Wake up, Buy Here, Pay Here people. It's a beautiful day. Go grab yourself another cup of joe and say hello to Jim and Michelle Rhodes on the Buy Here, Pay Here morning show. Take it away, you two. Hi. Good morning. Hello. Good morning, buy here, pay here people. Yeah. Buy here, pay here people. Yeah. You got your extra cup of joe. I got mine right here. Yeah. Yeah. All good. Any particular announcements? Of course, we're... Our last podcast before heading into conference next week and we got... the white hat certification course with um good group coming in for that this will be an important conversation with a lot of current partners and potential partners and uh so it'll all be good yeah for sure yep so lots of final preps prep work and then I'll be speaking on uh wednesday morning and uh just a quick reminder to our dealer friends out there and all of our vendor friends too for that matter um we will have a booth number one twenty one please come and see white hat way Yeah, absolutely. We're doing a game. So pick up a game. Yeah, a green board. Michelle's put a lot of work into creating a fun little game. And so looking forward to that as well. Shall we dive into our thing? Absolutely. Let's do it. We still got stuff to do before we get packed tomorrow. And so, yeah, we'll kind of keep it brief and concise for today. I think I wanted to introduce this Eleven Peas playbook that has been You know, it's been formulated in our coaching work. We have used various elements of this, you know, throughout the work with dealers. And it just sort of took shape in the form of a playbook or a workbook that for whatever reason, the letter P is. you know kept kind of surfacing just like it's like oh that's another p yeah oh that's another p some significance to all that but but yeah it's um it's an interesting um kind of a way to tie it all together I think we'll just start going through the eleven as we go people will understand but we're really it's about you know the work that we do we um we We strive to be an implementation solution, like an ongoing coaching solution. And look, the idea of presenting this workbook today was to give people suggestions. I mean, if we were working with you, if another coaching group was working with you, or you just want to do it yourself and just kind of follow this playbook, these are the pieces that we would be recommending, right? Yeah. Mm-hmm. so shall we dive in sure okay so we got uh hold this up for you so those of you who are listening on one of the syndicated podcast stations please go to youtube um jim and michelle rhodes and uh Like and subscribe while you're there so that you can see the things on the screen. So, yeah. So do you want to talk about, yeah. Just dive in, shall we? Okay. So the number one is philosophy. You know, I kind of rearranged that because in an ideal world, if you're working with a dealer who's brand new, before you started writing policies which is certainly some of the early work that we want to do is help create framework in the business and especially you know limitations on management people and this and that but before we get there we kind of have to start with philosophy we really need to establish as a business what is going to be our approach to business right and that helps us it really informs the policies that we're going to write, the procedures that are going to come after that. But it really just kind of, it helps to document. And I think it's really important to actually prescribe this, like put it in written form. So some would call it a mission statement or whatever. We're going to talk a little bit more. It connects with the second one as well when you're putting it in that frame of like a mission statement, which, yeah. Yeah, I Yeah, philosophy. And I know that when we've, when we've done a lot of this coaching, that that is, that is always one of the first things that you like, what is your philosophy? Because, like you said, everything that that's, that's like the, that's the filter. That's the, that's the thing that you put every decision and all of that through. Yeah. And obviously when we work with dealers where, you know, not all of them are necessarily going to subscribe to a white hat business approach, but obviously white hat way would in working with a dealer that's new, especially we would be saying, if you bring a white hat business approach, that's going to drive your foundational principles, your kind of your core values. Like this is all tied into these elements of, you know, kind of who are we as a company? What's our business approach, right? So in the language that it says here, it sets a tone for how you treat people, customers, staff, vendors, and shapes your company culture, which is, really, you know, important. And so this foundational stuff is why I kind of moved it to the front is what, if you can get these things in place first and just declare in writing video, the video, the transcribed, however you choose to. So putting it through white hat way context, give me an example of what a philosophy would sound. So it's going to be, it's our philosophy to take a really, we have a long-minded approach to customer relations. We believe that customers, most customers desire to be successful in their business arrangements. Okay. These are the kind of things that I would say first, form the philosophy of kind of our outlook on life, our outlook on the sector that we serve, the community that we serve. It's just sort of our philosophy about business. About that sector. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, we hear frequently people, just there's a broad range of philosophies. And it can be from very straight lines of to build a business that I can, you know, that will do X in, in very tangible straight lines ways and, and all of that. And to others that we have, we've worked with that, that come from a story that aligns with the customer. And so their philosophy around their business can be very, very different. And so none of them are wrong. They just, so, but being able to, to identify and articulate. Yeah. Well, the other reason I think this is important and it's mentioned elsewhere in these other, um, but if, if I'm hiring a manager or, you know, collection supervisor, whatever the role might be, um, when when I can have that person you know obviously this all ties into culture which will also be wrapped up in what we're still going to cover but when when if you're the employee and you understand the philosophy of how we do business how we think about customer relations how we approach customer interactions then obviously that allows you to make day-to-day decisions because you know as if I'm your manager I'm not going to be there with you to choose every word that comes out of your mouth with every customer so when we think about you know we have a certain framework we have policies and guidelines but then when we have this at the anchor at the core and it's written like I understand it I've been taught I understand what our company philosophy is it allows me to navigate It allows me to use my own latitude, choose my words, knowing that this is our philosophy as a company. It's like the filter. That and as well as the next P, which is purpose. Those two things are... are are uh it's really important for your team to understand and be able to articulate that as well and like uh so that they know that these are the filters these are the things that that every collections decision goes through this is this every expansion that we you know choose to do growth um policies procedures all of those things yeah Yeah, so purpose, you know, in philosophy, they can be pretty closely intermingled, right? I wanted to treat them separately because the purpose is kind of the why. We refer quite a lot in our coaching and in the podcast to the Simon Sinek coaching and book about, you know, start with why. So the same thing here. It anchors to all the stuff that we're going to talk about. When you define your purpose or your why, it – it's why the business exists beyond just making a profit. So is there a story there that we can, you know, share with our team? And again, I think these things, you know, the vivid vision thing that we do, that's all part of the things like when we can impart on our team, those things that are, you know, Part of who we are, the fiber of our company, why we exist, you know, what we are setting out to do and how we want to be known in our community. That's another one for me is like, who are we as a company? Like, it's kind of the who piece. And it says a strong purpose energizes your team and gives customers a reason to choose you. Right? So it's not just internal for your team. And that's why it's so important to have it articulated because it becomes your story. Right. And it's, you know, we talk all the time about... How are you presenting yourself to your customer? And, and it's, you know, the, the, this is a differentiating factor. And again, it can be straight line and it can be squiggly line. We tend to really lean heavily into the squiggly lines. What's the reason? Because there's a very specific business reason. There really, really is. And, and, and, and it's, yeah, the, the heart piece, the, the, the, the doing something for the betterment of those around you is like, that's, that's noble. Yeah. And one other element to consider here, and there's some material out there that I haven't gone back to find. I started sharing with our team, this, this phrase that I thought I came up with it on my own. I thought, but I, I, others have used it turns out that this concept of gravitational marketing and obviously you know we talk a lot about our business being spherical and it kind of everything kind of emanates from the the why the purpose the core right and so when you think about that in a marketing standpoint we would look at doing um kind of what is the gravitational element to that? What is the, what is the core thing that ideally all of your ads would sort of tie back to this one thing that tells the story of who we are as an enterprise? Yeah. Who we are as your neighbor in the community. Yeah. There's a, there's a car, it's a franchise dealer in the area. And I, Um, they're, they're one of the things that's like really central to all of their marketing, which is like their purpose is like, we will listen to you is that it's so important to them. And so every bit of marketing, it's just different spins and brings you back to, um, That's what, that's our differentiator is that we're going to listen to you instead of just trying to put you in a car and get you through. It's like, we're going to listen to, to you. And, and it's, it's, I mean, it's worked really well for them. Sure. So yeah. Let's move into protection. Now we're getting into more of the nuts and bolts of kind of the, the business. And this one is, you know, when I made a new dealer, one of the things I always try to do is why don't we, almost irrespective of how they're operating, especially when I'm assessing and getting to know their operation, one of the things I'm always looking to do first is identify what you've heard me call the gaping holes, right? Yeah, we take almost everyone that is engaged us through that first. Yeah, early. And we're working with a dealer right now in Georgia that is kind of going through that, and we're working through them piece by piece to make sure that the... The idea here is to make sure that we've got... the necessary safeguards in place to protect financial interest. You could say operational interest too. So, so first we just want to make sure let's, let's make sure we don't have any leakage that, you know, is avoidable. Yeah. Right. And so this is about protection. And that also comes into, you know, I spent some time yesterday recording with Tia Pappas, who's somebody we know from here in Utah, a financial planner and helping us with some life insurance and that sort of thing. So obviously that also comes into play on the protection side. So there's also protection to think about from a compliance standpoint, right? There's all these elements to make sure we protect. Yes. because dealers work so hard to build their business let's do let's make sure we have steps in place to protect what's being built and it's you know that whole protection thing so important to to especially um this kind of business where there are so many moving pieces there are so many important parts Um, that in it, like other businesses as well, though, the, the, the business owner is a central and many of them piece who understands and knows all of the pieces, parts, passwords, whatever it is, um, uh, intimately. And, and this is, you know, this, um, The protection side, you want to make sure that you listen and you hear every once in a while, we just got embezzled a bunch of money. And so what are the things that you should be doing for those safeguards, those protections to... have had a massive heart attack or I had a massive heart attack and my team and my family didn't know I was incapacitated for a while. They didn't know what, um, what, uh, what to do, where to go to find the things and that there's a level of this, you know, you talked about life insurance that when something like that happens, how, uh, safer, how much, how much more safe a family will feel to know, okay, you know, that it's, that it's going to be okay. It's going to be okay. And, and yeah, because a lot of, a lot of dealers, many of the dealers are men out there, but a lot of dealers, their wives do not know that, the first thing about their business. And so if that dealer is gone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So let me read through these because it kind of touches on some elements that I want to make sure we get in there. So protection includes internal controls, legal safeguards, compliance protocols, and even secure password management. So let's think about, in fact, let me read the second one. Then we'll kind of wrap them together. It ensures continuity, integrity, and confidence for both owners and successors. So that's the part you were talking about, you know, if you've got a loved one spouse, uh, who, you know, would be inheriting a business if something happened and listen, it's, um, we typically like to have a little bit of relationship equity with a dealer before we start stepping into these conversations around, you know, things like life insurance, because, you know, it's facing our mortality can be a little uncomfortable and just kind of preparing for a look, let's walk through. What does it look like if something were to happen to you? And what does that mean for the business? What does that mean for your family? What's the value of this business if you're not standing in the building? And so these are all parts of the protection element for me. And I use the example with Tia yesterday about this kind of the the safety latch on an extension ladder to me is the most significant metaphor that I create it's like we work so hard to build our business let's make sure we don't lose ground you know and obviously something as catastrophic as you know it could be you know the dealer could pass and we've had dealers have serious life-threatening things happen and you've had we've known of dealers who've passed away and left uh a spouse and luckily they've had like group members that are you know that that that can step in and help support because they understand the business they understand this person's I mean it's but not everyone is has that has that And, you know, one of the points it made is that good protection is proactive, not reactive. I really, really, I do like that because all of those people that we know and we've experienced either firsthand as our clients or we see on social media, you don't know. You don't know when something is going to happen. Right. It's not like, hey, you wake up one morning, it's like, I'm going to have a heart attack in six months. Yeah. So what do I need to do? Because I may or I may not make it. Yeah. And I think being reactive to a... a regulatory audit or something it's that's when it's a bit too late to be reacting to you know you're now in the crosshairs of a of a regulatory agency so again proactivity taking the necessary steps that are and and look some of this stuff is tedious michelle it's like dealers don't love the the you know the tedious part of this I'm busy I'm busy but what a peace of mind that it can bring to your family and your team to know that you, you've like, we, that all of those protection things are right there. George, George, In GEMS TV. We uncover a lot of these issues during a SWOT analysis. And those of you guys who are not familiar with it, we do SWOT analysis with most of our clients. It's S-W-O-T. Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Exactly. And then the second part to that was, by the way, this is George Spat. I knew that was George. GEMS TV is our YouTube channel. Oh, nice. Fantastic. so the um the idea here is to make sure that we have got appropriate safeguards and when I say you know it's tedious it's it's really about having somebody on the team who's sort of designated as being our playbook you know who's going to help us draft the playbook right and so this is just working through those elements and and just making sure that we budget time because You're going to see is we're just on number three. By the time we get to number eleven, you're going to see if you successfully complete these things and you tie them together well, your business value just went up sharply. And that is a driving motivator for us is to help dealers be able to have enterprise value. Yeah. And have a business that is conveyable. So heaven forbid something ever happened to them. Here's the playbook. Here's the pass keys. Here's how you hand this business off to somebody else. Right now, somebody else could step in and follow that playbook and have a reasonable chance to have the same results. Why? Because we've got a great team culture. The philosophy is well established. Not much changes when the dealer's not in the building. Right? This is the ideal scenario for our dealers. Most people that are going to come in and buy your business are going to buy it because they want to run it, not because they want to piece it out. You could do that really easily. And so to have all of that already set. You say do that easily. If I'm a spouse, I don't have a first clue about who's going to buy a portfolio. Oh, true. You know what I mean? Again, again, yes. So, you know, there's elements to even think about. So the fourth one is on people and personnel. And that's a big one. Yeah, it is. Because we know... We know you are part of the people and personnel, the dealers, and if their spouse is working with them or whatever. And we see dealerships all the time that are just kind of husband, wife, a couple of people when they're first starting. And a person, I know there's a lot that we're going to go in through this, but when you have someone in your team that is a lifter and a motivator, everyone's lifted and motivated. When you have someone in your team that is a negative Nelly and a doomsday, then it lowers the energy of the team. And so it's really important to find people that are not only someone that will help keep things in a positive, but it's also like what... who you bring in to is like, it's there, this, most of these businesses are family. And so these are people you're going to be spending an awful lot of time. And this is, this is your child. Your business is, you know, and who's, who is, who's babysitting. Right. Yes. Let me read these points. This great people drive great results. This P focuses on getting the right people in the right seat. Define roles and responsibilities clearly to reduce confusion and increase accountability, which also increases efficiency or effectiveness. Right. Our efficiency as a team goes up sharply when we address these kind of things. And then culture is built by people. your hiring training and leadership development efforts shape the business DNA. So there, there's some great news. Some of our dealers have been referencing something called culture index. There's apparently a thing you can subscribe to, and they're finding that they're, they're getting really excellent results in terms of assessing people coming through, you know, their, their application track. And before they make an offer to them, they kind of verify where they fit. So it's not only what position they would sit in, but kind of how they fit in the culture. Yeah, there's something I want to just kind of highlight is this having defined roles and responsibilities helps your team members feel appreciated and safe. True. Yeah. And most people want to know what's expected of them. And when we move the needle frequently, that it can create a lot of chaos in a business when it's like, I don't know what I'm going to be asked to do today. And So it is an important part, defining those roles, defining the responsibilities. And it's, you know, you talk about accountability, which is great, but it just really helps people feel safer in their roles if they... if they have a great articulation and you've been able to you know talk to them about do you have any and having that be an open open dialogue right yeah so I just I think having those that's important yeah and you use the expression about uh you know moving the needle it's like I think with some dealers we see that there's not even really a gauge to work from there's not really if I'm a if I'm in a role in a certain dealership I might not even, you know, know exactly where my bumpers are and what expectations are. And that exhausts your team members. Yeah, and they don't feel secure because they don't know if they're doing the job right. And so I think this is part of where you create that sort of security for people and they're able to then be more effective at what they do because they know They're comfortable in where they are and what their responsibilities are and kind of where they begin and end. Yeah. And then the next one really flows into that as that when a team member understands what the policies and, you know, the next one after that, too, will be going into procedures. If they if you're defined and clear about the things that are most important and we know that it's hard to understand. to define everything. But, you know, I think most of us would know the top. Twenty scenarios. Yeah. And if you can just define what what your policy is around those things. Also keeping in mind that first part of it, the philosophy and purpose that everything's kind of filtering through that. But if, if they, if they know here's my playbook, cause it does turn into a playbook for them, um, of, you know, being, uh, being really clear instead of, and, and I'll tell you dealers. You know, we talked about roles and responsibilities. If you are all over the board about how you handle things every day, it's different. And it depends on your mood. It depends on whatever is you will exhaust your team very quickly. That is because they don't know. And then what I've seen happen to dealers is that their team members have to come to them with every single decision because it changes. Yeah. And so they're unable to make a decision on their own because their toolbox is, or their toolbox of things that they can do to just deal is always being ransacked and changed. They don't know. There's no safety in what, what, how we're going to handle this. That's a good point. So when we write policies, you know, and that's most of what we do, we kind of give dealers a framework for writing their own procedure. So we're going to cover that next. But I think, With policies, it's really just about helping the dealer draft policies in areas that will be most, starting with those that will be most critical, with the safety stuff that we talked about, those gaping holes. Let's make sure we have the necessary protections to stop any leakage. Compliance, too. Compliance would be an important one. And I think it's also just operational policies about things like what's our limit on spending for a car in our purchasing, right? Having the discipline built in and the policy that creates that discipline and have a process for making an exception. It's not that everything has to fit exactly that box. Oh, yeah. but having a process for making those exceptions so that we've got clear boundaries and we can start to create some sort of consistency and discipline in our practices. Absolutely. And you know that when you can start to do that as a dealer, when you can start to frame out policies and different things, you allow the ability for you to hand those things off. Right. And that goes into one of the ones we're going to be talking about in a little bit. But the ability to not be so tethered is one of the major pieces for you to be able to not be tethered is have really great policies. Yeah, one of the things that I have implemented, a little nugget for our people, because most of the dealers that we deliver this to, including this most recent one, really could see the value in creating what I call a thirty minute rule. And so if you think about all these policies that I would write, so let's say I've got a policy in the collections department around repo redemption. OK, I write a rule. These are the circumstances under which whatever. And so there's an exception process. I'm supposed to, if that person, you know, wants to recommend to the dealer principal or general manager, however that process is going to flow, that they want to make an exception. They're going to make a recommendation based on their experience. They're going to make a recommendation that allow the customer to redeem. Having a thirty minute rule is kind of a blanket thing that can be placed in the thing where everybody who's in a position to do that is granted basically a structure that says, if you send me through whatever is the proper process. If you send the dealer, like this is something we need a decision made on. You send it to me, and if I haven't responded in thirty minutes, that's what I chose. I used to use a fifteen minute rule with approvals, but had a thirty minute, you could use a thirty minute and tighten it up and adjust it as you needed to. But the idea is, the business doesn't come to a standstill just because I'm at the car auction for three hours and not able to hear the phone or maybe I'm on a vacation. I've seen dealers do that. Some dealers go on vacation. So it's like, you know, whenever that happens, it's like, what is the practice? And if we can authorize people to, my phrasing usually said, if you haven't heard back from me in thirty minutes from the time that you've you know, sent me the material to ask for my input, then go ahead and act using your best judgment. So this is where, you know, policies can be prescribed, but you can still create scenarios where people can move, you know, without being completely tied to their business. So, then, and of course, the authority side of that is where we start to create efficiencies across departments and the whole gap thing. So, procedures. Procedures ensure that policies are actionable. So, this gets into, again, this gets into the day-to-day kind of stuff, and You know, what's our process for preparing and delivering bank deposits? Or even taking a payment. And, you know, a lot of times we just think, okay, so I'll just sit down with them and show them how to do it. Yeah. And dealers are busy or collection supervisors are busy or whatever. Um, but if you had a written procedure and then, um, you know, be able to, to, uh, have them see that as they can kind of, and you show them as well, if you can. Um, But they have something to fall back on or something to learn from because, you know, I don't know about you guys, but sometimes when you're in the process of teaching someone a procedure of how to do something, you might forget a step. And then it's like, oh, that was a pretty crucial step. And so it's... It's really good to have those things written down. And there are so many softwares and all of that that can just really help you through that process. And it can be as simple as your collection manager. turning on record my screen and record my voice and they're walking through how to do the thing and then ai can create the book the video all the stuff and now you can live in the cloud and it can be evergreen where you can go in and update it you just did it this is our this is our procedure as of this date you can amend it update it this is the most recent this is procedure so my managers out sick or taking a long lunch and now I've got this situation with a customer so I can refer to the procedure book and this is how we handle this situation and so now we're able to have some consistency in what we do and and I think when I think about these kind of elements too I always often think about think about what it means michelle to the value of a business imagine I'm selling a convenience store okay and the person who's considering buying my convenience store goes into the bathroom and it's a mess. Paper towels everywhere and toilet paper is empty, whatever. You go into another convenience store that you're considering buying and there's a checklist on the door that says the last initials from somebody was here at ten fifty five a.m right it's like this is procedural stuff that you can see yeah they follow processes and that's a much more scalable replicatable business and so that that business is going to have more value like I'm just a super simple example but that's one of the areas I see it when I go into a business a restaurant or whatever you just You get a glimpse in terms of management and their structure by these little things, right? Yeah. Yeah, we get it. Squirrel. I haven't done one of those in a long time. When you said restaurant, it's like one of the first things for me about it. And some of the best food comes from a hole-in-the-wall restaurant. Yeah. But if I walk up to their door and the glass is disgustingly filthy, I'm like, I don't know that I want to go in here and eat. It just, yeah. But those kind of things, and we talk about a dealership, it's like, does it pass the sniff test? What is it that someone, when they walk in the door, what is their experience? having things tidy, having it smell well, having the glass clean is, and, and, you know, there's, there's a lot of different variations of clean glass, but when, when it's just, there's just fingerprints everywhere or, you know, the whatever, and it's, it does, it's, and that's, and that's something that, that I, no one is going to just on their own accord to get up and do it unless they're like me, who would just notice as like, this is driving me crazy. But if it was part of, this is the procedures of, of opening the day, um, is that we're going to, that's when you turn on the lights, do the, do the doors need to be trimmed out? Um, a little bit polish, um, That kind of thing. And it makes a big difference. First impressions. And listen, you know, we always say about buy here, pay here. We are not proponents of any idea that a buy here, pay here business is ever going to be full autopilot. But when you have these kind of good procedures mapped out, you definitely, now you just need some degree of management accountability to hold people to the procedures that are necessary. our rule book, right? And so we just need a degree of accountability to make sure people know that's still the rule book. We still follow these procedures. And now you've got a business that will function without the dealer being in the building all the time. And you also have a different level of accountability for your team members that it's like, okay, were we not clear? All right, do we need to, this is the thing. So if it's not being done, it's like you've already mapped it out and then that's a different conversation to have with someone. And I feel like we're running a little long. We're definitely stretching out, but I think we'll get all these eleven points covered today. But I think we might just, you know, kind of wrap up and kind of hit five points of these remainders. But you start to get into some some bigger picture stuff, obviously profit. We would be working with dealers to establish their profitability, build track and verify their profitability. So let me just read profit. Profitability is profitability. it says the scoreboard. I would probably replace that with a scoreboard. It reflects how efficiently your business is operating. Now it goes on to talk about what in the next one, it says, understand both paper profit, which is accounting base and pocket profit is the phrase I started using, which is it's still probably paper profit, but it's more, it says actual owner benefit. In other words, this would be the kind of profit that we've determined in our calculations. That is, uh, We could spend it and not necessarily be to the detriment of the business. So this is a tricky part and we don't need to go too deep into it, but it's like, we certainly need to be able to verify our profitability, right? For, for to have a successful business, we certainly need to be profitable. And, and you know, my, my session next week, we'll give dealers a really quick, they can give us nine answer or nine numbers. And they will have a snapshot look at profitability and cash flow from the month or period they just closed. And so this is part of what we're working to do and get more information in front of dealers, especially timely. Positive cash flow. Obviously, again, without getting a lot of spreadsheets here, positive cash flow and profitability don't necessarily come at the same time. And so this is what we want to help dealers analyze their portfolios and make sure they can – They can project when they would reach positive cash flow. Because I always say, if your business never reaches positive cash flow, and we've got dealers that have been in business for a very long time and are currently not cash positive. So what does that mean? They're drawing from somewhere, either their own resources elsewhere or a line of credit. They're having to pull money into the business because operationally they're negative. Mm-hmm. And that's something that we want to see rectified in any business is get to a place where we can generate positive cash flow. Because otherwise, how would we ever retire the debt that we have in the business? Or how would we ever pay ourselves? Or what would be the attraction for somebody to come and acquire it? If they're acquiring a business, they have to keep putting cash into. That's not very appealing, right? Yeah. And it is intoxicating. that part to dealers, the cash flow. And so having a good, um, you know, positive cash, having a plan to, to get that is, is, and having a plan for the cash flow that's coming in. Yeah. Uh, personally, this, this is a big one. And this is something we talk when we, when we meet with new, um, with new clients. Uh, this is, this is a, um, You know, we've encouraged dealers on the personal and family life is go home and talk to your significant other and your children if they're old enough. And just say, if there was anything that you would wish would shift... um, you know, or that you would like to see happen in the future, what would it be? I think it's a really valuable conversation to have. And, and it's also important for a dealer to really be open to, to what it is that the responses are. But in our, um, experience when a spouse is brought into that conversation we've said this many times is that the spouse and the family are like man we'd really like to be able to see you yeah um you know you're spending six days a week and you're opening and you're closing And you're missing highlights of the kids and, and all of those kinds of things. And so a lot of this, you know, the policies, the procedures, all of those things, those are, those are ways to be able to create a solid foundation for you to be able to spend, step away, spend, you know, have having a more balanced personal family life as well. Yeah. Yeah, I think – I just want to read these because it has pretty good language to help folks kind of understand where we're coming from. Success shouldn't come at the cost of your health, your marriage, or you could say your relationships or kids. This P reminds you to set boundaries, right? It's like having some – and people talk a lot about work-life balance, and I think that's often overused, but it's like there's – We do want to make sure that the success in a business doesn't come at a price in a personal life, right? Systems and people reduce dependency on the owner and create room for life outside the business. So it's always something we're looking for. We talk a lot about absenteeism and enterprise value, and it's really all in this context of how do we get dealers to have their business be healthy enough, structured in a way that they don't have to be tethered is the language of this, right? Yeah. And I do, you know, one point of caution is I've also seen dealers that neglect their business, right? because of personal and family. And so the way you don't neglect your business is that you have the structure. You've got the policies, you've got the procedures. Your team knows that if your general manager is out, they know how to handle the things. And if you're gone and the general manager is, they know how to handle the things. Yeah. So, um, you know, my advice is, is, and, and because it is, it is so critically important to so many families and dealers. It's like, we love our families is let you know, they're, it's, it's taking a little bit of time. to set up all of these, these policies, these procedures, all of the safeguards, all of that, so that you can, you and your team can feel more confident without you being in the building. Yeah. Confidence is good. And I would say that, you know, One of the beauties of self-employment and flexibility in that is to be able to make the kids ball games and take the wife to dinner or whatever the stuff is. And so it's like, this is part of what we just want to see dealers be able to create a scenario where they've got that kind of ability to enjoy the flexibility of entrepreneurship and business ownership. And if they're finding that they cannot or if they're finding that they're away for two weeks and they come back and there's a huge stack on their desk, those are indications that we have got some procedural breakdowns and maybe policy breakdowns. Because if too much is required of me as the dealer principal, then we really aren't in a very good position to scale. Again, we know that these things take some time. And we did a series when we first started the podcast three years ago. on um on time management and I may redo that or do some kind of like an evening three-part course or something um on that but it's it's there are ways to be able to carve out the time and be able to do the to to really dive into um working your business working in your business sure Or on your business, sorry. That was number nine. Let's move on to number ten, personal net worth. So the reason I like this one is I'm recommending to our dealers, and every dealer that we would work with now or could ever work with is fine for them to hear me say, we like to see dealers grow their business to a place where it wouldn't have to be their only investment. Like we know any talk to Tia, talk to any investment planner, they're going to recommend diversification. Why? That's been recommended for a very long time. When we have all of our eggs in one basket, then that can be problematic. We've obviously seen that become a problem for people. So So if we can create personal net worth here, then we can leverage that into diversification. We see dealers that have real estate investment, other types of investment because they, you know, they've created enough net worth in this to be able to do that. There are other strategies. We love reinsurance as a strategy for wealth building, right? So this is about, so that can be a step in, in, um, It is a separate entity in the case of reinsurance. So it can certainly be a strategy in diversifying, but I'm really talking about, I'm talking about having the kind of net worth that lets you invest in other businesses, real estate, whatever you might choose. So that's really why we want to focus on creating personal net worth. And this business certainly has the, the means to do so, right? To create a lot of net worth for our principal. Oh, it absolutely does. And again, just a plug for that reinsurance piece, that is a diversifying of your... income of your your net worth. That is, it's not just an another part of your dealership, it is a diversifying of your income, because it can be treated as this is, you know, this, I also have a reinsurance company, or I have a reinsurance policy. And so, so many dealers that we've talked to, you know, you hear someone say, I don't know if it's worth it, or, you know, I've ran the numbers, and then you talk to the ones that have been doing it for a year or two, and they're like, life-changing for your personal worth. Yeah, and in my own modeling and forecasting, and I said even to Tia again yesterday, to me, reinsurance is an interesting first investment beyond your dealership if somebody's in that situation because there are both direct and indirect benefits to the operation. So from a global perspective, the success that I enjoy in my reinsurance company is you know, has indirect and direct benefits to my other company. And so, so that would be a natural place to invest where you could argue that we're still kind of under the umbrella of, you know, a dealership in a market, but, but it is, I think an appropriate first place to look at investing. It's kind of the same thing as like, this is your, this the dealership and this is your finance company and this is your reinsurance thing because we've seen um how well you don't you don't have to have your own reinsurance you can purchase third party right or you can do it in-house and then it's your own business that's being set up as an as an entity sure and it's the same thing with your finance company and we've seen dealers just do finance. We've seen dealers just do, just, um, do the sales part and then, you know, selling their contracts and all of that. So these are three distinct entities that all kind of come under one umbrella potentially, but yeah, there's more. Yeah, for sure. And I think that's, um, and I would just say that my, and my own modeling with, with reinsurance, um, and we'll be working with Tia and some other dealers around reinsurance and other investment. But I, I would say that, well, Just at a glance, it depends on the products that you put in the program, of course. But in my own modeling, five years was good. Ten years was great. Like it's what it does as the trajectory across five plus years is really incredible. And so, again, depends on products and all these kind of things and pricing. But philanthropy, number eleven is philanthropy. So we've already established personal net worth. We've got a business that is healthy and functioning without relying on us day to day. Now we're in a position to, let me just read what it says. When your needs are met and your future is secure, giving back becomes a joyful responsibility. I might replace that with opportunity. It's, you know, people can feel like a need to give back. So that can be in the form of mentorship, which it talks about next. Philanthropy isn't just about money. It can be time, mentorship and community leadership, right? There'll be things that you can, do for the benefit of the community that has supported your business and created your personal net worth and and all these things so so philanthropy is a really um satisfying way to enjoy your success and we we want dealers to kind of begin with the end in mind yeah and you know that's where this dealer starting or whether they're beginning into this you know eleven point process or whatever it's like let's let's think about what it looks like to be in a position to be philanthropic And here's something that I want you to consider. It doesn't have to happen years after opening your business. It can happen months after opening your business. If, because it's, it's, I remember, um, I did Dave Ramsey bazillion years ago and, um, and And it was, you know, you figure out your budget, you take, you know, have your, your, um, yes, you start working on your budget. Then you start, uh, you start putting aside for emergencies, but that was, that was something that, that he built in. And, and from a religious perspective, it was like, I'm going to give a certain percentage to community or something that, that would be of the benefit of others. Um, there is a, um, Oh man, how do you, um, neither Jim or I consider ourselves like really religious people, but there is a blessing. Hmm. And that comes from giving. And there's also a reward. That's a blessing reward. We've talked to dealers that it's like I've mentioned a bunch of times. We give instead of like all going into marketing dollars, we give to our community. That's where our money is going. It's like we're sponsoring baseball teams. We're doing the thing. We're out there. That is a form of philanthropy. Yeah. Yeah, I just, the part that I would try to cross into, my version of philanthropy would be no expectation of anything in return. I'm giving back. I've already earned. Like, I'm not here because I'm not, it's a promotional thing. I'm not here to earn more customers, right? I've had my success. I've enjoyed a lot of success. So you're talking about a bigger level of philanthropy. Well, I'm just saying. Yeah. I would like to include that type of philanthropy where my philanthropy has no strings attached I'm not I'm just giving of my resources and again as it says it doesn't have to be dollars but it's like I'm not get I'm at a stage of my career and my health of my business that I don't have to give with strings attached and because there's some promotional element tied to it. And I'm going to win more customers tomorrow. This is about, this is about generosity without strings. And so this is the part that that's my own version. I would like to include in this. Doesn't mean that every version is going to look like that, but that's what my version of, but you know, I, I, uh, from my perspective, we get on the microphones two to three times a week, uh, With no expectation of that, but it just kind of does. It comes back and it creates trust and it creates, you know, like these people that of a understanding that there is a caring of the success of your business. customer and and dealers out there listening to us are our customer and and I kind of I feel like you know it's it's there's not a string attached because we want to freely give we want everybody to be able to improve but it is something that just naturally comes and that and that was something dave ramsey when he talked about um you know giving it's like it will be returned you And in some cases, tenfold. You don't give it with the intent of it being a return, but that's just the law of how things flow. And so it is good to go into it without like, this is going to increase my bottom line and help me sell X amount. But it's about, I'm going to give back. I care about my community. This is something we've been talking about with White Hat Way is once someone is certified, what are the ways that they retain their certification year to year? And part of this is giving back to the community, which is a form of philanthropy. yeah and there's community engagement with the idea of having the community get to know me and eventually maybe refer friends and family to get to know me because I'm out in the community generally doing some good I just was trying to differentiate that I think if we can because we talk about this a lot in terms of you know goodwill events versus sales events right it's like just just kind of are we doing it purely out of a matter of heart and goodwill we doing it with something some expectation of something in return to me that's a very different feeling that is regardless of all the business matters that you're talking about I'm just talking about the feeling associated with just just giving yeah right with no expectation of um of anything in return and that's that's what I think when we when we all give in that way then you know the people who have needs the needs get met and so it's a it's a beautiful thing so uh anyway we we've covered that pretty well and by the way did you say it was a bazillion years ago that you did um dave ramsey if it was I put the wrong number on my birthday yesterday yeah I put the wrong number on there. Well, one of my other friends said, what, you're thirty? I was like, thank you. Thank you. Because I'm too old to say I'm twenty anymore. So thirty was like, that's a compliment. Forty actually feels like a compliment as well at this point. Yeah, so a bazillion years. That is a Michelle word. I don't think, you know, I use words like that and Jim's like... yeah is that a real word yeah yeah and it's like you know what you know what I meant so that's all that matters right is that a real word probably not um or yeah his other one is I'll go around and I'll come up with little tunes little ditties it's not a real song it's like I am singing it yeah it makes it a song yeah yeah and he's like that doesn't count but I don't have to have a record label Okay, fine. Yeah. Yeah. Hey everybody. Um, if you'd like this list of everything that we have gone through today, please feel free to reach out to us and ask for a copy of it. uh, um, Jim at white hot way.com or Michelle at white hot way.com. There's a phone number. If there's anything we can do to help you, please feel free to reach out. Um, you know, we can always have discovery calls. And, uh, And if you are going to be at the national conference, please look us up. Please look us up. And I'll be speaking at nine a.m. on Wednesday. All right, everybody. Thanks again. Have yourself a great day and we will see you on Monday.
