How You Can Own It, but Not Run It: 7 Tips for Building Freedom in Your Business with Jerry Hayes at Joe Polish’s Genius Network

Show Notes

• The quality of your life is equal to the quality of your questions.
• Jerry’s first consultant asked him an important question “Do you want to work for your business, or do you want your business to work for you?”
• Jerry knew that working harder and longer than anyone else was not going to be very fulfilling in the long run.
• What is the longest period you have been away from your business? For Jerry, the record is two years.
• Jerry has been an absentee owner of his business since January 2, 1990.
• When Jerry tells people the idea of being an absentee owner he normally gets two reactions: My business needs me to be there, or I love my work so I choose to be there.
• Leaving his business was not the original plan, Jerry was a micromanager in the beginning.
• The issue was he was focused on activities instead of being focused on results.
• Jerry was successful, but not happy. Once the company hit 50 people, he realized that he wasn’t having fun anymore. At 100 employees, Jerry realized that he was long on quick start and short on follow through. He was holding his business back.
• You don’t have to know everything to build a successful business.
• Figure out your core competency, then hire other people to do everything you can’t do.
• You have to get your business to profitability.
• You have to have great people around you, don’t be afraid to hire people smarter than you.
• Don’t give equity, but do overpay the market.
• You’re not going to get everything that you want so focus on results and not activities.
• The pros are: if you are away from your business, you free up 80 to 90 percent of the nuisance and it frees you up to start other businesses. Your business is also worth more to a buyer if they don’t have to worry about how to replace the unique talents of a CEO.
• The disadvantages are: you will probably have less growth and you have to be okay with that, and you won’t have the interaction with people you had before.
• Money is not the only endgame, it’s the four freedoms of the entrepreneur: Money, Time, People, and Perks.