Jonathan shares a story about a young man that he met that made him question, are we all thinking big enough?
It’s been a while since I’ve recorded a video. One, I’ve been thinking I need to get this done. Two, what would be something that would be of value to talk about or which question of the tons of questions I have outstanding that I haven’t yet answered should I answer? The thing that keeps coming to mind is a story, an experience I had a couple of weeks ago that I’d like to share with you. The story is also your challenge and my challenge.
A couple of weeks ago, I was in Louisville, Kentucky which is the GIE conference for the industry. It’s non-stop everyday from 7:30am till the end of the show. Dinners at night, probably some drinks in the evening and then you start the whole thing over again the next day. Along the way I have tons of fantastic conversations. I get to see a lot of people I know and have great conversations with them. I get to see people that I’ve never met and have conversation with them. One of the stand out memories from the show is that a fellow came up to me on Friday near the end of the day, and I can’t remember his name for the life of me, but I know that he was 17 and he’s from Ohio.
He had his little brother with him. He had a couple of questions for me but the biggest question, the one he started with was, “How do I go about hiring somebody to work inside my business?” I think it was full-time. He wasn’t looking for a high school kid to help him, he was looking for a person that could work for him all day while he’s at school. I think that’s pretty ambitious and pretty awesome. When I was in high school, I started mowing lawns. Not the business I have now, and I had a couple people working for me but they were high school students.
It’s far more intimidating when you’re 17 years old to go hire somebody that’s still possibly a young person but probably in their 20’s, maybe even somebody older, to work for you. That’s just super intimidating. I was super impressed that he’s thinking this way. He’s already thinking about what’s going to happen when he goes off to college. To you, I apologize I forgot your name, congratulations. That type of attitude, that type of working really hard, getting out of your comfort zone and doing something like that is going to make you really successful. Just keep doing that and do more of it and push harder and go faster.
At 17, if you can build this business now, you’ll be in a ridiculously great spot. I want to tell that story because I think that he has a lot of courage and a lot of guts to do such a thing. I wouldn’t have been doing that at 17. My challenge to you watching this, and the challenge to me is, what are we not doing or thinking big enough about because we’re scared or apprehensive?
Maybe we don’t want to put somebody else out. That’s generally my biggest flaw. I don’t want to put other people out or bother them and so I don’t ask for the thing that I might need or need help with.
What is it that you’re not doing that you could be doing that takes a little bit of courage like the fellow in Ohio that’s 17 that’s going to hire somebody out of school to work for him full-time while he’s going to school? That’s awesome. Is there an area in your life where you could push and challenge yourself like he’s doing with himself? Go do it.
