What Eric Learned From A Private Founder's Retreat

In episode #2929, Eric Siu and Neil Patel discuss the importance of peer groups in entrepreneurship. They share insights on economic perspectives, the value of shared experiences, and the significance of humility in business. TIME-STAMPED SHOW NOTES (00:00) Founders Retreat Overview (03:03) Purpose and Dynamics of the Group (06:02) Worldviews and Economic Perspectives (08:54) Business Strategies and Challenges (11:58) Frameworks for Problem Solving (18:05) Building Connections and Emotional Insights Prefer single topic episodes? Head over to our YouTube channel. To suggest a topic, go to https://www.marketingschool.io. For more content from Eric and Neil, check out Eric’s Leveling Up with Eric Siu YouTube channel and Neil’s Neil Patel YouTube channel. Connect with Us: Single Grain << Eric's ad agency NP Digital << Neil’s ad agency X @neilpatel, @ericosiu Instagram @neilpatel, @ericosiu Drop Us a Review If You Enjoyed the Episode!

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Finding customer information shouldn't mean digging through emails, call notes, and spreadsheets. HubSpot Starter Plan brings all of those details together, so it's easier to track what's happening with every deal, and what to do next. It pulls information from calls and emails. Then it gets to work, logging and summarizing them. Right after your call ends, HubSpot pulls next steps from your call notes and drafts suggested follow-ups. And it stays up to date for you, so you can build demand, win more deals, and spend less time on repetitive work. Your records, insights, and next steps are ready for you to act on. And you don't have to miss a beat searching for any of it. Try the Starter Plan for $10 a month. Learn more at hubspot.com. So, we're gonna start off with what I learned from a private founder's retreat, and I just came back yesterday. I was there,

• 0:42Speaker 00

  basically forty minutes away from Cancun, and I was there from last Tuesday till yesterday, which was Sunday.

• 0:49Speaker 01

  Oh wow. Before you go into what you learned, can you first describe the Founder Retreat, the type of people that make it up, and why you do it, and how long you've been doing it for?

• 0:59Speaker 00

  Yeah. So this group, we've had it since 2018. I started it, and I kinda handpicked the people initially for the first one that we did. So, some people, you know some of the people in this group. So, we have Sayed Balki, who is, owns, you know, a portfolio WordPress company.

• 1:14Speaker 01

  WP Beginner.

• 1:15Speaker 00

  WP Beginner. We have Yanniv Masjedi, who owns, co-founder of Nextiva. They're like a, just called like a voice company. And they do well. And then there's Patrick Campbell, who's in the group as well, so he sold ProfitWell for-

• 1:29Speaker 01

  Was he even there this time?

• 1:30Speaker 00

  He wasn't there this time. He had some personal things going on, so he was supposed to be there. So, he sold ProfitWell for $250. And then, we have had some other people in the group too, that are amazing. We have Al Don, who has like a nine-figure quilting company.

• 1:43Speaker 01

  Quilting?

• 1:43Speaker 00

  Quilting company, yeah.

• 1:45Speaker 01

  Like quilts for like blankets?

• 1:46Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and he buys towns. So, his town is like a quilt town. It's like Disneyland for quilting. And so, like, all these middle-aged old women go to that town, and they just go to town on quilting.

• 1:57Speaker 01

  And do a lot of the people in the town work for him?

• 1:59Speaker 00

  I don't know about that, but he's, he's kind of cracked the code on buying towns. And so, that's something you haven't cracked, nor have I cracked.

• 2:05Speaker 01

  I'm okay on the buying towns. I don't need to-

• 2:07Speaker 00

  It sounds like a lot of work.

• 2:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I also don't have that kind of money to go buy.

• 2:11Speaker 00

  But it's, it's a, it's a really good group. So, and I can tell you how we iterate over the years, but I think I answered your first two initial questions, right?

• 2:18Speaker 01

  Uh, yes, but what is the purpose of a founder group? Cause I'm assuming you're not talking about like, hey, guys, we're all starting up our business. It's not like EO or YPO.

• 2:28Speaker 00

  It is like EO, YPO, cause EO, YPO, you do a retreat every year with your forum. And so we just, this is our, our annual retreat. We're actually going to do two now. And this is where we're just having a good time. We're eating good food and we're talking about business ideas. We're talking about challenges we're facing, AI ideas too, and other things that, that are going on in our lives. And so the point of this is obviously you want to go with people that you get along with. And last week was really interesting to me because I went on my YPO forum retreat too. And I saw my former EO group on Monday before I left Tuesday. So I got a dose of all of it and it made me realize what I really want and what I really value. And I can go into that too.

• 3:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, go, go into it.

• 3:10Speaker 00

  Okay. So what I learned with this group, because we're all kind of growing old together. We're all in our mid 30s. Some people are in their 40s or so. This group, all we do is we'll, we'll do active, we'll do activities. We'll talk about business the whole time. So we're doing presentations like, hey, here's my biggest challenge with this. Okay, everyone experience shares, things like that, right? We'll eat dinner and we go to bed after dinner. There's no like, hey, let's go party, right? Whereas one of my other groups that I just was with, we were, they just wanted to party, right?

• 3:38Speaker 01

  So let's skip the other group that you're with. Let's, let's go back to this group. The first thing that you mentioned is you guys do activities. I saw some of the activities online. So tennis was one, bow and arrow?

• 3:49Speaker 00

  Tennis was tennis, archery, pickleball. And then usually we play basketball because there's some people in the group that are really good at basketball.

• 3:55Speaker 01

  All right. What's the purpose of the activities?

• 3:59Speaker 00

  One, because we don't want to be bored. So it's either physical activities or spa, because Yannick loves spa, right?

• 4:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm down with the spa.

• 4:06Speaker 00

  Yeah, so he's, he gets like all the massages. So he books all the massages for us and everything. And

• 4:13Speaker 01

  Wait, did you do the spa?

• 4:14Speaker 00

  Of course we did the spa. So this is a crazy massage too, because this massage, how long do you usually get a massage for?

• 4:20Speaker 01

  Depends which country I'm in, because some countries are really affordable, where it's like $10.

• 4:24Speaker 00

  Okay, you're in Thailand.

• 4:25Speaker 01

  Uh, in Thailand, I had two ladies massaging me at the same time. I think it

• 4:32Speaker 00

  You got a foreign hand.

• 4:33Speaker 01

  I, I, I think it costs. Thirty dollars for two and a half hours and it was me, Mike and some other entrepreneur in the same room and we were talking. And uh, I remember one of the ladies like was, I was like, oh, walk on my back. You know, this is like just walk and it was traditional Thai massage, like you come in, you wear like this Thai uh robe. Cause usually like you wear towel or your under sheets and you just keep your underwear on, but this is like you actually like dress up into like some Thai clothes. And dude, I was in pain. I learned the word bow bow, which means softer or lighter or something like that. Cause I was just in so much pain, but after the massage, it felt great.

• 5:14Speaker 00

  Okay. So I'll give you, and then I want to give some tactics to people as well, but um, we, so Yaniv booked us for these, these massages were a hundred and fifty minutes each. So that's two hours and thirty minutes. Okay. And they do all these things like they'll scrub you, they'll give you apples, apple ginger tea and everything, right? And then it's like a crazy massage, a lot of stretching and all that. So anyway.

• 5:35Speaker 01

  Wait, do you do them in the same room? So you can start talking to people and brainstorm ideas or no?

• 5:39Speaker 00

  No, no, no, no, no. Oh, actually no, some of them did. They did that, but I did it the day before or whatever. So I didn't want to do it twice. Right? So anyway, we do that. It's, it's like, okay, why do we do the activities? Because um, we can only talk about business for so much throughout the day, right? Like when we're together, all we're talking about is business. We're lunch, we're talking about business. Um, or Syed would bring up, this is new this time. It's, it's like, let's talk about worldviews, right? So how do you feel about um, you know, this war over here? How do you feel about this over here? How do you feel, feel about the economy right now? And you're getting everyone's perspectives. Um, what are you investing in right now? For example, right? And some people will disagree with me, like Syed would disagree with me on crypto, for example, right? Um, and then like, obviously I'm, I'm big on, I, I love crypto, right? Um, and so I, I think that the big thing is we have done this for eight years or so.

• 6:24Speaker 00

  We're very comfortable with this group and we've gotten it to a point where this is our core group now. We used to rotate people in and out. We're no longer doing that. And the idea here and, and uh, one of the people in the group has another group where these people are sixty to sixty-five years old in his group. And he's the youngest person and these people are some of the top investors in the world. One guy is even the GM of one of the largest automo- Of companies in the world, right? And so they do groups like this too, and they'll do a retreat like every year or so. The funny thing about the older group is they will go to lunch and then after they have nap time for two hours, right? Cause they're older and then at four sharp, you go straight to, you know, you go to activities and you go to dinner. Right after dinner, you go to bed and I was like, I'm getting to that age now where I'm like, oh, I feel like that's really good, right?

• 7:08Speaker 01

  How old are you? Thirty eight?

• 7:09Speaker 00

  Thirty eight. Yeah. But the key, the key thing is these people are like loaded with money, right? But there's still groups like this and, and um, this person told me that there's a lot of groups like this that will be together for twenty, thirty plus years or so. And they'll grow old together. Like you, you hear about their kids, you hear about the family and things like that. And so I think the whole entire purpose of this is it's very lonely at the top. And we both know that entrepreneurship is a very lonely game. And to have a group like this where you, where you know, you can trust everyone and you would do anything for these people goes a long way. It's like you and I have a very, there's a close relationship, right? But I feel like that's, that's that with this group and that's why I love this. And that's why I've always been a proponent of E O Y P O because they force you into groups like this.

• 7:53Speaker 00

  But I just happen to make my own and that's, it's, it's worked out that way.

• 7:56Speaker 01

  So let's, let's go back to one of the first things that you talked about and then we'll go to the business side of the group.

• 8:01Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 8:02Speaker 01

  One of the first things you talked about is you do activities and you guys discuss things during meals, activities. One of the things you guys discuss is worldviews. Now, I don't need to know what a specific person thought, but what was the consensus that the group overall thought? About the world views and what's happening right now from a business standpoint?

• 8:22Speaker 00

  We all think the economy is going to, going to be worse. It's going to get worse before it gets better.

• 8:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:28Speaker 00

  Yeah. And I think you're probably aligned with that.

• 8:30Speaker 01

  There's also a lot of uncertainty right now.

• 8:31Speaker 00

  Yeah. Um, I think we all agree on these outside wars as well, uh, for the most part. It was a little complex because some people, some people in the group actually think, uh, so I, I, I think Elon's a net positive for the world. Some people in the group actually think he's, um, maybe.

• 8:47Speaker 01

  A net negative.

• 8:48Speaker 00

  Not, maybe not a net negative. They think he's still positive, but they think he's gone off the deep end. And like I can, I can understand that perspective. So it's good to have different, um, different worldviews.

• 8:56Speaker 01

  So most people think the economy is going to get worse in 2025, but better in 2026 is their guess.

• 9:01Speaker 00

  Uh, they didn't say 2026 or so, we just think it's going to get worse. And then there's already indicators, I think I saw in today's, um, today's reports about GDP going to be down negative, negative 3.8%, I think.

• 9:12Speaker 01

  They say GDP is going to be down.

• 9:14Speaker 00

  Yeah. And so we're, it looks like we're, we're.

• 9:16Speaker 01

  3.8% going forward or from?

• 9:19Speaker 00

  Down, down 3.8% quarter on quarter, I think.

• 9:22Speaker 01

  This quarter over the previous quarter, was it for Q4?

• 9:26Speaker 00

  I think it was Q4.

• 9:27Speaker 01

  Q4, yeah, because they report later on.

• 9:28Speaker 00

  Yeah. So we'll, we'll see what happens. Um, and then I think the, the investing thing, it's like, what do you, everyone's mostly, um, buy and hold type of thing. We were, here's, here's an interesting business theme and, because I want to give some value to people too. There's a lot of, um, and I'm not going to.

• 9:42Speaker 01

  Before we go back to the business themes, so stick with the world views. If most people are thinking that things are going to get bad in the short run and long run, they'll start improving. No one gave a specific timeframe. They don't know if it's 25, 26, 27. It was left open. What are people doing differently with their marketing or how they're running their business?

• 10:01Speaker 00

  Hoarding as much cash as possible, taking as much profit as possible, trying to jack up profit margins as much as possible. Because some people in the group, um, and you might, you might be able to pinpoint this, but we're not going to name names. Some people in the group understand that maybe they're in the, um, Warren Buffett likes to say cigar butt stage, right? So cigarette butts, it's like they're, they're fading, but there's, you could still get a couple of puffs, right?

• 10:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:25Speaker 00

  Um, or you can look at it as the blue stamps phase, right? Like, um, Warren Buffett has the blue stamps, uh, blue chip stamps or whatever. Like they were always going down and down and down. Um, but you can still kind of ride the profits for, for a period of time. So does, does that make sense?

• 10:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:38Speaker 00

  Am I clear there? Okay. Um, so some people are like that. They're, they're playing more defense and they're looking to figure out where to deploy cash, but they're also slowing down quite a bit on M and A, um, because they're not sure if they, they were deploying a lot into M and A, but they're not sure about their industry anymore. Um, so there's that. And then some other people in the group, they're looking at buying iconic, um, you know, multi-billion dollar companies where they can just, you know how like Tai Lopez brought, bought, um, Pier One and Radio Shack? I think he just bought the intellectual property, right?

• 11:07Speaker 01

  The domain and the naming rights.

• 11:09Speaker 00

  So you're, at that point, you're paying pennies on the dollar. You're, you're paying like a, a fraction of multi billions, right? Um, and so there's some, there's some people in the group that are looking to, to do that.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  So they're just waiting for the opportunities of things to go bankrupt?

• 11:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, and the opportunity is here already. They were actually talking about how to potentially work on this opportunity. Yeah.

• 11:26Speaker 01

  So they're already putting bids on deals or they're?

• 11:29Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and you and I know this company.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  Cool.

• 11:33Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  All right, so from a business standpoint, what did you guys end up discussing during the retreat?

• 11:39Speaker 00

  So this is, this will probably be helpful for everyone. I want to give you guys some frameworks that you can use. So the way we do this is when you're in the EO or YPO forum, you will come with your, we call these hot seats, right? Or no, we call these now explorations. So Neil, let's use you as an example. What's the biggest challenge you have right now in your business? Frictionless Growth Marketing hosted by Sonya Thompson is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals. Frictionless Growth Marketing hosted by Sonya Thompson shows how modern brands grow by removing the friction in their marketing and customer experience that pushes customers away every single day, often without leaders even realizing it. Each episode delivers practical insights, real brand examples, and conversations with marketing leaders,

• 12:20Speaker 00

  showing brands how to win with the new rules of growth, identity-driven marketing, cultural relevance, and frictionless customer experiences. Listen to Frictionless Growth Marketing wherever you get your podcasts.

• 12:33Speaker 01

  Biggest challenge I have on businesses convincing people to sign up faster.

• 12:38Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 12:39Speaker 01

  Sale cycle is long.

• 12:40Speaker 00

  So sale cycle is long. Okay, so you might say, okay, that's the challenge. And then you get 10 minutes to frame what the problem is, and then we get 10 to 15 minutes to ask you clarifying questions around the room. So you have a group of smart people in different industries, right? They might not understand your core issue, but they might have an experience here that's relevant, right? And sometimes they can say pass. Then after that, each person gets five minutes to experience here. Not exactly give you advice. I know Neil is the type to kind of be direct and say, no, you should do this, right? In this scenario, you're actually supposed to hold back and just share your experiences. Sometimes people go directly into advice sharing, but each person goes for around five minutes.

• 13:15Speaker 01

  Wait, why are you supposed to just experience here and not give advice?

• 13:18Speaker 00

  So I know Heaton hates this. I remember talking to Heaton about this. So you're not supposed to give advice because whatever advice that you give is unique to your. Experiences in your life. And so some what happens is the argument here is from E O Y P O. It's called Gestalt rule, right? Um, the if I give Noah a piece of advice here and it screws him over, he will hate me for that, right? Or if I give you advice and you don't take the advice, the supposedly I will be annoyed or whatever. I actually don't really care. Nor nor would Neil care like Neil would just give advice, right? So the idea here is like, if I just experience here, you I tell you my story, you will come to your own conclusions on what you should do. And that feels better. And I will say I hated that in the very beginning of E O and Y P O.

• 14:01Speaker 00

  But I grew to love it because I came up with my own solutions and I I actually I didn't really like it as much when people gave direct advice. Because it was it's so contextual to them.

• 14:11Speaker 01

  Yeah. So you've gotten used to people quote unquote experience sharing instead of giving direct advice. Um. The the group every once in a while does share direct advice, but majority of the people just to experience.

• 14:24Speaker 00

  They do. If you're trained like um, Sayed is trained in Y P O, uh, David Henzel is trained in E O. I'm training both E O Y P O. Um, we'll hold back. Um, but you need, for example, can't hold back. So he'll go straight into experiences.

• 14:36Speaker 01

  He's not an either though, right?

• 14:37Speaker 00

  No, he's not an either, which is why he goes straight to experience. So if you are hanging out with us, which would be fun. Um, you would go, you should do this. You should do this. You should do this.

• 14:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:46Speaker 00

  Yeah. But um, so. So we would do that. And that's the format of it. Each person gets about forty. The each person's presentation goes about forty five minutes and we'll just go around. Until everyone kind of finishes it. And then when we go to like, um, is it is that part clear before I go into another set?

• 15:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. So you you first talk about your problem. People have ten minutes to um, ask clarifying questions. And for anyone listening, kind of like chat G P T, if you pay two hundred bucks, you ask it a question to do research for you. It'll ask you clarifying questions before it goes and does a research because it doesn't want to do research on the wrong thing. It's just making sure everyone's giving you the right type of feedback, hence clarifying questions.

• 15:27Speaker 00

  Yeah. And plus, by the way, um, I'll I'll give you some of the experiences as it relates to my context. Because you and I have been talking about my context a lot, right? It's like, okay.

• 15:35Speaker 01

  Well, but before we go into that. Forty minutes total. So then the rest of the time is people then telling you about their experience related to your problem.

• 15:44Speaker 00

  Give or take, the whole thing takes about an hour, forty-five minutes to an hour for the whole thing to wrap up.

• 15:48Speaker 01

  Got it. So you do all the people over multiple days, that means.

• 15:51Speaker 00

  Correct.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  Too many to do in one.

• 15:53Speaker 00

  Correct. And then typically we'll try to split it in two days. And then at the very end, let's say it goes back to you and you basically say, oh, Noah, thank you so much for experience sharing. I learned this, right? Or I learned this. And it's like, usually you'll get like a summary from the person that was, that has the issue. And hopefully it was valuable. And I think for everyone, everyone got value there. And that usually is the primary value of these things. So for me, if I go into me for a second, you know, right now, it's like, okay, I showed them, I demoed them carrot, right? And then I also said, okay, well, I have this issue right now where it's like, I'm, you know, I'm spending a lot of my time on, on single grain, right? And your whole thing was like, hey, the single grain kind of seems like a distraction, right? And you're like, maybe,

• 16:34Speaker 00

  maybe you should figure out a way to just focus full time on carrot, correct?

• 16:39Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 16:40Speaker 00

  Okay. So everyone has different opinions. But in this situation, I thought everyone was going to go your, in your direction where it's like, hey, just all in on carrot. But everyone, everyone was like, dude, one, they love carrot. Second thing is, they're like, no, you, there's actually a lot of synergies with single grain and carrot, right? And like, you should have both, but just, you know, maybe you need to hire more operators for single grain, but, but still you need to be involved 10, 15% of the time. And that's not something you can ever get rid of. And, you know, that's something that jives more with me, but like, I also respect the, the feedback you have, right? So I like hearing different perspectives.

• 17:14Speaker 01

  There's no right or wrong. Everyone has a different solution or different way to do to different things. Like Elon Musk will go create five businesses at the same time, or however many, and he makes it work.

• 17:23Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 17:23Speaker 01

  I can't do that. I don't think most entrepreneurs can. But Elon made it work. I think he's rare. But there's a lot of entrepreneurs that have two businesses going at the same time.

• 17:33Speaker 00

  You know what Warren Buffett said? Warren Buffett said, there are multiple ways to go to heaven.

• 17:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:38Speaker 00

  Yeah. And so there's no right or wrong way at the end of the day.

• 17:41Speaker 01

  Totally agree with that.

• 17:42Speaker 00

  I'll give two, two frameworks, and then we can move on to the next topic.

• 17:45Speaker 01

  Wait, give some other ones. So that was one of your problems. What were some other things that people helped you solve?

• 17:52Speaker 00

  Not so, I mean, that was kind of the main thing. It's like, okay, what do we, what do we do? What do I do? I have this thing right now and where, where should I focus my time, right? And then this is my, my challenge is I'm spending a lot of time on single grain and that there's this thing's about to take off, right? So that was the primary thing. We just focused on that. Yeah. And it's interesting. So I had actually brought up a good point as we were walking out. Because we actually have this, let's just call it Omni Channel Reporting in Carrot that will show you how, how, how our product is influencing your pipeline and it works, it works on ourselves, right? We were gonna add an organic social for it. He's like, dude, that seems amazing, but that seems like another, that seems like a completely different product. And I was like, yeah, you're right. And so I was, I basically, I immediately texted my CTO. I was like, yeah, we should probably hold that for now.

• 18:37Speaker 00

  And just, we need to continue to work, work out that focus muscle every single day. And he's like, yeah, you're right. So you just hear things in passing, like little things like that, like that happens in like five seconds. Like, oh shit, right? But it, it tweaks things pretty significantly. And then we did share a lot of stuff around AI.

• 18:55Speaker 00

  And that was, that was fun. But I want to share two frameworks that we use at dinner that can help bring people closer together. Cause I think my value for everyone with this is if you can somehow learn to be the connector, you can be the node. Cause I've gotten, the thing I've gotten really good at over the last decade or so is, is putting people together, right? If you can become a node and you can put these groups together, like the first group I put together was, I had a bunch of marketing directors at my place and I lived in Hawthorne, right by the SpaceX place, right? SpaceX wasn't even around yet. But I brought people together and all I had to feed them was a half eaten bag of chips, right? But I put, that's the first mastermind I put together. Eventually you get better at this stuff and eventually you can upgrade to Mediterranean dinner. Everyone gets one and eventually you can upgrade more and more, right?

• 19:39Speaker 00

  And in 2018, it eventually led to the first event that we did in Cabo. So I would just say that if you can somehow figure out how to do this, there's a lot of templates on how to run a mastermind. We like to call this a founder's retreat because we're not charging anyone money for this. Everyone's just paying cost. That's powerful, right? So David Henzel, remember David Henzel?

• 19:57Speaker 01

  Of course, I remember.

• 19:58Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 19:58Speaker 01

  He found us ice cream in Germany.

• 20:01Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah. Oh, that's right. We walked there together. That's right. Okay.

• 20:05Speaker 01

  He knows Germany really well. Of course he does. But Germany, he knows Germany really well.

• 20:10Speaker 00

  He was from that town.

• 20:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Of course he knows it. But yeah, he, he found us ice cream when there shouldn't have been any ice cream shops open.

• 20:17Speaker 00

  Yeah. So this exercise, this-

• 20:22Speaker 00

  Ice cream's great. Coconut, coconut sorbet though.

• 20:25Speaker 01

  Is that what you?

• 20:26Speaker 00

  That's my favorite.

• 20:27Speaker 01

  Mint, uh, Kind bars. So you know Kind? They have ice cream bars. They have a mint chip flavor. It's really delicious.

• 20:33Speaker 00

  Is it cancerous? You know those, those Girl Scout cookies I gave you? Basically, they're like, it's, they're very cancerous.

• 20:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:38Speaker 00

  So no more. So I, but I, but I found new cookies.

• 20:40Speaker 01

  I was the one who told you that.

• 20:41Speaker 00

  You told me that? I saw that on Twitter.

• 20:43Speaker 01

  I also told you that when we were recording.

• 20:45Speaker 00

  But, but I found these new cookies. Um, I'll, I'll bring them for your kids next time. They're organic. Uh, they're not really, they're not. They're as clean as they can be. It's my friend's mom makes them and they make some, oh my God, they're amazing. So they're called to me, I think, but I'll bring them. Yeah. So, okay. David Henzel, the last night, um, Saturday, we're having dinner and he does this exercise called the three, two, one exercise. Okay? So we basically all go around the table. Let's say the three of us are having dinner. So I'll be like, Noah, tell me three events that totally impacted your life. Okay? Then you tell your stories, whatever. Then it'll go to you, then me. And then the second one, the two is two people that most impacted your life. Okay? So you could say your parents, whatever it is exactly. And then the one is one decision that impacted your life. Okay?

• 21:30Speaker 00

  Now, you might be like, what the hell is the point of this? Right? The point of this is if we're going to be together for a long time, we need to really get to know each other and doing that exercise, we got, I, we all realized we're all kind of the same. So I don't know if Said will kill me for this. He probably will. Said is a private guy. Yanniv, I never knew this. You probably never knew this either. He used to run all the time. Right?

• 21:52Speaker 00

  I didn't know that. Um, or I wasn't paying attention. And then, um, we have a guy in the group, uh, Walter. He's really good at basketball, but I didn't know that his dad was really good before. And then Walter actually wanted to play in the NBA, right? But we learned that we're, obviously we're all competitive at the, but we're all competitive at a little ways. I played a ton of games. Um, and so when you share these stories, you can, in certain cases, people are tearing up and stuff. You got a lot closer to these people too. And if you're going to spend a lot of time with these people, you, you want to know how they are. Right? Um, for you, you'd probably be like, screw this stuff, right?

• 22:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:21Speaker 00

  But, but like, it, it, it has been generally helpful. And, um, the other question that Henzel asked, I like these dinner questions. He, you just keep going around the room. So. I'd say, hey Noah, um, no, I'd say, no, if you really knew me, you would know that I played drums when I was in high school, right? And so random facts, and then you would go, if you really knew me, um, you know, something else, right? If you really knew me, you, uh, if Neil said this, oh, yeah, I used to sell CDs and I used to burn CDs and sell them in high school. That's Neil, right? Yep. So you just share these random facts and you learn all these things about people. It's like, holy crap, right? Like, some people have been through some really tough stuff. Um, and I learned in that group that everyone was broke before at one point, which is why I love this group. You were broke before too.

• 23:05Speaker 01

  Everyone being broke when they're growing up or as an entrepreneur?

• 23:09Speaker 00

  Growing up. And that I love because.

• 23:12Speaker 01

  Wait, you knew was grew up broke? He grew up in Beverly Hills.

• 23:17Speaker 00

  He, there's a whole story around it and I don't think it's my place to reveal it.

• 23:20Speaker 01

  No, no, no.

• 23:21Speaker 00

  It's, um, yeah, we're all broke.

• 23:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:23Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:26Speaker 00

  Yeah. But I, I will tell you, I don't, and one thing I don't think you would mind me sharing is that, you know how he's a very calm person?

• 23:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:32Speaker 00

  You, like, you're, you're, you're generally pretty calm unless it's like you're really about to lose something, then you might lose your shit. Um, but you're generally pretty calm. I think I have more of a short fuse, um, but he brought up a good point. So he's, he learned from his father that like, you, the reason why he's so calm is because your fa- his father was like, look, if, if you don't have your calmness and you lose it all the time, you're in control of nothing. And life's gonna throw so many things at you that you just, the, the one thing that you can control is how calm you are. And that's something I've been trying to work on for a very long time, but even listening to these stories reminds me of these things.

• 24:07Speaker 01

  I agree with him on the calm. The reason I'm calm most of the time. And typically when I'm not, it's over stuff that I'm just really irritated on. And by not being calm, it'll get people to solve, uh, the issue that I'm facing or having with certain people. When you let emotions get, or when you start getting heightened and you start getting angry, uh, you get really emotional.

• 24:30Speaker 01

  It clouds your judgment and you can't think straight. So then you start making decisions that are really bad for you. And when I was younger as an entrepreneur, I would let emotions get the best of me instead of logic. So what would happen is I would make decisions that were really terrible for the long run. And that's why I stopped just put it, you know, stop being emotional and put them in a box.

• 24:51Speaker 00

  Yeah, and that's

• 24:53Speaker 01

  At least for work.

• 24:53Speaker 00

  That's how the game should be played in entrepreneurship. Emotions don't help that much in general. Yeah, um, the final thing I'll say before we move on from this is, um, one other dinner question that I brought up was what's the most impactful thing that you've ever done for somebody? And why did you do it? And then there's a flip side to that. What's the most impactful thing someone's ever done for you? And why did they do it? Um, and then you got a lot from that, but this is where people got emotional too. Um, but you know, it's as entrepreneurs, we typically will put on this front that we're, you know, very strong and we're kind of impervious. But it's like, you get to see the emotional side and it is helpful because it brings you closer to these people. And, um, you get to see the authentic side and I hate using that word because it's overused, but.

• 25:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, and entrepreneurs, even when they're close friends with people, they usually don't reveal everything. And this is a great way to get to know people who like, uh, who they really are. But I guarantee there's some people at your event. Um, I don't know all of them, but there's no way everyone revealed everything and

• 25:53Speaker 00

  No.

• 25:54Speaker 01

  I, I, I know at least few of the members are reserved.

• 25:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, there's, you get a lot more than you would typically, I, I mean, the, the people that you're referring, they reveal, they reveal a lot.

• 26:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, but they're not going to fully reveal everything. They're still reserved.

• 26:08Speaker 00

  No, not, not everything, everything, but more than they would to other people, I would say.

• 26:11Speaker 01

  Yeah. If you ask them their revenue, they would not reveal that.

• 26:14Speaker 00

  No, they would not. Yeah. Um, so, okay, let me just end it with this and we can move on and you can pick the next.

• 26:20Speaker 01

  Which by the way, when someone asks revenue, it's a. Irrelevant thing to ask most people. One, it doesn't matter if someone's making a lot of money. Good for them. If they're not, you know, uh, help them try to do better in life. And just because someone's making a lot of revenue doesn't mean they make a lot of profit. And just because someone's really well off right now doesn't mean they'll keep making that money or vice versa. Um, and the amount of money someone makes doesn't really define them.

• 26:42Speaker 00

  Yeah. And I think what we're both saying here is ultimately, I don't care how much money you make. You should stay humble no matter what, because there's always someone bigger than you.

• 26:50Speaker 01

  There always is.

• 26:51Speaker 00

  So ultimately, let me just close it off with this. I think, in my opinion, most people, if you're playing this game of ambition, I don't even care if you're a marketing director or you're, you're just starting out. It is, it is helpful to have a peer group, in my opinion, because the, I remember when I was 25, I called an entrepreneur and I said, "Hey, what's the most impactful thing you did?" I didn't even know why they took the call with me. Um, but they're like, "Oh, joining a group EO." Like, I'm like, "What's so good about EO?" It's like, because you're, you're growing together and people know what you're going through. Um, and you share, you share kind of, um, the, the, the, the struggles, the same struggles with like-minded people. Um, and I think to me, it's, it's almost a form of group therapy. And, um, some people, I'll, I'll say these things and eventually they'll drink the Kool-Aid and they'll love it. And but event, like in the very beginning, they'll, they'll be very resistant to me.

• 27:36Speaker 00

  But, um, these have always helped and you don't need to join like an EO or YPO. You can form your own groups and that's how I've done it in the beginning. Um, and you don't need to have a lot of money to do these things too. You can go, just go have dinner with these people too. Go to like, I don't know, go to Chick-fil-A or something like, that's fine.

• 27:51Speaker 01

  Nah, dude, dude, totally agree with that. Alright guys, so that is it for today. Please don't forget to rate, view, subscribe and we will catch you tomorrow.