Are you in cruise control with your business? Have you hit a point where you have settled in and are a little complacent? Our guest today is Dr. Jonathan Baktari, and he shares with us how he continues to grow his business by pushing himself out of his comfort zone and taking calculated risks.
TODAY’S WIN-WIN:
It is easy to go into “cruise control” for your business. Don’t forget about your hunger when you started your business.
LINKS FROM THE EPISODE:
- •You can visit our guest’s website at: http://www.enationaltesting.com
•Get a copy of our guest’s book CLICK HERE.
•Attend our Franchise Sales Training Workshop:
•https://bigskyfranchiseteam.com/franchisesalestraining/
•If you are ready to franchise your business or take it to the next level: CLICK HERE.
•Connect with our guest on social:
◦https://www.instagram.com/baktarimd
◦https://twitter.com/BaktariMDMedia
◦https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathan-baktarimd/
◦https://www.facebook.com/BaktariMD/
ABOUT OUR GUEST:
Dr. Baktari is the Founder and CEO of eNational Testing, US Drug Test Centers and e7 Health. He is a preeminent, national business thought leader interviewed in The Washington Post, USA Today, Forbes, Barron’s, andmany other national publications. He is also an opinion writer for The Hill and the Toronto Star.
e7 Health is a company that leverages technology to offer innovative medical care while providing cost savings for their patients and clients. They specialize in 7 areas of health care (Travel Medicine, Student Health, Corporate Health Services, Drug Testing,STD Testing, Physicals and Labs, and Vaccines) and have $5M+ in annual revenues.
ABOUT BIG SKY FRANCHISE TEAM:
This episode is powered by Big Sky Franchise Team. If you are ready to talk about franchising your business you can schedule your free, no-obligation, franchise consultation online at: https://bigskyfranchiseteam.com/ or by calling Big Sky Franchise Team at: 855-824-4759.
If you are interested in being a guest on our podcast, please complete this request form or email podcast@bigskyfranchise.com and a team member will be in touch.
TRANSCRIPTION:
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (00:01):
Welcome to the Multiply Your Success podcast, where each week we help growth-minded entrepreneurs and franchise leaders take the next step in their expansion journey. I’m your host, Tom DuFore, CEO of Big Sky Franchise Team. As we open today, and summer is full upon us here, I’m wondering if you are in cruise control with your business or maybe you’ve hit a point where you’ve just settled in and you’re a little complacent. Well, our guest today is Dr. Jonathan Batkari, and he shares with us how he continues to grow his business by pushing himself out of his comfort zone by taking calculated risks. Now, Dr. Batkari is the founder and CEO of eNational Testing, US Drug Testing Centers and e7 Health.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (00:49):
He’s a preeminent national business thought leader, interviewed in the Washington Post, USA today, Forbes, Barrons, and many other national publications. He is also an opinion writer for The Hill and the Toronto Star. e7 Health is a company that leverages technology to offer innovative medical care while providing cost savings for their patients and clients. They specialize in seven areas of healthcare, travel medicine, student health, corporate health services, drug testing, STD testing, physicals and labs and vaccines, and have over $5 million in annual revenue. You’re going to love this interview, so let’s go ahead and jump right into it.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (01:28):
Tom, thanks for having me. My name is Jonathan Batkari. I’m the CEO of e7 Health, US Drug Test Centers, eNational Testing. I’ve been a physician prior to that and I’ve translated that into creating these companies so far. So that’s where we are in our journey.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (01:45):
Wonderful, wonderful. Well, tell us a little bit about the businesses that you’ve built here. I always like to get a little understanding on that.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (01:52):
Great. The first business was e7 Health, which we started in 2009, which was a preventative health and wellness company focusing on adult vaccinations. We were sort of a COVID company before COVID hit. We focus on aspects of adult vaccinations that really were part of preventative health, which is travel medicine, student health, employee health, and general wellness health as it relates to vaccines and other things to keep yourself healthy. We did that at the exclusion of anything else. We didn’t do primary care, urgent care or anything else just focused on that. Out of that grew eNational Testing, which is a company that provides nationwide laboratory testing like cholesterol and sugar and men’s health package, prostate, whatever.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (02:36):
We’ve made that Amazon-esque, so you can just go three clicks. We have thousands of labs across the country that are part of our program. So you just basically order it, get your test done. It gets rid of a lot of the friction. The last company is US Drug Test Centers, again, is a technology company like the other two where we’ve ridden the technology that allows our clients to order nationwide drug testing at any one of 20,000 locations. We help companies and individuals manage their drug testing program through a technology solution. In a nutshell, that’s what we’ve been doing.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (03:09):
Wonderful. Well, certainly I find what you’re offering through your businesses interesting, as many of the folks who will listen to this are in franchising or are franchising, they’re part of national networks and certainly it’s always nice to have suppliers and vendors who offer these types of things on a national basis. One thing just to launch into for part of the initial conversation and discussion is how do you integrate with some of your clients, especially national brands or regional companies-
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (03:09):
Yes.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (03:40):
… and organizations, how have you found integration with these companies, those that do it well?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (03:47):
Our main focus has been to leverage technology. Even though I told you the name of all those companies, at the core of it we’re a technology company. We’re a software development company and a technology company. I don’t want to compare ourselves to a big company like Uber, but example holds. Uber is really a technology company. Yes, they get you a ride, they get you from here to there, but nobody at Uber headquarters ever drove an Uber car. Their job is to leverage the technology so you can land at the airport and quickly have someone pick you up and take you to the hotel. That’s where the client facing site see Uber. But really at the heart of it is they were able to put together the technology that allowed all this to seamlessly happen, where they seamlessly got ahold of a driver who happened to be a few blocks away from you, who happened not to have anyone else in his car, whatever.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (04:45):
That’s been our approach to providing nationwide laboratory testing and nationwide drug testing. We really took the problem of why is it so difficult if you just want to get your cholesterol tested. Make an appointment in three weeks, or if a company needs drug testing and they’re in 20 states, what are they’re going to do, go sign up a contract with 20 different companies in 20 states to provide them drug testing. There was a problem there, which I’m not sure they thought it was a problem, but certainly there was a better way to do it.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (05:18):
I don’t think anyone thought hailing a cab was a problem, but once you realize you don’t have to and you could just go on your phone, then all of a sudden, “Oh yeah, in retrospect, that’s a lot easier.” Whether it’s ordering a laboratory testing or whether it’s ordering drug testing for your company, for your pre-employment people that you’re onboarding, it really becomes a solution when you can provide them the technology so they can go about doing their business and not become involved in the minutia of what we’re talking about. We help companies take that headache away by us doing all the work and they can do what they need to do.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (05:59):
I just think it’s interesting, especially for clients that are in, for example, home services industries, by the way, that’s been the number one category in franchising for the last four years as home services and so the growth there has been tremendous. Service like yours, I just think it’s worth knowing that you can make it convenient and easy for franchisors, their franchisees on a local level and supporting their staff and teams.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (06:29):
For example, if you sign up with an account, it would be like signing up for a QuickBooks account. You basically sign up with us and immediately we give you the technology of the dashboard, and all of a sudden you have now access to 20,000 labs in every small town and middle-sized town and big town in the country, literally, at your fingertips. You don’t have to deal with anyone else, and you get one bill from us and all your results come back to one place. Even if you have offices in 40 states or 30 states, we basically solve that problem.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (07:01):
Well, pre-show we were talking about this idea of culture and building a culture and what you’ve been able to do and highlighting it. So I’d love for you to talk about some of the things that you’ve done in creating your culture, this idea of the employee to owner concept.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (07:18):
I have had the fortune of speaking to many business owners over the years, and I find that there’s a running theme that all businesses struggle with. Even as a franchise owner, you have to get a manager for your store and the manager quits, and then you got to get another one. This whole idea of you’re just struggling to run your business, but from an HR point of view, and even if your people are working, they’re not giving often that something extra that you need. The common theme that I’ve seen in businesses that accelerate and grow is somehow they’ve identified a core group of leaders, and maybe even beyond that, who are really all bought in that this is not just a job. Often, I say next to God and family is the most important thing in their life, meaning their career because they have made the calibration or calculation that what good are they to their family if they don’t have a successful career. If you can blow up your career, what does that mean for your family?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (08:27):
Of course, I’m not saying necessarily work more than 40 hours a week, but if you can have a thriving successful career professionally, financially, what can you do? I did a podcast, not to digress, on work-life balance, that you need work-life balance. At the end of the day, I’m not suggesting anyone needs to work more than 40 hours a week, but if you instill this idea that if you are a success professionally, you’ll also be a success financially, and that is the best way to achieve work-life balance. Because if you’re living a paycheck to paycheck and moving jobs every two years, you may think you have work-life balance, but the instability of not knowing if you got laid off, fired or company closes, that’s not going to be good for you. If you reverse engineer all that and say, “Look, what is really the best way to get work life balance?”
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (09:22):
The best way to get work life balance, I would argue, is to become a success in your career so you can dictate, “Okay, you know what? My kid’s going off to college, I’m going to take a month off and I’m going to go get them settled in. I’m going to hang out, see, make sure everything’s okay. If you have that ability, and some people do, some people don’t. Some people, “Oh, I can’t take that much time off from work,” but that’s because they spent 10, 20 years blowing up their career. So when the kid says, “Hey dad, I’m going to Dartmouth.” You’re like, “Sure, why don’t we make a road trip? I’ll get you settled in. We’ll buy some furniture for the dorm room,” whatever it is.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (10:03):
The job of any good CEO or leader is to say, “Look, I think if all of us get bought in and we make this company a success and you become a success, that’s going to mean the world for all of us, going to be good for everyone, me, you, the company, and everyone who’s working here.” How you get there and get that attitude often is going to determine whether your company is going to be a failure or a success or how much of a success it’s going to be. We can go through how you get there, but I think that’s the satellite view.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (10:37):
Sure. Well, certainly I think how you get there or maybe even how you’ve gotten there with your organization, would love to hear that story.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (10:45):
Well, let me say how you can do it wrong. Let’s say you hire a manager. Let’s say you’re a franchise guy and you hire a manager for your Subway or for your gym or whatever franchise you own. You hire him. You interview him, have a great talk with him, say, “Rah, rah, rah, buh, buh, buh,” and then you check on them two weeks later. That’s not really probably going to work out very well. A lot of it has to do is how much you’re willing to invest in them. Let’s reverse engineer that. Let’s say you hire a manager for your Subway or whatever franchise. I don’t know want I’m picking on Subway, but whatever. Then say, “Okay, so why don’t we meet every morning for an hour. I’m going to invest some time in you. Let me give you the big picture, what we’re trying to do, where we’ve been, where we’re going.”
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (11:32):
I’m going to also show you in these conversations of micro mentoring you, is how if you somehow give me the same product as though I sold you this Subway and it was yours, if you come to work and give me that same product, I’m going to show you how that’s going to open so many doors for you in your career. Because I’m going to value that. I’m going to take care of you professionally, financially, we’re going to open up 10 more Subways and you’re going to be the general manager, and that’s going to mean blah, blah, blah, and then we’re going to sell that and you’re going to be my lead guy when we parlay into something else. It’s all about building that vision of the future if they’re all in versus just clocking in and clocking out, giving a great product, but not giving you the product that they would give you if they owned it.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (12:21):
One of the things I tell some of my newer staff, I say, “Listen, if I sold you this Subway or this gym or whatever, would you come to work and do things differently or give me a different product?” If the answer to that question is, “Yes,” well what I’m here to tell you, if somehow you can give me that same product even though you’re not the owner, my commitment to you is to take care of you professionally and financially as we grow together. Now, that’s obviously a condensed version of a lot of conversations, but that’s the message you want to get across.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (12:57):
Is there maybe a first step that you like to take or recommend as people start implementing or maybe focusing more on this type of conversation and direction with their team?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (13:09):
Well, the first thing is you have to make the commitment, am I going to hire the director of marketing, put them in an office and check on them a month later? That’s just not going to work. The first thing you got to do is do I have the time and energy? Because we make time for things that we think are important, and I think it’s easy to hire someone and have someone else just give them the lay of the land. “Well, they’re already a marketer where they worked at other companies, so I’m sure they’re good to go.” If you are prepared to invest in them and then when you have leaders that you’ve invested in to have them invest in other people. The first thing you got to do is you have to make the commitment. I’m just not going to hire a general manager and meet with him 30 minutes every other week and expect him to light this organization on fire.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (14:05):
Can it happen? Maybe. Maybe. It could happen. You could hit the lotto, you could hit the one in a million. But no one joins in an organization and says, “I’m going to light this place on fire,” if there hasn’t been someone who has invested in them. Now, we can talk about what that investment looks like and how you do it, which I think was your question. But first you’re like, “Well, I have 50 employees, I can’t spend an hour a week with all of them.” I get that. But you can certainly do it to the senior group, and you could certainly do it as they initially onboard, for example, and then cut back once you think they’ve got division. But yeah, it’s a lot of work. But you know what, when they say you should be working on your business, not in your business, that’s what they’re talking about.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (14:51):
If you’re running a gym and you’re out there selling memberships, that’s not going to work out really well. If you’re to have a Subway and you’re cutting the sandwiches, it’s not to say that’s below you or above you, but you can’t be building division looking for opportunities and flipping the burgers. Every hour you’re flipping the burgers, that’s one hour you are not coaching, mentoring, teaching, inspiring.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (15:20):
I think it’s a point well made because whatever how to steps come afterward, those steps don’t matter if you haven’t made that commitment in your mind to be committed to this and recognize. I think that’s spot on. We always like to ask every guest the same four questions before we go, and the first question we ask is, have you had a miss or two on your journey and something you learned from it?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (15:45):
The first miss that I can really think of is when I really started this private endeavor stuff. I think I didn’t realize that being a leader involved having a certain skillset. I thought just, well, it’s my idea, my money, I’m naturally going to be great at this. You quickly realized you need to acquire certain skill sets. I think it was a struggle initially because until I realized these are not soft skills being a leader, that you actually have to go out there and find mentors and read books and what have you. That was initially a big struggle. I see that trap all the time. Hey, listen, I came up with the money for the franchise, so that means I’m naturally the best qualified person to lead it. Well, no. You pay for the airplane ticket, doesn’t mean you can land the plane. Just because you paid for it doesn’t make you qualified to be the head of even one store. Because why? What makes you the most qualified person?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (16:55):
Oh, well, I’m the one that got the franchise fee together and paid it. Well, so what? Now, that doesn’t mean you can’t be, but that alone doesn’t make you the leader. Let’s say you bought five locations. Oh, I’m going to manage these. I’m going to have people underneath me and I’m going to do … but why? Why are you qualified? You’re not qualified. Maybe you are, maybe you’re not, but just because you’re a nice guy, people like you, it was your idea, you came up with the money. Who cares? If those things made you qualified, literally you could do anything, you could land a plane, you could do anything because it’s your money. It was your idea to fly to Dallas, you paid for the ticket, you should land that 747. No, you should not land at 747, you should sit back and let someone qualified. I’m not suggesting that people who start a business shouldn’t be the head of it. I’m suggesting they have to go out and acquire some skill sets in addition to paying for the franchise, if that makes sense.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (17:59):
It’s a great discussion point and reminder for the audience, especially as they’re recruiting franchisees to join the system. Is that franchisee going to be an owner operator? They’re going to have a different skillset versus, like you just mentioned, an investor that’s coming in and thinking I’m going to invest the money, but I need to hire or bring in someone with the skill or background to operate the daily operations for the business. It’s two different types of candidates coming into the system, and it’s a very good point. It’s a very good point to recognize the difference and know that the coaching and training for the owner/operator versus that investor is it’s going to be different for that franchise system. On the other end of things, we talk about a make or some wins, some highlights that you’d like to share and maybe in your career or businesses you’ve built.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (18:53):
I have a few that I’m thinking about, but I think the running theme is in all the really good successes is taking risks, calculated risks, outside our comfort zone, calculated, but nonetheless, risk. If you always want to play it safe and only take the steps that you know have no danger and whatever, sometimes you miss opportunities. I think a lot of our good things that have happened is when we have really said, “We’ve never done that, but why don’t we look at that?” Yes, it’s going to require some risks, some capital that we may or may not be able to afford to lose, but we’re going to minimize all the downside as best as we can, but we’re going to go for it. I think that’s probably the common theme on some of the things that have worked out really well.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (19:42):
I like this idea of calculated risk. There’s a risk, but it doesn’t sound like you’re just saying, “Well, there’s this opportunity, let’s just run straight at it.” Right? You’re putting some thought into it. I don’t know if you can share an example or even just a process you go to, there’s a misconception of being a risk taker. I’d like for you to maybe just talk through that a little bit if you would.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (20:08):
I can give you the examples, like US Drug Test Centers was an offshoot of e7 Health where we offered drug testing in e7 Health locally, but then we decided to do it nationally and build all this technology to offer it nationally. But I think when I talked about calculated risk, what I’m really saying is to size up what it is and literally be committed to do whatever it takes to get there. I often talk about the best way to approach these things is not to have a plan B, because what happens is the first time there’s a hiccup, you have to make it work. Now, of course, sometimes it doesn’t, but what I have found is the more we’re not taking any prisoners, we’re burning every bridge behind us, metaphorically, that we’re going to have to make it work. It’s just when you think, “Oh, no, we can’t write all this technology. We can’t overcome this.”
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (21:14):
But if there’s no plan B, if you’ve burned all the bridges behind you in your mind and you’re like, “No.” I can’t tell you how many times where we’ve sat in a room, said, “That’s it. We don’t have any vendors that can do this. We don’t have anybody that can do that. We lost that. We lost this.” There’s no making up for it, and you just sit in a room and keep … let’s go to a convention. Let’s talk to other people in the industry. There’s got to be a way around this. It’s literally having no plan B in your mind that often leads to overcoming some of those obstacles.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (21:54):
Great perspective. I think that’s a great description on doing that. It’s interesting as you described that, when our clients franchise their business, that’s what they do, and they go through it. It’s a calculated risk, right? They’ve thought about it and they know, and there’s an upside, certainly, there’s a risk. It’s interesting, I think, how you describe that, clients that I’ve seen that have been probably more successful, as you might describe, maybe more successful than others, maybe they grow faster or sell more franchises over time, have been committed. Even in their mind, there’s no plan B. Even though there is a plan B, but in their mind, there is no plan B, we’re sticking to this, we’re going all the way.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (22:35):
So true. Totally.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (22:37):
The next question we like to ask everyone is, have you used a multiplier to maybe grow yourself personally, professionally, or some of the businesses you’ve run?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (22:46):
Yeah, that’s a great question because that is something that has been a big part of what we do. I’m not going to minimize it, our big multiplier is investing in technology. I did a whole podcast on this too, but I think a lot of people think, “Well, I’m just a small business. How can I invest in technology?” I’m actually quite shocked that it’s possible to write software. It’s possible to right technology. We got started by having the smallest project you can imagine that we thought we would just automate by getting some coding done in a little small amount of development. Boy, that was like crack cocaine. I mean, wow. That was like, “Whoa, how did we do that?” Maybe we should just, “How about this little thing?” And three, four or five years later, you’re a technology company. I’m like, “How did that even happen?” But nothing is accelerator.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (23:48):
If I had to get rid of all of our proprietary technology that we have in-house that we wrote, I’d have to triple my staff, maybe quadruple it. We don’t have a billing department because everything is automated. We integrate with QuickBooks, authorized.net. You’re talking about multiples, you really want to get multiples, not any technology, but you find the right technology for what you’re trying to do, because we didn’t fire all those people that are technology replaced, we just promoted them and they’re doing stuff that really matters. If you want to multiplier for your business, if it makes sense for your business, leverage technology and free up your people to work on things that really matter.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (24:38):
Jonathan, the final question we ask every guest is, what does success mean to you?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (24:44):
Success is a difficult question. For me, I think success is long-term. If you can make a difference in the world, have an impact on other people, whether it’s just to make them happier, healthier, provide them something that makes their life easier, have an impact on society and mankind, is really very satisfying. But on the other side for yourself, I think is to ultimately, achieve work-life balance. Where you are working, but you have the flexibility as life throws its curves at you that you are able to respond in a healthy manner to things that life throws at you. We don’t work for the sake of working, we work for the sake of our family and relationships and God and whatever else. If that’s important to you, your job is to parlay your career, so it can enhance all those things.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (25:47):
Jonathan, as we bring this to a close, before we go, is there anything you’re hoping to share or get across that you haven’t had a chance to yet?
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (25:55):
Well, we’re talking about franchise owners and people who already have a successful business. I think knowing that, to address that group, I would simply say it’s very easy once you achieve a certain amount of success to park the car or go neutral or cruise control or whatever metaphor you want to use. But I think that is really the time when you can have exponential growth and to really not take your foot off the gas at that point. It’s easy because once you achieve a certain modicum of success, it’s easy to live off that high and forget how hungry you were when you started, whether you call it hungry or drive or whatever, is not to lose that, because I’m always surprised when I see people’s businesses that no matter where they are, if they have another gear that they can go into.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (26:57):
At that point, they’re actually quite set up because you already have success, you already have an infrastructure, you already have teams. You’re really on the launching pad to take it to the next level. I would encourage people to reach out to consultants, take courses, listen to podcasts, go to your industry meetings and learn, learn and figure out what you can do to go to the next level.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (27:23):
I’d love for you to share just some information, website people to check out some of what you’re doing. Maybe they need to be tying into some of your systems for onboarding-
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (27:23):
Yes, yes.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (27:33):
… for their own staff as well for your podcast.
Dr. Jonathan Batkari, e7 Health (27:37):
Yeah, USDrugTestCenters.com, eNational Testing are two great places if you need nationwide services like that. My own podcast is Batkari MD. We’re on YouTube, Spotify, and all the regular platform, but if you want to watch the video, I’d say YouTube is the best place to see the content. It’s similar to content of what I’ve been talking about, a lot of leadership, how to grow your organization, how to deal with specific issues. So I think that’s a good way. Of course, I’m on LinkedIn, so if you want to message me if you have a specific question. Those are all really great ways to get ahold of us.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (28:11):
Jonathan, thank you so much for a fantastic interview, and let’s go ahead and jump into today’s three key takeaways. Dr. Batkari made this easy for me today as the three takeaways just go right in order of his miss, make and multiplier. It really made it wonderful, and they were great, great takeaways here. So takeaway number one is from his miss, where he said he didn’t realize that a leader requires certain skill sets. And so he said, you’ve got to find mentors, read books, bring on consultants, advisors, people who can help you. As he said, I thought he said this very well, just because you can pay for it does not mean you’re necessarily qualified to operate or run it. Takeaway number two is the make that he talked about, and the make for him is taking calculated risks to get him out of his comfort zone. He said the best way that he does that is when he thinks about things in these new business initiatives he may implement to say, I don’t have a plan B to think of it in that regard.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (29:15):
Takeaway number three is from the multiplier, and his multiplier is investing in technology. For me, as a small business owner and a leader of an organization, it was a reminder that small businesses can develop their own technology, they can do their own things. I thought that was a great takeaway. Because he said he did it and he started small. It was just a small thing here or there and here he is three, five years later, and now he really views himself as a technology company. Now, it’s time for today’s win-win. So today’s win-win came from the end of the episode right before we wrapped up. Jonathan said that it’s easy to go into cruise control for your business. It’s easy to get comfortable and complacent. But he said, don’t forget about that hunger when you started your business, be pushing to something new. That’s something that I love with our clients that we work with, when we help you franchise your business and go to that next level because it’s easy for a successful owner to sit and be complacent, make a nice living, have a nice lifestyle.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (30:29):
But why not take that business you’ve built and share it with someone else? Push through that. Push through that by taking a calculated risk, by franchising your business. That’s what a lot of our clients do, and it’s one of the things I admire in our clients because, look, at times I find myself sometimes getting complacent, sitting in cruise control, in my comfort zone. I thought that was a great, great lesson and a great win-win for today because you’re going to be able to grow the business, grow yourself, and provide opportunities for your quality staff and team to develop and grow as well. That’s the episode today folks. Please make sure you subscribe to the podcast, give us a review. Remember, if you or anyone might be ready to franchise our business or take their franchise company to the next level, please connect with us at BigSkyFranchiseTeam.com. Thanks for tuning in, and we look forward to having you back next week.