EntreLeadership - #394: Defining Purpose, Vision and Mission with Ken Coleman

Episode Date: September 28, 2020

Have you ever been confused by the difference between purpose, vision and mission? A lot of business owners use these words interchangeably. But while they’re highly interconnected, they’re actually not the same. Ramsey Personality Ken Coleman clarifies the purpose of these three important concepts and how they work together to keep you and your company charging ahead, even in times of crisis. Plus, Ken breaks down three key components to help you discover your leadership sweet spot.   entreleadership.com/podcast Ken Coleman’s website The Ken Coleman Show Documentary about climbing Mt. Everest on Amazon Join us for EntreLeadership Master Series Livestream Ken Coleman's Clarity Guide Mission Statement Mapper EntreLeadership Toolkit Review this episode for a chance to win a $25 Amazon gift card   “If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.” - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.   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

Hey, you know what's freaking demoralizing? You come to work every day. You're busting it. Everything's hard. Your team's quitting. Your team's frustrated. The marketplace is in your face, changing things all the time. And you're exhausted.

And worse than that, you don't even know why you're still doing this. Guys, if you don't have a purpose, the here's why I'm doing hard things statement, you're going to quit. Because it's going to get hard. And doing hard things when it doesn't matter, or you don't remember why it matters. matters, results in, I'm not going to do that anymore. I quit. Guys, I've quit so many times. I've done this. Now, I haven't actually quit like I went in and I resigned. I said I'm not going to work here anymore. I've emotionally quit when I forgot about why we're doing what we're doing. And you've done this too. You know when we quit? It's when it gets really hard and we don't

think that it's worth it. 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, Daniel Tarty, and my guest today is longtime friend, fellow Ramsey team member and Ramsey personality, Ken Coleman. I remember the first day that I met him. He wouldn't shut up about what he believed he was called to, why he was at Ramsey, and what he was going to do with his life. It's borderline obnoxious, but I admire it. When he started at Ramsey Solutions, well, his initial job here wasn't exactly in line with his vision, But I gotta tell you, after years of doing it the right way, being diligent, be unteachable,

and pushing for what he knew was inside him, the reason he was put on this planet. Today, a few years later, he's on fire. He's absolutely in his sweet spot, spending every day now, helping tens of thousands of people all around the country, figure out what their purpose is, just like he found his. As soon as you can tap into the thing that you're doing every day, being completely aligned, with who you are and why you exist, it's magic. In fact, I'm going to tell you, it's a 10x multiplier on your business. As a leader, you figure this thing out, the purpose, why are you here?

You can have more energy, more fun, your team's going to be happier, you can have more alignment, your vision's going to be clear, that's going to lead to more results, and ultimately, you'll help more people. That's what it's all about. And it all starts with getting really curious. I knew it before I came to Ramsey Solutions. I wanted to get into broadcasting, but I didn't want to do sports broadcasting. I didn't want to do nightly news, so your traditional journalism broadcasting.

I knew that I wanted to be in a situation on radio and television, and the television dream is building, where I just wanted to interact with people and be a counselor and a coach. I liken myself to kind of a three-headed animal on the show, the Ken Coleman show. On every phone call, I am a counselor, a coach, and a cheerleader. And it's almost always in that order. Because you've got to listen and perceive and dig and discern and all those things. And you hear the problem, you hear the challenge of the need,

and then you've got to come in and begin to coach and teach and guide, if you will. And then at the end, you know, it's, here's your homework assignment. You've got this, I believe, and you get after it. And that's the cheerleader thing. So I had a sense, a very clear sense of what the content was, which was what had helped change my life when I went through, you know, at the age of 31, 32, I'm faced with a real career crisis in that this fire in the belly I had had for public service in politics went away. And I had been aiming towards that and making progress towards that since the age of 16.

So that was a really confusing time for me. And so in that time of wrestling through, while I know that it's not politics, I'm not 100% sure what it is. And this isn't very difficult to understand. But when clarity doesn't exist, confusion reigns. Right, right. And confusion just runs like a cockroach to the corner when you turn a light. on in a room. And so going through the process that I went through a guy named Pete Richardson was really informative in my life and some other people. And I went through the exercises that Pete told me to do.

It was really a self-awareness deep dive. And so that process gave birth to what I'm doing now. And so I wanted to give that clarity to somebody else, to a lot of somebody else's. I love that. You know, I found it in my own story, and I hear it in yours. And I've seen this across so many of the people that we work with, Ken, small business owners. I imagine you see this your radio show every day, before somebody really gets dialed in on their purpose and the desire to do the work to actually clarify that, it's often preceded by, I call my season the desert season. I was wandering in the desert. You might call yours a crisis and I didn't, you know, but there's some type of a storm. You mentioned confusion that often is the thing that's the prequel to, okay,

now we're going to be on the pursuit of figuring out our purpose. Do you feel like that's always the case? I think it's a beautiful analogy. In fact, I talk about wandering versus wondering. And the key to stop wandering is to start wondering. And so what you're talking about, that desert analogy is absolutely spot on, Daniel. And that's what happens to a lot of people. Many people spend the majority of their lives wandering. They'll move from profession to profession or job to job within a profession. And they never quite figure out what that role is, that contribution that they're supposed to make in this world.

And so they're wandering, you know, and they just wander about. And again, when you understand how to recapture that childlike wonder that we're all born with on Christmas morning, and we just can't get down the stairs fast enough, can't wait for mom and dad to get the gifts out. We want to know what's wonder. And then when we see things as little kids, it's so fun to be around toddlers and three and four or five-year-olds. Because every time they see something they haven't seen before, it's just the most beautiful, pure expression of our humanness. And that is wonder. Yeah, it's magic.

And so we've got a wonder about ourselves. and wonder about our contribution and wonder how can that contribution be applied and then wonder how can we expand that contribution. So I want to live my life. I'm 46. I want to be 76 wondering what's next and what's the next iteration within my calling. And so when you capture that yourself, and it's just, by the way, this is the same for anybody out there that's in a profession that is people oriented. When you're giving something to people that you have benefited from, there's nothing like it. So absolutely knew the basis of the content, but to answer the question as pure as possible, it evolves. And it evolved once Dave said, hey, we're going to move you into that personality role and lets you start doing a deep dive. And then opportunities came faster than I thought they would with the Series XM show,

was six months into just doing research and kind of figuring out what my methodology would look like. and dreaming big, and then all of a sudden, boom, you got to get on the phone and answer calls. And I hadn't done it that way before. I had counseled people, but not in that short form. And so now here we are three years, almost three years. Tomorrow is the three-year anniversary of the launch of the Ken Coleman show under Ramsey Solutions. And 4,000 calls. So now it's like, you know, I'm starting.

4,000 sounds like a lot. But I'm starting to get my groove on. Listen, man, I get goosebumps here in that because I, I remember before you started that I saw the struggle. I mean, we sat down over coffee and multiple times to talk through the resistance, the struggle, whether that was organizationally, whether that was things going on with your own doubt and trying to figure out if this was your path. And I'm inspired to hear that because you're changing lives every day. And what you're doing is, it's just simply inspiring, Ken. You know, the thing you talk about, that idea of wondering and curiosity and that

childlike sense of, it's just magical all the time. You and I have people in their 50s that haven't been curious about their own life since they were in high school. What is it that happens to us that we lose that sense of wonder? Why don't we do that the way that we should? Yeah, well, the simple answer is life. Everybody's journey is very specific to them, but what has happened is life is essentially beaten the desire to be curious out of them. I don't think we ever lose our curiosity. I don't think a human being can actually lose that childlike wonder. I think it could be covered up. I think to the point where you don't feel it anymore. But I think that what happens is, is whatever has happened in someone's life,

using your metaphor, is that 50-something-year-old has gotten to a point where curiosity has only led to pain. Curiosity has only led to disappointment, disenchantment, you know, rejection, you name it. And so you go, this isn't getting me anywhere. I'm done. I'm done turning over rocks. I'm done exploring. I'm done with that. It hurts too much, and they've missed it, because the exploring and the curiosity isn't causing the pain. And yet that's what really happens. So they go, you know what? I'm going to, I'm going to go the safe route. And I think, I think safety, I think when we look back on this period of history, let's call it 1970 to 2020. Okay, let's make a fun 50-year window. I think we're going to look back in our, culture's desire for safety, which came on as the advance of technology came on. It was like, yeah, of course let's make it safer. Who wouldn't want to make it safer? But I think it has encompassed our entire lives to where we as human beings always choose the safe route. And I'm not saying to live a life that is just stupid and reckless, but I'm saying that choosing safety is the biggest

trap for most people, never truly becoming who they are because they go to a safe degree at the safe college, then I'm going to get out and get a safe job. So I have the safe 401k investing plan, and they've never fully lived. Well, Ken, you know, people want, it's human nature to want to avoid pain. Of course. I just posted this yesterday that you're going to suffer, you're either going to suffer the short-term pain of sacrificing to achieve your greatness over time. Yeah. Or you're going to suffer the pain of regret that's lasting because you never went for it. There's no question. And so the pain is going to be in the equation. I think it's

It's a myth that you're describing that somehow we can avoid pain and that safety is always going to be top of that list. Well, you know, I'll say there are a lot of people that can live a largely safe life and not have much hurt and pain. But at the end of your life, you're looking back with regrets versus you and me and the men and women that decide to get after it. They're going to look back and reminisce. I mean, you just, I'm looking at you right now in the studio. I don't know if people can see it, but the guy has no skin on both of his forearms. He just got back from a hiking, biking trip. I got 10% hanging on there.

So my point is that hurt. When that happened, it hurt. But it was absolutely worth it. The other thing is you absolutely knew that that could happen. You weren't surprised when you fell off of your bike because you were going down a hill like a maniac on a bike that shouldn't go down a hill. But you do it and you do it for what reason. The bike was supposed to go down the hill. It was the guy riding the bike that maybe wasn't caught.

But my point is, was that not a risk? It was a risk. But you assessed the risk. Back to what we're talking about, the purpose of the trip was, I'm there with one of our best bus. We're having an adventure. We're making memories. We're living. So my point is, there's no adventure in this situation if you play it completely safe.

Or we could say the adventure wasn't what it fully could be. And I'm after living fully. I'm trying to help men and women live fully and work fully. Well, guess what? You're going to hear no on that journey. Guess what? You are going to fail on that journey. You are going to be doubted on that journey.

you are going to face crazy fear on that journey. But guess what? The result is worth it all. So it's the trade-off. You can live the safe life in a padded room, but you're going to be a miserable soul. A cold and timid soul is what Teddy Roosevelt called him. Okay, so let's dive deeper on this,

because I think most people listening to this podcast understand that no pain, no gain. I mean, these are men and women who are running businesses, they're leading, they're charging the hill. I think oftentimes these business owners, that we speak with at our events and through our coaching experiences, just inspiring people. And their endurance and their tolerance for pain is actually remarkably high compared to the average person. More often what we have found is when it comes to this idea of purpose,

Ken, there's almost a sense of like, I know that I need it. I know that I have one, but I'm not exactly sure how to get it clear and how to make sure it's driving what we're doing every day. And our business, for myself as the leader, for my team, how do I go about starting to get clear on what purpose is and how we establish that. Well, from the personal application, the purpose question, I pose it as a question, what is your purpose? And it answers the question, why? Why am I here? And as a company, and we may talk about that later, I'm going to give a talk on that, Entree Master Series, why does our company exist? We've got to answer that. So why am I here? Let's look at the personal application. And what happens is people look at that question,

and they go, go, golly, that's a big question. And it's a really big question. But when you look at it From just that standpoint, it's the equivalent of looking at Mount Everest, standing at the base of it, going, oh, my gosh, there's just no way I could ever do that. It's too big, as opposed to breaking it down. I was watching a documentary on Amazon right now on Mount Everest, and it's amazing. And I never knew until I really dove into it how many different stages they actually put together on that climb. So when they plan that thing, there are multiple stages. And I had a sense of that, but I didn't know how many, and I didn't realize how long. How long they'll have to sit in a certain stage.

You've got base camp one, camp two. They're a base camp two to three weeks. They go up to camp two and hang out, then come back down. I mean, it's over the period of like a month that it takes to climb the mountain. Yeah. So what you have to do is you take this big idea of my purpose or our company's purpose and you have to break it down. So there's three indicators that every human being essentially has. Think it as a dashboard.

So Daniel Tarty's got a dashboard. And first we start with talent. What does Daniel Tarty do well? Okay? Now, these are, when we describe talent, we're talking about your hard skills and your soft skills. Soft skills are the people skills. The hard skills are more of the tangible skill that we use in the workplace. But again, both are extremely valuable and great indicators.

Now, here's what we got to do. When we look at what does Daniel Tarty do naturally well, these are raw talents and maybe he's now honed them into skills. We all are born with raw talent. And as we begin to live in this world, we begin to see those talents in our schoolwork on the playground or the field of sport or in extracurricular activities. And then we get to the point where we go, okay, these are my raw skills. Now here's what we're talking about. We're talking about the top three or four or five. I'm not interested in your skills.

If you were to rank everything you do well, Daniel, and you go, well, this I do well, but I'd call myself a five. I'm a six here. I'm not interested in five and sixes. Because here's the deal. Your seven, eights, and nines. that's what you're ranking, your top talents. Those are the ones you want to put all your effort into. Because we can now turn those into mastery.

You can get great at a 7-8 or not. Totally. And I found on those, like when I've done this exercise, it's almost always the things everyone else says automatically, they're great at that. And it's also the things you just can't help but do. Oh, of course. Because we just kind of drawn to it.

That's right. We don't like to do things we suck at. So look at the clues, folks. So that's the first thing, talent. The second thing is passion. And I define passion in this construct. as the work that I love to do. It's not about money or notoriety. I just love the work. I love the work. I know this about you. You're a guy that if you had a day that's full of strategy sessions where somebody's

coming to you and you're listening and you're drawing out solutions on the board, you got the juice. That's just one of the things you love to do, but it is definitely one of the main things that you love to do. For me, it's communicating publicly or privately. And I love the one-to-one communication. communication, the public communication, I love it. So we wanted to find the work that we just love to do, because it's not about, again, how much money I make doing it or notoriety. It's just, I love the work. So high emotion, high devotion. So I recently heard somebody define passion as something you're willing to suffer for. That's exactly it. So I hear you saying you love doing it. It's not just that it's fun all the time or that you're just like, oh, I'm just eating ice cream all day. It's that kind of giddiness around it. There's a deep desire that even when it's hard, you love it so much. that suffering is fine. Sacrificing for it is fine. Yes, it's not always that simple. This idea that you suffer for it means that you will suffer waiting, you will suffer rejection, you will suffer failure in order to be able to do it. You understand what I'm saying? Like you want to, because then here's the third piece. The third indicator is mission. And I define mission as the

results that matter deeply to you. So here's how they all work together. Talent, they're the tools we use. Okay. Our talents are our tools that we were gifted with from the creator of the universe to then do the work that we love to do to produce the results that matter deeply to us. So when we use what we do best to do what we love to do to produce results that matter to us, that's the sweet spot. That's how all three come together. That's the contribution zone for you. And we use a sweet spot analogy because it's the easiest one for people to understand, Whether you're an athlete or enjoy sports that much or not, the reality is that we all have seen somebody or we've at least felt at least one time in our life hitting the ball in the actual sweet spot of the instrument that it was designed to hit. And so then what happens is we have maximum performance.

And that's what we're talking about. So to be who you are, to find who you are, you must look at all three indicators and get clear on all three. What do I do best? what work do I love to do, what results of my work really matter deeply to me. When you're clear on all three, then you put them together and you go, where in the marketplace? So that's how you come up your purpose in. So it literally looks like this. I, Daniel Tarty, am going to use my top talents of blank, blank, and blank, to do the work I love, blank and blank, whatever, to produce the results that matter deeply to me.

blank. That's a working purpose sentence right there. Because here's what happens. When you read that and you fill in those blanks, for many people, the first time they ever see it, they're just, they get goosebumps. We did this the other day, my brand manager, Damon, we did this with a coworker, and we just let him fill in the answers. That's what we do.

I don't have the answers. You have the answers. So you fill it in, here's what happens. That purpose sentence turns into an arrow. And it's like, this is your zone. That's your compass. Sweet spot. That's where you're supposed to be.

Now, once we figure that out, we go, oh, Well, there's multiple ways for me to do this in the marketplace. And this is key for people to understand because, and again, we've got leaders here, so we're kind of applying this to you the leader. Like, what's your leadership sweet spot? Like, how much of what you're doing during the day are you a five or less on the talent line? How much of what you do during the day are you a five or less on the passion line? And goodness gracious, how much of what you do every day and the results you produce?

on the five or less of the mission scale. Boy, I've got to tell you something. If you're not eights and nines across the board on those things, you're not in your leadership sweet spot, and here's the deal. You're the lid. You are holding your company back in some form or fashion, and you're holding yourself back. I want you to talk more about this.

I think it's key for leaders, especially there's a lot of business owners that are leading a company they actually like. And they know that their net of doing this exercise is not that I need to leave and Now, some of them are. Some of them are. We can talk about this. But for the ones who are going, no, I really am doing the thing I love doing, I'm just miserable a lot. Oftentimes leaders doing this exercise, they have an existing business. They've got a team. They've gotten away from their sweet spot. They're kind of retrofitting their purpose statement into their business a bit. They're trying to figure out, okay, how do I have a purpose statement that still encompasses the business that I love? But I know that arrow starts pointing me in a different direction. What do I do with that? I still got to run the company. So the issue is once you know your sweet spot, then you look at your company, you go, where do I fulfill that or where do I fill that sweet spot in my company? So it's not so much a retrofit as much as they just got to go, where's the misery coming from? Where's the misery? I can tell you where the misery's coming from, one of those three areas.

So are you doing a lot of things? Or is half of your day, or goodness, 25% of your day spent doing things that you're not very good at? Misery. Or are you spending a lot of time doing work because you think you have to? And you realize, I don't love the work. I'm only doing it because I have to. Then I question, well, why do you have to? And then this is a key point, folks. Some of you are sole operators, you know, sole proprietors or whatever, or you're early into this thing that you've started. In that stage, your chief everything officer. I'm talking about as the, you're the this thing begins to scale and we begin to see this is a viable business. It's something you're moving towards.

You're not always going to start there. I know, but I want to point out that there are times where you're going to have to do things that you, quite frankly, you're not very good at and that you don't love. Yeah, but I'm going to say without this purpose, you stay there forever. Stay there. And you get stuck. And so we talk all the time in delegation, our job as leaders, it's to replace ourselves. Well, why? So that we live closer and closer to our sweet spot.

That's right. And as I said in the talk at summit, when you start to see where you're out of alignment, you're not in your. sweet spot. So you've got to think, can I delegate this? Can I eliminate it or do I hire for it? Pretty simple. So this is not complex stuff. It is very difficult, though, for leaders to make changes once they do this exercise. Here's why. On some level, you feel like you're very vulnerable. You're like, I don't know if I want to admit to the team that I'm not very good at this. And this is why I say, they already know. You're the last one to know. When you go through self-awareness, like this little exercise, you're the last one to know. Trust me. When you find out, oh my gosh,

I'm not in my sweet spot, what is the team going to think? They already know. They already know. So monkey off your back there. So go ahead and own it and they're going to go, wow, bravo. This is encouraging. It's funny. As much as I know that, I recently did this with our team. For the last couple years, I've been figuring out, like, what is my best contribution over the next five to ten years here at Ramsey? And as I've thought about that, I've felt really restless. I felt like there's things I need to be doing more of than I'm not doing, and there's things I'm doing now that I just, I'm doing it out of duty, Ken? I'm doing out of, because I'm supposed to be responsible. Yeah. And I did all this work and all this processing, you know,

checking in on my purpose and getting counsel. I even met with Dave and talked about some of this stuff. And I came to the team thinking, okay, this is going to feel like a big shift. They're going, oh, we need to really work through this and take our time. And to a person, they're going, yeah, I feel like it's, like, why aren't you already doing that? It's true, though. Some of the stuff I was doing out of angst was driving them crazy. Yeah. And they're going, we've been hoping you would leave these meetings for a while now.

Yeah. Because, you know, when you come in, it's a little bit of poop and swoop and, you know, you're gone. Which, by the way, key point here, we've been talking about the self-awareness exercise, but leaders, you've also got to drill this into your team. And I'm not picking on you here, Daniel, but as a leader, your team should not have been holding that back. They should have been telling you. And the question is, why weren't they telling you? And I mean, that's just real. So leaders, getting self-aware is huge. But staying self-aware, one of the tactics that will help you stay self-aware is to create some real feedback in there,

where you're going, hey, twice a year, we're going to have the old mirror session where I walk in the room, and you guys show me what I'm not seeing. Well, I'll tell you some of why it happened. I mean, it is on me as the leader. And I also have a role where I have some counterparts who have the same title. Yeah. And there's almost a unspoken organizational expectation that if you have this title, then you therefore do these things. And what I did is I got clear on my purpose and figured out, no, this is who I am. Now, can this thing we call the title, this container that I sit inside, can our expectations of what that is corporately here shift a little bit? Yeah. And of course, the answer, I want to talk to Dave and everybody else. Well, yeah, we made it up. We can have it be what. It

doesn't have to match that person and that person. That's good. And so I think sometimes in an organization, there's these templates that we don't intend them to be rigid and bureaucratic, but the unspoken, it's almost an assumption. Everybody just says, well, in that title, it looks like X, right? And if you've done this purpose exercise, you go, I'm not X. I'm less of an executive and more of an artist with some of my kind of the outcome. That's right. It's absolutely right. And I can still hold the title of EVP and be an artist. But Herb Jenkins over here, he's an EVP, and he's an incredible executive, and he's going to tell you he's not as creative as I am. So I think we've got to have permission, especially as leaders, give our organization permission

to have expansion in these titles. These people can manifest differently based on what they're about and their purpose. I think that's a really good thought. And off the top of my head, I think that's why we've got to be wary of titles. And I'm more in favor of roles. And I'd love to see leaders go, you know what, I'm going to do this exercise. that Ken's teaching here, and I'm going to figure out my sweet spot, and I'm going to do the math. If I use what I do best to do the work that I love, to produce the results that matter,

I'm filling this role. This is who I am. So for some of you, it may be cheerleader. For some of you, it's activator. You make up the word. There's no wrong answer. But I think there's tremendous clarity in simplification and going, I know what my sweet spot is, but if I'm going to pick a word, so for me it is, you know, I'm not saying,

me, but I'm saying you have to go, I'm going to be the chief encourager. That's what our company needs. Or I'm going to be the problem solver. Or I'm going to be the guide, the teacher, whatever it is. If you can embody a word that really describes you in your sweet spot as a leader, I would tell the company that. I think titles are, I think they're worthless. I think it's about hierarchy. I'm probably breaking some Ontario leadership rule. Well, no. I mean, we didn't have titles for years here. We didn't have titles for years here. We didn't have for years. We resisted it. We didn't want to have titles because all the reasons you're talking about.

I think there was a point in our organization where it got so confusing, like who sits where and reports to who. It almost became like, oh, okay, we've got to do this for some consistency. Well, and I got to clarify. I don't want to freak people out. I think you've got to have org charts. Okay, I believe in organization. But I'd be fine with everybody having a one-word role description on their desk. Everybody goes, oh, yeah, that's Tim over there.

Tim's our analyzer. you know that's uh that's sally sally she's our fixer whatever it is i just think what that does is is it gives us tremendous freedom to just be that it be the best version of that so i you know that's the way i come at it i think it's i think it's freeing for people and i would challenge people you don't have to turn this into the institutional thing i just recommended but i think those of you that are listening today to walk through that sweet spot exercise and then come up with a one word descriptor that you believe best personifies you in your sweet spot. I think you'll see tremendous freedom to then get rid of the things you should be getting rid of because that's the hardest part.

Clarity is the fun part and the easy part. The hard part is actually making the change. You know, we're talking to leaders and we're saying, okay, you've got to figure out your purpose. Based on your purpose, you need to adapt what you're doing all the time so that you live every day, spending most of your time doing things that are aligned with your purpose. Yeah. I believe leaders, it's like our job to figure that out because it's all about sustainability. I want to challenge, or I'm not sure I'm challenging this, but I'm curious, you know, there's a season, and you and I, if we look back in our 20s when we're just getting started,

we didn't know what our lives were about as well as we do today. We were raw, we had energy, we had passion. You mentioned you're sent in politics. I was in a different company in sales. There's so many things I can look back over the last 10, 15 years and go, I, wasn't ready to be in my sweet spot because I had these milestones and turning points and valleys and life lessons that I had to learn. No, I disagree. And I understand what you're saying, but I disagree because first of all, that's why I'm doing what I'm doing, because I had a mentor share this with me

in my late 20s and I got it. And so I'm trying to get this to many of these people as possible because I believe a young Daniel Tarty could have been a sweet spot then stayed in it and still evolved into the person you are. So all the trials, the trouble, lessons, the failures, those are just the experiences and the lessons that make you the best version of you as you're not necessarily a function of not being in your sweet spot. No, they're not at all. Well, I mean, I was in my sweet spot when I was in politics. But what changed was the mission.

What changed was the mission? Because the reason I wanted to be in politics is I love publicly communicating, fighting for ideals. fighting on behalf of people, but I wanted to see the results in the political world. And when I lost the fire for that, the confusing part was not talent and passion. It wasn't what I was good at. And the kind of work that I loved to do, I always knew that I had a public call in my life. There was zero confusion in those two columns. The confusion was, what are the results?

Because that dictates where I'm going to go do it. See, when we look at the talent, that's kind of the easy part. Okay, good. Those are the tools. Then we start going, well, what's the work I love to do with those tools? And when we really try to tie in, well, I want to create these results. So what is the work? What does the work need to be to then produce this result? You see how that really crystallizes? So when you do that, you go, oh. And so I had a problem because I was like, I don't want to do legislation. Turns out I'm not fired up about legislation to help better people's lives. So how am I going to communicate to make people's lives better? That was the question I had to answer. So back to the young Daniel Tarty, I don't care if you're 25 or 35. You may not have as clearly defined of a sweet spot because of life experience, but you can still know what you do best at 25.

You can know the type of things that you've always enjoyed doing or at least been interested in, and you can connect to some results. So as you evolve and life happens to you and pain happens, by the way, I think pain is one of the greatest formative things for a purpose. It's a teacher. Well, it's like the things that I've recovered from in my life and the pain and the frustration has a large effect on what I want to do for others because I go, I experienced this. I walked out on the other side of it by God's grace. And now I want to help other people either avoid it or be able to get out of them. Dave Ramsey.

Dave Ramsey doesn't wake up one day, you know, and just think, I've got all these great ideas. I think it's going to be money. No, he loses everything, everything, and almost loses his family, doesn't, but almost that. It loses everything else. And the pain is so unbearable, the hot shower story we've all heard, and he's just trying to figure out, how do I even move forward tomorrow? He does. He gets out of it.

and he realizes what he needs to do to never get in that situation again. He realizes what he needs to do to climb out. And then he's so excited about it because he's figured it out. He goes, I want to share it with other people. And now we sit here in this massive company and this massive legacy and all the things from pain. So I do think the pain shaped you. And I think it does form our passion. And our passion evolves.

But the formula doesn't change. The sweet spot, that concept doesn't change. So talk to me about it. It sounds like you're saying it's not an age. It's age agnostic. You can be 25 and in your sweet spot. You can be 55. Contrast this with the principle of paying your dues, being diligent. I mean, I think I know I can. I know you can on our teams. And I know leaders listening everywhere can think of that 24 year old who's going, okay, but I want to do that over there right now. And you kind of have the sense of like, well, you need to do this job for a year because this is the job. Well, it's not my sweet spot. I need to.

need to get my sweet spot now. And it's, you know, it's kind of like, no, we'll help you work towards that. But you've got to show me that you've got the character to be diligent, to show up on time, to do work even when it's hard, and it's not your favorite thing to do. Because that's a freaking job, Ken? Yeah, well, first of all, it's a ladder. So we advance into that sweet spot. So there are going to be times where you're in an entry-level job that's not your sweet spot. That's why we call it the dream job. Okay. So if it weren't for my day jobs, I wouldn't have a dream job that I have right now. But it was the day jobs that sustained me so that I could pursue and eventually get to the dream job. And so what you've got to understand is that we all have to pay our dues. So I don't care

if you're 45 and you've been very successful. We've made six figures for 10 years of your business career and you decide to start a business. Well, guess what? You're going to pay your dues when you start that business. Anybody that is taking on a new climb or is in the middle of a climb, no matter how fast they got there or all the details the variables always dictate to us that there are some dues to be paid again back to that mount ever's thing i was watching this it's on the amazon and i wish i knew the name of it it's incredible but this guy who's climbed who's scaled it more than anybody else he's leading all these people up and he's got experienced climbers that are on their third try they've been with him two other times they're on their third try and these guys are struggling in different stages that they didn't struggle for. I'm watching these guys on camera going,

man, I don't know if I'm going to be able to make it. I said, there's no way that I wouldn't make it, but I don't know that I can physically go. I don't know that I even have any choice in this. I didn't feel this way the last time. So what's happening there? Paying some dues. It's his third try. Different dues that he paid the last time. This idea that paying dues is only for beginners is nonsensical. Yeah. Yeah. Progress. I say this with Dave a lot. It's the price of admission. Failures, rejections, frustrations, delays. Every time something like that happens to me, I've gotten to a point where I'll say to Stacy and I'm talking her about it, she's therapeutically listening to me and I'll go, it's price of admission. You make a great point because I think it

becomes a, we talk about it like it's age because the younger you are, the more often you are early on the beginning of adventure. That's true. But any new venture, any new mountain you're climbing to use your metaphor, you pay your dues. Regardless of how old you are. Anything new that's going to be created or invented or pursued. Yes. Let's add this. Every time I step up, new title, new promotion, new product line, new challenge. I don't care.

You will pay dues in any advancement of your life. I don't care where you are, what you're doing, how you're doing it. Anytime you take on a new challenge, you're going to pay your dues. As you're going through those thresholds, do you find that your purpose, will shift and evolve, or do you keep your purpose constant and that guide you through those transitions? I think the purpose is largely constant. The mission is what changes. So this gives me a little on-ramp into something I'm very nerdy about, but a lot of businesses interchange the words purpose, mission, and vision. And they go, well, my vision statement, and like they're the same thing,

and they're not. So I'm not going to totally nerd out. But mission is how I guess. get there. So once I know my purpose, my why, see, purpose informs the where and the how. I must first know my purpose, my why. Once I know my why, I can then truly identify the where, the mountaintop. Now, once I've got the mountain top, now I've got to come up with a plan to get to the pinnacle. And so as we grow and move up in advance, I don't think our purpose, our ultimate why changes at all. I think what changes is our mission. How do we continue to fulfill the why? That's what changes. Because you think about a very successful business woman or man or whatever, and they set out and they're wildly successful. Again, let's use Dave Ramsey because I really do

think he's a great example on this because he's accomplished a lot. The guy's in the Hall of Fame. He's been on the radio for over 30 years. Millions of millions and millions of lives change. You know, we've got a thousand employees. The vision, it's huge. Well, Dave's why. Why, today, I don't believe, by the way, he listens to this, so I'll expect an email if I'm wrong, Dave. But I don't think his why has changed from the hot shower and the times when he was self-publishing a book. What I think has changed is the where because the vision has expanded. And then as the vision expands, guess what? The mission changes a bit.

Because again, mission is how we get there. Yeah. So right now, our purpose at Ramsey's solution is to provide hope. If we were going to break it down to two words, provide hope. And so has he done that? Unequivocally, yes, to an unbelievable level. But his vision now is bigger, more areas, different areas of content, of which I get to be a part of, right? So the vision will change in the sense that it must change. It has to expand as I grow. As I grow in advance, my vision gets bigger. As the vision. vision gets bigger, the mission must change because the mission that got me here won't get me to the next thing. So that's how that all comes together. I think it's really key that you've got the clarity on the difference between purpose, vision, and mission. As I've heard you talk about this in the past, I've thought about this funny little way that helps me stick this in my mind as his two scenarios of, you know, your mission is in scenario A, we need to dig a hole. Dig a hole. Okay, where are we going to dig a hole? In this field? In the field?

Why? Because we're farmers and we need a well. And if we dig the hole deep enough in the field, we're going to have water to water our crops. Oh, okay. Well, let's start with the purpose. Why? We need to water our crops. What are we going to do in the field? We dig a hole. That's right. Scenario B, we need to dig a hole. Where? In the floor of this room. In the floor of this room. Where? In the floor of the room. Why? Because we're in prison. We've got to break out. Yeah, right. But in both cases, we got to dig a hole. You know, and so if you don't start with, okay, why does this, matter and you just go off and start digging holes randomly, it's not tied to a specific objective. And I think that's where a lot of times, coaching space and consultants, they drive right in with get your mission figured out. And for business owners listening to this, I want you to

hear that if you don't know why you're here, if you don't know why you exist, and therefore, the company that you freaking run, that you're the boss of, you're in charge. You get to decide why your company exist. Let's look at an example. I mean, the examples are just, You can go all day. Let's use one that I think is fascinating as Polaroid. All right. So at some point, Polaroid had a purpose statement. And let's just say that it was something along the lines of we want to help people capture memories of their lifetime.

Oh, that's very nice. Right. That's what a picture is. And so they made their little Polaroid things and we shook it. And oh, it's very nice. Then technology advances. And that little shaky picture doesn't look as nice as the competitor over here who decided to come up with a digital camera or a camera that had a much higher-end picture. So we went from the white

borders to the regular pictures that were a little bit nicer. And then we went to digital pictures. Polaroid lost sight of their purpose. Their why. If they're why, and I'm making this up, folks, so don't send emails. I don't know what their original purpose statement was, but it was something along the lines of, we want to help people make memories and capture these memories for a lifetime so they can go back and look at it and it makes them happy and all the things. Well, guess what? they lost sight of the why. When competitors came in and the market shifted and all the technology shifted, they were just like, well, people like Polaroid,

and we're just going to shift into regular pictures now. And they missed the big why, which is if people are going to change their behaviors in how they make their memories, if we don't change with them, we can't help them make memories, and thus we have forgotten our why, and we're not achieving our why. Guess what? They go out of business. Yeah, that's right. They are out of business. They either forgot it or their why did not encompass the broader, like, here's things that could happen that we're going to continue to stay with our why. I mean, what if their purpose statement was, we exist to be number one in film and analog. If that was their purpose. Great. They achieved it. But I don't think that was it.

But they could have been Instagram, Ken, is what you're saying. Yeah. I mean. I mean, had they stayed with that purpose of helping people have images where they share memories and experience that together. The reason they went out of business that they didn't adapt. but what happens is we have the conversation like that and I want to go about eight levels deeper the reason they didn't adapt is because they didn't keep their eye on their why because if it's we want to be the leader

okay we want to help people we want to be the best because that's vision so the purpose is we want to help people capture memories all right vision we want to be the number one brand in the world when it comes to capturing memories that's a great vision

well guess what their mission needed to change, and it didn't. Because the mission is, how do they do that? The mission is, oh, gosh, we better adapt. We better get into higher-end cameras. We better cut a partner deal, whatever, whatever it could have been. The point is I could do this with Pan Am Airlines. I could do it with Blockbuster Video. I mean, we can go down the list here. The point I'm making is that it's not just, you can't just chalk this up to, well, it was poor management. Well, yeah, it was, but where there is no vision, the people perish is what the Bible says, and that you could substitute

companies in there, where there's no vision, but where is the vision coming from? You've got to go back. Purpose. The vision always comes from the why. So your purpose reveals the vision and informs the mission. So that's important. You can't reverse engineer it. That's right. A lot of times leaders will ask about purpose. Okay, I've got my own personal purpose statement. Should that be the same as the company? I'm the founder. Okay. So I founded this company. I'm excited about what we're doing. should my personal purpose statement as the leader be the same purpose statement as the company? I don't think so. I think they can be an alignment. I think they can be similar, but I think that that's a dangerous situation, and you're not setting the company up for success. So now, I do believe

that your personal purpose statement should come first. I think you should be clear as a founder. And even if you started, I'd go back and I'd get really clear on your personal purpose statement. and then that should inform your involvement in the company. I do believe it should, there should be alignment, but I do not think they need to be the same. They can't be because you're an individual, okay, first and foremost. Second, you're playing the role of leader, all right. Third, the company itself has to have its own purpose statement, right? And it's basically, who are the people you want to help?

What's the problem they have or the need or the want that they have? what are the solutions or solution that you're going to provide to meet the need or fulfill the desire? Well, they need to be separate and should be. But again, they should be in alignment. That's what I think. So we've got a personal purpose statement and we've done the work, hopefully with our leadership team to figure out our company's purpose statement. You and I know that if we aren't actively managing this, like you said before, where there's no vision that people perish, same as if we forget the vision, we're going to perish. You know, vision leaks. Yes, it does. It does not stay top of mind for our teams.

Let's talk about some of the ways you keep the vision alive. We do this well at Ramsey Solutions. You could interchange vision and purpose and mission, all these things. I mean, I know they're different. We just talked about how they're different. But all three of those things need to stay top of mind for our team. And it's more than just having everybody stand and say the pledge of it's written on the wall and we agree to adhere. There's ways to do this really well that make the team stay engaged with it.

Yes. Yes, and we do it well here. And, you know, Luke, one of our executive EPs and, you know, helps lead this initiative, why we work. And we spend a whole year highlighting stories of why we work. And we remind ourselves in our staff meetings and then in our individual team meetings why we work. Now, again, that's getting back to purpose. So when the why, your purpose stays top of mind, and I mean always top of mind. And Dave and our leadership team, I applaud you guys.

Do a tremendous job doing this. But it is – and I'm kind of – of maniacal about it with my my little team. I'm always telling them. This is why we do this. This is why we do this. I'll get off of a phone call sometime and we'll go to commercial break and I'll just hit the talk back button to my producers and I'll just go, that's why we do what we do right there. You've got to be maniacal about the why because again, as things change, the economy changes, technology changes, consumer behaviors change, all the things. You're why you go, uh-oh, we're going to make some changes here because if we don't, we're going to make some changes here,

because if we don't make some changes, we're not going to be able to fulfill our why to the best ability. And so that's how, again, vision goes, oh, the vision should expand. And I was going to say something earlier, be careful. If you're not updating that vision based on your why, your vision can actually hold you back. Because it's the wrong vision. It's like, oh, gosh. And I really think that's what happened to Polaroid and Blockbuster. They're like, man, like six weeks ago, we were like, we were the king of this mountain.

Now everybody's left the mountain. What happened? Well, the paradox there, the time that you need to be updating your vision is often when you are in a peak performance state. Yeah. Like you're not feeling the pain of disruption yet. You have to have vision to say, but we could be disrupted in two years from now. What are we going to do about it? That's right.

But cash is strong, sales are strong. You're at a very mature business model and ego kicks in. You got, oh, we're doing good. Oh, that's really good. So guess what? So let's just use that analogy, Daniel. So when you're on top, let's go ahead and use that. we're on top. So instead of looking down and around and being very impressed with all the stuff,

how about we look out? You know, I love going to those high points, look out Mountain in Chattanooga, and you can look out and you just see as far as your eye can possibly see. It's like your way and you're looking out. So that's what you do. By the way, so the Y is still constant, but now we're going to expand our vision. When we're winning, we go, all right, we're winning, but guess what? Our Y tells us that we're supposed to bring hope to people. And there's billions. billions and billions and billions of people, and we haven't touched them yet. We've got to touch them. How do we touch them? How do we get to them? And so now we're expanding the vision. The Y stays the same, but now we're expanding the vision. Guess what? When we expand the vision,

we go, oh, crap, we got this big vision at 4 a.m. last night. How do we get there? And that's when the team comes around. We go, we've got to change the mission. Yeah. I mean, if you don't feel uncomfortable, you're about to be really uncomfortable. I mean, you've got to constantly live in the state of Do you want to create your own discomfort or you want somebody else to force it on you? Because big vision will make you uncomfortable. But guess what? Blockbuster will tell you, poor guys at Blockbuster. They get picked on a lot. I know. But it's like they'll tell you, pick your own discomfort. Because they're dead. Gone. They're gone. Yeah. Hey, you know, we were talking earlier about at Ramsey, we read the stories of the lives that have been impacted by what we do. I think reading customer success stories is one of the best ways.

You keep that purpose alive with the team. I also know that people out there listening to this podcast look at Ramsey Solutions and go, well, yeah, y'all get letters from people talking about saving their marriages. And people in our staff meeting have tears rolling down their face because it's so emotional and meaningful and just, oh, wow, changing lives. I'm thinking about my friend Darren. He's got a company where they've got portable toilets and dumpster rentals. Think about my friend Regina. They do hospital medical buildings. I don't know that their fan mail is high volume, first of all. I mean, the people that rent

portable toilets are contractors that say, hey, we got a job site, put in some porta-potties. If you're Darren, how do you get your team to connect to, hey, this is the work we're doing, here's why it really matters in a way that's not as maybe as sexy or high-profile as the Ramsey's mission or purpose? But you and I know it still matters. Big time. So what you start doing is you start, I think a fun exercise for companies like that would be to put some tangible every once in a while, get the whole team in, whole company, and make a list of all the tangible things

that those porta-potties allow to happen. See, you can't just look at the port-a-potty. Because you go, if you just look at the porta-potty, you go, what value we bring in? Well, you've got the worker out there who's about ready to mess himself up after a chilly dog on a hot 90-degree day, and we're saving him some embarrassment,

or giving him some relief, or the mom who's at soccer practice, and she's got three kids and she doesn't want to have to change a diaper. She didn't have a diaper. You know, you could get to all of the personal emergency stories. There's only a couple of those. Okay. And you start to go, oh, gosh, is that really that valuable? Until you go, well, first of all, those things are valuable. But what are those port of potty's allow progress? See, portodys exist to not interrupt progress. So I can get there pretty quick and go, what we're doing really matters. But then you can get, that's in the real practical. But then you can step back and go, hey, we

doubled our port-a-potty distribution in the last two years, and it put this on the bottom line. As a result, every person in this company got a dividend or is making more money or whatever. And all of a sudden you go, I'm about port-a-potties is the mission. I think for the port-a-potty company owner, again, I don't want to paint them in a corner, but on some level, that's the mission. And what they're doing is they want to work for themselves. they got their reasons, right? They want to love on people and hire people that may never get a chance.

The company becomes a utilitarian mission to fulfill the purpose. And this is where the personal purpose and then the company's purpose can be an alignment, which is you provide great jobs for people in your community, the community that you never wanted to move away from. So again, I'd have to sit down with each owner. But in interviewing each one of these people, I could help them see how the purpose of the company is much higher than just the product of the service. Because remember, it's never just about the product

or the service, and it's not about money. What is it about? Well, it's about the result, the collective results. And so you have to be able to see some of the intangibles as it relates to the customer and then how that affects everything else. Well, I like the exercise of following it out past just the service you provide. Yeah, you got to look. It empowers what? Which empowers what? At some point, there's a human on the other end of it whose life is better as a result. Schools get built faster because we give people a place to go potty. That's good. It's not very inspiring, sounding.

But the fact of the matter is, is that does it have to be inspiring or does it have to be on purpose? Well, no, I think what you're saying, though, is every business has a purpose. You can't exist in business if you don't have one. If there's no function or utility in society to the thing that you do, your product or service, then you don't have a purpose. And so sometimes you just got to get clear on, no, we have one, but what is it and how do we? Martin Luther King Jr. said it best. If you're going to be a street sweeper, be a street sweeper that all of heaven notices. Go look the quote up. I'm not going to quote the whole thing. But he basically said, look, you're supposed to be the best at what it is that you're supposed to do. And guess what? We need companies that are providing porta-potties. We need companies that do medical billing. So better be the best. And by the way, be the best in what you're doing there so that your employees and everybody works for you, they get a chance to live their best life. Oh, we need them all. They're the backbone of our Absolutely. So we've talked about why purpose matters. I'm talking about how to find it. I've talked about what it does. Connecting the purpose and vision to your team so they know this is why we exist. I think the final step if you're leading a team is making sure the behaviors of the team consistently align with our purpose. You know, I mean, it's not just casting a vision and hoping it sticks, but it's actually at the leadership level, checking in on the activities, checking in on our projects, making sure that we're doing the right things. at the right time, the right way that are all an extension, Ken, of our purpose.

Yeah, I think that I've been thinking about this. And I think that one thing that leaders can do here is take the company purpose statement and the why that's talked about hopefully on a regular basis and have the leaders of your company make sure that they are on a consistent basis sitting down with the individual team members that they lead. Okay. So I'm picturing right now one of our technology leaders. And, you know, I think they need to be sitting down with all of our programmers. and going, hey, I ran some numbers for you.

You programmed this much code last year on these four websites and the life change that happened because of the products or the pages that you program or whatever it is. This is the life change that we can equate to your code. I love that. You've got to remind people. You know, you've got to remind the customer care lady or the, you know, the guy or the HR person who hired a rock star.

And that rock star has gone on to do this this year. This rock star that you brought to us, we weren't going to hire me. You really pushed. Well, I'm glad you did because we hired her. And guess what she did this year? And you have a hand in everything she did. We've got to remind people of their own scoreboard.

And I'm just such a fan. I'm such a competitive freak. I mean, I'm overly competitive. But I will say the one thing I'm grateful for with competition, it's one of my top five when I took string finders is competition. And where it has served me is that I've really understood the value of a scoreboard in my own personal growth in the lives of my kids, my wife, our personal finances. I think leaders, you've got to understand whether a person's highly

competitive or not, they're keeping score. And one of the ways that you can take the big company why, the big company purpose, and attach it to the individual's purpose in their role, is show them their direct scoreboard. This is your scoreboard. This is what you've put up on the board this year. Way to go. Because if you don't code, we don't have this result. They've got to see their why attached to the company why. It's big, man. It's good. You know, as we wrap up, I'd love to encourage leaders who many of them this year can have spoken with dozens of them. They may know that purpose matters, but their head has been a lot closer to survival. Purpose kind of goes to the back shelf a little bit, if you're honest. And how would you

encourage them to continue to navigate forward, not lose sight of purpose, and a little bit of hope for the future because we know it's out there. Yeah, I think that hope actually comes from reigniting purpose and getting purpose back at the forefront. I know that it's been really hard. I know you're going, Ken, it's a 20-hour day, and all I want to do is go home and fall in the bed, and I get it. But the next morning, you better have a reminder in your mirror of why you do this. And I think that in times of great trial, in times of great uncertainty, it is actually reconnecting with our purpose and our why that keeps us going. It fills the tank because you go, why in the crap am I doing this? You better be able to answer that. See, people quit, people fall away

when they can't answer the question. You're in a danger zone right now if you can't answer that question. Why in the blank am I doing this? It's okay to say that, by the way. In fact, I think it's highly therapeutic, but you better be able to answer it. And then, oh, by the way, in times of uncertainty, in times of trial and things are really tough, ask yourself on purpose. Why am I doing this? Oh, yeah, that's right. That's good. I just think that's how you reconnect. By the way, how can you stay with it if you have no earthly idea yourself? So the numbness needs to be shaken. And it's like, okay, remind yourself of the why again. I think that's how you stay the course. That's how you get encouraged. Well, I think it's really good. And I would just add to that,

give yourself a day or two for it to come back to you. Because I've had seasons where I've asked that, and it was not an immediate obvious, like, oh, yeah, that's it. Oh, I'm fine now. Yeah, that's fair. You've got some days where you're just like, oh, gosh. Yeah. Just don't quit until you know, okay, I no longer have a while.

And that's for those of you who've not answered this question. But for those of you who have the answer that you don't need two days, you just remind yourself right then and there because I've done the hard work to get the why in the first place. But for those of you that don't have it, yeah, you've got to take the time to do this. And you make a very good point there. You need to get away enough to where you're healthy or quiet enough to actually be able to. Because if you're in times of extreme survival, it's hard to have the clarity to get this. What we're saying is we hope you can get it so that when those times come, you're able to see that North Star.

You're right. These are things that are done well from a calm, rested state where you've got that clarity. Ken, incredible conversation and nuggets of wisdom about purpose, why it matters. I love this. I always love doing this with you as we close up any final thoughts or words of encouragement. Yeah, some of you out there are going, okay, I'm starting to sense that I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do. What do I do now? I'm leading a company. If I'm honest, I don't want to do this. And I'm saying this to this very few people, but I think this is the one thing we haven't touched on. So my closing remarks are, all right, take a deep breath. Don't do anything stupid.

You have a lot of people relying on you. But you've got to have the courage to get this. right. You've got to have the courage. And so figure out a plan to get there. Don't jump off a cliff. I would tell you just like I would have a caller. If you own a business that you really don't want to run, you need to come up with a good plan to exit. But do not jump. Do not do anything crazy. Be patient. And then for those of you who aren't in your sweet spot, you want to stay in the company. You love the company. It's what you're supposed to do. But you know you aren't personally in your leadership sweet spot. Would you please trust me that your team will admire you? and trust you more when you own this and fix it.

They're not going to distrust you. They're not going to lose confidence in you, and they're not going to leave you. This will be the greatest leadership decision you ever make. Please make it. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality and America's leading voice on purpose, meaning, and loving what you're doing every day because you were made for a purpose.

If people want to follow you or find out more about what you got going on lately, how can they find out more? Yeah, at Ken Coleman on Instagram. It's a great way to engage. Ken Coleman.com is the website. We've got a ton of free and great paid resources. And I'd love for you to check out the podcast of the radio show. If you're not listening on your local radio station or Sirius XM,

we have the podcast of the show. And we're also on YouTube. Just search the Ken Coleman show in all of those formats and you'll find us. Ken, love you, brother. Thanks for being here today. Thank you, bro. Thanks, man. Always fun.

Wow, what a fun conversation. Always good to have Ken Coleman back in the studio. I love that guy. I kind of miss that guy as the host. of the Entree Leadership Podcast. Although, I don't know, I think the host could be better today. You guys will have to tell us, if you think Ken's better, you know, don't let me know about it.

If you think I'm better as the host, be sure to tweak you in and let him know. Now I'm kidding, he's a friend, and we like to hassle each other all the time. Good conversation about purpose. You know, if you're like me sometimes, we know purpose matters, but we get really busy running the business

and we forget to keep it top of mind for the team. guys, anytime you're talking with your team, you've got to connect it back to the purpose. You know, business can be crazy. We get caught up in the tyranny of the urgent, the chaos, the storm of sales, marketing, and fulfillment and operations and closing out the month and vendor issues. And guys, that's business. But that's not leadership. Leadership is keeping all that stuff going and then still prioritizing the time to get above

it all and make sure that you know the purpose, you communicate the purpose, and to ensure that the team understands it in a way that drives their behavior towards that purpose. That's your job. That's what leaders do. All right, guys, so you know that purpose matters and you know that vision matters, and you also know you need a freaking mission statement. Do you have a mission statement? Do you know what it is? Does your team know what it is? Or, you know, do you have one at all? If you don't have one, got one that needs to be tweaked or dusted off a little bit, our coaching team has put together an incredible free tool just for you. It's called the mission statement mapper. It's a guideline. It's got some prompts and questions. It's going to help you figure out how to have a really strong

tight mission statement that captures what you're about and where you're going and is kind of sticky and memorable so the team knows what it is and keeps it top of mind. So to get the mission statement mapper, all you got to do is text the word mission to 33444. That's mission to 33.3.4. That's mission to 3-3-4-4. Or you can just click on the link in the show notes. Well, I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Entree Leadership podcast. Hey, do you know somebody that would enjoy this episode? We would love it if you would share the link. Send it to them. Let them know.

Hey, I thought about you when I was listening to this thing. That's the way we get the word out on this. Our fans create new fans. And guess what? You get to be the hero. So thanks for doing that. And also, if you want to hang out with this on social media, you can check us out at Entree Leadership.

You can also follow me on Instagram at Daniel Tarty. Would love a chance to hang out with you over there. I post a lot of things going on behind the scenes with the Entree Leadership team, stuff we're working on, cameo shots, silly videos of me talking about, well, important things, leadership, team development, all the Entree leadership stuff. It'd be fun to have you join the conversation there. Also, if you'd like a chance to win a $25 Amazon gift card, just drop us a review on this episode by clicking the link down on the show notes.

We actually read that stuff. We take your feedback and we use it to help us improve. This episode was produced by Tim Hull. It was edited and mixed by Will Rutter. I'm your host, Daniel Tarty, and on behalf of the entire Entry Leadership team, thank you for listening. Until next time, keep learning and keep leading. If you enjoy this podcast, you should check out other great podcasts from the Ramsey Network,

like The Ken Coleman Show. Are you doing what you were born to do? I'm Ken Coleman, host of the Ken Coleman Show, where I give you practical advice to help you discover your purpose and then map out a plan to get you there. From accounting to advertising, from plumbing to production, you were created to fill a unique role, and the world needs what you have to offer. Join me on the Ken Coleman Show wherever you listen to podcasts.