Taylor Milliken
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Barry: [00:00:00] Welcome to Business On Purpose. Taylor Milliken is my guest. He is the c e o and and Visionary for Milosi in Nashville. Welcome to the show, Taylor.
Taylor: Thank you, Barry. Excited to be on.
Barry: How have you been, man? I'm good. I love it. I'm good. Yeah. I just got back from rise Up Kings that it was it was life changing, man. Yeah. It, yeah, it's a big deal for me.
Taylor: Do, do we have, do we have time for you to tell me about it
Barry: or?
Absolutely. We have time for you, for me to tell you about it. I mean, it's, um, it's a lot of hard stuff. You gotta do the hard stuff. It's a lot of man stuff, you know. It's, it's, it's nothing I'm, none of, it's nothing I haven't done before, um, you know, in the Marines, but it was different. Number one, you know, I'm, I'm getting ready to turn 47 years old and.
47 ain't 27. I'm gonna tell you that. Yeah. [00:01:00] And then there's stuff that I haven't done for like 20 some years that I'm like, okay. Um, just nervousness and, and excitement and like, get jacked up, you know? And, and, um, it was, it really pushed my, my, um, you know, one of the things that, that they were talking about at, at one point was the problem that we as entrepreneurs and people who are there, one of the problems we have is our 50% is better than most people's.
A hundred percent. And you really get this notion that you are not living to the level that you, you, you could or should. Mm-hmm. And it's true, you know. The, the, but the good news is, is like for me, I get to hang out with people like you, and I'm like, I, I, I see it right in my face. Like there's another level.
And so, but it, when you [00:02:00] experience it, you really know that there's another level. And that I've been, I've been half stepping a lot of things that I shouldn't be half stepping. And it's easy to compare myself with people when I'm half stepping and you're, you're way ahead not to say it the wrong way.
Right. And 'cause you and I can half step and be ahead. True, true. Yeah. So that was one of the things that hit me. Um, just got real, real about getting real and, and in my marriage, in my business, in my faith my fitness, all the things. Really needs to be leveled up. And I have, since I've been back really just leveled up with, with all of those things it's refreshing.
Yeah.
Taylor: Barry, it's what, what you're saying is hitting home, but I'm also [00:03:00] struggling, like I'm in a season of, of kind of the, I'm in the struggle bust with this because I think I get it twisted sometimes at that whole level up that living life, like to the nth degree and that a hundred percent it, it can fill to me like a rat race sometimes, and I, I can, I can work myself towards what I, what I envision is that, that a hundred percent to the point of like burnout.
Yeah. Yeah. And, and I'll give you an example. Like right now, you know, if we are talking about, you know, e o s and, and accountability chart, I'm, I'm technically in, in four, you could shade it over to five seats right now if you really filled that. Truly feel the integrator seat. Um, and so I'm, man, I'm, I'm struggling a little bit in, in some ways.
Um, and then yesterday my buddy, he sent me a picture. He is at the gun range at 2:00 PM [00:04:00] you know, the middle of the day. And I'm like, I love you, drew. And he is like, what? Why? I said, because you inspire me. I said, you gotta figure it out, dude. And I said, you are living your life on purpose. I said, you know exactly what you want to do.
And, and I feel like that I know exactly what I wanna do until those days hit where I'm like, what in the world am I doing? I've worked myself, my goals have worked me into a place of, of discontent. Yeah. Or into a place of busyness. Mm-hmm. And so that's, that's what I'm, you know, really working on. And it, and it's, and that's why I told my sister yesterday, I said, I'm two positions away from living the best life that I've ever had in terms of business.
Two positions away. So that's why, and, and as you know, as our integrator, you know, those, there's two roles right now that we're working hard to fill, um, and and we're making progress. Um, so that's exciting. But I'm in a season right now that it, it feels harder for me to live that 100%, and [00:05:00] that's like full strides and steps and things like that.
So, um, but like last two days ago you got, you know, I'm, I'm running a half marathon coming up and on, on Monday, one of my goals was to, had, had, you know, to run and, you know, work, work, work, work, work, work, work, work. And at the end of the day, I'm like, I still haven't ran. So I went and ran, you know, from seven, you know, seven to eight o'clock at night and got home, had dinner, and did I feel accomplished?
Absolutely. Um, but also I, I felt like I traded those, that time for my time with my family at home that particular night. So those are the things that sometimes it's like that. That, that can be contradictory, you know, of kind of my life's purpose versus my life's goals sometimes. And, and sometimes I've gotta make sure that they, that they're aligned at all times.
Barry: Well, you're, you're doing what most of us do is, is we, and I talked to my son about it actually this [00:06:00] morning, um, and he was talking about, you know, he, you know, he's golfer, he, he, everything about his life is about golf. It's about the business of golf. You and I are all about the business of business, right?
And that's really not what I took away from Rise up Kings is the business. I mean, I, I don't need to work more. There are some things where I'm not being effective at work as I should be. I'm not gonna work. So much more hours, I'm gonna be more effective in the hours in which I'm working. Mm-hmm. And I think that's where you are with your hires, that you, you're going to hundred percent, but my walk with God is the thing that was preventing me from this other success or [00:07:00] lack thereof.
Oh yeah. I thought I was walking with God. I wasn't even half stepping. Hmm. I was barely stepping. Hmm. Um, yeah. And so then it bleeds into family and then you go to fitness, which, you know, I'm okay at. My problem with fitness is I can, we talked about it like I can wear people out in fitness at, at 46. I don't have to really even train for a half to break two, two hours.
It's ridiculous. Well, that's sad that I would even do that. Right, right. Work is easy for you and I, so I was telling my son, I'm like, work is working at golf is easy for you, but what are you doing over here with your ego and your, and your insecurities that are, that are preventing [00:08:00] you from being spiritually, the, the man you're supposed to be mentally, the man you're supposed to be.
Familial, the man you're supposed to be your friends and other parts of your life because we can dig in and, and, and only focus on business. And, and for him it's golf and feel, feel a, a sense of fulfillment because we're just head down. Yeah. So, yeah, we're gonna, like, I'm, I'm excited to, to really work through deeper work with you to get you those two hires and, and so, and, and, and make sure that they level up and give them the tools and, and the responsibility.
And, and here you go. Like, this is yours. Um, and then call them up. That's another thing that I'm really switching is call out versus call up. [00:09:00] You know, we call someone out, it's really about our ego trying to, you know, control the situation. But if I call you up to be the person and the man that you were designed to be, that's a different heart.
Hmm. And so that's a, that's a, that's a little terminology difference that I've, that I've adopted from this. Rise up Kings.
Taylor: Unpack that a little bit more,
Barry: Barry. Yeah, I can. And, and so
Taylor: if, if, if I, I, I feel like I understand the concept of calling out, but what's un unpack? Calling up.
Barry: Yeah. If I'm in a session room, and this is where it happens to me the most, because I can call people out because, I mean, I do live what I, what I say, you know what I mean?
It's not like I'm, I'm a hypocrite walking around and telling you something that I'm doing something much different, right? But my standards and someone else's standards might be different. My [00:10:00] capabilities and someone else's capabilities might be different. Taylor's capabilities are different than other people's capabilities, and so calling someone out, part of that is to call them out to our capabilities, what we expect of us calling someone up.
Is calling them up to their capabilities and their level, which is always higher than they think it is, but calling them up to their, to their standards and then asking them about higher standards that they would like to have is, is a different thing. And then calling out would be, I want this from you because I want it and because of what it's gonna do for me calling up is I'm gonna call you up for what it does for you, and I'm sure I'll benefit, but it's more about you and, and, and living what you say you wanna live [00:11:00] within what we're doing here than it is what I get out of it.
Taylor: Sure, yeah. Yeah. I'm going through that in my mind right now. I'm playing, you know, a, a meeting out or training or one of our L tens and, um, and seeing how that would, would apply. I can, I can. That helped me understand how, you know, essentially it's, it is telling someone that you believe in 'em and that, hey, what happened there?
I believe that, that you can, you can do this, and I believe that you can reach, you know, a higher standard because how much you believe in 'em versus telling people what they're doing wrong or telling people that they're, that they're not meeting expectations. Yeah. Yeah.
Barry: So that's another thing, like, you know, shame versus this is changing language.
Yeah. Shame versus curiosity. Mm-hmm. You know, I, I've really picked up some and I think language is huge, right? It is. And so, yeah, talking to people about like what they could do, they might be able to do better, and then following up with like, [00:12:00] if you're, if you're picking up shame and, and, and guilt and, and, and judgment from me, that's, that's not what I'm laying out.
So if you're picking that up, what is it in you? That is picking that up because that's not my intent. Mm-hmm. That's the thing that's, that starts changing me, is like I was picking up judgment from people who were not judging me. Yeah. Because I was judging myself. Yeah. And then, and then putting it on them as if they are.
Yeah. So we go through these really hard things and I, I won't give it away 'cause because hopefully you'll go through it, but, and they're, we're going through physical pain and they're asking questions of me during this and, and, and I literally couldn't, I'll call it, win the debate. ' cause if you put me in this and I'm comfortable, you know, you, [00:13:00] you've been in a room, like you're just it, you better be really good at debating and asking questions if you're gonna beat me.
But when I was in the middle of this pain, I literally couldn't think to win the debate. So my, my answers were very vulnerable and very, like, I didn't even know I had those answers in me.
Taylor: Well, you were in survival mode. Your, your brain was automatically in, in, in survival gear. And so it wasn't thinking about logic at this point in time.
It wasn't, it wasn't allowing you to analyze and be analytical and it was just all about the, the pain was, was putting your brain into a place of just keeping you alive. Yeah. That's just, that's the, the way that our brains work.
Barry: So, it's so funny because like talking to my wife and kids now, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm in a different state because I, I'm not [00:14:00] feeling that they're attacking me physically, you know what I mean?
And because, and, and I'm like, So I can get very curious about how I'm showing up. That's, that's, that's causing them to feel a certain way when they're, when they're talking to me. The key for
Taylor: the, for, for these and for you and for me. 'cause I've, I've went through, I told you a life changing event.
Whenever I went to the before, you know, leadership breakthrough is how do we keep it going? 'cause I can tell you that it's so easy for this high that we're on to wear off and, and you know, truthfully, it's wore off for me, but I have to keep going back to that place and keep finding. And so it's the tactical pieces of what, how can we keep that spirit alive on a daily, weekly basis?
And knowing that we're gonna have to give ourself grace. 'cause we're gonna hit the bottom. We're gonna hit, we're gonna go through the trials and the tribulations of life and business and all the emotions and 'cause [00:15:00] we're, you know, the chemical process that happens inside our brain and our bodies. So things are gonna happen, but we've gotta go back, figure out a way to reset.
Um, and I was thinking about this while I was, what, what helped me the other night run was the. Like can do attitude because honestly I wanted to go home the other night. Yeah. Long workday, I got a lot accomplished, but it was just, and frankly what had I was, I was gonna run earlier, but I got a phone call from somebody and it was, it was an important kind of friend of the family.
They don't often call me and all of a sudden I found myself in this position of like, do I take this phone call or do I go do this? And so I took the phone call, which is kind of true Taylor, um, mode because I say yes to things, sometimes I shouldn't. But this was a really good conversation. I felt like that, that once I got off the call, this person needed to talk to me.
Hmm. And you know, whether it was [00:16:00] God telling me to take the call or my ego or my, just me saying yes to more things I don't really truly know. But next thing you know, I was on the phone with him for 45 minutes. Well, there went my window, that was my window to get my run in. And I said yes to this. But then I, I finished up and I was like, all right, because I had a late, a late meeting for Black Wolf at the, at this time.
We got finished, had a great meeting, and every part of my D n A wanted to go home, but I was able to pull that, that, but LB one talks about of living, they call it fill in the dash. Yeah. As a samurai, you know, the dash between, you know, born date and deceased date, fill that dash with things on purpose. And that's like,
Barry: so we, we did something very similar to that at, at Rise Up Kings.
Yeah. Um, it, it was super powerful. Um, yeah. I'm with you
Taylor: on that brother. Yeah. But I was like, alright. So I mustered up the [00:17:00] strength, I was like, I'm gonna go run. It's gonna be great. And, and started just pouring that positive energy into it. And I went and ran. I got finished. I felt fantastic. Then I got home and I still spent time with the kids.
But I had a pause there of, of. Asking myself if I did the right thing, did I do the right thing? And, and there's kind of the jury's still out right now, right? When I, when I do that, do I, am I doing this in a selfish way? Is this just for me or is there a larger purpose here? Am I showing my kids, you know, that you, you can, you can do both, you can do all three, whatever.
Um, and that's where I'm at in a place right now when I have those days, which for fortunately, there, there're a few and far between. Yeah. I still show up for my kids game. Last night we were at the ballpark till 10 30 Saturday night, you know, all day long. So I'm, I'm definitely there and I'm present, so, um, but I, I was able to get those things checked [00:18:00] off that day and it meant a lot for me to get that done.
But I still question sometimes is it for the right reason? Yeah. Is, is it okay to not get that done sometimes? And just making a decision instead of not doing it because I'm lazy. Me actually deciding, you know what, I'm not gonna do this today because I'm gonna do something else instead. Yeah. And, and that's where I, I get a little conflicted sometimes.
Barry: Yeah. The, um, there's, there's a lot there. One of the things about what, what we've bought went through is in, in ruck at Rise Up King's, right? Ruck is they really have built in this system of long-term accountability. And, and so I, I signed up for the Mastermind, right? And so there's a, there's Ruck 38, which I was ruck 38.
And so we have those 30, those, those [00:19:00] 24 men. Or I think 22 of us actually signed up outta 24. Um, and then there's a overall community and they do a really good job of getting everybody together once a week doing the, the learnings. You get these, you get accountability partners. And what I love about it is there's an accountability partner of like, I have two other men.
And so when you have, like, if me and you are accountability partners, I'd be like, well, he could, he could reach out to me today and or, or I could reach out to him and, and some days neither one of us would 'cause we could expect the other person to. Right. And then over time, maybe neither one of us do.
'cause Well, if he's not reaching out to me, then I'm gonna reach out to him. Or, you know how that goes. Yeah. But this was three, so you, you reach out to one and another one reach out to you. So you are supposed to reach out to one. And, and, and it's like a, it's a circle. So it's, it's not up to this [00:20:00] person to reach out to me.
I reach out to them and this person reaches out to me. And I think that's genius. Yeah. So now if I don't reach out, like I'm, I'm kind of the jerk that didn't reach out. Yeah. Yeah. So somebody doesn't reach out to me. Yeah. I can talk to the guy that I reached out to and he's reached out to him and I'm like, Hey man, I didn't get anybody reach out to me.
And he's like, Hey, have you reached out to Barry? So you took this? Yeah. And, and if you think about God, it's the, it's the three strand that can't be broken. Yeah. Or it's hard to break me, my wife and God. Like it's hard to break, you know, if that's intertwined. And so it's, it's it's, there's a lot of it built in accountability and brotherhood and.
It's pretty impressive. And, and they do a good job about getting you all connected and really at the end of that three days, like you're, you're tight. Yeah. It's [00:21:00] crazy. And some of the things, like, some of the things that we did, like scared the heck outta half the people because they'd never experienced this type of thing before.
And like they were legit afraid, wanting to leave. Yeah. And every one of them, to their credit, just faced it.
And even like at one point, there was one thing and I was like, I'd done it before, but not at this level. And I was afraid. And I'm like, well, here we go. I hate to be so like cryptic. But
Taylor: I have to be in case you go. I get it. Yeah. It's the same, same, you know, all, all will be known in due time. Is is like what we say about rapport, all will be known in due time.
Yeah. Well, tell me about it. Well, it's it was life changing, but, you know. Yeah.
Barry: And really, like, if I, if I look at like, you and I are better at business than most of these people, it [00:22:00] just, I, I, I'm always surprised about how people can have a multimillion dollar company and really not know what they're doing except for they know how to do the thing.
I'm like, well, you don't know how to process. You don't have processes. You know, you just, but I'm in this, you know, e o s world, that it's all I live and breathe. So I've been there before. Trust me. Yeah. But, you know, everybody gets something different. I love it. So it's good.
Taylor: But those guys are, they're, they're great at something.
Barry, you know, there's. You know, it's, I think it's the, it is, a lot of times it's the curse of knowledge. I think that, yeah. Um, I fall into that trap a lot because I know quite a bit about several things in terms of business. Well, what I ends up end up doing is I take the monkey, I, I put the cape on, and where if, if I didn't know that, I think that in a lot of ways I've truly feel that in a lot of ways I would be further along.
Oh yeah. Because I would've, [00:23:00] 'cause I would've been forced to hire people that, that could, and so I think that the curse of knowledge and or that desire to, you know, my ego, I think has held me back for so many years and I've really been understanding that over the last 3, 4, 5 years probably. That, and I didn't know that.
Like, I don't ever, I don't think that I'm a cocky person. I don't think that I'm an arrogant person. I don't think I ever have been. But I've always liked, I. I like to win. Hmm. And that desire to win and, you know, quarterback through all, all through high school and being that leader in that center of the, of the offense and give me the ball coach, I'll run with it kind of mentality.
Yeah. Um, has frankly held the company back. Hmm. And, and I'll give you some true case examples is when, when we began building our sales team, anytime we fell behind in sales, rather than me going and coaching our sales team, I would just go sell more. [00:24:00] Right. I would just go sell and then I'd get us back on track and then I'd and, you know, would give the team all the, the praise and the glory or whatever.
But no, truly, truly, truly in the deep of my, I, I felt good about it. Yeah. And, and that was, and that held me back. That was, that was the wrong way to do it. That's not true leadership. So I was not building the ladder as, as John Maxwell talked, I wasn't a ladder builder. Um, at, at all. Yeah. For other people I was just, I was wanting to be the hero.
Barry: And, um, how did, how did, how did you make that switch?
Taylor: I mean, just the pain, you know, pain, pain is, is one of the most powerful things that we can experience in life. Yeah. And the pain and the burnout, um, made me realize that, that this isn't the, wasn't the life that I wanted. Um, at that time, I was truly, truly working.
I'd get up, would, would be working [00:25:00] from essentially six in the morning and a lot of times wasn't going to bed till 11, 12 o'clock at night. And was about the only break that I would have would be for dinner as soon as dinner got finished. And, um, and again, the, one of the questions. That began to change my life was my kids started coming to me and saying, daddy, are you gonna have to work tonight or are you gonna be able to play with me?
Mm. And I was just, it, it demoralized. And and I realized at that point in time, if I don't change my life, my kids are gonna stop asking me to play with them.
Barry: Wow. How, how long ago has that been? Um,
Taylor: probably about, about five or six years ago. Yeah. And, which in consequently, five or six years ago, we were about a third of the size we are now.
So that was about the time where I said, all right, I'm, I'm building a sales team. That was the biggest [00:26:00] thing that I needed to get out of in the company. And we started setting rocks at the time to where we're gonna build a sales team, and we started setting annual and three year initiatives to where, My sales production was going to go down every single year to the point that it was gonna be zero.
And, and, and I can say that I've been at zero for more than two years now. Zero, zero sales. Wow. I sold a job. So if I go on a sales call now it's for training purposes. Hmm. Um, but I always felt obligated because of us being in a small town and being around. Our business has been around for 21 years now.
Somebody would call and they'd ask for Taylor. Well again, ego. I like, I'm the only one that can go on the sales call. I've gotta be the one to go close it. You know, I'm the, I'm gonna beat my chest. I'm gonna go close the deal and show people how it's done. And realized that I was holding our entire team back.
I was holding our entire, the trajectory of our company would not change unless I changed. [00:27:00] So, because we, we, we had met a
Barry: ceiling. Yeah. So what you're saying is pain is the path. Absolutely.
Taylor: That's, that's what it was for me. That, that pain. Yeah. Is there, is
Barry: there a way that you know of now where you don't have to organically experience that pain, that you can put the pain on yourself in order to get there without having to organically and surprisingly experience
Taylor: that?
For sure. Yeah. Now we're just, I think we've mature. It's just the maturation process that companies go through with, with strategic planning and identifying future bottlenecks. Hmm. The bottlenecks, you know, using a business terminology is what creates the pain. And so if we understand what creates the pain, then you can forecast those and, and, and, and do a better job of, of avoiding those, those pains.
So we're, we're looking at that now and just doing a much better job of, of, of [00:28:00] projecting for the company and through our strategic planning. Um, because I also don't want our team to experience that pain. So this is, you know, goes well beyond that. And frankly, at the time I thought I was doing our team a favor because I would rather experience the pain myself as a leader, right?
Yeah. And so I had it all twisted. I thought that because I'm not gonna make them work late, I'll do it because I'm the leader. I'm, I'm the one that needs to be going through this, as opposed to building a, a, a company and building process and building, you know, the, the accountability charts where, you know, nobody experiences long-term pain.
Everybody's gonna experience some short-term pain. Regardless, at, at some point in time you're gonna deal with that, especially in, in seasonal businesses where you've got really heavy, heavy seasons. I mean, you can't staff a company sustainably [00:29:00] to deal with and and create zero pain during Yeah. With, with a landscape company, you know, they call it a hundred days of hell.
In, in our industry we call it a hundred days of heaven. Right, okay. Words out power. So in our, in OSI we call it a hundred days of heaven. 'cause we say, guys, this is a hundred days that we have a chance to provide an experience for more clients than we will any other time during the year. So we're gonna change the language so that we can change the results and we can change our intention going into this season.
So during those a hundred days, it is known in our industry that we're gonna work more hours
Barry: and, and
Taylor: if we staffed. For that to where we didn't experience any peak of hours, we wouldn't have anything for tho those other team members to do during the rest of the year. Hmm. That's good. So, so, but that's something that we discussed during the interview process onboarding, and most of the people that have experience in our [00:30:00] industry, it's, it's just a known thing.
You know, during the spring, the spring months, everybody's calling wanting their, their house to look great and their property to look amazing and they want it done yesterday. Yeah. So we push a lot of work out for, for about three and a half months, um, during that a hundred days of heaven for us. Yeah.
Barry: And, and then, you know, with that, have you, you know, 'cause you have a very seasonal business, like, I, I would guess really hard for you to do is financial planning and, and financial you know, just.
Fiduciary with your money. Like how do, how do you manage that? We
Taylor: we're not as seasonal as what we used to be. As we've diversified and we've created other, um, you know, verticals inside our company, we're not near as seasonal as what we, as what we used to be. Yeah. Um, seasonal, yes. But we, [00:31:00] it, it's not, it's not that difficult since we've been in business for 21 years and we've got.
Essentially 21 years of financial data. Mm-hmm. Um, for us to, to use and to forecast. So, um, one of the things that we've made a change now, and this is a brand new, one of the rocks that we're implementing right now is a 12 month rolling budget. So the benefit to that is as we close out a month, we're, we're looking at what, what worked, what didn't work, what changes do we wanna make?
And then we're forecasting that 12 months out already. So what that's changing for us is, and I'll tell you the why. One of the reasons why we wanted to do this is so that we didn't have as much of these seasons and these big projects every year. So we used to have this budgeting process that lasted about 60 to 90 days, and it was always this big heavy lift.
And I said, how can we, how can we just simplify this? So, went out and talked to different [00:32:00] people. There's a couple of Even financial books that I've read over the last, you know, several years, and I understood this concept of a, of a rolling budget. A lot of companies look at last 12 months, so they're always looking in the rear view, but oftentimes they're not forecasting out and projecting.
So I presented this to, to Sheila, Hey, what are your thoughts? And Sheila's our finance manager, what are your thoughts on the 12 month rolling budget? So we're always able to look 12 months back and also 12 months forward. So we're really now looking at a 24 month kind of, you know, rear view plus windshield.
Mm. Looking out. So reflection and projection is what we're looking at for our, for our finances. And she said, I could, I can get behind that. And then she went and did her own research and now we're implementing it. Love it. So brand new, you know, fresh off the press. I can't really tell you how it's impacted us just yet.
So that's, you know, I'll be able to tell you soon. Um, but I'm excited about it because my goal is for us to. Kind of a steady Eddie. [00:33:00] I wanna steady everything out across all months, all quarters, as best we possibly can, just to where we can keep that even workflow. And, and I feel like in business, if we can minimize the spikes, then it's a lot easier for us to staff for it, especially leadership management and, and just create these traditions.
So we close out every month, we what worked, what didn't work, and then we forecast for the next month. Hmm. Anything that we need to increase budget for will come into one of the L tens, and then that'll cascade up, cascade down. A decision will be made, it'll be plugged into that 12 month forecast. And it's just, it's just a process.
Um, rather than having this big budgeting season, that takes a lot of time away from our core competencies and our core responsibilities, which is producing work and taking care of the client. Could you, could
Barry: you have done that at year 2, 3, 4, and five? Had you known what you know now about it?
Taylor: Yes. So [00:34:00] interestingly enough, you, you know this, I've started a different, I started another company a little over a year ago.
Yeah. And what's, what took us, this is funny, I don't know if I've ever even said this out loud. I think what took us 14 years to accomplish, we've, we will accomplish in less than 18 months. Wow. In terms of revenue. So we start, we hit the ground last year, roughly June 1st of last year. We're on track to produce between four and $5 million of revenue in this new business.
And we will have most all of our core processes documented and simplified by year end. Already in that business. We're also already doing month end closeouts for our finances. We're also already putting together budgets, et cetera. So, Knowing what I know now, could I have done that in year one two?
Absolutely. I just didn't, I didn't know and [00:35:00] I didn't have someone, you know, mentoring me along that way. You know, a lot of my mentors growing, getting, you know, I started in business, were were authors, were books. Yeah.
Barry: Yeah. I resembled that remark.
Taylor: So and so in that case, they're not guiding me. I'm just being guided by whatever books I'm choosing.
Yeah. And, and, and during that time I was, I'm choosing the things that I really enjoyed reading, which was more about leadership. Yeah. So I felt like that I had leadership down. Pretty well, I think most of my team would say Taylor was a great, was a good leader. Mm-hmm. Um, still got a long ways to go to become that, that level of leadership that I really want to, um, to be.
Um, but I didn't, didn't focus on the finances and, and, and all of that. It was more about just going and producing work. You know, I was just a young kid that loved to be outside and, and liked to make people happy. Um, but it took me a long time to realize what it took to actually run a successful business.
And behind every successful [00:36:00] business is a, is is really strong financial acumen and a strong financial plan.
Barry: Yeah. I love that. You know, you, you, you need those three legs. You need sales and marketing. Strong ops. Strong finance, right? Yeah. All the way around. That's good. Absolutely. How would you tell people to find a mentor, whether paid or unpaid, if they need one?
Taylor: What I'm finding now that depending on what industry I, I, I'd say that this is, is. This probably exists in every industry. Most business owners have a client that is, that could be a great mentor to them. Um, they've got a deep connection. They've got a deep connection with them already. That person said yes, not because of the business, probably, especially when someone's early in their career.
Mm-hmm. Um, frankly, if they were truly looking for just the business part of it, they would've picked somebody else, you know, that had been more established. They picked that business because of you, the business owner. Yeah. And so they believe in you. [00:37:00] And so because they said yes to you, I think that they would likely be a good candidate for a mentor.
Um, so for me, I've got, you know, we are, we're we, we do both commercial and residential landscaping. Well on the residential side, we deal with a lot of very successful, um, entrepreneurs and executives. Yeah. You know, so that is. If I was more focused on that early on, I would've really latched onto, um, onto one of my clients, um, which is what I've done.
Now. I've got a mentor that is a, a powerhouse. Um, and, and frankly, I didn't have the courage at the beginning either. Yeah. Because I didn't, I I didn't, I didn't feel that there was gonna be the value. But what you find out is that these people love to share their knowledge with, with someone that's eager to listen.
Barry: Absolutely. That, that is good. So are you, are you paying that person right [00:38:00] now or No,
Taylor: what I'm what we're doing is we're taking care of her home, um, in exchange. Okay. For the mentorship. Yeah. So the values, the values, There. This, this person literally travels internationally to speak and yeah. Was, you know, c o o of a major, major, you know, company and huge turnaround during, in, you know, so it's a, it's a, it's a big deal.
What, what she gets paid to speak in one hour Yeah. Is about four times what her, her annual maintenance cost is. So. Sure. Um, so I'm, I'm getting the value there. Yeah. She
Barry: probably doesn't even care at that point. What it, she just loves to, to, to give back and, and speak life into you. Right. And, and she does.
Yeah. That's so good. Yeah. I was actually on a call yesterday with one of the leaders that is on leadership team. You know, I'm a, I'm an e o s implementer business coach, you know, whatever. And [00:39:00] it's so funny, I now have no customers including you that are. Smaller than I was. Right. Every customer that I have is, is really exponentially more, we'll call it in, in the eyes of people more successful than I ever was as a business owner.
And I was on the, the call to this guy. He, he, he has a the, the one of the company that leaves, they do over a billion dollars a year, which is incredibly crazy. And, and he and I were discussing, 'cause I'm gonna do a, a, a, a leadership management accountability for his leaders in a couple of weeks.
And I was on a call with one of his teams, his, his HR team. And I gave my opinion based on experience, [00:40:00] right, that I've seen in other companies that I've done and. His name's John, and he says, after I give my experience share, he says, well, with all due respect, that's Barry's opinion. He doesn't work for our company.
And like, and I was like, that's exactly right, John. I appreciate the feedback. And yesterday I was reminiscing about it with him and he's like, yeah, and, and he said, the thing that I do appreciate about you is you just take that and you are okay with it. And I'm like, yeah, I had to learn how to take that and be okay with it.
But I, he is one of the people that I see as a mentor because he's so successful. He has a education that I, I, I could only aspire to and. A success, but I see him as a mentor and I told him, I'm like, I just try to model myself in situations, the way you show up in a session [00:41:00] room with very little ego, and you could rightly have a lot of ego.
So it's kind of cool Right. To, to, to use your clients as a mentor. Yes, absolutely.
Taylor: Yeah. And a lot, I mean, a lot of people have, I mean, we're, this is a small world, right? Yeah. You know, we're, we're typically only one or, or two people away from someone that we aspire to be. Hmm. And so it's a matter of, I think what you, you know, the power of intention, just what we look for shows up.
So if someone says, and I believe every business owner should have a coach or a mentor, or both. Yeah. Um, and, and or, and I also feel like that every business owner should be part of a peer group. I do too. Peer groups and peer group. Yep. So I mean, if you really look at all three of those, if we said mentor, mentor, it could be a family member.
I think that, and, and now I'm, I'm 41 now, but I could, I could talk to the business [00:42:00] owners that are, are my age. Maybe younger, maybe older. It's not always somebody that's older. No, I think that there, there, there's so many things that I can now learn that I'm am learning from people that are younger than me.
And I wasn't able to say that back in because I was, I was the young entrepreneur. Yeah. And I still consider myself young, you know, praise God, I still feel good, still feel great and taking care of myself. Um, but I think people get it twisted oftentimes that they've gotta find this person that's retired or whatever, right.
That's gonna be their mentor. And that's not the case. You know, you're looking for, you've gotta first understand what you want out of life, what you want out of your business, and then just go find the person that's modeling that. Yeah. And whether they're the same age, young or older. And then have the courage to ask people.
Absolutely love to, people love to hear their name, and people love to, to be acknowledged. That's so good. So if, and if you're acknowledging them, Hey, I'm, I'm just [00:43:00] admiring the, the life success. And that's hopefully what, what the people that may be listening to this will, will be looking for. They're not just looking for money.
Money is, is such a, such a shallow place
Barry: to look. It's a low bar. It is such
Taylor: a low bar. Um, you're, but you're looking for somebody that is modeling what you want to get outta life. Mm-hmm. Then that's the, the, the mentorship, you know, route the, the, the coach to me is, is slightly, you know, different, well, not slightly.
I think it's, it's very different, um, in ways that they can impact your business on a one-on-one basis or, you know, through e o s, you know, implementer, um, or someone that's coming in for special projects. You know, we've got a, we've got a business coach that we're gonna have come in and look at looking at our construction operations.
Yeah. Because we can get so. You know, so such tunnel vision within our business when we're in the trenches on a [00:44:00] day-to-day basis, that it's good to have somebody come in from the outside just to offer outside perspective. Yeah. And I think that there's a lot of power in that, even though you've got a team where everybody sometimes has those blinders on.
Um, and that's one of the reasons why I've started really listening more to some of the new team members as they come on. 'cause they have a fresh perspective. Yeah. And I value their opinion so much because they don't have, they're not jaded by being here for five, 10 years. Yeah. You know, the people that have been here five or 10 years, a lot of times their response can be, well, this is the way we've always done it.
Well that doesn't mean that's the way we're going to do it. So we need to always have fresh perspective from coaches and then the, the peer groups. I'm in two different peer groups right now. I and I, I contribute a lot of my life success to these peer groups. I'm in one called EO Entrepreneur Organization.
Mm-hmm. The beauty of eo, and most people have [00:45:00] that in a local chapter somewhere, is that the, it's all different industries. And so it's, this is a, the powerful piece of that is if you've got a restaurateur, he may look at process and or how to hire, how to retain, how to find clients different than a landscape company.
Um, so it's, it's that collaboration across all the different industries from manufacturing to wealth management, to, you know, home building to property management, to whatever. So that's been a huge piece of for me. And then the second one is that I'm part of an industry specific peer group. Hmm. That, and we, we travel around to each other's facilities and we get to meet, meet each other's leadership team.
And we, we just got back from Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Good friend of mine, Cole Weller is out there and he let me, um, it is a real, a real gym. He let me come in. I, I went out there early and I sat through the leadership meeting, so [00:46:00] That's awesome. How many times? Have you sat through someone's leadership meeting?
Maybe you have as an implementer to help them create RPMs. Yeah. That is not common for most business. No, it's not. Yeah.
Barry: I talk about it all
Taylor: the time. Yep. So I mean, that's going through someone's underwear drawer. Yeah. You know, it's funny. So we said, Hey, I got an idea. Do you wanna sit through our leadership meeting?
And I like lit up. That's, that's my jam. Right. I'm like, are you serious? Absolutely. He said, yeah. And I said, dude, I would love that. So being able to sit through that, and then the coolest piece of it is they began asking me questions and now all of a sudden we're, we're, we're riffing, we're we're collaborating.
That's good. Yeah. We're collaborating and I left that meeting was like, that was one of the coolest experiences of my business career. Just sitting through someone else's Yeah. Leadership. It's so good.
Barry: Yeah. I, I, I it never gets old to me. That is my whole life is sitting through people's leadership meetings and, and facilitating.
Right. And you were talking about a while ago, people younger, you know, I, I'll be 47 in 10 days, you know, [00:47:00] you're 41. And, and, and I've caught so many great learnings from you in our time together and, and when I'm facilitating, um, because I've learned how to facilitate and e o s and you start to get it at such a level that everything slows down.
So you start to appreciate and understand and, and you're able to listen to everything. 'cause you, you understand the system that you're teaching and so you get mentored by people that you are teaching and facilitating because, I don't know, man, just smart people. It doesn't matter your age, it matters your experience and your openness to new things.
And it is just this growth so good for you. You got to sit in and, and see the inside baseball. Um, yeah, it's super
Taylor: fun. I know that, but something that we, we actually talked to our facilitators for this peer group who said, said this, this may be like something that we wanna implement. Yeah. Because we, we talked about, you know, there's like that, that reality show of like [00:48:00] life swap or something weird.
Mm-hmm. But it's like, what would be really cool is if like, we set it up to where we ran each other's business for a week each year. Yeah. So the, so
Barry: the. The, the from experience of sitting in. So if there's not already a very high level of trust in that leadership team, it it's gonna be a disaster. Mm-hmm.
So if you're gonna do that in your peer group, and I used to be an an automotive repair peer group and loved it, but from what I know now is if there's not a super high level of trust, or at least a high level of trust, you're gonna get a lot of false harmony when you run that company. You're gonna get mm-hmm.
The, the, the mask of each leader instead of each leader. And so a lot of people will be like, Hey, do you think any of your companies would, would allow me to sit in our leadership meeting? And I'm like, well, I may have a [00:49:00] couple that have been running on e o s that I've been working with for maybe three or four years, but almost anybody under two years is not ready because they're not super healthy yet.
Make sense? Yeah, makes perfect sense. Yeah. But I'm very cautious about having someone set in 'cause it is, it's such an intimate thing. And um, people who don't think it's ETI intimate either are, um, running their business like a tyrant or just don't understand, um, how close and, you know, family oriented a leadership team can be if done well.
Yeah. Yeah. So you don't wanna be a tyrant. No, no, you don't wanna be a tyrant. Yeah. That's good. So I, you know, you said while ago, and I love what you said about you're getting the opinions of new people because I'll bet you, and, and you tell me, like, have, do you see another [00:50:00] level of buy-in when you are you know, cultivating that?
Absolutely.
Taylor: Absolutely. And, and one of, like, one of the mi minor changes that we made just recently was, is kind of out of the necessity. Um, but it ended up being a great thing. So our sales L 10 originally was just our sales team and did not include our junior designers that are essentially, they're in a training role.
And I said, guys, we're holding 'em back. I said, they need to come in and, and provide experience. So we've done that. Well June, these junior designers are, are these young professionals that have recently graduated high school, not high school, but college. Sure. And we are getting more ideation now in that.
Than ever because it's this fresh blood that's been, been introduced to this, to these meetings. And the buy-in has been great, which ultimately now the culture within that team is growing stronger than than ever. Hmm. When we [00:51:00] could have had a disruption because we had a sales manager relief. We had a sales manager that had a great relationship.
Yeah. And this wasn't a, an illusion. She had a great relationship with this team. Yeah. 'cause she, she, she loved them. She nurtured them. And so when she left and I stepped into this role, um, that was a change that I made because I knew that I needed the entire team to now work together. Mm-hmm. And and by, but the, the byproduct of that, it, it not only worked really well, but the, but we're getting fantastic ideas and, and I feel like that the cohesion now, I.
It may be stronger than it's ever been. Not just, we're not just surviving. Like we're thriving in that, in that, in that department now. I love that. Um, and so, and we've also, like I'd say one of the most intellectual, um, team members that we have is one of our newer, um, team members that came on board last year, graduated, you know, college from B Y [00:52:00] U and is really running our r and d department.
That, or I say department committee departments way bigger than what it really is. But that was an initiative for us is to create an r and d committee this year with a budget that's on the p and l because one of our core values is create and innovate. Yeah. And I said, we've gotta put our money where our mouth is.
So creating innovate is just not about just getting better, like we want to innovate. So what does that look like? Well, that was, that's what came out of that idea. It's like we need r d committee. So we created an RD committee and then this young man. He's running with ai, he is running with our robotics program.
He's running with our, our, our growth regulators, which is basically organic chemicals that allow us to, that regulates the growth of plants and turf to reduce labor costs for us. We just sent him out to Las Vegas to the technology conference. He's come back. We're debriefing on that tomorrow, and he is got all these ideas of how we can, you know, and, and, but that's, that's this young, you [00:53:00] know, man, that's, that's on fire.
And he is smart, he is intelligent, and he, you know, he's, he still has that, the, the energy, you know, that, that some people don't have. Um, So that's what, that's what's exciting about, um, about it. And another thing that's been interesting is we hired a salesperson when we didn't really need a salesperson.
That's where I would also caution a lot of business owners and managers to, you wanna run by the budget, but you also sometimes just need to get that person on, on, on board when they walk in the door. Yeah. And I think that I've been guilty of that. No, we don't need that person. We don't have it in the budget, et cetera.
Well, we threw caution to the wind for this particular person and he is on track to potentially be one of our top sales producers this year. He's
Barry: making his own budget.
Taylor: He is making it, yes. Yeah. That's so good. I was just talking to one of our other designers [00:54:00] this morning and I said, whoa, you know, what a surprise.
Like this guy is crushing it and. The way that we would describe him. He is, he's approachable, he's likable, he's focused, he's steady. Um, and he's high energy, you know, he is just got a lot of, you know, just wonderful energy and he is great to work with. Um, but he, he's come in, he is learned new, new skills that are required of him for, in terms of, of designing with cad, one of the softwares that we use.
And he's crushing it. Yeah. Um, and he's, he's, I don't think he's been here for four months yet and he's fixing the past a million dollars in sales and may sell $2 million this year. And I think we've, we've only had one or two people pass $2 million. And these are tenured
Barry: salespeople. Yeah. Yeah. I love it.
You know what's funny is, um, you know, great salespeople are usually not entrepreneurs, [00:55:00] but they're very entrepreneurial. So when you give them the go, they can go out and sell. 'cause an entrepreneurial person can sell, but they're usually not great entrepreneurs because they're not great operators. So when you have a great system and a great operations like you guys do, and you give some room to someone who could be a great salesperson and they could just go eat and man, they, they'll, they'll, they'll make a lot of hay.
Taylor: Well, interestingly enough, Barry, this gentleman owned his own business in Connecticut, so he was an entrepreneur. Oh, but if, and I may get this wrong, um, so I'd have to fact check it, but I believe he told me that he only grew his business that he ran for 15 or 20 years up to about $400,000. Well, plugging him into our system, he's now fixing to sell over a million dollars on his way to
Barry: $2 million.
So, so think about what I just said, entrepreneurial versus entrepreneur. [00:56:00] He's entrepreneurial. But he, he got stuck at 400 probably because he's not an entrepreneur. That's, yeah,
Taylor: that was, I was just supporting what you said, like, oh, okay, thanks. Yeah. Yeah. That was exactly what, he was an entrepreneur, but he got to your point, he got stuck.
He couldn't take it any further. Um, but he was probably a great salesperson, but he couldn't do it all. Yeah. That,
Barry: that's, that's actually, I, I resemble that remark. If you probably know I'm not a great operator and that, so it, if I don't have operators in place, I'm stuck. But you give me that ability to just do what I do and sell.
I'm in this sweet spot that I could. Like the energizer bunny, it just all day, all, all day long. Right. So it's, it's the right people, right seat. And you, you've gotta have that dual sided. There's rare person who can do just both sides really well. I think you are one of those people. So, you know, hats off.
There's only [00:57:00] 5% of people who can do that. And so when you see them, it's, it's almost like a magic show. But to your point and you say it that will cause you to burn out because you have that, that magic trick. And just like most magic tricks, there's always something that they can't see that doesn't sustain.
Right. That's right. So good for you. Um, man, I could go all day interviewing you. Gimme one last takeaway. One bit of advice for somebody that is in, that is in a, a business owner seat that is stuck. That what, what's some advice that you have?
Taylor: I'm gonna go off what I'm going through right now in 21 years in the business.
And I, I, I think that this is, I wish that the delegate and Elevate exercise was a tool that I had, um, on, on day one. And that we, we use that tool for our strategic planning. You, you asked me a question early of, you know, is there a way to [00:58:00] to, to scale and to build this business without going through some of that, that pain?
And I'm gonna answer it in a little bit different way to plug into this, this, this tool. But think you're always gonna go through some pain. Um, that's just part, part of it. Um, so you've gotta be able to endure, you know, pain, just like what you went through with you know, rise up, you know, Kings, you went through some pain.
Oh yeah. But you grew through it. You grew through it, right? Um, and that's how you build muscle. You go through pain, you have to break muscle down to build it. That's the same thing. I feel like in your leadership and your business acumen and your relationships, you're gonna have to go through some pain.
However, I think that you can, can, can build a business in a way where you don't have to sustain that pain for longer than, than what's necessary. And the delegate and Elevate tool that we, that you've introduced to us through e o s, that what I'm actually going through right now I've actually completed the exercise and now we're implementing it and, and building this [00:59:00] into our plan.
I think that every entrepreneur. Needs to use this tool on an annual basis as part of their annual planning and three-year forecast. Um, because that is what's going to help you live, I think, the absolute best life that you possibly can because there's a difference in doing something because you can and, and are good at it, but if you don't enjoy it Yeah.
Then why are you, why in the world are you doing it? Right. That's exactly right. You know, I want to go home and be skipping and whistling Yeah. You know, to my family, and they're like, what has gotten into you? It's like, I'm living my best life. Yeah. I'm doing the, I'm, I'm only doing the things. And I had one of those days last week, and what's funny is I explained my day to my wife and she's like, well, it sounds like you didn't do much.
I was like, no, I did a bunch. I just did all the things that I love doing, which are more strategic, more visioned. More system building. Like I can go home [01:00:00] and run a marathon on those days. Yeah. But when I'm in the weeds dealing with the day-to-day and the administrative stuff and the daily operations, man, it just feels like someone put a, a syringe engine just literally extracted my energy.
Yeah. I just want to go home and sit on the couch and be an unproductive person. Yeah. Versus the opposite. I could go home and be like, babe, what do you want me to do? I'm ready to clean. I can organize like, what you got for me? I'm ready. Yeah. What you got? And I wanna be that man every day for my wife, my family, and for myself.
And I think every entrepreneur out there needs to really focus on. Building a plan to put people in a position to where they can also do that as well. Yeah. 'cause that's, the companies that are, are gonna be great and they'll be built to last. Yeah.
Barry: I love it. Just, just yesterday, I, I was, I was prospecting and doing follow-up calls and for four hours and, and, and my wife couldn't get me off the phone.
You know it. And for most people that's painful. For me. That's just like pure [01:01:00] joy. Yeah. And I'm ready to do the dishes. I'm ready to put stuff together. And it's like, are, you know, PE people would look in and be like, are you, are you crazy? But yeah, what you're talking about, like doing ops stuff, I, that drains the heck outta me and somebody loves it.
And so we always have this unique ability that we could just go to work and, and have that almost utopian lifestyle and I love it. So yeah. Taylor, it was an absolute pleasure. Tom flew today Yeah. Interviewing you. Thank you for being on.
Taylor: Thank you Barry. Always a pleasure. Yep.
