Ever wondered what the success formula is for top entrepreneurs? Dan Sullivan and Steve Krein discuss “The 25-Year Framework” and how it benefits entrepreneurs by helping them prioritize their biggest goals and measure progress every quarter. They explain how having a quarterly rhythm can be transformational, and provide insights into how to achieve long-term goals, adapt to advancements in technology, and overcome crises in the marketplace.

Show Notes:

• Measuring your past progress and planning out the next quarter, every quarter, helps simplify and multiply your efforts.
• This kind of self-accountability and measurement allows for compounding results.
• Growth entrepreneurs must engage in quarterly reflection to achieve their goals.
• Entrepreneurs who treat every quarter in business as a 90-day period of progress, recalibrating and staying committed to their goals, are much more likely to weather market disruptions (such as a global pandemic) and will fare better in the long run.
• Quarterly review and recalibration are essential for achieving not only professional goals, but personal ones as well, and help you build meaningful relationships.
• Your social circle can either support or obstruct your goals. Curate it regularly.
• Avoid making major decisions on Friday afternoons. Everything feels much bigger and scarier when you’re tired from the week, whereas you have a fresh perspective and more energy at the start of the week.
• To reach your quarterly goals, you must commit to weekly improvements.

Resources:

The 25-Year Framework by Dan Sullivan

The Strategic Coach® Program

StartUp Health

Free Zone Frontier by Dan Sullivan

Unique Ability®

The Entrepreneur’s Guide To Time Management (Free Days™)

Should businesses be focusing more on engaging their customers virtually or in person? Since some customers prefer one and some prefer the other, you’re alienating people if you go too far in either direction. Dan Sullivan and Steven Krein discuss the incursion of digital elements into various aspects of human life and what this has your potential customers feeling—and seeking out.

Show Notes:

There was an industrial phase where everything old was torn down to build something new. And then there was pushback.

A good city is for both the people who live there and the people who only come for a few hours, then go home.

There’s a 50% renewal rate for Strategic Coach® clients who stick to virtual, and a 75% renewal rate for Strategic Coach clients who attend in-person workshops.

Some people have decided to just not travel anymore.

Virtual strengthens what happens in real life; it doesn’t replace it.

Testing something out on 50 people gives you a good idea about whether it works.

People are now pursuing what they’re interested in, and it’s harder to get their attention for what you want to share with them.

News stories disappear from public discussions much faster than they used to.

In the 1940s, the notion that you were supposed to enjoy your work didn’t exist.

There’s become a complete disconnection between higher education and the job market.

When people don’t know where they’re headed in the future, they go back to what they know and defend it.

Resources:

Thinking About Your Thinking by Dan Sullivan

Unique Ability®

The Transformation Trilogy set by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

The Unique EDGE® Program

For most people, entrepreneurship used to feel out of reach. Now, technology has provided the necessary tools for anyone to start a company that has all the potential to give them freedom. Dan Sullivan and Steven Krein discuss the many invaluable ways AI can be used by business leaders, and how it’s opened doors for dreamers. 

Show Notes:

Entrepreneurism by its very nature creates disruption and inequality.

Entrepreneurs like talking to other people who are entrepreneurial about their ideas in order to develop them further.

AI is creating a whole generation of people learning how to learn differently.

It might be more interesting to consider what using AI does to your brain versus what it does to your business.

Ten years from now, everybody's going to be using AI just as a matter of interacting with their computer.

People who would never use ChatGPT are going to have AI built into what they’re already doing on their phones and computers.

AI will eventually become so normal that it’ll become boring.

Resources:

Perplexity.ai

The Kolbe A™ Index

The Impact Filter™

Blog: Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage

Book: AI As Your Teammate by Evan Ryan

The Transformation Trilogy: Who Not How, The Gap and the Gain, and 10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

As of this year, Dan Sullivan has been a business coach for half a century, and Strategic Coach® has been helping entrepreneurs lead their best lives for 35 years. In this episode, Steve Krein and Dan discuss the inaugural CoachCon event that recently took place in Nashville, how the three-day conference came together, and the secrets that made it a resounding success.

Show Notes:

When people are committing to an event that requires traveling, they give it a lot more thought than they did before COVID.

You’re going to see that almost all businesses have three tracks: a technology track, a teamwork track, and a coaching track.

Technology does not coach itself. Teamwork doesn't naturally expand itself.

Dan sees it as a form of progress when great things can be created in his company that he has no involvement in.

Most conventions and conferences are overloaded with content with no time to think.

What gets talked about in free periods during conferences is a more important takeaway than anything heard in the panel discussions.

Sponsors of communities are not always authentic members of those communities.

If people have a great experience, they'll tell a few people about it. If they have a bad experience, they'll tell a lot of people about it.

Resources:

Article: Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage

The Impact Filter™

The Strategic Coach® Program

Visual Capitalist

Ever been to a concert where everyone sings along to every song? That's the power of community. Dan and Steve explore the emotional side of entrepreneurship, discussing the benefits of building a strong community. It’s an environment of shared language, shared opportunities, and shared experiences where everyone can gain and grow.

Show Notes:

In any community, shared language and experiences create an environment where people feel more comfortable.

When you bring entrepreneurs together, there’s a shared language and also shared challenges that they’re all deeply familiar with.

When entrepreneurs share networks, it’s an instant capability.

Entrepreneurs can have shared opportunities not only individually, but collectively.

Questions are more powerful than answers.

Technology is actually about taking things that already work and putting them into a new form.

You can create a new lesson and a new course of action out of any three of your past experiences.

You want your existing clients to be part of your marketing team.

When you get involved with investors, there are two numbers that really matter: 51% and 49%.

Resources:

The R-Factor Question®

The Entrepreneurial Time System®

Unique Ability®

Genius Network®

Abundance 360®

The daVinci50 Mastermind®

Perplexity.ai

The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

Your Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan Sullivan

Serial entrepreneur Lior Weinstein returns to the show. Teaming up with Dan and Steve, he shares his systematic approach for tackling business challenges and leveraging AI alongside human capabilities. Three entrepreneurs operating at the top of their game promise valuable takeaways to transform pains into new revenue streams and fuel your success.

Show Notes:

Every company has a history and constraints they bring along.

Good marketing requires empathy.

Too many entrepreneurs overthink, overengineer, and overbuild.

Though it may seem counterintuitive, it’s better to build the website before building a product.

When an amazing technology launches, people make predictions without appreciating or understanding the actual engineering problems that underpin the technology. 

The rate at which the open source community is creating competitive products is incredible.

You’re only as smart as the quality of your questions.

Search engines are becoming answer engines.

We're going to learn more and more about human intelligence by interacting with AI technology.

Resources:

Book: The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan

Article: The 4 Freedoms That Motivate Successful Entrepreneurs

Unique Ability®

Perplexity.ai

Book: The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

Dan Sullivan and Steve Krein welcome Lior Weinstein, a serial entrepreneur who specializes in simplifying complex concepts into actionable steps. Lior shares his background, starting in Israel and moving to the United States, where he expanded his entrepreneurial career after serving in the IDF's Intelligence Corps. Lior's experiences taught him about teamwork, tackling big missions, and winning with small teams.

Show Notes:

• Strategic Coach® clients learn to prioritize being happy first.
• Focusing on meaningful relationships is the key to personal happiness and business success.
• Adopting an owner’s mindset in consulting leads to deeper problem-solving empathy and holistic client solutions.
• Curiosity is essential because it fosters innovation, adaptability, and continuous learning.
• When you’re not focused on short-term profit, it’s a lot easier to engage on all sides.
• Meeting in person isn’t a requirement for most knowledge-based businesses.
• Entrepreneurial community is a powerful multiplier that can accelerate business growth, innovation, and shared success.
• You don't have a community unless you have a common language.
• It's difficult for most entrepreneurs to avoid tunnel vision when they encounter a problem.
• Looking toward the future is something entrepreneurs do organically.

Resources:

Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy

Podcast: Anything And Everything with Dan Sullivan and Jeffrey Madoff

Article: The 4 Freedoms That Motivate Successful Entrepreneurs

Unique AbilityⓇ

The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss

Total Cash Confidence by Dan Sullivan

The Impact Filter™

Many entrepreneurs don’t hire well, and those that do mostly dread the activity. Dan Sullivan aims to change that. He explains a mindset shift about hiring differently as entrepreneurs, exploring how thinking of hiring as casting a play creates a new perspective on team building and collaboration.

Show Notes:

• Most entrepreneurs view hiring as a cost rather than an investment.
• An entrepreneur’s attitude toward hiring shapes the future of their relationship with their team.
• The notion of casting, as opposed to hiring, highlights the importance of finding the right fit for a role within the team.
• When entrepreneurs view the hiring process as casting, they shift their focus from simply filling a position to selecting individuals who will fit well within the existing team dynamic.
• It also helps them identify areas for improvement, reallocate roles, and ensure that the team functions cohesively toward common goals.
• It pays to view your business as a theater production, where the success of the team depends on how well each member fits into their role and collaborates with others.
• It doesn’t matter what anyone is doing on their own. It’s all about how you’re producing something as a team.

Resources:

The Impact Filter™

The Front Stage/Back Stage Model®

Unique AbilityⓇ

10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

Dan Sullivan and Steve Krein delve into the power of the “When Are You Great?” tool, discussing how it serves as a crucial planning aid and a potent marketing resource. Using real-world examples, they explore the implications for crafting compelling offers, narrating impactful stories, and leveraging a marketer’s secret weapon.

Highlights:

To figure out what gets talked about, you have to combine everything you’re telling with everything you’re being told.

You share when you’re good because you have competition. Others share when you’re great because they don’t think you have any competition.

Saying when you’re good is trying to make a convincing argument. Being told when you’re great is your compelling offer.

How you're making people feel transcends what you do for them.

Your messaging should include both what you do and what happens when someone participates in it.

Measuring impact is hard in the short term, but unavoidable in the long term.

Resources:

The Four Freedoms

The Self-Managing Company by Dan Sullivan

The Strategic Coach Entrepreneurial Time System®

The End of the World is Just the Beginning by Peter Zeihan 

The end of a year and the beginning of another is a great time to reflect and plan. Dan Sullivan and Steve Krein discuss effective ways entrepreneurs can look back on what’s happened and look ahead to what they want to accomplish, sharing insights from their own experiences running successful businesses.

Highlights:

A lot of people feel uncomfortable talking about long-term planning.

You can use the new year to reflect on the progress you've made over the last 12 months and what you need to do over the next 12 months while fitting it into the context of what your long-term mission is.

You can reuse your past any way you want.

It’s much easier to think about 25 years as 100 quarters: a quarter is enough time to get stuff done, but not so long that you’ll lose your way.

No one can predict the future. It’s all just guesses and bets.

Consistency over time in your past is crucial for building your future.

For the most part, entrepreneurs starting a new business don't have any structure or process that works.

There's a quick deviation from values sometimes when you're trying to just get financial return.

The more you plan backwards from the future, the better you get at it.

Resources:

10x Is Easier Than 2x  by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

Learn more about Steve Krein and StartUp Health

The Strategic Coach® Program

Learn more about Unique Ability®

No matter how long a company has been around, it’s vital that everyone is clear on and maintains their core values. Dan Sullivan and Steve Krein explain why this is so important, discuss why all team members need to be aligned, and share some of their own companies’ core values.

Highlights:

In the U.S., core values used to be structured into the environment you lived in.

Reminding team members of the company’s specific purpose can help avoid distraction.

The value reinforcement of a company today is 10 times more important than it was in the 1950s.

You either do or don’t have passion for, have conviction for, and are inspired by a mission.

People who aren’t aligned with a company’s mission wreak havoc during times when things shift.

Company leaders need to represent the values they want their team members to have.

Every entrepreneur is in the continual process of hiring or removing wrong-fit people.

In a period of high flux, you go to the organizing structure that actually works.

Resources:

Everyone And Everything Grows by Dan Sullivan

Unique Ability®

The Entrepreneur’s Guide To Time Management

“Geometry” For Staying Cool & Calm by Dan Sullivan

Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder by Nassim Nicholas Taleb