Our Partners Stole our $3,500,000 Business

[Music] Grace starts off this particular event and from Los Angeles hi Grace how are you I'm doing great Dave thank you so much for taking my call sure what's up so I am well I was the president of a company that my husband and I built with our Blood Sweat and Tears um we had 34 employees and our U most recent annual revenue was three .5 million we we had a bit of a situation uh we started the company before we knew you and we had two minority stake partners and it turned out to be a terrible decision with them and they basically stole our biggest clients from us and um and we found that the only way that we could move forward was to dissolve the company because they would not let us buy them out so we we are back at the beginning stages starting all over again um because we had to get rid of the cancer that was in the business and um now we're back to just the two of us we do uh oh so you do not have 35 team members and three and a half million now I do not have 35 team members or three and a half million annual revenue anymore no okay it's gone that's the history so how long have you how long have you been starting from Ground Zero again how long ago was that probably about a year okay and so what do you think you're going to do in 24 so we're we're just kind of stuck right now um we're trying to figure out how to move forward from all of the I guess sort of the pain and the trauma of what we had to deal with um because it was really our baby we loved that business and put our soul into it and the two partners were actually my husband's mentors and we were just really stuck at an impath and we're trying to figure out how how but there's not there's not a there's not a tactical impass there's an emotional grieving yeah that would sound about right yeah I mean there's there's no the all the legal and the garbage is in the rearview mirror it's just a broken heart now yes and we were also um the industry that we were particularly working in was we were kind of painted in a bad light in that industry and so a lot of our connections in moving forward in that direction are kind of a hard to go forward with if that makes sense well you got to rebuild trust because it was taken away from you yes or you got or you got to and or you got to get new clients yeah new connections okay all right so um so what do you think you're going to make in 24 in 24 um right now we're not actually making anything we had we were trying to negotiate some deals and these deals have just fallen through so at the moment we we we don't have anything on the books and so that's why we're trying to figure out how to regroup and how to move forward okay so the reason you don't have anything on the books three months into the year is what why is that are you spending a lot of time in your own head ruminating over this past and uh basically creating post-traumatic stress disorder you know I think last year we were for sure definitely in 23 in 24 um I spent the first three months negotiating some contracts and um it looked like it was going to be great it looked like it was going to be a real lucrative contract and then it just it just completely fell through it it just we were working on one deal that's true why why were you're only working on one deal working on one deal is not working on one deal is not a full-time job nor is it wise you need to be working on 10 deals you've done this before you know what I'm talking about yeah I I the last company that we had actually we had three major clients that supported us for seven years and um part of the problem we had with that was we knew we needed more clients yeah you you were set up for you were set up to be owned by your clients yeah and you did get owned by your clients and the screwing of your partners yeah yeah we grew too fast as well we went from uh just my husband and I to 34 employees in three months yeah which also put stupid people in your building when you grow that fast your interview process sucks yeah okay yes and um and you know also the other thing is we have three little kids and I'm since we haven't really had any business I've sort of stepped back to um kind of being a how can I help you so move the moving forward process um what is your advice are you would you suggest that this is partly an emotional problem that we have to work through it sounds like you were saying earlier but also it would be for me because I get mad about this stuff and then it rolls over and over and over in my head until I turn it loose and go on with the future and it takes up like your partners are living rentree in your head your ex Partners yeah and you spend you spend all your time back I do it I i' I've done it too I spend all my time back there going how could I be so stupid as to let these people have access to the keys to the kingdom and basically take everything from me I must be an idiot and I run this over and over and over in my head instead of looking forward and if I'd spend the same amount of emotional energy looking forward see like when you started you didn't have all this negative baggage in your brain so all you could think about is how wonderful the world is and go get something and I I got to get your brain back there because that's what I have to do with me I have to get my brain back there I got to go back to go okay yeah I did something stupid I let somebody have access to something they shouldn't have had access to I put up with it too long I did a bad deal I built a horrible structure on the partnership I hired too fast okay that's all the dumb things I used to do but now what am I going to do this time I'm going to learn from all that and I'm going to be a whole lot better than I was and so I'm a lot better business person than I was when I started that other company CU now I've got this thing called experience and I'm going to think positive see if your brain was completely clear and all you were doing was dreaming and happy and positive and excited about business you'd be looking at 20 deals instead of one okay and you'd have some stuff on the books and there's always been somebody in quote the industry whatever the industry is that doesn't want to work with anybody and that's just part of life I can promise you there's some people don't want to work with Dave and we go ahead and do it anyway right we got go somewhere else that's fine next mhm you know I'm going to sit I'm not going to spend time thinking about them they they don't make me any money they don't help me help people they don't do anything I got to move on to the next thing or you guys need to start a whole new thing one of the two just get completely out of this industry and go to a whole different thing I don't care but that's why you don't your your your confidence is shaken and you're angry and hurt and so you're being very tenative instead of strutting with swagger into these meetings and doing 10 times more meetings than you should that than you're doing now that's what I think I'm hearing am I am I accurate No you you are completely accurate it it's been a struggle to actually get meetings yeah and I'm not I'm maybe it's the confidence thing it's like it is it's in your voice it's in your voice yeah they you can smell it you can smell it I mean you know and think about it somebody comes into an interview for a job and um you know they got fired from the last job and their confidence is gone the way they walk the way they carry themselves the shape of their vocal cords so it sounds like stress or anxiety or something in their voice they're up an octave from what they ought to be instead of the guy that comes in just sits down as cool as a cucumber and like doesn't care whether he gets hired or not and is all confident not arrogant just confident and you you you pick up on all the body language cues you pick up on all the voice spacing and the the verbiage that's being used and we pick up on all these non-verbal cues a and you can't help but put those off when you're hurting and grieving and so this is a healing process for you and I think one way to overcome it is just massive amounts of activity massive amounts of activity I think you go get 25 appointments blow some of them up mess them up cry when you get to the car bang the steering wheel whatever drive home throw something and get up and do it again tomorrow and and just keep moving and keep moving and keep moving and keep moving keep moving otherwise these people that screwed you win and the best revenge is Success so go build a big old thing that's the best revenge there is you know anybody that messes you over I mean can you think about somebody mess me over in radio business back in the day what they look like right now it's so cute yeah the best revenge is Success right that's what you need to do it's awesome you you you have the right stuff Grace um it's just the hard thing I have to do you have to do when we get screwed over is quit blaming ourselves we got to forgive ourselves and we got to quit living in all that junk in the past the rearview mirror is smaller than the windshield for a reason the windshield is Grace go forward this is the Entre leadership podcast

Channel: EntreLeadership

Views: 24,802

Keywords: entreleadership, dave ramsey, Our Partners Stole our $3, 500, 000 Business

Id: svPJVbwnfBc

Length: 9min 54sec (594 seconds)

Published: Tue May 07 2024