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Navigating Growth and Leadership : Insights from Robert Levin
13 Plays4 days ago
In this episode of The Entrepreneur Speaks Podcast, host Kofi Anyemedu sits down with Robert Levin, seasoned entrepreneur, investor, and founder of CIS Ventures. With a diverse background that spans serving as a Navy veteran, studying at Harvard Business School, and leading multiple successful ventures, Robert brings a wealth of experience in entrepreneurship, leadership, and investments.
Together, we explore his entrepreneurial journey, the highs and lows of building businesses, and his expertise in mergers, acquisitions, and corporate buyouts. Robert breaks down what makes a company truly investable, the common mistakes entrepreneurs make when preparing for acquisition, and the leadership principles that have guided his success.
Whether you’re a startup founder seeking growth, an established business owner considering acquisition, or simply looking for timeless lessons in entrepreneurship and leadership, this conversation is packed with actionable insights and inspiration.
Tune in as Robert Levin shares his wisdom on scaling businesses, mentoring the next generation of entrepreneurs, and building ventures that stand the test of time.
Recommended
Transcript
Embracing Mistakes as an Entrepreneur
00:00:05
Speaker
is you have to be willing to make mistakes and you have to own those mistakes and learn from them. me you Early on, you're afraid to make mistakes. You're afraid of looking foolish. as You're afraid of screwing up, losing money or whatever. And I think you've got to get much more comfortable with like, hey, I'm going to make mistakes. Nobody's perfect.
00:00:22
Speaker
um We don't want learn from them and be... humble about it. So I would say that's a big one that you have to be able to to internalize and say, it's okay to make a mistake.
00:00:33
Speaker
Nobody's perfect. We're all going to do it. You're going hire the wrong person. going to, you know, whatever, ah you know, and just be able to, but but I think the thing is, is once you realize it, just fix it quickly, right? So we have a tendency to to think that it'll get better or I can fix
Podcast Introduction: Entrepreneur Speaks
00:00:51
Speaker
it.
00:00:51
Speaker
Welcome to another exciting episode of the Entrepreneur Speaks Podcast. where we bring you inspiring conversations with entrepreneurs, business leaders, and change makers from around the world.
00:01:04
Speaker
I'm Kofi Anymedou. And today, we have a special guest who's made a significant impact in the world of business, investments, mergers and acquisitions.
00:01:16
Speaker
Joining me today is Robert Levin, a seasoned entrepreneur, investor and the driving force behind CIC Ventures. With a world of experience in identifying scaling businesses, Robert has successfully navigated the challenges of entrepreneurship, leading multiple ventures to growth and success.
00:01:35
Speaker
His expertise in mergers and acquisitions has helped numerous businesses transition and thrive in competitive markets. In this episode, we'll dive into his entrepreneurial journey, uncover the lessons he's learned along the way, and explore his insights on business growth, leadership, and navigating the ever-changing investment landscape.
00:01:57
Speaker
Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, or a seasoned business owner, this conversation promises to be packed with valuable takeaways.
Robert Levin's Entrepreneurial Beginnings
00:02:06
Speaker
So without further ado, let's welcome Robert Levin to the Entrepreneur Speaks podcast.
00:02:13
Speaker
Welcome to my show, Robert. Oh, thank Gophie. It's great to be with you. All right. So to start off, can you share a bit about your early life and what shaped your entrepreneurial mindset?
00:02:23
Speaker
Yeah. ah So early life, I was born in Philadelphia ah and um in 1970. So I'm 54. So it goes back quite a ways. And, you know, very normal, middle class upbringing. We moved to a suburban neighborhood just outside of Philadelphia when I was very young.
00:02:45
Speaker
My father was an accountant. My mother was a hospital administrator. to of, you know, your regular Nothing super exciting, but i I did have that kind of entrepreneurial itch early on. I actually got my first job when I was 13 years old working in a clothing store, unpacking boxes and putting shirts on hangers and putting them into the... yeah into the store. So, you know, just, just basic work. But immediately, you know, it was like, it was great because it had a, it it gave me a little bit of independence, right? you know, I had some responsibility. I had, you know, my own money. I could, know, it wasn't a lot of money, but when you're 13 years old, anything is, you know, it feels like a lot of money.
00:03:24
Speaker
And, you know, I always just liked having that independence and having, you know, to be able to you know, take care of myself and and be ah have some responsibility. because I kind of went through my high school years. I think the first real entrepreneurial um activity, if you if you want to call it that, what we would, we had some, ah there was a friend of ours whose parents used to travel quite a bit and he had some older siblings and we would would pay them to go to the store and get us a keg of beer.
00:03:54
Speaker
And then we would throw a party and charge all of our friends to come and, you know, it was are our our own little thing, which I'm sure lots of people did back then. But again, we it was it was an entrepreneurial kind of thing where we were just, ah you know, and we would do that, you know, several times a year and it was a lot of fun. and and I think that that was really the, you know,
00:04:14
Speaker
the The thing that um sort of started me off on that journey was kind of, you know, hey, this is great. you We're making some money. People are liking us and they're paying attention. And we've got, you know, a good thing here. And then ever since then, it's always, you know, it's always been my um my desire to sort of be self-sufficient and be able to sort of ah take care of myself and family and friends and things like that.
00:04:38
Speaker
So we'll try and unpack a lot of the things you said.
Navy Influence on Leadership Skills
00:04:41
Speaker
in your introduction as we converse. By reading about you, I realized that you're a Navy veteran and you've also attended the Harvard Business School. So looking at serving in the Navy, attending business school, how do you think that your time in the Navy, how do you think has influenced your leadership and your business decisions?
00:05:02
Speaker
Yeah, that's a great question because those two things really do, obviously, they're very different. But, you know, when you're, i think being in the military and particularly in the Navy and and yeah and what we did was there's there's a whole host of things. mean, one is you realize very, very quickly that you are part of a much bigger thing, right? You're part of a bigger team. You're part of a bigger team.
00:05:27
Speaker
You know, you know, everything from whether you're on the ship, your ship is part of a battle group, your battle group is part of ah a larger thing. You know, so you get a sense of like, OK, you know, there you have to learn how to work with a team. You have to be able to follow directions and you have to be very disciplined. One of the things that continues to, you know, that I continue to kind of carry on through this day is, you know, we were ah in the Navy every there's nothing left to chance in the military. Right. So everything's got a checklist. Everything's got a script.
00:05:54
Speaker
Everything's got a way that that things are supposed to be done. And if you don't do them, there are really bad consequences, right? So, you know, if you if you screw something up in business, you could lose some money, you know, maybe that.
00:06:05
Speaker
But if you screw something up in, you know, in the military, and I did serve during Desert Storm, you know, people will die, people will get hurt, you know, things, your your mission won't won't get done. So it teaches you a lot about discipline. It teaches you a lot about leadership, you know, in terms of how to lead, what a good leader looks like, you know,
00:06:23
Speaker
again, being part of a team, being part of this much, much bigger thing. And when you're young and and starting out in in the world, you think you know everything. You think you've got all the answers. You think it's you against the world. And very quickly, the military takes that away from you and says, no, no, no, you are part of this. This is your job. And everybody.
00:06:43
Speaker
The other thing that's interesting about you know people have been in the military would tell you is i don't care what you accomplish before you got there everybody's exactly the same when you get to boot camp or when you get to your first ship like you're at the bottom and you got to work your way up and you work your way up by you know proving that you can actually do the work it's no there's no ability to to sort of fake it yeah when you're doing it so it taught me a lot of discipline it taught me a lot ah about um working with teams, being part of a bigger group, a bigger unit. It it teaches you to very mission oriented, right? So we've got the objective um and there's there's a little bit of um some of it doesn't translate into the real world, which is where maybe the, you know, the yeah the business school side of it is because
00:07:29
Speaker
in the real world, in the military, it's like, if somebody tells you to do it, you do it unless it was, you know, obviously illegal or whatever. And you can't take that same mindset into the business world because people, you know, can't just order people around and, you know, and tell them what to do.
Military vs. Business Leadership
00:07:45
Speaker
So you've got to kind of learn the balance of that. But even the best leaders in the military, they don't, ah you know, of course, if they have to give you a direct order and do it, they will, you know, the the great leaders that, you know, that I've been around will, you know,
00:07:58
Speaker
They lead from behind. They make sure that you have what you need and you understand it And sometimes you just have to do what they say because there's there's just a bigger mission there. Going to business school was a very different experience, obviously, where now that is it's it's a world where you're you're You're taking some of that those say that same discipline, but now you're applying it to um really problem solving. i would I would say the biggest thing that you get out of a business school, and I think the biggest thing that entrepreneurs do is solve problems, right? ah
00:08:31
Speaker
But a big, one of the things that you really, yeah they they they try to teach you when you're going through that is you have to to solve problems. You have to solve the right problem.
00:08:43
Speaker
So you have to be able to unpack, okay, what's going on inside this business? Why isn't it performing or why is it performing? And really get down to the root of what's going on.
00:08:54
Speaker
And I think those two things, you know, having that military background and being part of a team and then learning how to sort of think strategically and think critically and really ask that next question, ask that next question to get to the root of what the the problem you're trying to solve or or what's occurring in the business. I think those two things, you know, kind of come together, you know, really nicely.
00:09:16
Speaker
All right.
CIC Ventures' Post-Crisis Evolution
00:09:17
Speaker
So you currently run CIC Ventures. Can you tell us a bit about your company, exactly what you do? Yes. CIS was created in, it was actually, i founded at the um in 2009, right after the the great financial crisis here in the U.S. s and we had ah I had a business at that time that was a specialty finance company, um and we were doing a lot of business with Wall Street banks and insurance companies and hedge funds and, you know, that whole world. And obviously in 2009, the economy blew up and, you know, we had to kind of rethink, you know, what we were going to do post the the crash. And one of the things that the initial reason that we set up CIS was to
00:10:01
Speaker
try to find distressed assets, try and find things that had real you know had good value, had good fundamentals, but were just getting um because of the market. In general, people needed liquidity, they wanted to sell. And that was the initial motivation for creating CIS.
00:10:19
Speaker
Over time, we shifted. Obviously, I think we made two big pivots over the Last, ah you know, called 16 years. The first was to not try to buy these, you know, distressed slash toxic toxic assets. And we just, we we had, it was a good theory. And this is one of those things that you sort of learn as an entrepreneur.
00:10:38
Speaker
It was good in theory. It was very difficult in practice to get done. and certainly it was going to take a lot more capital than we had access to. So we pivoted away from that to looking at funding businesses coming out of that crisis. Like they're going to still be very good businesses that that will emerge from this situation. How can we take advantage of that? How can we start, you know, investing um in earlier stage businesses? And I had had the benefit prior to that business, which was the specialty lender of having sold
00:11:10
Speaker
my previous company. So I kind of understood what the landscape looked like, how hard it is to raise his capital, especially in very turbulent times. And so initially we started, uh, as a, it's why it's called CIS ventures and, you know, in investing small amounts in a lot of, um, emerging at that time. so remember what we're talking about is like 2010, 2011, um,
00:11:34
Speaker
um E-commerce was a brand new thing, right? Like people buying online and, you know, moving. It's not what it's like today. And, you know, nobody really knew. If you think back, you know, today it's, it's, you know, my, my, the 24 year old daughter and, you know, she doesn't remember a time where you couldn't go online and buy something.
00:11:54
Speaker
But back then people were worried, well, Are people really going to put their credit card into a website? Are they going to trust that they're going to get their product? You know, how does this work if it doesn't fit? Like all of those things are still very unknown, but it, but, you know, we saw a lot of interesting trends and and things going on. So we started out in the venture space and what happened during that period of time and, and,
00:12:16
Speaker
when we started working with these companies is we realized that we were, know, the capital that we were providing, the money, was valuable, obviously, but there is there was money out there where we were really adding a lot of value and a lot reason that we were getting, the opportunities we were getting was because we knew how to work with the entrepreneurs. We knew how to coach them. We knew how to help them with strategy. We knew how to help them with their investors. We knew how to help them, you know, build teams and and and grow businesses. So over, you know,
00:12:45
Speaker
Over time, I think that's so the second big shift. And a lot of what CIS does today is, yes, we still do some investing and and in different stages, but a lot of that work is helping entrepreneurs and or it doesn't matter what stage they're at to to you know to grow their businesses, to help them.
00:13:05
Speaker
ah what we where What I like to say is we we tend to shine and where businesses are in quote transition, right? So they're either growing very quickly and they're, you know, you know, the wheels are starting to fall off or things are starting to break or, you know, they've been growing for a while and all of a sudden that growth stops and it starts to decelerate.
00:13:26
Speaker
ah Maybe they're looking to sell their company. I know we we'll talk about this little bit or buy another business. So like any of these big inflection points for the business is all stuff that we've been through directly. Right. So we understand it. It's not like theoretical. We've bought businesses, sold businesses, invest in businesses, you know.
00:13:44
Speaker
merge businesses together. And so because of that hands-on experience, we can really get in and and sort of, you know, become part of that team for these entrepreneurs who are looking to take their company to the next level. And and sometimes that just might mean exiting completely and they're just ready to, you know.
00:14:02
Speaker
Okay. So in your submission, you've touched on a couple of concepts that I still want us to unpack. So you've talked about mergers, you've talked about acquisitions,
00:14:13
Speaker
You've talked about corporate buyouts and a number of things you do in your company. Can you explain these three concepts and how different they are? Mergers, acquisitions, corporate
Understanding Corporate Transactions
00:14:25
Speaker
buyouts.
00:14:25
Speaker
Can you really explain these concepts? Yeah, sure. um A merger is just that you have a company or there are there are more than one company out there and you're putting them together into one bigger platform. So, you know, Kofi owns the ah the bank down the street and he wants to grow. And there's another bank, you know, who's a competitor and he goes out and buys that bank and merges it, creates one bank out of the two.
00:14:49
Speaker
um And it could be, you know, then you create, you know, you buy another and you create one bank out of the three, it one bank out of the four. So in a merger, you're taking an existing business and folding it into or or integrating it into an existing business, right? mer You're putting them together for, and we could talk about the reasons that you would do that, but that's that's a merger. And in acquisition, it's just that you're buying a business, right? You're you're going out and you're saying, hey,
00:15:14
Speaker
I don't have a business, but I really like the plumbing sector. I'm going to go buy it rather than start one from scratch and try and build it. There's one out there already. I'm going to go out and buy that business or acquire, you know, that from them instead of starting from the, from ground zero.
00:15:30
Speaker
And a corporate buyout is little you know it's a little bit more complicated, but it's sort of a company has lots of different divisions and maybe they have a bunch of different products and one of them they decide is not interesting to them anymore. It's not core to what they do.
00:15:45
Speaker
you know Maybe you're a manufacturing business and for some reason you started selling services. And now you decide, you know what, those services are nice, but they're not core to what we do.
00:15:56
Speaker
We want to just go back to our manufacturing roots. So we're not going to sell the whole business. We're not going to sell, ah we're not going to merge with somebody else. We're just going to carve out this piece of it and sell that off to somebody else. So we're, we're, we're kind of, what they, they can be called corporate buyouts or corporate carve outs, but you're taking like a division or a product line or some service line that's in an existing business and kind of separating it from the business and creating a new company just with that one business.
00:16:23
Speaker
Well, thank you for bringing that clarity, for explaining these three major concepts. But I still would like us to spend some time on these concepts and what do you do in your business.
Considerations for Business Acquisitions
00:16:35
Speaker
So what indeed are the key factors that one should consider before acquiring or merging with a company? Sure. I mean, that's that's a big topic. Let's talk about but acquiring first because The merger is is is quite different. So when you're acquiring a business, again, you have to understand what am I buying, right? And, you know, it all depends on the industry that they're in ah the markets that they serve, all of, know, there's a lot of factors that go into it. But first and foremost is, well, i I guess you have to really start with why am I buying this business, right? Why am I buying a business? And so let's go back to our plumbing. Now, you love plumbing and it's something that you you're passionate about. You think you can do a really good job, but you don't want to start from scratch.
00:17:16
Speaker
ah You don't want to start from zero and build up a customer base and learn all the skills and do all that stuff. But there's a business out there that you think is, you know, is going to help you to accelerate.
00:17:27
Speaker
That's why you would pay for it. Accelerate your, you know, getting into that business. ah You find a local plumbing company and And you decide to to make an offer and say, I'd like to buy your business. And that's great. a You know, and you you talk about the price and we can talk about how you value these things. But you say, OK, we come up with a price. I'm going to pay you a million dollars for your business.
00:17:47
Speaker
the The most important thing there is um to understand what am I buying? Right. Am I buying something? tools? Am I buying parts? am I buying inventory? Am I buying a customer list?
00:18:00
Speaker
Am I buying the brand and the goodwill? Like, what is it that I'm actually getting when I buy this business, right? And you want to make sure that you're, you know, after you write that million dollar check and you now own the business, that you actually got what you thought you were getting, right? So that's where the the diligence process comes into play. And, you let's say that you're buying it because he's the, you know,
00:18:24
Speaker
the local plumbing shop. He's been around for a long time. He's got a lot of brand value or goodwill built up in the community and a big customer list. And if that's really what you're after, because you think, hey, I can do a better job as a plumber. What I need is just, you know, the the brand and the goodwill to sort of, you know, get started.
00:18:42
Speaker
You're going to want to concentrate on talking to the customers and understanding, you know, ah perspective and how they advertise, how they attract people. So you really want to make sure that you consider why am I buying a business rather than starting one, right? Because that's really the decision you have to make. Do i start from zero and build it myself from a clean slate? And I don't, you know, it's all me from the beginning.
00:19:06
Speaker
Or do I want to buy something that's already existing and established? and And will that help me to grow faster than if I just start from my own? So I think that's the biggest thing to consider is one, why am I buying versus starting?
00:19:19
Speaker
And two, once you decide, okay, buying is the right way to go, you need to make sure that you need to be clear on what you're buying. um and and And then your diligence will be all around that.
00:19:31
Speaker
When you're doing a merger, so there's a lot more complexity to it. There's complexity to the first, so get me wrong, but now you have an existing business, right?
00:19:42
Speaker
So Kofi's got, you know, it's doing great and you want to grow faster. So you go out and you make an offer to buy your competitor's bank. Well, now once you buy that bank, you've got to put these two things together, right?
00:19:56
Speaker
Well, that bank has their culture. It has their way of doing things. It has their systems. It has their customers. It has all their processes in place. And you have yours. And now you've got to put these together so that they work synergistically and that, you know, it it looks like and feels like one big bank at the end.
00:20:15
Speaker
And that's a lot more complicated. and And don't forget, while you're doing that, you still have your core business, your your original bank that has to continue to run and grow and do all of all the things that it would do without the merger.
00:20:28
Speaker
So mergers look nice and they sound sexy and people want to do it. ah But there's a lot of data, some of it that you know that we've produced and some of it that has just been out in the market by other people, that most mergers don't.
00:20:43
Speaker
do not deliver the value that everybody expects. It's it's about 60 to 70% of them fail to deliver the value that was anticipated at the time of close. And having seen multiple mergers, and and we could talk about, know, what makes it successful and what where it does work, but the people don't anticipate and don't appreciate how how hard that is to do. I mean, just think about it, right, Yofi? I don't know if you're, you know, married, you family, but, you know,
00:21:09
Speaker
Imagine that you have your own apartment and you're living on your own and you're doing your own things and everything's fine. And then next thing you know, your girlfriend moves in. Well, wait, you know, now everything's changed. right The way you do the dishes isn't the way she does the dishes. The way you do your laundry isn't the way, you know, and now you guys, you know, that's just one person being brought into your life, right?
00:21:28
Speaker
Now imagine doing that with 300 employees, you know, coming in and, and, you know, having to manage that and put it all together. And everybody focuses on the financial side of the transaction, the terms, the price, the all that.
00:21:41
Speaker
And very few people pay attention to all this other qualitative stuff, you know, the the people, the processes, the systems. um And there's a ah long ago, years ago, when we first started CIS in New York, we had a lawyer who was working with us and he He was in charge of doing all of the documentation for the investments that we were doing.
00:22:03
Speaker
And he made this comment one day, which has just stuck with me forever because it was just so it was just such a great snapshot in terms of how people think about you know these things when all you're doing is looking at spreadsheets and legal documents.
00:22:16
Speaker
um And he said, man, this would be a really great business if it wasn't for all these people. And like, well, the people are the business, man. That's what you're getting. So you have to can't forget that you're not acquiring this sort of nebulous thing. and It's people.
00:22:30
Speaker
And you have to be able to, you know if the people aren't happy, if the people don't, you know, kind of buy into what you're doing and believe in the vision and the goals and the culture and everything else, a lot of the money that you just spent buying that business is going to walk out the door and never come back.
00:22:45
Speaker
So mergers are a lot more complicated just by but then by their nature of, you know, having these existing enterprises, these things that are already running and having to put them together. Right. So imagine, you know, you're building a bicycle.
00:23:00
Speaker
Well, if you're just sitting in your garage and you're putting the bike together and it's fine. But imagine now you're having to build that bike while you're riding another bike. it makes it a lot more complicated to do. And maybe you just need to slow down and, you know, stop the bike and build, you know, the new one. But, you know you're, you have to be conscious when you're doing a merger, how difficult it's going to be um and be prepared for it. And we can talk about some of the things that will help you, you know, be one of those 30 to 40% that actually succeeds. um And there are some sort of key things that, that will,
00:23:35
Speaker
will will put you more on that side of being successful. ah But what happens in reality is you know, um a lot of those things just get pushed to the side as all that soft, mushy stuff. We don't need to worry about that. Okay.
00:23:49
Speaker
So I still want us to spend some time um ah on this subject matter. Mm-hmm. um So you've been at this for quite some time.
Avoiding Acquisition Preparation Mistakes
00:23:58
Speaker
So in your experience, what indeed are some of the common mistakes, common mistakes that entrepreneurs usually make when they are preparing their businesses for acquisition?
00:24:06
Speaker
ah Yeah, yeah. So when they're think when when they're thinking about selling their business, so they're saying, hey, i'm goingnna um' you know it's time for me to you know ah sell the business. There's a few big ones. mean, really, again, it depends on on the industry and the size. So there's some nuance to it. But one of the big things that I think entrepreneurs don't do enough of when they sell their, when when they think about selling their businesses is, is a question that we always ask is, can the business run just like it is today without you? Or are you the business, right? So if everybody's got to come and check with Kofi before they do something, or, you know,
00:24:42
Speaker
No strategy gets done unless Kofi says so or nothing. happens like And there's a lot of businesses that way because entrepreneurs are, know, they're controlling, they have visions, they yeah want things done a certain way, which probably got them to where they are.
00:24:55
Speaker
But at a certain point, if you're turning that business over to somebody else, they need to know that that business will run just as smoothly, if not better. without you there. And a lot of of the entrepreneurs and and management teams that we work with who are thinking about selling don't appreciate that. So one of the big mistakes is is not documenting processes, is not giving responsibility to other people in the organization to do things without having to check with you. that That's a very, very big one and one that most entrepreneurs get wrong, right? So they just think, you know, ah you know it's worked so far, but remember, you're not going to be there anymore. and Or the idea is at a certain point in time, you're selling the business and somebody else is going to be taking over.
00:25:41
Speaker
Maybe you stay for a little while for the transition. But they need to know that that business will run without you. And again, depending on how complex the business is, most of those processes aren't documented. Most of those SOPs, the standard operating procedures or whatever, don't exist.
00:25:56
Speaker
And so if you can hand a buyer you know ah a document, a website, whatever, But something that's written down that says, ah this is how this is done. This is how this is done. Anybody can come in here, pick this thing up, you know, and and continue on. Because the idea is when you sell your business, you're selling it for, you know, the the term is a multiple, right? So it's like if you're doing a million dollars a year of profit of EBITDA at the end of the day,
00:26:23
Speaker
you're going to get some multiple of that, three or four or five or six times that amount. And the reason that that company is going to pay you pay for that is because they what they think what they're paying for is that amount of revenue or earnings and then what they can build on top of it.
00:26:40
Speaker
So the last thing that they want to have happen is that revenue and that EBITDA they built to start going away once you leave, right? So now they paid for something and it doesn't materialize. So making sure that your business is functional without you is probably the biggest yeah thing that you want to make sure.
00:27:00
Speaker
It's the biggest mistake people make when they are going to market. and Okay. Beyond that, I think the other thing is, is just the presentation of the business is very, very important. If you're, know, I could, I'm just thinking about the last business that we bought about a year ago, they, the, the way that they ran their financial um reporting was fine for them because they didn't share it with anyone. It was just for the, you know, the ownership and the management team to look at.
00:27:26
Speaker
And it was great. But it took a long time to get that into ah format that would be understandable by an investor. And so because of that, they're the more neatly packaged up the businesses, the easier so it is to understand by the investor.
00:27:42
Speaker
um You know, you don't want to be handing them reams of paper and, you know, like all all kinds of things. So getting your house in order and fixing some of the the easy things to fix. um I always use the analogy of ah of a house like before you sell your house,
00:27:56
Speaker
you know, just throw a color paint on the walls and make sure it looks nice and make sure that, you know, it presents well. And, you know, you've got all your user manuals and all, like all of those things just make it a much better presentation. So the company that's buying is like, this is great.
00:28:11
Speaker
Everything's in order. We don't have to sit here and fix your accounting system, you know, for six months after we buy it. That's one less thing that we have to worry about. Great. So the better that the company is, you know, presented and and runs and runs without you,
00:28:25
Speaker
the easier it is for that investor to make the decision to buy it and the more they're going to pay you for it at the end of the day, which is really what what you care about as the seller. Okay. So, Robert, you very passionate about mentoring the next generation of entrepreneurs.
00:28:41
Speaker
What are some of the key lessons you try to instill in those
Misconceptions About Entrepreneurship
00:28:44
Speaker
you meant? So but let's start at the very beginning. um Everybody, not everybody, people have a glamorized version of what an entrepreneur is in their heads, right? They think it's, you know,
00:28:56
Speaker
parties and private jets and Lamborghinis and, you know, all these things. And they they think, well, this is great. I'm going to run. I'm going to start my own company. So I work for myself. Right. And I'm going all this freedom and all this time. It's going to great. I can do whatever I want. And, you know, that's just not the reality. Right. The reality is pretty much the opposite. Right. So when I've worked with young entrepreneurs, like, you know,
00:29:18
Speaker
people who are still in university and thinking about going but down the entrepreneurial path or or people who have started a business or thinking about it, you know, the first thing I want to make sure is like what I say to them is you better love what you're doing.
00:29:30
Speaker
Like you better love the problem you're solving or the product that you're putting out or the service that you're providing because it's going to suck. I mean, there's no other way to say it. Like it is like the first few years, it is going to be hard.
00:29:44
Speaker
You're going to get no from a lot of people. You're going to get you know, employees that don't show up and ah accounts that cancel on you and contracts that get rescinded and you're going to run out of money. Like there's all these things and you're going to work more and harder than you ever have in your life, right?
00:30:00
Speaker
If you're going to be successful. And if you think that you're doing this because you're going to have a bunch of freedom and free time and, you know, Um, and it, you know, you need to check that maybe, you know, maybe you're better And if that doesn't, if that's not comfortable for you, maybe you're better off just going to work somewhere else. I had a, um, a good friend of mine. She decided to leave her corporate job and, and be entrepreneurial because she's, you know, she was not very happy there.
00:30:27
Speaker
And she thought that being an entrepreneur and being her own boss and, calling her own shots was going to be, you know, it was going to make her happy. And she worked really, really hard. She raised some money and she, you know, she, she, she got to a certain point.
00:30:41
Speaker
Um, and then she just burned out on it and sold it and sold it, you know, pretty early. um and you know, didn't, she didn't do terribly, but she didn't make hundreds of millions. I'm not, not enough to retire for sure. And i remember meeting with her about six or seven months after that, she took some time off and,
00:31:00
Speaker
we sat down and she's like, look, I'm really struggling with what I should do next. And I was like, okay, you know, I thought maybe she had an idea for business. And her real um concern was, she's like, I don't think I want to start in business. I don't think that's for me.
00:31:14
Speaker
I've done it. I just, you know, what I really, like I have figured out of the last, you know, during this time off is I just really like sales. I just like selling, now like going out meeting people, making sales, you know, doing my job. And then, you know, at the end of the day, you know, clocking out and going out with my friends and doing my thing. And, and I was like, well, well, what's wrong with that? And she's like, well, you know i was an entrepreneur and I started and sold a business and now everybody expects like that to my path. And I'm like, look, that's not, you one, you tried it and you didn't like it so clearly.
00:31:44
Speaker
And two, you know, you're just trying now to live up to somebody else's expectations. If you just want to be a great salesperson, mean, that's awesome. Like just go out and be the best salesperson you can be. And,
00:31:55
Speaker
you know, do that. And, you know, you don't have to answer to anybody but yourself. And she now is a very, very, very successful salesperson for a technology business and she loves it. And it's, you know, it's just taken so much pressure off of her and she doesn't have to worry about all those things that that entrepreneurs have to worry about. So I think that if If I'm mentoring young entrepreneurs, you know, it's really like, why, what do you think you're getting here?
00:32:23
Speaker
And just making sure they understand the reality of it. And if they're passionate about it and they really want to know, great. I mean, that' that's awesome. But just know what you're stepping into before you step into it. We didn't talk too much about this.
00:32:37
Speaker
and at the beginning, but, you know, call myself the an accidental entrepreneur. I never really had, yeah know, we talked about some of those early entrepreneurial things and all, you know, in my, um you know, in my youth. But, yeah when I got out of school, I went to be an equity analyst for a large insurance company, managing, know, assets for them. You know, that was, you know, that's what I just thought you did. you know, entrepreneur didn't really, like building a business never really crossed my mind. But once I got into that role and I was lucky enough to to really have a good mentor there and and work on some very interesting projects, um it did resonate with me as like, man, I really want, like there was a problem that I saw in the financial market yeah that nobody was addressing. And it just kept bugging me and bugging me and bugging me. And finally, it was just like, you know, I'm going to see if I can't, you know, fix this problem. and
00:33:28
Speaker
a very high, a person, very high high, level in the finance department of a, of a company near us. And I were talking and he said, look, we had this problem. And it was the exact same thing that I had been, you know, thinking about.
00:33:40
Speaker
And, you know, I just said, look, I'd love to try and, you know, fix that for you. And he said, great, give me a proposal. And, you know, and I did and he hired me um and then I had to go build a team and get an office and stuff. And so it was like by accident, like I had no idea what I was stepping into. And I think at one level that was good because i think if I knew what I was getting myself into, I might not have done it.
00:34:02
Speaker
But it was really driven by this desire to solve this problem and fix, you know, this thing that nobody else was, you know, at least that I could find was doing at the time. So there was like a real drive behind it and it didn't feel like, you know, i was building a business. But as we got to the end of that project with this one, remember, we had one customer.
00:34:23
Speaker
um which I would tell any business now, don't ever do that. But as we got to the end of that project, we were like, oh no, like we need another customer, right? we we We didn't think about sales and marketing and all that stuff. We just like, we have this project, let's go work on it. But by the end, but when that project was winding up, you know, we had six or seven employees, we rented an office space, we had like rent to pay and payroll to pay and, you know, all this stuff. And we're like, wait what are we going to do now? And we had to start thinking about, you know, building up, you know, an actual pipeline of of new business coming in.
00:34:54
Speaker
um I think that that's very, that is kind of the the the right, I would say that's the right motivation to start a company. It's like, there's a problem that you see or a product that you want.
00:35:06
Speaker
How many, I see like, how many times, like, have you interviewed entrepreneurs, you talked to entrepreneurs, And basically the thing that is their business is something that they wanted. Like I wanted this product. I couldn't find it anywhere. i created it. And then, you know, I figured, well, if I want it other people might want it too. Right. So you're really feeling, you know, some,
00:35:27
Speaker
some need that you have or some hole that you have or some problem that you see that just keeps nagging at you, nagging you, that's when you know that you're really on to something and then you can build. If you're just doing it for the parties and the girls and the planes and the, you know, the Lamborghinis, like, you know, you're not going to have a good time of it at all.
00:35:45
Speaker
Robbets. Let's spend some time talking about leadership and the role of leadership in managing and running a successful business.
Core Leadership Principles
00:35:53
Speaker
So in your case, what leadership principles have really guided you in building and managing your business?
00:35:59
Speaker
I think there's a few, um you know, and and it is, there's there's a few general things and and a few things that I think really sort of underpin that. and And this is one of those things I've, you know, it's been refined over a long period of time. And, you know, like every other entrepreneur or, you know, senior manager, you know, I've i been to the workshops and the books and everything and tried to figure this out. And I've really condensed part of it down to some core principles that I try and follow. And I think that they are, they are
00:36:31
Speaker
good as a leader, but they're also good just in general. um And then there's sort of a concept underneath it that I think is, is you know, drive that that sort of drives a ah bigger vision. But to me, it's it iss really some simple things. It's first and foremost, do what you say you're going to do, right?
00:36:48
Speaker
So if you if you tell somebody you're going to do something, do it. If you can't do it, tell them well ahead of time, don't leave them hanging. So it's, you know do what you say you're going to do, show up on time. Seems like a very simple thing, but on each one of these, you know, if we boiled them down to kind of, you know, a sentence or two, but there's a lot of sort of meaning underneath them, right? So show up on time is, you know, you you want to sort of run a, you know, a productive day, but it also shows respect to other people, that you value their time, you know, that they're busy, but you know, you don't want to waste base that time and and you lead by example. So if you're late to every meeting, you've just made it okay for everybody else to be late for every meeting. And then that gets, you know, that starts to spin out of you know, and then everybody's late to everything all the time and it's chaos.
00:37:35
Speaker
You know, do what you say you're going to do. If you commit to doing something, then you need to do, you know, we just need to expect that you're going to get it done. And the same goes for the leader. And you have to lead by example. Show up on time, say please and thank you. Like, I think that's a big one. Like, you know, these are simple things that that people think there's all this wisdom around it, but it's just say please and thank you. You know, they're people, you know, you work with them, you know, you're not better than them. You you know, you don't, you know, the thing about leadership and and actually being at a higher level in the company, isn't that you have any, there are people who have worked for me and usually and um in all the business head, they're way smarter than me at what they do. They know that, you know, they know things that I'm never going to know about their their jobs. And so, you know, you have to appreciate that when you when you get,
00:38:22
Speaker
ah into those management roles or leadership positions, what you have that makes it um different is you just have a different view. You have either more information.
00:38:33
Speaker
yeah If you think about it, if you're on a mountain and you're standing at the bottom of the mountain, you can only really see this much. But as you get up higher, and you get to see a lot more. doesn't mean that you're not, you know that the people who are at the bottom of the mountain are any less valuable, like they're there, but You just have a different view.
00:38:50
Speaker
And so you just have to appreciate that, you know, say please and thank you, show up on time, do what you say you're going to do. Those kind of things, like outside of everything else, um are really kind of the core. Because if you do that, then people will have agency, they'll feel valued.
00:39:05
Speaker
um And I think that look that gets to kind of the underlying but little parable or or there's this, I don't know if you're familiar with game theory and some of the things you know around that. So you know lots of people talk about it, but there there's a concept and called the stag's hunt. have you Have you ever heard of the stag's hunt before?
00:39:26
Speaker
Okay. So the stag's hunt basically says, if we cooperate as a group, we can take down a stag and we can all have a lot of food and a good meal and stuff, you know, in reserve. And that's great.
00:39:40
Speaker
But if we don't, then we're all out there picking berries, chasing rabbits. so And yeah, maybe we'll eat, maybe we won't eat. And it's the core group. it's It's bringing those people together and saying, you know, we're going on a stag hunt.
00:39:54
Speaker
We're not out here, you know, you know, looking to, you know, pick apples or, or, you know, kill squirrels, you know, that's what the goal is. And you can't do that. Like I alone can't take down the stag.
00:40:06
Speaker
um I need other people around me to do, you know, their, their, their role in it. And if you think about that as like the, the company is just a group of people that come together for a common purpose, right? And that's what it is. So what is that common purpose?
00:40:20
Speaker
What is your role in that? And, you know, what's the stag that we're going to take down as a group, right? And the bigger the group, the bigger the stag that you can take down, you know, over time. So I think if you kind of think about, you what the business is at its core um and you treat people with respect and you show up on time and you say, please and thank you, you say you're going to do,
00:40:41
Speaker
I think those principles, if you just, you know, keep that in mind, you can do a lot, right? um There's the, you the saying is, you know people underestimate what they can do in a month and underestimate what they can do in a year, right? So you've got to keep the the big picture sight.
00:40:58
Speaker
And that's part of the leader's job is to keep people focused on the big picture. Because on a day-to-day basis, you're going to have all kinds of setbacks and problems and issues and things that happen. And you can't let that get in the way of like, hey, we're still making progress towards the big goal. And that that's the leader's job is to make sure that everybody knows where we're going and everybody understands their role in how to get there and that you keep everybody on track and motivated towards that by doing those, you know, those core basic things.
00:41:29
Speaker
so so So just as you're aware, entrepreneurship, running your business is not a walk in the park.
Decision-Making in Uncertainty
00:41:35
Speaker
There are certainly ups and downs. In your case, how do you approach decision-making, especially when it's faced with uncertainty?
00:41:44
Speaker
How do you approach decision-making in situations of uncertainty. Yeah, i think you have to think about it. And really, i know everybody, you know, you'll quote certain people, but, you know, Jeff Bezos, I think, has the best construct around this, which is what kind of a decision is it?
00:41:59
Speaker
Is this a permanent decision or is this a temporary decision? Meaning once we make this decision, it's kind of the revolving door, like, can we back out of it? What's the impact going to be when, you know, when you make this decision and then you want to sort of, you want to scale your effort appropriately, right? So if this is a decision, a good way to think about it is it's like, um you know, hats, haircuts and tattoos, right? So when, when you you're buying a hat, you know, you buy the hat you put it on, like it.
00:42:28
Speaker
If, if you walk out and people laugh at you or you think it's good, you just take the hat off, right? You're out a little bit of money. It's a simple decision. Great. Okay. You know, a haircut is a little bit more permanent. You go in and say, hey, I want to, you know, shave my head. And, you know, all of a sudden you realize you don't like it.
00:42:44
Speaker
OK, you know, it's going to suck for a little while till your hair grows back and it's going to be awkward and all. But it's it's good when you get a tattoo. It's permanent, man. Like you better think really long and hard about that. So you want to make the hat decision really quick because you don't like it, you get a new hat.
00:42:59
Speaker
Take a little bit more time around the haircut decision because it's going to be a little bit longer. Don't spend days and weeks and years on it, but take a lot of time with the tattoo decision. Right. um And I think you have to also understand that you're never going to have perfect information.
00:43:17
Speaker
That's a big problem. It's a big thing for people to learn because they're always just waiting for like just one more piece of information or then one more this or one more that. And youre you just never. And one is it's just that's not possible. There is no such thing.
00:43:32
Speaker
But two, things are always changing, too. So as soon as you think you've nailed down this thing over here and then you start looking over here, well, maybe something changed over here. Now we've got to go back because you're you in everything's constantly in flux, then you're you're never going to have perfect information. So you need to know, um, you know, influences, what are the big levers and, you know, spend your time on those, you know, and don't worry too much about the, you know, about the, the things that you have no control over or, um, that, you know, are, um, you know, are going to be changing constantly. And then you're not going anything to do with it. Cause then, you know, one of the things, by the way, we go back to the military. One of the things they teach the military is,
00:44:13
Speaker
no decision is the worst decision, right? If you just sit there and never make a decision, that's the worst thing you can do. So you've got to make a decision. You're never going to have perfect information. Just try and frame it around like, is this a hat, a haircut or a tattoo? You know, and then put the right amount of effort into it.
00:44:29
Speaker
And even when you get a tattoo, it's like, you know, yeah, it's permanent, but you know, you might not like it down the road and maybe you have to modify it or change it. and You go through some pain. Even the permanent decisions. yeah like We call them permanent. Nothing's you know ever permanent, permanent, but it's just a much bigger effort.
00:44:45
Speaker
And sometimes, by the way, the other thing that people will will get caught up on is they'll tie the the size, like you know the the financial investment to that decision. Say, oh this is a $10 million dollars decision. You better be really careful about it versus this $10,000 decision, which you know don't have to worry about. But yeah that $10,000 decision could have big impacts You don't want to just say, it's a lot of money or it's a big you know investment. Just that you have to understand, like, what what does this decision impact?
00:45:14
Speaker
And you can make a small $10,000 decision that can have huge consequences for the business, but you didn't spend a lot of time on it because you didn't you just saw it's a small amount of money and we don't have to worry about it. So, yeah, I would say decision-making, you're never going to have perfect information um and try and spend the right amount of time, to understand what kind of decision you're making and then just spend the appropriate amount of time when you make it. All right. So, Robert, we are just about wrapping up.
00:45:40
Speaker
But you've been on this journey for quite some time. And I'd like us to share with us some key lessons you've picked up along this journey. Yeah. um So I think we've covered, you know, especially from an entrepreneur's perspective, um you know, some some of those core things. But in addition to, you know, making sure that, you know, entrepreneurship is right for you and and and this is what you want to do.
00:46:03
Speaker
You know, I think over time, you know, and and this is just one of those things that you have to go through and you have to just sort of have it, um is you have to be willing to make mistakes and you have to own those mistakes and learn from them. me You know, early on, you're afraid to make mistakes. You're afraid of looking foolish. You're afraid of screwing up, losing money or whatever. And I think you've got to get much more comfortable with like, hey, I'm going to make mistakes. Nobody's perfect.
00:46:30
Speaker
um ah We don't to learn from them and be humble about it. So I would say that's a big one that you have to be able to, to internalize and say, it's okay to make a mistake.
00:46:41
Speaker
Nobody's perfect. We're all going to do it. You're going to hire the wrong person. You're going to, you know, whatever, ah you know, and just be able to, but but I think the thing is, is once you realize it, just fix it quickly. Right. So we have a tendency to, to think that it'll get better or I can fix it. Like you can't like, yo, know and we've all done it. Like, you know,
00:47:02
Speaker
I give you like just a quick story. Like we hired a chief operating officer in one of our companies and on paper, she was amazing. Like just everything that you would want. And she was a disaster in the business. Like she just could not run the business, but we were just like, nah, you know,
00:47:18
Speaker
we're just going it's going to work out. We're going to, and we waited so long to make that change. And other people saw it. And they were like, when we announced that she was leaving, nobody was surprised.
00:47:29
Speaker
You know, everybody was like, yeah well, it took you so long. Right. But, but we thought we could fix it. Right. So be willing to make mistakes, own those mistakes, fix them early, move on and just let them go. Right. You know, learn from them, but don't, don't let it impact your ability to make that next decision. Because a lot of people then say, oh, I screwed up this time. I'm not going to do that again. And then they'll be very hesitant to, you know, hire that replacement or invest in that business or whatever. In addition to, you know, just making sure that entrepreneurship is right for you and you have the right expectation and mindset and everything else.
00:48:02
Speaker
I think the biggest thing is just understand that you're a human being, you're fallible, you're not perfect. Nobody's perfect. um And I think the second part of it, going back to the, you know the Staggs Hunt kind of concept is when you're in leadership and you're running the business and the people join your company, they're joining, right? They have options. They can go other places. They're spending their time with you.
00:48:26
Speaker
They want you to succeed. And I think that a lot of entrepreneurs and a lot of leaders feel like it's kind of like you're all alone and you know, you've got to do everything. And yeah these people you're just, you know, um you know, they're they're against me or whatever, and they're not.
00:48:40
Speaker
And so you withhold information or you think, I've got to keep this quiet. They want you to succeed because they want to succeed with you. And you have to let them do that. that's ah That's something you have to, you know, really be open to is letting those people help you help to like, know, you go on there and say like, Hey, we're all here on this journey together, like this, you know, and they want to help you get there. Let them. Um, and I think early days, you know, you're very controlling, you're very detourant, you're very in the weeds. You know, you think you've got to be everywhere and that that only you can do it. And the sooner you get out of that mindset and you can appreciate that, you know, everybody's here to to work together and to help, you know,
00:49:19
Speaker
who is the leader or who is the management team, the much smoother things are going to run. All right. So, Robert, before we sign off, what would be your general advice to my listeners and viewers? You know, I think, you know, make sure that you're doing what you love. um You know, there's that old saying, like, you know if you do what you love, you never work a day in your life. So um that doesn't mean they chase your passion and yeah like there's all that stuff like You know, do something that really fulfills you. Do something that you love to do.
00:49:46
Speaker
ah Be around people that you want to be ah be around. um You know, life is life is very short. Time goes very quickly. um And, you know, don't, ah you know, don't fritter it away on things that don't excite you and things that you don't want to do. Go out there and, you know, and if you're happy, you will make a big difference in the world. but So thank you so much, Robert Levin, for sharing your rich experience with us today.
00:50:10
Speaker
We wish you the very best. Thanks, Kofi. So this has been another exciting episode of the Entrepreneur Speaks podcast. I'll come your way next time with another inspiring and exciting episode.
00:50:21
Speaker
I remain your host, Kofi Animedu. As always, do take good care of yourself and let's continue to keep hope alive. Cheers. Please be sure to subscribe to the Entrepreneur Speaks podcast on all your favorite podcast channels. And if you have any questions or feedback, feel free to reach out to us on social media or in the comments section below.
00:50:48
Speaker
Dreams light up the sky tonight. Builders of tomorrow shining bright. From every land they find their beat.
00:50:58
Speaker
Yeah, it's the entrepreneur speaks.