March 29, 2024 • 34 mins
You don’t have to be born into a legacy of wealth to leave one behind. That is one of several powerful takeaways from this interview with the successful venture capitalist, author, and founder of Backstage Capital, Arlan Hamilton. She shares the importance of having radical self-belief, owning the wealth you create, and the power of sharing success with others.
- How to Build Trust and Unleash the Potential of Your Direct Reports: Everyone has greatness inside of them. Are your leaders doing enough to unlock it? An exceptional leader's job is to unleash the potential in each of their direct reports.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:10):
Hello and welcome back toFranklinCovey's twice weekly podcast,
On Leadership with Scott Miller.That's me. I'm your host each week,
where on Tuesdays and Fridays,
we interview some of the most fascinatingpeople in the world with the intention
of making you better, more effective,more trustworthy, a better leader,
a better spouse, parent, partner,teacher, educator, leader,
(00:33):
contributor, friend, humanbeing. FranklinCovey, of course,
is the most trusted leadership firm inthe world, founded by Dr. Stephen R.
Covey of The 7 Habits ofHighly Effective People fame,
and his friend and partner, Hyrum Smith,
who invented the fatherof time management.
And if you ever had a time managementtool from the FranklinCovey Planner,
(00:54):
it probably set you up wellfor your career. For six years,
we've been shining our spotlight onnot just our own thought leaders,
people like Chris McChesney,Kory Kogon, Stephen M. R. Covey,
and others.
We also like to shine the spotlight onother people that we think have paid the
price to bring you some discipline, someresearch, a recovery from their trauma,
(01:15):
or just their own experience to bettereducate you and make you a better leader.
Today our guest is theauthor Arlan Hamilton,
written several books with a newbook coming out called Your First
Million, that got your attention,
Why You Don't Have To BeBorn Into a Legacy of Wealth
(01:35):
To Leave One Behind. Joining us fromour office at home in Los Angeles,
California. Arlan,welcome to On Leadership.
Hi, thanks for having me.
So the fact of the matteris we invited you on, gosh,
about six or eight monthsago for a previous book.
And although it was likeour 280th podcast interview,
we had a nightmare of technical problems.
(01:57):
And I just want our audience to knowthat you are a very in demand speaker,
entrepreneur, funder, investor, coach,
and you hung in therefor 25 minutes, right?
Our team did their best to get theiract together. You were very gracious.
It didn't work out.Six, eight months later,
you graciously gave us a second chanceto come back on to talk about Your First
(02:18):
Million. So A, thank you for that.
Sometimes second chances are the bestones. Will you take a few minutes,
Arlan,
and will you reorient all of ourlisteners and viewers to your journey
because you've become a very in-demandspeaker, coach, author, advisor,
investor,
but not everyone may know what yourjourney is because it's not the obvious
(02:40):
journey to becoming aninvestor in businesses.
Talk about how you got to where you areand we'll dive deeper into the book.
Yes. Well, thanks for having me, andI appreciate this second chance here
about a decade ago. Well, I wasin my early thirties, I was,
(03:01):
or mid thirties, I was homeless.
I was sleeping on the floorof the San Francisco airport.
It had come to that andI was on this mission to
start a venture fund toinvest in founders and
specifically founders who werewomen, people of color and LGBTQ+,
(03:21):
which I identify as all three.And fast forward to today,
my fund and I have investedin more than 200 of those
companies with those leaders.And it's been quite a journey,
but that's the nutshell version of it.
And kind of going back just a little bit,
(03:41):
I was raised in Dallas and hadalways had these great ideas
and worked on different projects,
but just couldn't quite make thingswork out and make ends meet. And
stumbled upon SiliconValley in my early thirties,
the concept of it andfound my people I thought.
(04:02):
And it kind of started a journey to
having Silicon Valley better represented.
Arlan, you write veryvulnerably about your journey,
a history of addiction, recovery,hard work, vision, work ethic.
Can you tell us what ledspecifically to ending up homeless,
(04:26):
sleeping on the San Franciscoairport floor? I mean,
I ask this question because I'd likepeople to realize what were some of
the decisions that endedup culminating in in the
hopes that other people might see somewarning signs in their own life or in
their children and made it moreinstructive for parents and leaders or
(04:47):
entrepreneurs who may have made one bettoo many or made a one wrong decision.
What is there to glean from that?
Yeah, I don't think for instance,
the addiction caused the homelessness.
I think the homelessness caused theaddiction, for instance. So I think,
I don't know if there werecertain decisions that were made.
(05:07):
I think that when I was achild, we didn't have much.
My mother worked two jobs andstill couldn't make ends meet.
And she grew up in Jackson, Mississippi.
There's generational trauma there.
Financial trauma there to say the least.
And I think that maybeshe wasn't as equipped to
(05:31):
put me on the right path forfinancial wealth and success.
And then as an adult,
I think after I've studiedand been around so many,
now I of these tech giants,
I think I was in the sameheadspace as the tech giants.
I just didn't have the rightresources and connections,
(05:53):
and I didn't necessarily havethe people recognize that in
me the same as others. So Ididn't go to college for instance,
and I think not going tocollege was a decision.
I did not want to leave my familyin the state that they were in
financially.
And I didn't feel comfortablegoing to a campus for four years,
(06:17):
even though I had received scholarships.
But I will say that the coolthing now is that my mother and I
have $1 million worth ofscholarships at Oxford University,
the first of its kind at DillardUniversity and at Harvard Law.
So there, let's talk a littlebit about your journey.
(06:40):
You are the founder of BackstageCapital and one of the motivators as you
alluded to early is your research showedthat I think 90 plus percent of venture
capital money went towhite men historically.
And you've been on a journeyto help broaden that to women,
to people of color, to membersof the LGBTQ+ community.
(07:00):
Talk about some of the passion andsuccess that you are having there.
Yeah, you said that number out loud.
You can tell that that's not right. Right.
It's white men make up about 30% ofthe US and they receive 90% of the
funding.
So I had a lot of white menfriends at the time when I
(07:22):
started who didn't know that statisticand when I told them they thought it was
outrageous and many of them wenton to invest in my fund as I
met more and more people. And so today,
Mark Cuban is one of them.
He's invested $6 millionin Backstage Capital,
2019 and 2020,
and we've had the enterprisevalue of our portfolio is in the
(07:47):
billions.
We've helped create thousands of jobs and
we're looking forward to the futureor we'll see, hopefully many exits.
So I'm going to have youteach some concepts today about how to earn your first
million,
but first I want to talk about JanetJackson and a particular truck because you
tell a great story in the book that'sjust a preamble to a lot of great stories.
(08:10):
Will you take your time,
talk about the role that Janetplayed in your life and then a
particular incident involving a truck.
Yeah. So when I was 13, Iwas just in love with Janet.
I looked up to her, admired her so much,
we couldn't afford tickets to her show,
but my mother did surprise me with theticket to her concert when I was 13 years
(08:34):
old in Dallas, Texas.I went to the concert,
she put some earrings on me to make melook older because she couldn't afford
that second ticket.
So she was sending me in to the wolvesand she's sitting outside in the car and
I was sitting there a little nervous.
Someone walks up to me andoffers me a front row seat.
I didn't believe him at first, but Ilet him walk with me to the front row.
(08:57):
I get there and I'm greeted and I'm inthe front row at a Janet Jackson concert.
My first concert ever. Turns outit was her partner at the time,
and Janet likes to seedher front row with a lot of
excited and excitable fans so she canhave that right energy for herself. So it
was just a transformative day forme and an event for me meant so
(09:18):
much to me in many ways.
And I've spent the last 30years just continuing to admire
her. In 2021, she had a life,
auction of a lifetime in Beverly Hills,
1300 items I believeand the centerpiece item
or centerfold item was atruck that meant a lot to her,
(09:42):
an antique truck thatmeant a lot to her and
it came with a 10-minute phonecall. So I had in my head,
I'm going to go for this.
I don't think I'll get it because KimKardashian and Christina Aguilera are
also bidding, but I'm going to go forit. And so the beginning of my book,
Your First Million transports you to thatmoment and that day and tells you what
(10:06):
happens next.
So we'll leave the outcome of thatstory to the reader of the book.
Let's talk about a concept you openedwith called radical self-belief.
Who doesn't need to have more of that?
What does that mean and why is itvital to someone's first million?
Yes.
I've been in rooms across thecountry on my book tour this year,
(10:30):
and I'll usually ask the roomhow many people here believe
that they can make $1 millionif they haven't already.
And that is usually about half theroom no matter what the room is made
up. And then I'll ask,who believes that they
deserve to make $1 million?
And it's even more surprising thatthere are a few hands up in the
(10:55):
air. And to me that's just shocking.
And so no matter who you are,
if you have felt underestimated, youare my audience. I'm talking to you.
And we do not have timefor imposter syndrome.
We do not have time for self-doubtin a world where so much is going
(11:16):
on first of all,
but also we only get so manyyears on the earth in this body,
in this form. And it really is,
I think it's up to us andI think we owe each other
the better versions of ourselves.
And so that's what I strive for andthat's what I hope is the takeaway.
(11:37):
When people talk to me,you read my books, meet Me,
is that I believe inyou, I believe in myself.
I have such confidence in myself becauseI have such confidence in others,
and I believe that youdeserve the radical belief and
the audacity to be yourself.
Arlan, expand on that a little bit.
You write also about this conceptthat everybody is an expert.
(12:00):
Everybody has some expertise.It's a pretty audacious statement.
We use the word expertpretty carelessly a lot,
increasingly, some peopleuse it more judiciously.
How do you define expertiseand how does someone uncover
what theirs is?
(12:21):
Yeah, I mean that everyone,
you don't have to necessarily have goneto a certain school or have a certain,
dare I say, breeding tobe an expert in something.
I think there's an experience level.
I think we can all agree that if youhave a certain level of experience in
something that you can becomeexpert and can be considered that.
(12:41):
And each of us,
what the point I'm making in the bookis that each of us has the experience of
being ourselves.
And so there are a lot of intersectionalthings that happen with your lived
experience,
not necessarily only youreducation or your work.
So if you combine the education andthe work that you've done and the
(13:03):
experiences that you had withyour lived experience as a human,
whatever that is,
all the things that you might considerto be knocks against you or something
that you have to overcome,
those combine to give you expertise.A great example is myself.
I couldn't be the person that youhave described a couple of times in
(13:23):
this interview.
I couldn't be all of those things if Ididn't have the lived experience that I
had. And what makes me me,because that is what people
are reacting to, that iswhy I'm getting into rooms.
That is why Mark Cuban invested in mewhen I asked him why he invested in my
fund when he does not like toinvest in other people's funds,
(13:43):
he likes to directly invest in companies.He said, without missing a beat,
you are in rooms I'll never be in.
The reason I'm in rooms he'llnever be in is because I am me.
And I think that goes with everyone elseis to answer the second part of your
question, to take the pieces of your life,
the things you'veaccomplished and experienced,
(14:04):
and write them down simply write themdown, enlist. I help with the book.
There's different ways to do this,
but to write down and to put in frontof you the different things that make
you unique, your fingerprint, andyou can find your expertise in that.
Arlan, what's your expertise?
(14:24):
I may have a few.
I think the most is I'm really great
at bringing people togetherfor a common cause and
leading that group to a certain point.
Will you take a few more minutes andjust expand on what exactly Backstage
(14:44):
Capital is? What do you do? Who do youinvest in? How do you invest? I mean,
I don't know anybody that doesn'thave dream of a side hustle,
some dream of someday expandingand wanting to grow their business.
They may need seed capital.
Take a few minutes and describepractically maybe demystify the world of
venture capital for some listeners.How does it work and what do you do?
(15:08):
Sure. So venture capital,
we raise money from institutions,
high net worth individuals, insurancecompanies, endowments from colleges,
et cetera.
And so from people who are looking todiversify their own portfolios, but major,
major amounts of money,
it's a lot of money beingspent in venture capital,
(15:31):
but it's also a very small sliverof private equity in general.
And this capital is meantto be spent on the moonshot
ideas, the big innovative ideas.
It's not to be treated thesame way as a lot of private
equity, which is very later stageand very kind of buttoned up.
And then there are differentstages of venture capital.
(15:52):
There's early stage tolater stage going closer
to the IPOs.
And so I'm in early stage venture capital,
which is like the riskiest placeyou can be in this asset class.
And so I go out, I take the moneyraised, I mentioned Mark Cuban,
but we've also had multiple otherpeople and institutions and funds invest
(16:16):
in us.I take that capital,
my team and I go out andrefine and have come to us
through different means,high potential companies.
And we do the legwork oflooking at these companies,
every single one that comes to us or thatwe go out to looking through them and
(16:37):
taking them through differentstages of diligence depending on our
interest in them. And then we make bets.
So we've seen more than 10,000 companiesin the last decade to invest in about
200 of them.
And I think that number'sactually a little bit higher because I think we invest
in maybe 1% of what we see.
And so we do that on a day-to-daybasis, and then we nurture them.
(17:00):
So you're planting seeds and thenyou're nurturing those seeds,
watering them withresources, with guidance.
You're a small part of theirstory, their overall story,
but you're there as much as you can be.And then you do hope that
over time, and it's yourjob to have a portfolio wide
returns on investment, so about 50%of the companies are going to die out.
(17:24):
That's just kind of the statistic.
But you're looking for those onesthat outlast and outpace the rest to
bring back the entire fund and thenhopefully on top of that, have returns,
higher returns. Having said all of that,
I am very much excited about investing.I've been doing it for a decade.
It's my life's work and my calling.
(17:45):
But a bigger piece to this is thatI want to help create thousand new
millionaires, and I want to do thatthrough education, media, et cetera,
where or content I should say,
where they're making those millionsfrom generating revenue and
having sustainable companies and notnecessarily creating those millionaires
(18:06):
through investment alum.
Arlan, indulge me. I wantto go a little bit deeper.
This is like a masterclass fora lot of visionary solopreneurs
that are looking to build their companies.
Are most of youropportunities inbound versus
outbound?
Can you just give us an idea of what isa typical level of investment and what
(18:28):
kind of things should people be tighteningup and buttoning down if they're
searching for a venture capital infusion?
So Backstage Capital, my venture fund,is a little different than most funds.
And there are some funds that dothis too now because of our example.
But most venture funds do not havean application process like we do.
(18:50):
So we have a large top of funnel.
So you can go to backstagecapital.com if you feel you
are ready to talk to us,
you can go to the site,see what we invest in,
see if your company is theright company and apply.
And then we have a 60 personapprenticeship team that looks through all of the
(19:11):
applications and then surfaces the onesfor the partners to take a look at.
So that's very differentthan most funds. Most funds,
it's a warm introduction that's neededor they find you in trade papers or
in events and they come seekingyou. And in either case,
I mean you're going to have todeal with both types of investors,
(19:32):
and we certainly have partners in theecosystem that do that. In either case,
the big deal is to be so great atwhat you do that you're undeniable,
that you don't even need venturecapital, which is counterintuitive.
But to be in a position where youdon't need VCs or investors is
usually when the VCs and investorscome running towards you.
(19:54):
Super helpful. Your book isorganized into five sections.
The first component isThe Audacity of You.
It's where you speak about radicalself-belief and uncovering expertise.
The next section is calledThe Importance of Ownership.
Part three is many, m-a-n-y, mini,
m-i-n-i,
(20:15):
Many
Mini
Empires.
Part four, Redefining Success,and part five, Catalyzing.
You write about owningthe wealth you create.
Are there any insights, principles,
life lessons you've learned that youcan teach people about what it means to
actually own the wealth you create?
(20:37):
Yeah, some cautionary tales have involved
very early on, even before I startedBackstage when I was as could say,
broke, there was an opportunity.
Someone offered me $7,000 to help me out,
but also an exchange for afuture percentage of my income.
(21:00):
And I know that sounds probablyoutrageous to you right now,
but it's actually was a startup thatwas out that was doing that anyway.
And so that's where they got theidea. That doesn't exist anymore.
But it was something thatpeople were thinking about.
And you can think of it nowas like indentured servitude.
It's not the greatestidea. But at the time,
$7,000 was everything to me when Icouldn't put together two nickels.
(21:23):
And I called a friend ofmine who is a black woman,
who a director,
who I just knew because I was in LA andI just wanted to get her advice. I also
wanted to see if she wanted toinvest the same. And she said, Arlan,
don't you dare do that. Do youknow how valuable you will be?
Your income will be over time.And she was saying this to me,
(21:44):
and I was relatively homeless.
I was sleeping out of an Airbnb at thetime and didn't know next week to the
other. So I couldn't quite imaginethe world that she was imagining.
But do you know that ifI had taken that money,
I did take her advice andif I had taken that money,
it would've been worth hundreds ofthousands of dollars today and I'm just
getting started. And so to me,that's really where it stems from,
(22:08):
is that, and also in your business,
if you're looking for a venture, so manypeople are looking for venture capital.
They want that quick hit, but they don'trealize that that money is fleeting,
but the transaction is not.And so you're diluting,
you're diluting yourself andyour ownership and your equity
(22:29):
by selling pieces of your company.
So it has to be made very soberly andvery precisely these decisions that you
make.
Arlan,
your book is rife with great practicalprinciples based on things you've done
well, things that you've failedat, you have a concept you call,
Don't Count on the MoneyUntil it's in the Bank.
(22:49):
Most seasoned leadershave a story about that.
What's your story thatsupports this chapter,
Don't Count the MoneyUntil it's in the Bank.
Oh, I have so many. I have so many,but one of them is so interesting.
So Backstage Capital, we'vealways kind of struggled to raise.
And so whenever we get thesebigger hits, it's really exciting.
(23:14):
So we had a group that was goingto invest 5 million into backstage
operations at a time whenwe really needed that,
and that would've lastedus years at the time.
There were tears shed in theboardroom when this was decided.
There was a lot of celebration.
And the only thing that was left was Iwas supposed to meet with the president
(23:34):
of this company, the CEO of this company.
We were supposed to sign the paperworkand kind of a press sort of thing and
then shake hands and it was going to bethis photo op and they were going to be
traveling a couple of weeks later,
a couple of weeks later whenthat was supposed to happen,
I wake up to the news that thatperson has been arrested for fraud
(23:55):
and that the entire companyhas been rocked to its court.
This is a multi-billion dollar companyand very famous and infamous case.
And that person, I don'tknow if I can say their name,
but that person was arrestedand is now on the run
in hiding and the dealjust went up in smoke,
(24:16):
$5 million to a company thatcould have used that for
years. And so I learned a hardlesson very quickly because that was,
for all intents and purposes,was ready to be signed.
I learned a similarlesson about maybe nine
years ago, and I only hadto learn that lesson once,
(24:39):
hopefully for all of us.
So many great chapters in thisbook. Creating Winners Everywhere,
Choosing your CollaboratorsCarefully, Matchmaking,
Building your Team, YourNetwork is Currency,
Getting into the Room, Callingon Experts, Chasing Impact,
(24:59):
not Unicorns, Successis Meant to be Shared.
Will you just take one of those thatyou're super passionate about that you
think people may have a misnomerabout or a misconception or confused
about and riff on it? Pickany of those you'd like.
The last one you said, Successis Meant to be Shared. I mean,
that's the running theme in my career.
(25:21):
And one way that I'vedone that is I did open up
the ability to invest inBackstage Management Company
in 2021.
So now there are about 6,500people who co-own Backstage
Capital. It was the first timethat's been done in the country,
and I don't even know if it's beendone. I think it's been done in Europe,
(25:43):
but this is the first time it's been donein the country and we had to create a
path for it. It was veryheavy lift to make it happen,
but I am bullish on Backstage Capital.
I've put all of my ownpersonal resources into
Backstage year after year after yearto make it work because I believe that
(26:04):
there will be a big payoff because Ibelieve in these founders. And so I just
imagined the same way Iimagined it existing at all. I imagined once it existed,
what's success look like and who do Iwant to be there with me when it happens?
And I didn't want to be alone or justhave a few partners that got to indulge in
this. And that's what reallyhappens in most venture funds.
(26:24):
And so I think we opened up a newcategory of venture fund when we did that.
I think we broke ground somewhereand these investments were,
the average investmentwas $749. Now it ranged,
it certainly ranged tothe high six figures,
but people could put in a hundred dollarsin a Reg CF, Regulation Crowdfund,
(26:45):
and now they own a piece of ourmanagement company. Which again,
the previous times that this has happenedwhere the management company has been
sold,
pieces of it's been tobillion dollar funds in
exchange for one or twopeople getting that ownership.
So it's pretty exciting.
(27:06):
Arlan,
you've written a concept calledKnock Down the Stairway and Build an
Elevator. What does that mean?
Well, it's a little bit of a riffon sending the elevator back down.
And it's also kind of inreference to a memory that I have
with Chris Sacca,
(27:27):
who you may remember was an earlyinvestor in Twitter and in Uber and a
billionaire. He calls himselfan accidental billionaire.
He was on Shark Tank as well.
And one time I wanted tomeet him and he was at
an event that he washeadlining this event.
I didn't have any connections to him.
I had talked to him acouple of times on email,
(27:48):
but I really wanted totalk to him about my fund.
And there was a black woman working there.
It was the only black personin attendance at this event.
There was a black woman workingthere at this event, and I said,
I need to go meet this guy who's onstage right now. She didn't know him from
Adam. She said, this elevator, withoutasking me any questions, she said,
this elevator will take you up towhere he's supposed to be next.
(28:10):
You'll be getting his makeupdone for an interview.
It'll take you right thereas a service elevator.
She opened the service elevatorfor me and sent me right on up,
and I was able to talk toChris aka for 30 minutes,
and he ended up investing inmy fund along with his wife,
all three of our first funds.So it's an ode to that,
and it's about hacking your wayand finding your way creatively.
(28:33):
It's a great story. Arlan, you'vebeen very vulnerable, courageous,
even about your struggles. Youtalked today about your homelessness.
You've written about and talked aboutextensively a previous addiction you
have with alcohol and inyour move beyond that.
And it's interesting because you're onthe cusp of something coming up that I
(28:54):
think there may even be a transitionstory there to the degree you're
comfortable. Talk a bit about your ownstruggles with addiction and how you have
marshaled that recovery,
that pivot into anentrepreneurial opportunity.
Is there a connection there?Talk about those two things.
Yeah, definitely. I mean,so I'm very open about this.
I have been sober for morethan six and a half years now,
(29:17):
and I'm just so proud of that.From alcohol, sober from alcohol.
I was addicted to alcohol physically and
emotionally and spirituallyfor almost 15 years
and drank every single dayunless I was very violently
ill from something else.I drank every single day.
(29:39):
I often chose it over food
when I did have certainamounts of money. I mean,
it got really bad towards the end.
And I was still highly functionalthough that was the problem. I was very,
very capable,
always the person getting people in ridesat the parties and all the even that,
(30:00):
but capable in businesstoo. But I needed to change.
I felt like I might even lose my lifeif I didn't make a big change fast
enough.So there's a book called This
Naked Mind by Annie Grace,who's now a friend of mine.
But I found this book one day andfive days after listening to it,
(30:23):
I stopped drinking andhaven't had a drink since.
So just a remarkable turnaround, whichI would've never believed before,
but you have your vices andyou want to kind of have
different things that you're into. So Imoved on to the Diet Cokes of the world,
and that was great. I drankDiet Coke for a long time,
but then I wanted something different.So I actually, I'm starting,
(30:47):
you're one of the firstto hear about this,
but I'm starting a newbrand called Yacht Water.
So excited call Yacht Water.There's a whole reasoning behind it,
but it's still and sparklingwater flavored and unflavored.
It's just a beautifuldesign can and packaging
and yeah, it's going to be veryspecial kind of rollout that we do.
(31:10):
How is it? Y-A-C-H-T?
That's correct. Yacht Water.
Yacht Water.
And what else can you tell our listenersand viewers about when it's coming and
where it will be and whythey'll want to buy it?
We're going to actuallylaunch it at my event,
your first million live April 9ththrough the 12th in Los Angeles.
(31:31):
And that'll be, if you're inthe building at that event,
you'll be able to tasteit for the first time,
which is why I'm so excitedabout it. But Yacht Water,
there was a Tweet in 2021,
a friend of mine wrote a tweet andsaid she was asking for a founder,
a friend of hers. The founder hadan investor who had ghosted her,
but then after they got sometraction and got some press,
(31:54):
they were chasing that persondown, that founder down.
And the founder wanted to know, howdo you handle that kind of person?
And I just replied tongue in cheek,splash them with your yacht water,
just meaning, let your successbe the revenge essentially.
And it got a lot oftraction for some reason.
A lot of people liked that response,
(32:15):
and it sort of stuck inmy head as like, wow,
that's actually a really cool take onthings and I can actually taste that.
And so it just hauntedme for a couple of years.
In the summer of 2023, I decidedI want this to be a brand.
I'm going to go for it. So I've gonefor it. I love being an entrepreneur.
(32:37):
I'm an investor, a prolificinvestor, of course trailblazing.
But I get the most fun andvalue and fulfillment out of
being an entrepreneur.
What a great story.
I hope that story is on the back of thatcan or on the website that's going to
give a lot of people. Yeah, the websitefor sure. Yes, that'll be viral. You.
Can go to yachtwater.comto check that out.
(32:58):
I love it. Arlan Hamilton, yourcurrent book is Your First Million:
Why You Don't Have To Be BornInto a Legacy of Wealth to Leave
One Behind. You're a prolificinvestor, entrepreneur, speaker,
water founder, what's next for you?Beyond Yacht Water? Is there a new book?
What's on the horizon that you'dlike to talk about today here?
Yeah,
(33:19):
I definitely think Your First MillionLive is going to be put on the map very
soon. You'll see it. Hopefully you'llbe there. And then hirerunner.co,
I think for thisaudience, it's a big deal.
We're matching thousandsand thousands of people with
opportunities at Fortune5000 companies all the way to
(33:40):
solopreneurs, and I think it's areally great place to check out,
and I'm happy to talk to anybody who'sinterested in any of these topics.
Arlan,
thank you for giving us a second chancefrom our tech debacle the first time.
Delighted we had you backon. Best of success to you.
Thank you so much.
And we'll see you back next week fora new conversation On Leadership.
Hello and welcome back toFranklinCovey's twice weekly podcast,
On Leadership with Scott Miller.That's me. I'm your host each week,
where on Tuesdays and Fridays,
we interview some of the most fascinatingpeople in the world with the intention
of making you better, more effective,more trustworthy, a better leader,
a better spouse, parent, partner,teacher, educator, leader,
(00:33):
contributor, friend, humanbeing. FranklinCovey, of course,
is the most trusted leadership firm inthe world, founded by Dr. Stephen R.
Covey of The 7 Habits ofHighly Effective People fame,
and his friend and partner, Hyrum Smith,
who invented the fatherof time management.
And if you ever had a time managementtool from the FranklinCovey Planner,
(00:54):
it probably set you up wellfor your career. For six years,
we've been shining our spotlight onnot just our own thought leaders,
people like Chris McChesney,Kory Kogon, Stephen M. R. Covey,
and others.
We also like to shine the spotlight onother people that we think have paid the
price to bring you some discipline, someresearch, a recovery from their trauma,
(01:15):
or just their own experience to bettereducate you and make you a better leader.
Today our guest is theauthor Arlan Hamilton,
written several books with a newbook coming out called Your First
Million, that got your attention,
Why You Don't Have To BeBorn Into a Legacy of Wealth
(01:35):
To Leave One Behind. Joining us fromour office at home in Los Angeles,
California. Arlan,welcome to On Leadership.
Hi, thanks for having me.
So the fact of the matteris we invited you on, gosh,
about six or eight monthsago for a previous book.
And although it was likeour 280th podcast interview,
we had a nightmare of technical problems.
(01:57):
And I just want our audience to knowthat you are a very in demand speaker,
entrepreneur, funder, investor, coach,
and you hung in therefor 25 minutes, right?
Our team did their best to get theiract together. You were very gracious.
It didn't work out.Six, eight months later,
you graciously gave us a second chanceto come back on to talk about Your First
(02:18):
Million. So A, thank you for that.
Sometimes second chances are the bestones. Will you take a few minutes,
Arlan,
and will you reorient all of ourlisteners and viewers to your journey
because you've become a very in-demandspeaker, coach, author, advisor,
investor,
but not everyone may know what yourjourney is because it's not the obvious
(02:40):
journey to becoming aninvestor in businesses.
Talk about how you got to where you areand we'll dive deeper into the book.
Yes. Well, thanks for having me, andI appreciate this second chance here
about a decade ago. Well, I wasin my early thirties, I was,
(03:01):
or mid thirties, I was homeless.
I was sleeping on the floorof the San Francisco airport.
It had come to that andI was on this mission to
start a venture fund toinvest in founders and
specifically founders who werewomen, people of color and LGBTQ+,
(03:21):
which I identify as all three.And fast forward to today,
my fund and I have investedin more than 200 of those
companies with those leaders.And it's been quite a journey,
but that's the nutshell version of it.
And kind of going back just a little bit,
(03:41):
I was raised in Dallas and hadalways had these great ideas
and worked on different projects,
but just couldn't quite make thingswork out and make ends meet. And
stumbled upon SiliconValley in my early thirties,
the concept of it andfound my people I thought.
(04:02):
And it kind of started a journey to
having Silicon Valley better represented.
Arlan, you write veryvulnerably about your journey,
a history of addiction, recovery,hard work, vision, work ethic.
Can you tell us what ledspecifically to ending up homeless,
(04:26):
sleeping on the San Franciscoairport floor? I mean,
I ask this question because I'd likepeople to realize what were some of
the decisions that endedup culminating in in the
hopes that other people might see somewarning signs in their own life or in
their children and made it moreinstructive for parents and leaders or
(04:47):
entrepreneurs who may have made one bettoo many or made a one wrong decision.
What is there to glean from that?
Yeah, I don't think for instance,
the addiction caused the homelessness.
I think the homelessness caused theaddiction, for instance. So I think,
I don't know if there werecertain decisions that were made.
(05:07):
I think that when I was achild, we didn't have much.
My mother worked two jobs andstill couldn't make ends meet.
And she grew up in Jackson, Mississippi.
There's generational trauma there.
Financial trauma there to say the least.
And I think that maybeshe wasn't as equipped to
(05:31):
put me on the right path forfinancial wealth and success.
And then as an adult,
I think after I've studiedand been around so many,
now I of these tech giants,
I think I was in the sameheadspace as the tech giants.
I just didn't have the rightresources and connections,
(05:53):
and I didn't necessarily havethe people recognize that in
me the same as others. So Ididn't go to college for instance,
and I think not going tocollege was a decision.
I did not want to leave my familyin the state that they were in
financially.
And I didn't feel comfortablegoing to a campus for four years,
(06:17):
even though I had received scholarships.
But I will say that the coolthing now is that my mother and I
have $1 million worth ofscholarships at Oxford University,
the first of its kind at DillardUniversity and at Harvard Law.
So there, let's talk a littlebit about your journey.
(06:40):
You are the founder of BackstageCapital and one of the motivators as you
alluded to early is your research showedthat I think 90 plus percent of venture
capital money went towhite men historically.
And you've been on a journeyto help broaden that to women,
to people of color, to membersof the LGBTQ+ community.
(07:00):
Talk about some of the passion andsuccess that you are having there.
Yeah, you said that number out loud.
You can tell that that's not right. Right.
It's white men make up about 30% ofthe US and they receive 90% of the
funding.
So I had a lot of white menfriends at the time when I
(07:22):
started who didn't know that statisticand when I told them they thought it was
outrageous and many of them wenton to invest in my fund as I
met more and more people. And so today,
Mark Cuban is one of them.
He's invested $6 millionin Backstage Capital,
2019 and 2020,
and we've had the enterprisevalue of our portfolio is in the
(07:47):
billions.
We've helped create thousands of jobs and
we're looking forward to the futureor we'll see, hopefully many exits.
So I'm going to have youteach some concepts today about how to earn your first
million,
but first I want to talk about JanetJackson and a particular truck because you
tell a great story in the book that'sjust a preamble to a lot of great stories.
(08:10):
Will you take your time,
talk about the role that Janetplayed in your life and then a
particular incident involving a truck.
Yeah. So when I was 13, Iwas just in love with Janet.
I looked up to her, admired her so much,
we couldn't afford tickets to her show,
but my mother did surprise me with theticket to her concert when I was 13 years
(08:34):
old in Dallas, Texas.I went to the concert,
she put some earrings on me to make melook older because she couldn't afford
that second ticket.
So she was sending me in to the wolvesand she's sitting outside in the car and
I was sitting there a little nervous.
Someone walks up to me andoffers me a front row seat.
I didn't believe him at first, but Ilet him walk with me to the front row.
(08:57):
I get there and I'm greeted and I'm inthe front row at a Janet Jackson concert.
My first concert ever. Turns outit was her partner at the time,
and Janet likes to seedher front row with a lot of
excited and excitable fans so she canhave that right energy for herself. So it
was just a transformative day forme and an event for me meant so
(09:18):
much to me in many ways.
And I've spent the last 30years just continuing to admire
her. In 2021, she had a life,
auction of a lifetime in Beverly Hills,
1300 items I believeand the centerpiece item
or centerfold item was atruck that meant a lot to her,
(09:42):
an antique truck thatmeant a lot to her and
it came with a 10-minute phonecall. So I had in my head,
I'm going to go for this.
I don't think I'll get it because KimKardashian and Christina Aguilera are
also bidding, but I'm going to go forit. And so the beginning of my book,
Your First Million transports you to thatmoment and that day and tells you what
(10:06):
happens next.
So we'll leave the outcome of thatstory to the reader of the book.
Let's talk about a concept you openedwith called radical self-belief.
Who doesn't need to have more of that?
What does that mean and why is itvital to someone's first million?
Yes.
I've been in rooms across thecountry on my book tour this year,
(10:30):
and I'll usually ask the roomhow many people here believe
that they can make $1 millionif they haven't already.
And that is usually about half theroom no matter what the room is made
up. And then I'll ask,who believes that they
deserve to make $1 million?
And it's even more surprising thatthere are a few hands up in the
(10:55):
air. And to me that's just shocking.
And so no matter who you are,
if you have felt underestimated, youare my audience. I'm talking to you.
And we do not have timefor imposter syndrome.
We do not have time for self-doubtin a world where so much is going
(11:16):
on first of all,
but also we only get so manyyears on the earth in this body,
in this form. And it really is,
I think it's up to us andI think we owe each other
the better versions of ourselves.
And so that's what I strive for andthat's what I hope is the takeaway.
(11:37):
When people talk to me,you read my books, meet Me,
is that I believe inyou, I believe in myself.
I have such confidence in myself becauseI have such confidence in others,
and I believe that youdeserve the radical belief and
the audacity to be yourself.
Arlan, expand on that a little bit.
You write also about this conceptthat everybody is an expert.
(12:00):
Everybody has some expertise.It's a pretty audacious statement.
We use the word expertpretty carelessly a lot,
increasingly, some peopleuse it more judiciously.
How do you define expertiseand how does someone uncover
what theirs is?
(12:21):
Yeah, I mean that everyone,
you don't have to necessarily have goneto a certain school or have a certain,
dare I say, breeding tobe an expert in something.
I think there's an experience level.
I think we can all agree that if youhave a certain level of experience in
something that you can becomeexpert and can be considered that.
(12:41):
And each of us,
what the point I'm making in the bookis that each of us has the experience of
being ourselves.
And so there are a lot of intersectionalthings that happen with your lived
experience,
not necessarily only youreducation or your work.
So if you combine the education andthe work that you've done and the
(13:03):
experiences that you had withyour lived experience as a human,
whatever that is,
all the things that you might considerto be knocks against you or something
that you have to overcome,
those combine to give you expertise.A great example is myself.
I couldn't be the person that youhave described a couple of times in
(13:23):
this interview.
I couldn't be all of those things if Ididn't have the lived experience that I
had. And what makes me me,because that is what people
are reacting to, that iswhy I'm getting into rooms.
That is why Mark Cuban invested in mewhen I asked him why he invested in my
fund when he does not like toinvest in other people's funds,
(13:43):
he likes to directly invest in companies.He said, without missing a beat,
you are in rooms I'll never be in.
The reason I'm in rooms he'llnever be in is because I am me.
And I think that goes with everyone elseis to answer the second part of your
question, to take the pieces of your life,
the things you'veaccomplished and experienced,
(14:04):
and write them down simply write themdown, enlist. I help with the book.
There's different ways to do this,
but to write down and to put in frontof you the different things that make
you unique, your fingerprint, andyou can find your expertise in that.
Arlan, what's your expertise?
(14:24):
I may have a few.
I think the most is I'm really great
at bringing people togetherfor a common cause and
leading that group to a certain point.
Will you take a few more minutes andjust expand on what exactly Backstage
(14:44):
Capital is? What do you do? Who do youinvest in? How do you invest? I mean,
I don't know anybody that doesn'thave dream of a side hustle,
some dream of someday expandingand wanting to grow their business.
They may need seed capital.
Take a few minutes and describepractically maybe demystify the world of
venture capital for some listeners.How does it work and what do you do?
(15:08):
Sure. So venture capital,
we raise money from institutions,
high net worth individuals, insurancecompanies, endowments from colleges,
et cetera.
And so from people who are looking todiversify their own portfolios, but major,
major amounts of money,
it's a lot of money beingspent in venture capital,
(15:31):
but it's also a very small sliverof private equity in general.
And this capital is meantto be spent on the moonshot
ideas, the big innovative ideas.
It's not to be treated thesame way as a lot of private
equity, which is very later stageand very kind of buttoned up.
And then there are differentstages of venture capital.
(15:52):
There's early stage tolater stage going closer
to the IPOs.
And so I'm in early stage venture capital,
which is like the riskiest placeyou can be in this asset class.
And so I go out, I take the moneyraised, I mentioned Mark Cuban,
but we've also had multiple otherpeople and institutions and funds invest
(16:16):
in us.I take that capital,
my team and I go out andrefine and have come to us
through different means,high potential companies.
And we do the legwork oflooking at these companies,
every single one that comes to us or thatwe go out to looking through them and
(16:37):
taking them through differentstages of diligence depending on our
interest in them. And then we make bets.
So we've seen more than 10,000 companiesin the last decade to invest in about
200 of them.
And I think that number'sactually a little bit higher because I think we invest
in maybe 1% of what we see.
And so we do that on a day-to-daybasis, and then we nurture them.
(17:00):
So you're planting seeds and thenyou're nurturing those seeds,
watering them withresources, with guidance.
You're a small part of theirstory, their overall story,
but you're there as much as you can be.And then you do hope that
over time, and it's yourjob to have a portfolio wide
returns on investment, so about 50%of the companies are going to die out.
(17:24):
That's just kind of the statistic.
But you're looking for those onesthat outlast and outpace the rest to
bring back the entire fund and thenhopefully on top of that, have returns,
higher returns. Having said all of that,
I am very much excited about investing.I've been doing it for a decade.
It's my life's work and my calling.
(17:45):
But a bigger piece to this is thatI want to help create thousand new
millionaires, and I want to do thatthrough education, media, et cetera,
where or content I should say,
where they're making those millionsfrom generating revenue and
having sustainable companies and notnecessarily creating those millionaires
(18:06):
through investment alum.
Arlan, indulge me. I wantto go a little bit deeper.
This is like a masterclass fora lot of visionary solopreneurs
that are looking to build their companies.
Are most of youropportunities inbound versus
outbound?
Can you just give us an idea of what isa typical level of investment and what
(18:28):
kind of things should people be tighteningup and buttoning down if they're
searching for a venture capital infusion?
So Backstage Capital, my venture fund,is a little different than most funds.
And there are some funds that dothis too now because of our example.
But most venture funds do not havean application process like we do.
(18:50):
So we have a large top of funnel.
So you can go to backstagecapital.com if you feel you
are ready to talk to us,
you can go to the site,see what we invest in,
see if your company is theright company and apply.
And then we have a 60 personapprenticeship team that looks through all of the
(19:11):
applications and then surfaces the onesfor the partners to take a look at.
So that's very differentthan most funds. Most funds,
it's a warm introduction that's neededor they find you in trade papers or
in events and they come seekingyou. And in either case,
I mean you're going to have todeal with both types of investors,
(19:32):
and we certainly have partners in theecosystem that do that. In either case,
the big deal is to be so great atwhat you do that you're undeniable,
that you don't even need venturecapital, which is counterintuitive.
But to be in a position where youdon't need VCs or investors is
usually when the VCs and investorscome running towards you.
(19:54):
Super helpful. Your book isorganized into five sections.
The first component isThe Audacity of You.
It's where you speak about radicalself-belief and uncovering expertise.
The next section is calledThe Importance of Ownership.
Part three is many, m-a-n-y, mini,
m-i-n-i,
(20:15):
Many
Mini
Empires.
Part four, Redefining Success,and part five, Catalyzing.
You write about owningthe wealth you create.
Are there any insights, principles,
life lessons you've learned that youcan teach people about what it means to
actually own the wealth you create?
(20:37):
Yeah, some cautionary tales have involved
very early on, even before I startedBackstage when I was as could say,
broke, there was an opportunity.
Someone offered me $7,000 to help me out,
but also an exchange for afuture percentage of my income.
(21:00):
And I know that sounds probablyoutrageous to you right now,
but it's actually was a startup thatwas out that was doing that anyway.
And so that's where they got theidea. That doesn't exist anymore.
But it was something thatpeople were thinking about.
And you can think of it nowas like indentured servitude.
It's not the greatestidea. But at the time,
$7,000 was everything to me when Icouldn't put together two nickels.
(21:23):
And I called a friend ofmine who is a black woman,
who a director,
who I just knew because I was in LA andI just wanted to get her advice. I also
wanted to see if she wanted toinvest the same. And she said, Arlan,
don't you dare do that. Do youknow how valuable you will be?
Your income will be over time.And she was saying this to me,
(21:44):
and I was relatively homeless.
I was sleeping out of an Airbnb at thetime and didn't know next week to the
other. So I couldn't quite imaginethe world that she was imagining.
But do you know that ifI had taken that money,
I did take her advice andif I had taken that money,
it would've been worth hundreds ofthousands of dollars today and I'm just
getting started. And so to me,that's really where it stems from,
(22:08):
is that, and also in your business,
if you're looking for a venture, so manypeople are looking for venture capital.
They want that quick hit, but they don'trealize that that money is fleeting,
but the transaction is not.And so you're diluting,
you're diluting yourself andyour ownership and your equity
(22:29):
by selling pieces of your company.
So it has to be made very soberly andvery precisely these decisions that you
make.
Arlan,
your book is rife with great practicalprinciples based on things you've done
well, things that you've failedat, you have a concept you call,
Don't Count on the MoneyUntil it's in the Bank.
(22:49):
Most seasoned leadershave a story about that.
What's your story thatsupports this chapter,
Don't Count the MoneyUntil it's in the Bank.
Oh, I have so many. I have so many,but one of them is so interesting.
So Backstage Capital, we'vealways kind of struggled to raise.
And so whenever we get thesebigger hits, it's really exciting.
(23:14):
So we had a group that was goingto invest 5 million into backstage
operations at a time whenwe really needed that,
and that would've lastedus years at the time.
There were tears shed in theboardroom when this was decided.
There was a lot of celebration.
And the only thing that was left was Iwas supposed to meet with the president
(23:34):
of this company, the CEO of this company.
We were supposed to sign the paperworkand kind of a press sort of thing and
then shake hands and it was going to bethis photo op and they were going to be
traveling a couple of weeks later,
a couple of weeks later whenthat was supposed to happen,
I wake up to the news that thatperson has been arrested for fraud
(23:55):
and that the entire companyhas been rocked to its court.
This is a multi-billion dollar companyand very famous and infamous case.
And that person, I don'tknow if I can say their name,
but that person was arrestedand is now on the run
in hiding and the dealjust went up in smoke,
(24:16):
$5 million to a company thatcould have used that for
years. And so I learned a hardlesson very quickly because that was,
for all intents and purposes,was ready to be signed.
I learned a similarlesson about maybe nine
years ago, and I only hadto learn that lesson once,
(24:39):
hopefully for all of us.
So many great chapters in thisbook. Creating Winners Everywhere,
Choosing your CollaboratorsCarefully, Matchmaking,
Building your Team, YourNetwork is Currency,
Getting into the Room, Callingon Experts, Chasing Impact,
(24:59):
not Unicorns, Successis Meant to be Shared.
Will you just take one of those thatyou're super passionate about that you
think people may have a misnomerabout or a misconception or confused
about and riff on it? Pickany of those you'd like.
The last one you said, Successis Meant to be Shared. I mean,
that's the running theme in my career.
(25:21):
And one way that I'vedone that is I did open up
the ability to invest inBackstage Management Company
in 2021.
So now there are about 6,500people who co-own Backstage
Capital. It was the first timethat's been done in the country,
and I don't even know if it's beendone. I think it's been done in Europe,
(25:43):
but this is the first time it's been donein the country and we had to create a
path for it. It was veryheavy lift to make it happen,
but I am bullish on Backstage Capital.
I've put all of my ownpersonal resources into
Backstage year after year after yearto make it work because I believe that
(26:04):
there will be a big payoff because Ibelieve in these founders. And so I just
imagined the same way Iimagined it existing at all. I imagined once it existed,
what's success look like and who do Iwant to be there with me when it happens?
And I didn't want to be alone or justhave a few partners that got to indulge in
this. And that's what reallyhappens in most venture funds.
(26:24):
And so I think we opened up a newcategory of venture fund when we did that.
I think we broke ground somewhereand these investments were,
the average investmentwas $749. Now it ranged,
it certainly ranged tothe high six figures,
but people could put in a hundred dollarsin a Reg CF, Regulation Crowdfund,
(26:45):
and now they own a piece of ourmanagement company. Which again,
the previous times that this has happenedwhere the management company has been
sold,
pieces of it's been tobillion dollar funds in
exchange for one or twopeople getting that ownership.
So it's pretty exciting.
(27:06):
Arlan,
you've written a concept calledKnock Down the Stairway and Build an
Elevator. What does that mean?
Well, it's a little bit of a riffon sending the elevator back down.
And it's also kind of inreference to a memory that I have
with Chris Sacca,
(27:27):
who you may remember was an earlyinvestor in Twitter and in Uber and a
billionaire. He calls himselfan accidental billionaire.
He was on Shark Tank as well.
And one time I wanted tomeet him and he was at
an event that he washeadlining this event.
I didn't have any connections to him.
I had talked to him acouple of times on email,
(27:48):
but I really wanted totalk to him about my fund.
And there was a black woman working there.
It was the only black personin attendance at this event.
There was a black woman workingthere at this event, and I said,
I need to go meet this guy who's onstage right now. She didn't know him from
Adam. She said, this elevator, withoutasking me any questions, she said,
this elevator will take you up towhere he's supposed to be next.
(28:10):
You'll be getting his makeupdone for an interview.
It'll take you right thereas a service elevator.
She opened the service elevatorfor me and sent me right on up,
and I was able to talk toChris aka for 30 minutes,
and he ended up investing inmy fund along with his wife,
all three of our first funds.So it's an ode to that,
and it's about hacking your wayand finding your way creatively.
(28:33):
It's a great story. Arlan, you'vebeen very vulnerable, courageous,
even about your struggles. Youtalked today about your homelessness.
You've written about and talked aboutextensively a previous addiction you
have with alcohol and inyour move beyond that.
And it's interesting because you're onthe cusp of something coming up that I
(28:54):
think there may even be a transitionstory there to the degree you're
comfortable. Talk a bit about your ownstruggles with addiction and how you have
marshaled that recovery,
that pivot into anentrepreneurial opportunity.
Is there a connection there?Talk about those two things.
Yeah, definitely. I mean,so I'm very open about this.
I have been sober for morethan six and a half years now,
(29:17):
and I'm just so proud of that.From alcohol, sober from alcohol.
I was addicted to alcohol physically and
emotionally and spirituallyfor almost 15 years
and drank every single dayunless I was very violently
ill from something else.I drank every single day.
(29:39):
I often chose it over food
when I did have certainamounts of money. I mean,
it got really bad towards the end.
And I was still highly functionalthough that was the problem. I was very,
very capable,
always the person getting people in ridesat the parties and all the even that,
(30:00):
but capable in businesstoo. But I needed to change.
I felt like I might even lose my lifeif I didn't make a big change fast
enough.So there's a book called This
Naked Mind by Annie Grace,who's now a friend of mine.
But I found this book one day andfive days after listening to it,
(30:23):
I stopped drinking andhaven't had a drink since.
So just a remarkable turnaround, whichI would've never believed before,
but you have your vices andyou want to kind of have
different things that you're into. So Imoved on to the Diet Cokes of the world,
and that was great. I drankDiet Coke for a long time,
but then I wanted something different.So I actually, I'm starting,
(30:47):
you're one of the firstto hear about this,
but I'm starting a newbrand called Yacht Water.
So excited call Yacht Water.There's a whole reasoning behind it,
but it's still and sparklingwater flavored and unflavored.
It's just a beautifuldesign can and packaging
and yeah, it's going to be veryspecial kind of rollout that we do.
(31:10):
How is it? Y-A-C-H-T?
That's correct. Yacht Water.
Yacht Water.
And what else can you tell our listenersand viewers about when it's coming and
where it will be and whythey'll want to buy it?
We're going to actuallylaunch it at my event,
your first million live April 9ththrough the 12th in Los Angeles.
(31:31):
And that'll be, if you're inthe building at that event,
you'll be able to tasteit for the first time,
which is why I'm so excitedabout it. But Yacht Water,
there was a Tweet in 2021,
a friend of mine wrote a tweet andsaid she was asking for a founder,
a friend of hers. The founder hadan investor who had ghosted her,
but then after they got sometraction and got some press,
(31:54):
they were chasing that persondown, that founder down.
And the founder wanted to know, howdo you handle that kind of person?
And I just replied tongue in cheek,splash them with your yacht water,
just meaning, let your successbe the revenge essentially.
And it got a lot oftraction for some reason.
A lot of people liked that response,
(32:15):
and it sort of stuck inmy head as like, wow,
that's actually a really cool take onthings and I can actually taste that.
And so it just hauntedme for a couple of years.
In the summer of 2023, I decidedI want this to be a brand.
I'm going to go for it. So I've gonefor it. I love being an entrepreneur.
(32:37):
I'm an investor, a prolificinvestor, of course trailblazing.
But I get the most fun andvalue and fulfillment out of
being an entrepreneur.
What a great story.
I hope that story is on the back of thatcan or on the website that's going to
give a lot of people. Yeah, the websitefor sure. Yes, that'll be viral. You.
Can go to yachtwater.comto check that out.
(32:58):
I love it. Arlan Hamilton, yourcurrent book is Your First Million:
Why You Don't Have To Be BornInto a Legacy of Wealth to Leave
One Behind. You're a prolificinvestor, entrepreneur, speaker,
water founder, what's next for you?Beyond Yacht Water? Is there a new book?
What's on the horizon that you'dlike to talk about today here?
Yeah,
(33:19):
I definitely think Your First MillionLive is going to be put on the map very
soon. You'll see it. Hopefully you'llbe there. And then hirerunner.co,
I think for thisaudience, it's a big deal.
We're matching thousandsand thousands of people with
opportunities at Fortune5000 companies all the way to
(33:40):
solopreneurs, and I think it's areally great place to check out,
and I'm happy to talk to anybody who'sinterested in any of these topics.
Arlan,
thank you for giving us a second chancefrom our tech debacle the first time.
Delighted we had you backon. Best of success to you.
Thank you so much.
And we'll see you back next week fora new conversation On Leadership.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.