On today's episode of Gathering The Kings. I will help you get where you wanna be at in life or financially. I will help you get there, but don't judge me based off of the materials that you see because you don't know the story behind them. You are listening to Gathering the Kings with Chaz Wolfe Gathering 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 journey and surrounding yourself with power players and Kings like today's guest. Grab your pen and notebook because we're about to dive in. What's up, everybody? Chaz Wolfe, Gathering the Kings podcast today.
I've got what has become now a good friendship. Aaron Abdulevard. How are you, brother? How are you? Good. How are you, man? Thank you for having me here. Of course. Happy to happy to have you. Not not every time with my guest. Do I get to spend a little bit of time? Beforehand, but but you and I have had a couple of talks already. So I'm I'm anxious for this story to unfold. We give you the platform here, but tell us what kind of business or in this case, maybe businesses that you have.
Okay. So I have been in construction for over 20 years. Work for people and decided to basically do my own thing and getting into building my own construction company. Grew from a very small, just a painting contractor, and then grew into remodels, to renovations, to flipping houses, to now building houses and also getting into residential and commercial.
And, you know, the other business that we as well have is we got into this fall and health and wellness history and open up a a a fully functional spa. You know, so those are pretty much our 2 primary businesses. And then right now, we do have a couple other businesses that we're looking at venturing into. And we don't want any of the same industry. We want every business to be a completely different industry. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of The who who agree with that or suggest otherwise.
So I maybe we'll be able to get into that, but I love I love the tenacity you've kinda you've kinda, come at us here a little bit a little slower than normally in our previous conversations. And I I mean, in a good way, meaning, like, you're you're very poised right now. And our previous conversations has been super high energy, so I'm excited to know why you're doing these different things. Obviously, construction's been your main thing for a long time.
And the spa is just basically getting started. You have some you have some expansion, maybe even franchise, I think is what you're saying. We'll get into that a little bit here in a second. But before we do all The story stuff, I wanna know why. Why do you push? Like, you obviously have been successful at this level. Why are you still pushing even with the amount of success that you've had?
Because I feel like you can always learn more And then I I I feel like my mentality and my attitude is I swing for the fences. You know, a lot of people, they'll go and they'll dittle a little bit you know, for the spa, for example, you know, my wife just graduating with her massage therapy and aesthetician license, and most people would take the the thought of I'm gonna go work for a spa, learn a little bit. I'm gonna get my feet wet, build a clientele. And when I approached her, with the idea.
It was me approaching her and she has a license of, I don't want my wife working for somebody else. And I feel like once you build once you have the mindset of being an owner, you never wanna downgrade or go back or, you know, basically, yeah, basically downgrade yourself to working for somebody once you build that mentality of, like, I'm a business owner I'm self employed.
I dictate what my success is gonna be because there's only so many hours in the day, and I don't want my wife working for somebody where she is going to do the work, and they're gonna potentially benefit from her work. So when she graduated, I told her, let's get into our own spa.
We have no experience, no knowledge, and Gathering, but the money and the finances that I've been able to make from construction has allowed me to be able to bless my wife to be able and bless our family to be able to get her own spall. But it's not about I, me, and and us. It's we also have been given the opportunity and blessing to help other people now build their business in our spa because our spa is not your normal hourly employee spa. We own a spa suite.
So every single room, every single person that is in there with us is not a renter. They're a partner.
So we're capitalizing on the fact that we are helping others to brand, build, and market their business, but it's also benefiting us because we're allowed to we're making money off the the rental side as now becoming a landlord and real estate and everything else and commercial development but we know that we are helping them capitalize on the potential of how much they wanna make, and they're not subjective to an hourly weight. If they wanna make $10,000 in a month, they have that potential.
But when you work as an hourly employee, you do not have that potential to make $10,000 in a month. I don't care what job you do. That is a very, very hard thing to do on an hourly wage employee mindset. Oh, yeah. 100%. Yeah. I mean, obviously, the hourly and then and then the mindset, both of those together. But what I'm hearing you say from, like, an angle of, like, why are you pushing? Is because you know your potential. You talked about the owner mindset.
I mean, obviously, there's a lot of entrepreneurs out there, you know, that are ownership mindset working inside of an organization. So I think that the mindset that you're referring to is is the same. Whether you take the risk, you know, or or you're inside of someone else's organization, very similar to partners. Either way, it can work. It's just a matter of what it's just reaching for something more is what I'm hearing you say.
Yeah. I just I I just feel like no matter where you're at, you can always grow into something bigger, more, learn more, I mean, you don't have to be subjective into one industry. And I feel like I always push that because I feel Chaz the more blessings and the more financial stability that we obtain, we're able to help others grow.
So that's what pushes me is because every single thing that I have done or I do, I literally look at who I'm touching and who I'm able to help and benefit as Wolfe, even in construction. I mean, I could have the hourly employee that I pay $20 an hour, which is a decent wage, But some of these guys, you know, off a The job, they're making 10 or $15,000 off of me on The scope of work, where that is not gonna be possible if they're an hourly wage employee.
So that's what pushes me is if I know that I can get into an industry, my first thought is I'm gonna get into this industry and who can I help? That's my push. That is my because I feel like god puts us into this world to to it blesses us with skills mindset, attitude, ambition, whatever, and characteristics. And he uses us as foot soldiers so that we can basically help and benefit others.
But the people that are like me, I, us, they're the ones that basically have limitations or The have a lot more obstacles to go through because god is like, I gave you these options. I gave you these characteristics, these skills, and you're using it for you. I look at Chaz I'm using what I have been blessed with for others, like construction. The money from construction goes to beauty, health, and wellness.
And then the money that we're gonna be getting from that and that is gonna go to another business. And the money from that, that, that is gonna go to another business. That we're just gonna keep growing, and that's my push is to basically help and benefit others. Love that. Love that. Okay. So tell me about your upbringing. Tell me about before you're an entrepreneur, how did you become an entrepreneur? Was this the was construction the first business 20 years ago?
Give us give us a little bit of the beginnings for you. So I I am 1st generation American. My dad came from me to Ron when he was, you know, eighteen years old. My dad's family, my grandfather was actually a 5 star general in the Iranian army. So he basically lived in Tehran and was basically brought into the US. My mother, her mom is French, so I'm European and Iranian.
And basically being brought up, my dad was a civil engineer, worked for other companies, and worked for Darden Restaurants Chaz chief civil engineer and just worked for other companies. And then his mentality was the same as what I have obtained is I'm tired of working for somebody. I'm gonna do something for myself and my family. So he went and opened his own site developing company. I started working for him when I was fifteen years old, literally digging ditches.
That whole phrase, I literally dig ditches when I was fifteen years old for my dad's company. I was knee deep in water and sanitary water, digging ditches. So I understand that concept of, you know, your life isn't that hard. You're not digging ditches while I literally did. I did it till I was about twenty years old. Joined the military. I was in the Navy CB's, which is The construction battalion that does construction in the military. So I went to Iraq.
I built Ford operating bases, went to Afghanistan, built Ford operate bases, went to the Philippines, did water well drilling, gave water fresh water to the to the town people in the Philippines. So my background Chaz always been construction. I lived, breathe, was brought up in construction, Right. But I have always seen the entrepreneur side ever since I was a kid, because I my dad do it.
And then my mom also owned all the events Orlando, which was a, wedding planning or party event business in Orlando, and they actually threw a party for Anthony Hardaway in the Magic in the Nineties when they went to get the goals in. We did the whole championship Gathering. She threw a party for the Atlanta Magic when they were going against the bulls from the finals. That's cool. I've always been around business. That's always been my go to.
And when I when I worked for a company and then saw what what you're ceiling height is or what you can reach for when you work for a company compared to when you own your own company. Right. It was no it was it was not even a question of, like, I wanna run my own business. And even did it when I was a Kings. I mean, sell gum, sell cookie, sell soda. I mean, I I literally ever since I was a kid, I was selling stuff.
So I've always had The entrepreneur and I had mindset ever since I was a Kings, but then it was when it it was basically one conversation with my dad where I was like, hey. I don't like how this is being run. And his answer was either shut up or get your own business. So I said, that is what I'm gonna do.
So I literally, the next day, quit And I basically sold all my stuff and sold my truck, sold my my street bike, sold all my stuff, and downgraded myself to a Nissan D21 with no window, with no handles, no AC, and sold everything, and then started my construction company. That's incredible. Do you I mean, first off, we've we've actually before I before we answer this question, you you you said a name I haven't heard in years, Anthony Hardaway, I had some hardaways, man. I had the shoes.
Did you have the did you have the shoes? No. I couldn't afford those. Well, I'll tell you what. I'll tell you what. It was later when I started working and and, like, you know, I was probably a little bit dumb with how I was spending money on shoes. I just hadn't heard that name in in in forever. And just it took me back. You got you got me a flash back to to the white and the blue, a little swooop. Anyway, neither here nor there. Okay. So so I wanna I wanna dial into this moment.
Where your dad says, for all intents and purposes, shut up or get your own business. In that moment, did was it, like, I'm gonna prove you wrong? Was it, like, betrayal? Was it, like, you thought he was gonna give you a different response. Like, give us the emotion of that moment for you. I feel like we all wanna we all wanna make our parents proud. We all want to make Yeah. We wanna glow.
Like, we want our kids to see us as idols And then I feel like our generation, we want to show our parents what we're capable of and being the middle child it is true. There is a middle child syndrome. So you're not giving everything because you're the oldest and you're not giving everything because you're The youngest, so you're Kings given the leftovers. And so I I I had that mentality, and that's why when he told me that it was more of a I'm gonna prove you wrong.
Yeah. Because he would always make comments like, you don't know how hard it is, or it's not that easy, or, like, you don't know when you're a worker how much it costs to run a business because we would run a dozer. And he's like, you're leaving the machine on. I'm like, it's not a big deal. I wanna get on in, like, 5 minutes.
But as an employee mindset, you're like, I'm gonna get back on in 5 minutes, but that 5 minutes running at a 1000 RPMs when when fuel was $2 a gallon for diesel, you know, you can end up burning 15, $20 from a sitting there for 5 minutes. As an employee, you don't think about The, but as a business owner now Yeah. I do think about that. So that's where it was kind of a a a brick to my head of, like, He's he's like either, you know, you you know, Shane or get off the pot.
Like, run your own business or shut up and do what I say. And I was like, I've never wanted that, and I'm not gonna have someone talk to me like that. So I'm gonna run my own business, and I'm gonna prove to you that I can run and build my own business. Yeah. Well, it sounds like mean, it sounds like he was right. I mean, The was there was a level of your thinking that was not where his was, which is fine.
Maybe his approach, you know, to getting you there was, you know, neither here nor there on on but it was effective. Sounds like he put you in a scenario where you chose your own thing. And then because you chose your own thing, you now realize that he was right. There was all these other things in business you gotta think about.
And to his point, to your point, not a lot of especially today, not a lot of today's team members, employees, staff, take the time to think about all of the other Kings, nor should The. It's not their business. Right? It's it's up to us to to take care of that and or even communicate that inside of our cultures so that way they either think like an owner or that they're aware that there could be a possible issue, you know, like, we can't just expect them to think like an owner.
Would you like to add anything to that now that you've seen both sides of it? No. I I I do. And and that's where and that's where you do have some of the employees that are like, oh, it must be nice to buy your boat. It must be nice. And and and that's when you're thinking like, well, you don't know the other part of it or the other half of it.
So on both sides of being an employee and being an owner, I I I do see the flaws of how I was as an employee when I worked for some companies or did some stuff. I mean, instead of taking a 30 minute lunch, took an hour a half lunch, whereas an employer, like, it's just an extra hour. But as an owner, you're like, that extra hour could have made me production of a 1000, 2000, 5000 in that 1 hour. Right.
So it's it's where it's where we get lost, and I feel like you know, by not teaching that to kids or not teaching that to the next generation, it's just gonna start getting diluted and worse and worse and worse, Yeah. And that's why I just I just feel like it's hard to know until you get in that predicament or that situation. Yeah. Like, you're not gonna know or value it until you're in that that predicament. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's it's the it's the gap for sure.
What would you say What would you encourage the listener to do? They're in their business right now. They've got an employee or 2 or or 10, and they're maybe they're having people pipe up about this. Like, oh, it must be nice, or I can remember, you know, on my very 1st Valentine's day, you know, we do, you know, a $120,000 or so in in a week, and people can see it on the screen that we've done a $120,000.
And they think that I'm taking 6 figures home you know, gonna go party after we dip a bunch of strawberries, and it's like, you know, they didn't think about the, you know, the labor and the the, you know, the seventy five people I had working and, you know, all The stuff. Right? So how do you what would you suggest to the listener right now if they're dealing with Chaz, like you and I both have, to be able to maybe communicate differently or to get over that with some of their folks?
How do they how do they deal with that situation if they're if they're experiencing that right now? So I mean, I I have been asked that even my some of my guys do make comments and stuff in The way that I've approached it in one situation or one story is I pulled up to a job site. We were getting ready to leave for the keys, and I had my boat attached to my truck, and we pulled up because it was on our way out.
And, of course, when my guys is like, it must be nice that you get to go on your boat while we're working. And I basically explained to him he was kind of a new subcontractor. And I basically told him, I was like, look, man, you don't know where everything started. You don't know the struggles that I had to go through. But at the same time, I'm not gonna tell you the things that you buy a purchase or do. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna judge you based off of that.
And I don't think it's fair for you to do the same to me because you don't know the struggles. Everyone goes through different struggles. But then I explained to him, I will help you I will help you get to a point Chaz where you wanna be at in life or financially. I will help you get there, but don't judge me based off of the materials that you see. Because you don't know the story behind them. And if you wanna ask me or you want to know, like, what I had to do to get to that position.
I have no problem sharing with you, but I don't feel that it's right for you to to judge question or or label me in a certain manner because based off of what you see. The then the conversations will be different. I mean, that that employee The might be doing something different where that employee just pissed off because they can't afford their car or whatever the situation is.
So every conversation is gonna be completely different, but I try to approach it more in a sense of how I wanna know what you want in life and I wanna help you get The. But some people just don't want that. They just wanna hand out, or they don't they make excuses of, I don't have money, but then they're sleeping. Or they're not Kings.
You know, The 24 hours a day, and they're working 5 hours of the day, and they're on Facebook the other, you know, whatever many hours are on but but then they're they're blaming everybody else's society, and they're blaming everybody of why they're not at their point of financially where they wanna be.
Yeah. So I think the the determining or what you're really kind of maybe deciphering here is there there will be people who who who don't want to know the answer, they they really it's it's more of a bad attitude category and and really determining those people or figuring out who those people are, and and then moving on from those people is is probably some of the best advice that I think a business owner can take is because Eventually, that will deteriorate the team, the morale.
The culture really needs to be around. Like, if you wanna go get it, Right? I mean, I have people on my team or different different parts of my teams and, hey. I wanna make this amount of money or, hey. I wanna be able to invest in real estate or, hey. I wanna be able to do this for my family. Whatever. It's like, great. Let's work together on how you can do that because that's the type of person like you and me, even though back in the day, we both had limited thinking.
We all do still wanted more. We still wanted to figure out, like, well, how did you do that? Right? When you see the guy with the boat, you don't think that must be nice. You think Kings. How do I get a boat or whatever the boat represents to to each of us? And so I think it's a good distinction. If you got the people on your team right now as a listener, who are saying things like must be nice to have the boat or whatever the boat represents. That's a pretty clear indicator.
At least for me, that maybe this isn't the right person or maybe this isn't the person I wanna build a team around. It what I want more so is Nice boat. Can you help me? And that's that's tough because a lot of times, people don't want to do the extra They don't understand the struggle we've been through, but I think it as much of it is the struggle, it's like, man, like, wouldn't you wanna know how? Like, I've made some good decisions. Along the way, wouldn't wouldn't you wanna know?
But to your point, some people don't. So anything you wanna add here to this Kings like employee culture attitude conversation that we're having here before we move I mean, the employee culture, I I one thing I could definitely tell the listeners is The the very beginning of doing construction, I did have employees. I had only employees, and it was $89,000 a week that I was paying in employees.
And it was until I figured how to restructure my business is where is when I started making money because I took all my all my guys from from employees to now subs. And then Chaz also allowed me to be able to help build them because as a subcontractor, when they ask me about the whole boat or car or, hey, it must be nice, or, hey, how do I get there?
As a subcontractor, I tell them I can help you build or expand your business and The this way by me giving you this advice and then it make them happy because they see the production or they see the results. Sure. So The when they come out and do my job, they're more happy because I'm paying them what they're worth as a subcontractor, then then feeling The feeling their worth based off their hourly wage. Right. So I always try to tell people, like, look at how you can restructure your business.
Not every single business has to be the traditional structure. Most construction companies are employees. I'm a very rare construction company that all my guys are also contractors. I have no employees. So that just helps out because now I don't have the guy I have to worry about the hourly wage. Now I tell my painter, hey. Look. I got this job. I need you to come in. How much how much do you want? That's the difference in mindset. How much do you want to paint this house?
5000. Okay. I can get you $5000. If he was an hourly employee, he would make a couple 1000. Sure. So that's that's where I feel like every person in business, and I got friends that are trying to do their own business or whatever. I tell him. Figure out how to structure your business where it benefits others that which is gonna motivate them to wanna work for you and with you.
And then also try to restructure your business so that you have the highest potential earning or the highest potential in your industry. Yeah. Lots of lots of good stuff there. I think that there's, you know, there's a big divide, really, and it'd be interesting to have a panel of people who agree with this and disagree The to be able to have a quality conversation because there's there's goods and bads, right, to to both, you know, the 1099 approach and and the and the employee approach.
I think that there there can be that may be dependent upon industry, may be dependent upon life cycle of the business, how long it's been around, or what, or what The objective of the business is. I think there's some certain things that you can do and not do in both of those scenarios. I appreciate your opinion on that. Hey, Kings and Queens. Jazz Wolf. I wanna talk to you about something that's super important to me. We put a lot of time and effort.
We, meaning myself and my team, into this podcast, into the content that goes out every single day. And if you have been getting any sort of value or insight from this, we want it to be able to reach other business owners too. So we would love if you would like, comment share, leave a review, post, share again, all of the things on social media, on all the different platforms, or even on the podcast, mediums of Apple and Spotify.
We would love to be able to get our content into more hands, more entrepreneurs so they can grow their business as quick as Together, we are building a community of like minded entrepreneurs who are committed to growing their businesses to new heights. So let's do The. Let's help each other. Let's help each other grow. Tell me about a good decision that you made early on before 1,000,000 in revenue Chaz would be helpful for the listener to take a note of.
So the one good decision that I made was basically stop trusting stories. Okay. I see Chaz. So I say that because in construction, real estate, you probably heard it a million times If you help me with this job, I will give you more. If you help me do this, I will give you more. And I based it off of one of the stories. So I used to kind of renovate houses for a guy. He basically gave me a house.
He's like, look, and this is Kings where it broke my business, but then it helped me grow my business at the same exact time because he gave me a house. He said, I need you to help me renovate this house so that I can flip it. He's like, I don't have the money. He's like, I'm trying to, you know, uh-uh, have some funds that are tied up. I was starting to grow my business and make more money.
So I basically put out all the money and helped him renovate the entire house based off of his story telling me If you help me do this, I will give you a profit margin. If you help me do this, I will give you more houses. I've got a bunch more houses lined up ready for you if you help me with this. Yeah. So I helped him do it. He flipped the house. I got completely screwed. Never got paid. Never got anything out of the property.
So that is my that is where I tell people don't don't trust stories. Trust facts. If he would have said if he would have said here, I'm gonna have a contract with you. We're on a 25% of what I sell for this house. Because you're floating the money, I'm gonna pay you back, plus give you interest and also give you, like, some type of profit from when selling it. But then also here's the addresses for the other houses. Let's go walk them. Let's get a game plan going.
That's why I always say don't trust stories, trust facts, because everybody was out of the story of how they wanna help you or what they wanna do, but you get if you help me do this first, then I'll help you do that. Yeah. Yeah. I I have I'll give 2 extra cents on that. It's not not really from, like, a trusting from, like, a, like, a a promise of new work. It was actually on the reverse.
It was me as an investor talking to the contractor, but we haven't we have a contract and, you know, everything's in place. We're paying them for the job. It's not not your deal. But it's the same principle that you just said, which is not not accepting a story. And the story had been We're getting close. You know, we're just got a couple more things to do. Just very rounded answers, in essence, both of us. And we can all relate to We've we've had a partner. We've had an employee.
We've had a vendor, 1099. We've had a sub tell us these very rounded answers. And it was a good experience for my partner because he got to see me in in in, like, direct. He had been handling it and accepting these rounded answers. And it's like, okay. Great. So when you say we're almost done, how many days? Well, it should be 3. And when you say should, does that mean 3, or does that mean possibility of 3? Like, just dissecting literally the language that you're Kings.
Like you just said, if there's more houses, great. What are the addresses? Great. When are we gonna go see them? K. Great. When are we starting those projects? Great. What's the contract look like? You know, like, if you just keep dialing boiling it all the way down so that way you can get out of The story form like you're talking about because I I've I I'm with you. And people give these rounded answers and and and then surprisingly, Other people accepted. It's crazy to me.
Yeah. That's what that's what that's what caused me to to it Kings broke my company because I put lots and lots of money, and I trust it in the beginning, every single realtor, every single because that in that time, flipping houses was like the trend. Mean, it Kings still is, but it was major trend. So everybody was calling me, hey. I heard you do good work. I saw you on social media. Chaz you come get me a price?
And The I started trusting and believing, and then it's when I was like, no. Now I wrote my business Chaz, and here's my price. Either paint or don't. I want money up front.
So that's where it broke, but it built my business The the same time because once I knew that I don't trust stories, Now when I go do a job, I want 50% up front, wire wire transfer or cashier's check to to my account, And once Chaz goes through, I'll send you a paid receipt so that we're both on the same level because I stopped trusting stories, and I started trusting facts. And the facts are first draw half deposit, whatever the case is, and they do Chaz. And then, boom, houses get done.
I've done hundreds of houses. I've done hundreds of projects. And there's never been an issue. The ones that are the ones that tell me the stories of, I will give you this, this, and this, and this have always been an issue, have always been a nightmare time and time again. That's why now I don't even listen to the stories. I'm like, that's good. Tell somebody else. Yeah. It's good. I I as I was just listening to you, the the phrase that keeps coming to my mind is some people talk.
Some people do. And and the doers have no problem with contracts. Right? Because it actually further explains whether it's you and the client, you and the vendor, contractor versus investor, like, whatever the scenario for somebody for somebody who shies away from a contract, it it it further professionalizes the situation, and it makes it real.
And I think I think that people shy away from it because like that guy, he had maybe ill intention or, you know, he he he didn't really know was gonna happen, and he didn't really wanna be held to it. But the reality of it is that if you can come together and be on the equal playing field, here's what I'm gonna do. Here's what you're gonna do, and here's the equal exchange of value.
The now you're now you're providing, like, a an actual give and take, a reciprocity of sorts so that way things not like projects can get done, but The next one and then the next one. And then now you're building a relationship. And now we're doing things over the course of 5 10 20 years really helping people. Kinda going back to the very first thing that you talked about. Right? Yes, sir. Alright. Well, tell me about a bad decision.
You Kings wrapped maybe a good and bad decision The put one in that one, but Tell me about, like, just a terrible thing that you did that was just like, oh my gosh. Give me that story. I mean, there's there's, I mean, every business, there's a lot of those. I mean, you you trust people. You hire the wrong people. And I feel like it's just a thing within time that it just takes. I mean, like, our last our last question was, you know, what the employee think.
I I was hiring everybody based on what they said, and then I was just going through people. But now since the business has been around for so long, that I filtered out the BS, and now I have a good solid team. So, you know, and I and I built that team. Like, I had hire 5 different concrete crews to find the 2 that I use now. Right. And and and and I mean, a lot of those is just the bad part. A bad part about business.
And and and it's funny because I had The today, like, I'm gonna start trying to get into some other stuff, And one of the guys told me, he's like, you cannot be married to your your your business or the money emotionally because you're gonna lose that one day. I mean, there's been a day that I lost $5000 in one day. But in that month, I made $20. So people that have, like, when they're getting it business.
They're like, I wanna make sure that I'm always profitable every single dollar, but if your mentality is that, it's gonna be very hard for you to grow your business because you'll be married to every single dollar. And I feel like getting into business, that's that's your bad every single day, but you just have to realize that the overall picture is deposited. You might lose $5000 in one day, but you made $20,000 in that month. So you're still in the green.
Now if you're losing money every single day, every single week, and month, then you might need to find a different business to get into because you should not always be in the red, and that's where I feel like that's a daily bad in the business. You're always gonna have bad. It's not gonna be positive 247. And you just have to realize that and accept it. Yeah. It's a good mindset.
Obviously, a good reminder, I think, for for everybody listening, even for myself, I like what I like how you used it in a couple of different examples too. You said, you know, I Chaz to go through 5 concrete crews to find the 2 Chaz I used.
What that means is that you spent time money energy on three crews that probably were frustrating or took too much time or, you know, you didn't make any money, like, some sort of resource of yours was overspent in the red, and for you to be able to figure out they weren't the right ones. And we do the same thing with SOPs, creating new projects, hiring new people, starting new businesses.
We do these same things over and over, which The mindset that I'm hearing you say and tell me if I'm wrong or if you wanna add anything is that there's there's going to be a certain kind of, like, almost like mind field that you have to go through, but you have to get to the other side. Once you get to the other side, you learn a bunch, and but there's gonna be a couple times where you step on a couple booms, if you Wolfe, but but those even in themselves are learning opportunities.
Would you add anything to that? No. A 100% because I had to go through 5 concrete crews to find the 2 that I used, and I use that for ex as as the main example, because it's pretty much The foundation of everything, every house, every building. But like you said, I had to go through the BS. I lost a lot of money. A lot of time. A lot of frustration because there was a couple of jobs where the concrete was done raw and I had to rip it out and redo it.
Yeah. But now because I've done it now, I could pinpoint, and I I know when they're bs ing. So if I wanna go and find another concrete crew, let's say another one falls out and I need to find another one, I within 5 minutes, I could tell if they're b s in or not. And I could tell if they know what they're doing. Same thing with tile. I have a tile crew that a tile guy that I use, and In the beginning, I trusted every The person. I had to redo tile a couple times.
But now when I see a tile guy start in the corner of a wall, I know that he's doing it wrong. Because your main start points need to be a sliding glass door or the center of the room. So by me having to go through those tile people to get where I have now I could tell within 5 minutes if someone's doing the towel wrong, the drywall wrong, the painting, the concrete, the The. I could tell within 5 minutes if someone's BS and But Yeah. That took the bad days to now it's a positive.
So for people to be like, I don't want any negatives or no bad, how do I get past that? What you're not going to? You gotta go to the bad to get to the good. I don't care what industry, what business, what placement, what Yeah. Tax bracket you're in, you're gonna have the bad to get to the good. Yeah. Yeah. I said The, I don't know, probably 2 or 3 years ago. I was on a podcast Gathering like you The.
And I said that my failures, or in this case, the frustrations, the time spent, the money, you know, those things that we kinda, like, call failures, The dues, and I just wanted to hurry up and pay them. I wasn't trying to avoid them. I just wanted to hurry up and get through them. Like, if this is the list, if I gotta find you know, the the things about painting, you know, foundation work, you know, the the tile.
Or for someone else's business, it could be how to run a campaign, how to hire a sales team. Like, Whatever the the the the frustration point is. It doesn't really matter, the tactic or the or the task. What matters is is that there's going to be failures along the way, like you're saying. And I just wanted to, like, okay. If I gotta do them, How do I just do them faster? You know? Yeah. Just let's just get through it.
Yeah. Exactly. So, I mean, I think I think podcasts like this and books and and getting around other high performing entrepreneurs help us identify those moments so that we can get through them faster or potentially navigate around them. To your point, you can't escape them at all, like, like, completely, but when you go through them, you can acknowledge that you're going through 1. You can write down the things that are are working or not working.
You can record maybe a new process that you wanna go through afterwards. You can set new targets afterwards. You can get rid of people that don't work. Like, we can go through and go, okay. Like, I can get benefit of still going through it even though maybe I was trying to get around it, but I couldn't There's still benefiting going through it. You wanna add anything before we move on? No. I I was gonna say that that was gonna be my point was that you're not gonna go through it.
But if you're so focused on how hurt trying to hurry and get through it, you're not gonna pay attention. You're gonna repeat it. So that's what I keep I mean, my son's eight years old, and I tell him all the time. And he does XMA. He does tricking. And I tell him, he's like, I don't wanna fail. I don't wanna fall, I don't wanna fail. And he's like, and he told me, I don't wanna fail you.
And I was like, dude, you will never fail me, but the one thing I can tell you is I'd rather you fail a million times than fail the same thing a million times. Yeah. So that's where people in business, I feel like if they're If they're trying to hurry up and get through a process because they wanna get through the bad, the problem is if they don't pay attention and they don't know what they're doing bad, Right?
Then they're Kings to repeat it, and they'll always think that every single day is bad. Yep. Exactly. It's good perspective. Okay. Let's go speed round questions here. My first question to you is this. If you could take your business, we'll take a construction business, for example, and I want you to dwindle it down into The trackable metric. What's the one thing that you would track forever and ever? What do you mean track?
What's the one trackable metric that you would pick you can only pick one thing to track inside your business. Like, are you tracking money? Are you tracking sales? Are you tracking customer satisfaction? Are you tracking reviews? You're tracking projects done? Like, what Wolfe be the one thing that you would pick to track forever and ever if you can only pick 1? I probably tracked the profit margin. And I say that because every job, like, I don't touch my profit, until I know what my profit is.
A lot of guys, they'll get a big check. They'll go buy a brand new truck or a car. I wanna track my profit because that's the money that I'm going to use to either help others expand others or build another business. I don't know what my profit is. If I don't know what might actually make, then I'm not gonna be able to expand. Yep. Makes perfect sense. What book would you recommend, Aaron, for a 6 figure business owner trying to get to that $1,000,000 mark?
Rich Dad. I think it's, don't cut out credit cards or how to become rich. I don't know the exact name for the book, but it's not the rich dad poor dad that everyone knows. It's the other book that people really don't even know about. Okay. Good. Well, we'll take a look at it, put it in the show notes. What's your takeaway from that book?
I just I just like how he already went through the rich dad poor dad book where he basically had the 2 dads explaining the wealthy and the the the different mindsets. The one bases off of people that already have that mindset to grow more. Yeah. Like, how to become? Because everyone has The mentality of rich and wealth. But they're completely different. You know, they're they're completely different.
You can be rich and make money daily, but if you're wealthy money, you're being you're being made money no matter what you're doing. Whether you're sleeping, whether on vacation, that's wealth. Rich is you have to put in the work every single day to get the rich. Yeah. Interesting. That's good. It's good. Okay. Last question for you here, Aaron. If you lost it all, my friend, what would you do?
If I lost so if I lost the construction company, I lost all my businesses for whatever reason, I would honestly I'd probably just teach others that are getting into business. I'm not gonna teach them how to how to, like, you know, miss the bad days or whatever, but it's more of that motivational of, like, The is what I see you doing from a from my outer view. This is what I would do.
This is what I did to help because you're gonna go through it, but I can help guide you and and follow you through it and and Kings show you different ideas of how to make it better. Instead of worried about undwilling on the bad, bad, bad. Well, you ended the show the same way you started by saying that you you love helping people. And and so you've done that.
Not only, just expressed how you'd how you would do that if you lost it all, but literally the last 45 minutes you've given us so many things from your story that's that have helped you be successful. And I think that plenty takeaways for the listener to be able to, you know, go apply in their business. You've got you've got energy, you got passion. I'm excited to know you. How can the listener find you if they wanna connect with you further from here?
So they can email me at partnerandconstruction@gmail.com. They can also look at ZenSpace Oviedo on Facebook on Instagram. That is our spa. It is ZenSpace Zen Oviedo. And I I do reach out to on emails and stuff like that. I do respond. I do have a couple organizations that I work with teams that are wanting to be entrepreneurs and I they reach out to me on their emails and I tell them or they say, hey. I wanna open up this. What are your thoughts?
And I explain to them, you know, what are, like, I give them I give them, you know, coaching on stuff like that. Sure. So if I received an email from a listener that was like, hey. I wanna get into construction, Like, what are your what are your, you know, what are your guidelines or what do you think? You know, I have no problem with or guiding somebody to make sure that their construction company is successful the way that I've been able to build mine. That's great, man.
You're obviously The that's always willing to help, and and you've I hear today in multiple ways. So thank you for just the time that you've given here today, and that we wish you nothing but blessing on your there's your family, kiddos, all that fun stuff. Thank you for being here. Thank you. You too, man. I appreciate you giving me the time to talk to you and your listeners and Kings hopefully help that one person that's struggling. That's what it's all about.
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 doing it all on your own, carrying the weight all by yourself.
What I have realized, not only in my own journey from malt businesses in multiple different industries and now interviewing over 2 or 300 The very successful 7, 8, and 9 figure business owners is that It's tough to do it alone. And so gathering the Kings 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 The very successful business owners. I want you to go to Gathering.
The 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.