Business Consultant | Business Advice From Successful Entrepreneurs

Have you ever wondered who you should take business consultant advice from? Well, in this video, it is actually called business advice from successful entrepreneurs. My name is Desmond soon, and I have run multiple companies as well as also scaled alongside multimillionaires to scale and grow their company. I also have here with me today, Josh Sperl founder of spill and associates. If you haven’t already checked out some of our other videos, please check around the YouTube channel here, hit the subscribe button comment below, like, and share this video. I’ve got Josh here on video. Number two of the series in which we’re helping entrepreneurs beat the odds. These are the common myths and the common question that we get on the channel that we are trying to get Josh a fractional CFO, CPA Canada’s top rated CPA to answer those questions. Josh, what is the main reason why people get business consultant advice from them wrong people?

I mean, statistically, it’s not very likely you have anybody in your family, in your scope of friends who actually is a successful business owner. It’s very, very statistically unlikely. I mean, first of all, only 4% of the population actually owns a business. So I mean, if you know, a hundred people, only four of them actually own a business.

And is it a successful business? That’s another question

We drill into that. Right? Right. Only 4% of those 4% will last 10%, but we’ll ask 10 years or more. All right.

All right. And if they last 10 years, are they successful? Do they sell the business? What level did it get to

Only half of those that last 10 years or more actually get five employees or more. Okay. Wow. Only half of those build something that’s valuable enough. Then another person would buy as opposed to just starting another business from scratch. And only half of those will likely build something that someone else would buy for a million dollars or more. You add up all of those numbers. It’s about one in 5,000. Right? So to give one in 5,000, some contexts one in 5,000 is the average, a large business school in Canada, UBC U of a they’ll push out about 500 commerce graduates every year. Correct. So we’re not talking about the valedictorian, we’re talking about the valedictorian

Of the decade, right? Right.

Um, they did another study where they, you know, they followed 30,000 kids around who were registered in minor hockey

From five years old, right. Six

Of the 30,000 played 400 games or more in the NHL, six out of 30,000, again one in 5,000. Right? So the chances of you having someone in your life who has built a million dollar business, these are virtual easier.

So Josh, the question that we have, I’m an entrepreneur myself, and I know there’s many entrepreneurs out there that have the same question and that is okay, we get it. We understand it’s the sticks of the 96% and a doom and gloom and the four of the four, the four. So what can I do since you’re the expert in beating the odds, who should we surround ourselves with? Who are the people that we should be taking advice from? I mean,

Who you want to take advice from is people who have more than five employees who’ve been around for 10 years or more just because someone’s a lawyer or a CPA, um, or quote unquote business consultant. You can’t verify that they have any actual, real T4 staff or an office where they couldn’t do work every day. Um, you know, that doesn’t make them better. I mean, I tell people, you would probably learn more from a plumber with 20 guys than you would from a lawyer who has him and his assistant. Who’s never figured out how to scale a business, right? Um, the things that make successful entrepreneurs successful that transcends the industry. So the more you can take business consultant advice from successful entrepreneurs, you know, people who have been around for more than 10 years with more than five, more than 10 employees, um, they’re going to tell you business strategies that will transcend industries and at a minimum, at least trying to move towards having other people in your life who, who actually do have a business.

So they’re at least part of the 4%, correct. I mean, the furthest away we’re going to get is, is kind of, you know, uh, your friends and family who they might be working at union job somewhere, um, it’s completely irrelevant, right? And a lot of the business consultant advice that we get out there it’s actually to do with big businesses, not small, correct. That’s what we get taught in school is how to do a very particular role within a big business. They do not teach you the businesses strategies that you’ll have to deploy in a small business where you’re wearing all of these different hats. Correct.

And I know that there’s advice out there that says, you know, eventually you don’t want to be working in the business. You want to be working on the business. It sounds really nice, but the reality is the first few years you’re going to have to wear many hats. Correct. So then do you get just one mentor? Do you just, cause I know you’ve got a mentor, in fact, yeah. I’m just going to quote here. Right? Clay Clark is one of your mentors. When I met you, you introduced him to me. Most people are wrong about most things about business. Most of that time, clay Clark, can you just quickly introduce who clay Clark is and how he’s been pivotal as a mentor in your life. And I’ve also got a mentor as well, too named Dan lock. So you know, their success leaves clues, but go ahead and tell us

About your mentor clay. He calls it one of his lyrical miracles. You know, most people are wrong about most things about business, most of the time. Uh, certainly he would fail English school, but that’s his goal in life? I think so. Um, you know, the, the principles that he taught, you know, when I met clay, I attended one of his conferences and I specifically went out to seek out a business conference. Right. And that’s why I hold the boot camps here in Canada, because I want other business owners to hang around with other business owners because that’s where success happens. When I went out and met clay at his conference, it was not, was the opposite of a Tony Robbins conference. Right. Who was the opposite of, you know, uh, you know, do some breathing and pounds of each ball around and

Goes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

Neuro-linguistic programming and say, yes, say I, no, no, no, not this. It’s just real strategic business consultant advice that only, you know, real business owners would value this advice. Right. And you know, hearing, you know, uh, the 13 businesses that clay has been involved in, right. And the businesses that I only realized that you’re not on an island, right. Uh, other business owners have experienced similar things and what’s even more impressive is that what will work in one business will work in another business, in a different industry. Right. Can you

Explain more about that? What does that mean? Well, most

People think that business advice should be industry specific and that’s not the case. And when you study successful entrepreneurs, you look around at like the Elon Musk’s of the world and he, he runs PayPal and then he runs Tesla. Those two companies had nothing to do with each other. Right. But this happens all the time where you see successful entrepreneurs go from business to business and they replicate success over and over again because successful business principles, they’re not industry specific. They will transcend industries.

Okay. So now that I’m understanding, I’m starting to get what that means. What can the average entrepreneur do? What, what is the advice, uh, for them to figure out what are those common trends or common traits? Common habits. Yeah.

Google’s your friend. Okay. Google’s your friend. If you were going to hire someone as a consultant for an advisor, right. And you’re likely going to have to pay someone and you, don’t the chances that you’re going to have, you know, the, uh, uh, the, the rich entrepreneur, just take you under the wing, under their wing and give you free, uh, you know, free business consultant advice is probably zero, right? You’re going to have to pay someone to function that role, but you want to vet them if they have not scaled a business. Um, so you should look, do they have an office that they have actual employees that go to this office, if not, do have they exited a business, is there a tray along Google that you can verify? They sold this business for X? Can they actually show you that? Right. Um, because you know, taking advice from someone who hasn’t gone down that path, right? Uh, if it’s like trying to crop climb, Mount Everest in the Sherpa, on your, on your, uh, on your journey has never climbed a mountain themselves. You’re probably

Going to fall off that mountain and die. Like

That’s likely what’s going to happen. You know, talk about the, the dentist example that you’ve heard me use in the meetings. It’s like, it’s like, you know, you want to trust your friends and family, but asking your friends and family about business advice, it’s, it’s kind of like sitting around the Christmas dinner table and asking your friends and family, how you should do your own root canal when no one in your friends and family are a dentist, right? It’s not going to work out very well

For you. Exactly. Josh, in fact, I’m going to quote from your book here, your uncle, Ron, as much as you love him does not. It’s not just uncle Ron giving you bad advice. I’m not interested in the opinions of business school. Professors who have never actually walked the path. Government employees working at entrepreneurial resource centers are usually worse than the business school. Professors, lawyers, bankers, and even accountants who have not scaled a business of their own. In fact, Josh, one of the reasons I came to you was when I was doing my due diligence, I saw you as an, a millionaire as an entrepreneur yourself though, I already had a mentor and I was very close with him. I sought you out because you were in the CPA, financial CFO side as a business owner. Yes. I could have just gone to any other CPA. In fact, I had another CPA and it was great if he was, I decided to move my business over to you. Now, what would you say to anyone else? Who’s out there getting bad advice from the professionals. They might have a lawyer, but they’ll say, Hey, you know, my, my lawyer’s, you know, he’s running a business. My, my CPA is running a business. Um, do do, do they need to actually have like, not just that business, but other businesses as well for you to take their business consultant advice,

They need to have some semblance of a business, even if it’s just that business, that business is fine, right? But you’re sitting in that lawyer, accountants office look around, do they, have they grown to five employees or more right? Is this a law firm with seven people, but three of them are partners. And then they were figuring out really how to get beyond, you know, one assistant per each. They had never figured out how to actually scale a business. There’s going to be a lot missing there. Um, it happens with CPAs all the time. You know, we’re, we’re entrusted as business advisors, but just look inside a CPA firm, how many CPA firms and get to 10 employees or more. Um, and they do it from scratch. You know, they’re generally someone in the firm is a second generation that bought a client list off of someone else. Um, these business principles, they will transcend industry and you need to find advisors in your life that you’re unfortunately likely you’re going to have to pay them. Right. Um, because that’s something you

Should budget for. You should, don’t try to be cheap on it,

Right? Yes. You’re likely going to have to pay them. Uh, but you, once you’re doing that, you should expect that you are getting the advice of people who have actually walked down this path. Right. And they might be scaling it out. You might be talking to their employee, but ultimately it filtering through someone that organization who’s built a million dollar business from scratch

Josh, a common question I get, and I’m sure let us know in the comments below, if you’re finding this information helpful. If you want us to go into deeper details, do comment and I will get Josh to answer your specific questions. Josh, a common question I get as well too is, well, let’s see, I’m running an internet marketing business, right. Which when I came to you, I was doing molded one, the digital marketing space there. Yeah. And should I take advice from someone who’s running a restaurant? They’re a business owner. They’ve been doing it for several years. They’ve got employees. Should I listen to that person? Or what kind of questions should I be asking that business owner? It seems like, it seems like such different worlds apart.

Yeah. Yes, yes you should. Yeah. That was a successful restaurant owner and they built, you know, 2, 3, 4 restaurants and they’ve got, you know, millions in revenue. They’ve got dozens of employees. They are going to have much better information than, than other internet marketer. Okay. Got it. With only two employees. Business is really at the end of the day, it’s about customers, cashflow keen, and they’ve already solved those three problems and the solutions to those three problems, they will work in multiple industries. So let me

Repeat that part again here. So let’s say you’re an internet marketer. I’m an internet marketer and I’ve been doing this for a couple of years, but I only have two or three employees. And the brand new person watching this video right now is just getting started into that marketing. Should he listen to me? Or should he go down the street and talk to Susan? Who’s been running her restaurant for 10 years. Who’s got, has always had over 10 employees. Um, you know, it’s, it’s always full house there. He should be asking her what sort of questions.

Yes. Find out that story. You want

To find out that story. So, you know, I had an opportunity to a while back to sit down with, uh, uh, uh, a guy who ran a trucking company. Correct. And he ran this trucking company for, I believe 50 years when I had the opportunity to talk with him. And he showed me his accounting records and his accounting records were absolutely archaic, but he was successful and he was successful. Why? Because he has a specific time carved out in his calendar every week to review those archaic accounting records. Now I can help him do a much better and much quicker. Um, but the, the principle was is that he had a set time every month, every week to sit down and look at those numbers. That’s what made him successful. That would make the internet marketers successful as well.

Right? So it’s the principle is those habits. That’s what you’re drilling into guests. The internet marketer of Delta adopt that regular once a week, checking the accounting. Yes. It’s not about some fancy ad strategy or some tactic. It’s about just doing those principles. That’s gonna help them. Right? Exactly. If you found this video helpful and you’d like to know more, do subscribe, check out some of the other videos in the playlist here, comment below, ask your questions. I’ll get Josh to answer those questions. We will see you in the next video.