EntreLeadership - #372: Going All Out in Your Business with Paul Steele

Episode Date: April 27, 2020

Triple 8 Management Partner Paul Steele says he’s always been an entrepreneur but is quick to admit that it kind of happened by accident. Diagnosed with attention deficit disorder as a young child, Paul chose to channel what he calls his “fidgeting” into entrepreneurial endeavors, like selling his baseball card collections or stamping envelopes for his mother’s real estate business. And once he started working, he never stopped—and he’s logged enough 80+ hour work weeks to prove it . Tune in to hear how Paul went from being homeless (three times!) in college to today heading up one of the fastest-growing music management companies in Nashville.   entreleadership.com/podcast Triple 8 Management Moon River Music Festival Magnolia Record Club EntreLeadership's Business Health Assessment 13 Ways to Build a High Performing Remote Team from BELAY Review this episode for a chance to win a $25 Amazon gift card   Want expert help with your business question? Call 844-944-1070 and leave a message or send an email to [e-mail]. You could be featured on a future podcast episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We love that title, entrepreneur, the driven, risk-taking, creative, crazy person that has the audacity to take an idea and make a business. And we all know that the entrepreneur is someone who loves to start new ideas, new projects, or even new businesses, but there's a dark side of this entrepreneurial spirit. In the process of going a little in on everything, you run the risk of not actually going all in on anything. From the Ramsey Network, this is the Entree Leadership podcast. where we help business leaders grow themselves, their teams, and their profits. I'm your host Alex Judd, and today's guest is someone who exemplifies that entrepreneurial spirit, but is still very much all in. Now, I want you to brace yourself because the list of everything today's guest, Paul Steele does,

it's a long one. He started and sold a music management company. He works as a partner for AAA music management, where he and his team represent artists like Drew Holcomb, Josh Abbott Band, Judah and the Lion, and Scotty McCreary. He found in the Moon River Music Festival with Drew Holcomb. He's the partner and co-founder in a vinyl subscription service called Magnolia Record Club. He's also the owner and founder of a record label and distribution company called Good Time Records. On top of that, he runs a speak easy bar in his basement and has one of the largest collections of antique bourbon in all of the South.

He and his wife also run a thriving short-term rental business here in Nashville. Oh, yeah. On top of all that, he's a husband. He's a father and he has a thriving network of relationships across the city. Now, I know what you're thinking because I'm thinking it too. How on earth does this guy do all of that? And here's what's crazy. He partially attributes his capacity to do all of these things to something that the world today has labeled a disorder.

I would love to tell you that my plan has always been hyperintentional. That is incorrect. I feel like every time I've done a five-year plan, it is always greatly meandered away from that. Like every entrepreneur on the planet. Yeah, exactly. So I think I've always been an entrepreneurally minded person on accident before I knew what that definition was. I've been recently attruted it to my ADD. I have found that that has been a great benefit to me as I've aged.

So are you, do you actually have ADD? Yeah. Wow, because so many people make jokes about it today, but you are someone that actually has it, and now you're kind of leveraging that. It was really interesting. I feel like a lot of parents in the 80s were a little bit wheels off. My mom was very much like, let's fix you. So my brother and I were on ADD meds really early on, for better or for worse. And before there was a lot of research about their effects and what they did.

And for me, they drained me from a personality perspective. And so, yeah, I was probably six or seven when I was first getting tested and prescribed medication, and it was Ritalin, Focolin, Adderall, six other names, I can't recall, and I would just start flushing them. Because I didn't like, I was seven years old. I was probably, I probably took them pretty religiously from seven to 11. And then once I kind of got my wits about me, I just didn't like how I felt. and home life was unique to say the least. And so I just kind of started to take matters in my own hands.

And I would medicate for tests, but I wouldn't take it unless there was something I needed to study for. It definitely did help me with school, help me study. So I think that's actually when the entrepreneurial side started to kind of kick in. I would reallocate my fidgeting into, like I had a comic book baseball card collection that I just started to sell. at the end of our street. What age was that at? I was 11. Gosh.

Yeah, 10 or 11. And it didn't go great because we lived on a cul-de-sac. So we didn't get the drive-bys. That cold-de-sac probably bought a lot of comic books. Yeah, but I would put signs up all along the neighborhood. And every single Saturday and Sunday, I'd be out there with the table and all the stuff lined out and people would come by. And so at that age, were you thinking to yourself, this is a business?

I was just trying to not be bored. Okay. You know, I mean, and we come from a very working class family. Yeah. You know, when I was probably around the same age, maybe earlier nine, I wanted a pair of shoes. And my mom said, well, you know, you're going to have to probably work for them. And so I would go to, this was over the summer, you know, out of school. So I would, a lot of the stuff was just trying to keep Paul busy in the summertime because I was a lot to handle.

Yeah, a lot of energy. And so I would go with her too. She was a real estate agent. go to her real estate agency and I would lick stamps. I got paid per stamp and I would seal envelopes and I would put up for sale signs. I would attach a wagon to my bicycle and put for sale and open house signs in that wagon and drive the neighborhoods for the houses they were assigned and just put those signs up and I got paid per sign. I got paid per stamp and envelope and so on and so forth and I would do things around the house and then she she didn't list me to do

chores for her friends, and I would get paid a little bit for that, and I got those shoes. So to me, working was this something you do? It was a means to an end in that capacity. Can you speak to the value of work for children? Oh, yeah. I mean, I think it kept me out a lot of trouble. I mean, I think kids, I mean, every situation is different, but I think for me, I was going to be doing something with my time. When I was bored, we almost burned our house down, my brother and I. Like actually? Yeah, yeah. We were cold outside and we started a fire and our little fort we built.

Oh, my. You lit a fire in the house but not in a fireplace. No, we, well, so we built this, we built this fort in our backyard. It was attached to the fence. So first of all, I wanted windows. So I saw it a hole in the fence of our neighbor's fence. Oh, my gosh. So that didn't go great.

And it was, you know, from Houston. So we thought it was freezing. It was probably like 50. And we had all these leaves. And we put all these leaves in this little area underneath our fort and we lit it on fire because that's what you do when you're cold. So all that to say, whenever you had work to do, that was a good thing. So then, you know, the fence catches on fire. You know, it was a whole thing.

So most of the time when we were bored, we would fight or we would get in trouble. So I think work doing something productive, whether that's helping around the house with chores or yard work or finding ways to positively run. reward and reinforce children. For me, taught me a lot of valuable lessons and I think kept me out of the trouble, more than whatever pain it made have caused. Gosh. And that pain for me, for me, was fixed pretty easy with about three months of therapy. So I'm a big, I'm a big proponent of it.

So it's fascinating to hear that that's your background and the fact that you did have ADD, but you chose to say, like, I'm going to channel all this energy in really focused ways towards work whenever it's productive, towards burning down the house when it's not, but walk us through now all the things that you are now involved in today. Sure. Well, so I, my primary job is music business. I started a lot of failed companies in high school and early college and found myself wanting to help artists with their businesses without really knowing that's what I was trying to do. I just, I saw creatives that weren't being promoted very well and thought I should help them promote. I got in a very lucky situation when I heard train on the radio, their

first singles meet Virginia, heard it on KTCU, the college radio station, and walked across the street to the record store, bought the record that that song was on, turned it over and saw a tiny little logo that said, aware records on it, and aware reps.com. Went to the website, signed up to be a rep, and I was one of the only reps in Texas. And this tiny little label called Aware was the label for Train. And they had had regional success before that, but that was really the record that kind of popped them. And in that two-year period, they broke John Mayer,

they broke Five for Fighting. They later had a very successful management company with the Frey, broke them, Brandy Carlisle. And you were their rep in Texas? And I was one of their reps in Texas. One of the only reps early on. And then they got bigger, obviously, as they had success. And so that was an eye-opening experience.

I owe a lot to that. How old were you then? I was 18, 19, 20. My word. And I would drive around the state of Texas doing sales reports for like 50 bucks a report, losing money on gas. And we'd promote shows when they'd come into town and records. We put up posters all over. And just it was grassroots marketing.

It was early days grassroots marketing. And you're simultaneously in school too? Yeah. Okay. So are you just, are you enjoying this grind, that is, I mean, just hustling with school and then hustling around the state doing all that work? Or like, what was your mindset like at that time? Yeah, to say I did all this well would be really generous.

I'm definitely a picture of learning from your mistakes. I was an honors program, 3-2MBA pre-law, and I pretty much failed out of college that first semester. Are you serious? Yeah, I got a 1-6 GPA. So I had to get a 4-0 the next year to keep my scholarship. I did, but I didn't sleep, and I got mono. And I was kind of in and out of school for better or for worse. It took me about six years to finish.

Okay. So you're learning a lot of lessons in a lot of lessons. Yeah, I was homeless three times. Oh, my word, Paul. But, I mean, homeless as a 22-year-old is kind of fun. You know, all your friends are around. You can sleep on their couches. I slept in front of their houses in my car.

I was on the road half the time. So it's a dramatic statement. And my, you know, if I was homeless today, that would look quite a bit different. Yes, absolutely. But I had a really good sports system. I still had my college ID, so I would work out and shower at the gym there still. And it was like, you know, kind of summer campy. But I was working probably 80 hours a week. Holy cow. You know, I turned my apartment into an office. I had a couple interns. And I was in college at the time. And there were interns from TCU coming to work. A couple of them who moved here. They've been pretty successful.

And I got evicted for doing that. You know, I took the doors off. I read a job. I read a Jeff Bezos' biography, you know, about him taking the doors off of his closet and turned them into tables. So I did that. I put holes in them and, you know, they didn't like me. And they proved that with their eviction. You just kind of have a history of breaking a lot of rules. I've just found that when the worst case scenario happens, it's still not that bad. Like, eviction, it was, I mean, not an ideal situation. Yeah. But I was fine. Like, that's what's starting me down the path of the music business. was aware. And then I just went out on my own, started to sign some acts and got very lucky with the

acts I did sign who ended up having great success. And I moved to Nashville really out of necessity. I wanted to move to L.A. or New York because I wasn't working in – I was working in Pop or Rock, which at Nashville at the time of 2000. And six or five wasn't exactly what they were known for. And it was the best thing that ever. happened. I thought I'd be here six months, and that ended up being, obviously, I'm still here. It's been an amazing run because I was one of the few people early on that was doing non-country or non-Christian music.

And so it was like a little club. We would get together and talk, like a lot of the agents that are doing really well now were interns then or assistants then. There's now a ton of people that have moved to Nashville from L.A. and New York because it costs living or opportunity. and to see that side of the business be birthed and to have the lack of expenses that I would have had in New York or L.A. allowed me to skip a few steps in business development and then reinvest that in myself and my business to allow my entrepreneurial ADD, if you will,

to percolate and to grow. And so from that, we've been able to spend, I've been able to spend my music business experience into a music festival called Moon River Music Festival in Chattanooga. with one of my clients Drew Holcomb. And we also started a record club, a vinyl subscription service. You pay 25 bucks a month.

You get a record in the mail that he curates. We were able to sell both of those entities off to other companies. And thankfully, they've allowed to still be involved. So I think, you know, Drew was a good client to have who's also entrepreneurly minded. So we've been able to kind of play off one another for better or for worse. And I think I've just always been a pragmatic person. So anytime I see an opportunity, I just strike at that. You just take action.

Yeah, so when Airbnb was coming up, before it was a thing, we thought, well, my wife and I were traveling three weeks a month at the time, sometimes less, sometimes more. We did a six-week vacation. We're like, well, let's have that paid for if we can do this Airbnb thing on the side. So that turned into a whole thing, had a couple properties that were doing that. And we've been able to invest a lot in real estate over the last two years. So I just think we're involved in a lot of different things. And you're still consulting for some of those previous businesses as well, correct? Correct. And then primary gig is with triple-Aid management. You're doing music management for that.

Okay, so you've got all these things going on. It seems like so often people in America today are saying like, I just need to less work. I need to be 40 hours a week. Sounds like that is not your approach at all, correct? It has not been. Okay. It has not been. For better or for worse, again, I think there's definitely been seasons of my life where I've probably worked a little too much. I've clocked 70 or 80 hours before. Yeah. But I think I'm at a really healthy fun 65. Yeah. But you say that honestly, it's a really healthy fun 65 hours a week. For me, it has been, yes. And you love it that means.

I do. I do. And I think it's allowed me, I think I come from a place where I want to work really, really hard and do as much as I can, as quickly as I can, so that I can do what I want sooner than most people might find that reality. Which is what you want is what? I want the financial freedom to work on my own time and have the freedom to be with my kid whenever I need to be or want to be. Take them on trips, go on vacation with my wife, not be stressed about who's calling and when and when to answer that call and help people. I love the most joy I get currently probably over the last decade has just been listening to people's stories and finding their problems and helping them solve. them. Management allows that. That's one of the reasons I really like it. That's a different

problem every day. Every single day something happens where I have to use my mind. I love using my mind. I love strategic thinking. I love helping light bulbs go off in people's lives, including my own. I love epiphany moments, whether they're large or small, there's nothing greater than realized clarity, whether it's one thing that you're experiencing or one thing you're helping someone experience. Bringing closure to something. I hate moving. movies that leave unanswered questions. I love a tight net. Oh, there's closure to that. Yeah. And I love that experience in my own life, and I love helping people come to that experience. And you do that with a lot of business owners right now, too. I do, yeah. Consulting's been a really

fun thing. I like and don't like consulting in a way because you get paid for your opinion. Yeah. They don't always listen to your opinion. Come on, man. Yeah, there's a difference between opinion and action. There is. There is. But I really genuinely do enjoy that. And I do it for free a lot. I'd say I do it for free more. than I don't. Just because that, what's the point of doing all this if you can't help people? You know, I think that's a big, big thing for me. People paid it forward for me. I have great mentors. I have great people who had nothing to gain by helping me. And that left a very lasting impact on me. And I get great joy out of doing that for others. So I think in a perfect world,

I'm doing more of that quicker than I would if I just did a normal 40 hour a week, 9 to 5, hopefully would be fortunate enough to retire at 5560. I'm trying to do that by, you know, 45 instead. Very cool. I feel like there's a lot of talk and a lot of publicity around people that are trying to retire early right now. But it seems like it's not always the same approach that you're talking about. A lot of times we see pictures of individuals that are just absolutely busting their tail doing things that they hate that make them miserable for 40 years so that they can one day reach this off in the distance,

completely separate reality of retirement. It sounds like that is not where you are. No. I mean, is that fair to say, like, you are actually enjoying where you're at and at the same time on this journey to retire early? Yeah. I mean, I think, again, I'm really, really fortunate. Right now, I'm working in a business that for thousands of years was patronage or free.

The music business, by its definition, is not a real business. It's a hobby that some people make money at through various courses. of their life. So I think I've had that reality since day one. I have known that this could go away. There's no promise to art being monetized, right? Okay, but that's a pretty incredible level of self-awareness to be able to look in the mirror and say, the thing that I do could go away like that. It could, though. I mean, if you look at it, the music business is the most disruptive business there is. Technology comes to the music business to mess it up and play with their stuff to then go mass market with it, whether it's TikTok or Snapchat or Twitter or Facebook or MySpace or whatever

it's been. Music is where you involve music to give people in. Then you mess it all up. The distribution methods get changed and you have to rewrite the script. Yeah. That's happened every decade since the existence of consumption. Gosh. And so does that not just freak you out?

No, it's fun. I've been doing it 20, I don't know, 25, 20 years, something like that. And I've made it through three cataclysmic consumption changes. and I've made more money every single year. And so if you embrace those things early, I was an early adopter on Spotify, early adopter on Napster, if you receive change and you're okay to be nimble with it, you're probably going to be okay.

And if you're not, again, the worst case scenarios have never been the worst thing in the world. I'm a smart person. If this thing goes away, I'm going to be just fine. But part of that is because I've been working so hard, and been smart with decisions we've made financially to where there's good cushions. There's good security blankets. I'm not going to freak out.

And we have different sets of business now that we've been able to build to where genuinely feel it won't way tomorrow. We would be just fine. And there's great beauty in that. I'm very, very thankful to be able to state that. But, I mean, I could get a job in an adagency tomorrow. And I don't think any of this is going to go away. Yeah. But it could.

But it gives you the ability to have an incredibly loose grip. And just sitting here talking to you, it's you are operating every day from a position of strength, it seems as though. On my best days. Yeah. Yeah. I think perspective you have to remind yourself of, right? So when I'm a bit of a preparer or worrier in some cases. Really?

Yeah. I have a propensity. When you grow up, I was kind of the non-rich kid at the rich kid school. So when you grow up viewing yourself in a lesser-than capacity a little bit, you have to over-rength. you have to overcompensate and compensate for that. So over the last decade, I've done a lot of self-work to change my perspective and view it. And you really do have to live day by day. My dad has a great quote about fighting for joy today.

You're giving enough grace to get through today. You don't have to worry about tomorrow. You don't have to worry about yesterday. Yesterday is already done. You're not promised tomorrow, that whole idea. Yeah. And he applies that to joy as well. You've got to fight for joy.

And I think when I wake up and remind myself like, you know what, I'm going to do my best to fight for joy today. It's a really, really freeing perspective to have. And I'm thankful that more days than not I've been able to have that. But yeah, who doesn't worry? It's like our favorite hobby in America, you know. That's right. So at what point did the vision of I want to retire early so that I can be financially free, financially nimble and help people on my own time? and be with my family. At what time did that vision really become crystallized for you?

Financial freedom, to me, hit me when I first left school, and my dad said, okay, well, you're definitely on your own now. I think the reality of like, oh, I've always worked hard, but there hadn't been consequences necessarily for my financial decisions. And he was helping me through college as long as I was in it. And when I went on tour for the first time, and he said, okay, well, I'm going to help you with your insurance, but other than that, you're on your own. That was a really eye-opening experience for me.

And it wasn't a rude thing he did. He was just like, hey, these are the kind of the rules. These are the guidepost that you get to run in. And if you aren't going to subscribe to those, that's absolutely fine. I respect you, but I'm not going to help you in that. You're now a grown-up. now that happened a couple years earlier than I thought it would and so I think that's when it hit me where I was like okay I want to be the I want to be the master of my own fate here and I'm going to double down and and just work as hard as possible to get creative and fight for freedom that felt like I wasn't free in that moment I felt scared I felt kind of trapped and I had this fork in the road so I could go back to school and the safety net of that or I could flex up and say double down and say I'm a capable person you know and I think when you're when

you're 20 years old you're also kind of an idiot you're like a little invincible so I'm thankful for that yeah time and kind of helped you so what that fork in the road the stability of going back to school versus I'm going to really go out this thing and try and create a future that doesn't yet exist was it a legitimate fork in the road decision like did it take a lot of time and energy to make that decision? No. I mean, I think when you're when you're 20 again, you kind of shoot from the hip. There was a tangible fork on the road that lasted about a day and a half. I deliberated and I thought, you know, this, this is something I want to do. I'm going to do it. And if I need to go back in six months, I'll go back in six months. What was it that gave you the conviction to take the first step?

Absolute, unadulterated pride. Really? For sure. Yeah. So it's almost like you can look at that now and you can say, well, that was kind of maybe a little bit stupid, and at the same time, I'm a little bit thankful for it. It was pure ego. I'm thankful for the grace to end up on the other side. So were you ready at that time? No. No, absolutely not.

I don't think in most of the citizens I've made up been ready. Life happens whether you want it to or not. So you just kind of need to adapt to it. But I think in that moment, it was very much a, I can always go back. No big deal. Yeah. And I did. You know, I'm very thankful that I was able to do 37 hours of independent.

it study or something like that. My dad really wanted me to get a degree. And I wanted to honor him in that. But it took a minute. Yeah. I don't regret any of that. Boy, you probably push your dad to the limit, too, in terms of like, because I'm pretty sure. I mean, I'm sure he loves you and cares about you and wants to see you thrive and succeed in the same way. Like, he's seeing you take this risk and seeing this could potentially pay off or it could be him being an idiot. Yeah, but I mean, I did have fun with it, though. You know, I went to Chipotle. And I said, hey, I'll clean your windows for free food. So they said, cool.

So I cleaned the windows at Chipotle once a week, and I got, I ate there 14 times a week. Holy cow. I need to stop at Chipotle after this conversation. So there were just these moments of that where, and like anyone I brought would eat for free. I think they got the worst end of that deal. I think they stopped doing that for college kids. But you just got creative. So does that creative problem solving, is that something that you were wired from?

Is that just part of the way that you're kind of designed? I think so. I think that's a really hard thing to teach. deduction, self-starting, those kind of concepts. I think some of that's ingrained in you. I think you can obviously teach some of that, but for me, I have just, I'm very, very, very lucky to have, I can see through the field and say, here's how I can get there. I'm good at finding ways to get to a conclusion to put the next step down and then the next step and then the next step. That comes very, very organically and naturally to me.

And I'm incredibly thankful for it. I think that's probably my greatest attribute. Isn't it crazy how almost overnight so many businesses suddenly became remote working organizations? And for people that have done this for a long time, it's business as usual. But for businesses like ours where it's like, holy cow, we've never done this before, we've got a lot of questions. Like, how do we maintain our culture? How do we make sure everyone's moving in the same direction? How do we structure communication and make sure that we run these Zoom meetings in a way that's not incredibly awkward?

Well, the team over at Belay has a 100% remote workforce, and they've been doing this for years, and they've compiled everything that they've learned in a guide that's called 13 ways to build a high-performing remote team. It's going to give you a bunch of tips and a bunch of practices for making sure that your team performs and stays connected and unified while they're working remote. So if you want to download this free guide, just text Belay to 31996. Again, to get the free guide, text the word belay to 3196. Why do you think it is that people who want financial freedom and know that they're going to have to take some creative, risky next steps like what you're talking about often sit paralyzed? I think a lot of its life situation. I think financial freedom for a lot of people is an answer to a frustration rather than something that they, like it's very rare.

is something you naturally come to in a happy place. If you want something, it's because you don't have it. Yeah, you're sick and tired of being sick and tired. Right. And so I think there's a lot of entrapment to that, right? Making decisions in high-stress scenarios rarely is clear thinking. And I think we live in a great culture of the grass is always greener. Yeah.

Right. You can ask 10 retired people if they're happy and they're going to say, no, they're bored out of their minds, you know. So I think there is, sometimes you get what you want, and you're like, I didn't really want that. Yeah. But I think people work so hard, we burn out so fast, I think financial freedom is an answer to being able to do the idea of that of,

oh, I can do what I want when I want it. That idea, there's something so beautiful and sexy to that, you know, I think, especially for my generation, the generation after me, really, really desires to call their own shots to go against the grain to they saw their parents work and climb the ladder. They retired when they were older and they didn't get to do all the things they wanted. And I think we're maybe a little bit more selfish in a way. I think what's important now versus what was important then, like people are getting married

later. They're having kids later. The corporate structure isn't the same. There's not as much ladders to climb. There's a number of reasons that are just true that are. have changed. I think 08 and 09 changed a lot of how businesses are built, how big businesses get, what opportunities are in business, what pensions look like, what retirement funds are available. You can start an online business today right now and let a thousand people know

about it on social media right now. And that didn't exist. That didn't exist. I think I think you can, there's probably a hundred legitimate true reasons for that. And so, So I think, like you just said with access, access is a big deal. I think if you wanted to self-start, you have more resources available to you to do that than you ever have in the history of business. You, the barrier of interest. It's the same reason why more music gets made every year than the year before. You can literally get your iPhone out right now, record something, put it on Spotify in 72 hours. Gosh.

So, and it costs you like nine bucks to do that, right? only 10% of the music that gets put out gets over a hundred, I think it's over a thousand streams per song. I mean, the same type of stats exist for books. I mean, all types of mediums. So what would you say to the small business owner, though, that is on the treadmill and just trying to keep their one business that they've started running and they feel like they're being maybe a little bit

crushed and trapped by that thing and they're trying to figure that thing out? And at the same time, they love the picture that you're painting of a brighter future with financial freedom and getting to spend more time with their family. That's a really hard question. That's a really good question. I think for me, the advice I have for people is I like to take a few steps back and say, why did you start doing this in the first place? Let's take the pain out of it, the work out of it. Why are you doing this? and if they can't remember

and if there's no joy there at all then do something else I think having the freedom to say you don't have to make this work so if they can't do that let's have a bigger conversation about opportunity and what you can do and what that looks like

that said if somebody can recall the joy that they that little spark that came to them and they said I want to do this this is why I want to do this and you get back to the basics of what encouraged you to make that step, then you can have a really, really beautiful, productive conversation of what the next steps are and open their books, look at it, like,

okay, how can we trim some costs, make some hard decisions? Are you overstaffed? Are you understaffed? You know, there's... But you even said hard decisions, and it's going to be hard decisions, even harder actions. Oh, yeah. And it seems like if they don't have that defining why or purpose to drive those hard decisions and hard actions, there's no point in doing. No, that's absolutely right. And that's why I say, like, if you cannot genuinely have an honest conversation with yourself to see through all of the stuff that is now around you to get back to the basic billing block of why you are doing this and what it gives you to do, then it's probably not going to work. There has to be something in you to force you to take that action. Because if you can't answer that question, then it's much easier to have that action.

There's immediate revitalization inside of them. I think a lot of the times friends exist or mentors exist or whatever you call it to keep people on the tracks. Sometimes you just need somebody to put you back on the tracks. And say, hey, remember why you started this. Yeah. And sometimes that time passes. There's things that made me happy that that time had passed where no longer served me. And I needed to close that chapter.

And were there times where sometimes other people called that act? out in your life before you did? Absolutely. I think it's always that way. I think it's very, very hard to think that the more you isolate yourself, the harder it is for you to see. So whether it's a wife or husband or good friend or father or whoever, if you don't have at least one person who you can be honest with and you can be honest with you, it's a very

lonely world out there. So I really, really like doing life with other people. I love when people speaking to me. I love speaking to other people. And it's just more fun. It's more fun to succeed in community. Yeah. Always more fun to succeed in community.

One of the things. And struggle in community. Yeah. Well, that's right. And that's part of what makes community, it seems like, is the struggle. And being willing, we see a lot of times it can be really tempting for highly driven people to try and manufacture community by impressing people. Totally. And, I mean, I've noticed this in my own life.

That leaves you upset. set and frustrated and with no actual connections. Absolutely. Did it take courage for you to really connect with people around not just the shiny image of Paul that is accomplishing all these things, but the image of Paul that is, I mean, has struggles, has big decisions that he has to make and isn't absolutely certain or sure about the future? Well, I think this is one thing that I was really, really fortunate of in being in the music

business and making that decision. There were two people doing what I was doing in Dallas, Fort Worth out of what, eight million people or whatever. So I knew I needed, if I was going to keep any of these clients I had signed, I needed a bigger network. That's just the tangible reality of the music business. You need other people to accomplish your goals. You need people believing you. You need chances. You need different people on the team to do what you need to do.

And honestly, I would say that's any business, maybe magnified in music business. And so I just, I know. needed a bigger network. And the only way I was going to get that was to leave. So I had a forced springboard to leave the nest of Fort Worth and Texas. And I couldn't afford LA or New York. So Nashville was the next thing. I was like, okay, well, I'll be here six months, save money, then move to L.A. or New York. What happened was I met a few other people who were at a similar place, not wanting to do country or Christian music. And then we did this together. I work with a lot of those same people that I met, I don't know, 15, 16 years ago.

Really? I still do business with them today. So there's so many relationships, and Drew is another one on, Drew Holcomb, and your marriage seems happy and healthy. Your family seems happy and healthy as well. There's so many times where we look at the entrepreneurial individual, and a lot of times they apply that same, like, oh, I'm just going to start new things and do new things all the time.

And as a result, they apply that strategy to their relationships and to their life. and their relationships are shallow and last a year. But you're talking about all these people that you've known for 15 years. How do you keep that steadfastness and commitment that it takes to have real thriving relationships in this city? Effort. There's no replacement for doing the work. And I think my wife and I have tried to be ringleaders in that. We have standing events that we host.

We have a regular coffee thing at a place down the street where everyone is welcome. We're there no matter what. If you'd like to see us, you can show up. And we find reasons to celebrate. Something that a client of mine, his dad told him, was, work is not worth doing if you can't celebrate the wins. He told me that probably in 2010. And that was a life-altering quote.

Yeah. So I think putting in the work to stay connected with people, doing work with them, I mean, a lot of these people I've invested with. I've invested in them. They've invested in me. We've done business together. We still do business together. And so, you know, I think that's an easy way to eliminate some of the competition as well. Just say, hey, let's do this together. Let's buy that together. Or let's, I have this idea, do you want to come in with me? Just having an open table. I don't need everything. I'm fine with a little bit. bit of it. Yeah. You know, and I'm fine with you having a little bit of it. I'm fine, diversifying risk. That doesn't bother me. And sometimes it fails, and that's okay. And saying it's okay if it fails is probably a healthy perspective. So I think, but truly it's just effort. I mean, reminding yourself that you need to pursue people and you can't expect the phone to go off and you can't get insulted if people get busy and have a kid and don't hear from them for a year. Make them know they're still welcome. Make them, you know, invite them. No, no pressure. Hey,

we're doing this thing. Do you want to come? No, okay, no problem. Well, and it sounds like not all your relationships, some of them are, but not all of your relationships revolve around your work. Is that fair? Absolutely. I would say my very closest friends I don't do any work with. So can you speak to the value of having real authentic connection? What is the value of having that in your life to your work. It's an unparalleled, undescribable value. It keeps you grounded. It makes you remember that work isn't everything.

I think if you're only in relationships for people who are in your business worldview, then all you're going to talk about is a very specific thing. There's beauty in that. That's a fine thing to talk about. But if you're living and breathing and dying by that, when you're not doing that, you're going to have a lonely existence. I find it very important to have people who I don't talk about any of that with because that's when you talk about family.

That's when you talk about, and sometimes you can have close relationships and work and do that, and that's fine. But for me, I do value a little bit of separation in that where you can really be reminded of all the things that aren't work. Certainly, we're not all just doing this to just work and then do nothing. Yeah. Right? Yeah.

And I think if you have relationships outside of your profession, it's easier to see that. It's easier to be reminded about that, especially if you can vacation with these people and have a standing dinner with these people once a month or go out, you know, watch a game with them, go to their place. Like, do life with these people. It recharges me. Yeah. It brings me back home. It makes me feel less tired, less alone. Probably three sets expectations that, I mean, what you said earlier, you've got this remarkable perspective that,

even if this stuff doesn't work, you're going to be okay. And part of that is that even if the music business thing blows up in your face tomorrow, you're still not going to be alone. No. That's a pretty powerful perspective. So what would you say to the entrepreneur right now that probably wouldn't tell anyone this, but would self-identify as lonely and knows they need what you talk about, but they don't know what to do next?

Yeah, that's a dark place. When I first moved here, I was in that place. for about six months. Really? Yeah, I was in a unique spot where I knew a lot of people that had lived in Nashville and were in Nashville, and I would see them when I would visit. But I feel like once I moved here, they're like, oh, we'll see them eventually. It's like that mindset changes, you know.

And I think that happens with a lot of people when they move to cities where they might know a few people. It's hard to integrate into someone's culture that they've already created for themselves. That's right. versus getting an hour of their time for coffee when you're driving through. And so that was a really, really, really lonely place. And I think that's a hard thing. I think it also depends on how old these people are, right?

It's easier for a 25-year-old to make new friends than it might be a 45-year-old who's starting a new business or doing a new thing or just got divorced or just had a second kid or whatever may be. So that answer is a little relative to what position they find themselves in. I think. Let's talk to the 45-year-old, because that's a lot of our listeners. Totally. So talk to that person. I would say, tangibly, I think from the work perspective, maybe joining a couple groups that might work in the same place.

So industry standard group or something like that? Industry groups, co-working stuff. Chamber of Commerce. Chamber of Commerce. I think from a relational perspective, your schools, you know, the parents of your kids going to school together. putting yourself out there, birthday parties of your kids. I think a lot of stuff revolves around kids at that point. Yeah.

And so I think a lot of it is perspective on opening yourself up for that. I think it is a very hard thing to do to put yourself out there. Especially whenever you, there is no shortage of work that you could do in the business. Totally. And just in anything, it takes time to develop a relationship. So I think, one, deciding to put yourself out there in a way that you probably haven't in a while. It's just that is a difficult thing to do. And then two, having the patience to foster that relationship is a difficult thing to do. I was very lucky to move here when I was 25, 26, and there were a lot of other 25, 26-year-olds, 24-year-olds.

And so we would go play volleyball. I would just start like, oh, can I join that? We'd go to a bar or whatever. It was really, really easy to do that. Yeah. And I still have all those relationships. I'm very fortunate. A lot of them stayed.

So I think when you're in your middle age, you kind of have to push reset a little bit and transcend back to that time and say, okay, whether it's a church or school or extracurricular groups, that exists for all ages. I like to say, like I just formed this group with several other entrepreneurs. And the only rule was you have to come three times. If you're going to commit to this, you have to come three times before you decide to stay with it. How often do you meet? Nine times a year. nine times a year and if you're going to be a part of it you have to come three times the first three times if you can't do that don't join and you started this so there's value there too because i mean that gives hope to

people like you can start something you don't have to go looking for a club or something you started your own thing so what is the purpose of this thing that you started uh it's multifaceted the main purpose is just to get different perspectives on how people are utilizing their time and money really I mean, at the end of the day, it's people of all different walks of life and who have all done well in their own right. And so it's an iron sharp and iron concept. It's a, what do you see? I mean, I get hit up every week about an investment. Yeah.

I'm sure they do too. So the point is, let's, again, put everything out on a whiteboard, do this together, see you through the trees a little bit. Okay, that's not worth it. That's not worth it. That is. There's a nugget there. Let's look at that. Let's do that together.

And so that's the main purpose. And from that, there's community as well. And so, and then the hope is there's one-on-ones that separate out of that. Maybe these two guys really connect. Maybe they go, get together, and friendships will exist within that. So that's the idea. But the main purpose of the time together is pretty business. So much of what I admire about that and about what you said about the coffee shop,

I think you said that your wife and you just show up and you say, y'all can show up if you want to. Every Saturday at 11 o'clock. There's so much of what you've talked about with regard to the relationship. work you are doing is saying, I'm going to be here, would love for you to join as well. That takes a lot of courage because you are opening yourself up to rejection or to people not showing up. And like, you're the person that's going first. You are leading in that capacity. Where does that courage come from for you? Or how did you develop that practice? For me, there's beauty in either answer, right? You just said the downsides. The downsides are great.

Nobody shows up. I get time to myself. Nobody shows up to the. Nobody shows up to the coffee, my wife and I get to hang out with our kid. Beautiful. Beautiful. What a better way to spend your Saturday. Nobody shows up to the group, okay, well, it's normally here in my basement with 600 bottles of bourbon. I'm going to be just fine. We didn't clarify the fact that we're recording this in your basement, which is simultaneously a speakeasy. So there's, I just, time is so precious to me that if other people don't value my time, I value my time. You have to value your time. And that's that, it doesn't take courage at all. It takes confidence in what your time is worth. My time is worth very much, whether it's just with myself or with just my wife and

kids or with friends or with peers. All of those are different hats and all of them are valuable. And I need to make time for all of them. So if one of these things doesn't quite pan out one weekend, nobody comes to our coffee thing. Awesome. We're going to be there either way. That's how it, that's how it started. We're already going there. Everyone was like, oh, we want to, you know, People, it's hard to find time now with a newborn. And so that was an easy way to connect some dots. Hey, we're going to be here. We're here either way.

We would love to see you. Please come. That'll be great. But if you don't, no big deal. Like, no harm, no foul. So I think being okay, rejection is not a bad thing. I think there's a negative light in rejection these days. You know, oh, that date didn't go well.

I got rejected. That's great. You just saved yourself a bunch of money in time. That's not your spouse. That's awesome. And I think the same can be true with business. Oh, that business didn't work. I'm so sorry. That's great. It wasn't supposed to work. That's awesome. Did you give it your all? Yes. Don't be stupid with your time. Don't chase a bad idea. If there are things that are rearing their head that say this is a bad idea, listen to them. Don't have the pride to just say, no, no, no, I'm going to force this. Some things aren't made to work. I can't count on both hands and ideas I thought would work that didn't. It just didn't work. That's okay. So I think shifting the perspective on what rejection means,

shifting the perspective on what failure means, can do a lot to a person's psyche and how they pursue relationships, how they pursue their business, how they build their business, how they decide not to build their business, how they shift their business. Things change all the time.

So I think being amenable to them, that's where the courage lies. Well, and it's interesting that, I mean, it's embedded in your story. You talked about how you were starting businesses and starting things and going after projects and things like that as early as middle school, high school and college. And you mentioned early on how much you failed at the beginning. But it's kind of like every time you fail, you just build that muscle a little bit to fail just a little bit bigger than next time up until the point where you succeed just a little bit bigger. Well, I think some stuff is also timing. Like you look at Airbnb, they launched that four different times before it took.

That's crazy to think about that. It just wouldn't take, wouldn't take. Oh, all of a sudden, now the lines of culture of a line to where strangers in a house are an okay idea. There are a lot of things that had to happen for that to be an acceptable reality. That's right. And it's crazy, number one, now that we accept that as a reality. Like when you say strangers in a house. That's what it is.

Look at Lyft and Uber, all these things. There had to be cataclysmic shift in perspective. Yes. Of other people that you can't control. You can't control that you can't buy marketing dollars on. Yes. That is culture. It's very, very expensive to change culture.

Normally that's just something that happens through time. But that is not the story that gets told today, I feel like. I feel like a lot of times the story we think of when we think of Uber or Airbnb or any of these remarkable brands. Honestly, Ramsey Solutions in general. We think of, oh, they had a great idea and it was up into the right ever since they had that great idea. And what you're saying is that that is certainly. not your experience, but it's almost like that is not anywhere close to reality. Yeah, I don't know if anyone's experience that was like that.

Huh. I mean, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, I mean, any of these guys, any icons that people look up to, I don't know anybody who just won and then kept winning. So how do you know you're pursuing the right thing? Because there's that line between like persistence and stupidity, right? You don't just want to keep getting knocked back down and not change anything. I think for me, that is a relative question to people are going to have very different answers. answer is, are you solving any problems? The businesses that solve problems typically find a way to

work. And sometimes you're a little too early to the problem. Or the culture's not ready for the solution. So I think that, to me, is great business. If you have a business that is genuinely servicing a need or solving a problem or tweaking a problem, then you've got something worth keep an after. I would say everything else is niche. That's right. And that connects to what you were talking about earlier with knowing the why, because a lot of times the why is rooted in solving problems for our people.

Absolutely. Or for yourself. And so that's what gives you the persistence to keep moving forward, keep adapting, keep changing. Absolutely. I would say any business that I've invested in or helped build or done myself, I mean, what got me into the music business was the problem of it.

It's a very problematic business. Monetizing art in itself is a problem. And so it keeps me in it. But that is always, and I stole that from my wife. I mean, she's the one that really opened my eyes to that. She is a real knack for seeing what problems are. Yeah, we didn't even talk about the fact that she does a lot of work on the Airbnb side with you and managing all this properties. Yeah, my wife and I, that's how we met.

We work together. We still work together. She manages a lot of my roster with me. Yeah. Yeah, she was the GM of our company before we sold it. So I know there's going to be some people out there that listen to this and they say, that guy is terribly unbalanced. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

What would you say those people? What's the definition of unbalanced? I would say, when I look at myself in the mirror, I'm the luckiest guy in the world. Balance is to be determined by the beholder, I think. And there are people in my life that I trust to speak into me. and I have absolutely been on balance in my life for sure. But this is the best version of myself I've ever had, and I'm really hopeful I can stay in this place for as long as possible.

Yeah, I'm sure they would probably be right in their own accord. But the way my brain works and the way my personality is and the way that I have found myself, I think I'm incredibly balanced now. Let's talk a little bit about your time, the 65 hours that you're spending every single week. how do you split that across percentages, like with regard to everything you're doing? It shifts. The festival is seasonal, so that's taken up a lot of work lately because it just went on sale. But most of the time, that's not a high commitment of time.

I'd say I'm a partner at this management company, and so that is a consistent level of at least 60% of my time every single week, as it should be. Yeah. Sometimes it's 85. Sometimes it's 62. Yeah. But that's always a very steady thing. Music bed, which is probably 15% of my time every week. General investments in just business is probably 15% of my time.

And then the record club and the festival are the rest of it. Yeah. It's kind of crazy, Paul. And I didn't know this before he came here today. You are someone that is, you have been diagnosed with ADD, right? And at the same time, you've got this incredibly disciplined approach to where your time's going, what you're using it on, and executing upon the plan that you've laid out.

Where does that come from? How did you build that muscle? Failure, for sure. I had some really good teachers at college that were helpful. I had some really good mentors. I can learn from other people's mistakes, not just mine. So I think seeking information. Yeah.

Being a student of that, I love people's stories more than their plans. I love knowing why somebody got into something. What are some things they did that they shouldn't have done? Those I'm really interested in rather than the tangible, like, this is my business plan. I care less about that because I think that's changeable. But you can't replace someone's wisdom, right? Like you can't buy wisdom. Wisdom is knowledge that's been applied through action.

So I love other people's wisdom because I think it helped me with mine. And then just failing early on making big mistakes and saying, well, why did that happen? How can I avoid that? And I think that helps me ask better questions of myself, ask better questions of my clients, and then build better plans to execute them. If you're working with a small business owner consulting them over a cup of coffee and they say, I don't know where my time's going and I don't know where it should be going, what would be your step one?

take a week of your time to allocate to write down where your time is going. Your time is being spent somewhere. It's tangible. You can see it. So if you can be present enough to document it, you're going to make some changes in a week, I promise. Whether it's taking a social apps off your phone or watching less TV or reading less magazines, whatever it is. like your time is going places. Yeah.

And it could go other places. You can absolutely reallocate your time. And then look at how you're spending your time and how that makes you feel. I mean, there's some things. Like, you can't just be like, oh, this makes me happy. So this is all I should do. Like parenting's not always happy, but you sure is heck better spend time doing it. You know, marriage, same thing.

So it's not to say, reallocate your time to just what brings you joy. I think that's unhealthy. But it is fair to say, spend your time on what is productive. What is going to feed your soul or, What are you truly responsible for? Spend your time doing those things. Maybe take a break, doing some other things if you find yourself in a pinch. You can always reallocate time.

And I also think saying with work stuff, I think part of the balance question, I used to have the perspective of, I have to do this for work, I have to stay up late, I have to do this. And if I don't, something bad is going to happen. And the minute I was okay to say, even if something bad does happen, It's not going to be that big of a deal or it's not going to be the end of the world. Sometimes you can't get away from that, but many times you can. Many times you can just say, I'm going to wait to do that tomorrow. And I think I've been a lot more balanced than the last year because I have actually done that before I would just work until three in the morning and just, I got to do it.

I got to do it. I want to do it. So I think reminding yourself that you're just not going to get to that. Go to bed. That's okay. See if you can wake up an hour early. That's showing yourself. lot of grace too. I mean, I don't know how you get through life without it. You've got to show yourself

grace and other people grace. You're just going to be a miserable person. You're probably going to die early for a heart attack. There you go. That's right. Well, there you go. Show grace. If you take nothing else from this episode, make sure you show grace. And you've got to receive it. I think a lot of business owners and their personalities are very bad at receiving grace. Yeah. Very hard on themselves, very judgey on themselves. Very, oh, God, I can't believe I did that. Carry guilt. Carry guilt and shame. And it's deeply, deeply, deeply sad and unhealthy. And I've absolutely been a victim of that in my own right. And I think that goes back to relationships. You know, and just you have to show yourself grace. You have to receive grace from other people. And I don't really know how to do that other than just deciding to do that. But you have to decide to do that for yourself. everything we've talked about today it's pretty remarkable from the outside looking in it's also a lot of work and you even talked about how not just the businesses that you're doing the relationships that you're creating your marriage obviously you have a six month year old right now right so that probably takes away just a little bit of sleep as well it's all a lot of work so what i want to know from you as our last question is not why is it all worth it for the future but why is it all worth it right now

You know, my grandfather had a great quote. He just passed away. He had an amazing quote a few years ago. He died at 92. And when he was 85, I asked him how he viewed his life. And he said, well, you know, I saw Hank Aaron play baseball, one of the greatest baseball players of all time. And he didn't bat 500.

And I'd say I'd probably bat about 550. I'm happy more times than I'm not. And so if less than 500 is good enough for Hank Aaron, I think I'm doing pretty great. I'm happy more than I'm not. I have a great life, a really great life, especially if you look in perspective with a lot of other people. And I'm just, it could always be better, it could always be worse. I think I kind of lay in that lane. This could always be better, it could always be worse.

But it's worth it right now because I like doing it. And I'm pretty happy. And so, and I think it keeps me out of trouble. I'm not burning down the house. Yeah, I'm not burning down the house. I'm not doing anything too dumb. So I think busy for me is good. Busy for me is healthy.

Busy for me is rewarding. And that doesn't have to be everybody else's story. It just has to be mine. Well, we're grateful for your perspective, your humility, and the example that you show of what it looks like to live a life all out. So thanks so much for your time, Paul. Absolutely. Thanks for having me. As I sat in Paul's basement,

surrounded by over 600 bottles of bourbon, I couldn't help but just lean back a little bit and just sit in absolute awe of all the things that he is doing. But then about halfway through that conversation, I think the thing that impressed me even more is the fact that he is still well-rounded, he is still centered, he has a family that loves him, and he hasn't lost sight of why it all matters.

If you're like me, we should take Paul, words and his advice as inspiration to make sure that we never lose sight of the things that make all of this stuff worth it. That's why we created one of the resources that we really believe in here at Entree leadership for the business owner. It's called the business health assessment. Because we know that when you become a more well-rounded leader and your organization becomes more well-rounded on all of the things that help businesses win, well, that's going to help yourself, but it's also going to help the people that you lead every single day. And so what this assessment is going to do is it's going to ask you some questions

and then reveal to you your strengths and weaknesses in the core drivers of business. There's six of them. And so if you want to take the business health assessment, it's a free resource. Just text the word progress to 33444. Again, just text the word of progress to 33444. And we'll send you the link to the Entree Leadership Business Health Assessment. Well, I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Entree Leadership podcast. If you did, please give us a five-star review and tell your friends to subscribe.

For a chance to win a $25 Amazon gift card, you can review this episode by clicking the link that's in the show notes. And be sure to follow us on social media at Entree Leadership. This episode was produced by Tim Hull, and it was edited and mixed by Will Rutter. I'm Alex Judd, and on behalf of the entire Entree Leadership team, thanks for listening. We'll talk with you again very soon.