➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Profit should always be the key metric that keeps your company afloat—but the last decade of entrepreneurship glorified valuations, funding rounds, and revenue while quietly burying the one number that actually matters. Leo breaks down why the real superpower in business is profitability, exposes the vanity metric trap that kills companies (businesses with profit talk about profit, companies without it talk about revenue, and the ones without revenue talk about market size), and reveals the exact moment it's okay to sacrifice margin for market share—and when doing so will destroy you. From understanding your customer acquisition cost to lifetime value ratio, to why most businesses die not from bad strategy but from making decisions too late, this is the financial discipline framework every entrepreneur needs before the next market shift hits.

➡️ Timestamps

00:00 The Superpower in Business Nobody Talks About
00:28 Why Vanity Metrics Quietly Kill Companies
01:03 The Shift from Revenue Obsession to Profit
01:32 Bootstrap vs. Venture-Backed: The Real Math
02:15 The Only Time You Should Prioritize Revenue Over Profit
03:05 The Vanity Metric Hierarchy (Profit → Revenue → Valuation → Made-Up Numbers)
03:45 Why Most Businesses Die Too Slow
04:15 Invest in a CFO Before You Think You Need One
04:58 Seasonal Business Survival: Forecasting Downside
05:30 Should You Sacrifice Margin for Market Share?
06:05 Blue Ocean Strategy: When Going Fast Is the Only Option
06:30 The Unit Economics Trap That Kills Growth Companies

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Most founders rush to hire for roles they've never done themselves—then can't figure out why they can't hold people accountable or spot real talent. The mistake: filling seats before understanding what success actually looks like in that position.

I break down the hiring philosophy that cost me hundreds of thousands to learn: why mastering the role first changes everything, the shift from hiring specialists to hiring grit, and Gary Vee's controversial take on protecting company culture at all costs. The reality check: you can teach skills, but you can't teach work ethic.

➡️ Timestamps

00:00 The Hiring Philosophy Nobody Teaches You
01:04 Master the Role Before You Hire For It
01:39 Why Team Members Say "What Took You So Long"
02:19 Cultural Fit Isn't Negotiable
03:03 Personality vs. Skills: What Really Matters
03:16 Gary Vee's Bold Take: Culture Over Performance
04:08 Creating Job Descriptions That Actually Work
05:22 The 90-Day Probationary Period Strategy
06:14 The Early Warning Signs of Cultural Decline
07:03 How Culture Evolves With Company Size
08:08 Building Teams That Protect Your Culture

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Most founders confuse growth with success—but growth without unit economics just scales your losses. The difference between Casper burning cash and Uber's land-and-expand play isn't luck—it's understanding what business you're in.

I break down why good opportunities kill great ones, the geographic depth trap that cost me 10 hours a week for nothing, and how I ruthlessly prioritize time as ROI. The brutal truth: saying yes to everything creates burnout and dilution. No is a complete sentence.

➡️ Timestamps

00:00 Growth Without Economics = Scaling Losses  
01:03 Casper vs. Uber: The Unit Economics Lesson  
02:34 The 3-5 Year Curve to Sustainable Profitability  
03:49 Good Is the Enemy of Great  
04:48 My Geographic Dilution Mistake  
05:40 Ruthlessly Prioritizing Time  
07:55 My Hard Rule: No Professional Dinners in Miami  
08:45 The Force Multiplier: Pouring Into Leaders  
10:07 No Is a Complete Sentence

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/  
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/  
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja  

#UnitEconomics #ProfitableGrowth #Entrepreneurship #SayingNo #TimeManagement #ROI

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Most founders confuse delegation with abdication—and it's costing them scale. Delegation is strategically giving a task to someone else. Abdication is deciding not to do something at all. The difference determines whether you're building leverage or just creating chaos.

I break down the 10-minute tracking exercise that reveals where you're spending double-digit percentages on hourly work, the "do, delegate, or delete" framework that clears mental RAM, and why documentation is the only thing preventing burnout from micro-decisions. The brutal truth: your team will never hit your 90% conversion rate, but 10 people at 60% destroys you doing everything alone. This is how you stop being the bottleneck in your own business and start building systems that scale without you in the room.

➡️ Timestamps

00:00 Effort Isn't the Metric—Not All Hours Are Equal
01:15 "If You Want Something Done Right, Do It Yourself" (The Biggest Fallacy)
01:54 The 10-Minute Tracking Exercise That Changes Everything
03:00 Your Time Has an ROI—Are You Calculating It?
03:31 Delegation vs. Abdication: The Critical Distinction
04:14 The Never-Ending To-Do List Stealing Your Sleep
04:54 When You Become the Bottleneck (And How to Spot It)
05:37 The One Task You Should Never Delegate
07:04 Letting Go of Tasks You're Emotionally Attached To
08:01 Why Your Team Will Never Be As Good As You (And That's Okay)
08:34 The Documentation Mistake That Kills Delegation
09:27 Trust Without Tracking = Anxiety (The Domino's Pizza Tracker Principle)
10:40 Understanding When Failure Is Normal vs. Operational
12:00 My 20-Year Evolution: From Control Freak to Leverage Master
13:07 Your First Hire Should Clean Your House (Here's Why)

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

#Delegation #Productivity #Entrepreneurship #TimeManagement #BusinessGrowth #FounderMindset #Leverage #ScalingBusiness #ROI #Leadership

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Jody Glidden dropped out of computer science after one year, joined a startup as employee #5, and sold his first company for $1 million at 19—a deal he now calls one of his biggest mistakes because he "didn't know anything about multiples." The five-time exited founder reveals how growing up in a fishing village programmed him to clash with every acquirer's vision, why getting acquired by the same company twice still couldn't teach him to execute someone else's decisions, and the brutal math showing why going deep in a vertical beats going broad every time. This is the raw playbook from someone who built IntroHive to a $500 million valuation serving 93 countries, now runs 25 people doing what used to take 150, and has generated 100-200x angel returns—exposing why commodity SaaS is dead and what separates founders who exit from founders who get disrupted.

➡️ Show Links

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/jodyglidden

➡️ Timestamps

00:00 He Didn't Just See Data—He Saw Relationships
01:41 Born at the Right Time: The Malcolm Gladwell Outlier Reality
03:22 "It's Hard for Me to Execute Other People's Decisions"
04:01 One Year of Computer Science Then Quit—Employee #5
04:43 $1 Million Exit at 19: "Never Should Have Sold"
06:45 Pitching the LMS They Rejected—Then Becoming Their Competitor
07:35 Same Buyer, Second Acquisition: $10 Million (Still Too Early)
10:02 The BlackBerry Relay Idea: One Year Building, Zero Market
12:40 Chalk Media: Ephemeral Content Before Snapchat Existed
14:29 Raising in September 2008 (The Worst Timing Possible)
15:35 Reporting to Jim Balsilie: Learning From a Childhood Hero
16:26 Big Four Discovery: 500K Employees Who Don't Know Who Knows Who
17:52 PWC: 100 Seats to 93 Countries to $500M Valuation
18:34 The Private Equity Firm That Didn't Go Well
21:32 Going Deep in a Vertical: The Strategy That's Never Failed
22:46 25 People Now vs. 150 Before: The Vibe Coding Shift
24:13 Commodity Software Extinction: The 8090 Problem
32:39 "I've Never Had an Idea Turn Out Exactly How I Expected"
33:35 Two Equal Founders = Tiebreaker Problem (The Speak Story)
35:54 Only Invest Where You Can Move the Needle
37:40 Irrational Confidence + Thirst for Learning

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

#JodyGlidden #IntroHive #FiveTimeFounder #StartupExit #PrivateEquity #VibeCoding #SaaSDisruption #VerticalStrategy #AngelInvesting #SerialEntrepreneur

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Tommy Mello started with $50, a borrowed truck, and a garage door business everyone thought was a dead end—now he's built an $800 million empire and decoded the exact playbook that separates $1 million operators from $100 million machines. The A1 Garage Door Service founder reveals how watching his mom come home with blistered feet from selling 53 houses (while bartending to survive) wired him to bet everything "a dozen times," why he flew out twice a month to study every major HVAC shop in America instead of guessing his way to scale, and the brutal math showing why chasing $10 million EBITDA companies beats grinding $1 million deals (hint: it's the same work, 10x the return). This is the raw systems blueprint from someone who didn't know how to make payroll multiple times but studied his way to a 4.5x return in three years, exposing why 99% of home service operators stay stuck and what it really takes to become the operator private equity hunts.

➡️ Show Links

Website: https://a1garage.com
Podcast: https://homeserviceexpert.com/podcast
Book: https://www.elevatedbybooktommy.com
Instagram: https://instagram.com/tommymello
LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/tommymello

➡️ Timestamps

00:00  Mom's Blisters: Selling 53 Houses While Bartending to Survive
02:10  The Red Corvette Moment: 16 Years Old When Everything Changed
03:36  Parents' Money Fights That Programmed Him for Millions
06:13  "Don't Speak" by No Doubt—The Song Playing When He Knew
07:03  Starting a Roth IRA at 16: The Cousin Who Changed His Life
09:45  $50 and a Borrowed Truck: Starting a Garage Door Company at 19
11:22  Buying Out His Partner at 21 With No Business Experience
15:30  The $100M Shop Tour Strategy: Flying Twice a Month to Learn
18:15  "I'm Just a Garage Door Kid"—Humility That Opened Every Door
21:36  Getting on ServiceTitan Changed Everything (The CRM Revelation)
22:12  The Legacy Promise: Why Every $100M Shop Let Him In
23:18  HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical: Building the Home Service Empire
23:28  4.5x Return in 3 Years: The $6M Restoration Company Win
23:46  Why $10M EBITDA Beats $1M EBITDA (Same Work, 10x Exit Multiple)
24:13  The Math Private Equity Doesn't Want You to Know ($80M to $540M)
25:02  The Bankrupt Founder Thesis: Why They Make the Best Hires
25:23  "I Didn't Know How to Make Payroll"—Betting Everything a Dozen Times
25:47  Everyone Wants the Views, No One Wants the Hike
26:12  The $800M Speedbump: Why the Next Deal Won't Change Him
27:12  Designing Life at 45: Golf, Hunting, and Stomach-Hurting Laughs
27:57  "This Is My Last CEO Role Ever" (We'll See About That)

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Gina Kirschenheiter was a bored housewife from New York who stumbled onto Real Housewives of Orange County by accident, watched her marriage fall apart on national television, then leveraged 866K Instagram followers and 24.2 million monthly views to build a real estate business that doubled in revenue in under a year at eXp Realty—now leading a 6-agent team while raising 6 kids and teaching other agents how to turn social media reach into million-dollar listing presentations.

➡️ Show Links

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gina-kirschenheiter/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gina.kirschenheiter/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gina.kirschenheiter

➡️ Timestamps

0:00 Intro: Meet Gina Kirschenheiter, Real Housewife Turned Top Realtor
2:04 From Bored Housewife to Reality TV Star by Accident
5:18 Using Reality TV as Therapy: Working Through Life on Camera
6:36 "You Should Get Your Real Estate License": The Career Pivot
9:18 Being a New Agent with a Million-Person Audience
13:23 The Golden Era of Social Media: Why Now Is Different
16:44 Getting Past Cringe Mountain: How to Start Creating Content
25:59 The Tuesday-Friday Listing System: Content That Converts
27:44 The Listing Presentation Advantage: 24.2 Million Views in 30 Days
30:05 Social Media Is Modern Marketing: Free Reach Beats Everything

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

#GinaKirschenheiter #RealHousewives #RealEstateAgent #eXpRealty #SocialMediaMarketing #ContentCreation #RealityTV #RealtorLife #TikTokStrategy #InstagramMarketing #AuthenticBranding #ListingPresentation #BlendedFamily #EntrepreneurMom #ViralContent #RealEstateInfluencer

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Failure isn’t final—it’s feedback. In this powerful episode, learn how elite entrepreneurs recover faster, build systems that turn setbacks into success, and master the mental frameworks behind resilience. Discover why systematizing recovery beats talent or luck, how to measure progress after failure, and why a plan B isn’t the same as a comeback system. This episode dives deep into mindset, leadership, and emotional endurance so you can scale through chaos with clarity, purpose, and confidence.

➡️ Timestamps

0:00 The fear of failure and power of recovery systems
0:16 You’re not the same person to everyone—villain or hero?
0:43 Success is about systematizing recovery, not avoiding failure
1:15 Why most people quit—and how volume trumps talent
2:05 The psychology behind failure and recovery mindset
3:02 How to build systems that turn setbacks into momentum
4:01 The difference between plan B and recovery systems
5:00 Why systems outperform talent and luck long-term
6:02 Learning self-compassion and grace through failure
7:15 The danger of perfectionism and false success confidence
8:03 How to transform failure into a process for excellence
9:10 Building emotional resilience through radical ownership
10:00 The loneliness of leadership and need for support systems
10:32 The 1% life: embracing extraordinary problems with grace

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

#EntrepreneurFailure #SystematizeRecovery #OvercomeFailure #BusinessMindset #StartupTips #RadicalOwnership #1PercentLife #FailureToSuccess #EntrepreneurMotivation

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Peter Taunton spent 20 years turning around a single failing health club on a $16k/year salary before selling it for $3M and thinking he was done. Then a loyal employee changed everything—asking Peter to build just one more gym led to Snap Fitness, a 4,000+ location empire across 25 countries that Peter bootstrapped with $300k and zero investors, eventually exiting at a $100M valuation while keeping majority ownership.

➡️ Show Links

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/petertaunton/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/peter_taunton/
Twitter/X: https://x.com/petertaunton

➡️ Timestamps

0:00 Intro: Meet Peter Taunton, Founder of Snap Fitness
1:48 From $16k/Year to $3M Exit: The First 20 Years
3:22 One More Club: The Birth of Snap Fitness
4:01 90 Days to Cash Flow: Validating the Model
5:56 Bootstrapping with $300k: No Investors, No Dilution
8:05 The $47M Phone Call on the Golf Course
11:14 Differentiation: 24/7, No Contracts, Strip Mall Strategy
14:12 2025 Fitness Industry: What Works Now
16:19 Biohacking: The Future of Performance Optimization
19:13 Opening 377 Clubs in One Year: Systems at Scale
22:29 The Multi-Million Dollar Technology Mistake
27:42 What He's Most Proud Of: Grit, Paranoia, and No Plan B
30:56 Advice to Younger Self: I Wish I Would Have Danced More

➡️ Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja

#PeterTaunton #SnapFitness #FitnessEntrepreneur #FranchiseGrowth #Bootstrapping #GymBusiness #SystemsAndProcesses #FitnessIndustry #ExitStrategy #PrivateEquity #Biohacking #RealEstateStrategy #ScalingBusiness #UnitEconomics #WorkLifeBalance #EntrepreneurJourney

➡️ Access ALL FREE business resources, episode blueprints, and exclusive content from past episodes: https://stan.store/leopareja

Dermot Buffini turned a family painting business into Buffini & Company—North America's largest real estate coaching firm, training 3+ million professionals across 45 countries. Known as "The Leader's Leader," Dermot shares how his brother Brian started with $0 and medical debt, discovered the power of working by referral, and built a coaching empire one agent at a time. From surviving the 2008 financial crisis to navigating COVID and the NAR settlement, Dermot reveals the secrets to building trust at scale, leading through market chaos, and why becoming an "influential person" beats being an influencer every time. Plus: his philosophy on Will vs. Skill, how to lead burnt-out teams, why the best relationships form during tough times, and the one book that changed his leadership forever.

➡️  Show Links

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/curiousceo
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/curious_ceo/
Twitter/X: https://x.com/dermot_buffini

➡️  Timestamps

- 0:00 Intro: Meet Dermot Buffini, CEO of Buffini & Company
- 1:33 The Buffini Origin Story: From Painting to Real Estate Empire
- 2:34 Brother Brian's Journey: Medical Debt to Top Producer
- 5:21 The Gap Between Information and Implementation
- 6:12 Dermot Joins the Business: From Skeptic to Believer
- 8:03 Evolution of "Oh By The Way" and Items of Value
- 12:09 Balancing Strategic Vision with Daily Operations
- 14:13 Protecting Your Calendar and Leading from Strengths
- 15:43 Leading Through Crisis: Financial Collapse, COVID & NAR Settlement
- 18:47 Eagles vs. Turkeys: Preparing for Market Downturns
- 20:24 Building Trust at Scale: The Drops vs. Buckets Philosophy
- 24:46 Influential Person vs. Influencer: What Agents Need Now
- 28:33 Will vs. Skill: The Two Pillars of Success
- 33:03 Success is Just Attrition: Why Not Quitting Wins
- 34:29 Leading Burnt-Out Teams Through Painful Market Cycles
- 37:56 Advice for Your 30-Year-Old Self That You'd Ignore
- 40:33 "It's Not About You": The Purpose-Driven Life

➡️  Connect With Leo Pareja

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leopareja/
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leopareja/
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@leo.pareja