Explore every episode of the podcast Inside Strategic Coach: Connecting Entrepreneurs With What Really Matters
| Title | Pub. Date | Duration | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Three Profiles Top Entrepreneurs Need To Know | 20 Oct 2026 | 00:32:38 | |
For decades, The Strategic Coach® Program has been helping entrepreneurs live their best lives. One of the first things new members receive is a set of three psychometric profiles. Business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain the importance and the benefits of what they call the “Strengths Package.”
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
The three profiles in Strategic Coach’s Strengths Package are Kolbe, CliftonStrengths®, and PRINT®.
The three Strengths Package profiles are extraordinarily valuable at getting to the very central concept in Strategic Coach, Unique Ability®.
Kolbe profiles tell you what activities generate happiness in your life, and what activities give you problems and failures. It measures how you can be relied on to take action.
While using profiles doesn’t guarantee success, not using them guarantees failure.
You never learn less by testing out a new idea.
Profiles provide users with a shared language.
The PRINT Profile deals with your underlying motivation, or your “motivational identity.”
Resources:
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
In our previous episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explained how entrepreneurs can turn their unique knowledge into capabilities that grow beyond themselves. Listen to The Entrepreneur’s Guide To Becoming An Invention Machine.
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| The Entrepreneur’s Guide To Becoming An Invention Machine | 06 Oct 2026 | 00:24:44 | |
What if your company could create value for clients without depending on you to deliver it personally? Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore why Strategic Coach® is an invention-producing enterprise, how intellectual property creates lasting value, and how entrepreneurs can turn their unique knowledge into capabilities that grow beyond themselves.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Strategic Coach has thousands of copyrights, hundreds of trademarks, and 85 patents.
Strategic Coach isn’t just a coaching company; it’s an invention-producing enterprise that creates new thinking tools for entrepreneurs.
Many coaching companies build their reputation through marketing and networking, while Strategic Coach’s intellectual property provides an additional source of marketplace credibility.
The U.S. Patent Bureau takes an adversarial approach, searching for reasons an invention may not qualify for a patent.
To receive a patent for a thinking tool, you must show that it’s unique, useful, non-obvious, and capable of producing consistent results.
Start by creating a product or service, then build the customer experience, create intellectual property, and turn it into intellectual capital that others can use.
Members experience Strategic Coach as an invention-producing enterprise through its thinking tools, teamwork, workshops, and the details of the overall experience.
Strategic Coach’s tools are tested with thousands of entrepreneurs and produce consistent results, even when taught by different coaches.
When your ideas become intellectual property, the value you create is no longer dependent on your being there personally.
Personality-based companies can grow only as far as the founder can show up, perform, and deliver the experience.
A system-based company gives other people the ability to create and deliver value using a proven method.
Ask yourself: For your company to have 10x the impact without clients ever interacting with you, how would your knowledge and capabilities have to be packaged?
Naming, documenting, and protecting your Unique Process™ is a practical first step toward making your company less dependent on you.
Resources:
What Is A Self-Managing Company®?
Casting Not Hiring by Dan Sullivan and Jeffrey Madoff
Casting Your 4 x 4 Company by Dan Sullivan If you missed the last episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss the dangers of maybes and the benefits of making clear-cut decisions. Entrepreneurs like being in action, but too often they get stuck in an in-between phase on a project. Tap here to listen to The One Word That Stops Entrepreneurs From Taking Action | |||
| The One Word That Stops Entrepreneurs From Taking Action | 22 Sep 2026 | 00:20:42 | |
Entrepreneurs like being in action, but too often they get stuck in an in-between phase on a project. Business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss the dangers of maybes and the benefits of making clear-cut decisions.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Both yes and no are strategically useful. In your past, you either said yes and took a complete action, or you said no and prevented yourself from getting into trouble.
Paralysis is in the middle of yes and no. This is where maybe is.
When you’re saying maybe, you’re not committed or certain, so you keep yourself in a state of suspended animation.
Your brain is what directs you toward and enables action, and it operates incredibly quickly.
You can give your brain some help by deciding yes or no, and eliminating everything in the middle.
Every week, look at your list of prospects and keep the yeses. “Maybe” kills you, “yes” rewards you, and “no” teaches you because you’re developing discretion.
For some entrepreneurs, their research phase doesn’t start until they’ve made a decision and are in motion.
When someone’s stuck in the maybe phase, it might be because they’re scared of making the wrong decision. They favor definitely not failing over potentially succeeding.
Instead of worrying about making the right decision, you can make a decision and then work to make the decision right.
Discovering what works for you leads to increased discernment.
No matter how long you spend on research and planning, you won’t know if your idea works until you engage with the marketplace or your clientele.
Resources:
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan
Multiplication By Subtraction by Shannon Waller
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| Yesterday Creates Tomorrow | 08 Sep 2026 | 00:21:43 | |
What if the best way to create a better future is to focus on making today a great yesterday? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore a simple, rewarding way to approach time that can reduce stress, sharpen focus, and help you feel more satisfied with each day as it happens.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
What you do today, and how you think about it, shapes your experience of tomorrow.
Start each morning by deciding what would make today a great yesterday when you wake up tomorrow.
When you focus on creating a great yesterday, tomorrow becomes less about worry and more about the commitments you make today.
Creating great yesterdays can reduce the stress and regret you carry from the past.
When tomorrow takes care of itself, you can feel less pressure and anxiety about the future.
Getting emotionally attached to future possibilities can create anxiety because those possibilities don’t yet exist.
Each future possibility you become attached to competes for your attention today.
Focusing on today can improve your concentration by freeing you from stress about the past and future.
A simple point system can make daily progress more visible, playful, and satisfying.
There are no punishments in this system—only rewards for actions that move your life forward.
An activity is more valuable if you do it consciously.
Resources:
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
Not Being Bothered by Dan Sullivan | |||
| A Bored Entrepreneur Is A Dangerous Entrepreneur | 25 Aug 2026 | 00:22:11 | |
For entrepreneurs, boredom is more than an inconvenience. It can lead to poor decisions, unnecessary disruption, and lost momentum. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore why conscious thinking is the antidote to boredom and how asking better questions can create fresh energy, clarity, and opportunity from the experiences already in front of you.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Entrepreneurs need achievement that feels new, better, and different to stay energized and engaged.
If you are no longer growing, or are achieving in the same way for too long, boredom can quickly set in.
Boredom is not always a signal to look for more external stimulation; it can be a cue to change how you’re thinking.
You can shift your energy by consciously switching away from an unproductive thought and giving your brain a better question to answer.
Becoming aware of what you’re thinking, feeling, and experiencing in the moment is a practical antidote to boredom.
Asking yourself, “What is actually happening right now?” turns you from a passive participant into an active observer.
Taking the role of an observer creates emotional distance and helps you see a stressful situation more clearly.
Naming your experience gives your brain something specific to work on and creates an immediate shift in energy.
Anger and negative emotions can take over when you’re reacting unconsciously instead of examining what’s happening.
Curiosity keeps entrepreneurs engaged because it turns familiar experiences into sources of new insight.
Reviewing your best “yes” decisions and best “no” decisions can reveal valuable patterns, connections, and confidence for the future.
The more conscious you are of your thinking, the more easily you can create fresh energy from your past, present, and future experiences.
Resources:
The Greater Game by Dan Sullivan and John Bowen
Thinking About Your Thinking by Dan Sullivan
Inviting Genius: How Good Leaders Use Conflict to Become Great by Matthew Abrams
The 3 Most Important Questions For Constant Growth As An Entrepreneur | |||
| Who We’re Looking For | 11 Aug 2026 | 00:28:13 | |
For over five decades, Strategic Coach® co-founder Dan Sullivan has been coaching talented, successful, ambitious entrepreneurs. In this episode, Dan shares insights from his new book, Who We’re Looking For, as he and business coach Shannon Waller define the kind of entrepreneur who gains the most from joining The Strategic Coach® Program.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Who you are is often easier for someone else to see, especially when they’re watching you in action and noticing what consistently works for you.
Your life is made up of hundreds and thousands of experiences, and the patterns of what works and what doesn’t reveal your real talents and direction.
The entrepreneurs who thrive in Strategic Coach are the ones who have chosen to base their income on their own effectiveness in the marketplace.
Entrepreneurs have the strongest connection to their ambition because they’ve taken full responsibility for creating their own opportunities and results.
Strategic Coach has coached over 25,000 entrepreneurs, and some members have been in the Program for more than 35 years, treating it as their entrepreneurial home.
The ideal Strategic Coach member is talented, successful, highly ambitious, and never wants to stop growing their freedom and impact.
When the right-fit entrepreneur hears about Strategic Coach, they recognize it immediately as the structure and community they’ve been looking for, which makes getting started simple and fast.
In the Strategic Coach community, entrepreneurs collaborate rather than compete, contributing their experiences and insights so everyone grows faster.
The biggest danger for entrepreneurs is loneliness, especially when they feel like no one around them really understands their ambition or experience.
Most entrepreneurs have had to prove themselves on their own without a process, structure, or environment designed specifically for people who think the way they do.
Strategic Coach gives entrepreneurs a space where they can be unabashedly ambitious and surrounded by peers who want them to think even bigger.
Fundamental entrepreneurial thinking is different from knowing your industry; it’s a way of seeing opportunities, taking ownership, and creating value regardless of the business you’re in.
There’s no point in being a successful entrepreneur unless your success continually increases your sense of personal happiness and agency.
Resources:
My Plan For Living To 156 by Dan Sullivan
What Is A Self-Managing Company®?
The Entrepreneur’s Guide To Time Management
Thinking About Your Thinking by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Grow Your Company By Growing Yourself, with Teresa Easler | 28 Jul 2026 | 00:41:16 | |
What does it take to build a business around only what you love doing? In this episode, Shannon Waller sits down with long-time Program Coach Teresa Easler to talk entrepreneurship, Unique Ability®, and designing a Self-Managing Company® that supports your best work. Teresa explains how better boundaries, courageous decisions, and seeing your business as intellectual property can change the way you lead and grow.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Most entrepreneurs can trace their roots back to childhood experiments in selling, serving, and creating value.
Sometimes we choose entrepreneurship and sometimes life pushes us into it, but the result can be the same: freedom and growth.
You can design a business where you do only what you truly love and are uniquely great at.
Real communication isn’t just data exchange; it’s genuine connection and partnership with the person you’re talking to.
Entrepreneurs need strong communication both in the marketplace and inside the company with their teams.
It’s almost impossible to clearly communicate your value on your own because you’re too close to your own business story.
You can decide you won’t work with anyone you wouldn’t genuinely enjoy spending time with.
Learning to say no is a courage muscle that keeps your life and business simpler and more profitable.
Saying “yes” too quickly creates obligations without real commitment, which leads directly to messes and drama.
Treating your ideas and frameworks as intellectual property lifts you out of just selling products and services.
When you build a Unique Ability-focused team, you can take more time off while your company keeps growing.
Resources:
The Entrepreneur's Guide To Time Management
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan
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| The Entrepreneur’s Playbook For Mastering AI Without Anxiety | 14 Jul 2026 | 00:24:03 | |
AI can do a lot of tasks that used to take human effort, but it can’t think about its own thinking. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain why the right response to AI is to become more conscious, discerning, and intentional so you can use technology with clarity and purpose.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
AI is doing work that people used to do manually, but that doesn’t make it original thinking.
A lot of everyday thinking is repetitive and mechanical, which is exactly the kind of work AI can handle well.
Every interaction with technology that we take for granted now might have been a troubling experience when it was first introduced.
AI isn’t new. It's just entered the realm of cognition.
Most people think about only three things: things, people, and other people’s thoughts. The fourth level is thinking about your thinking.
If you think about your thinking, you’ll become very discerning and masterful in how you use AI.
Everyone uses AI for different reasons.
A lot of AI’s capabilities probably don’t serve your purposes.
To use AI effectively, you need to be clear on your reasons for using it.
AI is trying to keep up with humanity, not the other way around.
Resources:
Shannon Waller’s Team Success Podcast
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| Failure Is The Fuel To Power Your Next Breakthrough | 02 Jul 2026 | 00:20:32 | |
Failure never feels good, but trying to dodge it or downplay it keeps you from learning what you most need as an entrepreneur. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore why you should let failure be failure, fully feel the emotion, and then transform that energy into better thinking, better timing, and bigger progress.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode: Why people sometimes avoid thinking about a failure. Why you should allow yourself to fully experience your first failure. Where entrepreneurs set themselves up for the most unhappiness. The new Strategic Coach® thinking tool that shows you how you handle your failures and your breakthroughs.
Show Notes:
If you don’t learn from your failure, you’ll fail the same way again.
When you fail, let yourself feel the full negative emotion once, then use that energy to decide what you’ll do differently next time.
A person who keeps failing at the same thing with no learning and no change in behavior becomes a failure in that area.
Repeated failures in the same way can start to erode your sense of who you are as an entrepreneur.
Every failure is sending you a message about your thinking, preparation, or timing, and your job is to pay attention to it.
How you handle your failures and your breakthroughs determines whether you’re actually functioning as an entrepreneur.
Entrepreneurism is a daily back and forth between breakthroughs and failures, and both are raw material for new capabilities.
Many people try to avoid intense emotion, but dodging the feeling of failure also cuts you off from the insight it could lead to.
Most people measure their progress against an ideal, but an ideal is not reality; it’s an unreality that guarantees disappointment.
Often the “failure” is not the goal or project itself, but an unrealistic deadline or short game that ignores the actual capabilities and resources you have.
Your emotions aren’t attached to what happens outside you; they’re attached to how you choose to think about what happens, which means you can respond creatively instead of reactively.
Resources:
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
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| Unlock A Fourth Level Of Thinking That Elite Entrepreneurs Rely On | 16 Jun 2026 | 00:39:11 | |
Everyone knows what cognitive thinking is, but what about metacognitive thinking? Dan Sullivan uses this term to describe the kind of thinking The Strategic Coach® Program develops in entrepreneurs. In this episode, Dan and fellow business coach Shannon Waller explore metacognitive thinking and how it helps the right kind of entrepreneurs achieve their biggest dreams with greater clarity and confidence.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
One level of thinking is thinking about things. People like things, and they often use shared things as common ground for conversation.
The second level of thinking is thinking about people, which is why social media has become such a powerful phenomenon.
For most people, thinking about things and thinking about people uses up almost all of their available mental time.
The third level of thinking is thinking about thoughts, which is the focus of higher education and high-level media.
In higher education, professors typically teach other people’s thinking rather than developing and teaching their own.
The fourth level of thinking, which very creative people—and especially entrepreneurs—can access, is thinking about your thinking.
Thinking about your thinking gives you the ability to deliberately change how you’re thinking about a situation or problem.
Strategic Coach® provides hundreds of thinking tools to help entrepreneurs think about their thinking in structured, practical ways.
Your emotions are not a direct response to what happens outside of you; they’re a response to how you’re thinking about what happens.
Resources:
My Plan For Living To 156 by Dan Sullivan
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| Real Entrepreneurial Creativity Can’t Be Copied | 02 Jun 2026 | 00:23:16 | |
Entrepreneurs often need to be creative to have a profitable business. What do you do when you aren’t a creative person? In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about the “why” and “how” of imitating other people in order to achieve business success. Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:
Show Notes: There are two timeless ways of learning and improving yourself: imitating other people's performance, and repetition. Humans are the only species that can use their brains to access the uniqueness of other people's brains. We all imitate other people, whether we like to admit it or not. If you're creative, and you come across someone who's more creative, you imitate, but at a certain point, you make it your own. What an imitating person does, and for how long they do it, tells you whether they're just an imitator or whether they're creative. If you appreciate someone else’s skills, you can translate them into your own world. Creative people can be polarizing. You create a new capability using vision and obstacles. The combination of two people’s uniqueness creates something brand new. People who imitate but aren’t creative are stealing. In a world of AI imitation, creative people are going to get wildly more creative to differentiate themselves from robots. Resources: Your Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan Sullivan | |||
| How To Create A Company That Top Talent Never Wants To Leave | 19 May 2026 | 00:35:44 | |
Every great entrepreneur wants (and deserves) to have a dependable team around them so they can be freed up to develop new ideas and focus on growing their business. But how do you get one? After all, the first question most entrepreneurs ask when they join The Strategic Coach® Program is, “Where do you find such great team members?” In this episode of Inside Strategic Coach, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller finally answer this question in-depth. From identifying and nurturing Unique Ability® within a team and creating a positive and collaborative work culture to investing in team members’ growth, Dan and Shannon share everything that makes Strategic Coach® a magnet for skilled and passionate talent—and how to become one too. Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
At Strategic Coach, you’re always either winning or learning.
There are a lot of Coach tools that support having a great team.
Everybody's on their own unique growth path in terms of who they are and the kind of work they’re most likely to enjoy and excel at.
Strategic Coach team members can continually focus their time at work on doing what they’re excited about.
The moment someone is hired, Coach invests in learning about who that person is and how they can grow their skills.
At Strategic Coach, if something doesn’t work, the system gets blamed, not the individual.
The four core values of Strategic Coach (PAGE) are: positive and collaborative teamwork, being alert, curious, responsive, and resourceful, getting results, and providing an excellent first-class experience.
Strategic Coach has uniformly very helpful and very positive staff.
Some Coach clients have been with the company for 15, 20, 25 years, and so have some team members.
The educational system generally disparages successful business people.
Almost all Coach team members are directly in contact on a person to person level with the company’s clients.
A team member can’t be at their best if they don’t feel safe.
If you want great team members, you have to be a great entrepreneur. And that also includes being a great person.
Great team members who want a bigger future aren't interested in being with someone who doesn't have any future.
If you're going to be able to attract and retain the best people out there, you can’t have an entitled attitude.
Resources:
Article: Your Business Is a Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show on the Front Stage
The Team Success Handbook by Shannon Waller
Everyone And Everything Grows by Dan Sullivan
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||
| The Powerful Mindset That Makes 10x Growth Feel Easy | 05 May 2026 | 00:18:19 | |
Every entrepreneur would love to go 10x. So what’s holding them back? In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller share the mindset you need to experience major business growth.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
The world is progressing on the basis of new tools, new technologies, and new opportunities.
We’ve all gone 10x many times in our lives.
It’s useful for entrepreneurs to look at how they’ve grown within the framework of their entrepreneurial lives.
You can look at massive growth as a series of 10x jumps.
If you don’t have a deadline for it, it’s only a wish.
Entrepreneurs don’t drive themselves crazy with their goals, they drive themselves crazy with their deadlines.
Money you make can be good or bad depending on the activity and who is writing you the check.
The four entrepreneurial freedoms are freedom of time, money, relationship, and purpose.
All entrepreneurs seek the freedom to focus on whatever they want to focus on.
Looking ahead doesn’t tell you how to go 10x.
Change is a natural part of being an entrepreneur.
Resources:
10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy The Self-Managing Company by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Just Because You’re Busy Doesn’t Mean You’re Productive | 21 Apr 2026 | 00:17:11 | |
A lot of people go to great lengths to always appear busy. But should you really see being busy as a badge of honor? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain why the answer is “no.” Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:
Show Notes: People try to establish their value by always being busy. Being busy has nothing to do with any kind of results. As results oriented people get better at what they do, they achieve their desired results by being less busy. Depending on the rules you set up in your company, either being busy or achieving results will be rewarded. Busy people see it as dangerous to not be seen on any workday. In large bureaucracies, you get promoted on the basis of your busyness because the organization’s purpose is to be seen as busy. Entrepreneurial companies get connected to the marketplace very quickly. There’s no progress without measurement. Entrepreneurs tend to make for really lousy employees. We’re always ignorant and incapable when we start anything new. Resources: “Geometry” For Staying Cool & Calm by Dan Sullivan The Entrepreneur’s Guide To Time Management Article: Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage by Shannon Waller The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Technology Isn’t Cool Until It’s Boring | 07 Apr 2026 | 00:15:13 | |
A technology doesn’t truly transform the world until it becomes so normal that it’s boring. As dramatic as AI feels today, it’s headed for the same destination. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore the different stages people are at with AI, what entrepreneurs can expect as it becomes embedded in everyday life, and how they can turn AI into a capability that multiplies their existing strengths.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Technology only becomes truly useful when it’s so normal in your life that you barely notice it.
What feels disruptive and exciting today will quickly become just another dependable part of how you get results.
AI will embed into every tool you use at a far faster pace than any previous technology shift.
Electricity, highways, and smartphones were once extraordinary breakthroughs, but now they’re simply part of everyday life.
If you’re overwhelmed by AI, the real issue isn’t the technology itself, but unmade decisions about what you want and what it means for you.
Humans are uniquely wired to normalize change, which is why your biggest breakthroughs eventually feel routine.
The faster you can emotionally normalize new technology, the faster you can turn it into a strategic advantage.
No technology changes your character, but it can dramatically multiply the results of your existing habits.
AI is particularly powerful for repetitive, standardized activities that free you up for higher-value thinking and relationships.
If you struggle with people and teamwork, AI won’t fix that problem; it will just expose it more clearly.
Most fears about AI come from team members feeling it’s being imposed on them without context, safety, or a future they can see themselves in.
Your team’s concerns about AI are useful raw material for designing solutions that grow their confidence and engagement.
The real opportunity is not just building smarter tools, but helping people feel capable and confident using them.
Every 10x jump in your business starts with a period of fear, uncertainty, and discomfort that later becomes your next version of normal.
Measuring your progress backwards shows how many things that once felt extraordinary are now just part of how you operate.
Instead of waiting for AI to feel safe, decide how you want it to support your best future and then take small, practical steps toward it.
The entrepreneurs who win with AI will be the ones who treat it as an everyday capability, not a one‑time miracle.
Resources:
10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||
| This One Small Change Makes Every Day A Win | 24 Mar 2026 | 00:14:24 | |
What if your only job today were to create a great yesterday? In this episode, Dan Sullivan shares a simple daily mindset shift that keeps entrepreneurs grounded, focused, and remarkably productive. Learn how “creating yesterday” calms future anxiety, turns frustration into successes, and helps you fully appreciate the small actions that make each day a real win.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
ADHD can pull your attention into endless future possibilities.
Thinking about tomorrow can make you feel great about what you’re doing today.
Focusing on creating great yesterdays keeps you grounded in the present.
Staying focused on creating a great yesterday helps you avoid feeling bothered by what you can’t control.
We never actually experience the future.
We can only act on the future when it shows up as the present.
Don’t let yourself get upset about something you can’t do anything about.
Stay in charge of your experience instead of letting situations be in charge.
Focusing on creating great yesterdays keeps you from getting worn out by the future.
Writing down what you do throughout the day anchors the experience.
Being conscious about the activities you’re doing has its own reward.
Resources:
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy
My Plan For Living To 156 by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Magic Happens When Improv Meets Entrepreneurship | 10 Mar 2026 | 00:18:18 | |
Most entrepreneurs were trained to win through competition, not collaboration. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller show how the rules of improv—no one in charge, “yes, and,” and always supporting your partner—create transformative business partnerships, helping you think on your feet, combine unique strengths, and co‑create new value that competitors simply can’t copy.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Strategic Coach® has always taken a theatrical approach to business, with a clear structure for entrepreneurs to bring their own content and breakthroughs.
Thinking about your thinking lets you compare experiences, spot patterns, and create better solutions than you’ve had before.
When you combine past experiences in new ways, you generate fresh ideas and opportunities that didn’t exist on their own.
At Coach, the workshop tools may stay the same, but what each entrepreneur focuses on and transforms is totally unpredictable.
Great coaching means being comfortable with anything participants say or ask and using it as raw material for progress.
Your work life and personal life work best when they collaborate instead of compete, supporting the same future.
Most entrepreneurs grow up in a world of pure competition and have to consciously shift into collaboration.
At the highest level, successful companies collaborate with other successful companies to create a “third thing” for shared clients.
This “third thing” is a new value creation that competitors can’t copy because they don’t know how it was created.
In improv and in collaboration, no one is the boss; each partner brings different strengths and has equal status.
The first rule of improv is to say yes to any new idea your partner brings instead of debating or analyzing it to death.
The second rule of improv is to actively support your partner’s progress by adding value to what they’ve started.
Powerful collaborators stay alert, curious, responsive, and resourceful so they can build on what’s happening in real time. Collaboration dies when your partner doesn’t respond, fails to comment, opposes your idea, or refuses to contribute to it.
The best collaborative days often come from letting go of rigid plans and following the energy of the group’s best ideas. Being a great collaborator means arriving prepared with a “quiver” of experiences and examples you can draw on in the moment.
You can strengthen your improv muscle by asking unpredictable, high‑value questions rather than trying to have all the answers.
Resources:
Casting Not Hiring by Dan Sullivan and Jeffrey Madoff
Thinking About Your Thinking by Dan Sullivan
Yes, And by Kelly Leonard and Tom Yorton | |||
| Why Your Kind Of Smart Is Exactly What The World Needs | 24 Feb 2026 | 00:18:42 | |
Do you ever catch yourself frustrated that other people don’t think or perform the way you do? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller reveal why that difference is actually good news. Discover how appreciating your own uniqueness frees you from comparison, deepens teamwork, and helps you recognize the countless ways other people are smart and useful.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Wanting to be unique while also blaming others for not being like you is a mental trap that creates frustration and resentment. As an entrepreneur, your success comes from being usefully different in the marketplace, not from everyone else sharing your strengths or level of intelligence. Profiles like Kolbe, CliftonStrengths®, DISC, and Working Genius® make it obvious that every person is wired in a distinct way that can be incredibly valuable.
The fact that other people don’t see what you see or think how you think is good news because it proves your uniqueness has real marketplace value. When you measure other people against your own personal “ideal,” you drop them into “The Gap” instead of appreciating the real progress and capability they already have.
The moment you genuinely appreciate your own uniqueness, it becomes much easier and more natural to appreciate other people’s uniqueness too.
Better teamwork happens when collaborators don’t have the same skills, instincts, and talents because each person covers gaps the others can’t see or fill.
A powerful question to uncover someone’s intelligence is, “When it’s completely up to you, what do you most like to do?” and then keep asking curious follow-up questions.
You’ll quickly discover that even people who don’t seem “smart” in your way are often extraordinarily knowledgeable and perceptive in areas you know nothing about.
Most of the useful progress in the world has come from people without formal credentials who simply applied their kind of intelligence to real-world results.
Being okay with the way you’re smart liberates you from constant comparison so you can focus on deepening your strengths and expanding your contribution. Unique Ability® combines what you love doing, what you’re exceptionally good at, what gives you energy, and what consistently creates value for others.
When you commit to getting better and more useful with your Unique Ability, you naturally attract opportunities, collaborators, and clients who value exactly how you think. Trying to be good at everything or match other people’s strengths keeps you average, while doubling down on your Unique Ability makes you extraordinary. Appreciating your own uniqueness removes blame, anger, and guilt from relationships and replaces them with curiosity, respect, and more strategic collaboration. The most productive entrepreneurial communities are built around uniquely different people who share common rules and values, not around everyone being the same.
Resources:
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
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| Simple Habits For True Happiness While Building Your Business | 10 Feb 2026 | 00:27:30 | |
Happiness can be tricky for entrepreneurs, especially when the outside world thinks you’ve already “made it.” In this episode, Dan Sullivan shares a simple daily framework for staying genuinely happy as an entrepreneur, regardless of what’s happening in your business, your relationships, or the larger world around you. Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Entrepreneurial happiness comes from a way of being that you practice every day, not a goal or a destination.
The first ingredient for a happy entrepreneurial life is making real daily progress, not just occasional big wins.
Measuring yourself against an ideal future is like measuring your distance to the horizon line—you never feel any closer.
You feel genuinely successful when you measure progress against where you started and what you’ve actually achieved.
A simple end-of-day reflection on what you accomplished turns an ordinary day into a tangible gain you can build on tomorrow.
The second ingredient for a happy entrepreneur is liking who you are, which means appreciating how you handle setbacks, not pretending you’ve never made mistakes. When you give yourself grace for past decisions, it becomes much easier to extend that same grace to other people.
Even if you don’t achieve your goal, you can be pleased with how you went about things.
Being truly useful to other people each day is the third ingredient that makes entrepreneurial happiness feel complete. Strategic Coach® is built on hundreds of thinking tools that help entrepreneurs reframe situations and recognize the progress they’re actually making.
These three ingredients—progress, self-liking, and usefulness—keep you grounded in the present instead of trapped in past regrets or future fantasies.
Of the three, liking who you are carries special weight because without self-respect, progress and usefulness don’t feel satisfying. It’s hard to feel useful doing work you’re not good at or don’t enjoy, so designing your role around your Unique Ability® is crucial for happiness.
Greater self-awareness helps you like yourself more because you understand which situations you handle well and which ones you should avoid or delegate.
Dan describes happiness as living in “local reality”—what’s real, available, and actionable right now, instead of chasing someone else’s reality. Viewing each day through this three-part lens is a practical way to keep your entrepreneurial confidence high, no matter what challenges arise.
Resources:
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
Shannon Waller’s Team Success podcast
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| Feelings Are Fuel For Entrepreneurial Creativity | 27 Jan 2026 | 00:21:03 | |
Today’s media environment constantly tugs at your emotions and makes it harder to think clearly about your future. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller show how to treat feelings—especially being bothered—as raw material rather than reality, and how to quickly turn intense emotional energy into insight, better decisions, and creative projects that expand your future possibilities. Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Modern news and social media are engineered to grab your feelings, which can crowd out your ability to think about your own future.
Constantly reacting to events outside of you makes it harder to think clearly and see where you actually want to go. Feelings are experienced physically and biologically, not intellectually, which is why they can be so overwhelming in the moment.
There’s a big difference between simply having feelings and using those feelings to trigger real thinking and new ideas.
Strong emotions, whether positive or negative, are early warning signals that something needs to be understood, decided, or created.
When you get deeply bothered by an experience, you can either stay stuck in the story or use that energy to design a better future.
Many of Strategic Coach’s most powerful thinking tools, including The Experience Transformer®, were created because Dan was determined not to repeat a negative experience. Capturing the energy from a negative event and channeling it into a specific creative project gives you huge momentum—but only for a short window of time.
Reinterpreting past experiences through learning changes how they feel and upgrades your capabilities going forward. Taking ownership of your emotional responses gives you power, control, and agency instead of leaving you at the mercy of circumstances or other people.
Resources:
Multiplication By Subtraction by Shannon Waller
Transforming Experiences Into Multipliers
Not Being Bothered by Dan Sullivan | |||
| How Entrepreneurs Are Using AI Without Losing Their Edge | 13 Jan 2026 | 00:17:44 | |
Predictions have been made over the years, especially with the emergence of AI, that computers will be more intelligent than human beings. But humanity is always infinitely greater than anything that humans create. Business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss why computer intelligence can never compete with humanity’s intelligence.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Humans communicate in many undetectable and immeasurable ways.
A single telephone has no value whatsoever.
With the addition of every new technology that allows human beings to interact with one another, the combined intelligence of the planet multiplies.
A new technological capability could never be greater than the total amount of thinking that all humans do.
You can’t be inside of a system and understand that system.
Computers are just a subset of human intelligence.
Unlike humans, machines can be consistent and constant in their use of intelligence.
Humanity is everything that humans have done over hundreds of thousands of years.
Resources:
“Overcoming Delegation Issues: A Comprehensive 5-Step Guide” | |||
| How To Build AI Around Your Most Valuable Strengths | 23 Dec 2025 | 00:20:29 | |
Your deepest passion is yours alone, and what lights others up may leave you completely cold. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore why every entrepreneur is born unique, how your experiences continually shape that uniqueness, and how doubling down on it leads to greater freedom, happiness, and business success.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Every person is born with a Unique Ability®, and that’s the central starting point for all Strategic Coach® thinking.
Your entire life is a process of navigating and giving meaning to the uniqueness of your own experience.
As an individual, you are constantly reinforcing a central set of interests and capabilities through every experience you choose.
When you go deep with anyone, you quickly discover they’re far more unique than you initially assumed.
Hundreds of times a day, you’re sorting experiences into “more of this, less of that,” steadily clarifying what matters most to you.
Entrepreneurs are the people who have bet the most on the thing they’re uniquely and intensely interested in.
To operate in the world, everyone has to learn a basic level of conformity—showing up, keeping promises, and finishing what they start.
Thanks to technology, individuals now have more freedom than ever to pursue and deepen their own interests.
Whatever someone is passionate about becomes the center of their universe, and they keep reinforcing it by seeking aligned experiences.
You’re always looking for experiences that make your passion and Unique Ability even more central and valuable in your life.
Powerful collaboration happens when people find shared interests where each can bring their own Unique Ability to create a “third thing” together.
Resources:
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||
| The Community Where Ambitious Entrepreneurs Belong, with Chad Johnson | 09 Dec 2025 | 00:46:13 | |
In this special episode, Shannon Waller sits down with Program Coach Chad Johnson to explore his entrepreneurial journey, what he’s learned along the way, and how he helps Strategic Coach® members grow bigger, simpler, and more rewarding businesses.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
There’s value around you all the time; often, it just takes a moment of attention to see it.
You can’t scale a business on ambition and positive attitude alone.
It’s natural for entrepreneurs to want to jump to the next project, but that impulse needs to be managed.
The right life partner can act as an accelerant for everything you want in life.
In great organizations, everyone makes everyone else better.
The work you do as an entrepreneur is closely tied to the growth you do at home.
For entrepreneurs, business is not just what you do—it’s part of who you are.
Strategic Coach coaches are also members, so they live the tools they teach.
Any new concept has to work for the coach first before it’s shared with members.
Freedom is often the deepest motivation for entrepreneurs.
It can take time for your real-world experience to catch up with your mindset and goals.
Long-term success comes from committing to a few important things, not chasing every new idea.
The right coach relationship helps you turn everyday experiences into breakthroughs.
Resources:
How to Win a Heart by Chad Johnson The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy 10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy The 4 Freedoms That Motivate Successful Entrepreneurs How To Foster A Longevity Mindset & Reap The Benefits The Entrepreneur's Guide To Time Management Your Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan Sullivan The Only Leaders Worth* Following by Tim Spiker | |||
| The High Price You’ll Pay For Creative Isolation | 25 Nov 2025 | 00:23:07 | |
Isolation is more than just uncomfortable—it distorts your thinking and drains your creativity. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller open up about the risks of going it alone as an entrepreneur and why strong relationships make all the difference. Listen now to learn smart, actionable ways to reconnect, recharge, and keep yourself moving forward with clarity and confidence.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Being an entrepreneur can be a lonely path, especially without external feedback.
When there’s no outside input, your mind starts making things up.
Isolation causes your brain to respond just like it would to sensory deprivation.
Entrepreneurs thrive on constant change, while most people resist change.
An entrepreneur’s creative imagination needs to be rewarded with real opportunities.
Many entrepreneurs feel truly stimulated only when they’re working productively.
Isolated entrepreneurs use their imaginations to give themselves the sense that they're actually connected to the world.
Feeling misunderstood quickly morphs into paranoia and makes isolation worse.
Entrepreneurs are better than most at finding their own clarity, even in tough situations.
The entrepreneurial journey means creating brand-new ideas and selling them, time after time.
Seeing life from other people’s perspectives keeps you connected and tuned in to reality.
The more you understand and appreciate other people’s experiences, the richer and more meaningful your own life becomes.
Resources:
Always Be The Buyer by Dan Sullivan | |||
| The Emotional Edge Top Entrepreneurs Can’t Ignore | 11 Nov 2025 | 00:18:00 | |
Do you ever wish difficult emotions would just disappear? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller reveal why every feeling, especially the bothersome kind, is actually a valuable resource for entrepreneurial growth. Discover how turning frustration into clarity and action can lead to your next breakthrough, and learn the thinking tools that transform emotional energy into future results.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Feelings are signals, not solutions—they alert you to something worth thinking about.
Feelings don’t transform themselves; vision and capability do.
The real power lies in transforming emotional energy into future-focused action.
Feeling “bothered” is raw material for entrepreneurial creativity and improvement.
Successful entrepreneurs treat bother as a resource, turning it into planning and innovation.
Asking, “If I weren’t bothered, what would I be doing?” can pivot your mindset and open new possibilities.
Responding thoughtfully, rather than reacting emotionally, leads to better results for you and your team.
You can’t control others’ reactions, but you can fully own your own process and responses.
Ignoring your feelings (or acting out impulsively) usually makes things worse.
Every feeling brings energy—use it to fuel thinking, problem solving, and the creation of new tools.
Mastery comes from skillfully transforming negative emotions into positive action, not from avoiding them.
The entrepreneur’s job is to turn low-productivity “bother” into high-productivity breakthroughs.
Don’t aim for perfect detachment; instead, get better at using what bothers you for future advantage.
Resources:
Not Being Bothered by Dan Sullivan
Multiplication By Subtraction by Shannon Waller | |||
| Why Ambition Is Often A Dirty Word For Entrepreneurs | 28 Oct 2025 | 00:24:12 | |
What if ambition isn’t something you’re born with, but a capability you can keep growing? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore why ambition is the single master capability for entrepreneurs and how to nurture it. Learn why talking about ambition is difficult, how to grow it continually, and why community and capability are the true accelerators of progress.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Entrepreneurs succeed because they decide to rely on their own ambition and capability, taking a road most people won’t choose.
Ambition is not a fixed trait—it’s a capability, and it grows each time you acquire new skills or take on new challenges.
Ambition is the single master capability that enables you to achieve all other capabilities.
Openly talking about ambition can be uncomfortable because people often feel there’s a pecking order with ambition, but this discomfort is natural, and moving past it leads to greater freedom and fulfillment.
Comparing yourself to others works against ambition; entrepreneurs thrive by measuring progress from their own efforts and growth, not against external ideals or other people.
Envy is the true enemy of ambition—it’s driven by comparison and leads to stagnation rather than growth.
The Strategic Coach community is designed for entrepreneurs to talk about ambition openly, celebrate wins, and receive genuine support and collaboration.
Unique Ability® is central: focus on a few activities that truly make use of your strengths, and surround yourself with others who do the same.
Collaboration among unique, ambitious people isn’t accidental; when you support someone else’s ambition, you reinforce your own.
Every Strategic Coach tool you master is meant to help you grow ambition, navigate obstacles, and create new opportunities.
If you want ambition to keep expanding, focus on what gives you energy and leverage your team so you can multiply your results.
Growth as an entrepreneur isn’t about fitting in; it’s about continually becoming more useful and unique in the marketplace.
Resources:
Always More Ambitious by Dan Sullivan
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||
| Why Entrepreneurs Who Keep Playing Always Win, with Lee Brower | 14 Oct 2025 | 00:37:56 | |
Are you thriving or just arriving? In this episode, Shannon Waller and Program Coach Lee Brower explore the lifelong mindset that keeps entrepreneurs in motion long after the initial motivation fades. Discover practical ways to make growth and gratitude central to your business, family, and life—plus the powerful impact of asking the right questions and building strong traditions that last.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Not everyone chooses entrepreneurship—sometimes it chooses you.
Money motivates at first, but it’s the freedom it brings that keeps you going.
The best lessons come from learning alongside other entrepreneurs, not just from teaching.
Successful entrepreneurs focus on making things better, easier to access, and more valuable.
Great entrepreneurs don't ask themselves what's wrong. They ask, “What's right?” and “How can I make it even better?”
Problems don’t hold entrepreneurs back; they turn problem solving into daily practice.
Motivation is temporary. Inspiration and purpose are what keep you going.
You can elevate yourself by surrounding yourself with people who have skills you don’t have.
Family traditions, shared language, and rituals build lasting culture at home and in business.
The most valuable assets aren’t financial; they’re values, learning, relationships, and contribution.
Never delegate away your Unique Ability® until you truly know and refine it.
Confidence grows from gratitude and from focusing on others, not just on yourself.
Great results come from being open to learning in every interaction. Instead of chasing answers, ask better questions.
The enemy of thriving is arriving.
Resources:
Range: Why Generalists Triumph In A Specialized World by David Epstein
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| Entrepreneurs Grow Stronger With Community Over Isolation | 30 Sep 2025 | 00:17:30 | |
Do you feel alone navigating the entrepreneurial journey, even in a room full of peers? This episode uncovers the power of a shared language, showing how entrepreneurs elevate their growth, tackle obstacles, and celebrate wins together. Discover how Strategic Coach’s thinking tools turn isolation into collaboration, making progress possible for everyone—no matter their industry or experience.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Entrepreneurs often don’t have words for their experience, and Strategic Coach provides them.
A shared language empowers entrepreneurs to interpret and elevate their experiences within a supportive community.
At most entrepreneurial coaching companies, every client knows that everyone else in the room is a competitor, and it makes for a toxic learning environment.
Most business coaching programs actually make entrepreneurs feel more isolated, lonely, and anxious.
Strategic Coach builds environments where each entrepreneur is seen as a resource rather than a rival.
Strategic Coach’s 250 thinking tools create a common language and provide practical frameworks for collaboration, growth, and clarity.
Strategic Coach members are all making progress within the same framework.
Common language shortcuts, like The 4 C’s Formula®, accelerate mutual understanding and meaningful conversation.
In creating his thinking tools, Dan Sullivan intentionally avoids jargon so that communication is clear, practical, and relevant to real experience.
There are elements common to every entrepreneur’s experience, no matter what industry they’re in.
Resources:
Your Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan Sullivan
How To Harness The Power Of Negative Thinking
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||
| The False Story We Hear About Ambitious Entrepreneurs | 16 Sep 2025 | 00:15:26 | |
Do you see ambition as a fixed trait or an ever-expanding capability? In this episode, Dan Sullivan reframes ambition as the platform for all growth. Discover why ambition expands with every capability you build, how it empowers collaboration, and why this mindset leads to greater innovation, freedom, and lasting entrepreneurial success.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Ambition is not a destination but a capability that creates all other capabilities.
The spark behind every new skill or achievement is your ambition to grow.
Ambition expands with use, much like a muscle that strengthens with repeated resistance.
Gaining one new capability naturally increases your ambition for the next.
You can decide to increase your ambition long before you know the specific projects you will undertake.
True ambition is abundant and does not come at others’ expense.
Empowering your own ambition can inspire and multiply the ambition of others.
Society often misrepresents ambition as competitive or distasteful, yet entrepreneurs can transform how it is understood.
Education rarely addresses ambition, leaving many people isolated in how they think about it.
Ambition should not be defined by limits, like a “gas tank,” but as an ever-expanding resource.
The 4 C’s Formula®—commitment, courage, capability, and confidence—depends on ambition to power growth.
Viewing ambition as a capability eliminates gender barriers and unfair expectations placed on both men and women.
Ambition grows through collaboration, teamwork, and creativity rather than isolation.
Focusing on your next capability creates a self-sustaining cycle of personal and professional growth.
Resources:
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
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| The Hidden Trap That Steals Your Energy And Blocks Business Success | 02 Sep 2025 | 00:16:26 | |
If you’re an entrepreneur, you’ve taken complete responsibility for your financial welfare, choosing to make a living based on what makes you unique. When entrepreneurs get frustrated and start focusing on what isn’t working, it means they’ve strayed from their uniqueness. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain how to recognize when this is happening and how to get back to finding business success doing what you love and are great at.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Your Unique Ability® is the innate talent you’ve been honing since birth, characterized by high energy and exceptional results.
When children play, it’s a way for them to discover what they’re great at and love doing.
Entrepreneurs create value for other people by doing what they’re very good at and find easy to do.
Most people don’t bet their futures on the abilities that make them unique.
Frustrated entrepreneurs become preoccupied with what doesn’t work.
The most effective way to solve problems is to strengthen what works, not to dwell on the problems themselves.
Strategic Coach® helps you become an objective observer of your own performance.
You’re the only person you have a total lifetime responsibility for.
Once you’ve figured yourself out, you can focus on being in great teamwork and collaboration with others.
Powerful external collaborations are simply the linkage of unique capabilities between organizations to create new market value.
Your role as an entrepreneur is to use what works for you to solve a "not-working" problem for someone else.
Every transaction in the marketplace is ultimately about freeing someone else up to do more of what works for them.
Resources:
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||
| Get Bigger, Better Results By Doing Less, with Gina Pellegrini | 26 Aug 2025 | 00:36:06 | |
Do you think your business must always depend on you? In this episode, Shannon Waller and Program Coach Gina Pellegrini reveal how empowering your team and building a business that runs without you creates true entrepreneurial freedom. Learn why letting go, focusing on your strengths, and shifting your mindset lead not only to business growth but to more energy, impact, and joy. Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
True entrepreneurial growth happens when you design a business that thrives without your constant management.
Outsourcing key activities like scheduling frees you to focus on vision, growth, and meaningful client relationships.
Building a Self-Managing Company® starts with hiring, trusting, and empowering team members to take real ownership.
Owning your role as a leader means knowing when to let go and allow others to shine.
Team members should be treated as an investment, not a cost.
Experienced, long-term team members create trust, efficiency, and a shared shorthand that eliminates friction and builds momentum.
Pursuing personal passions outside your main business can energize you and is made possible by the right team support.
The Impact Filter™ tool provides clarity, commitment, and a practical road map to execute on new ideas without falling into overwhelm.
It’s important to take time to measure how far you’ve come (“The Gain”) instead of only chasing what’s next (“The Gap”).
Your journey as an entrepreneur impacts not just your bottom line but your freedom, joy, and well-being.
Resources:
The Appointment Scheduler by Gina Pellegrini
What Is A Self-Managing Company®?
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
What Free Days™ Are And How To Know When You Need Them
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| One Bold Move That Separates Top Entrepreneurs From Everyone Else | 19 Aug 2025 | 00:21:02 | |
Do you strive to stand out or fit in? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller challenge the myth of equality and reveal why entrepreneurs are hardwired to pursue uniqueness. Learn how comparing yourself to others can hold you back, while focusing on being usefully different fuels impact, happiness, and growth in life and business.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
You can choose to be unique or equal, but never both.
Entrepreneurs succeed by leaning in to their unique skills, not by blending in.
The question of whether to be equal to others or to be unique often arises early in life.
Focusing on being useful, not simply “fitting in,” sets you apart and attracts opportunities.
Being equal and being unique represent fundamentally different psychological and emotional worlds, and your thoughts and mindset will shift depending on which you pursue.
Unique individuals are self-referential, while equal-focused people constantly compare themselves to others.
Someone who focuses only on uniqueness creates their own games.
Anytime you create something new, it disrupts the status quo.
Fairness means consistent rules, not identical outcomes for everyone.
The best collaborations happen among unique individuals playing by shared rules.
Entrepreneurs will only be successful to the degree that their uniqueness is seen as increasingly useful to other people.
Resources:
The End of Average by Todd Rose
Bill Of Rights Economy by Dan Sullivan
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||
| Business Success Starts With Context Over Content | 05 Aug 2025 | 00:17:33 | |
Worried about competitors copying your ideas? Dan Sullivan reveals why context—not just content—makes your thinking truly unique. Learn how The 10x Mind Expander® tool helps entrepreneurs reframe their past successes as springboards for growth, why AI is creating exciting new contexts for creativity, and how to protect your best ideas while staying ahead of the curve.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
For 36 years, Strategic Coach® has delivered new thinking tools every quarter.
AI isn’t just a tool—it’s a game-changing context for how we create and communicate.
A 10x revenue goal feels impossible until you realize that you’ve already done it before.
Past growth holds the clues—look back to see how you’ve already achieved 10x jumps.
To grow 10x again, simplify. Keep what works and focus on the few key changes needed.
You likely have 50% of what you need for your next 10x leap—your experience proves it.
Entrepreneurs accumulate a lot of content (experiences, data) without necessarily knowing what it means.
Context transforms content—it’s the difference between “what happened” and “why it matters.”
Strategic Coach thinking tools give brand new context to content, helping entrepreneurs reframe their past to unlock their future potential.
Recognizing how you made a previous jump allows you to see content differently.
You have to be willing to go through fear, uncertainty, and discomfort to get to a new level of normal.
Content can be stolen, but it falls flat without context around it.
Resources:
The 10x Mind Expander by Dan Sullivan
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| Unlocking The Secret Fuel That Powers Entrepreneurs | 22 Jul 2025 | 00:20:04 | |
Do you embrace the fear that comes with chasing bigger goals, or do you let it hold you back? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explore why excitement and fear are inseparable for ambitious entrepreneurs—and how reframing fear as fuel, not a foe, is the key to lifelong growth and fulfillment.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Growth is like a coin with two sides: excitement and fear.
Entrepreneurs need to normalize fear as a regular part of their journey.
Committing to a bigger future goal naturally brings up fear about whether you can achieve it.
Real growth requires pursuing something more exciting—and more challenging—than what you’ve done before.
Many people lose their ambition because they’re stopped by the fear that comes with it.
Entrepreneurs are driven to ensure their future is bigger than their past.
Status-seeking entrepreneurs focus on external markers of success while growth-oriented entrepreneurs measure success internally, by their own progress.
It takes courage for entrepreneurs to keep moving.
Expect failure along the way—it's part of the growth process.
For growth-minded entrepreneurs, fear isn’t a necessary evil; it’s a necessary resource.
Stopping growth means losing the new capabilities that come with it.
When you stop growing, you may feel uneasy about others who continue to grow.
For status-seekers, ambition is a destination; for growth-seekers, it’s a capability to develop.
Growth-oriented entrepreneurs compare themselves only to who they used to be, not to others.
Resources:
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan | |||
| The Surprising Reason Great Salespeople Fail At Hiring | 08 Jul 2025 | 00:19:07 | |
Just because someone excels in their role doesn’t mean they should interview new hires—especially if they’re a salesperson. In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller reveal why great salespeople often make the worst hiring decisions, how to spot the right evaluators for your team, and the mindset shift that separates a persuasive seller from a discerning buyer.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Salespeople shouldn’t conduct interviews because they’ll treat every interaction like a sale—focused on overcoming objections rather than evaluating fit.
Great salespeople are wired to close deals, which means they’ll prioritize getting a "yes" over finding the right candidate.
A sales-driven interviewer risks hiring the wrong person simply because they couldn’t resist "winning" the interaction.
As the person doing the hiring, you’re the buyer, not the seller.
It’s the job of the applicant to convince you they’re the right fit.
It’s not the interviewer’s job to get the applicant excited about the position.
Your hiring team should be dispassionate evaluators—think poker players, not persuaders.
The best hires are those who sell you on their ability to contribute to your company’s future.
Confidence in hiring comes from being decisive, not from convincing someone to join.
Trust your instincts—if a candidate feels off early on, that feeling rarely improves over time.
Resources:
Free Zone Frontier by Dan Sullivan
How To Improve Business By Asking Good Questions
Always Be The Buyer by Dan Sullivan
Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage | |||
| Bad Decisions Beat No Decisions For Entrepreneurs | 24 Jun 2025 | 00:17:18 | |
Are you holding back, waiting for the “right” decision? In this episode, Shannon Waller and Dan Sullivan reveal why taking action—even imperfect action—is the key to entrepreneurial momentum. Discover how making any decision unlocks feedback, reduces anxiety, and activates your best thinking, while indecision keeps you stuck. Plus, learn practical strategies to overcome perfectionism and move forward.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Taking action, even with imperfect information, is better than staying stuck in indecision.
The problem with making no decision is that you’re not changing the situation that’s paralyzing you.
When you can’t make a decision, the pressure builds on you exponentially, as does the feeling of isolation and disconnection from your team and your goals.
As soon as you start taking action, you get an enormous amount of information about whether it was a right action or a wrong action. Perfectionism is the enemy of progress.
Humans are best when they’re in motion.
People become unproductive when they’re not making decisions.
You don’t have to make the right decision. You can make a decision, and then make it right.
Clarity and confidence come after you commit, not before.
Decisive entrepreneurs make mistakes, but they also learn and adapt much faster than indecisive ones.
When you’re indecisive, you lose access to your wisdom, experience, and problem-solving abilities.
The act of deciding eliminates alternative options and allows your mind to focus on what matters most.
Protecting your role and saying no to distractions is a by-product of being decisive about your commitments.
The word “decide” literally means to “kill off” alternatives, freeing you from mental clutter and overwhelm.
Resources:
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan with Dr. Benjamin Hardy
| |||
| How Entrepreneurs Rise Stronger After Setbacks, with Gary Mottershead | 10 Jun 2025 | 00:33:23 | |
An entrepreneur for over 35 years, Gary Mottershead is the founder and president of GCP Industrial Products, the largest U.S. importer of industrial sheet rubber, serving customers across North America. In this episode, he shares the highs and lows of his career, as well as his goals as a Program Coach for The Strategic Coach® Program.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes: If you’re going to bring children into the world, you should look after them. Having a support system at home is vital to the success of any entrepreneurial family. Stability in some areas of your life can give you the energy to handle changes in others. Sometimes, not making a decision is the greater risk. There are things entrepreneurs feel compelled to do without knowing why. Trying to be significant before you’re successful is doing things backwards. The time isn’t up unless you decide it’s up. The mark of an entrepreneur is not how often you get knocked down, but how many times you get back up. You’ll handle a situation more calmly if you’ve experienced something similar before. Being nimble is a mindset. Forgiveness means letting go of the hope for a better past. You can rewrite your own story, keeping only what’s important. The future isn’t written yet—which means you can still shape it. Entrepreneurship is a lifestyle, not just a job. Without intention and direction, too much information can paralyze you. The hardest thing for an entrepreneur is being honest with themselves. You can only help those who want to be helped.
Resources:
Antifragile: Things That Gain From Disorder by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Nimble Future: Reinterpret Your Past, Protect Your Present, Engage In Your Future by Gary Mottershead
Time Management Strategies For Entrepreneurs (Effective Strategies Only)
The 4 Freedoms That Motivate Successful Entrepreneurs
The Self-Managing Company by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Why Entrepreneurs Should Sell Opportunity Instead Of Fear | 27 May 2025 | 00:19:27 | |
Many entrepreneurs use negatives to make a sale. But why sell fear when you can sell opportunity, and why sell pain when you can sell growth? Dan Sullivan reveals why positive messaging attracts the best clients, how ambition fueled by principles keeps you young, and why your community determines your growth. Learn why the most successful entrepreneurs never retire—they just keep reinventing themselves.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Most sales pitches use fear—but fear attracts the wrong clients and limits your growth.
Selling has two parts to it: intellectually connecting people to a desirable future result, and then emotionally engaging them to take action to achieve that future result.
To be effective, a sales pitch has to be both convincing and compelling.
Instead of pitching that you can remove a negative, focus your pitch on amplifying something positive.
You're ambitious because of your passion. You'd like to see your passion have an impact out in the world.
Who you surround yourself with determines your trajectory: growth-oriented people keep you young, while stagnant people age you.
Status entrepreneurs, as opposed to growth entrepreneurs, eventually run out of ambition.
Ambition is driven by strategy. Growth is driven by principles.
Your principles are your way of being.
The moment you retire from fear, you also retire from excitement.
Fear and pain go together, as do opportunity and growth.
The biggest thing you're putting at risk when you're growing is your own past.
In the Strategic Coach community, you're not the exception—you're the norm.
Resources:
10xTalk Podcast with Dan Sullivan and Joe Polish
Anything And Everything Podcast with Dan Sullivan and Jeffrey Madoff
The Mindset Scorecard by Dan Sullivan
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan
Growing Great Leadership by Dan Sullivan | |||
| How To Turn Your Solutions Into Profitable Intellectual Property | 13 May 2025 | 00:27:20 | |
What if the solutions you’ve already created could generate value for decades—without more of your time? In this episode, Dan Sullivan reveals how packaging, naming, and protecting your ideas transforms them into scalable intellectual property. Learn why your “second company” (your multiplier) could soon be worth more than your entire business—and how to make it happen.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Your first company, your R&D company, creates solutions for people.
Your second company, your multiplier company, packages your solutions as your intellectual property.
If you record, package, and name a solution you’ve created, it will have massive ongoing value.
Before you put your ideas out into the world, you must protect them.
Boredom with your own solutions is a hidden risk—document them before you move on to the next idea.
The value of Strategic Coach’s patents will soon surpass 55 years of coaching revenue—proof that IP compounds value.
Protecting your creativity isn’t just a multiplier; it’s an accelerator of long-term wealth.
A two-company structure makes you immune to market chaos because you control the value of your ideas.
Your biggest breakthroughs will come from technology multiplied by teamwork, not from grinding harder.
The same business model that built your success can scale infinitely—if you focus on IP, not just execution.
Resources:
Unique Process Advisors by Dan Sullivan
Casting Not Hiring by Dan Sullivan and Jeffrey Madoff
This Tool Will Help You Make Sense Of The Past AND Take Charge Of Your Future
Everything Is Created Backward by Dan Sullivan
Extraordinary Impact Filter by Dan Sullivan
Growing Great Leadership by Dan Sullivan
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan | |||
| The Secret Behind Why Every Entrepreneur Has Two Companies | 29 Apr 2025 | 00:27:16 | |
Do you feel torn between the company you have and the one you wish you had? In this episode, Dan Sullivan reveals The Second Company Secret—how successful entrepreneurs leverage their first (real) company to fuel a second (multiplier) company built on intellectual property. Discover how to eliminate tension between the two, protect your creativity, and unlock exponential growth.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Entrepreneurs often undervalue their real company while idolizing an imagined “perfect” version.
Your real company isn’t the problem—your thinking about it is.
Your most creative breakthroughs feel tied to this unrealized vision, but it lacks traction.
Your second company allows you to see the value of your first company.
You could be making money at one company while still resenting how much of your time it takes up.
Your second company thrives through collaboration, not through your time and effort.
Structure and partners are non-negotiable—they’re the multipliers of your vision.
You bring the vision and capabilities, and your partners bring the reach.
When your second company succeeds, it fuels even greater creativity and innovation in your first.
The solutions you create are your intellectual property. Take steps to protect them.
Resources:
Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage
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| Turning Tariffs Into Your Unbeatable Advantage | 22 Apr 2025 | 00:38:18 | |
Are you prepared for the biggest economic shift in 80 years? In this episode, Dan Sullivan reveals how the new global tariff landscape creates unprecedented opportunities for agile entrepreneurs. Learn why the post-WWII economic order is over, how to adapt your business model, and why being alert, curious, and resourceful is the secret to success in this emerging era.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
On April 3, the U.S. announced tariffs of 10% for most countries, with higher rates for nations with significant trade imbalances.
Post-WWII, the U.S. economy was self-sufficient, yet other countries charged tariffs on U.S. goods while enjoying tariff-free access to American markets.
One-sided tariffs led American corporations to offshore factories, costing U.S. jobs and prosperity.
Trump’s tariffs are a negotiation tactic to reset unfair trade terms and bring manufacturing back to the U.S.
China’s current trade practices make it the primary target of aggressive tariffs (now 125%).
U.S. companies abroad face tariffs unless they relocate production home—creating a surge in domestic opportunities for entrepreneurs.
You want to be the buyer in every negotiation. The buyer is the one who can walk away from the table.
The United States is the best place to sell a product created anywhere in the world because it has the most customers.
Tariffs aren’t about fairness. They’re about trade.
Entrepreneurs are skilled at responding very quickly to new dangers and new opportunities and developing new strengths in the process.
Global supply chains are fracturing, forcing businesses to source locally and regionally.
During uncertain times, people feel as though they’ve lost their future.
You can help clients and customers rebuild confidence in their future by focusing on their dangers, opportunities, and strengths (D.O.S.®).
The 1945–1992 economic order was a historical anomaly, and we won’t see anything like it again.
AI reduces labor costs (and creates new opportunities for entrepreneurs as a result).
Resources:
Trump: The Art of the Deal by Donald J. Trump and Tony Schwartz
The D.O.S. Conversation® by Dan Sullivan
The Great Meltdown by Dan Sullivan
Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss and Tahl Raz | |||
| Growing Great Leadership | 15 Apr 2025 | 00:26:09 | |
What if leadership isn’t about titles, but about creating new capabilities others can observe? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller break down the shift from bureaucratic management to self-leadership in the networked economy. Learn the four-step process to transform uncertainty into confidence—and why focusing on problems is the death of innovation.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Self-leadership starts with creating new capabilities—not waiting for permission.
Anytime you’re doing something that creates a new capability, and other people observe you doing that, that's leadership.
Your activity of creating a new capability gives others the confidence that they too can have the courage to create a new capability.
The pandemic created a network economy.
Great technologies like Zoom have enabled people to work remotely.
Many management activities within a company can now be handled by apps.
Bureaucracies punish boundary-crossing, while networked teams reward it.
When people get possessive about their territory, it shuts down creativity.
Instead of trying to fix problems (or worse, just complaining about them), create solutions that make problems irrelevant.
Confidence comes after courage—not the other way around.
Resources:
Growing Great Leadership by Dan Sullivan
The Self-Managing Company by Dan Sullivan
The Team Success Handbook by Shannon Waller
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Clarify Your Thinking To Become A Better Entrepreneur, with Erik Solbakken | 01 Apr 2025 | 00:27:27 | |
The Strategic Coach® Program has been helping entrepreneurs achieve accelerated growth and personal freedom for over 35 years. Now, Strategic Coach® is excited to welcome a new coach to the Program. In this episode, Associate Coach Erik Solbakken shares his unique journey from chartered accountant to successful entrepreneur, and what excites him about connecting with fellow entrepreneurs.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
The way to create your future is by reflecting on your past.
Entrepreneurship isn't always easy; it's a journey with ups and downs.
Your ideal client wants the authentic you, not the pretend you.
Self-discovery is a lifelong journey.
Capabilities and confidence come from commitment and courage.
Being part of the Strategic Coach community means being surrounded by entrepreneurs who can support you through tough times.
Strategic Coach thinking tools help you clarify and simplify your thinking.
Each time you use a Strategic Coach thinking tool, you gain deeper insights.
Every coach at Strategic Coach is also a client, applying the tools and concepts to their own business.
Our eyes only see and our ears only hear what our brain is looking for.
Strategic Coach is one of the world's greatest philosophy programs wrapped in a business blanket.
Resources:
The 4 Freedoms That Motivate Successful Entrepreneurs
How To Sell Transformation Using This One Question
What You Can Learn From Failure
“Geometry” For Staying Cool & Calm by Dan Sullivan
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy
The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy
10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy
What Is A Self-Managing Company®?
The Accountant Success Formula™
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| All Entrepreneurs Need To Have Courageous Creativity | 18 Mar 2025 | 00:15:52 | |
Is complaining holding you back from your full potential? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss the surprisingly simple choice between complaining and creating when facing obstacles. Discover how shifting to a creative mindset, embracing courage, and taking full responsibility can unlock new capabilities and exponential growth.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
An obstacle feels like something is blocking your progress.
There are only two ways of dealing with obstacles: creating or complaining.
When you’re in creativity mode, you’re fully engaged with transforming or bypassing the obstacle.
To deal with an obstacle, you have to create something new.
Taking 100% responsibility is essential for creative problem-solving.
Complaining involves blaming external circumstances or people.
Committing fully to complaining offers a sense of freedom because you’ve absolved yourself of any responsibility for improving your situation.
Few people are entirely creative or entirely complainers. Most are a mix of both.
Creativity requires courage; complaining does not.
Creators are more likely to be honest with themselves.
You attract what you are: complainers attract complainers, and creators attract creators.
Resources:
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Why Entrepreneurship Is The Safest Career Move You Can Make | 04 Mar 2025 | 00:28:33 | |
Organizations have changed a lot over the past 50 years, and it’s vital for entrepreneurs to be aware of these changes if they want to achieve great business success. In this episode, Dan Sullivan, who has been coaching entrepreneurs for 50 years, talks to fellow business coach Shannon Waller all about the changes in companies that have taken place over the past half-century and the very different position that entrepreneurs are in today.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
The invention of the microchip allowed entrepreneurs to have a lot of power and capability they’d never had before.
The introduction of the microchip meant large corporations would start to fracture and wouldn’t be as effective or useful.
It might take three months to get a decision from large organizations, but entrepreneurs can decide to hire you, and write you a check, in the moment.
About every 15 years, the number of employees required in an organization is about half of what it was 15 years previously.
Now that small companies with microchip power can be powerful economic forces, government has adjusted to make the process of incorporation faster and easier.
We’re partway through a 50-year period in which we’re shifting from large, pyramid-shaped organizations to network-based organizations.
Artificial intelligence can do work that used to require many people to do.
A lot more people can own companies and have leadership positions now than they used to.
Canada, especially Ontario, is one of the easier places in the world to incorporate.
Being a bureaucrat in a large pyramidal organization used to be the safest job in the economy, but is now among the riskiest.
Being an entrepreneur has become the safest role.
Resources: Growing Great Leadership by Dan Sullivan
The Great Crossover by Dan Sullivan
Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage
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| How Lucky Are You As An Entrepreneur? | 18 Feb 2025 | 00:21:45 | |
Do you believe in luck, or do you make your own success? In this episode, Dan Sullivan explores the concept of luck in entrepreneurship. Drawing from 50 years of coaching experience, he reveals how successful entrepreneurs create their own paths, often starting young by seeking opportunities to grow their wealth. Discover how self-made success intertwines with luck in the entrepreneurial journey.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
50% of your success comes from luck, and 50% of it comes from the ability to take advantage of the luck you've had.
An entrepreneur’s success is an act of self-creation.
Entrepreneurs create their own income streams and their own capabilities.
Entrepreneurs understand intuitively that freedom requires money.
It’s difficult to separate luck from skill.
The U.S. is an entrepreneurial country created by entrepreneurs.
Even the challenges you’ve faced have shaped who you are today.
Recognizing the luck you’ve had keeps you centered and grounded.
Whether your capability drives your luck or vice versa depends on your perspective.
Resources:
Your Business Is A Theater Production: Your Back Stage Shouldn’t Show On The Front Stage | |||
| What Ambition Looks Like At 80 | 04 Feb 2025 | 00:26:50 | |
Do you believe ambition fades with age, or can it actually grow stronger? In this episode, Shannon and Dan discuss how ambition evolves over time, share Dan's desire to be even more ambitious at 90, and reveal how transforming ambition into action can lead to growth and fulfillment at every age.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
People begin to feel old when they stop making commitments—and stop prioritizing courage.
When entrepreneurs focus exclusively on doing what they’re great at and love doing, their impact multiplies. When combined with technology, the results are exponential.
Since your skills and capabilities will be much greater 10 years from now, your goals can be much bigger in 10 years too.
When you’re ambitious, all sorts of unexpected opportunities and experiences become available to you.
When you view ambition as an action, it becomes something you can invest your talent, skills, and time into.
Ambition is a skill made up of a number of subskills.
When your brain normalizes the idea that you’re going to live far longer than normal expectations, it changes your understanding of the present.
Time only speeds up when you think you’re running out of it.
Being unable to imagine yourself with more ambition in the future robs you of your power in the present.
No one’s interested in being in teamwork with someone who’s stopped growing.
Your real age has to do with what lies ahead of you—and your imagination.
What human beings most look for in other human beings is commitment and courage.
Commitment and courage create capability.
If you’re more committed and more courageous, it’s easy to be more ambitious.
Confidence is the reward for acquiring a new capability.
With a higher level of confidence, you can make greater commitments.
To make any significant improvement or change in your life, you have to be 100% committed to doing it.
You only truly start aging when you give up your ambition.
Resources:
My Plan For Living To 156 by Dan Sullivan
The 4 C’s Formula by Dan Sullivan | |||
| Entrepreneurs Can’t Move Forward With Costs, Only With Investments | 21 Jan 2025 | 00:15:32 | |
Entrepreneurs always want to be moving forward. What determines whether they’ll be able to is their understanding of the difference between cost and investment. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about the growth mindset that lets you improve for the rest of your life—versus the mindset that means you’ll forever be stuck right where you are.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Some entrepreneurs have essentially only created a job for themselves that doesn’t go anywhere.
If you see hiring people as a cost, you might just do all of the work yourself.
When entrepreneurs do everything themselves, 90% of what they do doesn’t actually make sense for them to do.
Investing in team members means you’re freed up to do better work, and that will easily pay for the investment.
When you hire someone, you’re investing more in yourself than in the other person.
If you consider someone to be a cost, that person will know it.
Making an investment is a risk, and it can require courage.
Someone who treats other people as costs treats themselves the same way.
With an investment, you'll put an enormous amount of thinking into it to guarantee that it’s successful.
When you’re making an investment, have a goal for the return and a deadline for that goal.
Resources: Casting Not Hiring by Dan Sullivan and Jeffrey Madoff | |||
| Business Lessons For Creating The Job You Want, with Patti Mara | 07 Jan 2025 | 00:31:10 | |
When Patti Mara graduated from university in the recession of 1989, she couldn’t get a job—so she made one up instead. In this episode, Patti shares how she’s achieved entrepreneurial success, the exciting new project she’s launching to support local businesses, and what she’s learned as a long-time coach in The Strategic Coach® Program.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Resources:
Blog: Time Management Strategies For Entrepreneurs (Effective Strategies Only)
The 10x Mind Expander by Dan Sullivan
Turning Teams into Heroes and Customers into Raving Fans by Patti Mara
UpSolutions Team Success Program
Blog: What Is A Self-Managing Company®?
Tool: The Positive Focus®
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy
Podcast: Team Success
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| The Right Way And The Dangerous Way To Think About Ambition | 24 Dec 2024 | 00:20:35 | |
Entrepreneurs need to be ambitious. But what happens when you achieve your ambition? In this episode, Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain the drawbacks of having ambition as a destination and describe the incredible benefits you can expect when you see ambition as a capability.
Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:
Show Notes:
Resources: Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy | |||