The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – If Caterpillars Can Fly, So Can I: Master the 7 Universal Laws to Achieve and Prosper by Alvin Day

Episode Date: October 11, 2025

If Caterpillars Can Fly, So Can I: Master the 7 Universal Laws to Achieve and Prosper by Alvin Day Here is the info for the webinar: Timing: Tuesday, October 21 at 1:00 pm Eastern Time Link: http://bit.ly/zoomalvin https://www.amazon.com/If-Caterpillars-Can-Fly-Universal/dp/0972730486 Alvinday.com Practice any ONE of the seven chapters and it will light up your life! After 30 years of training and coaching successful people across the world —from senior executives to entrepreneurs—Alvin Day presents the seven principles to help you achieve more, earn more and become more. Examples: Yvonne, a Fort Lauderdale businesswoman, doubled her income in 30 days; John, a Harvard dropout student, immediately re-matriculated and went back to school; Curtis, a West Palm Beach prisoner, changed his mind about killing a man; and John a San Antonio employee, moved from making $38,000 to $63,000 per year. However... WARNING: This book is visceral—it ignites fire in the belly. It will challenge you and make you dissatisfied with the status quo—the ordinary, regular and average. It creates a sharpened hunger for excellence that drives readers to get up and go toward their dreams and aspirations. What could “If Caterpillars Can Fly ~ So Can I” do for your insights, influence and income?About the author Born barefoot and penniless and raised in a rural country town of Jamaica, Alvin Day spent his first 20 years without parents at home, electricity, running water or social pedigree. Hungry for life, he dreamed, devoted himself to study and drove himself hard. With two university degrees from the University of Wisconsin, a 14-year career working for Fortune 500 companies including Procter & Gamble, he eventually founded his own management consulting company. Today, he resides in the USA and is Executive Director of Global Empowerment Institute, a premier leadership development company, specializing in executive coaching, employee engagement and sales training. His books include blockbuster, Persuasion Power and bestseller, If Caterpillars Can Fly ~ So Can I. They lay out the simple pathways anyone can take to discover the explosive high-achievement and dignity that characterize a great life! What makes him special is that he runs a small company serving massive multinational clients from Boston and Buenos Aires to Bogotá, Barcelona, Bangkok and Beijing. With over 25-plus years’ experience, Alvin delivers unparalleled Best Practices leadership programs, serving Colgate, Campbell’s, Valvoline, National Commercial Bank, The Central Bank of Jamaica, Pepsi, Nestlé and many others. Let him serve you with this book that ignites a fire-in-the-belly passion, making readers want to soar.

You wanted the best... You've got the best podcast. The hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready, get ready. Strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times.

Because you're about to go on a moment. monster education rollercoaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi, folks, is Voss here from thecrisVos Show.com. Ladies, gentlemen, the earliest things of that makes official. Welcome to 16 years going on 17 of the Chris Voss show. We're starting to approach 2,600 podcast episodes with, I mean, there's close to 50 new episodes a month, folks.

So if you're not keeping up on them, you need to go back because there will be a test. and you never know I could show up a knock on your door on a Saturday morning like the Mormons or seventh day of Venice but I'll be like it's time for your tests or what was the last episode you listened to

and if you flunk it I don't know I go out in your yard and I kick dandelions over so that you'll have a whole dandelion front yard see it's it's really I'm really that sadistic

no I'm just kidding folks I wouldn't do that I did that as a kid anyway guys I used to piss all a lot of my neighbors. Get off my lawn when I was a child. Anyway, guys, don't let that happen to you. Refer your friends to the family to the show. Go to goodrease.com, Fortresschus Christch, Chris Voss.

LinkedIn.com, Fortresschusch, Chris Foss, and all the other crazy places. You can find us on those interwebs in the sky. Opinions expressed by guests on the podcast are solely their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the host or the Chris Foss show. Some guests of the show may be advertising on the podcast, but it is not an endorsement or review of any kind. Today I'm excited. We have a wonderful young man

with a ton of energy on the show. Alvin Day joins us. He is the author of several books. The one we talk about today is called If Caterpillars can fly, so can I. Master the Seven Universal Laws to Achieve and Prosper out January 1st,

20-03. I had to blink there for a second. I was going to, 20-03. I'm like thinking, wow, this book's been around for a while. It's got a lot of great reviews and all that good stuff. So we're going to get into it with Alvin. Alvin has 10 years of leadership experience at Procter & Gamble to his global,

from that to his global consulting business with Fortune 500 and multinational firms. He helps leaders with skills, strategies, and tools that deliver results. He connects with your people's heads, hearts, and stomachs, touching them viscerally as a few speakers or coaches can. Now I'm hungry. He said stomach. His compelling story, rising from being an abandoned child without running water and electricity to an internationally recognized business coach and author will inspire your people and remove any excuse they may have for not pursuing excellence, irrespective adversity.

He didn't have water electricity, damn it, people. We call that Fridays around here in the show. Welcome to the show. Alvin, how are you? I am doing much better than I deserve. I'm living on good favor. Good favor. It's always good to have gratitude.

So Alvin, give us your dot coms, where can people find you on the interwebs? right my my dot com is my name www.alvinday.com just like it's spelled a lvian d-a-y-y-com and yes and today's alvin day of course officially so welcome the show give us a 30,000 overview what's inside your book

oh what's inside the book when I was a child growing up and had to run around barefooted without electricity or running water I kind of knew it at the time I was not poor. And in that process, I learned some things that are so valuable. I found that they don't hardly teach them in schools. And so I set out to write down what I knew because people kept asking me, where's your book? Whatever I got into conversation socially. And so these, this book has seven principles that I've discovered that are so powerful, they are actually

laws that you cannot break. You know, you have 55 miles an hour, 60 miles an hour. You can break that law for a little while go faster. But there's some principles by which life operates and nature works that you can't violate. And if you try to violate them, they'll run over you. And so I make that bold statement. But it's based upon what I've seen happen since this book has been out for many years now. I have seen someone who wanted to commit suicide, get a little of this book inside, and develop a 10-year plan. I've seen a prisoner in West Palm Beach County Jail where I used to go every few weeks to do a little contribution back. He told me, he changed his mind about killing a man.

Now, wait a man, get this. I'm about six iron gates into the center of this prison. Everyone I go through, they lock it behind me. And I'm like, whoa, boy. And after I'm done, this 38-year-old five-foot-eight guy comes up to me and says, Mr. Day, I want to thank you. I said, yeah, you're welcome. He said, no, no, you don't understand.

Last time you were here, you saved somebody's life. I said, how's that? He said, I was going to kill a man. But something from that book you talked about hit me in my belly. And I called my friend and put off the hit. Now, I have, like, goosebumps on me because I look around, and these are some serious people around me, okay? What am I saying to you? Real quickly, I found out that there are some things that are inviolate.

And if we don't know them, they will hurt us. And if we know them, they'll work for us. And real quickly, I tell you now, when I first published, was about to publish this book, I was scared. Because I thought, if my business people found out about it and it was stupid, I would lose my reputation. And so I went to do some research and found an Egyptian high priest from 2,500 years BC who had almost the same book translated from Egyptian into English, and I thought, you've got to be kidding me, 2,500? And so, yeah, I didn't make them up, I discovered them, and they've changed the lives of so

many people, not the least of whom is my life, you know? Yeah. Yeah, seriously. That's pretty amazing. Yeah, yeah. And so. And so you wrote this book. I love the concept of caterpillars can fly, so can I.

Now, there's a lot of people in the world. I've been on this thing called Twitter lately, and they're not really up to par on how the caterpillar flying thing works. Can you explain what that is and maybe how it translates to us as humans? Right. So what I have come to discover is that life gives us gifts in raw materials. You're a baby, your flesh, and you've got some consciousness, but it's not developed. and you need to grow into it.

Somebody gives you a piece of land. It's got stones. It's got wood all over it. It's ugly. You have to till the soil. So you till the soil, you get a garden. You grow up, you get education, you get responsibility, you get a job. And so you keep growing.

What this says is that in a very similar fashion to the caterpillar, you and I, Chris, and everybody listening to or watching this podcast, is in a raw material stage. Every single person, even if you have $10 million or you're most, fulfilled person you can imagine. The mere fact that you didn't die last night means that you have more to go, more growing. So here this, here this, Chris, if you are one year old and you know you need to grow some more, and you become five and you become a little smarter, and then you become 15 and you become a little smarter, what if you're 45 years old? Do you stop growing? When do you stop growing when you're dead, right? So anyway, yeah. Well, actually, actually,

I don't know if that's true because I think you start growing some weeds growing. throwing out of you there in the coffin maybe some maggots have some free lunch there i'm looking for it to well you when you when you say that you're actually you're actually maybe eternally growing you mean yeah well no but you're actually confirming it because you can grow good stuff or you can grow bad stuff but you're going to grow something there's a lot of people that are dead inside that are growing just ugly shit i've seen that on twitter yeah yeah you've seen that right so So, anyway, to give me a short version of this, when I was a little boy, I wasn't popular. I didn't have any social pedigree or nice clothing.

And my grandmother told me that I shouldn't worry about it because I was more like a caterpillar. When people look at me, they see the outside of me. But if I should pay attention to my teachers and trust in God and do the right thing and stay away from the temptations of bad kids, one day I would grow up and wings would come out. That's all I had, that promise. And it has manifested in ways that my grandmother probably couldn't even imagine. The caterpillar is ugly. butterfly is just this amazing creature.

And every one of us has that before us. I, you know, and I love how you have this analogy that people can understand where, you know, so many people they want, they want the things in their finality, right? I want to get rich. So they just want to wake up one day and there's, you know, bags of money in the bank account. And there's a Bugatti parked in the front lot and, you know, just it's like that. But I like how you put it that really what life gives us. is that raw materials, and it's us to, you know, form it, build it, weld it, mold it, and build ourselves into something that, you know, can be successful.

I love that analogy because so many people are just, they're just like, I want it now. And you're like, well, you have to do the work. And they're like, there's work. Chris, Chris, I heard a story once about an old retired man sitting on his veranda by the front yard, just walking away. Huh? Yeah? And a young man passed by and literally came back and said,

excuse me sir, I didn't want me to bother you, but I had to come back and tell you, congratulations. You have, God has blessed you with the most beautiful garden. Those flowers are just amazing. And the old man said, uh-huh, you should have seen the shape it was in when he first gave it to me. Yeah. I mean, that's the great thing about our stories.

and how we build our lives. And, you know, I was thinking the other day about the freedom that I have and the wonderful life I have and the fact that I can do what I love, interviewing, sharing stories or listening stories from people like you, collecting them and sharing, you know, with our audience. And I love it. It's, it's something that I always, you know, I struggle for many decades trying to find something that I truly loved.

And, and I think about the young, I was thinking about the young man. I have a thing called Gratitude Sundays. So every Sunday is a time that I spend with myself and I usually go out to dinner. I used to go gallivanting too with my camera and I go photographing and I try and find interesting stuff. It helps me slow down time and become present. And I was just thinking, God, you know, that 22 year old kid who said to his business partner years ago, you know, we can start this company now and we're kind of young and dumb, but we

got a lot of sweat equity and we can work really hard at 18 hour days. And he goes, and I told him, I go, you know, we could, we could probably do the corporate thing. And then, you know, if we get lucky, we leave with a golden parachute at 40 or 50 years old. He goes, but I got to, I remember I said to him as 22. I go, I go, I got to tell you, I don't think I'm going to have the energy to start a company work 18 hour days. I'm 50. And I'm 50-ish now. So, and I can tell you, I just look back and go, God, that kid was smart.

yeah yeah he sure knew some shit because i i don't there's no way i can do 18 hour days like and chris chris you were fortunate because you were able to make that decision on your own yeah with the coming of i many people to the tune of millions are going to have that decision made for them and if they're not ready mentally to be leader to be strong to be visionary they're going to be ending up on the end of the concrete somewhere yeah you bring a good put a good point up because yeah it's it's kind of out there you know

there's a lot of I mean you could place me with the eye but it's not going to be funny probably have the energy or being his interest plus I have really stupid jokes that are bad and people will laugh at me out of pity so that's easy how the whole show is so tell us about your upbringing

I think you said your grandma I mean what a visionary she had at giving you that idea but what was your upbringing like and how did you you know climb up out of it I my trouble started before I was born if you can believe that my uncle my uncle looked at my mother reportedly and said to her you should be ashamed of yourself why don't you have an abortion and spare us of embarrassment oh wow she was like 16 years old when she was pregnant with me

in a conservative Christian family and they wanted to kill me before I came out and my mama ran away and had this little boy I tell you what I love my mother because I came out of her And even though she's not perfect, we better love our parents because we came out of them. And when we curse them, we curse ourselves. So my mother ran away, had this little boy. But then Papa wasn't there. They both moved away after a while. One went to America.

One went to England. And I was gone between uncles and cousins and so forth until I ended up with my mother's mother, my grandmother. And she taught me, look, we didn't have anything special to show socially. She taught me that I was special. She taught me to laugh. People would curse her and she'd burst out laughing. And she taught me, she taught me principles, morality, discipline, hunger for excellence. But again, going to school and getting everything that I could.

And you know, the funny thing is the year when I graduated from the highest level of my high school had ever seen was the year she died. She didn't even get to see it. But she probably knew you're on your way, maybe. She knows she put me on my way. And so, yeah, so I couldn't stay there anymore. And I left where I grew up in Jamaica, I left because I couldn't live in the house anymore, came to join my mother in America, went to the University of Wisconsin, got a couple of college degrees with this hunger. Yeah, this hunger. And I was strange, man.

I was the University of Wisconsin with 25,000 Caucasians. And I was one little black boy. It was great. You know, growing up in Jamaica where everybody kind of looked like me, I thought I owned the place in Wisconsin. I mean, I loved it. I didn't, you know, racism, they talk about. Give me a break. I mean, it's my place. America belongs to me. Jamaica belongs to me. And so that's the mentality with which I grew up. What a great attitude. Yeah. I mean, you know, and Jamaica,

I mean, so you grew up there. And did you, do you have to come here alone to come to America when you did? Well, my sister and I came together and we went to join our mother who had been living in Wisconsin. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we had a home to go to it. And how old were you when you made that transition? Oh, 20 years old, just before my birthday. Young. So I have many cultures in me and different languages. But to answer your question, though, I grew up with that background and I never knew I was poor. There was always food growing on the trees in the backyard. And so I got into, I don't know how, I got into Procter & Gamble as a youngster and started rising in the ranks and rising in the ranks and rising the ranks.

After 10 years, quit, joined a consulting company, went to work at Bristol-Myers Squibb, totally revolutionized the company because I didn't know any, I didn't know any better. See, when you're hungry and passionate, you step over borders that you don't even know you're stepping over. So I went to the guy who was running my division, the senior executive, when I was just like a middle manager, and I said, this company has no strategy. You didn't get in trouble for that. And I went with me, Chris, based upon that passion, he promoted me and told me to develop the strategy. He's like, well, now it's your problem. Yeah, right.

And so I worked until after midnight for about a year, and it really changed the question. I went in business for myself and started flying to places like London and Barcelona and Bogota telling people that I knew about leadership development and retail management. And they believed me. They actually believe me and paid me. I think that's how I work when I speak or doing books. They're just like, well, you wrote a book. You must know something. And then they listen to the podcast and they go, this guy's an idiot.

No wonder he has brilliant guests on the show. I don't know that. It really is crazy. You know what it teaches me if someone like me with no starting advantage, other than a few words from somebody wise, could get to a place where he's flying from Asia to Europe to South America in different places and being paid not only to do the work, but expenses all paid.

Every single person listening to this podcast, every single person watching us has deep inside that capability, become the butterfly of their dreams. It's built in. You can't be alive without it, regardless of where you are socioeconomically. And the sad part is most people die with it inside. I'm not into that. Okay. Yeah. And I'm glad you go around and you help people awaken that too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's good. That's good stuff there. The, uh, so let's get into some of the offerings you have on your website. Let's talk about some of the things you're doing there so we can get the plugs in for there. I don't know if you want to plug any other

books or anything else. But let's talk about what else you want to talk about there and what you offer on your website. Well, there are a number of products on the website, including the book you referenced a while ago, if caterpillars can fly, so can I. And another book that teaches people how to get yes, a very dangerous book, it gets people to change their minds and say yes to you, persuasion power. And there's a sales manual that comes out of it because I was running a sales organization, the proctor, and so forth. But what I have to say to you, and there are a number of other video, audio, things online at my website. What I have to say, though, is that having gotten into business in leadership development, I've had the favor of working with multinational

corporations like Colgate and Campbell's and Commercial Mexicana and different companies across the world. And I've been doing that for over 25 years, but you know what's interesting, what you see, what you'll see beneath all the products on the website. I have been frustrated because I used to get, I'm still getting 4.9 out of five on surveys when I ask the people participate in my leadership courses. But when they give that to me, I'm really frustrated because it's a group of 20 people at a central bank. And there are 20 million people who love this stuff. It's a group of 36 people at Southern Call Center. And there are 20 people who, 30 people, million people who need it. And I can't take people in there. But recently, I have taken everything

that I've known on my company and we've begun to put it online. for anybody to get the principles of this book, the principles of selling, the principles of transformation, and it is just the most amazing, energetic thing to change lives for small business people. So yeah, that's what it's beneath all of those today, making it available to anybody who wants to be in business or is in business and wants more out of it. And, you know, leadership has really changed, right? I think it does. I want to present this to you and ask you and get your input on it. So I'll kind of surmise, you know,

a lot of the thesis is out there now that, you know, we've transitioned to a more empathetic or maybe there's a different word, but a better sort of, it seems like leadership used to be kind of more of a stick sort of thing where it's like, do what I say or else, you know, we'll hit you over the head and fire you. And now it's more of, it's kind of, and that was kind of a push, you know,

push the mule down the road. Now it's kind of a poll where you, you try and motivate people to bring out the best of them, bring out that butterfly of them, maybe. Do you find that that's true in today's corporate culture and that leadership seems to have changed and turn to different way? I agree with you that more companies are moving in that direction.

It would surprise you probably to know how many are still in the old autocratic leadership style. Frankly, there's so many of them that my business is rich because they pay me to teach leadership to people who ought to know better. But, yeah. I don't know better. People smarter than me.

I have financial organizations and consumer package goods companies with senior, senior, senior executives reporting to the CEO, and I am getting paid handsomely to teach them good manners they should have learned when they were 10 years old at home. Do good things to other people?

Yeah. So what's happening, though, Chris? Yeah. What's happening, Chris, is that the research is in, companies like Gallup and others are finding that when an employee or a business person is happy and feels respected, productivity is in the range of 23 to 25 percent greater. Wow. So companies are really seeing the connection now on the bottom line, at least the ones that are advanced in their thinking. And when employees are not happy and they feel disrespected, productivity goes down, profitability goes down, and everything is kind of mediocre at best. So that's one of the reasons why companies are starting to say, you know, we need to have HR, you know, make sure everybody's fine.

But that's the problem. Yeah. In fact, it's not HR. I just pulled this up too. The other thing you have is turnover. A significant percentage of employees quit due to poor leadership with studies showing anywhere from 40 to 80% of workers who will leave a job because of bad manager or poor leadership. And, you know, you spend a lot of money to hire people. You spend a lot of money to invest in them, to teach them, you know, how your business operates and get them skills.

And, you know, I remember there's a, as a famous story, I think Tony Robbins tells it, or maybe it was Tom Peters, of where someone, I think it was a big company like HP or IBM, and one of the vice presidents lost like, I'm just going to make up a figure $11 million or something like that on a deal, right, lost $11 million. So the vice president comes into the CEO and goes, I'm sure that you want me to offer my resignation because I mucked up and cost the company a lot of money. And the CEO says, hell no, we're not letting you go. We just spent $11 million educating you. So we made an investment, but you're staying. I was good. Yeah, go ahead. I was coaching the leaders at the Valvaline company in Lexington, Kentucky,

and the senior executive, Fran, came into the room, sat there, and I was talking about the role of failure in business success, that failure is not the opposite of success. It's an ingredient in success. And if you don't have a tolerance for failure, you can't succeed at a big level. And now I was aware that I was talking with a senior executive in a traditional corporate environment,

and it would sound kind of strange to hear that. And I never imagined this. The senior executive Fran leaned forward and said to me, Alvin, you know, that's what we have found. We are so aware of it that in all of our processes and product development, we are accelerating the pace of failure so that we can get to success much faster. And I recall, I mean, wow, she gets it. Yeah. She gets it. So business is starting to turn because they have to, because the conservative risk-averse companies, they're not going to make it in the future.

Yeah. They're not making much in the present. Yeah. Yeah. That's an important point. And, you know, I mean, that's, that's all I do is it translates to entrepreneurism, too, folks. So that's what I do as an entrepreneur. And pretty much, you know, I've been joking that we should just change the title of entrepreneur to problem solver. Because that's all, that's all we do all day. I remember watching a guy who was in his 60s, and he's on TikTok. He's got a channel that's really cool, but he's been a broker of commercial or private airport. planes all of his life since he was young. He started really young like I did. And he talks about, he did a walkthrough of his day one time. I hope I say the clip somewhere because it's really epic. But he talks about how being in the business for 40 years or however long he's been the business, he goes, you know what the funny thing is? All day long, all I do is solve problems to get deals done. And he goes, you would think after 40 years, it would be easy. Like,

okay, it's the same problem. And some of that does play in business. and entrepreneurship. But he goes, it's amazing with technology and advancements and innovation and just how the world changes. There's always new problems I have to solve. And I have to figure how to solve those new problems. And he goes, that's all I do all day, really when it comes down to it. And I thought about it. I'm like, yeah, that's, that's pretty much all I do. And that's, that's university level leadership. But you might if I say something, that goes counter to that? Please do.

Hey, you're the big boss here, but I just want to mess with you a little bit. You're the smart one. You're the guest on the show. I'm the idiot with the mic. That's all I got going for me. I'd be a greater butterfly tomorrow. I'm just a caterpillar today. What you just said is university level leadership.

But remember now, university has bachelors and it has masters. On the one hand, when something's broken, we need to make sure we know how to fix it. And we need to take responsibility and ownership and so forth. That's bachelors. Here's where master's and PhD programs come in. Actually, PhD is another level. We won't even go there. But here's where the master's level comes in.

There are many managers and leaders, you can say, who spend all their time solving problems. But inherently, every time you solve a problem, you create other problems. And just like a drug that cures cancer but causes your eyes to fall out, you know, whatever. Well, it doesn't cure cancer. Maybe it'll cure gout, but it'll give you. you block your nostrils or something. They have a long list of side effects. There's research to show that the people who focus on solving problems

end up being tactical, transactional, operational, and they're just moving things around. But the ones who are strategic and big picture, they have vision that goes way beyond the problems, and they know problems are going to happen. And every time they dream, they're causing problems. But what they do is they let the problems alone. You know, if your toilet's not working,

you call some guy he fixes it okay but you're the guy in you're the guy doing the master plan for the house and you just have this vision of all the house is going to look how it's going to be decorated the architecture of it is in your head so when something goes wrong it's not that you don't fix it but you're at a higher level and and what's been found is that the guys who are visionary and looking way out at the big picture they expect problems and they don't even solve them they just pay to get them solved and the problems tend to be just like the tip of the iceberg you fix the system and the problem goes away. Sometimes, yeah, yeah. And so there are a lot of people who spend their time just chipping off the top of the iceberg and they have more icebergs showing up every day.

So we're helping leaders to understand that there is a way in which you can live where your vision is so clear, it's so magnetic that it moves your belly. And when you encounter problems, you just know they're going to be there and they're just like a step. You just step over and you go. And you step over and you go. These are the guys who change the world. These are the guys who make small businesses and big businesses. Yeah. And, you know, I mean, so a lot of times, you know, sometimes your problems are coming from some sort of source that you haven't done.

Like a good example of what you're talking about, I think. I'll let you tell me if I'm right or wrong. But a good examples, like for a lot of years, we had problems with people and people we hired. And, you know, we had the good, the bad, and the ugly. And we were like, how do we keep getting these, the worst people on our teams? and our problem was we would interview people and they would seem like really great people and we'd hire them right there on the spot one interview during that one interview and you know then I heard I don't know it was Tom Peters or somebody in a book I read that you know you really

should put more into your hiring process if you vet harder or better you'll you'll you'll you know you can filter those people and so I said well you know I'm really smart I don't need to do that but then I was like let's try it and so we started setting a process where people people go through two, three, sometimes four interviews, if we weren't sure. And boy, did we change the problems we were having that we had to solve, like you mentioned, you know? And turns out the real problem that we had to solve wasn't the one by one with each bad employee. It was to fix their hiring process. And boy, that fixed everything.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I saw somebody, I saw something that somebody wrote, it wasn't mine that said every, every business is designed to encounter the problems it encounters. It's all about the design. It's a big infrastructure, you know?

So we have to fix. And a big part of the system is us. It's the human beings. So many people are starting businesses now or running small businesses like I am, like you are probably, and you're probably a multi-billion dollar company. Nobody knows, right?

But when the business is like, $5.5. Right. When the business is not going right, we tend to externalize it and talk about the marketplace and the customers and so forth. And in a large majority, a big majority of the cases, it's us. Yeah. It's the discipline. It's the knowledge. It's the people skills. It's the whatever we need to make the business work. And so the funny thing is that while large corporations pay for leadership consulting, I'm not trying to. trying to get them to do their business better. They know their technical skills pretty well, but it's the attitude, it's the communication skills, it's the trust, it's the ability to resolve conflicts in the people, it's ability to build a team that is sort of the leading indicators of success. And so we're taking that to them, and I'm telling you, multiplied millions of dollars come out of knowing how to manage your thoughts and the thoughts of the people around you.

and that's that's the source of business it's not just supply and demand yeah that's why we hypnotize all of our employees so they do what they want yeah well that's not a bad thing if you think i'm joking we actually do we turn them into bots they're just walking around we told them no i'm just kidding we tried that but uh evidently the lawyer said we can't do that anymore yeah so there's that but no you're really right no here's a real business tactic for you hypnotize your lawyer Oh, see, this is another example of solving the problem at its source. Yeah, so it's just putting up with him. So you're feeling very sleepy and all good lawyers are like sharks at the bottom of the ocean.

No, I'm just kidding. We love lawyers. We've had plenty of wonderful lawyers and attorneys on the show. They stand it for the Constitution. It's kind of cool. It used to be when we had one. It's a joke, folks. It's 2025.

If you're listening to this 10 years from now on YouTube, You get that joke. Anyway, assuming YouTube is still in business. We've been on there for 18 years. I hope it's still around 18 years from now. What else do we want to tease out that people should know about you, different products maybe that they can get involved with with you to learn more and become better?

I have a platform that's called school. I didn't make it, SKO-O-L, many people know it. and it's literally school.com, I think, where like teachables and some other instructional platforms, they allow people to come together in communities to support each other. And I'm really excited about that because what is allowing me to do is to take all that I've learned over 25 plus years and package it in small size chunks to teach small business operators how to win, how to make money, how to get a better life, how to deal with stress, how to grow to be medium-sized and large-sized company. So what's happened

is I cut my teeth on massive corporations. They spend millions and millions in training and development and strategy. And then there are all these well-intended, brilliant people with small businesses who don't have the budget to invest in the training and development. And I am so excited now to be able to take it to them and go, have you thought of that? Have you thought about this? This is what it takes to go. And you know, the irony of it all is what we're talking about. Much of what we are helping small business people with is to deal with themselves. the imposter syndrome, how to write effectively so you don't cross political lines and get in trouble with people. For those who are in the service business, and my energy is high because

I feel this in my bones. I can show a business person who has a service business how to write a contract for $28,000 in one day, just to talk. Wow. Colgate, Palm Olive hired me and pays me $28,000 to take their people in Las Vegas. and talk to them for one day, and they loved it. And I know how the contract worked. I have the signature. So I'm taking all that I know to small businesses and go, look, I know how you can get companies.

I know how you can negotiate pricing. I know how you can communicate your value. I know how you can manage your thoughts and overcome imposter syndrome. I know how to build confidence. And if you missed self-esteem when you were a child, it doesn't work the same way. I know how adult self-esteem works. And it is a riot. And I have seen, Chris, I have seen people double their income.

I know one woman in Fort Lauderdale who told me she doubled her income in 30 days. I don't even know how she did it. Yeah. So it's really exciting. Yeah, that's pretty awesome. Yeah, I took some company people once to Las Vegas, but the company got really angry at me because I took them to Spirit Rhino. So I guess that was against the HR rules.

I don't know. I mean, we learned a lot about entrepreneurship and how to make money. Yeah. One dollar to find. So you do some keynote speeches as well. People can find on your website. You have lots of great success programs I see on here. And then for the products with the school, are those linked on your website?

So if I go through some of the success programs and shop, that you have a shop on here? Right. It's friend. Yeah, sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead. I was just asking how that worked. Right.

The school community is brand new. we're working to get all that connection made, but I'll send you the link, and I will send you the, even the QR code. If you can use it, I don't know. But it's, it's school.com and our group is called build a better business, build a better life. So look for either of those, build a better business, build a better life. And we literally help people to get from the caterpillar stage to the butterfly stage in their personal life, in their business life, in their business, and literally kick button, make some money. And you could finally fly. and be beautiful, but it sounds like a song.

Did I just do a rap? Hey, do you know, by the way, hey, by the way, you said that. Do you know that a famous reggae artist took my book and made a song of it, and it is so popular that the typical graduation songs in schools are being replaced by this? Oh, really?

Now the whole book are just portions of it? No, just it took the message of the, I think the first or second chapter. You know, there's the law of vision, the law of word. And you asked me, and I didn't go into it. The law of vision says what you see is what you get. We teach people how to see what normal people can't see. The law of word says the single greatest power you have in your entire life is your words, written, spoken, and heard.

And so on, we talk about the law of good and evil. So he took one of those chapters and made a song out of it, and it is kicking. It's kicking. I mean, I'm so proud of that. Yeah. Nice. Now, if Bar Bar-Barley did that song in reggae, it would probably have to do with Mary. marijuana, the caterpillars from fly part.

But, you know, he's a good guy. That's some good stuff there. So as we go out, give people a final pitch out to pick up your books, to pick up your wares, and all that good stuff, and dot coms, et cetera. Yes. All right. So if you are entrepreneurial, if you believe you are to run your own show and make your own decision and have autonomy, just know, yes, you can because otherwise that

thought would not come to you. But you can't do it alone. you need a community around you of like-minded people we've heard all kinds of research that says let's say for example if you with the five people with whom you hang around you're making about the average of what they're making and your mindset is about where they are i've heard that from a from a rich man in miami so you can't do it by yourself you can't do it when you're surrounded by negative or mediocre i hate to use that word average people in a community where the people are forcing you to look up and step up and and what we have

is we have this community in school, build a better business, build a better life, where you will be challenged, you'll be held accountable, and you're going to be taught some dangerously powerful stuff, like how to get people to say yes to you, how to understand people's impairments so you push the right buttons so that they want to be with you and so forth. And when you have that done, business is pretty simple. It comes down to supply and demand. But when we don't manage our own thoughts, our own mind, our own being, everything is difficult or relationships or businesses and everything. So I invite you, if you have an interest, if you're an entrepreneurial, to check me out at Alvin Day.com and at school.com and you will get

the link in this podcast so you can go directly there. And furthermore, Chris, I'm giving a free seven-day trial to anybody who goes to this. So you'll get a chance to go in and do anything you want inside that schoolroom and study all the amazing things and choose if you want to stay. Oh, well, that should be fun and exciting and wonderful. And they can sign up, they can find that on the website? Well, it'll be on the website very shortly, the Alvin Day.com. It'll be on school.com, build a better business. Well, that'll be exciting to have, and thanks for offering that.

People will check that out. There'll be links on the Chris Foss show. As always, you can go there and find all the good stuff. Yeah. Okay, so you also have a workshop. Tell us about the workshop you have that's coming up. People can access. Yes, I'm very excited.

about this because what we're doing is we're taking one of those leadership courses and making it available for free on a webinar on the, when is it, the 21st of October. So it's going to happen in a short while. And what this is going to deal with is give people the ability to become immune to stress and anxiety. Now, imagine, people are in bad shape these days from anticipated or real fears or issues happening. People are pent up. Where we live right now, people are just angry. There's road rage, their relationship issues, and so forth. And would you believe if I told you that stress,

you can live in a space where stress is not a real thing? And if you just knew how, stress could affect the person next to you and not affect you. This is really, really revolutionary ways of looking at life. And I have the science, I have the biology, and I have the psychology behind it. When you learn this, you can go through stress without the stress going through you. And so where are people going to be able to get access to this and find it? And how soon will it be up exactly? On it, go to my website on alvinday.com, a L-V-I-N-D-A-Y.com. And you will see it will be very obvious. And it'll be a Zoom webinar on the 21st of October. and it will be at 1 o'clock Eastern time.

Okay, so you'll get all the details. In case there are any changes in time, you'll get that on the website as well as the link. You can click to be part of that session. But listen, when you get this in your head, you get peace of mind. You are collected. You're more productive.

You don't fret as much. You don't worry as much. You don't fear as much. Just to know that stress cannot take you down. because you're in the right mental space with all the science behind you to help you live through things that take others down. You know, it's how you respond to the stimuli that comes at you in the world. You can either let it break you or you can let it build you. That's right.

That's right. That's a good way of putting it. But to know the science and to understand that, for example, there's no disease called stress. Disease caused stress. And we'll talk about that. And by the way, I have an algebraic formula with three variables. where if you push one button, your stress goes down, that way. If you push another button this way, your stress goes down.

And if you push the other button this way, your stress goes down. Guaranteed. Okay? And just it's a nice structured way to look at life so that the pressures and the rough and tumble of life don't have to take you down mentally, emotionally or physically. And mind you, people are dying of stress, they say. Yeah, literally are dying, but you don't have to. Yeah, it'll give you a heart to disease and all sorts of problems.

It's really awful. Yeah, really awful. Don't do that, folks. Well, thank you. Yeah, you're welcome. I'm just saying that that's one of the things that we teach, but we're giving that away for free on that date. And if you're interested at all, register.

Because, again, we're only going to be able to take a small number of people. And this is a promise. Everybody says that. But we have some structural limits. We can't take beyond a certain number of folks. So you want to register quickly because once it fills up, we don't have the ability to change it. So look for the link.

And I look forward to seeing you. You being able to walk through stress, like walk through fire and not get burned. How's that? I love walking through fire and not getting burned because the burn parts are kind of painfully. Well, thank you very much. It's been fun, Alvin. Lots of great energy you had you brought to the show. He certainly appreciated it, my friend.

That's awesome, man. Thank you. There you go. Check out his books and links wherever they are, we've discussed. But his book we let off with, if caterpillars can fly. So can I master the seven universal laws to achieve. even prosper. And boy, I'm going to be stuck with what your grandmother told you. What a great visionary that she was to show. Very much so.

Yeah. We need more parents to teach kids that. So that's a little bit of entrepreneurism. Anyway, thanks to my honest for tuning in. Thanks, Alvin, for being here. We really appreciate. Yeah. Thank you so much, Chris. Thank you. And thanks to mine us for tuning in. Go to Goodrease.com, Fortress, Chris Foss. LinkedIn.com, Fortress, Chris Foss, 1 on the TikTokity and all those crazy places in the internet. Bego to each other. Stay safe. We'll see you guys next time. And that should have us out.