Overcoming Fear and Leading with Purpose with Derrick Kinney

Are you wondering if you have what it takes to be an entrepreneur? To leave your firm and forge your own path?

In this episode, Shelby talks with Derrick Kinney—America's Financial Educator, author of Good Money Revolution, and former advisor who built and sold one of the nation's top firms.

Derrick shares how a $50 gift card changed his business, why "you care about what we care about" became his philosophy, and how connecting a generosity purpose to your work is the ultimate antidote to burnout.

You'll also hear about the "moat principle" that keeps clients loyal, why reinventing yourself when changing firms is so powerful, and how fear and anxiety are simply part of the entrepreneurial process.

Key Themes:

• Overcoming entrepreneurial fear
• Building client relationships through shared values
• The generosity purpose framework
• Reinventing yourself as a specialist
• Leading with purpose, not just profit

Connect with Derrick: https://www.successforadvisors.com/ 

Learn more about Muriel Consulting: https://www.murielconsulting.com/

Hosted by Shelby Nicholl. Produced and edited by Aaron Sherman. Operations and Guest Coordination by Shelly Hadel.

Transcript

0:06

Are you sitting on the edge of your seat? Wondering if you have what it takes to be an entrepreneur, to go out on that limb of forging your own path to make the big career leap? Fear is part of the process. Anxiety is part of the process. Today's guest is America's Financial Educator. Literally. Derrick Kinney trademarked that title for a reason. He's the author of Good Money Revolution and a passionate advocate for consumers doing more good with their money and for empowering the advisors who guide them What one woman said to me completely shifted how I thought about business. After building and selling one of the nation's top advisory firms, Derrick now equips advisors to overcome fear, lead with purpose, and master the conversations that truly matter. I call it your generosity purpose. We connect meaning to money and a purpose to profits and a cause to your cash Most of us in the wealth management industry know his name. We've seen him on stage and today he's here with us on the podcast and I wish I would've learned this sooner Here's my conversation with Derrick Kinney. All right. Well Derrick, I'm super excited to have you here today. Thank you for joining us. for having me. I, I've been looking forward to this. You know, we saw each other a few months ago and the work you're doing for advisors is off the charts, so it's really an honor to be with you today. Oh, thank you so much and it is an honor to be with you. Thank you. have, to me, always kind of personified this entrepreneurship mindset, right? And I know your kids are all entrepreneurs. Were you always an entrepreneur? Did you come from a long line of entrepreneurs? As somebody who came to entrepreneurship late later in life, I'm super curious. No, actually there was nobody in my family that I knew of that was an entrepreneur. saw my parents working very hard. My dad was an engineer. My mom worked part-time at a fashion, place. it seemed like we were just kind of making ends meet. And you know, I didn't know what sort of lower middle class actually was. I just know I was living in it and things were comfortable. but I always had this drive inside me to make more money. You know, it started off with a, uh, a bicycle inspection business. So I, I would actually make up little bike inspection, uh, pieces of paper. I would inspect my parents' bike, my sister's bike. I would tape it on kinda like an automobile. Inspection. Yeah, like the oil change. Exactly, and then I had this idea to, to buy this mix could actually remove oil and grease stains off of driveways. That was the pathway that I thought was gonna take me to millionaire status, you know, as a, as a 10-year-old. And then my, my last one. Was, I always had this interest in money, and so I made this, uh, this loan amortization chart and I put it on the back of my closet. And so I would charge my parents and sister interest. I think they did it just for fun to, to allow them to borrow money from me, and then they would assign the interest rate of what it would cost to pay me back. you know, I was kind of fighting to get my first job at 15. I was a package clerk at a grocery store, and I just learned, uh. You know, if you want to do something in life, it comes down to just working hard, but also building relationships. even with the people I took their groceries out to their car, for the woman that would give me the quarter and say, Sonny, you know, don't spend this all in one place, and she was coming from the standpoint of that quarter meant a lot to her, and she was giving that quarter to somebody and wanting that person. To really make the most of that quarter. So in, in honor of her, I wanna make the, most of all the quarters I get. Oh my goodness. I love that. You built your advisory firm. Talk about kind of just very briefly for the audience, you know, give them your, your five seconds snippet of your advisory practice, but then you sold it and now have turned into an entirely different business. Talk about that change. I found myself in a dead end job right outta college, I got passed over for a raise a big bonus. I was the one marketing person at the firm, everybody else with the engineers, and they got the big money. I, I reached this crossroads Shelby, and I thought to myself, I can either stay stuck in this job. And let someone else tell me what my economic value is, which typically meant a two to 4% raise if I was lucky every year. I could take the chips and I could put them all on Derrick and give the wheel a spin. And that was the moment that I began to investigate becoming a financial advisor. having basically no financial experience, I just loved making money. I loved watching money grow. And I loved giving money, and I thought if I could help other people do that and kind of escape this middle class trap that I saw my parents snare it in and help their friends do the same thing, that would be pretty meaningful to me. So I began to get licensed and, and do all these things in the evenings and the weekends. And so at 26 I launched my own financial planning firm, but I had a big problem. I was 26, but I looked like I was 13. No gray hair, no wrinkles. No natural market, no country club membership, but I had a passion for supporting local education, and so I had this crazy idea because when I was in high school, nobody successful ever came back and gave us a glimpse of what future could look like. They just said. Take your math and science and everything's gonna be okay. And we, we really thought that was kind of a weak plan at best. so I went to my local high school with a $50 Amazon gift card for the teacher and a $25 Amazon gift card for the student. And I began to give a teacher and a student of the month award at my local high school, Sam Houston, here in Arlington. And what happened next? I just didn't see coming. I, I just wanted to breathe life into these students and teachers and let them know how much we appreciated and valued. What they did, they would take a picture of myself and the teacher, the student, the principal, put this in the newspaper way back in the day, I began to get phone calls a couple months later. what one woman said to me completely shifted how I thought about business. She said, Derrick, we know you're new. We know you're young, we like the fact that you're giving back and supporting local education. We want you to be our financial advisor, and she said it's because you care about what we care about. You care about what we care about, and in that moment, it was like this weight lifted off my shoulders and it meant I didn't have to be the best looking or the most knowledgeable, or the most well connected. I just had to care about. What the people I wanted to work with cared about, and what I realized was it became like a magnet for Millionaire families She was my first millionaire client, and I realized that most millionaires are busy. They want to do more in the community. They often can because they're working so hard. But they like to work with professionals, primarily advisors who are givers in the community. It gives them a sense of status and it makes them feel like they're giving because they're working with a professional who is a giver. Yeah. Yeah. you turned that tiny statement into a almost mission in a way of bolstering also your own confidence. It sounds to me like you just switch, switched it and said, I care about what they care about, therefore I am able to serve them. I have zero doubts now about my ability to serve them. It's funny because when I left my job, which I knew was a dead end, no future feeling stuck, everyday job. This was the job where my paycheck actually bounced twice. You can Oh my gosh. like I would give money to our church and imagine calling your pastor or the church saying, Hey. My check I just wrote as a givon check is actually hot and it's not, it's gonna bounce. That was embarrassing. Or, or my boss would call us on Friday and say, Hey, by the way, Saturday is a workday. I have to call my wife and break our plan. She was crushed. I was crushed. I was like, I, I can't live like this long term. This is not Mm-hmm. place for me. I just couldn't do that. there's a part in the book I write about this and it's a, it's a picture I think about a lot. It's, it's when Cortez, took his men onto this island and he basically burned the ships he said, there's no turning back. And, and I didn't know it at the time, but there was this power of I have quit my job, wife and i's financial future depends on what I do every day. I'm going to make this happen. People said, Derrick, you don't have enough money in your checking account or savings account to last. What experience do you have? What I had was a passion to help people and a passion that if there's any best investment, it was me and I was going to bet on me every single time. I think that's incredibly powerful. You know, we work a lot here at Muriel Consulting with people who are breaking away from a more traditional firm or path as an advisor and often going out on their own, standing up their own firm for the first time. And there is so much fear. I get it. I was not an entrepreneur until the last several years, right? I worked 25 years as a W2 in the corporate ranks. Went up the ladder like you're supposed to do, did everything right, and then finally became an entrepreneur and bet on myself for the first time. It takes a lot of courage. It takes. A, uh, just a lot of work and gumption and, You did it at such a young age. I'm so proud of that. I admire that about you so much. Now you're teaching your kids this. How are you getting it down to your kids now also. We've got four kids. So my daughter's now 26. She's married, other daughter's, 24. She's married. Uh, my boys are 22 and 20. And as you said earlier, all of them are now entrepreneurs. They all have their own businesses. So my two daughters went to college. My two sons chose not to go to college. for what they each wanted to do, it's actually worked out perfectly when I think about this, some of this was intentional and some was unintentional. And I'll give you an example. Uh, about six months ago, my oldest daughter, uh, she and I were on a Jeep ride together. And, uh, it's my favorite time with my kids because I get to listen to their playlist and just spontaneous conversations come out when you're kind of looking straight ahead and listening to great music. It, it's, it's like the parenting hack of the century. my daughter says, dad, you realize that none of us would have our own businesses if you hadn't had the courage to launch yours. And it hit me like a punch to the gut Shelby, I'd never thought of it like that before. I just knew that for me and for my family and for how God made me to be, I needed to be bold and courageous and face fear and launch this business. What I learned though, was as a parent, more is caught than taught. Hmm. could tell them things, but when they observed things. That was the most powerful piece and so fast forward, I met another Jeep ride. This was just a few months ago. Uh, my youngest son, Dylan, and uh, he and I were talking and I said, so, so Dylan, what are you gonna do next? What, are you gonna do now that you're not gonna go to college? What's your, what, what's your plan? well, gonna start a business. And, and I said, for whatever reason, I said, why? And he said, well, because that's what we do in our family. Whoa. And, and there was, again, I got punched in the stomach again, I, I couldn't even breathe for a second. Like, gosh. He's grown up in a culture he believes launching a business is what we do because he saw all of us do that. And, and one of the things I learned along the way, and I wish I would've learned this sooner, and if it could help our listeners, is I wouldn't share mistakes. With my kids, Mm-hmm. kind of tell them, Hey, here's what's going great. And I, I would give them more the, the lectures Yeah. lessons. And during COVID, uh, we played this game. Everybody was back home. We played this game called Highs and Lows. Highs of the day, lows of the day. And I realized my answers were typically pretty boring. So, one day I, I made this investment and lost a couple thousand dollars. I'm gonna share this as my low. So it came my turn and I, and I said, Hey, hey guys. Uh, dad made a, an investing mistake today. I lost several thousand dollars. Well, you could have heard a. Pin drop, they were murmuring. Oh my gosh, dad really screwed up. This is gonna be really, really good. And so I told them, I said, yeah, when you, when you go into the market, you make you make some money, you lose some money. But here's what I learned from that. And they still remind me of that story because it made me appear to them real and authentic. Dad wasn't just dad, he was like a regular guy who can lose money just like I can. Yeah. Yeah. It's super powerful to know those lessons. You know, I, this week I took my 13-year-old, uh, to see the Broadway play. The Outsiders was here in St. Louis at the Fox was, I remember reading that book as a child, it being my very favorite book. so I took him there and I'd had this, this difficult client situation over the last couple of weeks and I was talking with him about that and I was sharing with him, like I was really struggling with like what was my, what could I have done differently in this situation to have avoided the outcome? And it was. Amazing because he started telling me, well, mom, it's not your fault, you know, or Mom, did you think about this? And I mean, it was, it was a wonderful conversation of that sharing back and forth. Yes. also, I wanna say my, my 7-year-old said to me the other day that he was starting like some type of business, I've forgotten what it was, I think related to his Hot Wheels or something, you know? And, and I was like, oh my gosh. He's picking up that we own a business. This is, this is coming down, down the path for him, right. Where it's, it's, it's bleeding through. This is amazing. So really admire what your kids are doing. Well, and it's interesting, I, I had this idea, this, this has been, uh, probably 15 years or so ago, I, I decided to launch a business Yeah. club at our kids' school. And I remember approaching my daughter with, called it the gift of dad. I, I'm like, I'm gonna, Hey Lauren, I, I wanna. You know, kind of share some things with you, give you some wisdom from dad, kind of give you this inside track, kind of a leg up on things. And I described this club to her and she was like, no thanks, not interested. And I, I kind of left the room feeling defeated and embarrassed, like, what just happened? My daughter basically just kind of squashed me. So I, I re-engineered my approach and I, and I came back a couple days later and I said, Hey, Lauren. Um, know, one of the things about this business club, and by the way, I don't think you're gonna like it, we give everybody their favorite candy. Every time they show up. Oh, really? I said, well, but I don't, I don't know if it's gonna be for you, we, we talk about, uh, how to start a business. We give away gift cards. We, we have contests and games, but I don't know if it's gonna be something that you would like or not. Well, well, well, let me judge that. Dad, tell me more about it. And before we knew it, at the end of the semester, the hook was set in her mouth she sat on the front row of the business club. For the next four years. and so what I realized was it's always tricky when you're the parent and you're teaching your kids, but one of the advantages was when you're the parent teaching the whole group of kids, those kids seem to like what you're saying, it forces your own kids to Yeah. Yeah, for sure, I just think it's so interesting how entrepreneurship has, has played through that, and even starting a, a club, right? You're like, I have this idea, I'm gonna make it work. Even the way that you changed that approach reminds me a little bit of that quarter turn, you know, kind of, uh, of an idea, right? Because what you did is you said, okay, I'm not gonna let that no. Stop me. I'm gonna go back and re-engineer my idea and come at her again. Right. And I think that's again, kind of this overcoming fear sort of idea when, I gotta think, when you were writing your book or starting to write your book or had the idea for your book of Good Money Revolution, you probably got some nos along the way and you probably had to do some quarter turn kind of an experience. Any, any stories stand out from that? Oh my gosh. How long is this podcast? Right, right. Yeah. You know, when, when you say that Shelby, two things come to mind. This is actually my second book write, and, but in both cases I pursued hard to get a book deal. Uh, to, to write these ideas. I mean, it, it was an important book. I just felt like I, I had a sense of urgency if it was to be, it was up to me and I needed to make this happen. And I remembered with my first book, and I remember my second book, the exact same thing happened. Literally, I signed this book deal. I get paid to write the book, get in advance, and the moment it comes time to write, there is this. Fear, immense fear. And it's like the computer screen is looking back at me pointing and saying, you are a failure, Derrick. You are a fraud. You have no reason. You're no credibility to write this book. Who are you to write this book? to come to terms with, well, you may say that computer screen, but in this moment. I, Derrick Kinney am the expert on this topic, there's no one who's going to write about this topic like I will. Mm-hmm. I just had to create a discipline, and so I would write three double spaced Microsoft pages, which were a thousand words. Every morning before I could allow myself to go to the office, the first couple days it was like worst writing ever. I was like, I don't know who's writing this. Hopefully nobody reads this. then I began to develop a rhythm and an expectation, much like a newspaper reporter or anybody who writes in the media today. They wake up every morning, they don't know what they're going to write about, but they know that when they go to bed that night, they will have written about a story. That is done now they have the confidence that they will do it. And so I would just know, okay, you're just gonna write. And that was the first book, lesson. The second was, I learned how to write more conversationally. Mm-hmm. writing, sometimes when you write, you begin to use bigger words. And when you talk, like Yes. type you, you come up with words like. as a result of furthermore, and if I'm having coffee with a dear friend, I'm not going to say to them, well, furthermore, how was your day to day? And consequently, how are the kids? You don't talk like that. So instead, I discovered this hack of I would sit at my desk. Press record and I would speak the book as though I were having coffee with a friend. And what happened was it came across more conversational Now I simply had chapters to edit and not have to bang out on the keyboard. Okay. So what, what I learned was that fear is part of the process. Anxiety is part of the process. Even every time I speak I do quite a bit of speaking, uh, all over the country and just being honest here, time before I'm about to go on, I feel like I'm gonna throw up. Yeah. Mm-hmm. I know I'm actually excited because I know if I don't feel like I'm gonna throw up, I really have to ramp up the energy. Right. is almost like the key reminder. Like, okay, this is gonna be a really good talk. And so what I would just tell people listening is so much of social media makes success look like it should be easy if you're struggling, really fighting a lot of challenges. Maybe you, you shouldn't be a financial advisor. Maybe you shouldn't. No, that's part of the deal. If Yeah. be in the top 1%, you're gonna have about 99% more challenges than most other people. And when you can embrace that as part of the journey and not punishment for being on the journey, that's the path to winning. Yeah, it's interesting. There's the whole phrase now of do it scared. Right? And, and you just have to, but what I, what I thought was interesting in your book, and, and just on this fear topic, it says in, in your book you wrote. The fear of the unknown of what might happen, most of which is only imagined, and in most cases never comes true. Yeah. It's the fear inside your own head that is trapping you. The fear of your past of what you think might occur or what that voice in your head is telling you will occur, and you have to instead turn those thoughts around. Send yourself a continuously looping message that you should reject your well-worn path of dashed money dreams, like I love that. Right? A continuously looping message. Yeah. I think that is such a central piece that so many people. You know, they, they sort of overlook, right? Because they think, oh, if, if this is to be, it's gonna come easily. Right. No. If this is to be, if, if you're meant to move from a, from one type of firm to another type of firm, and you have to leave that captivity, it's going to be hard. Yeah. There is nothing going to be easy about it. as well respected as you are in your space. I would only guess that you probably work with people that occasionally the fear gets the better of them. Like they know. They know it's better over there. But the fear of going from here to over there paralyzes them and they stay trapped and you know how close they are to So close. So close. Yeah. And so that's, that's e even starting my own businesses, you know, I'll tell you a quick story. So I was at, uh, I work with a trainer. Twice a week and this morning we're working on bench press. We did five sets and, and today was PR day, so he was adding weights on each side and the goal was just to get basically one press on this new higher weight. there was this moment where I pictured as clear as day. four of my kids were sitting on the bar they were all looking at me saying, dad, we need you right now to do this. And it was this moment of like, I can't let my kids down. Well, I was just lifting weights, but it was the moment I needed to push up and say, I will do this for my kids if nothing else. And I shove that weight. And sometimes when you're successful, you just have to find a split seconds worth of hack that will get you through the momentary fear. And that's what happened for me today. Well, and what you did there is you made it bigger than you. Suddenly it was about your kids looking on you. Right? So you talk a lot about purpose. How has purpose driven you over your fear? Well, purpose to me. Is everything. When I would talk to my clients, many of them would say, Derrick, it feels like in the news media, they talk about how money is bad. if you make a lot of money, then you're really bad. And if you're a billionaire. Well, you must be holding other people back from their goals and dreams so you can hold all, all the money yourself and you should be sharing that. And some of them were like, I don't know if I really wanna make a lot of money. I'm like, what the heck are you talking about? You're paying me. This violates the agreement that we have. You pay me, I help you make money. And what I realized was, until we connect. Meaning to money and a purpose to profits and a cause to your cash? Well, most people only base their validation on a bulging bank account. I wanna have seven figures, I wanna have eight figures. And they work hard. They, they give up almost all their relationships, all their time, their interests. And then they reach the top of the mountain eventually, and they look around. And nobody's there. They can hear themselves echo. I realize is money is not bad and good people should have more of it, but the key is to tie a cause to your cash. So just like for me, I call it your generosity purpose. I had a guy named Dave. he comes in the office, longtime client, and you know those relationships, Shelby, you've got where you can simply tell how a person's feeling without them saying a word just by their body language. Yeah. Dave sat down, slumped in his chair. You could tell the weight of the world was on this guy's shoulders. And I said, Dave, what's wrong? And he said, I'm not feeling motivated to go to my office anymore. I'm not feeling the excitement I once felt, for whatever reason, the words shot outta my mouth. Dave, is there a cause that you care about? his eyes got as big as saucers. He leaned back and began to reflect on a trip. he took his family on overseas a couple years earlier he remembered the guide, telling his family that this, this area was totally in poverty. It could be changed if one thing happened, if there was a dedicated school building to educate the kids, it would revolutionize this entire area of the country. he remembered exchanging a glance with his wife as if to say, Hey, wouldn't it be cool? fund that school. Okay? they got back to the states life, got busy business, et cetera. But my question brought this all back and I said, Dave, what if you did this? if you set an aggressive sales goal for this year and you took half of that increase and used it to fund that school? Well now we began to talk and brainstorm about what that might look like, and we came up with a strategy. Normally I would see him every six months. He happened to pop in the office. Three months later, he looks younger, he looks reinvigorated, he looks like he's back on the game. And I said, Dave, what happened? You look like a different guy. He said, well, this generosity purpose just remotivate me. put a, a tab on my website, mocked up a picture of the school, and I began to let our clients know that, hey, you can work with any consultant in the area, but when you work with us, a portion goes to support this school and make people's lives better. he'd ask for referrals, he let them know, Hey, you can work with anybody, but when you work with us, you're helping make these people's lives better. And his team got motivated that, no, no, no longer were just pushing paperclips and paper around. Now they were part of a company, we wanna make money. To help fund this school. And then most importantly, Dave himself now had a purpose. He wanted to grow the company so that he could grow the amount of money he made to make other people's lives better. They actually funded that school within about six months, and so that whole principle then became a central piece of the book, and I'm now taught it. To thousands of advisors and entrepreneurs around the country, because ultimately the, the greatest fear of the entrepreneur is burnout. going to give everything to this goal. I'm gonna put everything into it, and they lay their head on the pillow at night and they feel like, what am I doing? when you have a generosity purpose, a cause that you care about, that motivates you to say. happening with the homeless or the hungry or teachers not having the resources they need, that is just not right, and I'm going to do something about it. Mm-hmm. my business by helping so many people increase the value of their lives and their portfolios so I make more money so I can help solve that problem. Then you lay your head on the pillow at night and you, you feel like you've lived a day of purpose and meaning, and it motivates you. So the goal is go make a lot of money. a lot of people so that you can do a lot of good. It's much more fun too. Right? It's, it's tons more fun. You have the purpose, you're getting that. The whole dopamine rush of generosity. I mean, the science behind what you're describing is so strong. It's so strong. Fantastic. And it's funny because, uh, a lot of people don't really think about the science of it, but Mm-hmm. about is, you know, think about if you anonymously gave someone that you care about. Something. Yeah. wife and I, we love to give, and there was a, there was a moment in a, in a Sunday school class many, many years ago. This couple was really down on their financial luck. Things were not going well. They needed to have a roof put on their house, Mm-hmm. we. everybody behind the scenes and, and, and basically collected the money. And we, we put basically this envelope of cash anonymously in their mailbox. Okay? Oh, wow. would have it, this guy calls me and says, Derrick, you're not gonna believe what happened. Well, now I've gotta practice my doggone poker face and act like I have no knowledge at all of what No, I have no idea. So what I will tell you is if you choose to be a giver. Practice your poker face because God often has a sense of humor where you might be the very person, the person you helped, comes back and tells not knowing that you were involved in it. So act Oh my gosh. idea what's going on. I love it. I love it. Well, I feel like the real lesson in all of this is when we were talking about purpose, and if I think about those advisors that, uh, have, the fear Yeah. is you can get over the fear by having a really amazing purpose. Yes. not just getting over, you know, the, the, the worry of burnout or the boredom of your work or whatever you're getting. You can get over anything when you have an amazing purpose. And what I would add to that would be, you know, when you're confident in your own personal. Business operating framework. You Yeah. a stage there, there's a part where I say, if you remember only two things I tell you, remember this, you want to own an instantly relatable problem that your ideal prospect has that when you say that problem, they instantly say, oh my gosh, this person gets me. That's exactly what keeps me awake at night. And then second, you want to have a cause that you care about. Because what we find is. People that have money, as I mentioned earlier, they derive status from working with a professional that is known as a giver in their community. So, so many people are like, well, I wanna be a private giver. I don't want people to know what I'm doing. And that's fine. You can choose to do that. What I stumbled upon as a 26-year-old advisor who looked like he was 13, was that by letting people know that you're a giver, you then motivate other business owners to also be givers. And it opened up this doorway of marketing that I simply could not have predicted. I Yeah. people would choose the smartest and the best looking. Now that's negotiable for me. Uh, and the most well connected. only wanted to work with people who align with them. They, they assume you're knowledgeable, they assume you're competent. They assume you'll put their best interests first. But when you have a cause you care about, there's this uniting story together that's powerful. So when other competitors call, I like to call it the moat principle, that if you're a known giver in the community and you take great care of your clients and you treat them like they're the kings and the queens in your universe, when they get the free dinner invitations or the other. Competitive advisor comes calling, they're gonna say, no, I work with Shelby, I work with Derrick. I would never work with anybody else. And a lot of that comes from giving. And people feel like because they work with you, they're part of something bigger. Yeah. That's so powerful. And I think that idea of building a moat is something, you know, even, I'm thinking a few episodes back, we had Colleen bowler on on the podcast, and Colleen and I talked about this idea of building a moat around the practice and how do you do that, right? And what you've just, I identified is another way of building that moat. And then if I think about some of our listeners are thinking about those. Those future iterations of their business. You gotta build that moat first, and then you've gotta figure out how to take that moat to your new location too, right? And, and wrapping that purpose, that purpose can really drive you to doing the podcasts and the YouTube and all of the marketing activities that maybe you're feeling called upon and you know, the kind of tug on your heart. Well, it's not just a tug on your heart, it's not just a. Desire, you know, a small desire for you to do it. It's a conviction to educate others and to improve other people's lives. That's really what you're, what you might be feeling in those moments, right? So we gotta make it bigger than us. It's not just about us. It's about all of the good that we can do as advisors, as, as people in this industry, et cetera. You know, it's interesting as you say that it reminds me, and I think you'll relate to this story. There was an advisor who came to me who was considering changing firms, and we talked about the pros and the cons and why, and why nots and so forth. And he was basing the decision primarily on the platform and the products available and the payout. And I said, well, how will you change as an advisor between the firm you're at now and the new firm? I could tell the question stunned him. He said, what do you mean Derrick? I'm the same advisor I've always been. I said, well, why not treat this sort of like you're in elementary school and your parents just got a job transfer and now you get to be a completely fresh version of yourself. All the qualities you don't like about yourself, this new group of students will never know about, so you get to reinvent yourself. I said, why don't you pick one or two things. To reinvent you as a person. he said, well, tell me more. I said, well. What would be the instantly relatable problem that your ideal prospects would instantly connect with? See, he built his practice just hardnosed. Features and benefits of the products and services were better than the southern advisor. He became the commodity and, and he wasn't able to charge what his true value was, and I said. You know, when you become the specialist, just like if you were to have to have a a delicate heart procedure done, would your first inclination be, I'm going to reach out to my general practitioner who knows a little bit about a lot, or would you wanna go to the heart specialist who all they did was work on hearts 24 7? You go to the Simple. Mm-hmm. And, and, and what you'd know is there, there's three things that would happen when you would go to the specialist. Number one. Um, let's say that today is it's Wednesday at five o'clock. Would you expect if you called today to get in first thing in the morning to see the specialist or would you have to wait? I would absolutely have to wait. Absolutely. And Yeah. on your insurances can vary, but would you expect to pay more or less to see the specialist? More. And then third, your mentality going in to see the specialist va? I'm probably gonna do the surgery myself. I'm a do-it-yourselfer. I'm not gonna listen to what they have to say, or I'm gonna take my phone and I'm gonna write down or record everything that doctor tells me. Yes. Right. Yeah. And so what we know is when you can declare yourself as a specialist, solving a unique and instantly understandable and relatable problem, incomes of advisors, they go up automatically. And so this advisor, I said, you can change firms no problem, but change yourself. As you're changing the firm, because that's a way to get the double double in terms of true business growth and not just scaling the business, but scaling yourself. Obviously we talk a lot with people who are, are switching firms, and one of the things we talk about is finding the daylight between your old experience and your new experience. Hmm. Yes. a similar, you know, kind of similar take, but I love how you made it about the advisor. How are you going to be different in this new environment than what you were, how is your experience going to be different? How is your team going to be different? Yeah. has to be some. Some things that are consistent, right? Because, because clients don't want every single thing under the sun to change about them, right? About, about the new world. But they wanna see change. They wanna see things get better. That that's the whole rationale for you making, making the switch of any kind, whether it's switching planning tools inside of your existing practice or switching actual. Platforms, et cetera, right? Like anytime you're making a change in your business, there has to be something better in it for the client and some way that it's making you a different advisor. Love that. Yeah, I totally agree. Uh, well said. I love it. Well, thank you so much. I know we're getting kind of to the end of our time together. Alright, the question that I love to ask everyone, obviously the podcast is called Advisors Off Script. We believe here in leading lives that are off script. Script that are somehow, uh, distinct and exactly ours. What is a way that you are living an off script life today? Well, you know, we just did our family goal setting, so I, I took all of our family through a, a goal setting exercise of setting one key goal in five areas, one of the processes that I go through is asking all of us the question. at stake if I don't do this? You know what? Terrible, no good, very bad thing will happen. What relationship will go un put together? What business goal will go unmet? What financial goal will you miss? What relationship will be impacted? so that's kind of how I live, is every day. When I watch an hour of TV a night with my wife, have I lived a day that I would put my name proudly to, or did I just skate by? Because ultimately I'm the only one that knows, but I wanna make sure that I, did I get the double, double, did I give it my all to grow the business? And while I'm watching my Netflix show, I'm enjoying the show knowing that I enjoyed making progress that day. Oh, I love that. I, I'm an achievement, uh, hound, if you will. And so I like to get a gold star. I like the A's and all those things, so I love that question, that self-reflection and self-awareness that you're doing. Derrick, thank you so much for the honesty, the insight, the conversations about fear. Um, I, I just really appreciate everything that you've been doing in our industry to make advisors better. Everything that you do with your book and, and the work that you do on television to educate. Uh, consumers and Americans about their finances. You know, to our listeners, thank you all for being here. Uh, please subscribe and share the episode. Derrick, thank you so much. Pleasure, Shelby. I've enjoyed every minute of this. Thanks for a great conversation.