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Bootstraps & Battle Scars : The Cost of Becoming an Entrepreneur
20 Plays8 days ago
What does it really take to survive nearly 40 years in business?
In this episode of The Entrepreneur Speaks Podcast, Chris Shurian, founder of Bootstraps & Battle Scars and creator of Founders Exchange shares real lessons from a serial entrepreneur who has built, broken, and rebuilt companies across construction, real estate, hospitality, manufacturing, retail, and foreign investment.
Chris has lived what he calls “nine business lives in one.” He’s led multi-million-dollar ventures, faced business collapse, survived cancer, completed two Ironmans, and rebuilt when everything fell apart.
If you’re an entrepreneur facing failure, burnout, or doubt, this episode will show you:
✔️ How to rebuild after business failure
✔️ The mindset required to survive long-term entrepreneurship
✔️ What 39 years in business teaches you about resilience
✔️ Why founders must drop the armor and get real
✔️ The difference between hustle culture and true endurance
✔️ Practical lessons from wins, losses, and comebacks
Whether you’re a startup founder, small business owner, or seasoned entrepreneur, these battle-tested insights will help you navigate uncertainty and build something that lasts.
This conversation is about resilience in business, founder mindset, reinvention, and the courage to start over.
To host amazing guests on your podcast, join PodMatch here https://www.joinpodmatch.com/kofiasare
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Transcript
00:00:07
Speaker
Dreams light up the sky tonight Builders of tomorrow shining bright From every land they find their beat Yeah, it's the entrepreneur speaks
00:00:25
Speaker
Keep learning. Keep learning. Read books. Talk to mentors. Listen to podcasts. Do research. Keep learning. You can you can learn everything.
00:00:39
Speaker
on the internet today these days you can find books you can find information just keep learning if you're stuck learn go read a book if you need help figuring out a problem go search it I I mean so I think that The focus is keep learning, keep learning, keep learning. you can No matter what problem you have, somebody else has had that problem, and you'll be able to figure out how to get through it if you just keep learning. If you think you're really good, well, keep learning and get better.
00:01:08
Speaker
And then when you think you're really good, keep learning and get better. So there's always something to learn. There's always a place to learn it. So keep learning. Learn, things run high. This is the Entrepreneur's Beat.
00:01:22
Speaker
Hello and welcome to another exciting episode of the Entrepreneur's Beat Podcast.
Introduction to the Podcast
00:01:27
Speaker
I'm your host, Kofi Anymedu.
Meet Chris Shurian
00:01:30
Speaker
Today on the Entrepreneur's Beat Podcast, we are diving into the real stories behind entrepreneurship, the winters,
00:01:37
Speaker
the wreckage and the wisdom you only end the hard way my guest is chris shurian founder of bootstraps and battle scars and creator of founders exchange chris has lived what he calls nine business lives in one building breaking and rebuilding companies across industries for nearly four decades he has survived cancer finished two Ironmans, led multi-million dollar ventures, and now coaches entrepreneurs who are done pretending and ready to get real.
Beginning of Chris's Entrepreneurial Journey
00:02:11
Speaker
If you love honest conversations, hard-earned lessons, and stories that actually teach you something you can use, this episode is for you. Chris, welcome to my show. Kofi, thanks for having me. I appreciate it. This is going to be fun.
00:02:27
Speaker
It's going to be fun. So you often say your life is like a movie, full of reinvention, great wins and wipeouts. When you look back now, what moment do you see as the true beginning of your entrepreneurial journey?
00:02:40
Speaker
Man, that's a good question, Kofi. You know, I started this entrepreneur journey when I was, you know, early <unk>s you know, but about 40 years
A Turning Point: Back Injury
00:02:49
Speaker
ago. And um and there was lots of there was lots of moments that I experienced along the way that helped me and pushed me towards being a more successful entrepreneur.
00:03:00
Speaker
Like, for example, I remember the very first book I read about being a business owner. It was kind of a it was a how-to book on how to be successful. And it was called The E-Myth. by Michael Gerber. It was written back in 1986 or 1987. And I remember reading that book and that that was very inspiring because it taught me some some very true principles that I needed to learn in order to be successful in business. But I also remember, you know, when I first started my own business, the business was just me. It was just me doing all the work.
00:03:31
Speaker
And I had a couple employees that were working for me, but but we did everything together. And I had a back injury. And this is probably 30, 30, 33 years ago, and I had a serious back injury and it forced me to stay in bed. I couldn't get out of bed. i I couldn't go to work. I couldn't go to a job. I couldn't see what was going on. And so at that point, I had to rely on the people that worked for me because I needed them to step up and and take charge. And even though I was a control freak and I thought that I had to have control over everything and I thought that I had to be at every job And every project, when I got hurt, I couldn't go.
00:04:13
Speaker
And it forced me to rely more on other people. And what I learned from that at that moment was that typically the other people working for me were actually better at doing the work that I was. And by letting go and letting them and just go do the work, we got more work done. And then from that point on my business grew because then when I was back to where I was healthy, I didn't have time go work on the project. All I had time was to go find more customers. Well, I knew I had guys that worked for me that could do the work. And so that was a huge moment in my entrepreneurial journey was to let go, let the people do the work that know how to do the work and then support them the best I could. And then out that that was a huge turning point in
Diverse Industry Ventures
00:04:58
Speaker
my career. Okay. So you often say you've lived nine business lives in one.
00:05:03
Speaker
What exactly do you mean by this? Yeah. well so i've been involved in many different industries and because i'm a true entrepreneur i have this habit of you build one thing and then you see something else and you go ah to chase that other thing it's like the shiny object syndrome right and so i have been involved in several different industries um And it's not always like when I started off, my business was related around construction.
00:05:29
Speaker
And so then I started another company that built custom cabinets and custom furniture. Well, it was related to construction. Then I started another company that was an electrical contractor who did all the electrical work in our jobs. So I just started doing different things. And then I started working outside. of i started developing land.
00:05:47
Speaker
And I started a a hotel and I started a restaurant. And so I started doing all these different things in all these different industries. And I had, you know, I had different levels of success. I had some failures and and and some of the failures were hard.
00:06:01
Speaker
Like I had some pretty bad failures. But every time I had a failure, I'd pick myself back up and I'd keep going and I'd keep going and I'd keep
Essential Entrepreneurial Skills
00:06:10
Speaker
going. And so so nine lives means, you know, a lot of different businesses, several different industries, having some failures, having some successes, but always pushing forward and always working to be successful. Okay. So we'll still spend some time talking about some of these failures as well as the lessons you've picked up. But building on your response, having worked across industries, what skills have you transferred across these industries over the period of time? Yeah.
00:06:38
Speaker
So I'll have to say that I learned a lot about leadership. I learned a lot about how to lead people. and And that is a skill set that I'm still learning about. I've learned a lot over the years and I'm still learning. And I still know I can be a better leader.
00:06:53
Speaker
But being a good leader is something that transfers to every different industry that you can work in, because if you're going to have people working with you, working underneath you, working beside you, you have to be a great leader to to to build sustainable growth and success. And so one of the best skills I can think of was one, being a great leader, because that works no matter what business you're in no matter what industry you're you have to be a great leader. Another skill that transfers over, of course, is being a visionary. You know, entrepreneurs are people that see opportunity where other people may not see it. And so, for example, because I saw that I could be a construction and and start a construction business and I could do it differently and do it what I thought was better than the competition, that was vision. And then when I say, let's open a restaurant,
00:07:45
Speaker
Well, I wanted the restaurant to be different. I wanted to be better. i wanted to be different than all the other restaurants. And so that was my vision saying, let's go do that and do it differently. So I think having a good vision, having the ability to see how to do things different so you can set yourself apart from your competition, I think that's an important skill set as well. And then, you know, then there's all the other things like you have to know how to you know, run a business financially. You have to know how to pay attention to the books, to the financials to make sure you're being successful or not. ah You have to be good at taking care of your customers. I mean, all those skill sets, I think they're all core skills that you need to apply to whatever business for that business be successful.
Evolving Definition of Success
00:08:25
Speaker
So Chris, after nearly 40 years in business, how do you personally define success today as compared to earlier on your career? Yeah.
00:08:33
Speaker
You know, I think a lot of young people like myself are motivated by money, motivated by having things, having houses, having cars, having toys. And that's and that's good. It's important to have those things, but it's very important to focus on your family, focus on your personal life and and create balance.
00:08:55
Speaker
And so now, as I've, you know, 40 years later, i still want to have I still want to have money. I still want to have the things that money buys. I still want to have, you know, house and cars and I want to enjoy vacations.
00:09:09
Speaker
But also I want to make sure that my family is a priority. I to make sure I have a good relationship with my wife. I want a good relationship with my kids. I want to make sure that's, and that's, that's probably a little more important to me nowadays.
00:09:23
Speaker
And I think young people get, them get lost in focusing on the financial side of owning a business and they sacrifice their relationships with their families so they can invest in business. and And I've learned over the years, you can't do that. You have to you have to have balance.
00:09:41
Speaker
You have to do have to make sure your life is balanced so you don't get burned out. Or, you know, how many times we've heard about people that were so focused on their work that they lost their family because they weren't paying attention to their family. So I think now at a more experienced age, I have a ah little different look, ah live a little different a little different perspective on what it means to be successful.
00:10:03
Speaker
So in my mind, success is having a good family, having a good relationship with my kids, be able to support my family. You know, I don't need to live in the biggest house on the street. I used to be in the biggest house on the street. Now that's not important to me.
00:10:16
Speaker
I'm okay living in a nice, comfortable home that is more affordable that i I don't have to stress out about paying for. So the way I see things in life now are way different than how I saw them when I was younger and way different than how other people that I've watched, young entrepreneurs, I see, I see how they are.
00:10:34
Speaker
And so I help them understand that. I help them see that so they can not make the same mistakes that that I made or a lot of other young entrepreneurs have made. so So Chris, tell me, so why do you believe failure should be shared more openly, especially with Founder just
Learning from Failures
00:10:49
Speaker
starting out? Yeah, so I think that every failure has a lesson to be learned. And I think it's important that by by having experienced different failures, I look at that and say, okay, what lesson did I learn?
00:11:02
Speaker
And if I can share my experiences with others, I can share the good and I can share the bad because I think there's lessons to be learned in both of those. And so I think it's great when an entrepreneur or a business owner can share and and can let down their guard and say, look, I had some failure.
00:11:21
Speaker
This is why I had failure. This is the lesson I learned so I can help others learn that lesson and not make the same mistakes. So so I'm a firm believer in that. Okay. So later on in our conversation, we'll spend some time talking about some of the lessons you've picked up on this journey. You talked about failure and also losses and setbacks. But when we're rebuilding after a major failure or major loss, what should entrepreneurs focus on
Mindset and Support Systems
00:11:49
Speaker
first? Should they focus on their mindset, people, cash flow, or just on their vision? Well, obviously, i believe mindset is very important, especially when you're when you're navigating business and you're going to have failure. It's going to happen.
00:12:06
Speaker
nobody Nobody who reaches success goes straight up. you know People go up and they drop down. They go up and they drop down. So it's going to happen no matter what. So I think it's important that if you have the proper mindset and you can tell yourself that these failures, these setbacks,
00:12:22
Speaker
these hard times are temporary. If you can tell yourself that these are temporary, and if you can find the lesson, like like we talked about a minute ago, if you can find the lessons to be learned and keep pushing forward, that's how you get through the failure. That's how you get more success. And so I would say mindset is important.
00:12:44
Speaker
And you know sometimes we need to surround ourselves with other people. Sometimes we need to have people in our in our in our space who are experienced, who are more who who have a good, positive mind, who can help you and remind you what you need to do or remind you that you you still can push forward, you can still be successful.
00:13:04
Speaker
so So yeah, mindset's important and surrounding yourself with good people is ah is, in my opinion, is very, very
Symbolism of Bootstraps and Battle Scars
00:13:11
Speaker
important. Okay. So I'm always fascinated by company names and the story behind company names. And your company name is very interesting.
00:13:20
Speaker
Bootstraps and Battles Cars. What's the story behind this name and why did you go for this name? Well, okay. So Kofi, my business now is I coach entrepreneurs. I coach business owners. I coach founders. I help them work through some of the challenges that they might be experiencing in their business. And when I was thinking about my name of my business, I thought, you know, everyone knows in the business world what it means to bootstrap. Like, the but you know, you you pull yourself up by the bootstraps and you lift yourself up. And
00:13:53
Speaker
If you think about it logically, that's impossible. You can't pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. It's hard, right? that's the whole idea is we're doing hard things. When you start a business, it's hard. When you start a business and you don't have a whole bunch of investors, a whole bunch of money, and you're starting it on your own, and you're paying for growth as you go, you're paying to build your building, it's bootstrapping. It's hard. And so I think the idea of bootstrapping when it applies to business is very...
00:14:20
Speaker
ah it resonates with a lot of business owners. It resonates with a lot of founders and entrepreneurs when they hear the word bootstraps. So bootstraps just helps solidify, you know, these are the people I want to work with.
00:14:32
Speaker
I want to work with the people that are bootstrapping. I want to work with the people that are building. And and they're doing it on their own. They're doing it hard. and They're working hard and they're making it happen. And then battle scars, you know, every time you have a failure, every time you have a setback, every time you have some sort of challenge, it leaves a little bit of a battle scar.
00:14:50
Speaker
It leaves a little little a wound that is a lesson learned. It's a lesson learned. And those battle scars remind us of the lessons we've learned along the way. So when you say, when I say bootstraps and battle scars, that's exactly it. I want to work with, I want to help people who understand what it means to bootstrap.
00:15:10
Speaker
And I want to use my battle scars to help other people, right? And Now, I do work with some clients who are my age that are in business as long as I've been. And so when I say battle scars to them, they know exactly what I'm talking about and they can refer back to their battle scars and they can refer back to the lessons they've learned.
00:15:29
Speaker
So the name bootstraps and battle scars really just signifies where I'm coming from and who I want to help. And most people that are my client, when they hear the word and hear the name bootstraps and battle scars, it resonates. It absolutely resonates. So Chris, you also talk about dropping the ammo and
The Need for Vulnerable Spaces
00:15:47
Speaker
getting real. What kind of ammo do most founders wear?
00:15:50
Speaker
Yeah, well, I think Kofi, as a leader, as a founder, as a business owner, you know people look people look at us and look to us for answers. They look to us for strength. They look to us for motivation to push forward, to work hard, to be successful.
00:16:08
Speaker
And so as an owner, sometimes we have to hide our fears. Sometimes we have to put on this armor and show how tough we are. And we have to hide behind this facade because we don't want our people to see us struggling. We might be struggling. We're having a bad day. owners Owners have bad days. But sometimes we can't let our people see that because we don't want them to see our weakness because they're relying on us to show them how strong we are. so ah But I do believe that it's important for...
00:16:41
Speaker
ah a founder. He has to have a place, he has to have a safe place where he can go to remove his armor and and talk about some of the hard things that he's dealing with.
00:16:54
Speaker
He needs to have people or a person or somebody in his life that he can just share the challenges he's going through. And because a lot of owners don't have that, like a lot a lot of owners, a lot of founders have challenges in their lives that they can't share with their employees. They can't share with their partners. They can't share with their investors. They can't share with, sometimes they can't share with their their spouse. And so they need to have a place where they can let down their guard, remove the armor, and just be raw and talk through some challenges and and hopefully help figure out some of the difficulties they might be going through.
00:17:31
Speaker
And so I think that's a, it happens. um I know a lot of people, a lot of founders that that experience that. And that's why, you know, you've probably heard the statement, it's lonely at the top, right? Yeah.
00:17:42
Speaker
Well, when you're at the top of a business, it can get very lonely up there. And so it's it's important ah it's important for an owner to have you know someone to talk to or someone to share their challenges
Peer Support's Impact
00:17:55
Speaker
with. So, Chris, you spend a lot of time coaching founders. What really separates founders who stay stuck from those who truly transform? Hmm. You know, one of the things I i i do with, and as I mentioned this before, it's important for a founder to have someone he can talk to, someone that can relate to them. And so in founders exchange is it's a peer group. And in that peer group, we're all founders. We're all entrepreneurs. We're all business owners. And if somebody brings an issue, someone's stuck and they can't quite figure out how to get moving forward, or maybe they're having a mindset or their mind block.
00:18:30
Speaker
Well, they can come into a group like this and they can discuss some of the challenges they're having. And because we've all been in those situations, we all have experience, we all have very similar battle scars.
00:18:41
Speaker
We can share stories of how the times that we had when we were stuck, times when we had challenges, and we can help our friends and our fellow members of the group push forward.
00:18:52
Speaker
And so I think... ah You know, sometimes you have entrepreneurs it that that are stuck. Maybe they're having a bad day and in their business and they're having a bad time. They're they're having a failure or a setback.
00:19:03
Speaker
Well, just reminding them that we've all been through that and reminding them that, you know, if you push through, it's temporary. That helps give them a, you know, it reignites the spark. It allows them to keep going and push forward and um and have success. So once again, I think it's important that founders surround themselves with people who they can share with, who they can talk to, who they could help when somebody else is struggling.
00:19:30
Speaker
ah Because sometimes that's a good reminder when you're helping somebody else, when you're serving somebody else or helping them get through their challenges. it's very helpful to remind yourself that, hey, you know, I can keep going, i'm gonna keep pushing and I'm going have success. So I also read that you survived cancer as well as finished two iron months.
Strengthened Mindset through Adversity
00:19:51
Speaker
How did this experience change your mindset? Well, that's a good question too. You know, i um I've always had a very, I've always been very optimistic. I've always been very, a kind of person that thinks everything happens for a reason and I can overcome anything.
00:20:07
Speaker
So when I was diagnosed with cancer, um I was very fortunate that I caught the cancer diagnosis early and that allowed me to research the treatment plan and do what was best for me.
00:20:19
Speaker
But you know, I never felt like I was, like cancer was going be the end. I always felt like just like any setback, it was temporary. And I had the mindset that I could overcome this.
00:20:31
Speaker
And I was fortunate that I did. um i went through treatment. I was treated successfully. And and I've been done with treatment for almost seven years, and I'm still cancer-free. And so I already had a very strong mindset going into cancer, and I believe that helped me get through it. Now, Ironman, once again,
00:20:51
Speaker
I already had a very good, strong mindset, but Ironman made it stronger. Like I started doing things physically with my body, like running a long distance and riding my bicycle long distance and swimming a long distance. I was already, it it taught me that I can do even harder things.
00:21:08
Speaker
You know, it made my mind stronger. It it taught me that I can do very hard things. And not only could I train my body to do hard things, but I could train my mind to do hard things. I learned a lot doing that. Uh, you know, I was never, i was never a person who ran a lot.
00:21:28
Speaker
You I'm a big guy. and i' not built like a runner. So my I had a coach who helped me with my running and he taught me by making me run. He taught me that I can run and I can run farther and I can run farther. And so that just made me stronger. It gave me more confidence. It it helped me believe that I can do these things. And,
00:21:49
Speaker
The things that I never thought I could have done before, and I did them. And so, you know, between the cancer and the Ironman events, boy, it's it's very it's very important to have this in the right place as well as your physical body.
00:22:02
Speaker
And so those both were really great experiences for me. Okay. so So, Chris, you've been on this journey for quite some time, for a very long time, I must say, for nearly 40 years.
Lessons in Leadership and Accountability
00:22:12
Speaker
What are some of the key lessons you've picked up, lessons you would like to share with us today? Okay. So we talked about leadership a little bit.
00:22:20
Speaker
Yes. You know, I've learned over the years how important it is to lead your people. And part of that is helping your people feel that they're capable.
00:22:32
Speaker
You know, treating your people like they are the best at their job and they will be the best at their job. You treat their people that they're better than they actually are. And guess what? They'll become better.
00:22:44
Speaker
And if you can teach your people and you can treat them in a way that makes them feel good about themselves, then they'll be good ah they'll and then they'll do better work. They'll work harder. They'll work smarter. They'll grow. and so it took a long time to learn that, that not a lot of leaders actually make their people feel better. a lot of times leaders make them feel bad and make them feel like they're not good enough.
00:23:06
Speaker
And that's not proper motivation, in my opinion. So I learned over the years that a good leader, you know, I think about some of the great leaders I had in my life, some of my mentors, some of the people I really liked working for, and some the people that made me better.
00:23:20
Speaker
Well, it's because they believed in me and they made me feel better. And they told me I was better. And they they they taught me that I was better. And so I've learned that as an important skill set is that you have to you know help your people.
00:23:34
Speaker
you know A good leader is a builder of heroes, a builder of heroes. So everyone that works underneath them feels better about themselves. They feel like they can do more. They feel like they can conquer more.
00:23:45
Speaker
And that's because the leader believes in them. So I think that's a very important skill set. Now, another thing is you need to hold people accountable. You need to have metrics in place where you can track their success. you know everyone the For example, you know we watch a football game and how do we know which team's doing better?
00:24:03
Speaker
Well, there's a scoreboard and you watch the scoreboard and you can tell who's winning and who's losing. I think that's important for business as well is to have a scoreboard that you can see when people are winning and maybe when they're not winning. And if they're not doing very well, that gives you an opportunity to go talk to them and coach them and help them be better.
00:24:21
Speaker
So keeping track of what I call KPIs, which are key performance indicators, and having good KPIs for all your team is very important to being successful in business. Because then allows you to sit back, they know what's expected of them, and you let them do your job, and then you coach them and you help them, and you can see the scoreboard you can see them be successful.
00:24:43
Speaker
so so So leadership is important. KPIs are important. And then, of course, there's one part of a business that seems to get neglected sometimes, and that's the financial side of the business. It's very important to have a very, very close relationship to the finances of the business. You need to know If you're making money, you need to know if you're losing money and you need to watch it closely because if you're losing money, you can't do that for very long.
00:25:09
Speaker
Right. So you have to make sure that you're watching to make sure you're making money, because if a business is not making money, it's going to fail. If the business fails, everyone loses their job.
00:25:21
Speaker
So even the employees have to respect that the business has to make money. The owner has to make money. If the owner is not making money, why is he running a business? So I think it's very important for owners and founders to keep a very close eye on the financials of a business. So so probably those three keys, leadership, KPIs, and watch the finances of a business are very, very important in my opinion. yeah ah Chris, you also around you run Founders Exchange.
Founders Exchange vs. Masterminds
00:25:49
Speaker
you you It's also the Founders Exchange you say is known as a space where entrepreneurs can finally get real. what What makes Founders Exchange? What makes it different from the traditional masterminds that we have around? Yeah. um You know, there's a lot of mastermind groups. There's a lot. Everyone has a mastermind group. I mean, Napoleon Hill talked about mastermind groups a hundred years ago.
00:26:13
Speaker
So it's been a concept that's been around for a long time. And every I think every everybody so mastermind group has their own agenda. For Founders Exchange, my... Number one priority is to create a safe place for the founders and the entrepreneurs to come to the table and be able to share and be able to share the hard things. And so our mastermind group, our founders exchange has rules, very strict rules. Rule number one is you have to commit. Everyone has to commit.
00:26:40
Speaker
to come into the group once a month and not miss it They have to prioritize being at that meeting because that creates consistency, which helps solidify and create a safe place. The other rule that's very important is there's nobody in the group is in conflict. So there's no businesses that are in the same industry.
00:26:58
Speaker
There's no competitors in the group. They're all in different industries and they're all in different areas. So they can't, they're not, there's no conflict because the moment you have conflict outside of the group, it creates conflict inside the group. You're not allowed to give advice. Nobody's allowed to give advice inside the group.
00:27:15
Speaker
If somebody comes to the group with a challenge, they can share their challenge. But the only time I can respond is if I share an experience that I had that's similar and I can share what I did and how it turned out, then The person who needs help can take away from that what they want. Because once again, we want it to be safe. And then another thing is confidentiality. Whatever's talked about in that meeting stays in that meeting and stays in that group.
00:27:43
Speaker
And so by so our group is very disciplined. We have very strict rules and it's very it's designed to create that safe place. And if there's somebody in that group that doesn't want to...
00:27:55
Speaker
follow the rules, that doesn't want to commit, that doesn't want to show up, then we invite them to leave. Because if one person can change the whole feeling inside that room.
00:28:06
Speaker
So so that's that's what makes us different than a lot of traditional mastermind groups is that we create that safe place so that anything can be talked about. You can talk about business,
00:28:16
Speaker
personal, family, whatever rich issues you might have, you can bring to the table and feel safe and feel like you you can actually share these really hard things. So so if a founder listening to us today, right now feels isolated, what is the first step they should take to stop going it alone?
Preventing Isolation through Mentorship
00:28:35
Speaker
Well, I think no matter where you are, you can you can find somebody, whether it's a ah ah a friend, therapist, a coach, um or even a mentor who you can talk to to help. I think, you know, over the years, I've had some great mentors in my life. I've had people in my life who I looked up to ah that had more experience than I did, and they were always to to sharing with me and to listening to me. And I still have mentors. I have people that, for example, next week I have a lunch meeting with a mentor and and I'm able to sit down with him. We're just able to talk. And sometimes we just have good conversation. And sometimes if I have an issue, I can lay it on the table and we can talk about it. So I think it's important to seek out mentors. When I was building businesses in certain industries, I could go find somebody who was very successful in the exact same industry that i was, and I would go talk to them and they would share with me what they did to be successful.
00:29:30
Speaker
You know, most successful people aren't afraid to share some of their secrets, right? They're not afraid to help younger people that are trying to improve. And so, um I think it's good to go find a mentor, find people you can meet with on a regular basis, you know find friends that are in business that understand your challenges and go spend regular time with them. But also find people that you think are better than you.
00:29:54
Speaker
Find people that make you want to elevate yourself. Find people that make you feel better about yourself and and spend time with those people. you know There's a lot of people in this world that don't want you to be successful. There's a lot of people that want to drag you down because Maybe they're jealous.
00:30:08
Speaker
Well, you don't want to hang out with those people. You go find people that are better. You go find people you think are elevated and you go spend time with them so you can become better. And and you'll be surprised how spending time with the right people will make a huge difference. So we're just about wrapping up,
Writing 'Bootstraps and Battle Scars'
00:30:23
Speaker
Chris. But I read that you are writing a book and with the same title as your company, Bootstraps and Battle Scars. Why this book? What is really inspiring this book? Yeah.
00:30:34
Speaker
Well, so there's a lot of information, a lot of things I've learned over the years that I think could help other people. And so, you know, you write a book. I try, I'm trying to put all my experiences, my thoughts, the things I've learned, I'm trying to put that in a place where if, if I have a young business owner who's trying to figure out, okay, what do I need to do to build my business, that he could grab my book and say, okay, here's some very basic things I can do to start off to help me be successful. I'm a big fan of keeping things simple, right? So part of my book says, look, if you're going to start a business, keep it simple. Here are some here are some key some key ideas that that you need to implement to be successful, but keep it simple.
00:31:14
Speaker
If you do something super complicated and nobody does it, it doesn't it doesn't work. So start off simple and grow from there. so So basically the book is me trying to take these ideas, take the things I've learned, put them down so that somebody could read them and it might help them a little bit. in their journey and their entrepreneurial journey. You know, there's going to whole section in the book about failure.
00:31:36
Speaker
Failure is temporary. going to tell stories about some of the failures I had, because I think that'll help people work through and and get through failure and and and learn whatever they can out of it. So basically the book about, you know, the boot the book and the book, Bootstraps and Battle Scars is basically that. It's going to talk about how I bootstrapped and the things I did and the things I learned. It's going to talk about the battle scars I've had. It's going to, I'm goingnna share things that hopefully help young entrepreneurs be more successful and maybe help them navigate, maybe help them avoid some of the failures I had, maybe help them avoid some of the battle scars that I have. So if I can teach them and train them and coach them, then hopefully their their track is a little bit smoother.
00:32:17
Speaker
So, you know, you put that in a book so that hopefully, you know, someone can read the book and whatever they're in need of, they can take away from it.
Advice on Continuous Learning
00:32:24
Speaker
Okay. So Chris, before we sign off, what are the pieces of advice or your last words for my audience before we sign off? Well, I think that I'm ah narrow it down to one thing, and that is keep learning. Keep learning. Read books, talk to mentors, listen to podcasts, do research, keep learning. You can you can learn everything.
00:32:47
Speaker
on the internet today, these days, you can find books, you can find information, just keep learning. If you're stuck, learn. Go read a book. If you need help figuring out a problem, go search it. i I mean, so I think the focus is keep learning, keep learning, keep learning. You can, no matter what problem you have, somebody else has had that problem and you'll be able to figure out how to get through it if you just keep learning. If you think you're really good, well, keep learning and get better.
00:33:16
Speaker
And then when you think you're really good, keep learning and get better. So there's always something to learn. There's always a place to learn it. So keep learning. Keep learning, keep learning, keep learning.
00:33:26
Speaker
Chris, thank you for showing us that success isn't about avoiding scars. It's about learning from them and still having the courage to show up. To everyone listening, if this conversation resonated with you, share it with someone else. And remember that you don't have to wear the armor forever.
00:33:45
Speaker
Chris, thank you once again for sharing your rich experience with us on the Entrepreneur Speaks podcast. We wish you the very best. Thank you. Thank you, Kofi. Appreciate it. All right. Thank you all. We'll come your way next time. Cheers.
00:33:58
Speaker
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.
00:34:17
Speaker
Dreams light up the sky tonight. Builders of tomorrow shining bright. From every land they find their beat.
00:34:27
Speaker
Yeah, it's the entrepreneur's beat.