of you. No. I never yell, but, I've never made a cry because of you. You've never done that. I I've I don't think I've ever yelled. No.
30:47
I could be I could be, like, kind of else. I I could all curse. Like, I'll be like, hold on. Wait. What the fuck are we doing here? Right? But it's more of that that are just You've never been, like, You're an idiot. You've never insulted someone
31:00
or beat them up or just I'm sure that I've been rude. You know, just punch them in the face or just I'm sure I've been rude, but I but it you know, there's some finesse to my rudeness where it's, like, it's a backhanded slap, not a front handed slap type of thing.
31:13
There's been many times in the past where I've lost my anger, and I'll be
31:17
really just a huge bitch to someone. And, and, it's
31:24
like,
31:24
I deeply regret that. Not only do I regret that because it was just silly, but, like,
31:30
so the way that I used to, like, react to bad news is I would,
31:35
I would yell at people sometimes, and I would lose my temper, and I would freak out. And I realized that that is just so weak for so many. That is just a bad... One, I've come to the conclusion that I can't change people. So if I think someone is just repeatedly not screwing up,
31:53
I I just I shouldn't have hired them. I made that mistake. I someone is either great You you're normally a great
31:59
executor who sometimes makes mistakes,
32:02
or you're just never gonna change and you're just not good. Like, I think losers exist and I don't want to surround myself with them. That's kinda like my my attitude. Like your sign, it's like a a store that's like, you know, no shoes, no shirt, no service. It's like losers exist. We must avoid them. Like, keep them out. Yeah. Like, I think that that's real. Like, losers exist. And sometimes I've been a loser. I tweeted this out when I was working at Twitch, I go or, like, right after I left Twitch, I think. I tweeted this out. I go
32:27
Well,
32:28
you know,
32:29
seems to be a pattern. You know, basically, there's a pattern now, which is that when someone's great, odds are they're great kind of right away. Like, of course, there are exceptions, but I would say the general rule is that the best people I've ever hired,
32:41
it's pretty obvious within three, four weeks that they're amazing. And that they just stay amazing. And
32:47
of the people that were late bloomers,
32:49
the key there was just the the only consistent pattern I found was I hired somebody before I even understood what role they should have or what the role is. And, like, when they had an undefined role, they didn't really do very well. Then when I defined a role for them, and I said, look, this is what you gotta do.
33:06
They performed. And what I found is that when I have a defined role for someone and they're not very good,
33:11
It never, never really changes for me. Yeah. You can't change them. You can't change people. And I used to be I used to lose my temper, and I would, like, curse and I would, and I definitely made people feel stupid. And that was that's such a bad mistake because,
33:24
a, that's just wrong. That's just not how you should treat people, but b, I I'm not gonna get my desired outcome. They're not gonna change. Exactly. I I I still suck at that. I would be honest. I'm not, like, a yeller, but I can make people feel small. And I kinda realized this the other day, I was, like, in every interaction,
33:39
you're either gonna walk away, like, you're gonna leave someone, and they're either gonna feel a little bit smo like, they're gonna feel either smaller or bigger based on how that interaction went, how you treated them.
33:49
And I was like, damn, I I think I've make people feel small a lot. And, you know, I'm I think I'm doing it in service of, like, We're doing dumb shit. We need to do the right thing.
33:59
But I'm definitely not like, I've seen people who are really good at
34:04
still getting the thing done without ever making people feel small.
34:07
And I wanna learn that, Jed, I Who's an example? Who's an example of someone who does that?
34:13
Our buddy, Sully, I think, is pretty good at that. I don't know what he's like inside of a company, but, like, I've seen him kind of, like, as a adviser
34:20
type of guy.
34:22
And,
34:23
I know what he's thinking in the moment. I'm like, oh, man. He's gotta be looking at this being like, what in the actual fuck is going on here?
34:31
But that's not what comes out of his mouth,
34:33
and he will
34:35
finesse his way there. And I don't think it's because he's a kinder nicer person. I think it's because the last thing you said, which was I think he's realized that's not how you get to your desired outcome.
34:44
That's not how you get desired outcome. Not at all. Exactly. So so I think that that's
34:49
That's definitely a,
34:51
an area to improve. And in fact, like, the one time I did make somebody cry was when I was firing somebody, and I realized in that moment, I was like, oh, he's not crying because he's sad that getting fired. Obviously, there's that part of it, but, like, he's very surprised.
35:02
And that's on me. Like,
35:05
I was too scared to
35:08
be clear upfront that, hey, this isn't going the way we needed to go, and it's gotta go differently. And here's what the level is. And this is not, like, this con currently not at the level. And so I want I avoided that tough conversation there, and now I'm having a tougher conversation.
35:23
Because I avoided that one. How many people have you fired?
35:27
I don't know, like, twenty?
35:30
Really?
35:31
Yeah. That's that's a lot. Right? I don't know. I've been going for sixteen years, like, you know, one of years. Not not that long, not that much.
35:40
I've not fired that many people. I'm such a punk. So there's a story about Dave Port. There's a story about Dave Portnoy
35:46
and, like, Dave Portnoy is, like, I don't fire people. Like, it's it's impossible to get fired by me. I read, I'll just pay you and you just are lazy and a bum, and I'll just make fun of you. And it's good content. I kinda feel the same way. I suck at firing. I, I have a good script. I basically say, like, right off the bat. Go. Alright. This conversation's gonna stink, but I'm firing you today, and we could talk about why if you want. Now I don't even say why. I'm just like, this isn't working out because it doesn't benefit me to say why. It only hurts you because I can sue you. But, I'm horrible at firing people. Like, I, I, like, I'm such a punk. I, like, I, I, I hate having that conversation that I avoid it. But it's just like anything else. Like, you just stretch the pain out longer versus rip off. Oh, I know. The key is
36:26
and I say this because everybody who every manager, everybody who becomes a manager of any people, like, don't worry. You suck. Everybody sucks as a manager at the beginning. Nobody
36:35
is naturally just like an amazing manager right off the bat. It is a learned skill. And,
36:41
the key to firing, though, if you learn nothing else about firing, is
36:45
In the first ten seconds, you need to say the news. Just do not beat around the bush. You know, the reason we're here today is because we're gonna let you go. And, you know,
36:54
that has to come out of your mouth in the first ten seconds. And if you say anything else Right away. In the first ten seconds, just realize you're being a complete asshole because, when it does come and they realize, wait, what were you just saying all that stuff about? Why didn't what? And you're gonna blindside them in a much worse way. It's it's key. Absolutely key.
37:14
I have a couple other areas I wanna ask you about. One is, I think, probably the key to making shit work.
37:20
Keeping things simple and focused and knowing what to say yes to and what to say no to,
37:25
Do you have anything that you actually do
37:27
to make that to, like, do that better now?
37:30
I think that I'm
37:32
so good at focus and I'm bad at it. I've missed a lot of interesting opportunities, but by default, I say no to everything.
37:39
And it's actually cost me,
37:41
a bunch.
37:42
Like, for example,
37:43
at the hustle, we thought about launching multiple newsletters, and I was like, nope. Do this one thing. We're gonna do it well because Scott Belsky told me to focus
37:52
and to only do this one thing. So I'm literally gonna say no to everything.
37:56
And
37:56
our competitor did, and they scaled their revenue significantly faster. So I said no to too much, actually, but, I might my default was just I'm gonna say no to everything.
38:06
That's interesting.
38:07
I'm the opposite. I'm a shiny object, you know, syndrome kinda guy. And so By the way, the hustle didn't we didn't even have an Instagram channel until, like, four years in. Like, I, like, I was like, no. We're not gonna do social media. We're doing nothing.
38:22
It was like, we're doing nothing. We're just gonna do this one stupid newsletter all the time. Like, can we have lunch?
38:27
No.
38:30
Dude, one of my biggest, one of my CEO of by the way, I used to be really cheap. One of deep in my soul, the thing that hurts me most is one time
38:39
I bought all the supplies from Costco for a conference
38:43
And I ended up returning two thousand dollars worth of, like, canned soda
38:47
and stuff. And, like, the lady at the front desk was, like, You're pathetic.
38:52
And because I was like, what?
38:54
And she's like, you know, we throw all this stuff away. Is this just from from some party that you threw? And it was like, my answer was even worse, which was like, no. It's for a business conference. I made a lot of money. And, like,
39:06
and, like,
39:07
hurts my soul that I was so cheap that I returned open cans of soda to Costco for two thousand dollars.
39:14
Like, crushes me. Like, like, the twenty four, like, the twenty four case was like, partially used.
39:20
Yeah. And I and, like, I was like, I can't believe that was such a punk move. I can't believe I did that.
39:27
That's one of my biggest regrets.
39:29
That's next to this one time. I tipped this taxi driver and he said, oh, no. You don't need to do this. And I said, oh, no. You need it instead of you earned it. Like, those two things are, like, the two things that, like,
39:41
crush my soul. I'm, like, I can't believe I said that.
39:44
But what what what what were you saying? You're talking about, focus. What were you talking about? Focus. Fucking a focus.
39:51
As we get back on track.
39:56
I create I I now have a a thing which is I I create a a a doc for every business every year that's called the the big bet doc, which is basically, like, we we are gonna make some bets this year. We're gonna do some things.
40:08
But let's be super,
40:10
conscious about what we're saying yes to and what we're saying no to. So my big bets doc and I'll literally write it like this. I'll say something like
40:19
we bet number one.
40:22
We really suck at inventory management. Today, forecasting is just me looking at the spreadsheet and making up numbers based on what I hope happens.
40:29
I know there's probably a smarter way to do this. Other people certainly have solved this problem.
40:34
I need to figure out how to hire people who know how to do this. So the bet is I'm gonna hire two people, and that's gonna lower our waste from x to y. And I write a sentence like that. And then that's my bet. I'm gonna make this higher for this outcome
40:48
because of this problem. And I write in a bet number two.
40:53
You know, you keep talking about businesses though. Are you what how many are you what how many Well, like, I I would do this even for the podcast. Right? Like big bets. Right?
41:01
Hiring Ari. Okay. Why? Why why'd you do this? Why did you make this bet? Or we just launched the clips channel? Okay. Why am I going through this effort where I'm sitting here clipping my favorite parts of podcasts because I hope that somebody out there wants to just listen to the best parts on YouTube when they come up because that's how I like to listen to things. And so I'll write it out. And I'm like, if I'm gonna invest my effort, my time, my money into something,
41:24
then I write it out. Or, like, you know, maybe it's for Shepherd.
41:27
For Shepherd, hey, here's the bets that we're gonna make.
41:30
And so I'll do this exercise. This is so useful. So I write the big bets and it's like, here's the three to four big bets that we're gonna make. The things that we're gonna bet on that we're gonna do, that we're gonna invest in, and we're gonna try to do really, really well. And then I'll make the no list right before that. And the no list, I write, There are a bunch of other things that we could talk ourselves into doing that are easily justifiable.
41:49
However, we're gonna say no to these things this year, because we wanna do the we actually want the things above to happen. And then I'll make the no list. Here's the things we're not gonna do this year that we totally could have talked ourselves into. So for me, that was a very useful exercise. And then when I bring people on, everybody, I sit down with them with this big bets list. I'm like, here's what we're doing. And then if they're the one responsible for it, I'm I treat it like a commercial because I'm like, I need to make this memorable. I need this person to wake up and remember, because it's not just for me to be focused. I need my whole team to be focused. How do I do that?
42:21
I basically
42:22
shrink down
42:23
one of these bets into a almost like a like a slogan or a jingle for their role. It's like your your mission is this. Remember that, and I'm gonna say that to you probably a hundred times in the next three months. And, we're just gonna keep checking in on that. And that's how I'm gonna bonus you is if you did that or not. And that's how I'm gonna assess your performance. If you did that or not. And if I ever if if I ever what's a priority? It's that. That's the priority. And I took this because, like, Peter Teel said that he did this at PayPal. He's like, yeah. I don't know whatever. Management's not my favorite thing. So here's my shortcut to management.
42:54
Everybody at any time has one priority. And if you ever try to talk to me about not that priority, I will just simply leave the room.
43:01
I thought that was just a visual. That was so funny to me. What's fucking weirdo. That I was like, Peter, can you can you be normal for what? Like, yeah, if someone just walks up walk stood up and walked away when I was telling telling them about stuff. I'm like, dude, can you just speak to him? He just had an idea about a new program that we could do. And he just, like, drifts away, like, a hot air balloon.
43:24
What a weirdo, man.
43:26
There's stories of I dig it. There's store there's stories of Elon doing that or, like, in an interview, like, within thirty seconds, he would be like, oh, I'm not interested in this person. And so he would just hang up.
43:36
Yeah. He he emailed out a Tesla.
43:39
Closing. He was like,
43:41
if you're in a meeting and in the first few minutes of the meeting, you realize that this is not useful to you or to anybody, please stand up and leave. Like, your time is valuable. These meetings are a drain and, vote with your feet. Just get up and go. That is a completely acceptable behavior here at Tesla.
43:57
Do you ever send emails with the
43:59
one of those emails where the subject is the body of the email? Yeah. Of
44:01
course.
44:04
It's just like a pager. Basically, you're treating it like a pager.
44:08
I had one of the only jobs I ever had. My boss sent me an email like that. And I was like, is this how we send emails?
44:14
And then I
44:16
I I sent them an email. I go, what's the status on this, this thing? And it was in the subject. And the reply was, don't ever send me an email like this again.
44:25
It was a very seriously.
44:27
I I actually I think there are those levels. So, basically, what I realized is that
44:31
rich people or busy people treat email like texting.
44:34
So their email is, like, lowercase on their phone, one line totally fine. That's, like, their normal way of of emailing.
44:41
And then
44:43
mega rich people
44:45
treat email like it's letters. They'll have somebody actually screen them, print them out, and then they'll kinda, like, review them at their desk and paper. This is, like, the old school way of of doing things. Who do you know who does that? I think Mark Laurie does that if I had a guess. I like he did tell us that. Trump does that. He went on. He told us he didn't even own a computer. He didn't own a computer. Yeah. But, like, I I've I met a couple of people. One of my old bosses to do that. Like, he used to print out his important his assistant would print out his important emails and just put them on his desk so that he could, like, see them and he would just leave a sticky note on them and she would go figure out what to do.
45:17
I, you know, I worked for a guy who had four women at the office with giant TV screens, just managing his inbound emails. And he would just stand and walk around. They would be like, oh, this person said this. They pull it up on the screen. He would just orally dictate his reply, and then he would walk away, and then they would just keep managing. This is insane. Ma'am, most of the day, I feel like I'm responding to stupid ass messages, like on Slack, Twitter,
45:37
text, email.
45:39
It I cannot stand it, man. It is so hard. So I actually think printing out that thing and replying. It could be kinda cool, actually. Yeah. We're creating you need some kind of firewall. Like, for me, it's like my assistant is the firewall. She triages all the emails, and then I only check my email for thirty minutes a day. Like, you know, because it's already taken care of. And if there's something that needed a faster reply, she'll tell me. She'll text me. And then that's it.
46:02
There was one other thing that I was gonna share, which is
46:06
There's a big difference, I think, that's worth saying, which is pre product market fit and post
46:12
So pre product market fit, what you do versus post is very different. I think most of this call has been about post.
46:19
But, actually, like, most of my life has been about before you have product market fit. Before you have product market fit, you don't do any of these things. You literally just figure out what your product is, and you go try to sell it and get customers.
46:29
And then you basically get rejected and, you know, you handle that and you iterate
46:35
until you figure out what the product should be and who the customer should be. And you've proven how to get product and customers to go up,
46:42
you know, to connect and and get more customers. Like, I think that's worth saying too. And then after you have figured that out, after you have figured out that this product actually has a market and you know how to communicate it to customers, you know how to get customers, then you hire people to, like,
46:57
do more of that. And I would say, like, I saw you firsthand with Hampton doing this. We're like, There was a couple months where
47:04
you showed me your calendar,
47:05
and it looked like a jenga tower.
47:08
It was twenty minute calls stacked on top of each other.
47:11
Sometimes overlapping.
47:13
And I was like, what is this? Like, where do and you're like, yeah. I'm trying to go get the members for Hampton. I'm trying to figure out what Hamptid is. And you you sent me, like, a, like, a kind of a script or, like, a landing page you were writing it yourself Yeah. Trying to explain what the benefits are and who it's for And you considered, like, you know, should I take this angle or this angle or this angle? Like, would help you, you know, like, reply on the Google doc. Well, it's kinda like,
47:36
kinda like being a comedian. You know what I'm saying? Like, when you when Hassan Minhaj finally does his Netflix show, he's done two hundred before that and you see which angle hits. Right. It's the same thing. It's like I gotta see which angle is hitting.
47:48
Someone tweeted out or something they're like,
47:51
product market
47:53
product market fit is like sex. If you have to ask, you're not having it or something like that. And I was like, that's so stupid. I've definitely asked him both of those that you if I have it or not.
48:06
Like, that's one of those lines. That's one of those lines that sounds good. But,
48:11
that ain't true.
48:13
I was uncertain multiple times about both of them things.
48:20
Is it happening? Is this it? Is this happening? Are we doing it?
48:26
That's the pod.
00:00 48:50