Next Level Pros - #67: The Real Life Wizard of Oz: Steve Sims; The Ultimate “I Got A Guy”

Episode Date: January 15, 2024

Steve Sims, author of 'Bluefishing: The Art of Making Things Happen,' shares his journey from being a broke bricklayer to working with the most powerful and influential people in the world. Sims emphasizes the importance of thinking big and ‘going for stupid,’ surrounding yourself with the right people and finding opportunities in challenging times. He also highlights the significance of balancing success and family while providing the best practices for making big things happen. In this conversation, Steve Sims shares valuable insights on building meaningful relationships, highlighting the importance of considering what you bring to the table when approaching someone, remembering the need to address the other person's needs and problems. Discussing the power of research and intuition in building connections, Sims shares personal anecdotes and strategies for engaging in conversation and treating people as equals. He encourages listeners to invest in relationships and pay attention to details, as meaningful connections cannot be replaced by transactional interactions. Highlights:“Google doesn't lie to us. There's nothing wrong on Google.”“If they don't pay, they don't pay attention. Okay. And if I give it to you for free, you value it as that.”“When you play with things, you don't lose energy, but when you're fighting things, you do.” Timestamps:03:00 Going for Stupid10:00 The Power of Networking16:00 Making Things Happen23:00 The Right Circle29:00 Opportunities in Challenges38:00 Balancing Success and Family45:01 Approaching relationships48:24 'How can I help you?'53:08 Taking Initiative in Relationships57:24 Value Relationships

And you know, like in the old days, when you go, hey, you need something, I've got a guy. I was that guy. You were the guy. But I would hang around. Yeah. And I would hang around in the most affluent places I possibly could. And so all of a sudden I started working for them. Not only was I working my database, but I now had access to that database. We're going from, can you get me into this club to literally, and I'm not lying, can you get me married in the Vatican by the Pope? Yo, yo, yo, yo. Welcome to another episode of the Founder Podcast. Today, I am joined by Mr. Steve Sims.

Steve is an incredible entrepreneur with some awesome stories. I'm super excited for this episode. Steve is the author of two incredible books, Blue Fishing and Go for Stupid, which is, we're going to have to go a little bit deeper into that title. So super excited to have Steve. Welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. It's exciting to be here.

We're in the beautiful Spotify podcast studio. Have you ever been here before? I've driven past it many times, never actually been in. I've been blessed. Yeah, pretty cool. So I love being here. But more Pretty, pretty cool. So love, love being here, but more importantly, love being here with you. Excited to get to know you, tell your story and you know, do all the good things. So a family man. Yeah. Awesome. Married.

How long have you been married? Forever. We literally met, I think I was 17. She was 16. So, you know, just literally forever. Awesome. That sounds like me and my wife. Yeah, we've been dating since I was 16 and been married for 18 years. And you have how many children? I have three kids, two dogs, loads of motorbikes and a fair amount of whiskey. Yeah. And clearly not originally here from LA. No, no. You guessed, didn't you?

No, I'm an East London um that just started a journey to try and uh surround myself with affluent successful people so i would stop being a broke-ass biker that i was yeah that's so that's well you got the good uh biker look but then you know we were we were joking uh kind of reading through your bio, the fact that you're from London. And I'm like, of course, he's in the concierge business, creating incredible. You can't be in that business unless you have a British accent. It's funny, but they may expect a British accent, but they don't expect me. £245 of ugly is not commonly what people want turning up on their doorstep asking for their black card but it just I think funny enough that actually worked for me because we were in a we were in the late 80s and 90s where there was an air of precociousness when people had money right you

know if you had money people could oh good afternoon sir oh how are you you know there's a standing joke that the richer you become the more British you become yeah there was this kind of like air that came along with money. But the fact is, if you think about everyone that has money now, they came from basically not a lot of it. So they know what it's like to have a real conversation, real interaction. So in which case, they can see through the fake BS very, very quickly.

So while I didn't know how I came across, I was very ignorant to the way that this was bowling into your world, it actually became very refreshing for a lot of my clients. And I ended up working with the most powerful and influential people in the world. And if we want a name drop, we can do it. Elon Musk, Richard Branson. Oh, I love the name drops.

It's all out there. But far more powerful, far more impactful people that you've never heard of. So I was very fortunate. That's so awesome. So, so tell us what is exactly, so I know what you do, but I'd love you to tell the audience, like what has been your gift to humanity? Wow. I don't know if it's been a gift to humanity. It's been a gift to a lot of big people's checkbooks. I was a broke bricklayer and I wanted to surround myself with rich people. So I tried getting into affluent jobs and failing, ended up being the doorman of a nightclub in Hong Kong. And backing up, from what I understand, you dropped out of school at a very young age. Dropped out is an understatement. At the age of 15, I was asked to leave.

And I think I was in the no hope pile. So tell me about that. You're 15 and asked to leave. I mean, you must have just been a pain in the butt. Wasn't every entrepreneur? Yes. We were the ones that kept on going, excuse me, miss. I don't understand that. Right. Until we were ridiculed by the other kids. But as entrepreneurs, we were always kind of like, well, why has it got to fit in that box?

Why is that the only option? Oh, yeah. And now we revere people like Elon Musk that doesn't even see a box. Right. So I was very quizzical. Yeah. And of course, being a big lad, it was coming across as a troublemaker. And I was like, no, I don't understand.

Tell me. And, of course, like, you know, so I was classed from a very early age. I had anger issues. But I had confusion issues. And that was the thing. So I constantly asked, why does it have to be done? Why me? Why not that?

You know, and there was only ever one answer, which never sank well for me. Surely there's more than one answer, one way to do something. So in England, you leave school when you're 16 and you go to college. So it's a slightly different system. But I was very young in my year and I was 15 and they literally said, there's no point in finishing the year and don't apply for college. Wow. And that was my school counselor that said that. So they sent me home with a letter to my parents. My dad owned a bricklaying firm,

which consisted of him and his uncle and my granddad. And they went, right, you know, you start on a building site tomorrow. And I was like, damn, is that my life? Is that it? Yeah, exactly. And they went, right, you start on the building site tomorrow. And I was like, damn, is that my life? This sucks. Is that it? Yeah, exactly. And there was a very pivotal moment that I spoke about in Bluefish Inn where I went up on the building site and there was my dad, my uncle,

my cousins, and my granddad. And I could see my life, you know, my teen and my cousins. Right, just the progression of the entire. my progression of the, yeah, right. My car was like 16, 17 years old. My cousin was 19. One of them was 26. My granddad was in his eighties. And I remember running down to my granddad during the tea break time and a squeeze, not

big mammoth of a man. He was like Hagrid, you know, just huge guy. And I remember running up to him and going, granddad, did you ever think you'd be doing this at your age? Now, of course, that's not a very polite thing to ask an eight year old that pretty much has screwed up his life to get to having to work just to survive. He didn't even look at me. He literally blew into his tea and he said, if you don't quit today, you'll be me tomorrow. Oh, those are probably the best words you could ever hear. I quit that day. I quit that day and I knew I had to leave. Sadly, my granddad died probably

about two weeks later. Never got, never got, I swear he's probably up causing some shit in heaven now and just waiting for me with an old fashioned, but I'm going to give him a hug when I'm up there to say thank you. But I believe that there's many pivotal moments I've gone through, but that was the first one. Right. That was the one that went, hang on a minute. We don't know about tomorrow. And if we waste it, that baby's going to come real fast. Yeah.

And coming from a guy that's 80, you know, like obviously he's full of wisdom. Yeah. And you're like. I hope so. Yeah. I mean, he knows something. He knows a few things.

He's been around a while and hopefully a few things he says. Yeah. And that was it. I just knew that I was a curious kid. I didn't have Instagram to validate how inadequate my life was. I didn't have YouTube to convince me that, you know, I wasn't the guru. So, you know, we didn't have those things then. Right.

But as an entrepreneur inside, you've got that curiosity married with that aggravation. You know, what's next? How can I be better? How can I do it? And I had that. And I went out on a journey to try and find it. And as I say, you know, I failed a ton of jobs. Learned a million jobs that I couldn't do.

Only to end up on the front door of a nightclub because I'm big and ugly. Big guy. Yeah, perfect. You know, look at him. He can slap people. Yeah, natural fit. So they threw me on the door of a nightclub because I'm big and ugly. Big guy. Yeah, perfect. You know, look at him. He can slap people. Yeah, natural fit. So they threw me on the door of a club. But I got a PhD of human psychology there.

Really? You know, I got to see how, and we've all been there. You know, those people that are full of it, how they act. Right. Those people that have really made it, how they act. Right. You know, those people that are curious. So I recognized it very early on

um how old were you at this time well i was in my early 20s now in this and were you still in the uk no i'd moved to hong kong because there was a chance for a job this was in hong kong i know wow there was a chance of a job in hong kong which i took and i lasted two days what was the job can you believe it a stockbroker um They were employing trainee stockbrokers. Two days. And I managed to talk my way into getting a free ticket over there and a free apartment into this stockbroking apprenticeship. And they fired me after two days because I couldn't even add up

without using my fingers and toes. So they fired me. But it didn't squash the curiosity. And I managed to just start interacting with these people in the club. Um, and you, you know, like you're going to a restaurant and you get the manager walk around the restaurant going, Hey, how are you? Are you having a good night tonight? And they do that.

I was doing that in the club and the manager wasn't. And the manager was like, what are you doing? And I was like, I'm just making sure everyone's okay. But I was becoming this almost maitre d' hospitality. But the point is, I wanted to talk to affluent people. So I'd go up to them and I'd be like, you know, because I was on the door. I knew where all the clubs were. And I was like, are you going to the new club Thursday?

And they were like, no, I didn't. Let me see if I can pull a few strings just to get them to talk to me. Just working deals. Yeah. So I went from getting people into nightclubs to working for Ferrari in Monaco at the Grand Prix. I worked for the Elton John Oscar party for eight years. So, I mean, how does that happen, right?

Like, I mean, it's not just you do this twice and then one day you're working for, you know, Ferrari at the Grand Prix. Like, what were, like, some of your big breaks that, like, got you these connections? Or was it just one little connection and one little connection that led to that? That one after one. It was a stepping stone.

It was an inch by inch. Someone wants to get into a club. All of a sudden, I know the club owner. That club owner knows that restaurant. That restaurant spent sponsoring an award show. Can you help us with the award show? It was just one after one. What year was this?

So it all kicked off in the early 90s. Okay. And I suppose- I mean, this is pre-cell phone. Oh, God, yeah. I mean, you've got, what, like a little black book that you're taking notes and putting people's names down, studying them at night. What were some of your best practices in those early days when you didn't have this nice smartphone?

That was the thing. Studying the people. It's very easy to meet someone and you go, look, they've got a brown belt and black shoes. Are they paying attention to those details? Is there any roughness about their outfit? Is there any roughness about their demeanor? Is there any

inconsistencies within that story? And who's teaching you these things? Is it all just coming natural for you? Didn't we have that demeanor? Is there any kind of like, you know, inconsistencies within that story? And who's teaching you these things? Is it all just coming natural for you? Didn't we have that? Pretty much everyone in this room is older than Google. Yeah. You know? So when we walked into a bar, you knew there were guys you would mess with

and there were guys you wouldn't. Right. You know, you just knew that. People call it the street smart. Right. But now we've diluted it and we now trust the Wi-Fi because hell, you know, Google doesn't lie to us. There's nothing wrong on Google, you know. It's true.

But the trouble is we trusted our gut back then and we don't now. Right. There was way more intuition. That was the thing. And we actually paid attention to life instead of being buried in here. Yeah. And I think paying attention is a muscle. Right. And I think the fact that when you start relying on your cell phone to give you all the gospel, you start losing the ability to trust your gut.

Now, that gut and that intuition is what is going to steer you. And if you stop using it, it's a muscle you're going to lose. I really like that. I mean, and it's a muscle that most people have lost today. And it is dying. We've got phones now that are there to keep us more connected, and we've never been more disconnected. Right.

And we've just gone through COVID as well, which has basically alienated us from having a conversation. In fact, if you want to look like a criminal, if you want to get arrested, stand in a coffee shop or a bus stop or a tube station and strike up a conversation with the person next to you. It's almost alien now. They'll be like, what are you doing?

Who are you? Get back to your phone. Yeah, but no, it's a weird old thing now. So it's something that's dying, but we should never ignore the fact that as human beings, we're pack animals. We like nothing more than connect with like-minded disruptors, people that do things differently, people that we can align with.

We like this kind of car. We like this kind of motorbike. We like this kind of music. But we're in a world now where we're doing everything we possibly can to disconnect. It's kind of scary. It is scary. It is scary. So you're going about this.

How long are you working as a club bouncer or whatever? So I was a bouncer for probably about two and a half years. Then I turned into, and I just started building up these things. I remember going, I remember when I got the, do you remember this, the Palm Pilot? Oh yeah. Oh God, man. I was like, I was like Steve Jobs. I had this Palm Pilot.

I thought I was like whiz kid. Oh yeah. Um, and I had a Palm Trio at one point. Hey, you're fancy. You're fancy. I could tell that. But, and I would like Wizkid. Oh, yeah. I had a palm trio at one point. You're fancy. You're fancy. I could tell that. And I would make notes in there. I'd make notes in there on the jewelry.

I'd make notes on how well-dressed they were. So, you know, I'd make notes. They go to a restaurant and they order a Negroni. Why a Negroni? Oh, I love Negroni. I'd make a little note. So I was constantly making – and I'd build up this database on people on a little black pad and then in my Palm Pilot.

And so I just became this fix it. And, you know, like in the old days when you go, hey, you need something? I've got a guy. I was that guy. You were the guy. But I would hang around. Yeah. And I would hang around in the most affluent places I possibly could.

And then those places would go, look, you know, can you get people into our party? Can you get the right kind of people into my gala, my award shows? And so all of a sudden I started working for them. Not only was I working my database, but I now had access to that database. So I was constantly working up and around. And, of course, the requests I were getting were going from, can you get me into this club, to literally, and I'm not lying, can you get me married in the Vatican by the Pope? And just the requests were getting bigger. So obviously, I mean, these came from all different types of things. One thing I've

noticed, so I have several friends that are in, you would call them connectors, right? And they're really good. They know a lot of people or whatnot, but very few of them actually turn it into actual money. Yeah. Right? Like they hang around fancy crowds, but they end up being the poorest guy in the crowd because all they did was connect. Like at what point did you actually transition to making it where it actually started producing funds for you? Day one. Day one.

Day one. And how did you go about that? I'm a great believer if they don't pay, they don't pay attention. Okay. And if I give it to you for free, you value it as that. Right. So I used the example when I said to you at the beginning that I would meet a couple of people in the club that were affluent and that I wanted to connect with. And I'd walk up to them and I'd be like, hey, Chris,

are you going to the new club? And they'd be like, no, I'm not. And I'd be like, let me see if I can make a call. And then I would come back to her and go, look, they're opening up on Thursday. I pulled a few strings. I want to look after a doorman, so it's a couple hundred bucks each. Straight off the bat.

They'd be like, fine. And I realized. So then you would take a piece of that and give it to the doorman? Yeah. Yeah, always. Look after your people. Right. Look after yourself.

And I realized that people are happier to pay for access than potentially getting turned away. Right. No one wants to be lining up and getting sold. Not tonight. They don't want that. Right. So I became that person that you could actually pay to get what you wanted. Pay to play. I was very, very, I never had fee phobia.

Yeah. You know, I was always like, yeah, that's going to cost you 500. That's going to cost you a couple of grand. Yeah, you're looking at about 1.3 million for that, you know, and I'm going to take 50% up front and start getting it going. So I never had a problem with that. So like, for example, you talked about getting married by the Pope in the Vatican or whatnot.

Did you make that happen? I did. Okay. And how much did that cost that person? I can't tell you. Oh, you don't have to tell us who. We just got to know how much. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because maybe I want to get married, remarried to my wife by the Pope in the Vatican. So it was held in St. Peter's and then the blessing was held by the Pope. But we're not allowed to discuss. We never discuss the clients. Yeah, yeah. We never discuss the donations and the financials. And here's the funny thing. When you get into that world, the last thing you ever discuss is the financial.

It's like you buying a car and then being surprised you've got to pay for the gas. I remember I was working with Elton John for about eight years, and someone came up to him during the party, and I was stood next to him. Very, very affluent gentleman came up, and he went, hey, I'm having a party at my house. How much would it cost you to come and perform? And Elton turned around and said, I'm actually busy then,

and walked off. The guy hadn't even given him the date. And when I caught up with Elton, he turned to me and said, no one buys me. The last thing you want to do is put a price on something. I'm not a commodity. So when you're talking to people like that, you've got to work out what's going to make them want to do this. You know there's going to be a financial aspect. You know there's going to be a pay to play near the end. But what's the reason that they're going to want to be involved in that event, that experience, that transaction, that story, that memory, whatever. That's what you're going to focus on. And today we're far more

concerned on completing a transaction. How much is it going to cost me rather than, hey, I got something that is dynamite and I'd love you to be involved in it. Should I tell you what it is? That kind of thing. People are missing out on that element yeah no i agree so you don't have to tell me about the pope but you got to tell me like what was the biggest transaction you ever did oh that you like that you were able to take monetary monetarily that you took i don't like talking about the money no i get it i get it But I will tell you of an experience that I created that was fun. Okay. You know, I'll squirm my way into that.

I had a client that contacted me, and here's a big lesson for anyone listening. People say to me, have you ever not been able to get anything? Okay. And the answer is arrogantly no. Oh, I love it. And the reason the answer is arrogantly no is because i've never even attempted to give you what you asked for because people always ask for what they think they can get right okay well if you give them that you've just completed a transaction and isn't that what

amazon does you know so people would come to me and they'd be like hey i'd love to go to this concert great let me see what i can do and then i'll get you backstage you know i would always go above and beyond and one of the classic ones and again it's in the book um was i had people say to me like you know i want to have this amazing dining experience in florence you know i really want to show off to my future mother-in-law and father-in-law can you can you make happen? Absolutely. I ended up taking over the Academia de Galleria, which is the museum in Florence that houses Michelangelo's David, the most iconic statue in the world. Yes.

I took it over from 5 o'clock in the evening until 2 o'clock in the morning, 9 o'clock at night. I had a table of six set up at the feet of David, and I had the clients brought in to have dinner at the feet of the most iconic statue in the world. Now, that's good, yes? That's pretty good. Couldn't stop there, though.

So we had a string quartet in appearance there. So I said, look, during the main course, I'm going to have a local entertainer come in and serenade you while you're digging into your pasta. So when it got time for them to start that main course, I let them know that I wanted to bring in the entertainer. They approved it. They said, certainly, Steve. Bring him in. I brought in Andrea Bocelli to serenade him, join that pasta. So that's the kind of thing that I did.

Of course, nobody knew that was the level that I played at. And of course, when you do that, they become addicted. They're like, what can you do for Monaco? What can you do for this? What can you do for my barbecue? What can you do for this amazing Sunday? Just because it for my barbecue what can you do for this amazing sunday you know just because it's a bloody sunday so i became that and i carried that on for like 25 years until forbes did um i suppose the word should be beautiful but they did a an eight page expose

on the most connected man in the world and they called me the real life wizard of oz i love that it was kind of nice, but up until about halfway through the day, it killed about 50% of my business. Oh, really? Well, all the powerful people that I was dealing with around the world. Didn't want to be outed that you were their guy.

Because they wanted to tell their mates, this was the reason I played drums with Guns N' Roses. This was the reason I drove a Formula One car in Monaco. So they wanted you to be their connection that they... Their connection, but they wanted me in the background. And I was very happy being in the background. I was very chuffed, just no one knowing who I was. Right. And then all of a sudden you're getting inundated with... I'm getting pictures of me with Branson and everything. And so all of a sudden people were like, hang on, is that the guy you used for that story you told?

So I lost a lot of business. But funny enough, within about two weeks, Simon and Schuster contacted me and they said, can you do a book? And they wanted me to do a book exposing all of the powerful people that I had worked with and what they had. And I said, look, I've dealt with some colorful people. If I expose that, I'll be dead before cocktail hour. So they said, well, can you do how a bricklayer from London ends up doing this? And so we wrote that book, not knowing if it'd work. And that was eight years ago.

This was Blue Fishing. Blue Fishing. It came out as a bestseller and got translated, I think, eight different languages. How many books have you sold? Oh, I don't know. I think 200 and something thousand. You know, just ridiculous. Yeah, that's great. We couldn't believe it. And of course, here's don't know. I think 200 and something thousand. You know, it's just ridiculous. Yeah, that's great. We couldn't believe it.

And, of course, here's the dumb thing. I love you, Solomon. I should say that. I front-loaded. So I'm not making anything out of books now. So they're very happy. But, yeah, I really didn't think anyone would take this book seriously. Because it's simple.

So you got paid out up front and didn't get a piece on the back end. I got a piece, but it's not exactly keeping me in old fashions, that's for sure. So, all right, moving on from the financial aspect, not focusing there. The real question is, how did you make these things happen? And what were some principles that can be taught for other people to go and do? Maybe not dinner at the feet of Michelangelo or David. Why not? That's the first mistake.

That's the first mistake. People go, maybe not this. Think big. You mentioned earlier about the second book, Go for Stupid. I've been using that title since 2003. Yes. Because someone would come to us and they'd be like, Hey, I'd love to do this. And we'd be like, great. And then we'd sit around with everyone and we'd go, Hey, how can we make this stupid? Now here's the thing. Think about it. It's just happened to you. And so you're, I've seen it. And anyone watching this video will pick up on this. If I ask you what your goal is and you tell me what your goal is,

and then I say to you, okay, what are we going to do? We're going to make it impossible. We're going to break through the impossible. We're going to make the impossible possible. You get very feisty, don't you? You get very gritty, you know, and you get very rigid. But if I say to you, well, that sounds fine, but how can we make that goal stupid?

You're going for 10 million. Screw it. Let's go for 50. Anyone that's watching this video can see your face. You're now smiling. Why? Because you've become a child. Right.

When you play with things, you don't lose energy. But when you're fighting things, you do. Absolutely. So when you're going for the impossible, it's all just, come on, let's play. But when you're playing with a concept, when you're going for the impossible it's all just come on let's play but when you're playing with a concept when you're playing with an idea when you're imagining things you become a child and child have no parameters they have no boxes again powerful all right so that's what we used to do so the first thing is if you want to do something go for stupid make it bigger make your goal laughable you You know, it's interesting. Like I downplayed

whatever else somebody else would do, right? But the reality is I believe that, right? Like as an entrepreneur, I've gone and built companies that done 200, close to $250 million a year and done stupid things that, you know, younger me would have never thought possible. And it was all because I did dream big. And so I agree with you that the principle applies to everything, that you have to go for stupid. Well, there's two things. And you asked me what was one of the tactics. The first thing is to go for stupid.

And the second one is know your arena. Now, the downside is, and this is a test for anyone that's listening to this podcast. You're in your environment. You're at listening to this podcast you're in your you're in your environment you're at your coffee table you're in your bar and you turn around and you address your mates and you go well look you know i've been looking at this but i want a 250 million company you know as one of them i want three of them and i'm gonna franchise them off and i'm probably gonna launch a tv show on it and i'll probably even write a book on it as well. So other people can follow my ups and downs and my lessons.

When you're telling your crowd, your community, your goals, are they looking at you like a deer in headlights? Or are they smiling and supporting? The downside is nine times out of ten, today we're scared of being laughed at. And we start telling our people, those people that we've grown up with, our goals and dreams. They're looking at us like, you've gone mad. You're a bricklayer. Yeah, what the hell do you know?

You're going to fail everything. And what do we do? We then go, yeah, I'm sorry about it. Someone must have spiked my drink. I'll back voyage. Apologize for thinking that. Yeah, sorry about it. Exactly.

You apologize. You're in the wrong arena. Now, I guarantee you would not be where you were if you were in that arena. You surround yourself with people that push you and challenge you. I remember having a conversation with Jay Abraham. You know Jay Abraham? Oh, yeah. He actually lives just down the road from here.

Oh, awesome. So I was having dinner with him one night and I had this brilliant idea. Absolutely an epiphany moment of how we could make millions with little effort and energy within like about 10 months. And I went down to Jay and I went, Jay, I want a picture.

And he was like, come on down. And I pitched him on this thing. And at the end of this pitch, me proud as punch, first ever PowerPoint presentation I had ever done in my life. And I was so, because I love Jay. He's a good friend, but also he's

Jay Abraham, you know? And I'm like, so, Jay, what do you think? And he just looked at me and started rubbing his chin. And I'm thinking, is this a good sign? Is it a bad sign? And I went, what's wrong? And he went, I'm a little bit concerned. And I'm like, why? And he went, well'm a little bit concerned. I'm like, why?

He went, well, knowing you, I was just expecting more. I was like, damn. I don't know if there could have been a more upsetting statement. And I was like, what do you mean? He was like, well, with your effort, your energy, you know, you put all of this in a place. I thought you would go for a billion. And we realized that I'd actually sold myself short.

And we ended up dissecting that, bringing it down to like one or two elements of it and franchising it off and then getting a piece off of them doing it. You know, but the downside was we do sell ourselves shorts. We need the environment. So you did go and do something with that. We did. I think we probably completed maybe the second paragraph of the first page of a 60-page document. Came up with this concept, found a company that could do it. I gave them the deal to do it, took a top slice, and we were happy.

And we didn't even do anything. That's awesome. But the point is today, you need to make sure you're in the environment of people that are not going to laugh at you they're going to cheer you they're going to support you but also they're going to challenge you they're going to be like is that really the best that you could do that that statement of jay's so much was the best statement he could have ever made yeah you know it saved me a lot of anyone else would have been i'm with you steve how can i invest in you and then we would have had a problem for a year.

We'd have made the money, but how much effort would it have taken? Oh, yeah. So you've really got to make sure you're in the right room and then you've got to think big. That's remarkable. I think that's like one of the biggest bombs that have ever been dropped on the podcast. Well, there you go.

I'm done. Thanks for playing. Let's go, man. I'll be off. I mean, we'll call it 25 minutes. Well, there you go. I'm done. Thanks for playing. Let's go, man. I mean, we'll, we'll call it a call it a 25 minutes. No, man. So that's, that's awesome. So those are the two main principles behind, behind your, your second book. Those are the two main principles behind my life. Um, I realized that when I was actually, I had this, again, this anger and this frustration in me that I wanted more out of life, that the people that I was around were trying to calm me down. Well, why

should they be? They should be letting me go. They should be like opening the door, get out boy. And so I realized that my environment, you've heard the old statement about, Hey, you know, you put a little shark in a fish tank and it'll always grow to the size of a fish tank. You know, that's us. Right. And we're in a society now where, you know, I don't want to get on a soapbox, but we just went through COVID. Yes. And COVID was a period where apparently we couldn't connect.

During this period of, you know, lack of connection, connection apparently we invented two cultures the gotcha society and the cancel culture in a period where we couldn't talk to each other couldn't hang out couldn't you know drink and go to barbecues and stuff like that we started having trolls going through the internet to find something that you had said that was inappropriate in 1983 and now we're going to cancel your career about it. You know, we started infeeding, and that's terrible. Right. You know, it's interesting that you just brought up that during COVID, we apparently could not connect, right?

It's funny because the early days of COVID were when I created some of my greatest connections and still did it in person. Yeah. You know, because everybody was under this mindset that you can't connect. And so I started reaching out to some of my big connections and be like, hey, come up to my cabin. Let's get away. Let's do something.

Nobody else has got anything else going on. You know, and I went and held a mastermind up in my cabin with, I don't know if you, Alex Ramosi. Yeah. Alex Ramosi, Russell Brunson, Brooke Castillo, Alex's wife Layla was there. Oh, man, they're just some incredible people. They all had nothing else going on,

and I was thinking bigger than what everybody else was thinking at that point. Let's not skip over that, okay? Here's the dumb thing. We couldn't go out. Nor could they. Right. You know, at the beginning,

I've got on my, I got on my phone, I've got a hit list. And every time I have a conversation with someone and someone mentions a name or something that I don't know, I make a little note of it. And I'll be like, it'll be good to go and meet that person. You know, one stage somewhere,

somewhere. So when COVID hit, I had this hit list. So I started reaching out to them. Do you know what? somewhere somewhere so when covid hit i had this hit list so i started reaching out to them do you know what they weren't traveling they weren't in a meeting they weren't in your cabin right you know so all of a sudden i could get them i got through that list in the first three months that list had taken me five years wow it had just been feeding it and every time i'd sorry you know he's not taking me oh Oh, he's busy. Oh, he's on it. He's working on it.

First three months. And here's another fact for you. You probably already know. The BBC did some research at the end of COVID. During the worst two years of the society, of economy, whatever you want to call it, the worst two years of humanity, there were over 5 million first-time millionaires registered. Oh, I believe that.

It was the largest boom period of first-time millionaires ever. Not real estate, not oil, not stock market, not the NASDAQ. None of those times. None of the tech bubbles. This was the greatest birth the first time in years because we saw an opportunity out of it you did i did and it absolutely worked and so many people did and so many people didn't yeah it's it's uh it's crazy to think back like on covid because in my business we uh four months prior to covid hitting, so we're talking November, 2019, right?

Yep. We launched, so we're in the solar industry. We launched our inside sales division, which is like remote sales from a computer. Just kind of luck of the draw, we decided to do this. Four months later, COVID hits. We have a 25-man sales team built out inside that we're able to transition all of our outside sales guys into. And that, over the next two years, just absolutely boomed into a 300-man sales floor, right? And taking that from revenue of $32 million to $233 million. It was remarkable, the opportunity that that type of stuff presents itself.

I've heard this called many different things. I've always called it the yellow car. I've heard other people call it different things. But you're in a garage, or we're in America, a garage. Garage. You're in a garage, and you're walking through a parking lot or something like that, and you see this car, and it's a weird color yellow, green, blue, whatever.

You look at it, and you think, I've never seen that color before. color before that's a weird ass color when you're driving down the highway that night what's the only color car you can see yellow because you're looking for it because your mind's been opened up to that and now that's all you can see right as entrepreneurs we see opportunity so when it's a bad stock market when we're in the recession that we're in which is a distraction when we're in a political year when we're in a interest rate when we're in covid we don't see the drama that the media want us to be saturated we see the yellow car we see the opportunity so it doesn't surprise me that all of my friends are going oh kobe that was brilliant bring it back bring it every five years we want to be with my family more and make

more money oh my god i had no so i i like traveling i bitch about it and i moan about it but i like traveling you know i i love traveling all over the planet i love experiencing new cultures but it can be a bind. And, of course, when you've got kids, you can't travel as much. So you're now away from your family and stuff. And I was chatting with Tucker Max. And Tucker said probably one of the best things out of COVID. He said, I was now locked down with my wife.

And he said, I knew I loved her, but I had no idea how much I liked her. Oh, nice. And, you know, with my wife, you get on this hamster wheel of, oh, I'm flying off here and I'll be back here. Let's go out for dinner and stuff like that. Now I'm waking, I'm not going anywhere.

I'm not traveling. I've got her for the entire day. And guess what? The same thing the following day and the following day. It was such a beautiful time for our relationship. Created incredible. That actually pivots into a question I had for you. So you've done all these remarkable things, right?

You've facilitated incredible events and experiences and met the coolest people on earth. How has your wife played into that? Because you don't do that without an incredible supportive role like yeah how is your how is your wife so the beautiful uh the the beautiful thing is that um both of us are quite introverted um we we play extroverts very well when we need to um but i love riding around on a motorbike I love sitting on my own in the garden, you know, walking the dogs. We love that quiet period. So actually, when we go into like a red carpet gala in Hollywood or something like that, that takes effort.

But we know why we're doing it. And Claire loves the benefits that she gets from it. So she's very supportive. But we don't buy into the egotistical element of it. So it's not a case of, oh, there's Brad Pitt. Let's go and get a picture and stuff like that. You know, there's none of that. I worked for Elton for eight years.

And I, you know, we know the power of having a good photograph. You know, we know the power, especially on social media today. But I got into such a communication with elton that to have gone hey should we get a selfie would have undermined the relationship and i remember quite a few times when he would actually get people running up to him when i'm next to him and they'd be like can i get a photograph and he'd be like yeah and you know he just had this demeanor about it, you know, that he was being used for that photograph. So I never got it.

And I remember, I think it was like five, six years in, thinking, been with this guy every single year at the Oscar party, never once got a photograph. My wife's met him, we've hung around, we've sat around with him and his husband, we've had drinks, never, ever got a photograph. Some pictures, there's me in the background, but that's about it. And then one day he was having a photograph done with someone,

and it was a professional shoot for one of his sponsors. And I was just there, and they went off, and he went, Sims, we've never got a photograph. Get in here. Let's get in. That was the first time I ever got a photograph with the guy. It was like six years into an eight-year career. So we've

never really cared about that side right so you know the the hanging out with andrea bacelli in in florence and doing this in venice or this in you know japan and stuff like that we've never really been interested in it but being able to kind of walk the dogs on a sunday morning you know and just chatting that's opulence to us. Being able to go to the fridge and knowing that there's going to be food in there. And if by any chance there isn't, we can book any restaurant we want to. Having those kind of choices, that is what opulence and affluence is to us. So we've always been very, very grounded.

And I'm very grateful that, you know, again, you know, for anyone that can't see this, you know, I'm 245 pounds of ugly. My wife's like 5'4", particularly, and scares the living crap out of me. So she's always been able to keep me grounded. She's a little piss fire. Oh, yeah. Every time I've kind of gone a little bit too, she'd be like, well, let's have a chat, you know, and she'd been able to bring me back to where I should should be that's so awesome how old are you kids uh 26 22 and uh 18 that's

awesome that's awesome where where have they like along your journey like how have they motivated you um whoa that's an interesting question. Most of the time they've aggravated me. You know, they're kids. And kids never think you're cool. Right. You know. Like a sure dad, okay, whatever, you're hanging out with Elton John.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've actually spoken with other dads where they've gone, you're never cool. You know, I was with Gary Oldman a while back and, you know, his kids and we were at this party and this actor came in and his kids flocked over to see that. And I'm like, don't you find that he's like, you're never cool enough for your kids. You know, that was Gary. So through the years, it's been very challenging to try

and help them to actually try and open their wings and just to try things. You know, you want them to fail. But sadly, we're in a very tough world today where social media is quick to judge and laugh. Yeah. And so kids today, it's all about what do I look like? You know, who am I stood next to? What my carve is. And my 18-year-old, he's made some mammoth mistakes in some businesses that he's tried. And I've been very quick to go, you don't know the power that's in those mistakes, you

know. And nine times out of 10, there's only one element that was the mistake. The rest of it was a r in success. Right. You know? You've got to lean into that to realize how educated and how ahead of the curve you are. Right. He's 18 and he's already having failed businesses. That's phenomenal. That's brilliant.

Yes. But, of course, when you try and explain that to an 18-year-old, they're like, you know, but I lost all of my money. You can make more money. Right. You've got that education at 18. Right. It's not like you've got a mortgage to depend on because you're at home. Now is when you make mistakes. When you've got three kids and you're 45, that's not when you want to be making mistakes. So I'm glad to say that a lot of my kids have made some mammoth mistakes and they've learned from it. And I do

believe that they've got some advantages in them. But that curiosity gene, that entrepreneurial gene that's in your body that makes you turn left when everyone turns right can quite often be a devastating and distracting moment and decision. When everyone else is over there doing this and you're like, but what's over here? It can very much be a very much of an alone period as well. Because again, being an entrepreneur, we're the ones that have to make the decisions.

Everyone else is looking at us, you know, and we have to be the one that makes the decisions, steer the course, steer the track, change the marketing, argue with the narrative, you know, argue with the copy, argue with the design. And everyone's cheering when it goes well. And when it doesn't, it can be very lonely. Right. Oh, I know. I know. My very first business was a massive failure. There you go. And a huge, huge education. Absolutely. Taught me incredible things. So a couple more questions regarding going

and making something big happen. So I love the principle of like, first of all, you got to think stupid and think big, right? Like just going after something that even the mind can't potentially conceive.

Yep. And then second, having the right crowd around you to support you. Now let's talk, what are like two to three best practices of nuts and bolts of actually making it happen? Right. So you have like this famous person that you want to go

approach or somebody that's not in your league, right. That you need something from, you know, what are some best practices of like making that happen? All right. Perfect. Great. Love it. Tactics. The first thing we're going to do is basically the, the question you asked for number two, all right. Never put who you're going for on a pedestal. You can't communicate with them as an equal when the first thing you do is stuck on 10 foot above you. I love, I love this because this is actually something I, I actually preach. I say, if somebody's above you, kick them in the knees first. Yeah. And make sure that they know that you're on the same level.

Right. Like, don't gawk at them. Don't ask for an autograph, a selfie. So I love that that is in alignment. So we're aligned on answer number two. But let's play with number one, and let's make it a bit easier. We'll pick on you. All right.

You're here for a short period in L.A. All right. Let's say, for argument's sake, you're available tomorrow night. And I say, well, look, why don't you and your boys come over to my house? I'm having a barbecue. Come on over to my house. And you say, great. What's the first question you ask me? Where do you live? If you don't know where I live, how the hell can you get there? So I give you my address. You've now got my address. You know where the barbecue is going to be. What's the second question you ask me? What time? What time?

If you don't know what time it is, you could be late. You could be early. You may miss the damn thing. It's at 8 o'clock. So you now know the location. You know the time. What's the third question? Is there anything I can bring?

Fantastic. It took you two questions before you thought of me. Now, I always pick on a guy when I ask that question. Never the girls. Why? Because the girls always get it right. I'm sure your missus is going to listen to this and go, you nutbag. Yeah, you should have.

Oh, yeah. She's always the person. Oh, my God. You should have asked that question first. The girls always do that. In fact, I've been in these environments where the wife's been next door and she's elbowed him going, what could you bring? You've got to think about that whenever you enter into any relationship. If you're going to enter into a relationship with you,

Russell Bunsen, Dean Graciosi, any of these kind of people, what do you bring to the party? Whenever you approach someone, that person you're approaching knows you want something. If you get a phone call tonight at 8 o'clock, I don't care who it's from, you can guarantee the fact that they phoned you they want something. It may be just your mum for a natter, but they want something. Right.

You've got to find out what it is, okay? So in which case, when you get into a relationship, that person knows you've reached out to them, knowing that you're trying to, they're like, what do you want? You know? So you've got to step into that sandpit and go, hey, I know you've got a new book coming out. And I've been following you for years. And I love the impact you're creating.

I've got a great pool. I've got a great distribution network. I'd love to see how I can help you distribute your book. You know, Gary Vee says he's always free when he's got something to sell. You know? So you can do that. When you're walking up to Elon Musk, when you're walking up to Richard Branson, when you're walking up to Elton John,

when you're walking up to a celebrity in your own high street, when you're walking up to someone you want to do a JV with, what do you bring to the table? You know? It may not be what they have. In fact, I hope it's not. Because they need to be the complementing thing to the thing that you don't have.

Right. But you should always think, what can I bring to it? It may be your enthusiasm. It may be, I've got 20 people behind me, and they're really good at editing, and we can do a massive amount of digital presence and get what we're talking about with you out to a wider audience which is going to help your personal brand would that be of interest i'll give you a little thing uh florence um when i got the

museum to actually shut down and in time bear in mind british guy can't speak Italian. Got a museum to shut down. That's remarkable. All right. Not really. It sounds remarkable. It sounds remarkable. I picked up the phone. I did some Googling and did some checking up on this, this, um, uh, this museum.

Cause this was where my, my God, this is my stupid moment. You know, this is my ridiculous, you know, what can I... So I found out about the museum and I found out that they had a gala coming up later on that year in October. And I checked up why they were doing the gala and the proceeds went to repair the roof. So when I went in there and I said, hey, thank you very much for taking the time.

You know, I was doing a little bit of Googling around and I noticed that you've got a gala coming up at the end of the year. That's a lot of effort putting galas on, isn't it? Have you done many? We haven't done many. Oh, what is the purpose of the gala? The gala's for the roof.

Well, why do you need a new roof? And they went, well, you know, we've got all of this work in here. You don't realise that it's not a normal roof. It's got to be protected against the climate, not just the wind and the rain, but the temperature, you know? And we've got to protect it against fire, so it's not your normal roof. It's got to be protected against the climate, not just the wind and the rain, but the temperature, you know, and we've got to protect it against fire. So it's not your normal roof.

I said, that sounds expensive. They said, are you kidding? They went into the expense. I said, oh, that's amazing. How would you like me to be able to cover a quarter of that before you've even printed your first flyer? Would that help? Now they're only thinking, well, of course it would help.

How do we get him to do that? So you've got to turn up. In that situation, I had shown, not that I wasn't turning up going, how much is it going to cost me? I was now putting a tag to something that they needed to achieve. I was finding a solution to that problem. And that problem was they needed to get this roof done. Well, I'm going to help you with a major chunk of that before you've even printed your first flyer.

And, you know, I think where a lot of people go wrong is they want to help the person that they're approaching. And instead of doing the research and presenting something, they actually ask, hey, is there any way I can help you? Oh, don't you hate that? It's the worst because now you're asking me to do work to figure out how you can serve me. Right. Because like in this particular example, if you went to them and you're like, Hey, is there anything I can do to help you so that I can get this in return? Right. They'd be like, no, there's, there's nothing. Right. Like why? No, we're not going to shut down this, this museum and we don't need

anything. Meanwhile, not even thinking about the roof because that's already covered by the gala. Yeah. Right. Right. So there's not even a need or a pain, but you, and this is classic sales, right? Like you identified the pain that they didn't even know that they were currently in yeah right like they knew that they needed to fix the roof but it was already being fixed in their mind right and so you have to identify like hey putting on a gala is going to be extremely expensive and painful and everything else help me let me help you and this is how i'm going to do it i love i just poked a bruce there's a guy called jeff moore that always turns around and says um why has you got a why has

you helping me now got to be my problem right you know so i've had people that have texted me before they've dm'd and they've gone hey how can i help you and i've gone well the dog took a turn this morning if you could come over and clean up the grass i'd really appreciate well that's not what i meant well then be more specific right you know so i hate i hate cold dms they're like like hey it's really cool what you're doing what kind of business are you in what are you kidding me you like all you had to do was read two sentences on my profile and you would know when I do. And you have the gall to ask me that question as the first thing. Like, get out of here.

No, that's classic LinkedIn. Don't love LinkedIn for that. That's usually the biggest culprit. But no, I actually. But that comes down to the beginning again. Intuition and those couple of seconds of research. Now, from you getting out of the Uber to walking into the bar, you can Google people with more accuracy than NASA had in the 80s.

And you can find out things. I'll tell you a true story about how I got involved with the Elton John Foundation. Yeah. You look, Elton doesn't run the whole thing. He has people that run it. So who's running that? That's your first Google. You get those answers.

And then I found out the person that did it. I went along to the event, all right? And this is the class, you want tactics? Google someone and then don't read the information. Click on images. Okay? Now, if you've got a ton of images where they're hanging around with motorbikes, you can guess that they like motorbikes.

They're hanging around with horses, equestrian. So I found out that one of the guys there had actually done a couple of articles for shoes. He collected handmade shoes, not sneakers, handmade shoes from leathers from all over the planet. And he had his favorite guy in Italy that would then construct. He would buy the leather and he would construct the shoe. And I found out about this. So I went up to him.

This is one of Elton John's right-hand guys. Yep. Okay. And so I paid for a ticket. I went to the party. I saw him go to the bar. I left my table. I went to the bar, stood next to him.

Now, of course, I'm a big lad. He's feeling all important because he's running the event. Right. If I had gone, hey, this is a great event, I'd have lost it straight off the bat. Okay. If I had come in with like, oh, you know, oh, you're so-and-so. If I had done any of that, you know, I'd have lost it. So I'm stood next to

him. He's ordering his drink. I'm waiting for my turn. I look down. I went, no shoes. Those are some wicked shoes. Where'd you get those shoes? And he went, sorry? I went, what colour are they? And they were like this weird purpley that as the light was catching as he walked, I could see this.

And he went, you like these shoes? I said, I don't know if I could wear them. I said, but they're bloody great shoes. And so we ended into this whole conversation about shoes. It's amazing. And then I actually said to him, I said, look, I've got them. I called myself. Look, it's a party.

It's busy. Let me go. I'd love to have a coffee with you one day and just chat. You seem like a cool guy. And I took his number. All right. Now, a lot of you out there will be going oh you were just after something there's a way to play the game you flirt you tease you seduce you get you know dating bring back

dating so i got this conversation go with him i texted him about a couple of weeks later and i went hey i'm in the area should we grab a coffee I was in LA and he turned around and he went, what, you're in New York? I thought, crap. You know, and I'm not. And I went. And you're like, on my way. I just said to him, I said, Tuesday? And he went, yeah, great, let's do it.

I hung up, I went, Claire, I'm off to New York. And we booked a ticket. And the funny thing is, here's the dumb thing. I put that story in my first book. And he read it. And he contacted me and he went, that was me. You went after me. You actually targeted me.

And I said to him, look, I felt that a relationship with you would be so beneficial to us both, I wasn't going to leave it to chance. Does that offend you? And what did he say to that? He was like, no, not at all. And then I had a friend of mine contact me. He went, I don't want to mention the guy's name.

He's like, he's just told this story about how he was featured in your book. He was excited. He was over the moon. I had valued that relationship. How could he be offended? Right. Somebody that drops everything, buys a plane ticket and heads out just to make it to a coffee. I felt there was so much value and potential in a relationship that benefited

everybody for eight years. So no, I wasn't going to leave it to chance. It's amazing. It's amazing. I've had different examples in my career of these different principles you're talking about, right? There was one that I was down at a boxing convention with a bunch of professional boxers. Michael Moore, I don't know if you knew him. Yeah, another name. Yeah. Michael Moore, he'd only ever lost to George Foreman and Muhammad Ali, like, I mean, big dude, right? Great people to lose to. Yeah. And he was a world champion and whatnot. And I got introduced to him and I immediately fanboyed him, right? Like, oh, you're great.

You signed my boxing glove and everything. And he was turned off, right? Like just immediately. But then whatever reason, we had a mutual friend there and we continued the conversation. And then it got to the fact that like he loved guns and i love guns and we started talking guns and he's like dude why didn't you start with with this right like like being treating me normal and talking about normal things he hated to be fanboyed and that's actually when it finally clicked for me for the first time in my life like people hate to be fanboyed right and that you have to treat them

put them on your on your level talk about things that are important to them right like what you're talking about doing a little bit of research and whatnot and so yeah it's just interesting because you're you've you've taken and you've created a formula of what works and i'm thinking back through my life like oh that yes i remember when I kind of learned that principle. But here's the thing. And you know it. And then whatever happened in your life, you diluted it. There's nothing that I've spoken about.

And there's nothing that I could teach you that you wouldn't sit there and go, but I already know that. But I just stopped doing it. We stopped paying attention to the little things. We stopped paying attention to the idiosyncrasies of what you talk about, your favorite music, how you turn up, how you handle yourself. We go past that now. And because we're in a world of transaction and instant gratification, if I can't connect with you in two seconds, I can't connect.

Well, any relationship's going to take time. And that's what we've lost out on now. You know, people don't want to go on a date now. They want to hit Tinder. You know, get the whole minute. Swipe. Get it out of the way. I'm not going to buy them lunch.

Let's get it going. So, you know, we're into that kind of society. But I do believe it's going to come back. And I do believe that those people that have got that unfair advantage value relationships. And this is something you still can't order on Amazon and you can't download an app for. It's a muscle that you have to learn, focus, and build. And you had it. You just got to revive it. I love that. I love that, man. Incredible value brought today. I appreciate you so much, Steve. Where's the best place for my listeners to follow you on Instagram? Where's the best spot? Steve D. Sims. D for Dashing and only one M in Sims. I'm on Instagram, Threads, Twitter, all the usual stuff. Probably most vocal

on Instagram, but Steve D. Sims is my website, but I will give you something for free with no hooks. If you go to goforstupid.com,

I actually did my audio in a studio and we ended up with all of these videos from it. So we just listed the entire book up there on video that they can get

for free. So goforstupid.com. They get all the videos for free. So if you're hearing this or you're watching this, goforstupid.com, you get his newest book on audio. Awesome. For free. Absolutely free. That's incredible value. Thank you so much, Steve. Appreciate you joining us in the studio. Until next time.