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The Impact Entrepreneur

Mike Flynn takes you behind closed doors and invites you into his conversations with game changing entrepreneurs. These conversations go beyond success and failure, beyond product or service or platform, to uncover what is really behind the decisions these entrepreneurs make and what IMPACT they hope to have in the world.
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Now displaying: September, 2019
Sep 30, 2019

Gustavo Fernández’s first career in pharmaceutical sales was inspired by his stepfather, who was the general manager for Johnson & Johnson in the Dominican Republic. Gustavo stayed in the industry for 10 years after graduating college — until his real passion started calling to him.

 

Photography had been Gustavo’s hobby since college. Wherever he went, he always took a camera along with him. Then, when the internet became a massive tool for building communities, he started connecting with other photographers. Serendipitously, one of the top wedding photographers in the world lived just down the street from him. So he went to a workshop she was holding, and that changed the whole trajectory of his life.

 

Now, Gustavo has a career photographing people like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. 

 

The internet and online communities continue to be hugely important to Gustavo’s photography and career, too. Because, in this era of social media, the vast majority of new business that comes to him is through word of mouth.

 

But you can’t just be part of a Facebook group and reap the benefits of belonging to a community — you have to create lasting, authentic relationships with people

 

When Gustavo is building relationships...

 

  • He always follows up leads and conversations (he even carries a notebook so he doesn’t forget anything!)
  • He always picks up the phone. A couple of years ago the event planner for Forbes called to ask him to photograph an event. And she told him, Thank you for picking up the phone. No-one picks up the phone anymore.
  • He gives unique, thoughtful gifts to clients and contacts. A $10 gift he sent to a contact actually resulted in $10,000 worth of business. 

 

Gustavo says that people sometimes comment about how different his two careers are but, at the end of the day, it’s all the same — because “it's all people.”

 

Don’t be a podcast junkie…

Resources:

 

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We are brought to you by the Lawton Marketing Group, a full-service advertising and design agency serving companies and entrepreneurs at all levels. They are your one-stop shop for all your website, logo, social media, print, app design and reputable management needs.

 

Visit LawtonMG.com for more info.

 

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The Impact Entrepreneur Show is a production of Crate Media

Sep 23, 2019

Colleague, friend and fellow storyteller Taylor Sledge saw the way that his parents wrote the stories of their own lives — and their constant presence, love, and support gave him the foundation he needed to tell his story, too.

 

Taylor’s dad was an attorney. He owned his own business in a risky area of law, so his income was up and down, but Taylor loved that he set his own schedule and never missed family events. His mom was a flight attendant for Delta Airlines. She was never afraid to talk to anyone, regardless of how different they were to her, and this made a huge impact on Taylor. 

 

Taylor founded the Big Small Business Story to tell the stories of entrepreneurs who are driven by purpose, character, and belief. Their trademarked slogan — “It’s never just business” — reflects his belief that your career or company is about the lives of other people, not just making money, and an understanding of psychology and the human condition are crucial to creating authentic business relationships.

 

It seems simple — your career is about the lives of other people — but a lot of businesspeople still don’t understand that. And it took Taylor a while to realize it, too.

 

When Taylor was 27, he had a business deal go upside down. He realized that he was experiencing the same gut feeling that he had when he was 10 bringing home a bad report card. There were areas in his life where he wasn't living as an adult, and this inspired him to work out where he needed to grow.

 

And it’s an ongoing journey. Taylor and his wife have recently experienced fertility challenges, and this forced Taylor to confront things he didn’t like about himself, including his self image, and work out what really matters in his life.

 

Something that really matters to Taylor is legacy. He doesn’t think that we spend enough time considering it, but believes that, “We have the responsibility of setting a trajectory for the future with every decision that we make.”

 

Don’t be a podcast junkie…

Resources:

 

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We are brought to you by the Lawton Marketing Group, a full-service advertising and design agency serving companies and entrepreneurs at all levels. They are your one-stop shop for all your website, logo, social media, print, app design and reputable management needs.

 

Visit LawtonMG.com for more info.

 

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The Impact Entrepreneur Show is a production of Crate Media

Sep 16, 2019

Growing up, Heather Adams always had her nose in a book, and her heroes spoke to her from the pages; smart and savvy women like Anne of Green Gables, Jo from Little Women, and Nancy Drew. 

 

Heather compares Nancy Drew’s mystery-solving adventures to her own life today — owner of a public relations agency, Choice Media & Communications — because she’s always “running toward the flames, constantly taking notes, and bringing order to the chaos.”

 

But, unlike Nancy Drew, Heather isn’t doing this alone, and she is passionate about building a cohesive, invested team. After the partnership with her co-founder dissolved, Heather held a strategic planning retreat for her entire team. They re-evaluated Choice’s mission and core values and Heather says this was a game-changer for their work culture — because, now, everyone has skin in the game. 

 

Heather also has an unusual approach to human relations, arguing that you have to throw out all the policies and love your workers as human beings first. When one of her team members is going through a hard season, she puts their responsibilities aside and taps into what they need. This human-first approach carries through to every aspect of Heather’s business and life, including her attitude towards her competition.

 

Before Heather started her own company she worked at Thomas Nelson, which was then the world’s largest Christian publishing house, she worked with Michael Hyatt, who eventually became the CEO and chairman. He taught her many important lessons, including to embrace the competition and look at them as someone to learn from and champion instead of someone to take down. 

 

Heather sees that as a crucial transformation in her life. As she says, “I have this mentality that a win for one is a win for all. And that was something I had to learn because I sucked at it.”

 

Don’t be a podcast junkie…

 

Resources:

 

--

 

We are brought to you by the Lawton Marketing Group, a full-service advertising and design agency serving companies and entrepreneurs at all levels. They are your one-stop shop for all your website, logo, social media, print, app design and reputable management needs.

 

Visit LawtonMG.com for more info.

 

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The Impact Entrepreneur Show is a production of Crate Media

Sep 9, 2019

Remi Adeleke’s life changed abruptly when his father died—when his family went from being royalty in Nigeria to struggling to feed themselves in the Bronx.

 

The public education system was so poorly resourced and Remi was exposed to precious few role models in his early life. As a result, he didn’t feel that there was an expectation for him to even graduate high school; it seemed the only path available was stealing, selling drugs, and running scams. 

 

But when Remi hit rock bottom at 26 and realized, he needed something bigger than himself. That’s when Remi met Tiana Reyes, a military recruiter who helped him find his true path. Tiana was also from the Bronx, so she was passionate about helping to give young people from the neighborhood an opportunity to establish a career and explore the world—because she knew that not many other people would give them the chance.

 

Tiana attended multiple court hearings to advocate for him and helped him fill out the paperwork to get Remi into the Navy. Once in Navy boot camp, Remi was exposed to all the different programs and set his heart on becoming a Navy SEAL. 

 

But it wasn’t a slam dunk. He didn’t pass the academic test on his first attempt and, even if he had, he wouldn’t have passed the physical test because he didn’t know how to swim. But Remi’s mother always taught him to persevere, and he drew on that to train and study in the time outside of his role as a medic. The hard work paid off and Remi was accepted into Navy SEAL training.

 

In addition to fulfilling his dream of becoming a Navy SEAL, Remi is an actor, entrepreneur, writer, husband, and father. He has written a memoir about his life called Transformed and volunteers as a mentor for kids in similar situations that he was in. 

 

He believes that the past does not have to be a template for our future, that there is always hope and that you can help a person so much that you’re actually hurting them because you're enabling them to keep doing what they’re doing. 

 

As for all the hardships, setbacks and failures in his life, Remi says they made him who he is today because “you can't grow without failure.”

 

Don’t be a podcast junkie…

 

Resources:

 

--

 

We are brought to you by the Lawton Marketing Group, a full-service advertising and design agency serving companies and entrepreneurs at all levels. They are your one-stop shop for all your website, logo, social media, print, app design and reputable management needs.

 

Visit LawtonMG.com for more info.

 

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The Impact Entrepreneur Show is a production of Crate Media

Sep 2, 2019

Vicky Oliver’s favorite days begin when somebody writes to her and says they read her book and it helped them get a job. But Vicky didn’t start her career writing about job hunting – it took quite a few twists and turns before she stumbled into a mission that she loved.

 

Vicky got her start in advertising. But, after September 11, 2001, there were articles in the New York Times every single day about people switching their careers. And this wasn’t because of a downturn in the economy – it was because they were looking inwards and asking, “Am I doing what I want to be doing should I die tomorrow?” And when people were honest with themselves, they started making gigantic changes.

 

Vicky enjoyed writing commercials, but there was always the lingering feeling that she was making corporations rich, making millions of dollars for them, without really enriching herself. So she looked at her skill, which was writing, and asked herself: Can I do something else with this skill? Can I help people more?

 

Throughout her career in advertising, Vicky was constantly looking for the next job opportunity, and she was actually really good at securing the jobs she wanted. She realized that she knew quite a bit about job hunting, and that was how she could help so many others achieve their mission. She started writing some articles, and then eventually a book.

 

Even though Vicky made more money when she was in advertising, writing books turned out to be the thing that brings her the most satisfaction. As she says, “If you look at what you love to do, you will probably be better at it than if you just do something because you think it's going to make you a lot of money.”

 

Don’t be a podcast junkie…

Resources:

 

--

 

We are brought to you by the Lawton Marketing Group, a full-service advertising and design agency serving companies and entrepreneurs at all levels. They are your one-stop shop for all your website, logo, social media, print, app design and reputable management needs.

 

Visit LawtonMG.com for more info.

 

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The Impact Entrepreneur Show is a production of Crate Media

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