Setting Big Hairy Audacious Goals

I might tell you a littlestory, and some of youmay have heard thisbefore, Ben burnsand I were verydifferent creatureswere almost like born on theopposite side of the world, ok?And somehow we find away to work together,and it's pretty fantastic.But he has a verydifferent perspectivethan I do, excuse me.His perspective isthis is a Chris.In order for us tofigure out our price,we should calculate our expensesand our overhead and the wagesthat we have topay people and thenfigure out how much moremoney we want to make.So for for the simplemath part of it,let's say when we add all up ourexpenses for the for the year,it's 100,000.Then he says, then weshould sit there and think,should we make 15k?Should we make 20k profit?Should we make 30k profit?Right?so he's like, yeah,if we do $130,000 thatwould be pretty good becausewe're going to do 30% profitand it's going to be awesome.And most companies wouldkill for 30% profit.OK, so that's oneway of looking at it.And that sounds like,you know, right?I think I can hit 40.If I go a little bit overit, I'm going to be happy.And if I go a lot over,I'm going to be ecstatic.Yeah OK.So you guys do me a favorright now and just temporarilyraised your digital hand soI can see how many hands,if you guys think that'sa perfectly reasonable wayof thinking about it.Raise your digitalhand for me right now.Just think about it.It's not a trick question.I'm not going to judge you.Just raise your digital hand.You guys know how to do that.There's a three littleicons on the top rightcorner of your face.You click on that.You can raise your hand.OK, I see one person, too.OK, let's see who else.Three four.Somebody changed their mind.I'm scanning scanning.So only four out of 56.Come on, please.Either you do not knowhow to raise your handor you just lyingto me right now.Don't lie to me.I thought we knew each other.OK, so I see four.Oh, come on, Mo, don't do that.What are you doing?I just can't figure outhow to raise my hand.I thought we were done.I thought we were doneto lower your hand.So, Rachel, hover overyour face and there'sthese three dots on the upperright corner, I believe.Is that is that?Am I doing it right, guys?Because I'm the admin, I havedifferent functions in you,so it doesn't work on everybody.Maybe we need me and Rachel needto update our I think, yeah,something's not working.OK, guys, let's justpress participation.You'll see it at thebottom of the participantslist on the left hand corner.OK there it is.I knew it was somewhere else.I just couldn't figure it out.Wait, where is it?Participants oh OK, Ihave managed participants.I see.And then the rest of usshould have participated.Now I see 13 of youraise your hand.That's much better.No thank you very much.Now we all learn how to dance.Now you guys can alllower your beautiful.OK all right.All right.OK, so here's here's theother way of doing it.OK, so if you guysdon't mind, justplease put yourself on mute.I hear somethingtonight again that.Bobby Kennedy goes silent.I just I just want thefruit that Abby is eatingbecause it sounds amazing.You have to share if you'regoing to eat something,everybody has to get a bite.All right.Here's the otherway of doing it.I say, OK, Ben, that'sone way to do it.But here's what I want to do.I sit there and imaginemyself in the lifethat I want to have.And in order for me to livethis life, I want to make.I want to make 360,000.I have no regard for howmuch my actual expenses arebecause I don't live inreality because realityis no friend of mine.And like 360,000.OK, Dan's laughing, maybeshe understands the referenceto a song, I don't know.Anyways, I'm like 350thousand, he said.Chris, where are youpulling that number from?I don't know, frommy imagination.It's what I use it for.350,000 and then lateron, I can figure outwhat my true expensesare, and I knowbecause I overshoot what myexpenses are going to be.And it turns out my expenses are$100,000 so I'm going to havea net profit of 2.50, he said.Chris, why would youapproach it like this?What science is just based on?What what kind ofchecklist are you going?I don't think like that then.Now I'll tell you what thedifferences between these two,ok?When you look at your expensesand your cost of living.And you said thisis what it costs.That becomes an anchor.So you guys know, anchoringis a form of bias.So when you say $100000, itwould be audacious of you.How dare you thinkyou could thengo and do 200,000 or whatever?Who do you think you are?And you're going to saynow that every dollar thatcomes into your company, only50% is going to go to expenses.Is that ethical?You see all the kindsof problems there.So I think are really high.I shoot for the moon.I said this is what Iwant my company to be.This is the life I want to live.These are the thingsI want to affordand this is how I want to.Support my family.And then reality can set in.So what happens in my mind now?This is part of thelaw of attraction here.If you say $360000 andyou look through societyand you say, well, whatbusinesses make three sixty?What profession makes 360and what kind of skillsdo they have?Well, a graphicdesigner from art centerdoing letterhead and logodesign and editorial designhas zero chance of makingthat kind of money.What kind of person do I haveto become, what kind of mindsetdo I need to have?Who do I need to surroundmyself with or by for meto have a shot of making that?What kind of books do I needto read, what kind of lecturesdo I need to watch?Podcast I have to listen to.So I line my life andI'm attracted to thingsnow that I thinkcan lead me there,and they take action every day.Now we talk aboutgoals quite a bit.The goal is right,you have to have goalsthat compel you to take action.So a goal that.Covers your expenseswith a little bit more.It's not that exciting to me.A goal where Ican imagine myselftraveling around the worldand meeting amazing peopleand sharing what I learned andhelping them in their life.That's a prettyfreaking exciting goal.Now, don't get me out ofbed, so if you guys were allsitting around me rightnow, a group of 55 people,I said, I want you tothink of a goal right now,goal that's so excitingthat it just you'rejust shaking inside.That you can feel yourheart rate elevated, right,it's like, wow, I reallywant to do this thing.That's a good goal.And then some people are like,yeah, this is an OK goal.And I say toeverybody right now.Somebody yelled out fire.You guys would alljump out of your seatand you would runfor the exit or youheard that crazy ear piercingsound the fire alarm,you would get out.Only a few people would sitthere and like, yeah, maybeit's just a false alarm.Almost everybody would runout of the theater, right?That's how your goals work.It needs to be like that earpiercing alarm that you hear,it's like I am going towake up today full of energybecause this is whatI want in my life.Period so, Elena, Iwant you to change.I don't want you to shootfor a reasonable goalbecause reasonable goalfor reasonable people.You're an exceptional person.Have an exceptional goal.And to be honest, 60 k, I waslike, I should have said 80,I should have said90 four, you know,really like I havea big goal, but I'mthinking of of this yearas a as a little steptowards that goal.But I don't want toget I don't know.I think that's a big gap for me.I mean, like, I want itto be realistic in a wayof like reaching thatgoal, not to be burned outor to be, you know, frustratedbecause I didn't do something.I kind of I'm settingmyself a smallergoal towards the big one, andI want to surpass those smallergoals while I'm going.Does it make sense?It does.I don't agree withit, but it's OK.I'm not going to anymore.That's the best I cando to try to get youto have a big, audacious goal.And I'm going toshare with you whatour big, audacious goal is.OK, the future as a productand service, not a service.A product company isan education platform.Our goal is to do 4 and 1/2million dollars in revenuethis year.And if you look backjust 4 and 1/2 years ago,we did $18000 inrevenue the whole year.We do 18,004 or five days now.Just think about that.Now, if we sat therelike, you know,it'd be kind of nice to havea couple of $100,000 we'lldo this, but our goalis to grow our businessnot 15 percent, not 35 percent.We want to grow our business300 percent every single year.So last year, we're justshy of hitting $1.8 million.So when we did the forecastingthis year with thenwe're all shocked.In January, we needto do this much money,and it's a giant numberif you think about it.It's three times what we usedto do in January of last year,just one year ago.And then February is like evenbigger in march is even bigger.And we're sittingthere last yearlooking at these goalsand our projectionsand thinking, how are wegoing to get ourselves there?How is this goingto be possible?So here's the thing.In my heart and mymind, I'm like, can wedo this when he looks at me,he's like, I don't know, Chris.That's what the math says.When you told me tomultiply it, I did.OK so here we go.We're creeping into Januaryand we have a plan now.What do we need to do?We need to fix our website.We need to runmarketing campaigns.So we started splitting up thegroup into different divisions.You do product, Chris.I'm like, OK, I'lldo product Matthew.You do content.That's why Matthew isrunning the YouTube channel.Ben is going to run marketing.Mark is going tolook for b2b sales.And we just do it.And the crazy partis in January,we overshot our own goal.We passed it, I waslike, oh my god, there'sno way we can do this againin February, can we bend?It's like, I don't know.On the last day of February.We hit our financialgoal, it was so close.And the fact that weeven that close is scary.So now, Ben said.Between January andFebruary, already $50000ahead of our goal.Let's see what marchis going to do now.March is a giant number.It is like, oh mygod, can can we do it?You guys see a patternhappening here.And then the teams likeChris, we need to do this,you've got to make thatand everybody is justdoing what they need to do now.You see, it's like you expandto fill your own goals.Hey, Chris.Yeah, I have a questionfor you, are youspeaking solely for thefuture blind or the future?No, no, we don't.We have zero dollars for blind.I'm telling you how crazyour business is right now.Wow yes.On the future of the future.OK yes.The future.And if you wantto know more, I'lltell you as much asyou want to know.OK, because we do not want todo any more client projects.We have turned down toprojects this year for blind.That's 5,6000,000.And it was that itwas out a decisionbecause you wanted toput all your effortsinto the future moving forward.Yeah, there's acouple of things goingon we think and we believe inthe company and our future.That every clientproject takes us awayfrom building ourgoals, our dreams.And it's hard it's hardto say we're going to go.You've heard me say this,you've seen me write this.It's hard to live it.I'm going to tellyou, I'm not goingto lie to you right now whereI say, you know, double down,go all in, burn the bridgein which you came from.So there's no retreat.And those are wordsfor a little while.So last year, towards the lastquarter of last year in 2018we said we don't want todo client projects anymorebecause even if wedo $300000 project,it means that we'regoing to be taken outof the game for amonth and a half.It means thatwe're going to haveto bring in all thesepeople do this workand what kind of profit willwe have from that $300000 job?Maybe we'll do 40% Sothat'll give us about 120 k.So the net profit ofthat job after doingall this stuff istruly just 120 cakeis wolf spent the other money.It'll just go straightfrom our pocketto vendors and freelancersand machine rentals,all that kind of stuff, right?But if we sit down and we writeanother topography course,which thus far hasearned us over $250,000.Of course, that's $149.250k if we just sitdown and write a book,we just sit downand do the thingsthat we said we'regoing to do but neverdo because we getdistracted with client work.What is that goingto mean for us?And the great thing aboutthis is when you do a clientproject, you make that 120 k.If that all goeswell, you make 120 k.But that's it.That's end of it.But if we do aproject that earns us40k in the launch period.Over the year, whatwill that equal?Over the next fiveyears, how does thatcontribute to the librarythat we want to grow and buildso that it's moreof a curriculum now,not just a couple of courses?So we have to makethat decision.So the first time we hadto say no to a $250000 job,I was like, thisis going to hurt,it's going to hurt real bad.I mean, Greg's room, we'retalking about the project.I asked him a few questions.I'm like.I see some.Let's turn it down,just doesn't make sense.He looks at melike we didn't evenhave a lot ofdialogue about this.He thought he was going to haveto convince me and remind me.I'm like, no, Greg,I agree with you.Let's walk away from this one.This was for riot games, guys.We're not talking aboutsome dumb project.Turn that one down.Didn't work for us.You don't want to knowabout the projectswe turn down becauseit'll kill you.So that's what wehave to do, we'refocused all in on the future,so we're going to live or die.And this is it.Now, here's the interestingexperiment, right?What if it doesn't all work?Then this thing will endin four or five months,and that'll be that.But that's thekind of commitmentwe have to make if webelieve in the dream.J.d. you got another question.I was just going to say,are you keeping blindaround for just aslike a just in case,let's say not thatI personally thinkthat this is going to happen.Let's say the future does notmove forward and and crashesevery few months.Good question.Good question.Excellent I'lltell you the truth.I'm only keeping blindaround because therewill be some consultingservices that's OK for us.We don't want to domaking services anymore.So if a company wants usto go in and train or teachor to do some bigevent with them,then we'll do it that way.We're keeping a line aroundalso just for a little bitbecause there arelittle client projectsand this is where you'regoing to say what they said.No client projects.There are littleclient projects that wedo because we canfilm the content,so we're not doingit for the money.We're doing itbecause we can sharewhat it is that we do freelyand openly with anybody.We've been givenpermission to do that.So there is a an alcohol.What is it called?A beer brewer likea microbrewerythat we're doingsome packaging for?So they've been documenting it,shooting a really long series.So you haven't seenany of that, but youwill see it at some point.I'm also doing some work withsome two independent brandsthat like, yeah, goahead and share it.Don't worry about it.So we're still keepingaround for that reason,but I'm not goingback to that worldand I'll tell you why now.Probably my teamdoesn't want me here,doesn't want to hear this,but the reason why is.I don't need tomake money anymore.I have enough money tolast me until I'm dead.I'm OK with money, soif this doesn't work,it just won't workin the way that it'sexisting now in this big officewith 12 people and two peopleoff site.It just won't live like that.It'll be like this.I'll just continueto talk to you.I'll be OK now, the rest ofthe team that will have a job.And that's a different problem.And I'm not just lightlysaying that I don't care.But ultimately, ifit doesn't work,I would just go and dolectures and workshops.I would teach and record videoson YouTube just like the wayI'm doing right now, andI'll write another bookor whatever it is I'm doing.The operation willhave just scaled down.Now there's no way that's goingto happen because I'll tell yousomething too.I have about.$700,000 in assets that I'mselling off right now in stocksand whatever.And I'm going tospend all that money.So when it fails,it means that we'verun out of all of ourmoney and I've burnedthrough $700000 of savings.And then next thingis, I'll sell my houseand then I'll sayit's not working.So there are manysteps involved.So when I say go all in,I'm 100% committed to this.I truly am 100%committed to this.And my wife's on board.Go ahead.So I have a question, Ithink I know the answer,and so I think weget to a point whereour time is is themost valuable assetand we stop caringso much about money.And that's where you are, right?Yes so tell them so I understandthat it's not about the money,but so I think it's abouthelping people, right?It's making the world betterwith everything you doand you have a biggerreach now to do that.Is that your reason?Or can you tell mewhat your reason is?My reason for moving awayfrom the service businessand building the future soservice business takes time,right?So it's allowing youto produce content,but that content is drivingthe things on the future.So that's the only reasonyou're keeping it together.That's right.So but this is a completelydifferent mindset.You're really helpinga lot of peopleright now go with thatbusiness of services.Right?but in a way,you're also helpingthem do these other things too.Like you're giving them allthese skills that they can helpclients, that it's notjust time based, right?Yes yes.So I'm going to take youback to a conversationthat I had with myfinancial advisor.So I have a financial advisor.I've been working with himfor seven or eight years.He helps me to investmy money and make surethat we're going to be OK.So the joke always iswhen we have our meetings,like his name is John, I'mlike, John, when can I retire?And my wife looks at himand she's telling me,give me three more years,honey kind of thing.I'm like, I just don'twant to work anymore.It's just dumb.I've done my work already.And then he said,Chris, I don't knowif anybody wants to hear this,but I looked at your numbers.You could have retiredthree years ago,and I look at my wife like,honey, why didn't you tell methis?You're just, you'rejust bleeding me here.I'm done like beingbled out like this.I'm done with thisservice stuff.And he goes, you guys livevery conservatively relativeto your income.You live conservatively.And if you continueto live like this,we can make a plan soyou can burn it down.So it's all gonewhen you're dead.I said fantastic andwent home that day,I was thinking to myself.You know, I've been wakingup every morning thinkingabout when can I retire?No wonder I'm not enthusiasticabout life and work anymore.I mean, what kind oflife is it to wake upto think I don't wantto do anything anymore?That's why I started to think,well, what's this money for?What is my life for?Is there more to it than this?And it happens to coincidereally beautifullywith the time inwhich we're startingto do some content on thefuture because I love teaching.And if you everask somebody, it'slike, I love a couple of things.I love building businesses andI love teaching and helpingpeople that genuinelymakes me happy.So once my financialneeds are met,the bottom of Maslow'spyramid, I'm a good, happy boy.I'm done.The problem withteaching is I don'tfeel like I'm beingcompensated fairlyfor how much I put into it.The system is not designedto support teachers,nor is it designed necessarilyto be of great valueto students.So that's why I started tothink I need to do this thing.And then there'sthe creation story,which I'm not going totell you about why I'mdoing the feature the way I am.But to me, it'slike, you know what?I want to teachon a scale that Ihaven't been able to do before.And I look at rock musicians,I look at celebrated authors,gurus and coaches likethey're teaching on a scalethat I like.That's where we needto go as a company.And here's the thingin my life, I know thisthat if I pursue somethingthat makes me happy that I'msuper passionate about that Ihave some skill towards doing.The weird thing is, Idon't do it for money.But money seemsto chase you whenyou do these kinds of things.It's really weird the lessyou want to make moneyin pursuing somethingthat you're superpassionate about, that you canimpact other people's lives.The more money is there,it's really weird,Sony just called us up.We want to put you on apanel to talk about somethingI'm like, Sony, like Sony,would not even know who I am,having worked in theindustry for 23 years.Even though we've done so manyPlaystation commercials before.I was just interviewedfrom PBS socal.Not in a million yearswhere they called me up for.So it's reallyweird, like when youdon't chase the fame,the money or anything,and you truly just want to give.In many ways withthat expectations,wonderful, amazing,crazy things will happen,and I'm a capitalist.Let's not confuse that, ok?The dream is fueledby the capitalbecause I've said this before.There's no causewithout capital.Like if you wantto save the whales,you better make some money.Because how else are yougoing to save the whales?You can save one whale oryou can save all the whales,but you need money to fuel that.That's going to be agreat luxury for uswhen we hit all our goals.So this is a fantasticpart, and you guysare in on the ride with me alongwith this, this entire journey,because at the end of theyear when we do 4 and 1/2million dollars in revenue.The future is just nirvana.We have no clients.We come and go as we please.I have no idea whatanybody is doing now.We've gotten rid ofthe executive producer,the producer,project coordinator,so we got rid of salespeople.It's all creatives,with the exceptionof one person who makes surethat there's money in accounts.That's Monica, our bookkeeper.What a crazy place.So it's like our ownlittle bubble of Google,it's like, I know I don'thave that kind of money,but everybody comes andgoes whenever they want.Look, errands likesleeping at the officeand there's guys justhanging out all the time now.It's hilarious because they wantto make films to get I'm like,this is what you get to do.I think that's a futureworth fighting for,and that's what I'm going to do.So it is a tough, tough,daunting, scary, unnervingthing to say that everymonth when a 300% of whatwe did the samepoint in last year.It is super scary, and we mightmiss it a couple of months,I'm prepared for that, but Ihave a different definitionof failure than you guys.You know, failure justreminds me to keep doing it.Go ahead.So, Chris, sorry, Iwant to interject herebecause so you have this dream.But meanwhile, it doesn'thappen alone, right?I mean, you talkabout the nirvana,but you guys have toput good content outor, you know, people are goingto fall out of the bandwagon,right?So, yeah, don't have ahigh, high amount of workand you still have, of course.OK, so it doesn'thappen just like,oh, I'm just cashing in, right?No, no, no.This is not.This is not cashing in at all.This is the oppositeof cashing in.You see, because one beforemy motivation was to cash in,just like I'veworked hard enough,I've saved enough money.I've been a good boy.I'm going to go party now.I could have done that yearsago, but instead, I'm like,you know what, what gets meout of bed isn't to make money.What gets me out of bed isto build this kind of companyto ultimately and I think youmay have heard me say thisbefore, if we dowhat we do correctand it works and successful10 years from now,all these privateart schools will notexist the way they dotoday because they will notbe able to say with astraight face to a prospect.That this is still a goodvalue for your money.So why didn't you do that beforeI dropped so much frickin moneyon art school?I'm sorry, I'm workingas fast as I can.I really am, I promise you.And there are somepeople who are 16, 17,even 15-year-olds whoare watching our show,learning from us andpeople in university whoare just recently graduated,said, say it to meall the time.This happens if youread the comments.I've learned more in this videothan I did all of last semesteror all of the whole year, orthey never have taught anythinglike this in school.I'm doing the best I can.So what happens is this j.d.if we make enough money?If we make enough money,I can hire more teachers,writers and producers, differentkinds of producers now.To make more contentwith me, and we're justgoing to slowly but surelyrecreate the entire designcurriculum fromthe best schools.Then that's justthe starting point.And this is actuallywhere I knowyou've asked on Facebook somequestions about that, whereI also wonder, likein the group, what'sthe percentage of peoplewho actually want to buildan agency on an agencyalready and whatare their goals versusthe sole entrepreneur?Or, you know, I know Iwant a lifestyle businessfor a few years untilkids are out of the house.And so that's my goal.But it's interesting.The interesting.I don't know why to me,but the people know stand.And maybe thatstarts being havingclustered because thepain points are different.I think if you are an agencyversus a social entrepreneur,yes or no.Yes, 100% And I want to beclear about something right now.Excuse me.I want to be clear.That I'm nottelling you my storybecause I want you who justgraduated from school to dowhat it is that I'mdoing, I'm tryingto lay out the roadmap from howyou go from point a to point z.I'm not at point z yet, but I'mgoing towards that direction.So, Priscilla, foryou, you have kids,you need to make acertain amount of money.Elaine, I need to make acertain amount of money.I don't mean to tell youguys to get on YouTubeand do x, y and z.We don't sell that as a concept.I want to help youbecome a better creative.I want you to learn how tovalue your creative servicesand achieve the goalsthat are relevant to you.OK, so some of you wantto create a passive incomebusiness model.I want to be there to help you.Some of you justneed to learn howto price your projectscorrectly or how to turn downa few clients, or how toaddress a problem that youseem like, you can't seem tofigure it out on your own.I'm there for you.All of us are on thedifferent ladder, right?And I love this, and you putout a lot of product productthat's already, at least for me.And I'm sure I talk witha lot of other peoplehave helped them.I just wondered atthe clients thatare going through abig agency like yours.Well, I have the answer.Your clients are very differentthan my clients, right?I can't charge 260,000.Right I don't thinkI'll ever be able to.Oh, don't say thatout there, you know?OK OK.