Passage To Profit Make Radical Shifts In Your Business and Life with Ken Paskins

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
The following is a paid podcast.iHeartRadio's hosting of this podcast constitutes neither an
endorsement of the products offered or theideas expressed. The number one asset to
any company is you yourself. Doyou think has led me all over the
world. I don't know how todo fun things without turning it into a
business. I'm Richard Garhart and I'mElizabeth Gearhart. You just heard some snippets

(00:21):
from our show. We had amazingpeople on listen for the rest of it.
I want to protect your business.The time is near. You've given
it heart, now get it ingear It's Passage to Profit with Richard and
Elizabeth Gearhart. I'm Richard Gerhart,founder of Gearhart Law, a full service
intellectual property law firm specializing in patents, trademarks, and copyrights. And I'm

(00:45):
Elizabeth Gearhart. Not an attorney,but I work at your Heart Law doing
the marketing, and I have myown startups. Welcome to Passage to Profit
everyone, the Road to entrepreneurship,where we talk with startups, small businesses
and discuss the intellectual property that helpsthem flourish. We have a great guest,
Ken Paskins. I've known Ken fora while now, and I do

(01:06):
want to say that he is anamazing guy. He's a business transformation expert
and co founder of the Shift's Spot, So we're really going to be looking
forward to working with him and findingout what he's all about. And then
we have your typical entrepreneur. Wehave a musician who's also an author.
He has a book, he hasa lot under his belt, So Cliff

(01:26):
Beach will be here to talk abouthis career and his entrepreneurial experience. And
then we have Danielle Woolley, whois my co host on the Jersey Podcasts
podcast, and she's going to talkabout all the tech stuff and everything she
did to get this podcast going andhow she keeps it going. But before
we get to our guests, wehave IP in the news. Can you

(01:48):
trademark the shape of lettuce? Well, why wouldn't you be able to trademark
the shape of lettuce? We're goingto find out, I don't know.
It's at the USPTO right now,right And the company called Little Leaf Arms
has a product called Baby Crispy greenLeaf lettuce and what they're trying to do
is trademark the shape of the curlof the lettuce. And if you look

(02:09):
at a picture of the lettuce,they are all little tiny pieces with curves
on them, so it is verydistinctive. And as far as we know,
this is the first time that anybodyhas filed a trademark application on a
vegetable. So I guess we'll findout if you can trademark the shape of
a piece of lettuce. Yes,And I have to say that we found
this article on Fast Companies website byElisabetta and Brandon, so I just want

(02:31):
to give her credit. It's avery good article. And people have recognized
the lettuce when they're eating dinner atother people's houses, right, and that
makes it distinctive. And so oneof the factors is whether or not the
mark is distinctive or the goods aredistinctive. These are important considerations and it'll
ultimately be up to an examiner atthe trademark office who reviews the application and

(02:53):
then they'll comment on whether or notthey think little leaf Arms is entitled to
a trademark, and see what happens, Right, can you trademark of shape?
Well? Apple trademarks the lay outof their stores, so why not
a piece of lettuce, assuming youwould even want to trademark a piece of
lettuce. But time now for Richard'sroundtable, and we'd love to hear from
our guests, So Ken, goodto see you. What's your opinion on

(03:15):
this? I'm going to say no. I've got some experience in trademark and
registration and things of that nature.But the only reason I'm thinking no is
I guess what I don't know isdo they genetically engineer it themselves? Otherwise
I'm going to say that God didit right, and who prevents them from
controlling the makeup of that plan?I don't know. That's kind of open

(03:35):
to me. You raise a reallygood point, and the article states that
the plant actually comes from seeds thatare found in nature, so you're right,
it is a natural creation. Althoughthey do have some processing that apparently
influences the shape of the lettuce leaves. That could be a factor as well.
But you're right. If something isjust found in nature, then why

(03:58):
should somebody be able to get atrademark on it? Otherwise I'm going to
do all the plants in my backyardnext week. Well, if you need
a trademark attorney, you have mynumb I knew where to find me.
Go to learn more about trademarks dotcom. That's right, set up a
free consultation with Richard absolutely, sothat's not a joke. If you are
interested in gathering a strategy for trademarkprotection, you can contact your heart law

(04:20):
at learn more about trademarks dot comand you can download some free content there
on trademarks, or you can setup a consultation with me. So learn
more about trademarks dot com. Cliff, what are your thoughts about this?
I think it's quite interesting coming fromthe entertainment world with lots of copyrights with
songs and seeing people suit over that. I think if you're able to do

(04:41):
it, I say go for it. I think they made rexangular watermelons a
few years ago. They should havetried to copyright that trademark that too,
and that was a missed opportunity.I think ultimately they may not win,
but they'll definitely get some press thatthey're already getting ridden up by fast companies.
Sometimes that's the goal, you know. You see people go on the
Stark Tank. They know they're toget shot down, but sir, but

(05:01):
being out in that blood and festivewater, it gets you in front of
people. So in the end,I think, try it all, see
what sticks. You probably won't win, but at least people are talking about
it. But you're right because theyhave a couple of quotes in here from
people that have used the lettuce.The curl is where all the magic happens.
You think that's I'm made for aquota. Did somebody say that I
don't know curliest salad I've ever had? So yeah, I think the publicity

(05:26):
is not hurting at all. That'sa really great point. And you make
a great point, Cliff, becausethis helps the brand get known. You
generate a little innocent controversy around thelegal action, and who knows, hopefully
it'll help sell the brand and iftheir customers get wind of this, this
will be something that people talk aboutwhen they're having their little leaf Farms salad.
So definitely a pretty good idea.Danielle, what are your thoughts here?

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So? I know it's specifically mentioningthe shape of the lettuce and all
the frilliness, but my thought isif there's a special process that went behind
it, or if it's creating anelevated eating experience like those are the things
I think can be protected. AndI'm a big fan of ask and the
answer could be no, but atleast you asked yeah, and try it
and ask for permission later. Butthey do say that there is a slogan

(06:11):
here clean from the start, whichapparently is related to their process, and
they have trademarked that too, soI think they followed your advice. I'll
add leaf expert to my list ofthings. Thank you. That's great.
So I guess the moral of thestory is that if you have a unique
approach to something that you want toprotect, you should contact an intellectual property
lawyer. I mean, I thinkwhoever came up with this, whether it

(06:33):
was the lawyer or whether it wasliterally farms, I think they were trying
to be a little bit creative andthey sort of mixed the marketing along with
the legal. So the moral ofthe story is this can only help your
business. And if you want tolearn more about trademarks, go to learn
more about trademarks dot com and youcan download our free content there. Now

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it's time for our featured guest,Ken Paskins. Ken is a business transformational
coach and that means that he helpsnewer businesses succeed he's a coach and he's
an entrepreneur, and he's co founderof the shift Spot, which is a
website full of resources that are usefulfor an entrepreneur. So we recommend that
you go there and you check outthe content. But welcome to the show.

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Ken, tell us a little bitabout what you've been up to with
the shift Spot. Yeah, we'vebeen around for nearly two years now.
But the shift Spot is a coachingand peer advisory community for business owners that
want to make radical shifts in theirbusiness in their lives, and we help
them achieve their vision by reducing risk, achieving scale, and eventually exiting the
company. So we work with companiesone hundred employees are less generally CEOs or

(07:39):
business owners with ten years or lessof experience, and we focus on six
core areas leadership and management, systemsand process, sales and marketing, finance.
And we also add a balance equation, right because the number one asset
to any company is you yourself,so we had that as an element as
well. Why is coach important foran entrepreneurial venture for the CEO, especially

(08:05):
in the startup phase. During thestartup phase, if you look at business
owners, so First of all,I said small businesses. But small businesses
out there, ninety eight percent ofcompanies across the United States or a hundred
employees are below, right, eightynine percent or twenty below. A lot
of people hear small business and think, oh, that's not for me.
Well, guess what. It's amajority of the population or the companies out

(08:26):
there. But fifty percent of entrepreneursactually learn all their business acumen by doing
the job in their company. Myfather was one of those. My grandfather
and my great grandfather were one ofthose, which is why I went to
corporate track to start. So thatmeans, if you think about it,
it's daunting, right. I've gotto teach myself everything about leadership and how
complex that is. I got toteach myself how to read a P and

(08:48):
L and all the different financial statements. I got to teach myself about systems
and processes and all that stuff thatmakes a business succeed. It's important.
And if you look at just failyour rates, eighteen percent involved companies fail
the first year and fifty percent afteryou're five. Right, So we think
it's important to surround yourself with otherlike minded individuals and experts to achieve your

(09:11):
vision and get the results you dessert. Well, that's true. It also
helps. I think being an entrepreneur, they've always said, is lonely.
That's why they were all those coworkingspaces. Yeah, and you don't have
anybody to give you the ADM blois, Right, it's lonely at the top,
as we say, Yeah, yeah, if you're a CEO, you
really have to take your satisfaction fromserving the customers and seeing your business succeed.

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Sometimes people don't really appreciate that.I think one of the advantages of
joining a group or an organization likeyours is that you do have other CEOs
to interact with it. Yeah.So the CEO interaction specifically go through an
entire onboarding program. It starts witha gap analysis and it's a very intensive

(09:54):
eye open an experience that evaluates andlooks at your company from finance it to
everything and shows area of opportunities toimprovement. But then we've got one hundred
and forty four different events open inour community through the year. Right.
Some of those events are an issuesresolution group, if you will, where
the CEOs, if you can imagine, drop into a virtual community, if

(10:16):
you will, and it's professionally facilitated, and they'll bring some of the toughest
problems to the table and we'll usea six sigma approach. For those that
haven't heard of what that is,it's the five wise to get to the
root cause and then we'll come upwith what the best solution is for them
and then they can go execute against. But then throughout the not just that
experience, but throughout the community,they have the right or the ability to

(10:39):
interact, network, pick each other'sbrains, etc. To get to where
they need to go. That soundslike a really powerful organization. I'm part
of a pure advisory board right now. I'm just me so I could.
I wouldn't qualify for your group becauseyou don't do solos, right, that's
correct. But we do have somequestions here in our notes that we can
ask you. And you know we'vetalked before, but you know this is

(11:01):
my favorite question. Do you haveany crazy business stories that would shock us?
Yeah? I do. I havetoo, and it doesn't happen all
the time. But prior to theshift Spot, I operated as a fractional
drop in CEO COO. After workingin Corporate America, I manage p and
ls up to half a billion,very large teams of four fifty plus,

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and I decided that I want totravel one hundred and fifty thousand miles a
year. So for nearly a decade, I've been doing that, dropping in
as a CEO COO. And thebest way to explain it is, I'm
a fixer when companies are struggling alot of these entrepreneurs that learn on the
job, they're an accidental entrepreneur perse, and they suddenly have a company

(11:43):
that's two, three, four orfive million dollars and they're turning over staff
and they feel like they're always grinding, always working into business and just not
getting ahead, and they don't knowwhy. I'm one of the guys that
they'll call what's broken? How doI get to the next level? What's
missing? So I spent a lotof time doing that, which is what
helped me actually create the idea ofthe shift spot right, because I wanted

(12:05):
to bring that expertise to larger population. And then to your question, which
I already forget, which is themost outrageous stories, Oh yes, yes,
Pore we cool there can I askyou? I know that for a
lot of businesses. Financial reports arereally tough, right, what do you
think is the biggest thing you encounterwhen companies are struggling? The first problem

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is is not utilizing their financial systemscorrectly, you know, having the books
tight and clean, and then understandingthe data and how to interpret the data
and utilizing the data. So runninga company just like flying a plane,
like driving a car, like anything, is using the spedometer, zdometers and
all the different things to help youunderstand not just where I've been, but
where I'm going as well, butjust understanding that and if you need help,

(12:50):
there's plenty of help out there.There's great books, there's great videos,
there's great everything, or just youknow, find a fractional CFO or
somebody else, suspends some time andput those KPIs and metrics in place so
you understand the financials and how toguide the business. Running your business without
financials is like flying an airplane withoutinstruments. Right, yeah, a lot
of people do. I mean itmight be surprising, but a lot of

(13:11):
people do. It's like, allright, I write the check. Is
to have money in the account andgo. You know, I'll ask people
are you making money? Are youprofitable. I think, so I took
money out last month, right,So you want to get beyond that and
operate with data and science, andto be successful in your business, you
have to take some of the extramoney that you generate from the business and

(13:31):
reinvest it, right. And soyou can't really know how much to reinvest
unless you know what your margins are, what your benefit is. Yeah,
so if you take it all out, then the business may not grow.
I do the marketing for your heartLaw, and I'm constantly asking, Okay,
who are the most profitable clients.You want to spend your money for
marketing on where you're going to makethe most profit in your business, right,

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Yeah, and specifically marketing, youwant to market where they're actually getting
their information and getting their data,and you want to go after the right
personna. And you know as wellas I do, all sorts of metrics
in return that you want to evaluatefrom a marketing perspective. Absolutely. So,
now we want to get to thestory the two scarious or one was
scary and one was just weird.And wow, you don't want this to

(14:13):
happen of any poor individual, butone family organization I was working for it
is meeting with myself, the CFO, and the wife who served as head
of sale cro and the husband whois a CEO. And we start the
meeting and she decides that was thebest time to serve him divorce papers.
You know, our jaws dropped.Didn't know what to say, didn't know

(14:35):
what to do. So, youknow, just be cautious. Any envelopes
going back and forth between you tworecord, We'll get I'll get nervous.
But that was more bizarre the otherone, which was the scariest, and
it's taught me a lot in life, and honestly, it reminded my father,
because my father is one of thoseentrepreneurs that frusted everyone and he was

(14:58):
taking advantage of multiple times, multipletimes, and he fortunately ended up well.
As I say, he's eighty twoand he's finally out of the nest
and he's finally grown up. Butthere was this client that called me and
they were out of Puerto Rico andhe called me and said, hey,
my COO and I we're about aten million dollars company, and I think
that we've outgrown each other. Wehave a great relationship. We've agreed that

(15:20):
when we outgrow each other, we'llgo this separate direction. She's agreed to
bring a guy like you and tokind of just look at things, evaluate
things, maybe coach her up orjust tell us what's missing. I get
in there and within two weeks,I'm telling the guys you got to fire
her. And he thought it wascrazy. And this guy's he was in
his early thirties and he did onlinesupplement, so he had this whole business

(15:43):
and it was complex and you manufacturingand all of that stuff, right,
And you know, he had askedme why, and I said, she's
just she's cancerous. And here's somedata points on why I believe she's cancerus.
She's working against you, she's turningemployees against you, she's doing this
stuff. He's like, man,she's critical to the company. I cannot
do that. It's like, allright, fine, this is my advice,

(16:04):
but it's your call, right,So what do you want to do.
Well, let's keep her for threemonths and unwind her and give her
a saverance and work with her andall that. Fine, let's do that.
So we go through that process,and in the process, I'm getting
deeper and deeper with finance and othersand talking to the manufacturers and everything.
Long story short, find out thatshe embezzled over two hundred and fifty thousand

(16:26):
dollars. She has iPads for herfamily, flights for her family, something
that I'd ever never realized my entirelife. But evidently there's a phone line
that you used to call prisoners,and she had that phone line on the
corporate I don't know, it's oneeight hundred called prison I don't know what,
but there's a special it could beso they recorded. I'm guessing,

(16:47):
but I remember seeing that. Anyways, we researched her. She had five
different aliases. She went operating inthe company with her real name. So
we went to a Puerto Rican attorneyand it's like, look, you know,
she's an Austin, Texas. Shestuck to somebody's state side. We
did that, and the attorneys like, you can go after It might cost
you, guys a half a milliondollars. You may or may not win.

(17:08):
She may counter sue. What doyou want to do? And he
was in a tough spot. Andhe was in a tough spot because of
what she had done with some ofthe manufacturers were then threatened to sue him
as well. So I'd helped thepoor guy unwind his business, sell off
ip and everything and go do somethingelse. And it was scary. It

(17:30):
was really scary and side So itpoints to the importance of doing due diligence
on people that you hire, youknow, checking references and background checks and
all the things you can do tomake sure you have the right people on
board. Yeah. I do wantto ask a question, though, Ken,
and that is when you're in asituation like that and you really have
a key person who maybe isn't asawful as the person that was the worst

(17:53):
one I've ever seen, by theway, but they are still key and
there are issues and you're not sureif they're really healthy for the business.
What I tell owners all the timeis never leave yourself in this situation where
you're hostage, and your hostage ifyou have that key individual. There's clearly
key individuals, and we have keyman insurance to protect a company as if

(18:14):
somebody should pass or whatever. Butrunning a company and operating a business is
kind of like a chessboard, andyou've got to understand that. And we
actually have one of our users rightnow in our community it's looking to get
rid of their controller right, andtheir controller. We fortunately have a fractional
CFO that pops in every quarter,so we've mapped out this plan. Well,

(18:34):
guess what, the board now wantsa fractional CFO to interact every two
weeks and go uncover this data.And it's manipulative. But we're planning the
exit right now. He Obviously thisindividual hasn't harassed anything or done anything or
stolen money or whatever, so wedon't have to be as critical, but

(18:55):
they need to be exited. Sowe've mapped out a strategic plan. You
can't be high stage, and youhave to plan for that and prepare for
that. And if you're going tobe a CEO, you have to have
the stomach for that. Yeah,because sometimes moving people out who you've had
a relationship with and who you evenlike personally, it's not necessarily an easy
thing. And when you do that, you're taking a risk because one hand,

(19:18):
you know you have the status quoand at least to some extent,
it's probably working right yeah, Yeah, but then you also appreciate that the
company can be better if you makethat change. And keep this in mind
too. Some people are they don'tlike to fire, right, I don't
like to fire. Unfortunately, Fortunatelyit probably fired and hired thousands of people.
So I now just look at it. It's part of the process.
But if you're a CEO and you'restruggling with I just don't want to do

(19:41):
this. They have family and allthis. Think of it this way.
You need to fire them because something'snot working in the company, which means
a company isn't as healthy as shouldbe. If the company is healthier and
where it should be, that's betterfor your customers. But also it's better
for your employees because that person's probablyimpacting your other employe. Boys, So
do you want to take care ofthe greater good all your employees or focus

(20:03):
on this one individual? And ifyou can look at it that way,
the greater good my clients, allmy employees versus one individual, it does
make it easier. So we havequestions here they ken as always ready to
answer. Yea, what are thekey differences between leadership and management? So
you hear leadership and here management Whatthe difference? Yeah, So leadership at
a high level is setting the visionand the direction for either your group and

(20:27):
or your company right and setting upthat communications and proper expectations. Management is
more of the day to the daytactical such as giving them the systems and
the processes holding them accountable to executingthe task at hand. But they are
different. Actually, we've got anentire presentation that we actually do on our

(20:48):
community on this. But think ofthe leader, as you know, the
general on the front lines right,and the manager is the lieutenant actually in
the battlefield supply and AMMO and doingall the hard work, if you will.
So we have to take a break, Ken Passkins. This is a
great discussion. Make sure you staytuned and we'll be back with more Passage
to Profit right after this. I'mMerchard your Heart, founder of Your Heart

(21:11):
Law. We specialize in patents,trademarks and copyrights. You can find out
more and learn more about trademarks dotcom. We love working with entrepreneurs and
helping their businesses grow. And here'sour client, Ricky, to tell it
like it is. Hi. I'mRicky Frano, founder and CEO of Prime
six. We manufacture high performing,clean and sustainable fuel spike, charcoal and

(21:32):
logs. We've been working with yourHealth Loft since the beginning, really and
they've helped us figure out the trademarks, the patents, everything that has to
do with product development and how toprotect our inventions. And we're extremely grateful
for the wonderful team that has beensupporting our business since day. Want thank
you Ricky. To learn more abouttrademarks, go to learn more about trademarks

(21:53):
dot com and download our free EntrepreneursGuide to Trademarks, or book a free
consultation with me to discuss your patenttrademark needs. That's learn more about trademarks
dot com for your free booklet abouttrademarks and a free consultation. Now back
to a passage to drop in onceagain, Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart, we
have with us Ken Paskins. Wejust had an incredible first half of his

(22:15):
interview. Now we're going to jumpright into the second half. Ken is
a business guru. He has abook and he has a group. The
Shift Spot is his book. Butnow I want to ask him. We
were talking about KPI's key performance indicators. How can I create KPIs for a
company that matter? Because anything couldbe a KPI, Like how many times

(22:36):
I ordered donuts this week? Idon't call that might put a good KPI.
By the way, can we spenda lot on donuts. Yeah,
so a lot of people will justpull stuff out of the air. Right.
I'm a marketer, so I needto track people that come to my
website. Might be a good KPI, but make sure that it's actually relevant.
And what I try to tell CEOspecifically is look at it. And

(22:57):
I'll use a healthcare term fradle tograve, right, is in the healthcare
industry. And that's pretty self explanatory. But what starts at the very beginning
of my company. So let's sayI'm a landscaper, and the very beginning
is I invest a thousand dollars andAdWords, and AdWords turns into five marketing

(23:18):
qualified leads that then turn into threesales leads that then go through my sales
funnel that then I close ten percentof those, Right, And I know
what my ASP is average sales price, And I'm just making stuff up,
So forgive me. Let's say thatmy average sales price is twenty five thousand
dollars per deal. Right, Thatthen goes to my operations team, or

(23:40):
probably goes to finance. First,Finance is gonna invoice and then it goes
over to operations. Then operations actuallycreates a project, dispatches the team and
everything does the work, and thenback over to finance and financing collects the
cash and then the cash gets inthe bank account. So that entire process

(24:00):
from marketing and not always marketing,right believe it or not, just in
sales to operations to finance. Howand what does it touch? And what
I like to do is actually geta whiteboard and just whiteboard every little thing
across the entire organization. And thenif you can imagine, some of those
things can be the very important KPIsper department. So I've got some marketing,

(24:22):
KPIs got sales, they've got opts, I've got finance, etc.
And I can pull those out froma high level perspective, focus on as
a company and a CEO, focuson pulling out nine to fifteen of those
of the most important ones across thatcontinuum, and focus on roughly seventy percent
of those being leading indicators versus lagging. And that's a little tricky because if

(24:45):
you think about it, closing adeal, a lot of people look at
that as that could be a laggingindicator. Well, closing a deal,
if I know, turns into cashin the bank. Sixty seven days later,
that could be a leading indicator forcash in the bank or cash flow.
Right, So determine what are themost important and then focus on those.
The strategy is look at everything andthen determine what's most important per group,

(25:07):
and then what's important to me focuson leading because you want to put
yourself in the direction where you're lookingahead as a company, I can see
ninety days to one hundred and eightydays out where I'm going to be,
versus looking at the end. Oh, I'm glad we close that deal.
And if you can put yourself onthat trajectory, then you know where you're
going and you can predict problems andyou can pre up problems, and that's
really what the purpose of the KPIsare. The goal is to try to

(25:30):
sort of anticipate what's going to behappening in the future. So if there
is an issue or an opportunity someplace, then you can take advantage of it
before it becomes a problem or theopportunity is loss. That's correct, And
like I said, a lot ofpeople will just pull them out of the
air, right, and they'll guess, I think I must monitor this,
right, and then a really goodthing is after you get that scorecard together

(25:52):
and you're measuring those if something's offtrack, used to five y process a
six sigma process. So if Ididn't close those deals, why did I
not close deals? Well because Ididn't work hard last week? Well why
did I not work hard last week? Well? I was distracted? Why
was it distracted? So get tothe root cause and identify what's causing that
KPI to fail, and then whatsolution could I put in place to make

(26:15):
it succeed. Well, do youthink that you need to start from the
end? So okay, right now, I need X number of dollars to
run this company, so let's workbackwards. Is that kind of how you
would do it? Or would youstart at the marketing part and work forward?
Honestly, I would do it either, But I prefer if you're doing
it at the end, and that'sa good way to back into financials and

(26:37):
also capacity planning and all those typeof things. But actually, if I'm
trying to map out my KPIs,and I never thought of it that way,
I was prefer to actually just startat the beginning to point A whatever
A is, and then question yourself, is this truly a right. Some
people say, well, we'll senda quote that's where we start. Well,
is it really where you starts?There? Something more than that,

(26:59):
and force yourself to get the pointA and go all the way backwards to
your point though. That's really howI'm looking to build my financials and capacity
playing it and for my OPS teamor customer service folks or so forth.
If I want to hit two milliondollars in revenue, what sort of profit
is at? How many people doI need per department? When do I
need to hire them? And thenI'm kind of working backwards from a headcount

(27:21):
perspective. How long does it takethe recruit how long does it take the
onboard? So I think mathematically they'retwo different approaches for two different problems.
The way I sit KPIs are aform of accountability. But how do you
drive accountability through a team or throughan organization? Really there's five things that
you got to do. You gotto set clear expectations, lead by example,
make sure that you provide regular feedbackto the team, drive a culture

(27:47):
of accountability, and do what yousay as a CEO or an owner yourself
as well. What do I meanby that? I always like to tell
owners or leaders expect ninety percent ofyour team of what you're willing to do,
because if you say that we mustexecute, but you never do what
you say you're going to do,then don't be disappointed if your team doesn't
do it. But that's it.So, I mean, those are kind

(28:08):
of the areas in the buckets.But setting expectations is something I don't think.
It's one of the basics that alot of people don't do. We
assume Danielle just knows that she's supposedto show up one time, well does
she right? I mean her previouscompany, it was, hey, you
just arrive eight to nine. Wedon't really care. And if I haven't
had that conversation with Danielle and saidhere's what I expect and what I need

(28:32):
and if I'm not clear with that, then you know I can't hold that
against her. And something to keepin mind too, You've got to continually
reinforce that. So I do thatin quarterly dialogues with the employees. Document
it. We all learn differently aswell. Some people are audios, some
people are visual, if you will, so I have them queued in on
it today. But somebody says Ihear you, I guess what they listen,

(28:53):
So when I speak to them,they're going to absorb it more.
If they say I see you,then they're visual, right, So put
it in writing let them read it. But those are the areas that you
want to focus on. The driveaccountability, But accountability, I believe honestly
follow us on the leader more thanthe employee. If you set up that
framework of clear expectations and everything andgive them everything that they need to be

(29:17):
successful. I believe ultimately as humanswe want to be accountable, But it's
up to the leader and manager toset that and then for the employee to
step into it and be accountable.If they don't, that's when it's on
them. What do you think aboutvision? Vision for company? How do
you create and implement a vision thatstarts with the owner clearly why did you

(29:37):
start the business? I'd like toask people to jot it down and come
up with what their core values are. Think about where they're going to be
in three years, two years,one year as well, But we're ultimately
do they want to go? What'stheir biggest purpose? As well? You
can own a law firm in yourbiggest purposes to serve humanity, but create
that vision. And I think thathelping employees understand the vision and understanding the

(30:00):
expectations of how to be accountable,how to execute, I think are two
of the biggest things that actually aremissing from the CEO, the owner or
the leaders of the organization. Butyou also with that vision, you've got
to constantly articulate what it is toyour people. Don't assume or how many
times I've heard people say as well, I don't know why they don't understand

(30:22):
our vision. I don't understand whyI always have to do this. I
don't understand why I have to alwayssell or whatever it's on us. So
create a quarterly structure of where youare articulated and going over the vision.
Get people involved with that, makeit a culture where the employees want to
actually own and be a part ofthat as well. Another thing that I
like to do with owners that areespecially newer company or they're trying to get

(30:45):
the vision out and get it absorbedand get it within the DNA of the
employees, create a weekly thing.I had one client's name is Casey,
So I created this thing called Coffeewith Casey, and it wasn't mandatory as
every Friday for thirty forty five minuteemployees would dial in and guess what because
it wasn't mandatory, and I pitchedit this way. It was like,
hey, it's your chance to sitdown with the CEO. Small companies still

(31:07):
fifteen twenty employee sit down with theCEO and asking anything you want and for
him to share where he's going,and everybody would attend they were curious and
they would feed back into him onhere's what other customers are saying, here's
what I'm seeing in the market.Have you thought about this? And that
would actually help fine tune his visionas well. But vision is important.
You got to put a lot oftime and focus in it. You got

(31:30):
to reiterate with employees. Don't justmake it one and done. A lot
of people do, here's our vision. Everybody got it? Okay, get
back to work and go deliver myvision. It doesn't work that way.
It's a constant, constant process.Okay, ken, So I got my
vision a lot of other ducks ina row, but I don't know how
to scale. What's keeping me fromscaling. It's all the basics of the

(31:51):
shifts spot and where we talked aboutthose core areas. You got to be
tight with leadership and management and whatthat means, and all sorts of things
fallen there, such just how dowe communicate communication, cadence, providing the
right tools, major monitoring, driving, accountability, all those aspects. You
have to have a grasp of systemsand processes as well. As newer companies

(32:12):
start out, we throw bodies atit. Oh, well, Susie's overwhelmed.
Let's get another person. Oh they'reoverwhelmed. Let's get another person to
see Daniel Shakan or had I knowwe're backgrounds, right, but we want
to just toss bodies at it.You've got to understand what systems and processes
can alleviate some of that and whichwill save your money and also prevent human
air which will probably also deliver abetter experience. And as we talked about

(32:36):
earlier as well, understand your financesand your numbers right. Understand that you
be just like a professional coach aprofessional athlete. They all know the plays
ahead of time. Understand that stuffrock solid if you will, and just
focus on those core areas and disciplineand surround yourself with the right people in
the company. To help grow thecompany. But it really gets down to

(32:58):
business basics. And I like totell people all the time, I don't
care what you think about Tom Brady, even though he might be retired.
Every time Tom Brady gets out thereto do a game or whatever, he's
practicing dropping back and passing the ball. Guys passed the ball two million times,
right, He's practicing it right.And there's no reason why we shouldn't
do that as business owners and CEOs. Get the basics down and build off

(33:21):
the basics. Once you do that, then you can scale and you can
put yourself more in that visionary owner. See great advice. Can we have
to take a break, but Ijust want to say this amazing discussion,
thank you for all the helpful advice. And where can people find out more
about you and the shift Spot?Yeah, just go to the shiftspot dot
com and find a bunch of stuffthere. And then for all of your

(33:42):
listeners, we wanted to do somethingspecial. We've got this gap analysis when
I was a fixer, we'll callit drop in cooo. I use this
gap analysis when I first go intocompanies and it's a five thousand dollar value
and we're provided for you guys,go to the shiftspot dot com forward slash
gap and type in passage to Profitas the code, and we're going to
pull a couple of your listeners outand we're going to go through some areas

(34:06):
of opportunity work on the east andyou're going to have a better business and
a better life. Thank you somuch. And I hope our listeners will
take advantage of that. You mayget selected and hopefully you can get something
of real value to help your business. So we really encourage you again to
go to the shiftspot dot com andtype in board slash scap the shiftspot dot

(34:28):
com forward slash gap, and thenpassage to Profit is the code? Is
your code? I just want tosay, the shift spot is the shift
spot. That's correct. Thank youso much. Ken Paskins back with more
Passage to Profit with Richard Elizabeth Kerhartright after this. Hi, I Lisa
ask Leasi inventres, founder, CEOand president of Inventing a to Z.

(34:52):
I've been inventing products for over thirtyeight years, hundreds of products later and
dozens of patents. I help peopledevelop products and put them on the market
from concept to fruition. I bringthem to some of the top shopping networks
in the world, QBC, HSN, E, Vineline and retail stores.
Have you ever said to yourself,someone should invent that thing, Well,

(35:14):
I say, why not make ityou. If you want to know how
to develop a product from concept tofruition the right way, contact me Lisa
Askleys, the Inventress. Go toInventing atoz dot com inventing a too z
dot com. Email me Lisa atinventing at z dot com. Treat yourself
to a day shop full of networking, education, music, shopping and fun.

(35:37):
Go to my website Inventing atoz dotcom. Passage to Profit continues with
Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart. You justheard from Kem Paskins. What fantastic segment,
filled with so much useful information thatyou can apply to your businesses.
And if you haven't had a chanceto hear the whole interview, we encourage

(35:59):
you to go and find us onpodcasts so you can get to us anywhere
where you get your podcasts. Justlook for the Passage to Profit show and
download the episode and you can hearfrom Ken again as well as the rest
of the episode that's coming up.Next. So now to our lovely co
hosts various entrepreneurial projects. So Elizabeth, why don't you tell us what's been

(36:21):
going on. If you've listened tothis, you know I started a company
called Blue Streak Directory. It's avideo directory for business services, and I'm
right in a crucial part of itright now. As I said earlier,
I made some strategic partnerships, onein particular for getting the videos done.
You can't believe the software out there. This software wasn't there when I started,
but now it's there, which isreally cool. So I think that

(36:44):
that is one thing that's important forbusinesses, my business especially, is to
know everything that's out there that's newthat I can use for it. Because
I'm trying to push the envelope withthis. I haven't found anything like it
quite like it. Knock on wood. Yeah, So hopefully nobody else is
doing the same exact same thing.But for instance, like I'll probably use
AI to help me do some blogswhen I get the website done, and

(37:06):
that's just a really powerful tool.So I'm working on that. I'm going
to a networking events small business expoin Manhattan this week, so I'm going
to get a lot of education thereand hopefully make some good contacts. And
I don't want to talk too muchabout what I'm doing with Blue Street because
it kind of in a sensitive stageright now, and we're working on the
website too. And then of course, my lovely co host for Jersey Podcats

(37:27):
podcast is here and she's going totalk about that in much more detail.
But she just had a cat comeon our desk. Danielle and I post
a podcast together where we interview.We'll not really interview, We kind of
try to have a conversation with catlovers. But one of our most popular
things that dog people want to beon there too, that's coming up as
dogs versus Cats, Cats versus dogs, And the last time we did one,

(37:50):
I do think Danielle one when shesaid wet dog smell. Danielle's getting
us great guests to talk to andwe're really having a lot of fun with
the but Danielle's doing a lot ofthe technical work with it too. So
I really want to hear now fromCliff and then Danielle about their projects and
companies. So we have here withthis Cliff Beach. He is a musician

(38:12):
with California Soul music record label.He's also an author. He wrote a
book side Hustle and Flow, TenPrinciples to live and lead a more productive
life in less time. Lost timeis the real checker to there isn't it?
Clip tell us all about what you'redoing. I am a musician and
author based in Los Angeles. Ihave been a musician for over twenty years.
Music has led me all over theworld touring. I've released ten albums

(38:37):
in the last ten years, allof them are which are all all streaming
platforms. I've also for raid intoradio. I have a weekly radio show
in Los Angeles called Deeper Grooves.I also have a podcast based on that
Deeper Grooves, where we interview musicianson music, very similar to the Actors
Studio with Actors on Actors. Wetalk about Grammy Award winning and Grammy nominated
musicians, musicians of all tracks oflife, how they were able to start

(38:58):
their journey, especially focus on thebusiness side as well as the art side.
And then I've also had two seasonsunder my belt Undiscovery Channel, Discovery
Plus now On also Max of beinga health band leader for Josh Gates Tonight.
So yeah, I really enjoy nowhelping people as a life coach and
mentor music artists, but really anyonewho wants to side hustle. I really

(39:20):
feel that, as you had mentionedabout ai, AI is going to replace
a certain amount of people. AndI think as we do talk about business
entrepreneurship, I do remind people thatintrapreneurship is also a part of the journey
where people can work for someone whilestill working for themselves. And I think
you're at a point now where youalmost have to do that. And then
with the rise of so many appsfrom Uber and Airbnb, there's so many

(39:43):
opportunities that didn't exist and more thingswill exist ten years from now. So
people that are trying a lot ofthings to see what sticks, and following
Ken's advised to have those KPIs tobe able to understand what's working and not
working and refine the process, knowwhere you're going, where you've been,
and understanding your customer. I thinkall of those things happen. And with

(40:04):
musicians, what they don't tell youis that, whether you think about it
or not, you are a business. You are a solopreneur. You are
a business of one and if youwant to be able to scale, you
want to be able to have pathiveincome creating things that are out there,
and the streaming services world allow peopleto be able to tap into it as
they see fit on demand and beable to learn in different styles that can
alluded to as well. Allows youto just be able to expand your brand

(40:29):
and universe. So wow. Allowus to ask you, though, when
we talk about musicians and entrepreneurship,how does that interact? I mean,
how do musicians who are trying tobuild their own careers act as entrepreneurs.
I think all businesses, and especiallymusicians, they have to. They're selling
a service. They are the brand, they are the product. You have

(40:51):
to now know social media and howto get your information out there. Gone
are the day is waiting for agreen light from a record label or a
and our person and to be ableto tell you that you can go ahead
and do that. Now it's ademocratized platform and society with the Internet where
people are able to get stuff onYouTube and Spotify and Apple Music, etc.
And so I think the hardest partfor musicians is that the marriage of

(41:15):
art and commerce they conflict against eachother. So the artist mindset, it's
like we would do this no matterwhat for free because we love it so
much and it's something that's in ourDNA. But as the benthest you can't
do it for free. That becomesa charity, a nonprofit if you will.
And so I think they do worktogether well. I think understanding that

(41:36):
when you hear about stories like someonewho had their funds and bezel because they
weren't watching things, that happens tomusicians all the time. You look at
someone like a Billy Joel, Butthat happens because people you trust, Because
again, sometimes you're focusing so muchon the art the commerce part is like
an afterthought. And the same wayI tell people all the time, we
spend so much as artists on whatI call the pregnancy and the birthing stage.

(41:57):
But in real life, if youever had children, you don't just
have a pregnancy and then it's overnine months later. You have to now
raise this kid for eighteen years plusand they always need you. So you
have to be thinking about the futureand how you want to go through all
these incremental what they call baby stepsto be able to grow your business.
But there's really no right or wrongway. I think the main thing is
that you have to start asking questions. Just like six six months the Five

(42:20):
Wives, you have to be askingself reflecting questions to like, am I
becoming better? Because, as JimRohn says, life does not become any
easier. We just must become better. That's really the only option. And
side hustling is one avenue that allowsyou to do that, to try a
bunch of different things while you're still, you know, gaining income from your
full time job. So when you'retalking about side hustling, are you talking
about different potential projects or career paths, or are you talking about this for

(42:45):
musicians and entertainers. You know,it started out from me on the music
side, but I think anyone cando it at the same time. In
the book Side Hustling Flow, Idifferentiate that some people can have side hustles
that don't make money. Really,what we talk about being more for projective
and less time. It's about beingmore effective with our time. Right.
So people always say how do Ispend my time? But what you want

(43:07):
to actually say is how do Iinvest my time? Because you can't have
a return on and spending it.You can only have a return on investing
it. And so as you startto do that, the side hustle becomes
There's a theory and Japanese called ikaguy. What am I good at?
You know? What's my reason forliving? What can I give from society?
Give to society? What can Imake money from? Those types of
questions allow you down the path tofigure out. For instance, I'm at

(43:29):
a person who was like, Ilove to solve it that, and I
told them, well, if youknow what you love to do, you
should try to do it as muchas you can afford to and as much
as humanly possible. Eventually, ifyou want to make money from that,
you can teach and do other things. It's ways to diversify. But the
first thing is figuring out what youreally want to do. Because sometimes you
may love to do something and maybe great at it, but maybe that's
not something that you can make moneyfrom. So all those questions are important.

(43:50):
It's not one question, it's allof them. But really, again,
when you talk about side hustling,it's allowing yourself to have these opportunities
to be able to see what youwant to plant different seeds and then what
they grow. The beauty of plantingand having that harvest time is that you
don't have a one to one relationship. If he plants a lot of seeds,
you don't plant one apple seed andget one apple. That would be

(44:10):
like a futile and not predictive.So you would allow it to be able
to do that. But at thesame time, you get whatever you put
into it. So if I'm planningapple seas, I'm going to get and
expect apples to come. Yeah,that's a really great way to describe that.
So I'm just wondering if Ken hasa comment or a question here.
I'm curious on honestly, the impactsyou mentioned AI, the impacts of AI

(44:31):
in your industry and what you seegoing on there. We use it.
I believe in it, but it'salso scary and I think it can be
robbing from artists in the future aswell. Definitely, And they have already
seen people with AI tried to writesongs and emulate singers who have died in
the paths that they're using to makenew creations. AI is able to pull

(44:52):
from historical information, say we lookat chap TBT. It it has limitations,
obviously, they have humans to comeon top of that to be able
to do that. It's very formulaic, and there's ways that that work,
especially when you're writing you know,very formulated emails for example, you could
probably get away with that and tweakit a little bit easier than if you're

(45:13):
writing a book or a screenplay ora song that needs an artistic license that
a computer wouldn't be able to get. But I think I think it's a
tool, and I think you shoulduse it just like money as a tool.
You know, the people say it'sgood, it's bad, It really
isn't different. It's how you youlife that that makes it wud have becomes
and that's for the human behind.You still have to manage it though,
because we've looked at some AI blogsand you can tell oh yeah yeah.

(45:36):
And the visual arts AI is takingpictures from different artists and then combining them
together to create you know, Idon't know if you call it artwork,
but at least you know, newdesigns. But the art does bear the
striking resemblance to the art that theAI used to create the pictures, right,
yeah, copyright lawsuit about that,yeah? Absolutely? Yeah? So

(45:58):
who did the original creative? Andthat's what AI has to do, though,
is go find people's creative work toput together whatever AI is going to
give you, right and does thatwork in the music industry, then and
AI find music and combine it fromdifferent composers or different sources. Yes,
it most certainly can. And againthere are some copyright and core cases that
are coming up based on that becauseit pulls again from historical data and things

(46:22):
that have already existed. It creatingone totally from scratch, I think is
what makes us have a human experienceat the same time being that snowflake,
having that X factor DNA. Theuniqueness of it filtering through you is what
makes it unique because everything is technicallybased on the past and what has happened.
So some music and styles have evolvedfrom previous styles and previous genovations,

(46:45):
and then we come back and revisitcertain things in a new way. So
you think of it as like you'rein a kitchen and you're able to make
so many different things because you haveall these inputs and there's recipes, and
then some people go all script andfigure out how to do their own thing.
But I think AI can definitely helpyou if you're stuck to figure out
certain ways of doing that. Butagain, I think the human experience of

(47:08):
being able to do something just scratchon your own. It's something that a
computer won't do. I mean againa computer and all of that is created
by a human to be able tocreate that code, etc. So I
don't think we'll ever fully be areal place. We'll just move on to
very uniquely human thanks that only humanscan do. From your lips to God's

(47:28):
ears. We're waiting for the techoverlords to take us away, and hopefully
your prediction is that's probably not goingto happen, at least not in the
near future. But going back tothe side hustles, are there particular types
of side hustles that you think areespecially successful being something that somebody can do
outside their normal job, which iskind of the definition of a side hustle.

(47:51):
Yeah, I think there's a soundthat are more advantageous than others.
I think when you think about timeand how you invest it, you have
to realize the value of your owntime, and so things that require you
to physically be in the presence youhave to charge more for. You know.
So when you look at someone that'sdoing coaching, if you're doing one
on one coaching with one person versusteaching and mass as a seminar versus having

(48:14):
an online course. Obviously, theonline course becomes efficient because you can record
one speech today that can be listenedto and downloaded on demand and perportuity.
So I think when you're thinking aboutthat as especially as a solopreneur and a
side hustler, there is a certainpoint where you reach a tipping point where
you have to decide, how canI, from a passive income and a

(48:36):
time management perspective, have something thatcan live on without me, because essentially
you just own a job if youjust are the only person doing everything all
the time, So you have tofigure out how you can delegate. But
then utilizing these tools like aim likebeing able to record, to be able
to then have something that people canaccess to. So as a songwriter,

(48:57):
having my music with people can streamat any time now having one time it
has almost a million streams. Youknow, people were able to listen to
that while I was asleep. That'sthe beauty of it. It's like if
I had to go and perform thatsong for everybody on a one on one
basis, that would be very tiring, exhausting, and be limited to my
physical limitations. My geographical limitation.So I think that's the beauty of the
world, you know, having thatlimitless potential, having that growth mindset to

(49:21):
believe that that is possible. Butthen from their technology has allowed you to
now from a human resources perspective,you can work with people remotely now that
you wouldn't have been able to accessto. Maybe your CEOO is someone who's
based in Australia and you're based inAmerica, and you have the ways to
do that. We have here withthis Cliff Beach. He is a musician
with California Soul Music record label.He's also an author. He wrote a

(49:43):
book side, Hustle and Flow.So in the show notes that we have
here, it says that you've gothipped off American Idol and then you had
a hit song called Confidence. Yeah. Well, let me tell you that
there are many rounds to get totelevision. And when they say you're going
in the Hollywood, that has happenedmany times over. Before you actually see
it on television, they actually haveproducers bring it into a room and they

(50:06):
explain to you that they picked peoplewho are great for TV. Doesn't necessarily
mean you're the greatest musician the world. Are just great four TV. What
America vote for you? That's whatthey're always thinking. And so I,
yeah, I made it through multiplerounds getting to the round where I ended
up getting cut off on television.And it's tough. It's tough to have
public failures where people can call youand say I saw you get kicked off

(50:28):
on TV. So all the familymembers and friends, you know, people
I haven't heard of. I tellpeople all the time. They're like,
oh, I want to find familymembers. I don't know if they exist.
Let me do twenty three and meI'm like, no, no,
no, just tell people you wonthe lottery. But an ad out.
Believe me, family members will findyou the same way for some reason public
failure, they will find you.And so yeah, it was tough.

(50:49):
It was tough to be kicked offby people that you admire to tell you
that you're not good enough or whateverit is. But I learned very quickly
to pivot that one nobody can reallytell you what you can and can't.
You are the captain of your ownship and the master of your own fate,
and you can only you know,write your own epitat and that way,
and at the same time, realizingthat it was only one channel to

(51:09):
get out there, but not theonly channel. And you look at people
like Jennifer Hutson who were kicked offAmerican Idol, But then you know one
Oscars and Grammys and other stuff,and so no one can really know the
whole story. You can be ableto create that journey for yourself. But
definitely when you talk about resiliency andwhat Angela Duckworth calls is true grit.
I tell people all the time withperseverance, it's after the point that the

(51:31):
feeling has left you and anyone hereon this Pannel, I'm sure it can
tell you that the feeling leaves prettyquickly. To be able to do a
day in and day out for yearsand years, and to be able to
through all types of adversity still bethat person, you know that that dares
to be great and has been blessedby a circumstances and the ring day after
day after day. You know,you look at Rocky, it's like,

(51:52):
oh my gosh, why aren't theystill fighting? Why are they still getting
beat up? His eyes look terrible, like someone should tell him through the
town. But you get to theplot where it's like that's how you build
that character and that residiency and thattough skin and that's stomach to be able
to do that. And for theentrepreneur, you know, it's a roller
coaster. Not everybody will be ableto weather it those storms. And I
can tell people all the time,a ship at harbor is the safest,

(52:15):
but it's built to sell. It'sbuilt for adversity, but not for the
faint of part for sure. Well. I love the way that you express
things, and I just want tosay that so much of what happens in
the public sphere is arbitrary anyway,and it's very subjective, and a lot
of times people who are making decisionsin that realm are wrong. There's just

(52:36):
human like anybody else, and theymake mistakes as well. So when you
do face that kind of adversity,I think that you have to take that
into account. But not taking itpersonally I think would be tough. In
fact, you went further than virtuallyanybody else ever does, and these kinds
of contests, and yet there aresome people out there who would say,
well, you didn't make it.But then he came back and had a

(52:59):
hit song called Confident and sounds likea perfect aneco. Cliff, It's been
absolutely marvelous having you on the program. Cliff has been in the music world
a long time and he's done alot of amazing things, and you can
find out more about him at cliffbeachmusicdot com. Now on to Danielle Woolley,
who, as I said, ismy co host on the Jersey Podcasts

(53:21):
podcast. But she is not justa super good podcast co host. She
is also a professional services consultant.She's a liaison for a rescue group called
Tommy's Cats Rescue, so she reallygives back and of course she does a
lot on the podcast. So Danielle, welcome, let's talk about the podcast.
Both of you, guys Can andCliff talked about such cool things.

(53:44):
I can actually take pieces of whatboth of you said and apply it to
podcasting as well. Usually the firstquestion I get from people is like,
you're a business consultant and you workwith field service companies, but you have
a podcast about hats, Like theyjust don't get it. And I actually
have this addition called I don't knowhow to do fun things without turning it
into a business. So that's kindof how we wound up there, and

(54:07):
I'm also a big fan of networkingand connecting with other people. And I
actually had met Elizabeth Gearhart. Youknow, we were introducing ourselves to one
another. I happened to be ata conference the Association of Women Inventors and
Entrepreneurs led by the amazing Lisa askPolice, and you know, just introduced
myself as what I just told youguys. I said, but you know,
I'm just here to relax and meetpeople, and I really love cats.

(54:29):
And she's like, wait a minute. I was just telling my husband,
how you know, I would reallylove to start a podcast about cats,
but I don't know anybody that Ican do it with. And seriously,
that's exactly how it happened. Soyou never know who you're going to
meet. When Danielle and I started, we're like, well, yes,
let's do make this a business ofDanielle. I know a lot of people
have asked me about podcasting and whatyou have to do. Can you talk

(54:52):
about all the tech you put inploys for this? Absolutely? And I
want to start by saying there's nota definite right or wrong similar in business.
You want to kind of analyze whereyou're at, what your goals are
what kind of time and money investmentyou want to make, And for us,
it was important to me at leastto not just have what everyone kept
saying we should have, because thatwasn't really a fit for us. I
wanted something that was fun to use, that had a community based around it.

(55:15):
So one of the software platforms wechose specifically has a community geared around
podcasting and the equipment behind it,the technology as far as you know,
where are you recording, what kindof computer are you using? I'm a
macgirl, So it was a niceexcuse for Santa Claus to bring me a
new MacBook prow because if I hadjust listened to you, like, okay,
here's the checklist of all the thingsyou have to use, if they

(55:36):
weren't comfortable for me, I wasn'tgoing to have fun doing it. Absolutely,
the equipment does make a difference.If you're confident in the way you
sound and you're confident in the wayyour recordings come out, I think that
encourages you. So absolutely the equipmentis important. Yeah, and even Ken
mentioned earlier how some people are visual, some preferred to listen versus seeing.
For me, I actually it's veryimportant for things to sound good and look

(55:59):
good, and we decided to doboth YouTube and to do the regular podcast
in all podcast platforms, as wellas a Facebook community group. I've sometimes
been questionable why those three areas.Why not be everywhere? Why not be
on TikTok? Why not have anewsletter going? Those are all plans to
have in the future, but wewant to make sure we have the fan
base there first. And then Iknow you guys are all going to agree
when I say, our systems andprocesses have to be in place. So

(56:22):
there's nothing worse than me working withclients all day and telling them it's broken
because you didn't follow the system,or it's confusing because you don't have the
data behind it. And then forme and Elizabeth to be in the same
as x Spot, so it's likecalling the kettle. Is it calling the
kettle? Black practice? What youpick your own medicine? Yeah? Yeah.
We've played with a couple of differentformats, so first we would do

(56:43):
some bands from between us, andI thought, well, let's put the
guests first, and we're just kindof trying to figure out what flows the
most naturally, and we're turning itinto a business, so it startup as
a fun project because I love editing, I love marketing stuff, I like
playing with graphics. I like allthose pieces. And that's why I also
chose certain software programs to use,because if it wasn't fun for me to
do it, I was not goingto do it. But yes, we
easily could have hired out for somebody, but then it's not a fun creative

(57:06):
project for us, And yeah,I guess, just the only question what
is the goal? So our goalis to monetize it. As I mentioned
before, I don't know how tonot turn things into businesses. We are
starting small though, because again wewant to make sure it's a nice fit.
Even like the format of it.Just because everyone else is very successful
doing interview style doesn't mean that that'sthe format we want to follow. We
want to kind of build it upfirst and then we'll be monetizing it.
We already have things available as faras supporting the show, and I love

(57:29):
doing that because I love following contentcreators. I'm a big fan of actually
listening to podcasts on YouTube, sothat's why that's important to me because when
I could follow and see what they'reseeing, and then it makes other suggestions
that other things that I should seeand watch. So we're clickting all that
data and actually building community around itas well, especially because people don't know
who I am and I just hearI run a podcast. They're like,
oh, But then when they startedtalking to me and they're like, oh,

(57:51):
wow, she knows business, sheknows really cool interesting people. Okay,
I'm going to pay more attention toher now. I want more people,
and I know Elizabeth Greece to feelcomfortable talking about something that they love
all day and for us that happensto be cuts. What are your biggest
challenges now? I think that's anobvious answer. I feel like everyone probably
throws that one out with free.Being honest, it's time. It's not
just the amount of time it's allottedfor doing things, but to the degree

(58:14):
that we want to right because wedo. You know, we have full
time lives behind all of this aswell, and there's only so much time
you can allocate each week. ButI would say the second biggest challenge is,
funny enough, the marketing, becausewe both do marketing, so sometimes
doing it for yourself can be achallenge, and we've actually had people reach
out wanting to promote and wanting tosponsor, but they don't feel aligned for

(58:35):
us, so it's kind of likean oh, okay, it's interesting that
that's the type of company that reachedout, but maybe they don't align with
our values. They're just seeing ourlisteners and wanting to get in front of
them. So it's really picking andchoosing, and I think we're able to
be more picky about things and alittle bit slower because we both have other
endeavors and I have a full timejob as well. It sound like we're
like itching and kicking and screaming wherewe have to be bringing in money right

(58:55):
at the moment. That's great.I kind of like to bring Cliff back
into the US a little bit becausewe were just talking about side hustles and
it's interesting what Danielle said is oneof the challenges with the side hustle is
really investing enough time in it sothat it can actually mature into a business.
Right, So what are your commentsabout that? Well, I think

(59:15):
they have some great things going forthem. Obviously, cat lovers it's an
audience and there's ways to find themand tools that will do that. And
I think it's nice to have anovel idea because I haven't heard of a
podcast on this subject manage to thatdegree, and people are looking into doing
that. You know. I've talkedto people in the podcast world, like
medical doctors who have created podcasts aroundbreath cancer, and someone actually documented their

(59:38):
actual journey because normally they figured outthat people were always talking about it after
you had gotten through it, butthen one was really documenting like how I
feel in the moment, and people, as my agement says, like they'll
forget what you did and what yousaid, but they'll remember how you made
them feel. It's the trans startsa feeling from the music world and beyond.
I think that does that even inthe business world when you're talking to

(59:59):
someone about those numbers, when youattach feelings to that because we're good at
bad, you know, it makespeople move the needle a different way than
you know, just looking at somethingin black and white. But I think,
yes, figuring out the time andtime management is always the struggle.
That really is the commodity that we'retrading money for time and vice versa.
But I do like what Danielle saidin terms of the same because you are

(01:00:21):
side hustling because you do have otherendeavors. It allows you to be able
to grow as quickly and as fastand be able to be selective. And
I think that is important because you'lllook at a company like Amazon that became
the tug juckernaut. But Jeff Bezoswas very strategic and how he bootstrapped how
for seven years he wrote to theshareholders he was never paying a dividend,
they weren't going to get any moneyback, and he kept putting it back

(01:00:44):
into the business. And he decidedto do books, which was a very
unsexy industry at the time, buthe knew that warehouses were cheaper than having
store friends, and he totally blewout that whole market. And so I
think the way you're thinking about itis great is that just stick to how
you believe and you're values, becausethat's going to be important. That's going
to become your DNA and the peoplethat you're building right now, the fan

(01:01:05):
base, which is your tribe,doesn't have to be a huge amount of
people, but if they're like,really engaged, then it's super important.
I remember that someone told me astory about I think they alve Underground.
When they released the first record,they were like they didn't really sell bad
many copies, but everyone who boughta copy wanted to start a band.
You know, if you got fiftyor five hundred people, that's better than
having maths that are a little bitmore tickle. Great comments, and maybe

(01:01:29):
that should be your goal, isthat everybody who hears the podcast wants a
cat or at least another cat.Right, Yeah, So I'm glad you
mentioned that because we do we focusa lot of time on rescue and having
people asked their everyday questions too.And it sounds like nobody's walking around asking
these questions, but we have away of talking with people and creating a
comfortable environment that before we know it, someone's like, oh, yeah,

(01:01:50):
I do have this issue, maybesomeone can help you with this, and
then they connect over that like,oh, my cat does that too.
I thought that was just like acat thing, and you know, people
feel more comfortable talking about things thatthey love about. And I think one
thing I'd eventually like to do withit is to have some in person meetings
for people, because we're trying tobuild a community, I think more than
anything else. And it's funny becauseit's finding that balance of like, okay,

(01:02:12):
I am a quirky person. I'mcreative and it's fun. There's more
two mee than cats. But giveme an outlet that I can connect over
them and talk about them freely withoutpeople saying, oh, I'm a dog
person. You know, it's kindof funny how people go that way.
I mean, if you can figureout how to monetize that community aspect,
that's where the money is. Right. Cat people, dog people, all
animal people can be obsessive. Butwe utilize community quite a bit in our

(01:02:34):
branding and messaging, and I gotto look at it because I remembered this
fully. But community is single bestway to navigate rapid change, build new
practices, pursue results and transformation.So if you can create that community environment
where all of your members become ravingfans, marketing and everything that you love
becomes a lot easier. But that'scool. I constantly text cat pictures to

(01:02:55):
my kids, but since Danielle andI started this, Danielle are texting cat
pictures pelt By And that's one ofthe questions we actually ask people. We
asked them, if you look atyour phone right now, especial if you're
on an iPhone, you can searchfor certain words and it categorizes them,
and we say, if you lookfor the word cat in your phone,
how many do you have? Andthen you can tell who our loyal listeners
are because I'll just get a randomtext message from somebody, or someone will

(01:03:19):
message us on Facebook or Instagram.We'll talk about things. And the other
day we were talking about the songthat was from a movie. We couldn't
figure out what it was sixties later, because you know, the show was
recorded a week earlier, I'm gettingan answer of leading the Tramp And I
was like, did you text theright person? Like that's the answer to
the question on your show? AndI was like, oh, oh wow,
they're listening. This is awesome.Yeah, so we feel like it

(01:03:40):
can be really interacted, but wealso feel like a lot of people don't
want to hear us talking about cats. Yeah, and let's we keep them
short. I'm glad you brought thatup because I was one of the things
I wanted to share again. Withthe format, I've had some people say,
you know, it has to bean hour, it has to be
interview style. You have to havefrouteen commercials or two and a half commercials
as a secret number I think ifit's not fun for you, then I

(01:04:00):
think you can't sustain it and monetizeit. More For us, we're finding
that number between like twenty five andthirty five minutes is good. It's like
just enough because then honestly, atthe end of the day, I'm like,
all right, I'm done talking aboutcosts. Can we talk about something
else? Now? Well, that'skind of funny because Elizabeth never really seems
to lose interest in talking about Yeah, she's a little bit more Hertuart than
I am. I think. Well, I like to say I was born

(01:04:21):
with a cat in my arms.That's my whole life. So it's the
Jersey podcats. And then, Danielle, you're very active on social media too,
Danielle Woolley, we will be rightback. We're not done yet.
If you miss any of this,listen to it on our podcast tomorrow for
Passage to Profit show wrote to Entrepreneurshipwith Richard Elizabeth Gerhart. Our guest today,

(01:04:41):
Ken Paskins, and we will beright back. I'm Richard Gerhart of
Gerhart Law. We specialize in patents, trademarks and copyrights. We love working
with entrepreneurs and here's our client Anyato tell you what it's like working with
us. Anya Hi, I'm Anya, the founder of Happy Bond, and
we've been with gerhard Law for aboutsix years. They've followed our whole patent
and trademark journey and we're extremely happythat we had them at our site,

(01:05:06):
especially because our product is a petcollagen that has now two patents thanks to
them for the joint of the patsand a new dog food that is extremely
new and has a process that isprotected through their help. We really have
to thank them for guiding us throughthe whole process and as a startup,
made it possible for us to dothat. Thank you, Ania. So

(01:05:27):
to learn more about patents, goto learn more about patents dot com and
download our free entrepreneurs guide depends.That's learn more about patents dot com Age
Passage to Profit. Alicia Morrissey isour programming director at Passage to Profit and
she's also a fantastic jazz vocalist.You can scroll to the bottom of the
Passage profitshow dot com website and checkout her album. But now it's time

(01:05:54):
for the question. Elizabeth, youhave a question for our guests, so
Ida put it out there. I'mgoing to ask Ken Paskins first the shiftspot
dot com. So, Ken,what inspires you every day? It's my
family, getting up every day andworking for my family and probably honestly just
coming off Father's Day and my threedaughters fixed me a beautiful breakfast started with

(01:06:16):
an omelet turned into scrambled eggs.Though well, as long as you like
both, but either or I askedfor an omelet turned into scrambled eggs.
I knew that I probably shouldn't haveasked for the omelet, but I tried.
But you guys probably had a lotof fun watching the that's a whole
thing. Yeah, the youngest wasscraping it often. Yeah, it was

(01:06:36):
good. Yeah, I'd have toagree that family is always a good answer.
Yeah. Cliff Beach with Cliff BeachMusic dot com and your book side
Hustle Flow Principles Productive on Amazon.You know, I'm thankful and inspired as
an artist and businessperson that we livein a world where we can get paid
for ideas. I don't find thatto be very novel, and I feel

(01:06:58):
like that the process of being ableto pull an idea from your head out
to make a tangible to the worldwhere other people can access. It's just
an amazing thing. And so I'mjust humbled and inspired by the human experience,
the artistic journey. But really,I think we all have our own
hero's journey, you know, beginningMiddland and cradle to grave, as I
heard mentioned earlier, and so I'mjust inspired that you can pull that child

(01:07:21):
like wonderment forward and to life whereyou can continue to ask interesting questions and
be curious about the world. AndI think people that do that end up
having more interesting and exciting lives.Excellent, Yes, Danielle Woolley The Jersey
Podcasts dot Com, but also avery successful businesswoman. What inspires you every
day? For me, it's beingmore myself and being able to aim to

(01:07:45):
be the person that I wish Ihad when I was younger, especially because
I've always been kind of quirky andcreative, but I've also been very business
oriented. Early on, like Iwas obsessed the customer service. One of
my first jobs. People are,like, you mean, the counter where
people go to to yell at youfor stuff that's wrong. I just love
learning how everything worked and how tomake it better. And I kind of
held myself back a little bit backthen. Because nobody was really doing those

(01:08:05):
things or saying the things that Inow say and do. So what inspires
me is trying to be myself sothat others feel like it's okay for them
to be themselves too. Excellent Richardyour Heart, owner of your Heart Law,
Patton's trademarks, copyrights. Inspiration comesfrom a lot of sources. For
me, I like a good pizza, and I adore my family. Elizabeth

(01:08:27):
and my kids are constant sources ofinspiration, and the Cats to a lesser
extent. And then I would sayprobably the entrepreneurial journey I am on with
your Heart Law. You know,every day is different, every day is
a mixtay. You know, everyday has its highs and its lows.
But I feel like I'm growing allthe time and working hard to meet the

(01:08:49):
challenges. So I think for me, the pleasure is in the journey.
And people say that, but that'sreally where I'm at. Well, what
inspires me? As I said,I have a video directory of business owners,
and we have this radio show andpodcast and the cat podcast. Other
people really inspire me. I lovehearing their stories. But I have to
agree with Ken as well. Mydaughter inspires me my son too to some

(01:09:13):
degree. But I want to bea role model for my daughter and I
want her to see how successful womencan be, so hopefully it'll be successful.
You're already successful and you're already aninspiration to her. Thank you.
So I'm doing exactly what I loveright now. So at this point in
my life, that's a good thing. So our guest today was Ken Paskins,
business transformational expert, co founder ofthe shift Spot shift Spot, founder

(01:09:39):
of GC Strategic Consulting. He hasa special offer for anybody listening. Honestly,
if I were in the position totake this up, I would if
I could be yes, members ofPassage to Profit and that applies no,
but he's got two people that getback to him a free gap analysis for
their company, which is just anamazing thing to to get. And to

(01:10:00):
get that you go to his website, the shiftspot dot com, slash set
forward slash I guess yeah, andthe code is Passage to Profits. So
honestly, if you have a businessand you're listening to this and you want
to get some expert advice, Iwould definitely put my name in the hat
for this. So it's gonna picktwo people. And then we had Cliffbeach

(01:10:20):
and honestly, I don't think we'veever had anybody on the show before.
He's been on American Idol. I'mlike so impressed. But Cliff has been
in the music world a long timeand he's done a lot of amazing things
and you can find out more abouthim at cliffbeachmusic dot com. And then
his book is called Side Hustle FlowPrinciples, Thank You, and that is

(01:10:41):
available on Amazon, and you canfind his music videos on YouTube. And
then we had my co host forJersey Podcasts, Danielle Woolley, and you
can get a hold of us atthe Jersey Podcasts go to the website in
Jersey podcats dot com. Danielle isjust like a fountain of knowledge. He's
also professional services consultant and she's aliaison for a rescue group, Tommy Scat's

(01:11:02):
Riscue Cats are the name of thegame. We love our cats. So
before we go, I'd like tothank the Passage to Profit team, Noah
Fleischman, our producer, Alicia Morrissey, our program director. Our podcasts can
be found tomorrow anywhere you find yourpodcast, just look for the Passage to
profit show and don't forget to likeus on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

(01:11:23):
And remember, while the information onthis program is believed to be correct,
never take a legal step without checkingwith your legal professional first. Gear
Heart Law is here for your patent, trademark and copyright needs. You can
find us acureheartlaw dot com and contactus for free consultation. Take care of
everybody, Thanks for listening, andwe'll be back next week. The proceeding

(01:11:50):
was a paid podcast. iHeartRadio's hostingof this podcast constitutes neither an endorsement of
the products offered or the ideas expressed