Greg [00:00:00]:
So let me tell you this. There's a couple things that I didn't understand when I went into business that I understand today. When you're a CEO, you actually take on about five to six other roles, okay? This is Secrets for Success. When? Welcome to the Seekers for Success podcast. I'm your host, Greg Tod. Thank you, as always, for being here. Today is one of those episodes that I think is extremely important because I think that being a CEO and being an entrepreneur is so glamorized. It's so glorified.
Greg [00:00:47]:
You see on Instagram and on TikTok, the Lambos, the amazing houses, the vacations, whenever you want this, that DA DA DA DA. And I really don't think people talk about the other side of it, what it really takes to be a CEO and the tough decisions that you have to make and the hardships that you have to go through. And so I want to use today's episode to talk about those things. But I was actually advised to do this from one of my team members because I'm going through some tough times right now as an entrepreneur, as a CEO. And I don't even want to talk about the times in the past with Renewal Rehab or with Therafit or one of my other companies or things that have happened before. I want to share with you guys right now what I'm going through as the CEO of a multimillion dollar company. This past week, as I'm doing this podcast, I had to do one of the worst things that you will sometimes have to do as a CEO, and that's lay people off, especially when it's people that you love, people that love you, that have a lot of respect for you and that believe in you. And that's the only reason why they decided to come and help me in my mission.
Greg [00:02:14]:
And so I had to make some decisions. And you want to know why? Because that's what a CEO does. Let me tell you this. There's a couple of things that I didn't understand when I went into business that I understand today. When you're a CEO, you actually take on about five to six other roles, okay? So number one is when you start your business, you got to be a CTO as well, right? That means that you're the one, especially when you're doing an online business, you've got to understand tech to at least a certain level, right? You got to be a CMO. You've got to understand marketing. You got to know what your audience is looking for, right? You have to be responsible for being a CSO, which is you got to be the Chief Strategy officer. You've got to understand what is a strategy behind what it is that you're going to do.
Greg [00:03:04]:
You have to be the COO. You got to be the person that's responsible for making sure that everything is working in line. What's the process of getting a customer? What's the process of keeping a customer what's the process of making a customer become loyal to you? Right? These are all the different parts of it. But then there's another part. You have to be the CFO, and that is the chief financial officer. You have to look at the numbers and say, okay, you know what? Based on these numbers and this strategy that I'm putting together, I'm going to go for it and I'm going to risk it, and I'm going to invest. And so this year, that's what I did. This year I created a strategy.
Greg [00:03:49]:
In the beginning of the year, I started marketing and created a new event. And we crushed it. We absolutely crushed it. And after all of these new clients that came in, I was like, okay, what do I do as an entrepreneur? I invest. So I took all the money and I reinvested it back into creating a new way to serve clients. And I brought on a lot of people. I actually seven Xed my team in 45 days. That was crazy, right? And once I did that, I did a live event, and I had the largest live event I've ever had revenue wise.
Greg [00:04:34]:
And it was absolutely amazing. And everything was great. Everything was great until a couple of little things went awry. And so I had to look as a CFO and say, whoa, you know what? We're projected to not hit some of the numbers that we need to hit for the rest of the year. And I had to lay off a few people here at my business. Now, you will very rarely hear that from a business coach because business coaches want to show you all the good, and they don't want to ever show you any of the bad, and they want to act like they're perfect, and that's the reason why you should use them as a business coach. Guys, I'm not perfect. I've been through business for 18 years.
Greg [00:05:16]:
I've had highs. I've had lows. I've had days that I don't even want to get out of bed. Like on Sunday when I knew what I had to do. I didn't even want to get out of bed Monday morning when I knew I was going to have to come and tell my entire team I didn't want to get out of bed. But as a CEO, that's what you got to do. And so it wasn't that I just laid off people and people that you love so much that are like your little brothers and your little sisters and mean so much to you, but then you also have to face the music to the rest of your team. And I'm sure they're confused and they're, oh, my gosh, am I going to be next? And this and that.
Greg [00:06:00]:
And you have to galvanize back up the team. And then guess what? You have to still take care of all your clients, and you have to show up for them, and you have to take care of you, who are people that lean on me for wisdom, for business, education, for so many other things, and then you still got to show up for your family. You got to show up for your wife, you got to show up for your kids. And they're scared. And it's crazy, because when I was doing some of these layoffs, my wife it was the first time my wife's ever heard me have to do that. And she felt the burden of it, and she couldn't sleep. And you guys, look, man, this is what the other side of it is. And I will say this.
Greg [00:06:43]:
I will say that I've never had a day where I've had to do multiple layoffs, but I've had days that have even felt worse than I experienced this past week when I only did one layoff. And so there's a couple of things that I want to share with you guys that I think is really important. I think number one is if you're willing to go through these tough times and you're willing to say, Lord, can you give me the wisdom? What should I learn from this? What you will do is you'll become stronger, you'll become more resilient, you'll become much more effective. And I realized that, wow, as terrible as those past two days were, it wasn't as bad as when I actually had to do this for the first time. You want to know why? It's because I'm a better CEO. I'm a different person. I'm more resilient. I can handle it better.
Greg [00:07:39]:
And so I think that's what I love about entrepreneurship. I love that it forces me to do hard things. I love that it forces me to become better, a better communicator, more resilient, emotionally, more stable spiritually, more have more resolve. I have to be physically better, and I have to be able to allow things to bounce off. And so anyways, that's my story. And I hope this resonates with you. I hope this doesn't detract you from being an entrepreneur and a CEO, but I know a lot of you right now you're struggling. I shared some of this with my inner circle, and I think they all agreed that it was probably the most powerful call, because I think sometimes all we're showing is the highs, and we're not showing the lows.
Greg [00:08:36]:
And right now, as I'm doing this podcast, I'm feeling the lows, but I'm hoping that this serves you. I'm hoping that this blesses you and you to know that if you are going through that right now, you're not alone. I'm right there with you, and there's a lot of people that are. They might not show it online, but I'm going to show it to you all. So I love you guys. Hope you got a lot from this episode. Till next time.
