A Navy SEAL Taught Me You Don't Have 40 Problems. You Have One. | Between The Builds

Chris Fay: Welcome to Built with Purpose. I am Chris Fay, and this is the show where vision meets execution and leadership leaves a legacy. From design studios to innovation hubs and product lines to skyline. We meet the people building more than great companies. They're creating culture, driving impact, and shaping what's next. These are the stories and strategies behind how the world gets built with purpose. All right, everybody, welcome to Built with Purpose. I am Chris Fay, your host. Today is normally an episode where we have a guest join, but I decided to release another episode of Between the Builds. Just because I was coming in this morning. Actually, we're getting ready to release ⁓ one of the latest episodes, and I just had some reflections back. ⁓ with with yesterday being Labor Day, ⁓ with all that's happened and transpired kind of in my life and everything that's happened in the business. And I just felt like a bit of reflection was was due this morning. ⁓ you know, you if you've been following along on the podcast, you've, you know, you've known outside of the conversations we've been having that we have been undergoing this major transformation inside of our organization. You know, as I was reflecting back on it last week, it actually began in February of twenty twenty five. And then ultimately culminated last week. So we have ⁓ we've sold a couple business units, we've bought a business, we're making some major fundamental shifts in the way that we go to market. ⁓ you know, in in in the past, we used to be a pretty diversified organization. We had we had six different business units trying to go to market, trying to trying to scale in each of those key areas. And as we looked at kind of what the competitive landscape looked like, where technology was heading, we realized what we needed to do is really narrow our focus and accelerate ⁓ in fewer key areas. And so that's really the evolution that we've been going under. And it's amazing, you know, when you're in the in the fight and in the hunt, we talked about this a little bit last week. It's oftentimes hard to see the other side of the mountain. It's hard to see that light at the end of the tunnel. And so last week was a major culmination in the fact that we signed the deal for the last ⁓ and closed on the last ⁓ acquisition. ⁓ we we met with the ⁓ the ownership group and we had a great conversation and and ⁓ and really had a chance to to to reflect back and celebrate. ⁓ last week was also we had ⁓ a funeral on Friday for a longtime employee who who had a very aggressive and and very short battle with stage four pancreatic cancer, had been with our organization for 19 years. ⁓ we celebrated his life on Friday, and then we moved into ⁓ this long weekend. And, you know, I I started reflecting back on Labor Day, and you know, this was a holiday that the federal government put in place almost 150 years ago, back in the late 1800s, just to celebrate the American worker, the American laborer. And as soon as I started thinking about all these things coming together, it just began to hit me ⁓ with a little bit of reflection that I want to share with you all. You know, you know, first off, I I've kind of talked to you about, you know, as we've been kind of going through this challenging time. And whether you're going through a challenging time personally, you might be going through something in the business, you might be going through something physically, you might be going through something in your in your own personal life, in your marriage, in your family. ⁓ there's no telling. There's no telling, but we all go through struggles. And that's the one common thing that we all share as humans on this planet, is we're all going to go through struggles from time to time. And I may have told the story years ago, but we had a a gentleman named Tom Shea. He's a ⁓ a former Navy SEAL sniper. He's been a ⁓ instructor at ⁓ at Navy SEAL training, and he came and spoke to our company probably three or four years ago. And I'll never forget ⁓ there was a moment and he was kind of up on stage, he was sharing some different ⁓ aspects of you know ⁓ his storytelling, and he opened up the he opened up the crowd for questions. And there was one ⁓ one ⁓ lady that works for me. That ⁓ asked a question and she she has a lot going on. She was ⁓ working in one key part of our business, you know, was feeling very overwhelmed. And and she asked the question, said, you know, hey, I've got, you know, lots of projects going on at any one time, and I have a really hard time prioritizing, you know, and and I'm just looking for some advice for somebody, you know, obviously that's experienced a tremendous amount of stress ⁓ for how to deal with kind of these multiple projects. And he looks at her in the eye and says, Well, how many projects do you have going on at any one time? And she said, Gosh, I don't know, maybe like, you know, thirty or forty different projects going on at any one time. And then he kind of looked at her a little bit more intensely and he said, How many projects do you have going on at any one time? And she said, Well, I think like, you know, 30 or 40. And he looked at her even more intently. How many projects do you have going on at any one time? And she still wasn't getting it. And so finally, after the fourth time asking, somebody from the crowd said, One. And he said, Yep. One project. You have one project going at any one time. What we did in in the Navy SEALs and training and anything complicated is we focused on one project, one footstep, one milestone. He said if you start thinking about the broader picture, you know, in the SEALs, if they started thinking about the entirety of the mission or what they were trying to accomplish, it would be extremely overwhelming. You couldn't be in the moment and really focus, especially at a really critical step. And so he talked about really focusing on how do we go from, you know, this point of our of our ⁓ attack plan to that point. And then once we get there, we'll worry about everything else on the backside. And the advice to her was she was trying to juggle all these things at any one time. And he said, Look, when you are focusing on one project, that's all you need to be thinking about at that one time. And so I took that to heart. I'll never forget that moment. Really intense moment. You know, he's a he's a ⁓ 20-something year Navy SEAL veteran, sniper, instructor, you know, talking to one of this really sweet, really successful lady that wor had worked for us in the sales organization. And so it was a really it was a really ⁓ interesting moment to to to watch a witness, but I never forget that. And so anytime I'm doing something hard, I'm on a run, ⁓ I'm working out, ⁓ at work, we're going through some major transition at the house. It's a really challenging week. You know, whatever it is, you always think about putting one foot in front of the next one. And so what's happened for me is when we started this transformation in our company, you know, call it 18 months ago, you know, today felt very far away. And I made a I made a personal ⁓ kind of note to myself to say, if if I keep thinking about what this is going to look like a year from now or two years from now, all of a sudden I start thinking about all the things that have to happen in order to get from from here to there. And it becomes overwhelming and heavy. And I start asking questions and having doubt. And so what I really tried to do is basically come back and say, what do I need to do today to continue to move this ball forward? And then what do I need to do this week, right? In order to make sure I have a successful week to do that. And I'm not going to think heavily about next week. I'm not going to think heavily about next month. And for me, I think, and reflecting back, that was probably the one single thing that really got me through, you know, this major transformation. You know, we've done five MA deals in essentially like 15 months, which is unheard of and it's crazy. And they're not like these huge, like multi-billion dollar year acquisitions, right? I mean, they're they're they're small business, mid-sized business acquisitions, but there's a lot of work. There's a lot of stress, communication, attorneys, you know, financial arrangements, teams or team arrangements, real estate arrangements. And so it's a very, very challenging time. And so I was as I reflected back, I think why I wanted to share this message with you today is I never really focused on today. And what's interesting about today, the day after Labor Day, is everything culminated last week. That kind of the the end of our work, ⁓ at least at least in that evolution, right? ⁓ the end of that phase completed. We got across the finish line. You know, we spent time, we celebrated with the team. And then we go into a three-day weekend that happens to be Labor Day. And we end or we begin that weekend with the funeral of a longtime employee of our organization. And so we celebrated an amazing life that went too soon. We celebrated the end of this kind of MA season for us. And then we go into a federal holiday that tells us to take a moment to stop back, ⁓ take a step back, and let's celebrate the the American laborer, the American worker. And so as I come in today, I've got a completely different mindset now than I did weeks and weeks and months and months and years ago. And one of the things I reflected back on last week, we had a dinner with with ⁓ with our whole team and and basically said, you know, I'm not very good at celebrating success oftentimes. Cause for me, I enjoy the fight, right? I love like the the work and the struggle. And when I get there, I'm kind of ready to I'm ready to do the next thing. And so people have been really encouraging me to take a step back and reflect on what we have accomplished, right? And to celebrate that success. Because we've now repositioned our company for this next accelerated evolution, right? Which I'm completely excited about. It's sad to see some of the past go, but I'm so excited about the future. But in today's moment, I just want to take a moment and reflect. So as I think about this and what it means for any of you all that are listening to the pod is, you know, number one, we're all we're all going through something, all of us. You know, and and and that's good, right? That's how we grow. ⁓ you know, doing hard things is how we become better. You know, if you're ⁓ if you're a runner or you like to exercise or you want to do things in business, if you keep doing easy things and things that ⁓ are second nature to you, you're never going to grow. So the way that you grow is to do hard things. And hard things are uncomfortable. You know, we talked about getting comfortable, getting uncomfortable. Like it sucks to do hard things. But what happens is when you do hard things, they become easier over time. And then you can take another step up and do harder things, which become easier over time. And ultimately that's where growth comes from. And so if you're going through challenging times today, just know that's part of the process. It's just, it's just part of the process. And that's how you grow. There's always growth on the other side. And don't get overwhelmed with everything you're living in. How can you how can you take one step forward today or this week to move one step closer towards that light? Right? Don't think about next week. Don't think about the following weeks. What can you do today and this week to take that step forward? And I promise you, because I've just witna I've just witnessed it and experienced it, is if you keep that one step forward, you focus on one project at a time, ultimately you will you will get there. You'll hit your milestone. And the recommendation is when you hit that milestone, take a moment to reflect. What did you learn? How did you improve? What would you have done differently? What would you have done the same? And maybe go out and have dinner. Maybe take a couple hours off for yourself and find some time just to reflect and relax. Yesterday, I went and I I went and cut grass for a couple hours in the afternoon. It was awesome. Just gave me some time to sit there and think, to enjoy. ⁓ nature to be outside and to reflect back on what we've accomplished. And now I'm ready for this next evolution this morning. So with that, I hope that's helpful for many of you all that are going through this. We've got some awesome episodes that are coming up. Some really cool guests. Wanted to pivot a bit a little bit this morning just because it was a major milestone in my life. Want to share that with each and every one of you all. And with that, I hope you have an awesome day. Look forward to seeing you soon. Okay, thanks for joining me on Built with Purpose. If you have enjoyed today's episode, subscribe, share, and leave us a review. It helps more bold leaders find the show. For resources and show notes, visit our website and connect with me, Chris Fay, on LinkedIn. Until next time, keep building great companies, cultures, and legacies with Perkins.