Should I Work For Myself? | Business Principles 102 | Modern Wisdom Podcast 106

Jonny & Yusef from PropaneFitness.com join me for another Business Principles episode. Today we're talking about one of the questions we're most commonly asked - should you take the plunge into self employment. Being your own boss sounds fantastic, but what's the reality of your income being completely in your own hands? Expect to learn our favourite mental exercise for working out the true salary of your job, why Jonny & Yusef left high paying graduate jobs to pursue their passions, what sort of personality types are not built for self-employment and whether we believe everyone can find a job they enjoy. This episode is brought to you by https://pso-rite.com - if you're sitting at a desk all day, this product may be a fantastic addition to your routine to reduce psoas tension. Extra Stuff: Check out everything I recommend from books to products and help support the podcast at no extra cost to you by shopping through this link - https://www.amazon.co.uk/shop/modernwisdom - Listen to all episodes online. Search "Modern Wisdom" on any Podcast App or click here: iTunes: https://apple.co/2MNqIgw Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2LSimPn Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/modern-wisdom - Get in touch in the comments below or head to... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx Email: [email protected]

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jonny?

  If you're in a job, you're thinking about leaving it and you've experienced a pay rise and your happiness hasn't increased in proportion to the pay rise, leave.

• 0:06Speaker 01

  Self-medication. When the existential pain starts to bear so much on your shoulders that you're like, I'm gonna just blast myself on Friday to Sunday.

• 0:16Chris Williamson?

  I'm just going to ingest things.

• 0:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 0:19Chris Williamson?

  In desperate hope that it's gonna make this job feel less shit. People should be allowed to enjoy themselves on a weekend, but if that enjoyment is medication, or if that enjoyment on a weekend is, if it's done in an effort to be like an anesthetic for what's going on in the week.

• 0:32Jonny?

  People think, they start a job, they're like, fresh out of school, fresh out of uni, they're like, oh, it's a bit crap, but it'll probably get better. And then like 20 years later, it's no.

• 0:40Chris Williamson?

  It's not got better.

• 0:41Jonny?

  The person who loves the nine to five job is the person who is all right with the shit things about the nine to five job. The person who's good as an entrepreneur is the person who's all right with the fact that like, next month.

• 0:51Chris Williamson?

  You might make no money.

• 0:52Jonny?

  You might make no money. Now, you know, next month, in six months, you might be out of business.

• 0:55Chris Williamson?

  Can you deal with potentially going for two months or three months without earning any money?

• 1:04Chris Williamson?

  Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. I am joined by Jonny and Youssef from propanefitness.com. Business Principles 102. 102. Did so good, did so good on the last one. Done, gonna do it again?

• 1:19Speaker 01

  Doing another one, gonna do another one.

• 1:21Chris Williamson?

  Was one of our most popular, uh, new episodes that we've released in a while. Went down super, super well. And this episode is brought to you by So Right. Uh, if you haven't seen one of these before, Joe Rogan and David Goggins went on about it for ages on their podcast together and it shut their website down. So there's a business principle for you. Make sure you got enough server space that if Joe Rogan and David Goggins start talking about your product, doesn't break.

• 1:49Jonny?

  Be ready.

• 1:49Chris Williamson?

  Be ready. Um, so it is a psoas manipulation tool. If you sit down at a desk all day, we are talking business principles. If you talk, sit down at a desk all day, you will have a tight psoas. I'm right in saying it's the only muscle which actually connects the trunk to the spine. Is that right? Or one of the primary muscles that does it? Um, so it gets tight when you sit down. That helps to relieve it. We've all got one and. And we've been using them pretty regularly. It does help when you've been sat cranking out a big, long day in the office and to relieve things. So all that you need to do, leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you are listening. And I'll pick someone to win.

• 2:23Speaker 01

  Sorry, it's not the only muscle that connects the trunk to the spine. It's the only muscle that crosses the pelvis.

• 2:28Chris Williamson?

  That connects. Yeah. Thank you very much. There we go. Well.

• 2:32Speaker 01

  I think it's a filet mignon on a cow.

• 2:35Chris Williamson?

  Ah, that's interesting.

• 2:36Speaker 01

  So you can eat.

• 2:37Chris Williamson?

  So if I cook you. If I cook you.

• 2:39Speaker 01

  After using the so right, then it would be.

• 2:41Chris Williamson?

  Tender. Lovely.

• 2:43Speaker 01

  It's not load bearing in the cow, which is why it's so tender.

• 2:45Chris Williamson?

  Interesting. So, uh, business principles, one or two. We talked about a lot last time. We talked about our sort of genesis stories for business, about um how we got started. About how useless a university degree is when it comes to running a business. Um, so one of the main questions that we get asked a lot is when someone should make the decision. But whether or not to leave their current employment and take the big leap. Into being self-employed. Yeah. Pulling that pin. You started to talk about your decision when you were sat on a couch that I no longer have.

• 3:28Speaker 01

  I think I've made the decision.

• 3:30Chris Williamson?

  By then, yeah. Um, so.

• 3:33Speaker 01

  It is, it's, yeah, it's like jumping out of a plane and hoping that the parachute cord works.

• 3:38Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 3:40Speaker 01

  People make the decision often either way too prematurely, like, oh mate, I'm gonna start like a new tea company. It's gonna be sick. I've not got any clients yet.

• 3:50Chris Williamson?

  So accurate.

• 3:52Speaker 01

  Got no clients, but like I'm working, uh, I'm just gonna quit my job. Like I'm currently working as like a management consultant in it. But anyway, like I. I know that like I just need like two days, get my drop shipping sorted, gonna sit and it's like.

• 4:06Chris Williamson?

  Mate, you are eight months away from launch and you have two weeks of.

• 4:11Speaker 01

  No, no, it's sick though, cause like, you know, I've got a logo and my mate's a designer and he's gonna make my look and you're like, oh no, just.

• 4:20Jonny?

  Wait until your your revenue, your profits start to like eclipse your salary and then it's like, oh.

• 4:26Chris Williamson?

  Um. So I think one of the cool, interesting little thought experiments that we've done over the last couple of years, which is a good strategy to do with other people as well. If you hear someone complaining about their job or complaining about their boss or whatever it might be. This is a good strategy to use on them. And we promised that we were gonna do it before the last one. So. What we're gonna do is we're going to take a salary. Now, at home, you can take your own salary and deduct as is appropriate, but we'll have to. Johnny, I'm gonna pretend that you are a person in a normal, some normal job. Let's say that your take home pay per year is twenty thousand pounds. Okay?

• 5:04Jonny?

  Gross.

• 5:06Chris Williamson?

  Take her.

• 5:07Jonny?

  You live in Netland.

• 5:08Chris Williamson?

  Oh, okay.

• 5:11Jonny?

  Let's say, let's say, let's say twenty grand. So that's about.

• 5:17Jonny?

  Twelve hundred quid a month, I think.

• 5:19Chris Williamson?

  Okay.

• 5:19Jonny?

  Received, I believe.

• 5:21Chris Williamson?

  Okay, so.

• 5:22Jonny?

  If it's twenty grand gross.

• 5:23Chris Williamson?

  Do you do not believe me?

• 5:24Jonny?

  If it's twenty grand net.

• 5:25Chris Williamson?

  Twenty grand gross. Twenty grand gross. And that's like a maybe just below a starting salary for a graduate scheme, something like that, maybe twenty one, twenty two.

• 5:33Jonny?

  I think it's pretty much a starting salary.

• 5:35Chris Williamson?

  Cool. So you've got twenty grand and I am going to, you are the normal graduate scheme. But let's imagine that you're someone who's a little bit unhappy with the job, thinking about maybe starting up their own thing. I'm going to offer you some concessions at work.

• 5:49Jonny?

  So this is, this was me?

• 5:50Chris Williamson?

  Yep, I'm gonna offer you some concessions.

• 5:53Jonny?

  Okay.

• 5:53Chris Williamson?

  And I want you to tell me how much of your wage you're going to give me back. For the things that I'm offering that you can have.

• 6:00Jonny?

  Okay, are I doing this as me?

• 6:02Chris Williamson?

  Uh, as you, as you, in the role that you were at the job that you were at at the time you left. So.

• 6:10Chris Williamson?

  You are allowed to wear your own clothes whenever you want. So you don't need to go to work in office dress. How much are you gonna give me back?

• 6:18Jonny?

  Per month or per year?

• 6:20Chris Williamson?

  Per year. Take it off the twenty.

• 6:24Jonny?

  So, yeah, I have trouble fitting in the suits. Let's say.

• 6:31Jonny?

  Hundred quid.

• 6:32Chris Williamson?

  Across the whole year?

• 6:34Jonny?

  Across the whole year, I thought this is monthly.

• 6:35Chris Williamson?

  No, so a grand and a half.

• 6:37Jonny?

  Oh, no, no, I can't think like that. I can't do that. Can we do monthly?

• 6:42Speaker 01

  Twelve hundred pounds a year, a hundred pounds a month. But then in grossing that.

• 6:48Jonny?

  Yeah, that's what I mean. Just I I I get twelve hundred quid a month and in exchange for that twelve hundred quid a month, I have to go somewhere and do stuff. Dress in a certain way, at a certain time.

• 6:57Chris Williamson?

  Okay.

• 6:57Jonny?

  So you're saying I have to do all that, but I can go.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  Pyjamas.

• 7:02Jonny?

  Jogging bottoms and t shirt.

• 7:03Chris Williamson?

  Yeah. How much are you gonna get?

• 7:05Jonny?

  Hundred quid.

• 7:05Chris Williamson?

  Hundred quid.

• 7:06Jonny?

  I've got eleven hundred quid left.

• 7:07Chris Williamson?

  Okay. Now you can choose your own start time. And you can choose if you want to have weekends off, you can basically ultimate flexy time.

• 7:16Jonny?

  Okay.

• 7:17Chris Williamson?

  Could get up at six P M at night and do the shift.

• 7:19Jonny?

  So I've got to do thirty five hours a week, but as I please.

• 7:22Chris Williamson?

  Yes.

• 7:26Chris Williamson?

  Can't believe you gave me a hundred quid back per month, just so you could wear.

• 7:29Jonny?

  I know, I I owe that, didn't I?

• 7:31Chris Williamson?

  Well, I've I've got it now, sorry.

• 7:33Jonny?

  Fuck. Cause I've I've boxed myself into a situation here.

• 7:36Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 7:36Jonny?

  Cause soon I'll just have nothing.

• 7:38Speaker 01

  We can renege on the on a hundred quid.

• 7:40Chris Williamson?

  Can't renege, he's given us it.

• 7:41Speaker 01

  He's already given.

• 7:42Chris Williamson?

  How much, how much, how much?

• 7:43Jonny?

  Two hundred quid.

• 7:44Chris Williamson?

  Another two hundred?

• 7:45Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 7:45Chris Williamson?

  For you to be able to flex around.

• 7:47Jonny?

  Well, because now, hold on, is location flexed? Still got to go to the place.

• 7:51Chris Williamson?

  Still got to go to work.

• 7:52Jonny?

  Hundred.

• 7:52Chris Williamson?

  Hundred.

• 7:53Jonny?

  I would, I should have done fifty for the clothes.

• 7:55Chris Williamson?

  Come on, too late, sorry. So you're at a grand.

• 7:57Jonny?

  You just don't fit me.

• 7:58Chris Williamson?

  You're at a grand a month now.

• 7:59Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 7:59Chris Williamson?

  Okay.

• 8:00Jonny?

  And I'm naked.

• 8:02Chris Williamson?

  Potentially.

• 8:03Jonny?

  Coming in whenever I want.

• 8:05Chris Williamson?

  Yeah. Okay.

• 8:06Jonny?

  Pretty good situation, do you mean you say?

• 8:07Chris Williamson?

  Pretty good situation.

• 8:08Jonny?

  For a grand a month.

• 8:09Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, not bad.

• 8:10Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 8:10Chris Williamson?

  Um, now. You don't have to interact with anyone at work that you don't want to.

• 8:19Speaker 01

  No, thank you, it's fine.

• 8:22Jonny?

  So does that, I'm gonna be difficult, does that mean that like a boss comes up to me and goes, you've got to do this?

• 8:28Speaker 01

  And you just go la la la la.

• 8:29Jonny?

  And they just go.

• 8:30Chris Williamson?

  Well, no, but it would be.

• 8:31Speaker 01

  Black mirror blocking style.

• 8:33Chris Williamson?

  Uh, it would be submitted through someone that you actually liked. Everyone that you worked with would be.

• 8:38Jonny?

  Doesn't affect my workflow.

• 8:40Chris Williamson?

  Everyone that you worked with would be someone that you liked.

• 8:42Jonny?

  So you're not gonna get much for that.

• 8:43Chris Williamson?

  Are you? How much am I gonna get?

• 8:45Speaker 01

  Why, why not for that?

• 8:46Jonny?

  Just because I think the thing that affects you most is like what you're doing.

• 8:50Chris Williamson?

  Okay.

• 8:51Jonny?

  And like most of the stuff that happens is on a screen.

• 8:53Chris Williamson?

  Okay, so.

• 8:55Jonny?

  You know, you're gonna have fifty quid for that.

• 8:56Chris Williamson?

  Fifty quid, okay, so nine fifty. Uh, now, now you're allowed to work from home.

• 9:02Jonny?

  Hello. The thing is, I'm.

• 9:08Chris Williamson?

  You can see the accountant in him just being like, ah, right.

• 9:11Jonny?

  Well, because soon I'm gonna have like, still a fairly shit situation for like four hundred quid a month.

• 9:16Chris Williamson?

  Okay.

• 9:17Jonny?

  You know, I'll just go with.

• 9:18Chris Williamson?

  Come on, so how much, how much are you giving me for working from home?

• 9:20Jonny?

  A hundred quid.

• 9:21Chris Williamson?

  Another hundred quid, so eight fifty we're down to now. So if you've got any concessions that you can think of here that we would be able to tempt him with?

• 9:29Speaker 01

  So we have flexi time.

• 9:30Jonny?

  How about work that I like?

• 9:31Chris Williamson?

  No, we're getting on to that.

• 9:32Jonny?

  All right.

• 9:33Chris Williamson?

  That's the, that's the fucking tip of the spear.

• 9:35Jonny?

  Oh, I see. That's where it just goes to zero.

• 9:37Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 9:37Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 9:37Speaker 01

  We have lo- freedom of location.

• 9:39Chris Williamson?

  Yep. We have working with people that you like.

• 9:43Speaker 01

  Which didn't get much interest.

• 9:44Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, no, it didn't really, didn't really.

• 9:47Jonny?

  No, no, you didn't say that. You said I don't have to speak to people that I don't like.

• 9:51Chris Williamson?

  You don't have to work with people that you don't like. Well, yeah, that, I mean, on the flip side of that, it's working with people that you do like.

• 9:55Jonny?

  But those people are there now. There's just also some people that I don't like.

• 9:59Chris Williamson?

  Right, but they're not there anymore, so that's.

• 10:01Jonny?

  But they are for me. Oh no, I paid for that, didn't I? They're gone.

• 10:03Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, they're gone.

• 10:04Jonny?

  What did I pay fifty quid?

• 10:05Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 10:06Jonny?

  I'm happy with that. I paid too much for their clothes, Dean.

• 10:09Speaker 01

  Okay, so the, the, you're allowed to take the worst twenty percent of tasks that you do, that provide you with the eighty percent of ballack, and you can outsource that.

• 10:26Jonny?

  So is that reducing my hours?

• 10:28Speaker 01

  Yeah. So. Oh, well, no.

• 10:31Chris Williamson?

  No, no, keeping, keeping his hours.

• 10:32Speaker 01

  So your hours are the same, but your, your, what you do day to day, what fills those hours is the nicer tasks.

• 10:39Chris Williamson?

  You're not paying for it?

• 10:40Jonny?

  No.

• 10:40Chris Williamson?

  Okay, how about, here's this, you're no longer paid based on your hourly wage, hourly wage, you're only based on work done, you have an allocation.

• 10:48Jonny?

  That's more like it.

• 10:51Jonny?

  Two hundred quid.

• 10:52Chris Williamson?

  Six fifty. So you're not.

• 10:54Jonny?

  You'll just do a morning.

• 10:56Chris Williamson?

  Mm hmm. Cause you can crack out the work of a, you can crack out the work of a normal human in, in a morning.

• 11:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, this, so this is assuming that like in a thirty five hour work week, you can do it in less time if you just work harder.

• 11:08Jonny?

  You definitely can.

• 11:09Speaker 01

  You can, but, but then that, that would suggest that the initial allocation of work was too low.

• 11:16Jonny?

  It suggests that, well, I think in some.

• 11:19Chris Williamson?

  It's not, it's, as, as in your job, you, when you completed work, you just got given more.

• 11:24Speaker 01

  But we were equalizing for hours on the previous question.

• 11:26Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, but that's why we were said, no, he said no, so I renegotiate.

• 11:30Jonny?

  You have, people react to incentives, so if your incentive is, I have some work to do, but I have to save it for five o'clock. Are you going to work fast or not, or slow or medium?

• 11:40Speaker 01

  You are slowed down.

• 11:41Jonny?

  You'll just pace it out, won't you?

• 11:42Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 11:42Jonny?

  Well, there's no reason to rush, cause you've got to do Monday to Friday, you've got to do nine to five.

• 11:46Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 11:46Jonny?

  Someone says to you.

• 11:47Speaker 01

  If I finish my work too quickly.

• 11:48Jonny?

  Skown, you can go home at midday if you just do it all. What happens to Skown?

• 11:52Chris Williamson?

  Well, the concern is then that you rush so much that your work gets done at a lower quality, isn't it?

• 11:57Jonny?

  As long as it's at a quality that's enough.

• 11:59Chris Williamson?

  So we're now at six.

• 12:01Jonny?

  At the moment, I'm working a morning, I'm naked. In fact, now I'm working, I want to admit it, I'll do four A M. Till eight A M. I'm gonna do all my work for the week naked in the office before anyone gets in.

• 12:13Speaker 01

  And you don't have to speak to anyone.

• 12:14Chris Williamson?

  You work from home, you're working from home.

• 12:16Jonny?

  Am I? Have we done that one?

• 12:18Chris Williamson?

  Have you said you can work from home?

• 12:19Jonny?

  Yeah, we bought, I bought that.

• 12:20Chris Williamson?

  You paid for it, yeah.

• 12:21Jonny?

  Wow.

• 12:21Chris Williamson?

  Dungham paid for it.

• 12:22Jonny?

  So I'm getting six hundred quid for a couple of hours working on a Monday morning naked at home.

• 12:27Chris Williamson?

  Yep.

• 12:27Jonny?

  Sounds all right.

• 12:29Chris Williamson?

  Sounds pretty good.

• 12:30Jonny?

  It's very like my life.

• 12:30Chris Williamson?

  So my point is, and we could take this all the way up, I could say, how much would it be to exchange the um job that you're doing? For something which you have full, complete, creative control over, how much would it be for me to get you to um? Be able to have your wage grow in line with the value that you create for the business that you are working in?

• 12:53Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 12:53Chris Williamson?

  Keep on chugging away.

• 12:55Jonny?

  You feel like you're adding, like you, you feel satisfaction from what you do.

• 13:00Chris Williamson?

  So you can imagine, if you, if you're listening at home, like, think about this in your own head, think about how many concessions you could make with all of this sort of stuff. I've managed to sit around a dinner table and get someone to pay me to come to his job. Like, hated his job a lot more than you did, and you weren't a massive fan.

• 13:15Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 13:16Chris Williamson?

  Um, but was just so keen to get out of the office, get away from the people he didn't like, not have to wear the shit suits, not have to fucking blah, blah, blah, all that sort of bollocks.

• 13:23Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 13:23Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 13:26Chris Williamson?

  He was paying me to go to his job. You're like, but how much do you need to hate your job?

• 13:32Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 13:33Chris Williamson?

  To pay someone to not have to do it anymore?

• 13:35Jonny?

  It, I, I think the um, so someone messaged me about a currency after the last episode.

• 13:41Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 13:42Jonny?

  And there's something that he said in the message which resonated with me, and I think this is probably the case, anyone who like doesn't like their job. We need to go in a box A, box B stuff at some point, but I think people think they start a job that like nineteen, fresh out, how old are you? Twenty one, or fresh out of school, fresh out of uni, and they're like, oh, it's a bit crap, but it'll probably get better. And then like twenty years later, it's no.

• 14:05Chris Williamson?

  It's not got better.

• 14:06Jonny?

  Because of course it isn't going to get better, like, uh, at twenty one, everything is completely novel, everything's brand new, it's the first time you've done everything. People are really not expecting very much from you, you get to go home at five o'clock.

• 14:18Speaker 01

  And you've got your health, you've got no commitments, you've got no dependents financially.

• 14:21Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 14:22Speaker 01

  Usually your parents are in good health, like, you're in, you, you might be in a relationship or you might, you know, be.

• 14:29Chris Williamson?

  The dark specter of mortality hasn't started to hang over you yet.

• 14:32Jonny?

  The sigh, but I suppose like, you maybe aren't adding much value, it isn't feeling that rewarding at that point, but I definitely felt. I joined and felt like this, like, this wasn't really what I was expecting. Waited and hoped it would get better and it didn't really. But also, so something else for me was I I could see because of the way the job I did worked. I could see people who were like five, six, seven years down the line. And I'm looking at them going like.

• 14:57Chris Williamson?

  That's that was the big one for me, looking at my seniors and saying. They are miserable, tired, they look old for their age.

• 15:05Jonny?

  Um.

• 15:06Chris Williamson?

  And.

• 15:07Jonny?

  And they would just moan, they would just moan about it. And I'm like, if they if they'd all been like, going home at three o'clock in their event at all. To a, you know, a mansion in the in the hills, I'd be like, fine. You know, like, at least, like, we're all on the same page here, like, it's a bit shit, but look what happens in, you know.

• 15:23Chris Williamson?

  Because the salary progress is like that.

• 15:24Jonny?

  Yeah, but but yeah, so you could see that. And I think people hold on to something. Because they always think, oh, well, it'll turn around, it'll get better, it'll get better. And then, before you know it, you're fifty, and it's all too nice.

• 15:38Chris Williamson?

  In a typical job, you're totally right, you you have the ability to see your future years within that company ahead of you.

• 15:45Jonny?

  Um.

• 15:46Chris Williamson?

  And it's your boss, and your boss's boss.

• 15:47Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 15:48Chris Williamson?

  And so on and so.

• 15:49Jonny?

  And sometimes, like, some people will think, like, I'm really jealous of my boss. And definitely, like, the boss of most companies are doing all right.

• 15:54Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 15:54Jonny?

  But, you know, most organisations are also like that. They aren't like that.

• 15:58Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 15:58Jonny?

  Like, everybody doesn't become the boss. And the top salary, so like, by definition, there's a there's a process of elimination. So. That's when the thought process for me came in of like, well, all right, there's at some point, it's gonna be me versus him in an interview. And I just wanna go home at five o'clock and he loves staying till eight. Who's gonna win the interview?

• 16:19Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 16:20Jonny?

  So then, that's all the questions you're asking me, like, what I actually think is the best. The the number one reason to leave is if you just do something that you like doing. Then you don't really think about, like, I don't care about any of that stuff, really. Like, I don't really care about now, how many hours I'm working.

• 16:37Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 16:38Jonny?

  Or, I I mean, I'm aware of it.

• 16:39Chris Williamson?

  I mean, you have had to create.

• 16:44Chris Williamson?

  Automatic structures on your laptop to stop you from working.

• 16:48Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 16:49Chris Williamson?

  You you have an app on your laptop which shuts it down at five o'clock, no matter what you're doing. If you're in the middle of an email or sending out an SOS call because you've been hit by a car.

• 16:57Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 16:57Chris Williamson?

  Like, there is a thing that stops your laptop.

• 16:59Jonny?

  Because because that's, you know, that's what normal people do and I have to try and be normal sometimes.

• 17:04Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 17:04Jonny?

  Like, we have conversations with girlfriends where it's like, you're on holiday and you're like, please, please, can I just have a couple of hours to work in the morning?

• 17:12Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, I I I had a difficult negotiation of like, right, we're going away for four days. It is longer than I can tolerate without work. I'm gonna have to, I'll I'll get up early, I'm gonna have to do five to six hours in the mornings. And it's like, what? No, that's ridiculous. Yes, I know. Here we are.

• 17:32Chris Williamson?

  But I'm sorry about me.

• 17:33Jonny?

  Yeah, sorry, sorry for being me. But yeah, so like, you don't, I, there's a, it was a palpable shift for me from like, I'm here, I'm resenting it. I wanna go home, I wanna be let out of this.

• 17:44Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 17:44Jonny?

  To like, actually, I don't mind, like, if I'm wa- watching something like Love Islands on in the background, like, you know.

• 17:52Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 17:52Jonny?

  Quick way of work.

• 17:53Chris Williamson?

  So, so, so, okay, so someone, someone might be unhappy in their job. Um, what are some of the real key triggers that you think people need to be looking out for? Because unfortunately, this is one area of business slash careers, which I'm wholly unqualified to talk about because I've never, except for a summer at the A A, had a job.

• 18:17Jonny?

  Summer at the A A?

• 18:18Chris Williamson?

  I was like on the call, uh, on the.

• 18:20Jonny?

  You weren't like driving the truck to go, no.

• 18:22Speaker 01

  Did not know about this.

• 18:23Chris Williamson?

  I'd, it was, you didn't, you didn't know me at the time, but I just, I did calling during my placement, yeah?

• 18:28Jonny?

  Right.

• 18:29Chris Williamson?

  I was like, I need some extra cash, so I went and did that for four months.

• 18:33Speaker 01

  Didn't like it. I'm guessing, oh, loved it.

• 18:36Chris Williamson?

  Oh, you fucked me?

• 18:37Speaker 01

  Class?

• 18:38Chris Williamson?

  Uh, no.

• 18:39Speaker 01

  Okay, interesting. So, number one behaviour, pacifying behaviour, so self-medication. When the, the, the existential pain starts to bear so much on your shoulders that you're like, I'm gonna just.

• 18:56Speaker 01

  Blast myself on Friday to Sunday, get absolutely.

• 19:00Jonny?

  With all sorts.

• 19:01Speaker 01

  With with all sorts, um.

• 19:03Chris Williamson?

  I'm just going to ingest things.

• 19:05Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 19:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:06Chris Williamson?

  In desperate hope that it's gonna make this job fit or this shit.

• 19:09Speaker 01

  It's exactly that, yeah, it's like ingest things, so like, looking for inane types of media to consume. Putting calorie, very calorie dense things in your mouth, um.

• 19:21Jonny?

  Cream.

• 19:21Speaker 01

  Cre- putting cream in your mouth.

• 19:23Chris Williamson?

  Just one form of medication after another.

• 19:25Speaker 01

  Putting, yeah, like lots of.

• 19:27Jonny?

  I I joke about the cream, but people do like overconsume alcohol, like get a takeaway on a Friday night because it's Friday.

• 19:33Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 19:33Jonny?

  Like, you know, I will have a special breakfast on Saturday because it's Saturday. And like, they're creating this like perfect world over a weekend.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  It's like.

• 19:41Jonny?

  Because the week is so unpleasant.

• 19:44Speaker 01

  And it's, uh, this is different to work hard, play hard. I don't think it's the same. I think, um, work hard, play hard is like. Have defined time boxes for when you do productive deep work and have times where you're relaxing fully. That's not the same as. Spending Friday to Sunday semi-conscious and then rolling into Monday.

• 20:01Chris Williamson?

  Work hard, drink hard.

• 20:02Speaker 01

  Here we go again.

• 20:03Jonny?

  It's, I suppose it's like the living, the living for the weekend thing, isn't it? Like if you really, like, you know, when people like post everything on Instagram being like, oh, hump day and. All the shit about like, oh, it's Wednesday or halfway through the shit.

• 20:15Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 20:15Jonny?

  Closer to one, you know, closer to Friday when I can go out and get drunk and forget about Monday to Friday.

• 20:20Speaker 01

  I don't mean to judge people that do this, by the way, like this is definitely an experience that we've, we've been through ourselves and done this and I just think really it's a red flag.

• 20:28Jonny?

  It's just a warning sign, isn't it? Yeah.

• 20:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:30Jonny?

  If you're doing it, it's like, oh, right.

• 20:32Chris Williamson?

  What what have you been doing with your knee?

• 20:34Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 20:35Chris Williamson?

  There's not, yeah, you're so, you are, you are totally right. Like, people should be allowed to enjoy themselves on a weekend, but if that enjoyment is medication. Or if that enjoyment on a weekend is done to, um.

• 20:46Speaker 01

  Excess.

• 20:47Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, well, if if if it's done in an effort to be like an anesthetic for what's going on in the week.

• 20:52Jonny?

  Yeah, so like, there's one thing like going out on a Friday with your mates, because you love going out on Friday with your mates and actually like, you really like your life or otherwise versus. I really need a drink because it's Friday.

• 21:03Chris Williamson?

  Because my boss is a cunt or because I have to wear a suit every day or I have to get up and go to work at this time or do work which isn't creative or all of the things that you gave me. Six hundred, uh, five hundred and fifty pounds back.

• 21:13Jonny?

  Yeah, yeah, well, now I'm winning. Um. But yeah, so anything to try and like avoid the Monday to Friday reality. Um. So that's, that's, that's a warning sign. What else? I think just not like, it's hard because.

• 21:32Jonny?

  I think it's really easy when we, we both had like a something to go and do. So I think part, part of the reason why I was so like anti it was I need, I was very aware of an alternative. Of like how interested I was in that and like the possibility where it might go.

• 21:49Speaker 01

  That's interesting, because if that wasn't there, there'd be one of two things would happen. Either you would feel like you'd lost your mojo and be like, you're turning up for work and you're like. This is meant to be my ultimate purpose in life and I really don't feel like it matches with my, with, with some vague sense of my inner purpose. Or you invest all of that desire for purpose into something like. A vicarious enjoyment of something else. So like going like, and again.

• 22:20Speaker 01

  I, I was gonna say like, like.

• 22:23Speaker 01

  Like investing it all into um a dog or a football team or something that like. It becomes the surrogate for all of your um meaning in your life and that.

• 22:34Jonny?

  Unactualized passion.

• 22:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:37Jonny?

  I think some, uh, cause I, I've often wondered if, if propane didn't exist, would I have just like lent a love accounting? Like maybe I would. I think that, I'm convinced that that's what some people do.

• 22:50Speaker 01

  I think you could, if, if propane didn't exist and you were on the track that you were in, I think you would have. Gone into an adjacent field that still allowed you to leverage your.

• 23:01Jonny?

  Express other things.

• 23:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:03Jonny?

  Cause I think the, in the.

• 23:05Speaker 01

  Probably end up working for like a, a, a, a social media marketing.

• 23:08Jonny?

  Yeah, pro- probably, yeah.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  Startup or something.

• 23:10Jonny?

  Doing, still just doing spreadsheets. That Dan Gibson has a really, he just sees the world as like, everyone's just doing spreadsheets. Like it doesn't matter what they're doing.

• 23:20Speaker 01

  It's true.

• 23:21Jonny?

  It's all just spreadsheets like.

• 23:22Speaker 01

  Every graduate scheme.

• 23:23Jonny?

  We we run a fitness business.

• 23:25Chris Williamson?

  Must be on spreadsheets.

• 23:27Jonny?

  You run club promo.

• 23:28Chris Williamson?

  Let me tell you Dan, my business has got nothing to do with spreadsheets.

• 23:31Jonny?

  I've seen your spreadsheets, it's just that you don't do much with them.

• 23:35Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, no, that's true. Um. One thing that I can think, again, another warning flag potentially for someone who's thinking about their career. Is how hard is it to get yourself out of bed in the morning when you've got work?

• 23:45Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 23:46Chris Williamson?

  Like if you really, really have to fucking force yourself out of bed and you're too coffee steep by the time that you get into the office and. It it just doesn't light a fire.

• 23:55Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 23:55Chris Williamson?

  Uh. We did an episode um for. What the name of this podcast was before it was called Modern Wisdom that has never been aired um on purpose and meaning. It took two hours. But one thing that came out of that that I don't forget is the best. Synopsis of what is purpose in life is a reason to get out of bed in the morning.

• 24:16Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 24:16Chris Williamson?

  It's like the.

• 24:16Speaker 01

  Good metric.

• 24:17Chris Williamson?

  The coolest way, just the roughest human way to work out what purposes are getting out of bed in the morning for something.

• 24:25Jonny?

  I remember Becca saying, um, after I quit and was doing this, she, like, I was just whistling one morning. Like, I was, like, drinking my coffee, like, getting ready, putting my own clothes on, um, whistling. And she was like, she like stopped and and looked at me and like, are you being, like, are you taking the piss? And I'm like, what do you mean? Cause like, putting, building up with that, like, every morning was like, in fact, I think I even used to sing a song which was, I don't wanna go to work. I don't wanna go to work.

• 24:55Chris Williamson?

  If you are singing a song which is called, I don't want to go to work. I think that that's a good indication.

• 25:02Jonny?

  But I, yeah.

• 25:02Speaker 01

  That's so lovely because because the the fact that the question was even like, are you taking the piss?

• 25:07Jonny?

  It was so unusual.

• 25:08Speaker 01

  That you were like so.

• 25:09Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 25:10Speaker 01

  sarcastic about your life.

• 25:11Jonny?

  It stops becoming work, but, oh, I'm moving on too quickly.

• 25:15Chris Williamson?

  Do you not think that, do you not think the reason that you got asked about that is that whistling is so. Charicaturistically, hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work we go, like, it's just, it's almost as if you're like, oh, what? What, you're going to have to go and work for your boss? Put your suit on peasant, I'm just gonna lie here with my cock out.

• 25:35Jonny?

  Hi ho, hi ho.

• 25:36Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, hi ho.

• 25:39Speaker 01

  I've paid two hundred pounds a month.

• 25:40Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 25:44Speaker 01

  Have the privilege.

• 25:45Jonny?

  You've got no idea how much it costs me to get this position to be on a whistle in the morning. Um, but yeah, so escapist behaviour, um, not wanting to get out of bed in the morning.

• 25:56Speaker 01

  Sense of mojo lost, vicarious enjoyment of putting your meaning into something.

• 26:00Jonny?

  And the stuff I said before as well, like you, you just don't like it. Like you don't feel excited, you don't feel, um, cause there, there will be people who work in our job, I assume, who love it, who feel like they're valued, who feel like they add a lot, who feel like they're really good at it.

• 26:18Chris Williamson?

  So this is my next.

• 26:19Jonny?

  A lot of independence.

• 26:20Chris Williamson?

  This is my next question, which is, you can be unhappy in your job and many people are, I think the statistic is that uh eighty five percent of people in the US are either.

• 26:31Speaker 01

  Neutral.

• 26:32Chris Williamson?

  Neutral or actively uh dissatisfied.

• 26:35Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 26:35Chris Williamson?

  Um, as actively unengaged as opposed to uh actively engaged, fifteen percent people in the US, that's it. So the only uh the, the option for you is not only to go work for yourself though.

• 26:49Jonny?

  Absolutely.

• 26:50Chris Williamson?

  You can move to another um bureaucratic organisation, you can move to a startup, you can move to other things. So the next question is, okay, we've worked out that someone, if you're not unhappy in your job, then like, fantastic, listen and enjoy the remainder of these episodes, use them to supplement your understanding of the business world, but you don't need to think about how they're going to apply to what you're doing. Stick at what you do and become better and move up within that organisation. Whereas

• 27:18Chris Williamson?

  next little route down the thought tree is, I'm unhappy. Should I work for myself or should I move to another company and work for someone else? How do we, how do we work that out?

• 27:28Speaker 01

  On that note, there's a very, so you, this, this thought experiment you did where you take away certain things, you know Juju Mufu, the, the guy that is like now a very famous and, and rich ac- uh acrobat. He initially set out, set up his life in the way that you described to start with, which was that he had a job that was like ten till four and he was, he was like bookkeeping or like admin stuff that was quite cognitively easy. It allowed him two hour lunch break, flexible time. And he set it up so that he was able to do as much like. Dancing around in the grass as possible. And training and just enjoying his life and didn't care about like. Um, what was it called upward?

• 28:12Jonny?

  Mobility.

• 28:12Speaker 01

  Upward mobility or anything like that. He was just like happy to just turn up, do the job and. And set up his life so that his job was low stress and low cognitive load. Incidentally. He ended up becoming very, yeah, um, so that.

• 28:28Jonny?

  The people that I come into contact with who love their job. Usually aren't doing it because of the salary. And I think a lot of the people that I've spoken to were like. People who are like in one of our programs who are leaving their job. It's they they started it because of like. The gross annual salary. So I think certainly the world I was in, like, there's a lot of talk about, you know, people are leaving that accountancy firm. To go into industry, all people talk about is the annual gross number. Because at the end of the day, it's just.

• 28:57Chris Williamson?

  But you're not taking home. Because it's getting chipped into like a motherfucker.

• 29:01Jonny?

  But like, no one ever talks about the hourly net pay, which really is all, because you don't get hours back. But money renews monthly. So every month someone puts money into your bank and says, I'd like all these hours, please. But no one thinks about that. They think like, but it's fifty five grand instead of fifty.

• 29:17Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 29:18Jonny?

  So the, what was the point of the back of that?

• 29:22Chris Williamson?

  Did you move if you're working in a job that allowed?

• 29:24Jonny?

  Oh, yeah. So like, do you, so you're in this position, you don't like your job. What do you do? I would say. Do you have anything? In your job now. That you are much better than your peers at. So I think a lot of people have like a skill that they might be like outstanding at, for example, that's a specific skill. And you think, well, could I go and just do that somewhere else? For example, it may be not chase the number. But instead just chase the interest.

• 29:50Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 29:50Jonny?

  And this is, I mentioned this in the last podcast about what Alan Watts speaks about, like if you are. Genuinely really good at something. Firstly, you'll enjoy doing it because you'll feel competent.

• 30:02Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 30:02Jonny?

  You'll feel like you're adding value. And if you're very good at it, chances are you'll be able to command a good salary or a good fee, whatever. So that may then manifest in a business or you may need that skill may be required in another business. So like people who are like interested in photography, for example, who might be exceptionally good at that, might go and do that for another business or go do it themselves or whatever. Um, but I think the decision to like set up your own business has, there has to be a desire to want to do that. I think if that, if that, if there's not a natural, like, I really want to do that, then I think it's probably a bad idea.

• 30:38Chris Williamson?

  Is it not probably as well if your particular passion or whatever it is that you have this pull towards doing for a profession.

• 30:45Jonny?

  Um.

• 30:46Chris Williamson?

  Can't be facilitated by somebody else.

• 30:48Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 30:49Chris Williamson?

  So.

• 30:49Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 30:50Chris Williamson?

  With me, I.

• 30:52Jonny?

  Couldn't go work for.

• 30:53Chris Williamson?

  Couldn't go work for another promo company running these events in these clubs because they didn't exist.

• 30:57Jonny?

  Yeah, and we were the same.

• 30:58Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 30:58Jonny?

  Yeah, so like, I think that probably comes from pursuing an interest rather than a.

• 31:05Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 31:05Jonny?

  Salary.

• 31:06Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 31:07Jonny?

  Um, and if it turns out financially successful, that's kind of a side benefit.

• 31:12Chris Williamson?

  Yeah. On a, a point about the salary thing, my flatmate at university went out of uni and went straight into, they did it, this was thirteen years ago, or. Twelve years ago, so it would have been before placement years were quite as ubiquitous as they are now, that pretty much everyone that I know either does a gap year, whether they'll go travelling or does a placement year in industry or whatever it might be. Especially in business related degrees.

• 31:33Jonny?

  Um hum.

• 31:34Chris Williamson?

  Um, he, twenty one years old, out of university, went behind the years, had lived at boarding school throughout all of like thirteen to eighteen as well. So just been completely insulated for all this time, well rounded guy, went straight out of university, straight into the Aldi graduate scheme.

• 31:51Jonny?

  Oh, yeah.

• 31:52Chris Williamson?

  Which is sixty grand a year with a free Audi.

• 31:54Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 31:54Chris Williamson?

  Um, but no one told him seventy hours a week and he'd be travelling all over the North East.

• 31:59Jonny?

  Yeah, I remember, I, I knew a few people who, it wasn't Aldi, I think it was maybe Tesco did a similar one, but the Aldi was the one that everyone spoke about was being like.

• 32:07Chris Williamson?

  The salary was.

• 32:08Jonny?

  The mental salary.

• 32:08Chris Williamson?

  See, I, I remember that as well, like, thinking like, oh, Aldi's.

• 32:12Jonny?

  But people got sent to like Bradford for six months with no warning.

• 32:15Chris Williamson?

  Um hum.

• 32:16Jonny?

  And you're like, all right, you just.

• 32:17Chris Williamson?

  You know, you know what the like, um, on ramping. Process was for that. You had to spend the first two days as a checkout assistant.

• 32:24Speaker 01

  You have to work your way up from the bottom down.

• 32:25Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, but you just do it like an unbelievably accelerated.

• 32:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:29Chris Williamson?

  It's like, it's like you move through someone's career of fifteen years in the space of like two months.

• 32:34Speaker 01

  That's quite clever, actually. You get the full stack experience.

• 32:38Chris Williamson?

  We said it on Business Principles one O one, you need to understand everything from the ground floor up.

• 32:42Speaker 01

  The technician to the manager.

• 32:44Chris Williamson?

  That makes sense, but I mean, so this guy was in O T C, so he's an officer training corps. He's a hard guy, like fucking could stick stuff out, was happy. And he was, you know, twenty one years old with sixty grand a year coming in and Audi A four parked outside. Lasted six months.

• 33:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:01Chris Williamson?

  Lasted for as long as his probation was through, so that it didn't look like he quit at the first hurdle. Gone.

• 33:09Chris Williamson?

  So when you, when that sort of thing isn't right for you, it's interesting. One question that comes to mind at the moment. Do you think that there is a job out there for everybody to like, a job that someone loves out there for everybody?

• 33:24Speaker 01

  Probably not.

• 33:25Chris Williamson?

  I'd agree.

• 33:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:26Chris Williamson?

  I think that there's this like, you know, you can, you can get paid for your passion and everybody can, can just monetize what they love, man. And it's like, I still fucking need my street cleaned. I still fucking need.

• 33:39Speaker 01

  That's a different question. That's, is there a person for every job versus is there a job for every person? And I think the, the problem is that everyone wants to be an Instagram influencer, juice plus coach.

• 33:54Speaker 01

  But that maybe not, but there, there, there's vast demand for certain jobs and there's very little. So like, we know someone who very cleverly, um, so he's a smart guy, had an option to go into investment banking or corporate jobs. And instead said, I'm going to go into construction because I have this level of interest and drive in something that I know that if I were to apply it to investment banking. I would be in a in a sea of extreme competition and not get anywhere.

• 34:27Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  Whereas if I enter more of a blue ocean and really pound it in the construction management sector.

• 34:33Chris Williamson?

  Ah, so he saw a weak weak competition professionally.

• 34:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:38Chris Williamson?

  In a particular sector.

• 34:39Speaker 01

  So it's really then like if you're willing to do a job that is kind of boring or unsexy like, so I know someone else who runs a portaloos business and he's doing really well.

• 34:47Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 34:48Speaker 01

  Because like it's not a sexy, you know, but he doesn't care.

• 34:51Jonny?

  That's still kind of hunting for the for the paycheck though, isn't it like that? I suppose it is all just about. So it's kind of the it's the Mark Manson, so I'm not giving a fuck. It's like it's what you're willing to tolerate. So you know, there's a part in that book where he talks about like the the person who loves the nine to five job is the person who is all right with. The shit things about the nine to five job. The person who's good as an entrepreneur is the person who's all right with the fact that like next month.

• 35:18Chris Williamson?

  You might make no money.

• 35:19Jonny?

  You might make no money. Now, you know, next month, in six months, you might be out of business.

• 35:22Speaker 01

  I like that because there because there's no value judgments applied to either one. It's like, what is your tolerance for uncertainty or for?

• 35:28Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 35:28Speaker 01

  You know, security.

• 35:29Chris Williamson?

  So that's it. That's the next, literally the next question. Like the what we're talking about is should I work for myself? Choosing the role, the relative benefit versus risk or downsides.

• 35:40Speaker 01

  I've just seen the last line.

• 35:43Chris Williamson?

  Oh, no. I said to Yusuf that I had a special question for him. Right. I'll do it now. I'll do it now. I'll do it now. So I wanted to ask Yusuf about specific. Arabic approaches to business because Yusuf is mining Johnny's window into the Arab world. And I just wondered if you have any family members or any uh uh any friends that are Arab. Who.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  Sell batteries.

• 36:13Chris Williamson?

  Have a particular approach to business and if you had anything.

• 36:16Speaker 01

  I I mean.

• 36:17Chris Williamson?

  Signature to do with their style.

• 36:19Speaker 01

  To do with Arab business style. I mean, my my Arab family still believe that homosexuality is a. Is a is a disease that is spread through advertising on the internet. So like.

• 36:32Chris Williamson?

  Is this the sixteen sixties?

• 36:35Speaker 01

  But um Arab, so you're gonna have to elucidate on Arab business principles.

• 36:41Chris Williamson?

  Arab approaches to business.

• 36:43Jonny?

  I'm sure there was a module. At uni where you could study like, because haven't they got a different.

• 36:49Speaker 01

  Oh, do you mean.

• 36:50Jonny?

  Banking rules.

• 36:50Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, no, no, I don't mean, I mean, I mean, cultural, cultural approaches to.

• 36:55Speaker 01

  Not Islamic finance principles, because that that is, that is very, that's a thing in itself.

• 36:59Jonny?

  Oh, right.

• 37:00Speaker 01

  I I wrote a dissertation on that.

• 37:01Jonny?

  Oh, right, that's that's.

• 37:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:03Jonny?

  Yeah, right, okay.

• 37:03Chris Williamson?

  No, not that, I mean.

• 37:05Speaker 01

  So so not the thing that I know loads about.

• 37:07Chris Williamson?

  No, I'm, I mean.

• 37:09Jonny?

  The thing that he doesn't know anything about, but you would like him to.

• 37:11Chris Williamson?

  Yes.

• 37:12Jonny?

  Got it.

• 37:12Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 37:13Speaker 01

  What.

• 37:13Chris Williamson?

  Like, if you, if you made, if you made your brother run a business.

• 37:16Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 37:18Chris Williamson?

  Or your sister.

• 37:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's right. So there's, so my, my brother has done business in Egypt. And they're very much about like, oh, come in, Habibi, we will do big deal with you again, like making big promises. And not actually delivering on them, or.

• 37:34Chris Williamson?

  Is that just part and part, what happens when they don't deliver and you go back and you say.

• 37:37Speaker 01

  Everyone's just late and kind of, this is, this is Egypt, but also, um, there is more of a sense of. Like, maybe it's a political climate, but there, there's a, there's a situation where like entrepreneurial characters will create jobs for themselves. Out of exploitation, so like, you'll have people who are employed by malls to. Open automatic doors for people, so the automatic doors are.

• 38:06Jonny?

  Okay.

• 38:08Speaker 01

  And as you walk in.

• 38:09Chris Williamson?

  You're fucking kidding.

• 38:10Speaker 01

  Like, just because they have to fill up their numbers, like, so that the mall has to, like, set a certain number of employees for their thing.

• 38:16Chris Williamson?

  So there's a man who waves at the censor.

• 38:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, so for people.

• 38:20Jonny?

  They're getting, they're getting tipped.

• 38:21Speaker 01

  He wants a tip, yeah, but then there are other people who will just create their own, so that in the street, they might like, you'll be parking. And they'll like stand behind you and be like, yeah, yeah, fine, cool. And you'll be like, I don't need your help, I'm, I'm fine. And, and then. Basically, they're blackmailing you because if you leave and you don't tip them, they, you know, yeah.

• 38:40Chris Williamson?

  Well, it's a dysfunctional, all that stuff, it's the same, and I am around these guys all the time and they're lovely. I just wish that they would go and work behind the bar, toilet attendants in nightclubs.

• 38:53Speaker 01

  Okay, so similar approach.

• 38:55Chris Williamson?

  I just, I'd like.

• 38:56Speaker 01

  You don't get your car key.

• 38:57Chris Williamson?

  I want to get my own paper towel, I want to put the soap on my own hands. Like, I don't want to feel guilty every time that I go to the bathroom, when I work in clubs.

• 39:10Jonny?

  If I were doing what they do, I would invest like the first week's wages or how how long it takes and I would buy an I Zettel contactless point of.

• 39:18Speaker 01

  Ah.

• 39:20Jonny?

  Because like.

• 39:21Speaker 01

  And they say, how much do you want it?

• 39:22Chris Williamson?

  I'm not sure that all of these guys are running.

• 39:25Speaker 01

  Legit.

• 39:26Jonny?

  It doesn't, it doesn't matter about that. I know what you're saying, but like, how many people have a couple of quid? How many people have a contactless card or an iPhone or?

• 39:35Speaker 01

  So this is.

• 39:35Jonny?

  I just think they get more, even if it, even if it's now taxed. God forbid.

• 39:40Chris Williamson?

  No.

• 39:40Jonny?

  I, I'm, I'm not.

• 39:43Speaker 01

  This, this is a controversial point though, like I've.

• 39:45Jonny?

  Ah, I see what you mean.

• 39:46Speaker 01

  I've heard someone describing homeless people as trading in guilt.

• 39:52Chris Williamson?

  I was in a blog post.

• 39:53Speaker 01

  Uh, trading in shame. It was, it was an old coach that I had that said that. I was like, it took me a while to kind of get around what he was saying, but. I suppose like ho- homeless people, I don't think they are trading in shame. I think they, they have no choice. But the people in the, um.

• 40:09Chris Williamson?

  Total attendance.

• 40:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. That you write the social cost of leaving is like, well, he did get the paper towel for me, even though I didn't want him to. It's, it's imposing a service on you. Or like in America, if you've been to New York. Where you get people go, yo, you like rap music and you get by my CD and you're like, no, no, no. And so it's like.

• 40:27Chris Williamson?

  So it's homeless people in America do this a lot. I've just come back from America. Um, and when, when someone has no other option is when I'm like, cool man, like get your hustle on, like I'm sweet. As long as it's not stealing. As long as it's not illegal, like if you can make some cash, then fantastic. But. When we were in a soft top car and guys would come up with like their dirty rag. T-shirt and be like, hey man, you want your car washed? I'm like, mate, I'm like fucking red light. How, how washed are you going to be able to get the car in the next fifteen seconds? Yeah, with that T-shirt that I've just seen you take off.

• 41:02Speaker 01

  There's an important business principle behind that, isn't there? Which is don't force something on the market when there's no demand for it.

• 41:08Jonny?

  Don't offer shit service in the market, it doesn't.

• 41:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, like you, you, it's, it's not for you to decide what the market should, should have and should want. It's like. You look for the demand and you redirect it to your service because you offer a better option than.

• 41:22Jonny?

  There was a better in Vegas that was just standing there going, does anybody have any money for hookers and cocaine?

• 41:29Chris Williamson?

  And I like, I've never felt more of a pulling to just go like, because he made me, he made me laugh. And I thought like.

• 41:36Speaker 01

  So he's redirected the demand of like.

• 41:38Chris Williamson?

  The balls on that guy to just like, this is what I'm going to do with the money. Can I, can I have some money? And he looked like, from his little collection, looked like he was doing all right.

• 41:45Speaker 01

  We heard George Carlin address that, where he's like, when people say like, oh, uh, when you see a homeless guy. And they're like, oh, I'm not giving him any money. He's just gonna spend it on cigarettes and alcohol. It's like, well, that's what I'm gonna spend it on.

• 41:58Speaker 01

  And what else do you think he's gonna spend it on? Like, he's not gonna go buy some real estate, is he? So like.

• 42:02Chris Williamson?

  That was a point that Rory Sutherland made about the fact that if you give money to people in small amounts. They will buy immediately gratifying things because in small increments, money can only give you small amounts of happiness. And conversely, people think, don't give um, people from low incomes, like all of their year's allowance of tip. Like um, payments in one go, because they're just gonna spunk it all and do whatever. But the converse is actually shown to be true, that if you give someone a hundred pounds every week. That they'll just keep on buying fags. If you give someone five thousand two hundred pounds, they'll actually think, oh my god, I've got five thousand two hundred pounds.

• 42:46Chris Williamson?

  Look at all of the things I can do with this five thousand two hundred pounds.

• 42:49Speaker 01

  That's so interesting.

• 42:49Chris Williamson?

  I should save some, I should. Yeah, I can invest some, I can buy, oh, I should buy a bike and then I can get to work and then I can have a.

• 42:56Speaker 01

  Fags.

• 42:56Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, as opposed to, what can you do with a hundred quid a week? Like, get yourself pissed and have a, have a tab. Loads of wine gums.

• 43:04Speaker 01

  Wine gums.

• 43:05Chris Williamson?

  Is that what you do?

• 43:05Speaker 01

  And fudge.

• 43:06Chris Williamson?

  Um, so Arabic approaches to business, we've got the fact that they're a bit like.

• 43:14Chris Williamson?

  forthcoming and uh, everyone kind of uh, plays the big man. Anything else? Any other sort of signature?

• 43:21Speaker 01

  Playing the big man, overpromising, underdelivering.

• 43:26Speaker 01

  Uh it's very macho, kind of not wanting to lose face and being very kind of like quite chest beaty.

• 43:32Chris Williamson?

  Is everyone, does everyone wear shirts that are open down to the stern?

• 43:36Speaker 01

  I'm massively generalising, but like.

• 43:38Chris Williamson?

  That's the point, that's what we're trying to do here.

• 43:40Jonny?

  I imagine very hard negotiations, shouting.

• 43:44Speaker 01

  Uh, very passionate, but, but then again, like.

• 43:46Chris Williamson?

  Dax wax.

• 43:47Speaker 01

  But like.

• 43:47Chris Williamson?

  And grill cream.

• 43:48Speaker 01

  Then again, like, you know, all our countries are countries that operate functionally and have a full spectrum of business people. So, so there are, there are very, you know, sensible, quiet business people that work for kind of corporate.

• 44:01Chris Williamson?

  What we want to hear about.

• 44:02Jonny?

  Chris wants you to pretend.

• 44:04Speaker 01

  They're, they're all just like Cuban drug dealers that are just like.

• 44:07Jonny?

  Cause that's what they're like, aren't they?

• 44:10Chris Williamson?

  Aren't they?

• 44:11Jonny?

  That's what we thought.

• 44:11Chris Williamson?

  Thank you. Right, getting back to whether or not we should work for ourselves. Um, so relative uh benefit versus risk, um we just touched on it there, I think. Personal preference and actual approach to risk is a big part of this. Like, can you deal with potentially going for two months or three months without earning any money?

• 44:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:34Chris Williamson?

  That's both a financial question and a psychological question.

• 44:37Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 44:38Chris Williamson?

  Like, are you able to take the concern of, fuck, I might make no money this month?

• 44:45Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 44:45Chris Williamson?

  And then I might not make any money next month despite having done forty hours a week.

• 44:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:51Chris Williamson?

  Um. That's why I could never be a trader. Can't be a trader. Every time I try and trade, every time that I try and trade, can't do it.

• 44:58Speaker 01

  So, so this is a, like, yeah, a case of what's your threshold? Because trade, even full-time traders say, don't trade for income, trade for wealth creation, wealth, like growth of capital. But have a separate income, cause if you're reliant and your monthly paycheck is dependent on your profits from trading day to day. And you're watching that, that horribly stressful run.

• 45:21Chris Williamson?

  Oh.

• 45:22Jonny?

  It's the same reason why surgeons aren't allowed to operate on family members. Is that, is that true?

• 45:27Speaker 01

  I, I imagine so, yeah, like.

• 45:29Jonny?

  Cause you just can't see, can't see the wood for the trees, can you? You're just panicking, so like buy or sell or do something stupid.

• 45:37Chris Williamson?

  If I was a full-time trader, my anus.

• 45:40Jonny?

  Nike Adidas.

• 45:41Chris Williamson?

  Anus would be constantly.

• 45:44Jonny?

  Blackberry.

• 45:45Chris Williamson?

  Pulsating.

• 45:45Speaker 01

  Ubisoft.

• 45:47Chris Williamson?

  The boys, the boys are laughing because the couple of forays I have made into trading have been.

• 45:55Speaker 01

  Things you like.

• 45:55Chris Williamson?

  Bro trading.

• 45:58Chris Williamson?

  I did do really well.

• 45:59Speaker 01

  Really, really well.

• 46:00Chris Williamson?

  I like, I like the, I like the trailer for the new Call of Duty uh game, so I bought some Activision.

• 46:07Speaker 01

  So that's a really smart play and I bet it worked out really well.

• 46:09Chris Williamson?

  Run up.

• 46:11Speaker 01

  There you go. Like all these people looking at like GDP forecasts and you're just like, well, Call of Duty comes out in a month, so all these traders are gonna miss that.

• 46:20Chris Williamson?

  Anton, come and talk to me.

• 46:24Chris Williamson?

  Uh, yeah, what else? What, what are some of the other things that people need to consider? So we're, we're talking about sideways move from your current job, which you hate. Into potentially another job or then perhaps working for yourself.

• 46:39Speaker 01

  So.

• 46:40Chris Williamson?

  Cause even, sorry to interject, even if you have a passion that you like and you can monetize and do all the rest of it. If psychologically your profile doesn't allow you to not uh to have self-directed work and not have a boss who's laying out your structure for you. It's gonna be difficult. Maybe you could get a P A who could try and structure your week perhaps or something like that.

• 47:03Speaker 01

  That guy who paid a P A, paid someone to slap him every time he went off task. Have you heard about this?

• 47:09Chris Williamson?

  No, the ultimate Pomodoro Disciplin.

• 47:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, I, I, I thought, I thought one of you sent this article to me. It was a guy paid someone to just sit in a cafe and watch him work and slap him whenever he like changed tab or changed app or anything. And he said he didn't get slapped once.

• 47:23Chris Williamson?

  Every penny.

• 47:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, he, that's what he said. He was like, the most productive.

• 47:26Chris Williamson?

  So you only paid, you paid per slap? Or did he pay per hour?

• 47:29Speaker 01

  Per hour.

• 47:29Chris Williamson?

  That's like playing for clicks or impressions, isn't it?

• 47:31Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 47:33Speaker 01

  However, I think that's what you said there about the sideways move is really interesting, really interesting point because the first decision is, should I work for myself or should I not? Can I tolerate the uncertainty of income?

• 47:44Jonny?

  And then secondly, like, there is probably a lot of benefit, a lot of advantage to working for like a small startup of like five people or ten people.

• 47:51Chris Williamson?

  George's doing that.

• 47:52Jonny?

  Yeah, so George's doing that. You're exposing yourself to a huge potential upside.

• 47:56Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 47:56Jonny?

  Um with like, maybe even a, if you can get like a share in the company or whatever.

• 48:00Chris Williamson?

  George did that.

• 48:01Jonny?

  But also, um.

• 48:02Chris Williamson?

  Talking about George.

• 48:03Jonny?

  The sideways move, like, if you're gonna, so like we were saying with Johnny, like, going from accounting to something that you can still leverage those skills, but in a different, at least go into the right sector, like go into something that is slightly more aligned with what you wanna do.

• 48:16Chris Williamson?

  Was there a moment when you were like, right, this is it, I'm out of here? Uh. Apart from, obviously, tha- that moment was technically when you sent the, when you sent the message that said, I'm leaving.

• 48:28Jonny?

  It's like you don't send a message, you go into an A to Z menu, you go to R, click resign, fill out a form and then press yes.

• 48:35Chris Williamson?

  Wow.

• 48:36Jonny?

  You know, and you just feel like they're going, no, no, no, please don't go, please don't go.

• 48:40Chris Williamson?

  Was there a, for this decision as permanent consequences?

• 48:43Jonny?

  It felt very final.

• 48:44Speaker 01

  Was there a cancellation funnel?

• 48:46Jonny?

  No, there wasn't actually, no, there was nothing.

• 48:48Chris Williamson?

  No objection handling.

• 48:51Speaker 01

  Supposed by that point.

• 48:51Chris Williamson?

  Was it?

• 48:51Speaker 01

  Was it too expensive?

• 48:52Chris Williamson?

  Was it, are you sure? And then the are you sure button was in the opposite colour to the one that you think it is?

• 48:59Jonny?

  It's, it's green, green, green, green. Are you sure you want to resign? No.

• 49:06Jonny?

  Dark patterns. Um, I remember filling out the form, Becca was in the shower and I was like, I bet it, oh fuck, you know, like, pressed like, having a resign, I was like, she's good. I'm definitely gonna do this. She was like, yeah, well, I'm like.

• 49:19Chris Williamson?

  Thanks, Becca.

• 49:21Jonny?

  Ah, and then you're like, this is the mo- the immediate moment of like, what have I done? And then you're like, actually, this is exciting.

• 49:27Chris Williamson?

  Started whistling.

• 49:28Jonny?

  But it was.

• 49:29Chris Williamson?

  Immediately.

• 49:30Jonny?

  But the, I tried, before I left, I tried to do something within, uh, the firm that was like a bit more in line with what I found interesting. So it was like, they were looking at bringing in loads of new, um. Like A I and smart technology and stuff and they were looking for a team of people to like front that. And I got offered the role to do it, to be on that team. I had to go down to London and like, you get to see the Canary Wharf office and it is like super like you're like, fucking hell, this is awesome. Um, got got offered that and then told my like line manager. So many days, she was like, oh yeah, cool. But like you're doing it on top of your audit work. All right, fine. So I literally thought at that moment, like, I'm quitting, done.

• 50:13Jonny?

  Didn't say it to her, but and then she I then spoke to her on the phone and I said like.

• 50:18Speaker 01

  Would they be able to enforce that? Like if if you just said, no, like they want me, I can.

• 50:21Jonny?

  No, because it's all under the same.

• 50:23Speaker 01

  Uh.

• 50:23Jonny?

  There is, there is a call that they do, um, where they'd say like, what are you going to do? Like, we can talk about matching salary and all that sort of stuff. Like, you know, who, where are you going to work? It's like, I'm actually, I'm going to.

• 50:36Speaker 01

  Going home to sit in my.

• 50:37Jonny?

  I mean, start and try and grow an online fitness business. And she was just like.

• 50:43Jonny?

  All right, well, I can't, I can't compete with that.

• 50:46Chris Williamson?

  Uh, what was yours, Yusuf?

• 50:48Speaker 01

  Very, very similar. Um, it was like send the, send the boss in it. So it was throughout the year, having to keep it completely under wraps that I'm applying to med school because, um, it obviously it would be the end of the job because you're on like a training program where they're investing a lot in you. Um, even flatmates didn't know, family didn't really know. I think Johnny knew towards the end.

• 51:10Chris Williamson?

  Fuck me. So you've gone like full.

• 51:12Jonny?

  Bodybuilding project.

• 51:15Speaker 01

  Staff mode and like preparing for this entrance exam, which was like every day after work, four hours, weekends, just all, all waking time, pounding it through the whole, whole time. Um, and then when I passed it, I was like, right, I've got like three weeks to, to give in my notice and then to get set up. So I sent the boss an email as soon as I got the result. Can I have a chat with you on Monday? Met up on Monday, sat down in the little room. She was like, sorry, I'm quitting, yeah? Like joking. And I was like.

• 51:47Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 51:50Speaker 01

  She was like, oh, you're you're not not kidding. Okay, uh, what are you, what are you going to do? I was like, um, gonna go study medicine. She was like, oh, thank God. I thought you were going to see you want to work for Goldman. Okay.

• 52:08Speaker 01

  Well, I can't compete with this, so I good luck, but you must specialize. Okay, don't be G P.

• 52:16Chris Williamson?

  You're G P.

• 52:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:20Chris Williamson?

  Uh, was there a moment when you knew that you wanted to not do Blackrock and to go and do, uh?

• 52:25Speaker 01

  Quite early on in Blackrock.

• 52:27Chris Williamson?

  Okay.

• 52:27Speaker 01

  Because.

• 52:28Chris Williamson?

  I'm just trying to find that identifier, yeah.

• 52:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, so first of all, it's like that you go to New York, you see the intense passion everyone has for the job like. They send you for a month in New York and you have to do like a bunch of um. Induction stuff and you see people there who are just all like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, super like. Masters in various financial sciences and really just so passionate about the stuff.

• 52:53Chris Williamson?

  Fucking love it.

• 52:54Speaker 01

  They they absolutely get such a stiffy over it and like people like they'll have high high powered execs from different. Uh, parts of the company coming in and that they're like bursting for these questions. Oh, what do you think about like um? Potassium exports in Kazakhstan.

• 53:11Speaker 01

  Oh, man.

• 53:12Chris Williamson?

  You're like, mate, do you think I'm a fucking, do you think I'm a fucking prick?

• 53:16Speaker 01

  And then you you're chatting to them over you over breakfast, you know, this is a nice breakfast and they're like. Yeah, so uh, what do you think about fixed income in Europe? I'm really interested in bond pricing.

• 53:29Speaker 01

  And so you just think like you can't maintain this. And then once you get back, you look at the the. Progression, the people who are ten years ahead of you and you think. I don't want, like, thi- this is the the direction that you set on. You don't wanna be that person, or you don't wanna like. Nothing about this whole path is attractive.

• 53:45Chris Williamson?

  You didn't want to be that person right then.

• 53:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:49Chris Williamson?

  So ten years of that person.

• 53:51Speaker 01

  As if it gets better, but it just doesn't, yeah.

• 53:53Jonny?

  Cause I I think like, I I I remember thinking like, what is the best case scenario? Like, I stay here and everything goes perfectly.

• 54:00Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 54:00Jonny?

  What will be happening? And like, I'll be round that corner, much older than I am now, having been here for ages. I'll still be looking at a very similar laptop, just looking at slightly different spreadsheets.

• 54:11Speaker 01

  You only got one screen as well.

• 54:13Jonny?

  One screen, yeah. Oh, they have. Sometimes they give them a like VGA to VGA.

• 54:17Speaker 01

  Oh, cool.

• 54:17Jonny?

  Or AW HDMI now. Um, but like, a lot more responsibility. Mo- a lot more money, but like, same building, longer hours, more like your life's exactly the same.

• 54:27Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 54:28Jonny?

  Just when in the time that you have, when you get home, before you go to bed, like, if you want, can buy like, really posh things online. And then at the weekend.

• 54:35Chris Williamson?

  Like seltzer water.

• 54:36Jonny?

  Like seltz, like loads of it. And then like, you go on nice holidays. So in the, in like the twenty five days a week that they give you.

• 54:42Speaker 01

  A year.

• 54:44Jonny?

  Sorry, yeah.

• 54:45Speaker 01

  I wish.

• 54:45Jonny?

  That would be mint.

• 54:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:46Jonny?

  Twenty five days a year that you can spend out out of the work. You can go somewhere that costs you more money.

• 54:52Speaker 01

  So I spent all of my like holiday time, like standing in surgery, like shadowing surgery.

• 54:58Jonny?

  God, god.

• 54:59Speaker 01

  Pre-application thing. But, oh, did you have a nice holiday? You're like, yeah, watched loads of um. Acidectomies and kidney, yeah.

• 55:08Jonny?

  But I think if the best case scenario isn't like, wow, then like, what's the point?

• 55:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, definitely.

• 55:13Jonny?

  You might as well. So I I thought like, I'm just gonna position myself in something where I'm like, if that really works out, that'll be fucking class.

• 55:19Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 55:20Speaker 01

  That's the George McKeel approach, isn't it? Like, what what decision would produce the most luck? And just going, that's such a great metric.

• 55:26Jonny?

  Well, I'm like, y- you, in a job, you have, someone decides your upside for you. And your upside is on a traject- trajectory. You can't really accelerate that. You can't do a year faster.

• 55:37Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 55:38Speaker 01

  How fast is the trajectory?

• 55:39Jonny?

  Like, it's three years to qualifying, and then it's like, normally two years and you make manager, and then it's a certain amount of time manager and you make. And ob- obviously, yeah. And most people leave. That's the business model.

• 55:48Chris Williamson?

  It's so, it's so weird, isn't it? Like, that.

• 55:53Chris Williamson?

  You progression, because there's so many people creaming off the top. And because progression is based in a lot of bureaucratic organisations, based on seniority, not on capability.

• 56:02Jonny?

  It's based on time served a lot of the time. Because otherwise, like, you would employ grads. And then the smartest grad, you would just take him up here. And give him the big, like, if he's legitimately smarter than all the management, then like, why would you not promote him? But he's got to have the time.

• 56:16Chris Williamson?

  Experience?

• 56:18Jonny?

  But, well, yeah, but there's, there are points at which, like, even, eh, mm, experience is outpaced by.

• 56:23Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 56:23Jonny?

  Intelligence.

• 56:24Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 56:24Jonny?

  But the, this idea that like, you can't really accelerate that. So you're going to be in there for that amount of time anyway.

• 56:31Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 56:32Jonny?

  If you don't really like that, then.

• 56:34Chris Williamson?

  I don't know. I think it's a lot to do with the way that people are wired and.

• 56:37Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 56:37Chris Williamson?

  I hope that people aren't getting like triggered by, well, like, you can be, but. This is just our experience. It's the way that, um, it's the way that, and it's the fact that all three of us are wired the same way. But I think a lot more people are than, than think, eh, that they are.

• 56:50Jonny?

  I certainly, like, a lot of my friends, eh, working in accountancy jobs and, you know, seem to, at least they don't say to me. Like, I hate it, but I don't know, it's suppressing my feelings. Like, they seem to like it. And I, eh, we disagree on it. But, you know.

• 57:02Chris Williamson?

  That's a preference.

• 57:02Jonny?

  That's a preference, yeah. Like, I think it, it's, it's interesting that I feel like I get a lot of judgment about what I'm doing. I judge them, I suppose, but like, as long as they enjoy it. I think it's great.

• 57:13Chris Williamson?

  So I think maybe going back to the Daniel Slusks jigsaw analogy, like, different people value different things, right?

• 57:19Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 57:19Chris Williamson?

  Like, those people, eh, it was totally like you said about Juju Mufu, that he had a job. Which facilitated him to do the things he cared about, which happened to be his side projects of, um, training and doing acrobatics and other things like that. Other people might really fucking love their family. Their family might be a huge part of the thing, and as long as they've got the money that they need to be able to take life on. And then spend time, because they've got a massive family, or they really love their brothers and sisters, or mum and dad, or their boyfriend or girlfriend, or future wife, or whatever. Sick, like that's, that's, that's fantastic.

• 57:53Jonny?

  We are three slightly autistic, um, young men with, with no family. And so what our preferences are doesn't.

• 58:01Chris Williamson?

  Well, I need to, weirdly enough, we fill the void. I say this all the time, like Darren, my business partner has a family. He has two dogs and a wife and now two beautiful baby boys. I also have a family. Mine are just businesses and projects on the side. I have a podcast and I do my modeling and I do traveling and I do, you know, to, to, to, to, to, to roll it out. Do property and blah, blah. Like that's, that is my surrogate family because I think that a lot of people have this pent up.

• 58:37Chris Williamson?

  Forward momentum that they need to invest into something and they might invest it into dog, football team. Some sort of passion. They might invest it into family, um, like growth of the home unit, whatever it might be. Or they might invest it into business. And it's weird that there is, you're right, there's this weird sort of value judgment about, well. The Gary Vee hustle and grind says that you've, you know, if you're not making a business, then it's fucking bullshit, mate. And you're just working for the man. It's like, well, no, like if you value the stuff that's outside of working for the man. Crack on because the man's going to facilitate you because you can turn up to work. You have to do something catastrophically fucking shit. To not get a paycheck at the end of the month.

• 59:20Jonny?

  You have to, you literally have to get fired, which is actually a legal process, which is a nightmare. Like to fire someone is difficult.

• 59:28Chris Williamson?

  Lemon.

• 59:29Jonny?

  Lemon difficult. Um, the, what was I about to say? Oh yeah. I think the, so there's, there's definitely judgments both sides. So like, I think entrepreneurs judge people in jobs because like, like.

• 59:41Chris Williamson?

  Working for the man, mate.

• 59:42Jonny?

  And like people in jobs judge, judge entrepreneurs because they're like, oh, waste man. They never do anything.

• 59:46Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 59:47Jonny?

  But I think the, the only time I think it's a shame on both sides is when people are doing something and they're just like shagging their short term. Everything because they are so entrant, entranced by this idea that like, when I earn X.

• 1:00:03Chris Williamson?

  I will.

• 1:00:03Jonny?

  It'll, it'll all be brilliant. And like something that's, that happens when you are running your own business is you're exposed to.

• 1:00:13Jonny?

  Like when you when you're earning salary, like you get like two grand, two grand, two grand, two grand. Like, yeah, you get a bit of savings and maybe get a bonus.

• 1:00:21Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:00:21Jonny?

  But when you're an entrepreneur, like you might, you you revenue.

• 1:00:24Speaker 01

  No grand, no grand.

• 1:00:27Jonny?

  But then you might be this and it might be this. So like this month, and you you I don't think you know this. May maybe this is the biggest revenue month we've ever had in propane.

• 1:00:37Speaker 01

  Man, congratulations.

• 1:00:39Jonny?

  Well, yeah, but like, I I don't care. And I thought I would. Like, I remember the entire time doing this, thinking like, when we pass X.

• 1:00:49Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:00:49Jonny?

  I'll be so, but like, um, I live in a reality where you it's proven that it just doesn't affect anything. Like, there's a number on a spreadsheet somewhere that's different, and it's past a mark that you set for yourself arbitrarily.

• 1:01:04Speaker 01

  When you think of your life like that, you think like, well, what would be different? Like, I'd wake up and I'd have a coffee and I already buy the coffee.

• 1:01:10Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:11Speaker 01

  Would I buy a nicer coffee? Well, I mean, I don't have a coffee at all, but but like.

• 1:01:16Jonny?

  I'm a nutter.

• 1:01:18Speaker 01

  Psycho. Um, but then you're like, oh, I put on a pair of shoes. Like, would I buy a nice pair of shoes? Okay, if I did, could I buy now?

• 1:01:24Jonny?

  Changes, yeah.

• 1:01:25Speaker 01

  You probably could afford all the little upgrades that you want now, like.

• 1:01:28Jonny?

  Mr. Money Moustache.

• 1:01:30Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Well, he says just just get the upgrades immediately as soon as early as you can.

• 1:01:33Jonny?

  Has like a really nice coffee and a really nice piece of chocolate and it costs him like a quid more.

• 1:01:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, right.

• 1:01:39Jonny?

  But his quality of life is like, oh, way.

• 1:01:41Speaker 01

  So then if you if you if your income was to double, what would you do? What else would you do?

• 1:01:45Jonny?

  So this is something that I think about a lot and it's something I've talked about a lot as well. It's a shame that I've not done this at the start of the podcast, but the uh relative difference between how materialistic you are and your means to be able to get that end.

• 1:02:00Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:02:00Jonny?

  Is one of the biggest determinants, I think, in terms of someone's satisfaction, especially now.

• 1:02:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:02:06Jonny?

  Like if.

• 1:02:07Speaker 01

  So if you're very materialistic, but you don't have the means, big, big sadness.

• 1:02:10Jonny?

  Catastrophe. Like if you if you, uh, cause I don't know. I don't know whether you could class it as like a.

• 1:02:16Chris Williamson?

  A genetic predisposition, but it's certainly something that your family will have instilled in you. If your family always bought nice things, if there was an atmosphere of keeping up with the Joneses, if prudence was kind of looked down on or just wasn't something that was drilled in, then you are going to have a higher natural level of spending than we do. Like, all of us here are quite scrimpers and savers. And if that's you, you need to get your fucking nose to the grindstone because you're going to be unhappy. Because.

• 1:02:50Speaker 01

  If you have a high preference for.

• 1:02:52Chris Williamson?

  For spending, yeah. If you like nice things, if you always have to have Gucci sliders and you always have to have that sort of stuff, you better hope that you're gonna get a fucking good job.

• 1:02:59Speaker 01

  Well, the fact that I walked in in this T-shirt, you both were like, that's not your T-shirt.

• 1:03:05Jonny?

  I find I spend a lot less on stuff I thought I'd spend money on. So I thought I'd spend money on like constantly getting new clothes and like constantly, like I thought I would like lapped up the latest laptops and all that sort of stuff. But actually the stuff I spend like disproportionate amounts of money on, it's like fucking.

• 1:03:24Chris Williamson?

  Training courses.

• 1:03:25Jonny?

  Cool, yeah. And I do have moments where I'm like, well, why am I doing this? And it's not because I can earn more money, so I can buy.

• 1:03:32Chris Williamson?

  More courses.

• 1:03:33Jonny?

  Yeah, I just like find it really interesting. And when you're just, when you're just like in a world where it's just all just really interesting.

• 1:03:40Speaker 01

  Well, you always make a return on investing in yourself.

• 1:03:42Jonny?

  In some way, yeah.

• 1:03:43Speaker 01

  Especially business coaching or business, like or any, anything.

• 1:03:46Chris Williamson?

  Unless you buy the four thousand pounds down to three hundred and fifty pounds. Um, what was that one?

• 1:03:54Speaker 01

  Oh, the like the ultimate bundle.

• 1:03:56Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, you support, you support a bundle and got, it just got fully upsold, went on a website.

• 1:04:02Speaker 01

  I think fifty.

• 1:04:03Chris Williamson?

  Oh, but it was like down to, down to, down to this. It's like one nine nine nine seven.

• 1:04:08Speaker 01

  Nine point eight percent off or something.

• 1:04:11Chris Williamson?

  Um, so yeah, materialism and means to achieve that or to get to that is like a real big thing. And I'm, I'm very thankful that I don't have that, that I've had the same car now for four and a half years.

• 1:04:27Jonny?

  I think as long as I've. No, he had Renault.

• 1:04:31Chris Williamson?

  Renault.

• 1:04:31Jonny?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:04:32Chris Williamson?

  And there was an RS and then after that I had the Audi Softop and then I've got this.

• 1:04:37Speaker 01

  But it's to the point where I've forgotten you had a Renault.

• 1:04:40Chris Williamson?

  So it's been, it's been that time, but in that same time, I've got four houses.

• 1:04:43Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:43Chris Williamson?

  Like, because for me, and even that's not about wealth creation, it's about, I am liberating myself from uh, industry which is very fickle and I just feel like.

• 1:04:56Speaker 01

  You barbelled.

• 1:04:57Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, I'm less, less at the mercy of something that's like that. But yeah, the.

• 1:05:03Jonny?

  Well, what we'd all do in companies that like hockey-sticked and went mental growth-wise would not be all buy Lamborghinis. We'd probably all be like, right, like, who can we bring into the team? Like, what, like, let's get this office, because it'd be cool.

• 1:05:17Chris Williamson?

  I'd get one Lamborghini.

• 1:05:18Jonny?

  Maybe, like, maybe we'll share one. But like, but do you know what I mean?

• 1:05:21Chris Williamson?

  You wouldn't get one, would you?

• 1:05:23Speaker 01

  If you had fifty million pounds, would you get a Lamborghini?

• 1:05:27Jonny?

  It does interest me that, like, what is the amount at which that seems reasonable?

• 1:05:31Speaker 01

  Like, what percentage of your asset, of your total net worth would you? That's a very good question.

• 1:05:35Jonny?

  One time.

• 1:05:36Speaker 01

  Hmm. Um. Let's do it as an experimental experiment in business one or three.

• 1:05:39Jonny?

  How much money does you have up to hundred to?

• 1:05:42Chris Williamson?

  Spend any of it frivolously.

• 1:05:44Jonny?

  Gosh, I just had another point. Oh, yeah. So all of us have been in situations, so your, is your trailing story?

• 1:05:51Speaker 01

  It's on some life fails.

• 1:05:53Jonny?

  So like, you were, you were put in a position that, again, so like, the reason I reference the revenue thing is, I just don't think, unless you like have this big windfall, like inheritance or something, people aren't presented with like X amount of money and then ten times that, su- suddenly. It doesn't really happen in life. But we've all been in a situation where something like that's happened. Has it affected your happiness? Like, have you, have you suddenly thought like, oh?

• 1:06:18Chris Williamson?

  So much happier.

• 1:06:18Jonny?

  Life's complete now. I don't need to do anything else.

• 1:06:21Chris Williamson?

  There's that really well-sighted study in America, isn't it? I think it's seventy-five thousand dollars in America or fifty-eight thousand, fifty-eight thousand pounds per year is the point at which an increase in salary essentially has no impact on your amount of happiness.

• 1:06:37Speaker 01

  It's mental, isn't it?

• 1:06:38Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:38Speaker 01

  Fifty-eight thousand.

• 1:06:39Jonny?

  You hear that and you think bollocks.

• 1:06:40Chris Williamson?

  Fuck off, man.

• 1:06:41Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:42Speaker 01

  It's quite scary.

• 1:06:43Jonny?

  And fifty one.

• 1:06:44Speaker 01

  Pitching for everyone's like driving towards.

• 1:06:47Jonny?

  Especially people who are already over that, who are still going for more, even though data suggests.

• 1:06:52Speaker 01

  And their past experience, like, which is even more vulnerable to those people, but.

• 1:06:57Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:57Speaker 01

  Crazy.

• 1:06:58Jonny?

  So suppose if you if you're in a job, you're thinking about leaving it and you've experienced a pay rise and your happiness hasn't increased in proportion to the pay rise, leave.

• 1:07:07Chris Williamson?

  There we go.

• 1:07:08Speaker 01

  Um, any other, any other points?

• 1:07:10Jonny?

  I am not professionally, not take my advice as serious advice.

• 1:07:13Chris Williamson?

  Yeah. So, you know, like, um, Daniel Sloss has the number of divorces and breakups that Jigsaw has caused in his Twitter bio.

• 1:07:22Jonny?

  God.

• 1:07:22Chris Williamson?

  Like, if we start totting up the number of people that have left their jobs to go, do not ring me, I repeat. Do not ring me and tell me that you've left your job because of this. Have a strong and frank discussion with all of your friends and then message me at Chris Well X on all social media.

• 1:07:38Jonny?

  Enroll a proper business and we'll teach you how.

• 1:07:40Speaker 01

  We've had a lot of people that have quit their jobs over the last few months because their revenue just.

• 1:07:46Chris Williamson?

  It's so ballsy, but this is so the other thing as well to consider, which is a total other element to this is most jobs. In the same way that Jujimufu had his, most normal jobs that don't take up too much of your time will not prohibit you from starting a business outside.

• 1:08:03Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:04Chris Williamson?

  Like, why can you not? Because the inevitably, the first two years, no matter how fucking good your business is. The first year of it, especially if you've never done business before, the first two to three years of it, you're gonna see growth at a pace which is so slow, it's fucking unrecognisable.

• 1:08:22Speaker 01

  Losses, mo- most of the time, statistically, you'll see big losses in the first year, definitely.

• 1:08:26Jonny?

  Lots of businesses are lost making up to a million quid revenue. Bonkers, bonkers, like, like big businesses.

• 1:08:35Jonny?

  Like that, remember that the book, there's a book, there's a really well known book called Ready Fire Aim, which talks about like challenge from zero to a million, acquiring a base of customers. To generate a a million revenue.

• 1:08:45Speaker 01

  But you'd be lost making.

• 1:08:46Jonny?

  But the challenge from a million to ten million, just trying to become profitable.

• 1:08:52Chris Williamson?

  Fuck me.

• 1:08:53Jonny?

  Like, I can't get my head around it. But yeah, like, you're right. Like, you can't, there, there's, there are things you can wake up and do in your ten hour day, how long you wanna work. But that's not gonna make the business grow any faster, chances are, unless you're doing like, really revenue generating things.

• 1:09:08Chris Williamson?

  So that's one of the things people are saying about the podcast. Oh, hey, man, like, so, you know, what are you gonna do? You're gonna, you're gonna like, start doing, start doing that more. Yeah, I'm like, well, I, I like. What do you mean more? Like, what's more? Like, produce more than two episodes a week? There's an open limit on how much time people can listen. And I think that's about twice a week. If I'm wrong, tell me, but I don't think I'm, I'm not wrong. Um, so like, what the fuck am I gonna do? Yeah, upgrade the fucking production quality, but that's just a, a, a matter of investing in kit.

• 1:09:36Jonny?

  Hmm.

• 1:09:37Chris Williamson?

  What would I, like, if I was doing the fucking podcast full time, what would I do?

• 1:09:40Jonny?

  What'd you do differently?

• 1:09:41Chris Williamson?

  Just write up loads of really, really fucking well-prepped notes.

• 1:09:45Jonny?

  That's why the top podcasts are not purely profit-based. Like, they are, they, they started and probably still are very much passion projects for people. And, you know, like, the Joe Rogan one kind of has become profitable as a result, but I'm sure he's turned away a lot of sponsors and things.

• 1:10:03Chris Williamson?

  Someone's tried to put him onto a exclusive podcast network. So, you know, like, iHeart Radio or something like, you have to, you have to download the app to listen to Joe Rogan. Like, that would be worth, to any company, it would be worth a stupid amount of money.

• 1:10:17Jonny?

  It'd be great for him personally, but he's, he's, he's beyond, probably beyond the fifty eight thousand pounds of income that.

• 1:10:25Chris Williamson?

  But it, it would be great for him personally, but terrible for his legacy.

• 1:10:28Jonny?

  Yeah. He's at a point where, like, brand is more important than revenue, really, in term, like, short term.

• 1:10:34Chris Williamson?

  I think it's always been that way. I'm.

• 1:10:36Jonny?

  But even, even if you were viewing it purely financially, it was like, do we make the decision short term?

• 1:10:40Chris Williamson?

  But he can monetize harder, even if it was financially, he could, there would have to be, it would be an inordinate amount of money.

• 1:10:46Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:46Chris Williamson?

  Like Arab Sheikh money.

• 1:10:48Jonny?

  Oh.

• 1:10:49Chris Williamson?

  You know, you get like billions.

• 1:10:50Jonny?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:52Chris Williamson?

  Uh, on a side point, have you seen the video where someone's cut all of the times that Donald Trump has said the word billions?

• 1:10:59Jonny?

  I have, yeah.

• 1:11:00Chris Williamson?

  Billions and billions and billions.

• 1:11:03Jonny?

  Hours long, wouldn't it?

• 1:11:04Chris Williamson?

  It's about ten minutes long.

• 1:11:07Jonny?

  Lots of billions.

• 1:11:07Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:08Jonny?

  I remember hearing Jim Wendler, who made Five Three One, like, the, the strength program on the internet. Here, like, he did like a thirty minute video about, like, business. And he's a super, like. Like no bullshit.

• 1:11:22Chris Williamson?

  Bean and potatoes.

• 1:11:23Jonny?

  Like big bald bearded powerlifter, done lots of drugs, very honest about it, extremely strong. Squat a thousand pounds like.

• 1:11:30Chris Williamson?

  Thousand solid.

• 1:11:32Jonny?

  Thousand solid ass. You don't get to that point by like getting sucked in by fads like that man has squatted until he's squatting a thousand pounds. And he just said, when you're starting, just don't do it for income. Don't do it to be your income source because you just make decisions that prioritize getting money in now over the long term trajectory, which is why we we talk about like have your freedom number, the number that you have, the revenue has to get to feel like, right? I could leave if I wanted to. So know what that is for you, like know what your costs are. Build your business to that point and then either you've doubled your income or.

• 1:12:08Chris Williamson?

  Great.

• 1:12:08Jonny?

  You can leave and maintain your.

• 1:12:10Chris Williamson?

  Also great.

• 1:12:10Jonny?

  Like zero downside, infinite upside.

• 1:12:13Chris Williamson?

  It's a really nice little rule. Uh, well, I hope that we've.

• 1:12:17Jonny?

  It's a massive one.

• 1:12:18Chris Williamson?

  I hope that we've helped some people in understanding where they're at with their career and stuff like that at the moment. Uh, I think we had some questions, didn't we? We have had some questions submitted. I promise that we will get round to them. We might have to peel off a little bit of business principles, one or three, so that we can do them. Any stuff that you want us to speak about, whatever the topics are, whatever the issues are that you're encountering with career or business? Feel free to leave it in the comments below and do not forget to get a lovely buttery so ass from so right. They will send out one of their great manipulation tools to one person who leaves us a review on iTunes or wherever else you are listening. So leave us a review there. And I'll choose someone and let you know. Okay. Thanks. Bye.

• 1:13:01Jonny?

  Bye.