On today's episode of Gathering the Kings. When you're looking at your profit and loss, you both of those avenues, your offense, you know, defense go exactly to the same button bottom line. They both contribute to the same number that that appeals at the at the end of each month. And you have to look after both. So if you're a a smaller business, we work small businesses just as much as we work with big businesses.
It's vital important for you to look after those expenses at the defensive end of your business. Because if you're doing that, you're you're gonna have more you're gonna have more money to pay your offense. Yeah. And you're gonna be able to keep more of that Martin Lane? You are listening to Gathering the Kings with Chaz Wolfe featuring fellow 78 and even 9 figure business owners who have real battle scars. From business and life, but have prevailed as the king that they are designed to be.
We welcome high performing entrepreneurs to the stage in order to reveal the real of the real on what it takes to build a successful business today. We dissect the good and bad decisions they've made along the way Chaz give a true and accurate picture of the and surrounding yourself with power players and keys like today's guest. Grab your pen and notebook because we're about to dive in. What's up, everybody? I'm Chaz Wolfe gathering the Kings podcast. I'm your host.
Today, I've got William McKissick here on the King stage. My brother, how you doing? I'm good. Thank you. Thanks for having me on. Absolutely. You know, it's not not very often that I have guests that have a super fun accent, but you're the second guest this week. Actually, I had a gal from Sweden. And and then now you, I'll let you tell you tell the audience where you're from, but I love Audi or Essence. And so I'm I'm gonna really enjoy this this interview.
I didn't tell you this before you hit the recording button, but I could listen to you talk all day, man. So here we are. I'm gonna ask a questions and be quiet so I can hear you talk. Okay. Appreciate you being here, man. What type of business do you have? Yeah. I'm a I'm a franchisee with Sculley Mitchell. We are North America's largest independent expense reduction consulting company.
So it's my job as the business owner with the team doing all the background Wolfe for me to find businesses that are looking to save money, and we guarantee they will save money with our our operations. All those no charge for a fee. So that's the type of business business admin, expand reduction consulting. That's incredible. I love how you've labeled it. It's so specific. Give us just a quick, you know, maybe 30 second, like, What type of companies do you usually work with?
What type of expenses are you helping them reduce Chaz type of the thing? The expense categories is quite a few, so it's not gonna be a quiz at the end. So we'll have telecom credit card processing, shipping waste, e signature, utilities, fuel. We have facilities, supplies, and we also have uniforms and linens. So those are the categories, and we do an individual audit for each one or all of those categories. So we do an audit report. It's free.
We show the client Wolfe they're spending the money. Where we where we recommend spending the money, and then those recommendations will always be a recommendation to stay with our existing vendors because we negotiate with everybody.
We've got a database So the kind of businesses that we look for, the reality is Chaz any business that spends money in those categories, whether you're a small, medium, or large businesses, Me, personally, I've found some a lot of success working with wholesale distributors and medical groups. They tend to be bigger companies and bigger spends.
I've been doing this for about six and a half years as a franchisee with Schulley Mitchell, but the reality is is that any business that's spending money in any of those categories We wanna talk to them because there's no cost. It's like, we're gonna look under your expenses hood for free, and we're gonna give you another report that's gonna confirm you've got the best prices and services possible with a free order, or we save you money. Simple as that.
But the reality is is that any business that spends money as a Chaz a potential client for us. Yeah. I love that. Would you would you categorize or or does the franchise system put themselves in, like, the procurement industry? No. We tend to work with procurement directors, etcetera, within organizations, but we are not in the procurement business because we're not buying any of the services. We'd sell any of the services. Right. It's more like group purchasing.
Yeah. We we we have more than purchases. So we we negotiate with with the the vendors on behalf of the client. It's kinda like, you can imagine I'm a new employee for you and your business. My job is to find savings, but you're not paying me unless I find savings. Which are gonna share those savings with me. Kind of that, that's, like, who we are, but on a consultative basis, because we don't charge any money for the consultation.
We only have charged money if we actually produce results in the form of savings. Yep. I love that. Yeah. And usually, you know, you've got contracts with with a big big names that people already are probably doing business with and If they do it through you, then you can leverage you can leverage volume and get them a better price. Right? Yeah. We we've got over 27,000 clients and we've got a database and we've team of a 120 members of staff at headquarters Chaz well as 240 offices.
We pull all that knowledge together. So whether you're a last business or a small business, You'd only want business negotiating with the same vendors we negotiate with, building relationships with. So we've we're doing it for thousands of clients on a daily basis. If you're a business owner, whatever your business says you're making widgets, you're doing something as a business and cost reduction consulting is part of your business. But it's not all of your business.
For us, it's all of our business. It's all we do. As I say, we guarantee business Wolfe save money with their efforts, or they don't pay as a single penny. Yeah. That's pretty cool, man. I appreciate you bringing such a heavy heavy need, really. It's it it serves a big a big a big market. I I love how you use the word widget. Because, you know, for when when when you're in your position, I mean, you can help anybody. It doesn't matter what the quote unquote widget is. It's funny.
I don't hear a lot of people use that word, but I've used that word a lot over the years in a little different format, but it's the same kind of general perspective of, like, it doesn't matter what the business is. And that's how I've used it, which is I've never been so sold, you know, or so in love with, you know, edible arrangements or fruit, or I've never been so in love with you know, a specific real estate deal, or I've never been so, like, the widget, whatever the widget is.
Yeah. You know, it's business. It's funny because I used to say that until gathering the kings. And so gathering the kings for me is, like, a little bit more of, like, a, like, a purpose driven like a totally what I feel like I'm designed to do. So I actually am in love with. And so it's a different experience. It's not just a widget to me anymore, but I've used that language for so many years.
So a little different when you're helping so many people, so many different industries, you just kinda have to call it a widget. Right? Yeah. Because whatever you're selling, whether it's it's a service or whether it's a project. Yeah. Or or whether it's a pair of shoes.
You're selling something, and I just use the widget as the terminology for If you're a business owner, of the you you're a CEO of a business, CFO, you're selling something, and we're just calling everything a widget, and and we we concentrate in the the cost reduction consulting because we're not selling widgets. Right. Our our widget is helping businesses save money. If if you want to call it, it was a widget. That's where I was helping businesses to save. That's your service. Yeah. I got it.
Awesome, man. I wanna know. I'm gonna flip the script down here a little bit and kinda get into some questions. Personally, why are you why are you doing this? What's the bigger picture for you? You've been success full, you know, maybe someone's listening to you today realizing that you're on the show. We've got some, you know, pretty clear parameters on, you know, who who can be on the show. And they're like, man, Chaz guys made it. But you're still at it. You're still pushing hard.
You're trying to help more customers. Why? Yeah. I mean, look. Look. To give a little bit of a back end story for me, I'm I'm from a working class background in Scotland. I didn't do well at school. I was not well, I left high school with no qualifications. So I jumped from one job together, then I kinda found myself working in local government, cutting grass, parts department. I pushed the lawn, working a thing, and it almost get made redundant.
And this is a true I almost get me redundant, and I was like, well, what happens if I lose this job? What if I got a driving license? That's a I've only got a driving license. What am I gonna do? Drive taxis, work in a bar, So at that point, I thought, you know what? I need to educate myself. I need to do something to give myself an opportunity to be able to follow my career or get a better job simple as that. Just got a better job.
So I went back to school, and I did my high school qualifications. By this time, I had met my wife who was a a graduate of Saint Andrews University. So there was a little bit of a kind of incentive there learning. Well, there's probably a little bit of a difference when you and her. My the everything I do is a bit Wolfe learn from what other people have done. So my wife graduated from university. I was like, well, I wanna do something like that.
I wanna be able to go for the better jobs So I went back to school to night school when I got my high school qualifications, and then I went 6 years at night school again to get my business degree. And I graduated when I was 37. Wow. So at this time, I'm working with local government. So while I was educating myself, so it doesn't have to be formal education, any kind of education, if you're bettering yourself, It's gonna help you in your career.
So it opened doors for me, and this is all local governments. I moved along from customer services, GIS consulting. I ended up in in economic development. I used to write and present reports to committee. So I've taken a huge step from a working class boy who didn't have any qualifications. Suddenly, I'm sitting in front of committees presenting reports, responded to consultations, being the economic development guy. So I then moved to work for Scottish Enterprise.
So and I had a huge this was the last time I had a job in Scotland. I worked for Scottish Enterprise and I was the stakeholder and partnership manager for the south of Scotland, so it was a huge, big, long job title. I resigned from that job when we came to the United States in January 2011. My wife being the the Saint Andrew's graduate, she got offered a fabulous job. We thought, okay. Let's go. My wife, my 2 kids. I'd resigned from my job.
So I haven't had a job and worked for somebody since December 2010. We came here and economic development was my passion. I'm I'm gonna get the point of the question. Economic Development was always my passion. So I tried some things here. I had a floor clearing business. I wasn't successful. Made a lot of mistakes. You make mistakes. You're gonna do this. You're gonna go along business ideas. You're gonna make mistakes. So I then decided to try my hand at franchise consulting.
Helping people buy franchises. That can tap into a little bit of my passion for economic development Yeah. And helping people, helping businesses, get the right people, So in doing so, I discovered a franchise called Schooly Mitchell, Spend Reduction Consulting, tapped really into my economic the core of what I feel about economic development.
It's not strictly economic development, like, working for a local government, etcetera, but it's it's it's one of the players in the field of of the economic development battlefield, if you wanna call it that, helping businesses get forward with more money in the bank accounts So that resonated with me.
So that's the passion that I bring to School of Metro because I had that that climbing up the the the ladder and government back in Scotland, to now doing things for myself as a as a entrepreneur or a frontrepreneur, if you wanna call it that.
And in in North America, so that was my passion, what led me to doing Schooly Metro, and that's why I'm still doing it because I I I've vermint believe that It's important for businesses to look after expenses just as much as it is to try and get the salespeople to bring money dollars in the door. Right? What do you think that stems from? Is that is there like a, you know, like, in essence, you're you're helping people kinda keep their money safe or best use best purpose.
There's, like, in a high efficiency kind of tactic to this of, like, you know, don't don't waste. Is there something in in who you are that speaks to that, or is it more of, like, No. No. I just, like, the more businesses that are healthy, the better our system is. Is that is that the bigger kinda, like, purpose for you? It's about both. I mean, that that's absolutely true.
You you only have to re reduce your expenses by 5% to get the the the same deal from increasing your your sales, you'd have to do that by 20%. So 5% increase your sales will increase your your So your 5% decrease your your costs is the equivalent to 20% increase of your sales. I didn't see that very well there. So Yeah. And and for me, that that's an important drive. If you're a business owner, why wouldn't you use that 5% piece? Right. W with that, it means still keep increasing your sales.
You have to keep doing that. You have to keep growing. If you don't grow, you'll stand still, but but looking after your expenses is vitally important. And and I guess it always also comes from being from a working class background. I'm kind of frugal with my money. I try to spend money wisely, And I kind of take that thinking process into working with businesses because if you're a business and and you're earning tons of money, I've I've had businesses telling me only so much money.
They don't care about losing money. But we're okay. We'll give that money to charity. Give it do some some good with it because if you're earning money as a business owner, as a business, you you you have your expenses, which is a leaky bucket. It's like, got holes in it. And money's always flowing out of that. You can't ever completely stop Chaz. That bucket leaking, but you can plug some of the holes. And, therefore, you keep more of the water in the bucket.
And that's our job is to plug some of the holes in the categories that we look at. But, yeah, I I personally believe in kinda looking after your money because your money looks after you. That's right. Yeah. It was just funny. I was listening to a a video short form video yesterday, day before I can't remember.
And the guy that was talking was suggesting that his followers do this thing this thing that I've done for many, many probably, I don't know, 10 plus years, which is the very first thing when I do when I wake up, I look at all my bank accounts. And that sounds odd. It's like, you know, you would look at all your bank accounts. First thing in the morning, it's 5 o'clock in the morning. I'm like, you know, barely can see, and I'm scrolling through.
But the reality of it is that when you pay attention to it, you pay attention to it. And so just what you just said, if you're paying attention to expenses, and and I can see why a growth minded, you know, entrepreneur is like, no. Don't worry about that. Let's just grow. But when you put when you put numbers to it, right, when you say, well, it takes you four times as much growth for me to save on the back end.
And the cool part about your business model is that don't have to pay anything unless you actually do it. So I love that portion of it because all they gotta do is bring you in. You kinda, in essence, take care of the work. You do the audit. You do the the connections. And then then they get the benefit. What would you say? Work for, you know, kinda transition here a little bit, but what would you say to the listener right now?
Maybe who isn't a 100 plus person organization, which is probably a lot of your your big organizations, especially medical, like, all those are pretty pretty big organizations, I'm sure, but we'll just say to the guy that's got maybe, you know, 50 or less employees. And, you know, growth is really important.
And so to focus on growth, and watching all the expenses is is somewhat difficult unless you do have a CFO or maybe a controller where you're kinda go into the next level on some of these things. And so as the entrepreneur, the main entrepreneur, we tend to lean towards, like, there's just focus on the growth. Let's grow, and we'll worry about the rest later.
Would you say to that guy right now who maybe doesn't have the bandwidth or that he doesn't think he has the bandwidth to be able to watch the expenses or be able to save money while he's growing? What would you say? Mean, a very basic level, if you're an entrepreneur, you're you're running just to use a round number, you've you've got a thousand bucks of one profit wouldn't it be nice to have 1100 bucks a month profit? And then you could use the other $100 back into marketing your business.
So There's so many ways you can use the the the the excess money that's been left in the table for your business. You can put it back into a profit. You can give it to your staff. You can invest in equipment. You can invest it back into marketing. So if you believe that you're totally driven, completely driven, all but sales, sales, sales, sales is just keep bringing the money.
If you're not taking care of the back end, which is the defensive side offense of sales, defense is is looking after your expenses. If you're not taking care of that, you're literally leaving money on the table, and you could, for instance, be funneling that money back into your offense again. If if you're completely offensive minded, totally offensive minded, let your defense contribute to that by reducing your costs.
Yeah. It's funny that you say that because I I'm totally in agreement with you, and I'm definitely an offensive minded person. But I'm also fully aware of, you know, that defense is important me growing up with playing a playing basketball. I know this from even, like, a sports perspective, but what just came to my mind, you know, we're We're here. It's January. I'm not sure exactly when the show will release, but right now, we're we're a couple weeks away from the Super Bowl.
And here in Kansas City, everybody is a Patrick Mahomes fan. Right? And the reality of it is is that the last couple games, yes, the offense has done okay, but it's been the chief's defense that's kept the other people from scoring. And so, thank goodness, because our offense was alright, but it it wasn't what it normally is, like, the super flash, high, high flowing offense. And so just think it it's relatable to what you just said is, like, you can be offensive remind, you know, like, hey.
We gotta score. Gotta score. Gotta score. Gotta score. But if if the if the opponent is scoring, as quick as you are, score, score, score, back and forth, score, score, score, just over and over and over, touch down, touch down, touch down, You still may not win the game. Yes. And and with business here, your opponent's always scoring. You can't stop them scoring. With with football, you can.
And I get it with the Kansas City Chiefs because they they had a a rough game last week and the the whole team pulled together. It wasn't just them a home show It was it was it was the whole team. But, yeah, with football, you can stop the defense. You you can stop the offense with your defense. You can't stop the offensive defense coming into your business.
You can't stop that, but you can you can stem the flow and you can you can make make it more that you're gonna win a game, you're you're gonna win it 20 to 10. Yeah. Rather than lose it 21 to 10, and when you look at your your numbers at the end of the month, you go just lost a thousand bucks this month. I wish I'd looked after my expenses more because it's so important to your profit center.
When you're looking at your profit and loss, you both of those avenues your offense, you know, defense go exactly to the same bottom bottom line. They both contribute to the same number that that appeals at the at the end of each month. And you have to look after both.
So if you're a a smaller business, we work with small businesses just as much as we work with big businesses, It's vitally important for you to look after those expenses at the defensive end of your business because if you're doing that, you're you're gonna have more gonna have more money to pay your offense. Yeah. And you're gonna be able to keep more of that bottom line and your profit loss statement.
Yeah. Especially if if someone's listening right now and they're you know, in a in a venture that's, you know, I'd say less than five years old, you know, they they have a great business possibly. Maybe they're still grinding and growing, but even if they have a great business at 5 years, I guarantee you that growth mindset that they have is pouring back in.
Like, we gotta take what we got we gotta pour it back in to go get more, which is is how things happen for the 1st 5, 10 years of a business. And so to that point, wouldn't it be nice to have more fuel to re recircle through through the machine? You you can go twice as far in in the same amount of distance or the same amount of time, I mean, with with twice the fuel. In in essence, that's what you're doing for businesses is not only helping them pay attention because get it.
Again, I already said I'm a offensive minded person. I don't wanna necessarily think lack. I don't wanna think, like, we don't have enough or that, you know, like, cut the cost because you can only do that down so far but growth is exponential. I can I can make it as big as I want? So I agree with growth minded people out there thinking, like, well, I just I just need to grow. 100%.
It's a way bigger pool to be able to grow, but at the same time, what what we call Chaz being a good steward Right? Like, that's a core belief of mine. It's a it's a it's a core value of of gathering the kings is that that we're Royal stewards. And so you came be a royal steward of what you've been given, your time, money, resources, family, your people, you know, your clients. You can't be a good steward of that if you're not paying at least a little attention.
And and hiring a guy like William to to help you save some money. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Because on those savings, even though you you you think, well, it's not it's not necessarily a bottom It's not like, well, I've I've got my costs as low as it possibly can be. One of the things that we are bringing to the table is keeping plugged in till the mergers, the technologies, is moving forward. The telecom is one of the the big categories for us.
And if you think of all the mergers and technologies, it's amazing how much knowledge in that area Chaz help a business save money because they they know stuff. As simple as that, we bring that knowledge to the table. So saving money is constant, and you can continually keep pushing the cost down. And we know that because that's how we work with our businesses. The more we can get our clients costs down the more money we make because we share in those savings.
The further we can push them from that initial cost they were they were spending the money on, closer we can get them to to, well, the the father we can get them away from that, the more money we make, because we're sharing that. And we're always pushing that that number down as much as we can. Yeah. I love that. Okay. Let's talk about a good decision that you've made in your journey, especially maybe early on. You know, you've been doing this for a little bit.
Was a good decision that you made that, you can look back on that Chaz led to a lot of your success. For me, it's a well, I should've restored it. You can development background coming through and living in the United States. I I think Chaz one decision I made, which at the time, I didn't think was going to lead in a success was was franchise consulting because I wasn't doing well at it. I closed a couple of deals over a couple of years.
I didn't make much money, but it was still a good decision because it led to something better. It led to me looking at franchises to help people buy franchises and show them all these great ideas, to me finding a great idea that taps completely into my story where I'm coming from in my passion. So in the outs in the outskirts, it looked like a bad idea, a bad a mistake almost, but it wasn't because sometimes you never know what something leads to.
And and for me, when I look back now, it's like, well, that actually was a good decision because the fact that I get involved in that led to something that that that then Chaz led to me being successful with the Schooly Mitchell. Yeah. It's so true. It's a dynamic that's hard to grasp because it's a super intangible, right, where you don't know what you don't know.
And you wouldn't be where you are today without that decision, but there's no way for you to know what you know now without first taking that step or making that decision. And I and I liken it actually too. A lot of times, we talk with folks that are, you know, looking to join Gathering and the king's mastermind group, or, you know, maybe even guys that are already in, but we're talking about different connections that they've made.
And it's like, you know, 4 months ago, you didn't know this particular group of people. And 4 months ago, you didn't have this issue or this need or a desire for a connection or some something that you need in your business or in in a in a relationship. And and you put it before the group. And some guy's like, oh, yeah. Here. Here's the answer. Or, oh, yeah. I got a guy for that. I got a connection for that. And it changes everything.
Like, I don't mean to be dramatic about that, but it it changes everything. It changed everything for you. That one decision, obviously, you said, eventually kinda had to lead to something else. But it changed your entire, like, what you do. And and this happened time and time again, even inside of our group. So it's just like this majorly impactful, but super intangible thing. I can't just, like, measure this thing You know, you understand what I'm saying?
Yeah. Yeah. I I have a saying that that that I live by is that you'll sometimes regret the decisions you make. But you'll always regret decisions you don't make. Whatever that is, because you'll never know. You'll never know that with with that being a success. I mean, you may sometimes look at some things. I don't I don't wanna buy those scheduling the thing dives, but in generally in life, you'll mostly regret things that you don't try. Right. You sometimes are great things you do try.
Sometimes you work, but you won't know. So I guess the point of that is is don't be scared to try things. Just get out there and do it because you're gonna fail. That's that's a guarantee. You're gonna feel it stuff, but you will be successful if you just keep trying things because eventually you'll find something that works.
And you and I had talked before we started recording that if you do enough good out there, as like Zigla said, if you help enough people get what they want, help you get what you want. And I believe that because, you know, I do some of things to this and help with promote businesses. And, obviously, just trying to be a nice guy, trying to help people I'm I'm meeting a franchisee of School in Metro today. 1 is just new, so I'm gonna go through how I present.
I'm gonna I'm gonna be a tutor for that person. They have all that in spades at headquarters. Right. But because I'm I'm a a a foot soldier on the ground, I'm gonna share Chaz. And I don't get any benefit from that, but but seeing somebody else possibly be successful, but go out there, try things and give a little or give a lot. Yeah. Yeah. I'll I'll the way that you just said that last little part, give a little, give I mean, you're right.
We did agree, and I and the language that I used was that we were like minded when it comes to give, give, give. Like, just give and and then give a little bit more and then give again with without any expectation, you know, because that's what happens over the course of time. It's recognized by people by, you know, forces in in heaven or whatever. Right?
Like, the reality is is that there's there's good seeds planted Bible talks about this Chaz seeds are gonna come up with what what you whether you plant good seeds or blood or bad seeds. And I'm just like you, I'm trying to plant all kinds of good seeds everywhere. And because I'm trying to get a good harvest, and and I don't know where the harvest is gonna come up. I'm not sure exactly what relationship's gonna gonna lead to it.
I don't know what decision or what, but but I'm just trying to be faithful in in each of those action steps. And so I know that's where we agree.
I hope the listeners paying close attention because We're giving them some some practical stuff Chaz as well as conceptual, like, life, like, core, like, kinda this is who you need to be as a successful person, or I would even say as far as a king, right, it's the king mindset to be able to pour out, right, because out of the responsibility or out of the authority that you've got or even out of the leadership or the money that you've earned or whatever we wanna
say Chaz makes a king, it's now his duty to cover or to pour out or to take care of all these other people and you've given such an a great example of even somebody in your own system, that you get no benefit from, except for that you're gonna get a bunch of benefit from that because there's a lot of things that you're gonna share with him that you're probably doing. And that are gonna be are gonna sharpen your tool, and and there's gonna be a relationship built with that guy.
And that will come back. I promise. And you know that, though. Yeah. I mean, you learn from the rookies because we have an an annual conference. So I'll stand at the barn. Have a chat with the rookie as well as the more experienced people. They they wanna learn from me.
Like, like, like, I'm trying to learn from people who've who've been doing it longer than I have, but you'd be surprised at how much you learn from people who are just coming into the system because we all come from so many different backgrounds, and you can meet somebody who you might think somehow beneath you in the hierarchy of the organization. Right.
But that person always brings something to the table that they don't even know exist yet And that's one of the things I'm gonna share today with the with the the the fellow franchise either. They're gonna know stuff that they don't even know they know yet, and I'm gonna probably learn some things from them at the same time. I don't know that I know yet. Exactly. I love that perspective because you're 100% right.
But what it takes though, the the key to that is a learning spirit or humility to know that, like, you know, maybe I don't have it all quite figured out yet. And and even this new guy might teach me something, and we've experienced this even with Gavin the Kings because we've got guys that are just over the 1,000,000 mark, and we've got guys that are in the hundreds of millions.
And so the guys that are in 100 of 1,000,000 probably don't need tactical advice from the guy that know, that's just crossed a million. But I'll tell you what, when he when this guy gets around that guy, there's a transfer of courage. There's a transfer of energy. There's a transfer of this guy fumbled across something, and it spurred a memory of this other guy. He's like, oh, yeah. We haven't done that in a while. Have we hey. Call call Becky or you know, let's get that going again. You know?
There's just so many different nuances that get transferred is what you just said. Without even that person even knowing, Like, you can't get the transfer if you don't put yourself in that situation over and over again. Would you agree? 100%. Because you can never stop learning. When you talk to anybody about anything, you'll always learn something. And I believe that every single day, but just meeting you today.
I've I've learned a couple of things that but I didn't know before I spoke to you today. And it happens all the time, but just be that sponge and be that accepting of knowledge will come from places you don't think even though you might think it's some to his beneath the in the organization. Exactly. But just I I love helping people and and anybody watching this video or listen to this podcast should think the same way because you get such reward from helping people.
Just the way you feel about it, just the way it makes you feel is, like, if somebody somebody's asking, they're looking for help. I'm actually hoping they'll ask me so that I'm the one that can help them. So that I'm the one that can give them something that they don't have. And believe in living my life that way. I believe in operating my business that way. And, obviously, this is a business podcast and as a business on, you should live your life with that and try and and help as much as can.
Obviously, you have a business to run. We get that, but whatever there's an opportunity, Linda helped to somebody because it makes you feel good, but it also will benefit you in the long run. Yeah. 100%. Okay. Wayne, what about a bad decision? Something that you've done that we can learn from. I'm sure you probably learned from, but you can keep us away from making the same mistake. What is it?
Yeah. I mean, I mentioned when I came to this country that that I started a floor clearing company, there was there was one day I had somebody call me It was a little Mexican guy who came from a friend who had a gardening company, and he didn't need the employee. And he said he was a great worker. Remember, I spoke him to the phone. He was very Spanish, and I thought, you're going by a great worker, but I didn't believe I was making enough money at the time. To hire the guy.
Yeah. And and I swear to god is that you talk about some of the decisions that you don't make and you regret the rest of your life. I regret not hiring that guy because I believe vehemently that if I had taken the chance and hired him at that time, I probably would have been successful. It may sound a crazy thing that just hang somebody who sounds like they'd be a good worker could make a difference because that was one of the problems that I had in that business.
I couldn't find employees, and I never took a chance when it was there. I never I never grasped it when it was there. And and my wife and I've talked about it so many times. You remember that guy that that he spoke to? And I'm I'm I'm saying he was Mexican he was mexican. He told me he was originally from Mexico, and I I think that was a mistake. And for me, it's a big mistake. Who knows it?
The business might not have been successful, but I believe it would have been more successful because I would have had somebody in their work informer because I was doing the work as well as running the business. I was the and I was the accounting. I was the labor. I was sales. I was everything trying to grow that business, and I believe that was a mistake I made by not trusting the universe who'd sent me some day that could help me. I should've taken it.
Yeah. That's so interesting because there's a lot of people I'm sure listening who are in that same boat where Well, we call warrior stage. Right? Like, they're they're out there slowly, you know, the sleigh in the sleigh in the enemy. They're they're in the heat of battle currently. AKA, I'm wearing all the hats. I'm HR, I'm sales, I'm accounting, I'm the fulfillment, you know, I'm everything. And and and you can do it. You are doing it.
I'm talking to you, listener, and you are doing it, but you're stressed. And there's no quality of life. And your business is is probably gonna fail just like William just said his his went down the pipe because you can't do it all. You you think you can, but you can't. And that's why a lot of guys just stay small or eventually pop to something else because they just they experience burnout or systems fall apart or they're never worse systems. And so you're right.
Hiring that guy would have led to probably another hire, and then probably a maybe more strategic hire, maybe a maybe a sales guy. And then maybe another hire, like, a a a operations director. And and then so now we're talking about you're doing 2, 3, maybe 5, you know, 7,000,000 and and we're just a whole different trajectory Yeah. Based on you taking a Chaz, hiring a guy. And so I think that the listeners should pay close attention. What would you say to that guy?
Oh, he's right, but I don't know. I don't have the money. Oh, what would you say? I I would say find the money. Take the hit financially. I mean, I I could have afforded it, but it was I was kinda on the borderline. Take the hat financially. Go for it because if you're struggling along trying to wear all the hats, that wears your jaw at at Wolfe, wear you down. It won't be down physically Chaz well as mentally as well as everything. I actually kept that business going for 7 years.
I was still doing it when I started school in Metro. I was still doing it when I had my franchise consulting. I still kept doing it because I'm I'm Scottish and I'm a working guy, and I I I try to I try to keep it going and eventually I had to just stop. I had to just let it go. Because I was kinda like working weekends.
When I started school in Metro to help pay the franchise fees, which comes right at the beginning, whether you earn the money or not, I was cleaning floors at weekends to pay my franchise fees for the 1st year with Scully Metro. I was I was out cleaning floors to pay my franchise fees, because I said to my wife, you're not gonna be depositing her her bank money into this. I'm gonna do this myself.
So I I literally worked weekends with a business that was failing to to help this business be successful. So long story short, going back to the the question about who should they go for it? Yes. Absolutely go for it because you you will regret it if you don't take those chances. Yeah. What an incredible story to of you being able to make that type of a sacrifice early on. I think that we can all relate to that to a degree.
We just wanted to make that point there because every business I've ever known that's been any sort of successful Chaz a similar little part of their story where they say, you know, not not too many people know this. But and then they fill in the blank with some late night, some, you know, weekend deal that they had to do for a year or 2 or 3. You know, I I for the listener probably has no idea about this.
I owned 7 franchises doing, I don't know, $45,000,000 a year in sales in my twenties, and I went back to work as a sales guy. Full time became the top salesperson out of probably 25100 and and I was only able to do that because I had systems. And the only reason I wanted to do is because I wanted to start investing in real estate. So I took about 3 years of time and, like, pressed in hardcore. It was crazy.
I don't know if I would suggest anybody doing this, but I did exactly what I wanted to do. I start investing in real estate. And just like you, just like most listeners, probably they've got that moment in time, whether it was a couple weeks or a couple of years, where they had to just buckle down and get it done. And so I just appreciate you sharing that. I'm gonna go over to our speed round here.
I'm gonna ask you about KPIs, So in in your in your business here where you're helping other businesses, manage expenses, get rid of or or or increase cash flow by doing that, What's the most important KPI or, like, I like to say if you could only track one thing, what would it be? There are many people that say no. It's it's I'm sorry. It's a very basic answer from us because you've done sales. You wanna count the nose. Not not everybody says yes.
You think everybody wants to save money, but not everybody's sensible enough to take the opportunity. When That's a little dig there. When when we lay it in front of them, so the the biggest thing that I track is just the number of people that are saying no, but As you say, you know, sales, it's next. It's on to the next. It's on to the next.
So the biggest performance indicator I'm looking at is just how many people say no, and that helps guide you in areas as you're developing specific industries or talking to specific types of people or set certain people at certain levels in the organization, Chaz will help guide you because you're you're measuring that as you go along with those noises. Like, well, I only spoke to the director of procurement. We know we wanna speak to the CFO, the CEO. So that had a bearing on that note there.
So tracking the nose with some kind of underlying information is what what I look at, and I'm sure that's what most most franchisees in the School of Metro System look at, I mean, they don't they don't definite. I don't know that, but I'm assuming that that people are doing something similar to me in this in this organization. Yeah. Yeah. 100%. Okay. What would you say is a great book or maybe resource that you've used to grow your business? There's one book.
I've actually read a few times, and I'm not an avid book reader, and it's funny because I know a lot of successful people are avid book readers. Some listen to podcasts. I some listen to podcasts, some listen to music, I play a little bit guitar. I've got a book that I've read 2 or 3 times. It's called thoughts of things. If you're if you're interested in a book, that will kinda let get your your brain juices flowing. It's a really short read.
It's by Bob Proctor, and he talks about the fact that if you think of something, it's a thought. Like, the chair you're sitting on, that was a thought in somebody's mind. Everything that surrounds your physical world is a thought in somebody's mind all these inventions Chaz are thought in somebody's mind. And the point of, for me, the point of the book to teach you is that you think of things, you have to act in things to make them become a reality.
But every single thing around the the physical world is a thought that somebody thought, and it's developed into a tangible something. So kinda leads back to what we're talking about. Like, go for it. Go try things. If you think of something, you've got an idea for something, put it into play and see see if it happens because if you don't put it into play, If you don't step in the field, you'll you'll you'll never know if you could win the game or not.
Yeah. Yeah. And you're and you're a 100% right at taking the chance there. You know, that that book for me gives that angle plus 1 more, and I'll so I'll share my little tidbit here for the listener as well, which is Chaz you get what you pay attention to. You get what you think about. And so just like you said, I have I'm, you know, standing next to a chair right now. I'm standing at a desk. I'm using a mic because it was a thought in someone's mind.
Not because they thought about it, but because they took a risk. Like you just said, created this product and it's iterated over the course of years.
And so whether you're the inventor, or whether you're just the person that's trying to get a target done, a certain amount of money, a certain goal with your family, you wanna, like, fill in the blank, whatever the blank is, whatever that thought is, it will only be if you think about it, like obsess over it and, like, actually take action toward it. And then act on it. Yep. Yep. So I just that's just a really, really good book and a really great reference.
What do you think about intentionally networking or masterminding with other entrepreneurs? I'm a huge believer in all of the above. 90% of my business comes from networking, from meeting people, having coffees, one to ones, introductions. I do like the marketing. I do. I do invest my own money back into my own offense.
For my own business, even though we are defense of business, but I found the biggest offense in the the most cost effective offense for growing my business Chaz been networking and sharing of ideas with other people, other business people, especially because, as I said, talking to people, you never know what you're gonna learn.
And when you're doing masterminding, it's it's kind of incredible, the the ideas that flow around the table, getting back to the book thoughts or things, all those thoughts that people are having, and they'll show you how they develop into things, then you have you have ideas that you can develop into your own things. That's right. Generally, networking for me has been huge. I'm I'm always networking. I'm always having coffee. I'll have coffee with anybody. Like, a real estate agent. Oh, god.
I have no a 1000 real estate agents. You never you you never know where it leads to. You never know who that person knows. You never know who their connections are. They might be married to somebody who owns a manufacturing company, and they really need to stop leak leaking the bucket because they're not selling enough widgets So there's so many reasons why you should network and you should brainstorm, but I'm a firm believer in it, like, 100% Yeah.
That you gave you gave a really, really good description there. Obviously, networking more so for the business development and then master mining for ideas and strategy and you gave, you know, some incredible examples on both. I've got a question for you around family. You've you've mentioned, you know, your Wolfe, and I didn't ask you before we started if you had kids you'll have to fill us in on that. But for myself, real quick, I'll give I'll preface the question. I've got 4 kids.
And I've interviewed a couple 100 entrepreneurs here on the show, and and I've talked with business owners for, you know, 10, 12 years. And we all seem to have the same issue, right, which is, man, I'm obsessed with my business. I want it to grow, grow, grow, but then, like, oh, yeah. I forgot. I'm married. Oh, yeah. I forgot. I got kids. And and and that's where, like, a lot of people come in and talk about balance and and I just think that's hocus poke Right?
So here's my belief is that we gotta do it all. And I gotta be obsessed about my marriage and my kids just the same way I'm obsessed about my business. And so my question to you is, how have you been able to do that? Now two businesses in, one maybe didn't turn out the way that you wanted it to, but how have you kept your family, maybe an obsession? In the midst of all that. Well, I wake up every morning and every day is a new day. Everything's different. I never stop thinking about my business.
I I go for walks in the morning, and I like to think stuff, and I'll come back with some ideas Chaz I had a thought in my head, thoughts of things. But your your home life is part of your business. I also think that there's no point in doing the business if you of the the the home life. If you don't have something to a tangible benefit from it, so having a home life is a tangible benefit for your business. So therefore, I see it all part of the 1.
And and my wife and I are really good at pulling together. Right now, my wife is in Scotland. She flew out Monday night. Her dad's second hospital is really old and we're kinda like hoping he survived us. And we talked just last night, and I said, I'm gonna start looking for a new house for your mom and dad to live in, they live in this big house in Scotland. They need to live somewhere smaller, And she says, do you have time? I says, no. I will find the time. I'll make the time for her.
And then she said, well, I said to her, I I wanna feel as though I'm doing something help you. She says, you're helping me by being there. Because I've got a son at university, but I've got a son at high school here. So I'm making his lunches in the morning. I'm doing all the stuff. Gives her freedom to go do her best. Home Life becomes part of your business. It becomes part of everything because, as I say, that I I don't I don't believe in working for work's sake.
I believe in working for some kind of benefit at the end of it. That is a nice co nice house. We've got a nice swimming pool. We've got a nice life in Florida. So I believe that your your home life is part of your business. It's the it you can't really separate the 2 of them because they're so in they're so intrinsically tied together that that you've your home life as your business. Your business Chaz your home life.
Yeah. You you you fall into alignment with with myself and and plenty of others I've had here on the show that I've already started to question, but you're a 100% right. There there is no separation. And when we try to separate it, I feel like that's when we it's like, well, wait a second. Like, okay. Let me try to balance Let me cut this off and go over here. I was like, no. No. They just need to be, like, altogether. That doesn't mean that you don't have separate time for certain things.
Like like you just said, I'm sure when you're out at the pool, you're hanging with your boys or with your Wolfe, and you're doing the thing. But the integration of those things is really, really important. I I love the way that you said it. William, I got one last question for you. Are you ready? Yep. If you could whisper in the younger William's ear, What would you say?
Stick in at school because education is so important for you, whether it's academic education, whether it's it's personal education education education, it's what I would whisper in the young Williams here. What do you think that that would have done for the younger William that you didn't get until maybe later? I think I would probably be more where I am now earlier in my life. Sure. Simple as that.
And and I talked to my my younger son who's Not doing great at school, and he's as bright as anything. He's actually brighter than his brother who's at Florida State University, straight a student. This young one is is greater than him, and I keep talking to him as, like, get it done now because work hard in your academic life when you're at school, because then you then you've got the rest of your life because I had to go back to school.
I had to spend 6 years at at night school when I was getting my degree. I graduated when I started serving, and I'm and I'm tutoring my my horn here a little bit about doing that because I'm proud of that, but I wish I didn't have to do that. Right. So I wish I'd told the the if I could go back to the younger William and say, do this way instead of doing it that way, you'll be more successful early rather than later in life. Yeah. But there's there's there's never a time not to do something.
You if you're gonna be 55, you're gonna be 60, 70, whatever it is you're gonna be, you're gonna be that age anyway. So do it now if you're somebody who's in the fifties thinking it's too late. It's never too late. I graduated when it's 37. My my point is is that it's actually better to do early, but it's never too late. You know, you took the words out of my mouth because you're right. There is never a better time. I learned that in real estate.
You know, the best time to buy real estate was 20 years ago. The next best time is right now. Yes. Which is exactly what you just said. And so it's like, okay. So I can look back and I can go, okay. Well, not only just education, academics, formal education, but you also you made way for self education, YouTube, podcasts, know, getting around other business owners. Like, we learn in all these formats. And so number 1, never stop. Start earlier. Never stop.
And then, oh, by the way, you're not too it's not too late to start even if you haven't started yet. I think that's a pretty beautiful last message here. Okay, William. How can the listeners find you? Number 1, I want to I want them to know as small business owner, how can they connect with your business so that they can save money? They can be on the defense. They can plug those holes. How can they find you that way?
Or if they just wanna pick your brain as an entrepreneur, How can they find you that? If you can call me, I'll give you my cell phone, 813-449-1215. You can email me at william.mckissettat skillymetro.com. You can find my skillymetro webpage, which is is skilly. Will we sorry. Skillymetchell.com slash w mckissock. There you go. I forgot my own email address and my own my that's okay. We'll put it in the show notes for you. And and go go on social media. I'm very easy to find.
You find my website. You'll find me LinkedIn. You you you find my YouTube channel. You'll find me on Facebook. Very easy to track down if you wanna talk to me about just talk to me. I'm I'm I'm always open to a conversation with anybody about anything. If I can help anybody listening to that podcast, I'm happy to do so. Likewise, if you're a business listening to this and you wanna save money, I can certainly help with that 100%.
Yeah. I think I think we're gonna I mean, I don't come up with the titles, you know, for our shows, but I'm gonna put this in here for my editor who's gonna be listening to this. I think we should probably title this episode. Something about saving money guaranteed with William, you know, or something like that. I think that, you you threw it out there. So it's it's out there for the listeners to take advantage of.
You've given your direct phone number and every way possible to communicate with you, they'd be silly not to have a cup of coffee with you or a virtual meeting to see if if you can plug some of those holes. So, William, I just so appreciate you, you know, being here and giving freely, as you said earlier, you have done that super well here today.
You've done it like a king, and I wish you nothing but blessing on your family, even your wife's parents, and that whole situation, and even just, over your kids, and and your business, of course. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you. Thank you for listening to gathering the Kings today. I hope that you were able to pull out a few nuggets to go apply into your business right away.
More importantly, though, I hope that you're realizing that it takes more to be successful than just being by yourself doing it all on your own, carrying the weight all by yourself. What I have realized not only in my own journey from multiple business and multiple different industries and now interviewing literally over 2 or 300 other very successful 7, 8, and 9 figure business owners is that It's tough to do it alone.
And so gathering the Kings literally exists to bring together successful entrepreneurs. In fact, we are putting together 1 1000 kings, specifically who are grateful, but not done. We're intentionally assembling kings who fight tooth and nail for their business, family, and communities, and here's what we believe Chaz in the pursuit of excellence in those areas, that it ignites within us the responsibility to govern power and forge a lasting legacy. So if that relates and and resonates with you.
And you know that you need people around you sharp, qualified other very successful business owners. I want you to go to gatheringthekings.com. I want you to take a look at what we're doing and see if it makes sense for you to be part of our pursuit. To 1000 kings. Talk soon.