Music Welcome to the Brian Bafini Show, where we explore the mindsets, motivation and methodologies of success. Here's your coach, Brian Bafini.
欢迎来到布莱恩·巴菲尼秀,我们将探索成功的心态、动力和方法。下面是您的教练布莱恩·巴菲尼。
Music Well, the top of the morning to you, and welcome to the Brian Bafini Show.
嗨,大家早上好,欢迎来到Brian Bafini Show。
The guest I have for you today, I met him 31 years ago, I met his book 35 years ago, and it was a book that changed my business and changed my life. It's called the E-Mithri Visited. And as a guy who's written three small business books, the E-Mithri Visited is, in my opinion, the greatest small business book ever written.
When I give it to people, I tell them it's the Bible for small business. Michael Gerber, who lives in Karlsbad, who's right down the street from me, and we have not touched base in 30 years, which is just kind of nuts because we've been crossing paths.
So Michael Gerber, it is a long overdue pleasure to have you on the show today.
迈克尔·格伯,今天非常高兴能有您来宾,我们迫不及待地期待着这一天的到来。
It's a delight, Brian, and yes, 30 years is a long time not to see each other, especially when we're crossing each other in the freeway. Right, well, we're doing it today, and I'm sure it'll be the first of many.
One of the things that's happened with COVID, it's given me a chance to not only reconnect with some people, but it's given me a chance to connect with some people I've had a desire to. This was, like I said, I have my assistant reach out to your folks, and I'm delighted we could do this today.
So I want to kind of dive in. We've got some very exciting things to talk about as far as what you're doing today and the new directions of all the stuff you got going on.
Talk to people and explain to people what the actual e myth is.
和人们交谈并向他们解释实际的传奇是什么。
Well, the entrepreneurial myth is so transparent, the minute you hear it and understand it. It's the fact that most people who go into business aren't entrepreneurs. They're what I've come to call technicians suffering from an entrepreneurial seizure.
I'm sure they don't start a business to create something great. They start a business to get rid of the boss.
我相信他们开创企业不是为了创造出伟大的东西,而是为了摆脱老板。
So you've had folks working for you doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it.
那么你有人为你工作,一直在做它,做它,做它,做它,做它,做它,做它,做它,做它,做它。
Yeah. Ultimately, they say, why am I doing this for Brian? I can be doing this for me. Right. And they go off and start their own deal. Doing what they were doing for you for themselves. With the picture in their mind that now they're going to be able to take home all the money. And in other words, they start to split it with you. Now they do their own thing in their own way, etc and so forth and so on. And it's a disaster.
So that's the myth. The myth is that they're entrepreneurs because they've started their own business. The reality is something significantly different than that. Right.
And we know the current environment, Michael, is probably for me. And I'm in America 35 years and I believe this is the most challenging small business environment ever. You know, obviously I've never lived in an America where small business wasn't allowed to open its doors or a small business wasn't allowed to take care of customers or a small business wasn't allowed to do its basic daily functions or freedoms.
And we know that this too shall pass to some degree and we're going to pass this pandemic, but there's going to be a carnage left in its wake. That is beyond what's normal and we both know the vast majority of small businesses already fail. And now you have a circumstance like this. So it's probably one of the reasons why I reached out to you because I feel like so many people are in need of this help.
What is the fatal assumption people make that you talk about in the event that when they get into a business they make these assumptions and then they go open up their own business.
Oh, the fatal assumption, for example, choose real estate because you know that market. Right. The fatal assumption is that if I know how to sell real estate, I can start a business selling real estate. Right. And effectively they believe that just the fact of knowing how to do the work enables them to run a business doing that work.
And the reality is selling real estate is only a very small part of the true real estate business. The whole business of real estate becomes the question and becomes the problem.
现实情况是,房地产销售只是真正的房地产业务的很小一部分。整个房地产业务成为问题,成为难题。
But let me say something to what you just said because it said to me now over the past year, obviously, and more so more frequently. That because of COVID because of COVID because of COVID, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, there's a real problem on the street. Small businesses are suffering because they're being legislated out of business and on and on and on and on.
That last year, now I'm talking about the year before the year of COVID, there were over 500,000 small companies that shut their doors permanently, right? Year before that, identically the same, the year before that, the year before that. So understand that the COVID reality is simply another reason small businesses go out of business regularly.
Many people are just closed minded in I just got to be good at what I do. I just got to make the best widget. I got to provide the best service. I got to bake the best pies, I, you know, the great baking story in the book.
Look, we're in the personal development business. We're in the training business, the skill development business. Most people aren't that open to change. They're not that open to grow until they get their but handed to them a few times, you know, and so like you say, they get into these businesses, they're good at this one thing and then they're tend not to be that open to make the kind of changes it takes to be a great business owner.
We have a thing called a real estate career path, which is someone starts out as a licensey and then they become a producer and then they become a professional and the professional is the business owner and I tell people all the time I became a really good realtor and I was a crap business owner.
You're right. And then I had to learn how to be and it was through hard knocks and then really you get hurt enough to become a good business owner and then do the same thing when I formed befitting company to coach and train people I started out. I was a really good speaker. We had a really good system, but I was a crap business owner in the coaching business.
And so if there's a certain humility, there's a sense of experience and then you really got to go to work, right? You got to go to work. We have defined a path. You talked about a path. You're essentially saying first you're this, then you're this, then you're that.
I've defined a path. So the eightfold path resides at the heart of everything, emith, everything, Gerber. And I'll describe the path very simply by saying first it's I've got a dream. Second, it's got a vision. Third, I've got a purpose. Fourth, I've got a mission.
So dream vision, purpose and mission. They're different than each other. The dream is absolute critical. It sets the foundation for your vision. Your vision is absolutely critical. It sets the foundation for your purpose. And your purpose is absolutely critical because it creates the need for a mission. And the mission is absolutely critical because until you have one, you're never going to go beyond doing it, doing it, doing it busy busy busy busy, which is a crapshoot. And the mission is always dies. Right.
Now, the next four steps are the key to the process of business development. And the first is what I call the job and the job is the client fulfillment system. The second is the practice. And the practice is the franchise prototype with the lead generation system, the lead conversion system and the client fulfillment system. The next is the business and the business is nothing other than up to seven turnkey practices.
Lead generation lead conversion client fulfillment practice number one lead generation lead conversion client fulfillment practice number two. So real estate agent number one real estate agent number two real estate agent number three number four number five number six. Number seven is a business. It's a brokerage. final step is the enterprise.
And the enterprise is nothing other than up to seven turnkey businesses. And up to seven turnkey businesses is 49 turnkey practices. This is how you do it. This is how you do it. This is how you do it. And you do it, identically, the very same way, every single time, just like McDonald's.
Yeah. No, this is great. And let me ask a dumb question. And there are dumb questions, as we both know, where a lot of people get confused, I've seen in the application is the difference between the vision and the mission. And they're very well.
Let me describe what they are. Yeah. Very, very clearly. First, let me describe what the dream is. The dream is the great result you intend to produce. So in 1977, at the founding of my company, the Michael Thomas corporation, interesting lead the same year as Apple.
In 1977, I said, my dream is to transform the state of small business worldwide. So I set out to create a worldwide phenomenon. The first business development firm ever created. The first small business coaching company ever created. So that was a dream.
I had a vision. My vision was to invent the McDonald's of small business consulting services. You follow what I'm saying. Yeah. So suddenly, I now converted my dream, which is the great result I'm going to produce, into the media through which I was going to produce it.
The McDonald's of small business consulting services, what in the world is the McDonald's of small business consulting services? It's a turnkey methodology through which the store operates every single time, every day in the very same way. Right.
The third was my purpose. My purpose was that every small business owner could be as successful as a McDonald's franchisee if they follow my paradigm. And so if they internalize my methodology, they would in fact become as successful as a McDonald's and some would become as successful as McDonald's itself. Nice.
And finally, my mission was to invent the business development system upon which my dream, my vision and my purpose depended upon. So you can see, I have a dream, I have a vision, I have a purpose, I have a mission. And when someone gets that, and it takes people time to get that brine. Yeah.
But when they get that, when they absolutely do that work, what is my dream? Well, I'm not sure what my dream is. Well, my dream is to make some money. Well, my dream is to be rich. Well, my dream is to have a house in whatever or my dream is to have a swimming pool. Yeah, that's an outcome, baby. Right. Come on.
We're talking about a dream. Yeah. We're talking about Steve Jobs. We're talking about Brian Bufini. We're talking about a dream. We're talking about something bigger than life. We're talking about a legacy. And I'm saying every life is a legacy. It's either a stupid legacy or it's a moderately successful legacy or it's a legacy of brand design. But our life is meant to be lived that way.
You're taking me back to the very day of writing the mission of changing the entire real estate industry. You know, what it meant to be perceived by the customer and what it meant for the individual, the average real estate agent, even to this day makes $30,000 in gross commissions. We have 22,000 members at average over 300,000.
You know, as you're talking to me right now, it's visceral to me, Michael. And here's the thing. I'll tell you what I am is I'm a guy who applies things. I read this book at least once a year for the first 20 years of my business. And I became fanatical about something that I was not fanatical about, which was systems because I'm not a technical person. And many, many people when they hear systems today, they think it's technology.
But systems are the promise keepers. Systems are the trust builders. Systems are the foundation. It sounds impersonal. You know, there's so many people in business, they're relational and they want to be relational in business. And I teach a relational system. But if you're not consistent in that relationship building, you're a flake. If you're not consistent, if you're not systematic, people can't count on you, right?
And so I hear you and it's kind of what what's what's happening for me just so you know, listen into this. You know, obviously I've been blessed and we have changed the whole real estate business, right? We we're trying three million realtors in the last 25 years in 50 countries. But it's bringing up tremendous emotion for me because I live this. Anybody listening to this today, whether you've had the dream, maybe you've launched the dream without having this stuff together.
Guess what? You can take time out and refigure it. You're busy right now. You can take time out, start over. What was the dream? Why the hell just start this the first place? What is the vision? What's the purpose? What the mission? And then so it's it's so real. Let me get your thoughts.
I'd like to hear straight from the master himself. When you think of systems and systemization, what does that mean to you? And what's ultimately the benefit for someone to really buy into that in the biggest way possible?
When I think of systems prime, I think of them in the same way as you do, though you may not know that yet. I think of simply how we do it here. How we do it here. How we do everything here. Our lives are a complete texture of how we've lived them. So how we live them is the most important thing we could possibly ask ourselves if we're ever going to hope to produce something beyond belief.
I'll give you a perfect example. My partner is Mark Harris. Mark Harris has been married 31 years. Mark has 13 children. Oh boy. Mark made a commitment one day about 30 years ago that he would have breakfast with his children every morning. Here are this. Breakfast with his children every morning. He and his wife. He made that commitment 30 years ago.
Mark has kept that commitment for 30 years. Mark made a commitment. He would celebrate you the Sabbath every Saturday for the rest of his life. Mark and his family celebrate. Saturday is Sabbath every week, every month, every year. Imagine that. That's a system. It's a system of commitment. It's a system of strategy. It's a system of love. It's a system born out of who am I? Why am I here? So I'd love to say if we're born in the image of God and it said we're born in the image of God, it means we're born to create.
I'm going to tell you a little story that almost no one's ever heard, but I'm going to tell it to you for the McDonald'sizing of what you're talking about and the systemizing of what you're talking about.
I know how to do some finer things in the paint and business, go leaf and wallpaper and this and that and they said, okay, so they gave me a little job and I did a little job and then I got another job and I had a little motor scooter.
So I get invited to do this property. It's a guest home in a place called Fairbanks Ranch. And every day I show up and I'm working in this guest house. It was the nicest house I'd ever been in and the main house was somewhere up the hill and I couldn't see it and didn't go nearest.
So about two days in this lady comes down, very attractive lady and she says, I hear you're from Ireland. I go, yeah, she goes, I bet you love a cup of tea. I said, I do love a cup of tea.
So she comes down at lunchtime with a cup of tea, the pots a certain way, the silverware is a certain way, the china is a certain china cup and a little ham sandwich. She goes, I know Irish people like a ham sandwich. Boom, we have a chaff.
I go back to work and every day for two weeks at 12 o'clock, exactly at 12 o'clock, this lady arrived down with the silver tray, china cup, ham sandwich and we talked for half an hour. I finally said to her, I said, I got to tell you I'm kind of curious. I drove up the wrong way to the house this morning and the house is enormous and I said, what do you do?
And she goes, my husband was in the restaurant business. It was John Croc. I said, you do the same thing every day at the exact same time she goes, that's the way Ray liked it and she goes, it made for a good business and it made for a good life.
John Croc made me a cup of tea and a sandwich every day. 12 o'clock, I was 19 year old, immigrant house painter. I didn't know where I was. I didn't know who I was working for, but I've never told anybody that story, but that lady was phenomenal, but it was the same every day.
It looked the same on the tray. Fairbanks ranch at the time, a lot was about $2 million. They had 12 lots. So it paid the bills to systems pay the bills, baby. Systems enable you to keep your word. Yeah. Think about it. It's just able you to keep your word. Right.
And if we don't keep our word, who are we? Right. So there you go. It provides the integrity of everything we do. So that's my take on what a system is. I'm not a technology guy. I'm not a systems guy. I'm a life guy. Right.
Right. And so I keep my promise. How do I keep my promise? How do I keep our promise? I love it. For those who maybe are new and who are about to run out and get the e-mith revisited. I'd love to tantalize them a little bit with these three concepts.
The entrepreneur, the manager, the technician. I mean, I know this is classic Gerber stuff, but I think it's still a mystery to people. People fail. People go bankrupt. They they have pain in their life. They lose their dream because they don't know the difference between the three. Maybe you can just give us the overview.
Well, there's so obvious once you see it. Yeah. The entrepreneur is the leader. The entrepreneur is the creator. Entrepreneurs, what Walt Disney called the Imagineer. The entrepreneur is the one who makes it happen.
The manager is the one who makes certain it happens in the right way. And the technician is the one who does the work. So the leader creates it. The manager officiates over it. And the technician produces the result.
That relationship is critical to a successful company. But that relationship is critical to a successful life. And that's really the most important thing, Brian.
My kids will attest to this. A little food market opened up near where we live. And I walked in and it had all these cool things. And the gal behind the counter was so nice. And I asked her for some supplements.
You know, like the vitamin C type things were going to a tournament. My kids had a little sniffle. And she was so afraid of sounding like a salesperson. And she goes, I don't want to push anything on you. I know these are 99 cents.
But this $5 thing is really great. But I just don't want to be this pushy salesperson. And I turned to her and I said, if you don't get this thing down, you're going to be closing the doors on this place. I said, you're doing me a service.
You're doing me a service. You're helping me help my family. I remember going away from that store going. She's doomed. And she probably has a couple of months free rent to start with. She negotiated into her leaves. And yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, but she too, she won't gleefully promote what she has that can help me get healthy because she's afraid of being perceived as a salesperson.
Yeah. You know, she has the answers in there for all of us to feel healthier, but she's embarrassed about it because she's self conscious about being perceived as a salesperson or a pushy salesperson. And a couple of months later, I kid you not that that store was closed and they go, dad, you're right. And I go, I have no satisfaction in being right. I go, that was the death of a dream and that kills me.
And that's why I think the emits systems are so critical because you're very candid. You'll tell people you're going to fail. You're candid because there's so much soft soap in in our world today. Nobody's willing to actually affect somebody with the truth that if you don't have the creative side, if you don't manage it the right way, and if you don't then have the producers that get it done. If you don't have systems to support it, and you don't have the job and the practice and the business and the enterprise, you're done. You're done before you start.
Of course. So what am I going to say to people? I've been saying this whole whole my life. Right. What am I going to say to people? I mean, tell them a lie. Yeah. Say I want to, I want to, I want to, I want to, I said, I hear you want to, everybody wants to. But nobody does.
Yeah. So here in the vast majority of people who fail in business didn't have to fail in business. And it isn't the pandemic. The pandemic is simply another excuse for failing in business because here are me. I see retailers, restaurants who are suffering from the pandemic and have figured away around it. Right.
They figured away around it. They're already working on their business by figuring a way how to deal with that problem. Yep. While creating a successful life. Right. We're here in Carlsbad. You see, we have four buildings in our headquarters on our campus. They're all empty. Yes. That's March 9th.
I've had 250 employees working from home and working from out of state. And we put the systems in place to be able to handle that before the pandemic came. I think the big thing is I look at this and I'm excited for your new initiative and I encourage anybody.
First of all, start with the book. If you've never read the book, you got to go today and get the book. If you haven't read the book in a while, it's time to pick it up. But I would encourage everybody to go to emethstrategies.com. There's some really cool pieces over there. There's a video that has the who's who of American influence in the last 20 years there.
This is good for what ails you. If you're going to be in small business, you got to make it your business. You got to be about your business. You got to grow. You got to develop. You got to improve. You got to be willing to hear the hard things. You got to be willing to engage in things whether it be coaching and training where people tell you things where the gaps are because growing towards that stuff and pursuing your vision and your purpose and your mission. That's electrifying.
Brian, when you say if you're going to be in business here, me, if you're going to be alive, so I'm not talking about going to work on your business instead of just doing what to do and doing it. I'm talking about going to work on your life. Emeth is life work. This is just business work. Business is the economic side of life. But it's not the life of life. Brian lives a life of life. He speaks to his children about life.
When he spoke about that woman who started that store and she was apologizing for being business, Brian was giving a life lesson, not a business lesson. And so I just absolutely want to implore you all to hear this. This is life work every single person over these years who has taken on Emeth earnestly, has sent this endlessly.
It transformed my life. It made everything this way now. Yeah. So this is really, really critical. It's so appreciate you sharing that, Brian. No, that's great.
Let's do this. I have five rapid-fire questions we ask all of our guests. But before I get that, I just want to get that because that's a little bit about Michael. Let's do this. Let's say there's somebody thinking about starting a small business out there. Let's say there's someone who just started a small business out there or let's say there's someone who's floundering in their small business out there.
What's the best piece of advice you could give them? Read the Emeth revisited and then do it. Yeah. Read the Emeth revisited and then doing. Yep. Great. You said it.
You carried that book with you essentially in your back pocket for 20 years. You read it once every year, renewing it, renewing it, renewing it, renewing it. Listen to what Brian said. Every great Emeth entrepreneur has effectively done exactly what Brian just said to you.
It's a life's work and his business reflects his life's work. His life doesn't reflect his business's work. His business reflects his life's work. Very true. Very true. Become that leader in your life. Yeah.
And it's a real treat and a privilege for me today to have you. I have no idea how this took so long to happen. But you know, it's kind of cool to see it in 3D today and have this experience. So let's do this.
Michael, we've asked these questions of the who's who and it gives us a little insight into who you are and how you work. First of all, what's the single best piece of advice you've ever been given? Depends single advice I've ever been given is stop thinking like that. Who gave you that? I don't even remember. Wow. Wow. Okay. That's great. I love it. Stop thinking like that.
Okay. What one talent or gift do you wish you possessed that you currently don't? I think that skill is to stay focused on one thing. I'm distracted by many things because I'm a creator. Of course. Of course. I'm continually creating. Yeah. And my wife says, stop creating. Yeah. Yeah. I'm continually creating the next the next the next. Right. Sure. Next because I see possibilities and everything. Right. Yeah. The one thing is just that staying focused on one thing. Yeah. I think that's something I've committed myself to and it's been beneficial for sure.
What book has been most instrumental in your life? Actually, it's a book that I was introduced to. Oh, about six or seven years ago. I am that by three SRI Nizargadatta Maharaj. That's great. That's great.
你生命中最有影响力的书是什么?实际上,是有人向我介绍的一本书,大约是六七年前的事了。这本书是SRI Nizargadatta Maharaj写的《I Am That》。太好了,太棒了!
Okay. Yeah. You're not a big TV watcher, but let's say you're flipping through the channels and there's this one movie that comes on and every time it comes on, you stop. What's the one movie you've watched over and over and over again? There aren't any. No. No. Okay. That's interesting. That's interesting. Well, because you're also a very creative person. So you're you're kind of creating your own movie.
Last but not least, anything on Michael Gerber's book list that he hasn't checked the box on yet. There's something you want to do or see or. Oh, we're about to create the most significant company in the world. And we're about to create the Apple and Business Development Services. Nice. I looked up Apple just yesterday morning on Wikipedia. And the only reason I did it is because we were having a conversation about something in our business. And so I just looked up Apple and you understand when I said we were founded in 1977, Apple was founded in the very same year. Nice. And I wrote my partner this morning and I said I just checked Apple out on Wikipedia and noted that it is a two plus trillion dollar valuation.
最后但并非最不重要的,还有迈克尔·格伯( Michael Gerber)的书单中还没有勾选的任何东西。你想做或看到什么东西。哦,我们即将创建世界上最重要的公司。我们即将创造苹果和商业发展服务。不错。昨天早上我刚刚查了维基百科的苹果公司。我这么做的唯一原因是因为我们在谈论我们业务中的某些事情。所以我只是查了一下苹果,你明白我从1977年成立时说的时候,苹果公司也是同一年成立的。不错。今天早上我给我的伙伴写信,告诉他我刚刚在维基百科上查了苹果公司,注意到它的估值是2万亿美元。
Nice. And I said and Steve Jobs started his company the same day I did. We got a lot of catching up to do. A couple of teas to catch up on. And I look forward to meeting your partner. I'm 31 years married with only six kids. So I'm only as half as productive as him. So I look forward to catching up. You're going to love Mark.
That's great. This has been a treat. I am again, I have no idea. But things happen when they should happen. I have no idea why it's taken so long for us to connect like this. But I'm thankful we did. There's hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people tuning into this today. And many of them believe it or not. Even though since 1986 the E-Mid-3 visits been the best small business book on the market. There's a whole bunch of folks today. It's brand new too. And I'm excited. I'm excited to bring it to them and I'm excited for them to meet you. And it was a thrill for me to see it in 3D today. We shared a stage 31 years ago in Cleveland, Ohio. And it's taken a long time to reconnect since then. But this has been a treat the first of many my friend. Bless you and your family. Thanks for being on the show today. And I encourage everybody get a copy of the book and then check out emithstrategies.com. There's some really cool resources. Thanks for being with us today Michael. This has been a real treat.
My good light. My earnest to light, Brian. And we will see a lot of each other soon very soon. Well, thanks for joining us today. I appreciate this through his books and his information. It's been very influential in my thinking about business and how I've applied myself. And I hope it's the same for you today.
Thanks for joining us and I'm going to leave you with a little Irish blessing from someone who's been the most influential person in my life. That little 90 year old pocket rocket. My mother cherries with an Irish blessing. Until next time we'll see you then. May the road rise up to me too. And may the wind always be at your back. May the rain fall soft upon your fields and the sun shine warm upon your face. Until we meet again, may God hold you in the hollow of His hand. See you next time.