The Unshackled Owner

A gentleman does hard things without complaining. Kirk Chugg felt that he was becoming the default dad that this generation has created. As president of custom clothing boutique for men, Haberdasher, Kirk decided to become a devoted dad and started The Gentleman Project to put out the design of what fathers should be. Learn how to have the courage to start a new business, enjoy working hard for it and always give undivided attention to your children.

Getting piano lessons and baking brownies as a Girl Scout before becoming a passionate softball player, life is a big adventure when you are a kid. But growing up means making decisions for yourself that will affect your family or career. Even though Erin Saxton experienced a number of career crossroads, she knew that parenting and career should be the two things that she should do best. Listen to her stories as an intern for Good Morning America, her journey to becoming a TV producer and the founder of Eleven Communications.

The moment you start doing things other people tell you to do is the moment you put a shackle on yourself. After quitting her job, Wendy Lipton-Dibner started doing her thing and made honesty her moral foundation. Wendy shares how ethical influence can be a huge factor in attracting people who will eventually share her positive and honest outlook.

In this episode Aaron and Jeff discuss the strategies used to make massive deals in business. Emphasizing actionable tactics to do business “better, faster and cheaper” You don’t want to miss the wisdom shared by the incredible Jeff Flamm.

This is going to be a very interesting conversation. I’m very excited about it. You’re going to love the guest we have on today. This program has been so interesting in the way that it’s developed. I think this is our 31st episode. The Unshackled Owner sprang from an old podcast I had called The Lookout where I was just trying to tell my stories of business and how those might benefit listeners. Then we morphed over to The Unshackled Owner so we could get more specific and more intentional about how are you doing developing your business and are there best practices? Are there tips? Are there ways of avoiding mistakes that you could learn so that your business could be stronger? It could be more intentionally driven and grown. It could be developed into something that you could pass down to the next generation or you could sell or that you could at least enjoy the fruits of your labor and have the time you need to go out and do other things in life that stir your soul, whether that’s service or starting another business or going to hang out in the south of France for a month. Whatever it is, we want to make sure that you have the business structure set up and the systems in place and the team in place so that you’re not so critical to the everyday operation of the business. You’re an owner more than an operator.

We’re going to talk today with a fellow who really goes to the heart of several of those issues in his business. I’m really excited for you to hear his words of wisdom.

In this episode Aaron interviews Tammy Dunakin about how she transitioned her life from being a paramedic, to being a farm-entrepreneur. Starting with a few goats, she grew her herd into a thriving landscaping business and is now scaling her company by franchising throughout the country. Tammy talks about how hardships in her life led her to where she is now, living her life with passion and enjoying the life of an Unshackled Owner.

I’m going to say this for the first time today because of the guest that I have on with me. He and I were talking. We came up with a way to define what I’m working on here with this whole Unshackled Owner program: with the podcast, the classes, the website, the speaking, the radio show. All of it is this: There’s a tremendous amount of companies out there that fail. There’s tremendous failure. There’s a high rate of 80% of first time companies fail. Even for people who have been doing this for a while, a clear 50% of those businesses will fail in the first five years. That’s a lot of suffering. That’s a lot of wealth and capital down the drain. There’s a lot of frustration.

Small business is so critical to our economy, so critical to our community, so critical to successful families. I’ve just decided that my job with Unshackled Owner is to eradicate this idea that 50% of the companies are going to fail in five years. There’s no reason for it. When you learn the right steps, the right formula, you don’t have to be one of those statistics. We want to end this failure rate by giving people the tools they need to be successful and to progress and grow their companies and build something that will not only support their life and their family, but something they can sell and can be a benefit to other people in the future. This idea and this thinking really became crystalized in talking to today’s guest.

Today, we talk about getting out of your comfort zone, how important it is to go out and be face to face, knee to knee with people, especially perspective clients, perspective partners and so on. We talk about networking and how multiplying your network is really powerful in helping your business.

Ignoring The Basics Will Hurt You: I love being here with you guys. Today, I don’t have a guest. We’re not doing an interview, but rather I just wanted to tell you a quick story from an experience I had very recently. It’s a story that reminded me of how critical it is to pay attention to the basics.

Our guest today, Bonnie Laslo is a great example of someone who’s built a life and a business that not only serves her and creates value for her and her personal life, but also for lots of other people who are willing to listen. Bonnie got into real estate young, she says that she was financially free by the time she was 23 years old. When I was 23, financially free didn’t mean a lot of money. Just a couple of years later, she was, I think by 26, was a millionaire and has been just expanding her net worth all that time. She’s the founder of Hobby Millionaire, which is a great program that, full disclosure, Laughlin Associates, one of my companies, is now working as affiliates with Hobby Millionaire, sharing the knowledge of both of our organizations with our memberships, our client base. Bonnie and I do have a new and growing relationship. I needed to get her on the podcast so you guys could learn about not only how she got wealthy and successful at a young age, but how she’s taken that and taught thousands of people how to do the same.