OS MELHORES CONSELHOS sobre NEGÓCIOS | MELHORES MOMENTOS 2024

A good business model makes average people extraordinary. The centrality of a sexy brand lies in its strategy. If a guy, for example, made a mistake or launched a product and then started devaluing his brand with discounts, discounts, discounts, wanting to sell cheap, cheap, cheap, the end consumer does not accept drastic price reductions. A brand is nothing more than the external tangibilization of culture. When you have being a dreamer as part of your being, it's not something you choose to do, it's who you are. Let's go. Where do you want to start?

I wanted to start by saying that most people don't know about the existence of business models. They don't even know this story of the business model exists, you understand? The guy treats his business as if it were something random, right? "Oh, my father did it this way, my grandfather did it this way, so I do it this way too." It's my Gabriela syndrome, right? "I was born this way, I'll live this way, I'll die this way." So, it's not true, it doesn't have to be this way. A good business model makes average people extraordinary. A bad business model makes good people have mediocre performance because the model is bad. It's as if the business were the seed, and you plant the seed so that the tree can be born and bear fruit, and you profit from the sale of your harvest. Yes, it's not true. The business model is the soil. You can have a good seed, but if you plant that seed on concrete, it won't grow. If you plant that seed on asphalt, it won't grow. If you plant that seed on this carpet here, it won't grow. So, you can have a very good seed, the product can be good, your idea can be good, you can be good, but if you plant it in infertile land, it won't work. The business model determines if the land is fertile or not. So, it makes a big difference. And unfortunately, a large part of entrepreneurs don't even know this exists. And I know this because I didn't know it existed, you understand? I had to learn. I've been on the road for 30 years. Next April, I'll have been an entrepreneur for 30 years. So, today, for me, it might be obvious, but it's not obvious to most entrepreneurs, you understand? A large part of entrepreneurs, Caio, despite being entrepreneurs, work to earn their profit at the end of the month. And there's nothing wrong with earning your profit at the end of the month. The problem is that an entrepreneur who thinks like an employee of his own business thinks about salary, which is what's left over. He thinks about salary. His mental model is: "I need to work, earn a salary, and with that salary, I'll pay my bills." This is an industrial mental model: revenue minus expenses, and what's left is my salary. I have my salary. So, the guy has this mental model, and the ideal mental model for an entrepreneur is not this. It's to work for the value of his business, not for what he earns in the month. I usually say that profit, the dividend, is the entrepreneur's tip.

Tell me more about that, because its value is in the equity. A large part of entrepreneurs, the majority, can't even make a profit. 80% go bankrupt. And of the 20% that don't go bankrupt, maybe 10% stagnate, and 10% make a profit. Wow, but 0.11% build value, build wealth, build equity. So, the entrepreneur's best mentality is not to work to be an employee of his own business, because the industrial model created in the 19th-century Industrial Revolution, at the end of the 19th century, created the school model we know. No, it's the school model: one sits behind another, uniformed, in line. It's the industrial model, exactly. Because the Industrial Revolution, the beginning of capitalism, brought the need to prepare labor for industry, for the job market. And that's all right, man. The job market is important. We hire, we have many, we have many employees. The job market is important. But if the entrepreneur decided, of his own free will, not to be part of this job market, he needs to have another mentality. The problem isn't having a career in a company. The problem is deciding to be an entrepreneur but maintaining the thinking, the thinking pattern of a career in the job market. Because otherwise, no one thinks strategically, right? You have to leave the job market, and you have to think differently. So, what is the common thinking in the job market? "I'll work, I'll earn a salary, and that will pay my bills, I'll support myself, I'll pay my expenses, I'll pay my bills." That's all right. So, there's nothing wrong with that model. Now, if the guy decided to be an entrepreneur, he needs to play a different game than this. Because if it's to be an employee of your own business, I give a piece of advice to the person: be an employee of someone else. It's better because you'll work for another company, you'll have a salary, you won't have the risk. You'll have a salary, you won't have risk, you'll have a 13th salary, you'll have a guarantee fund. You won't have risk. Now, the guy decides to be his own employee, you understand? So, he won't have a 13th salary, he doesn't have overtime, he doesn't have a guarantee fund, he doesn't have anything, and he still has risk. It's better to work for someone else. So, if the individual decided to be an entrepreneur, then it's better that he does what? Have a different mental pattern. "Ah, but Flávio, but this only works for those who are already big." No, you have to be from the beginning. Even if you are still selling lunch to buy dinner in one phase of your life, and every entrepreneur has this phase, you need to understand that you are building wealth, not profit. So, working for equity is different from working to pay the month's bills. And the entrepreneur needs to internalize this concept if he wants to go further, if he wants to build wealth. Otherwise, he will end up being an employee of his own company, and then, who knows, it might be better to be an employee of someone who is much better than you. What do you think?

There are many people on the internet who say the following: "Ah, you can only think about cash and equity after I've solved my life through my company's cash." So, many people make excuses, saying, "I'm not even thinking about equity, I need to solve my life with the tip my company gives me." But the more he thinks about equity and the more he works for equity, the more tip he will earn. I liked it. You understand? One thing doesn't exclude the other, you know? But you've heard it, right? Many people have done this. But of course, I've heard it, and including Caio, I love dividends, I love profit, as I've said here. Yes, but the more I work for equity, the more profitable the company will be. Many people think it's one or the other, right? No, it's not one or the other. And it's not something only for those who are already big, you understand? It's something for those who are building something. It's more or less like this: an example, building a building to rent out the apartments. The rent is the tip. Uh-huh. So, I built 200 apartments and I'll earn rent. Rent is usually 0.6%, 0.4% of the property value for residential, 0.4% to 0.6% of the property value. But if you take the value you invested plus the capital gain from the appreciation of the development you built and sell that value, that increased value. I'll repeat: I spent, let's say, 100 million to build a building. Maybe I can rent out the apartments for 0.5% of that 100 million, which will be 50 million. No, 5 million, sorry. It will be 500,000. That's right, 500,000. Do the math just to be sure. 500. There are a lot of zeros here. I think it's 500. That's right, it's 500. Wow, 500. I thought it would be worse. The business is even more of a tip. I thought the tip was bigger. You understand, man? So, you see, you spent 100 million to earn 500,000 per month, man. And from the 500,000, you'll pay a lot of taxes, and there's still the risk of the tenant not paying. And then you have to hire a lawyer to collect, and the tenant doesn't leave, it takes 2 years for you to do repossession, so you spend money on lawyers, all to earn a tip. Now, you could have built the same building for 100 million, and then you built it, built it, built it. Then, when it's ready, it's worth 200 million. And then you sell all the apartments for 200 million. Then you pay taxes, pay everything, and maybe 180 million are left. 180 million invested in fixed income with no risk, 10% per year, will yield 18 million per year. And 18 million per year is 1.5 million per month, three times more than the tip. Three times more. But while you haven't sold it, you're earning the tip, right? While you haven't sold it, you can earn the tip. There's no problem earning the tip, but what is your focus? It's value creation. So, if the focus is to sell, then I'll think about a project that sells more. I'll think about a project that gives more appreciation. I'll think about a project that creates branding, that creates perception. I'll think about the location even before buying the land, because I'm already thinking about the sale down the line. I'm not thinking about the tip, the rent, I'm thinking about the sale. So, I'll create a development that will appreciate, that will sell. So, I won't sell for 200, I'll sell for 250 now, because I managed to build value. And then I take those 250, and from those 250, I set aside 50, and take the 200, and build two more buildings. And soon, I'll be building 10 buildings, 20 buildings. That's how Cyrela was born, our client here. That's how the big construction companies that are in the market were born: buy, sell, build another, launch another, generate value, hire Pan and Farina to do the project, hire... Let's build a Ferrari building, a building for the brand to generate more value and create more margin and build more equity. In other words, the entrepreneur who thinks about equity is the Builder. The entrepreneur who only thinks about profit, only about the tip, he is the Superintendent. So, you have the Superintendent entrepreneur and the Builder entrepreneur. Where is there more value? Being a Builder. Where do you build more wealth? Imagine, you earn 100 million in each building, and you build 20 buildings, that's 2 billion. You won't make 2 billion with tips, because both work hard, both the Superintendent and...

That's an important point. Bad model, good model, it takes the same effort. And there are people at home listening to us, and their brain is already frying. How can I do an X-ray to know if my business model is good? Because some people don't even know how to evaluate if a business model is good or not. When you're looking at a business, what are some of the indicators you look at? Obviously, to understand any type of business, it's important to understand the context, to go deep. But what do you look at? The first thing, man, that I look at is the addressable market. You understand? So, what do you mean by addressable market? Let's go. Let's take the education area, which is what I've been working in for almost 30 years, entrepreneurially. So, let's go. I'll create an English course. Uh-huh. Then I ask, an English course? Many people need English. Ah, many people. Everyone needs English. So, you have a large addressable market. Wow, who needs English? Man, director of a company, manager of a company, supervisor, assistant, office boy. Everyone needs English. Ah, but why do they need English? Because those who speak English have more job opportunities. English brings... Even with artificial intelligence, with the tools that exist today, will the guy go to a job interview and use artificial intelligence? Or the guy knows, or the guy doesn't know. If the company requires English for him, it's no use for him to bring a headset. The ability to speak English continues to be necessary. Or, the engineer continues to need to do math even though calculators exist, yes. Or, wow, English is a market. There's an addressable market. Ah, but I think I'll open a Javanese course now. What do you think? A Javanese course? I don't even know if this language exists. I'm thinking, man, what is a Greek course? It's Javanese, right? Let's launch a Dutch course, man. That's that mixed thing between English. The possibilities will be very reduced. They are much more reduced. Yes. A Vietnamese course. Yes. How do you say this language? Vietnamese? I don't know how to say it. Our point is this: the addressable market is smaller, it's much smaller. So, first, addressable market. Second, tax model. Brazil is a fiscal asylum. Not even tax experts can explain it properly because laws change all the time, more and more laws, and so on. In such a model, you need to structure yourself tax-wise so that you have a more efficient tax model. I am 100% in favor of you paying 100%. I am not in favor of tax evasion. I am 100% in favor of you paying 100% of your taxes. But I am 100% in favor of you organizing your business in a way that you fit into the legislation and have to pay less taxes. Uh-huh. So, it's very simple. Industry: you'll have IPI. If you import, there's import tax. If you sell products, there's ICMS. Man, just here, that's about 40%. 40%. Ah, you provide services? It's 5%. So, providing services is better than industry today. Uh-huh. There will be tax reform, maybe it will change this dynamic a bit, but until today, it's like this. Uh-huh. But you'll sell educational material, for example. There's tax immunity. Books don't pay taxes. It's not even a municipal or federal law, it's in the Federal Constitution. There's tax immunity. So, it's a product that has no tax, no income tax. Uh-huh. So, if you have an education company, for example, you can structure your business much more focused on a publishing house than on providing services. Uh-huh. Addressable market. Addressable market. Tax structure. Tax structure. Two checks. This is another point. Ah, I think a lot about sales channels to think about the business model. In reality, to tell you the truth, I would even change the order. I start thinking about sales channels before even the addressable market, because I'm already thinking about how I'm going to sell that product. You understand? That's the first thing. I start thinking about structuring the product by the sale, first by the sale. Many people first create the product, then decide how to sell it. Then maybe they even discover that it can't be sold, or maybe they discover that it sells little. But they are already in love with the product. The worst mistake is for the guy to fall in love with the product. Don't fall in love with the product, fall in love with the way of selling the product. Then the product is a detail. Because if there's gold, there's a lot of gold here. Wow. Tell me more. Say it again and say more. What did you say? So, fall in love with the way of selling the product, with the strategy, with the ingenuity to sell the product. You understand? In how this structure will be, the model of attracting people, training people, wow, the career plan, how will I do it? How will I have a sales team selling, an active team, a passive team, inside sales? How will I have a team of independent consultants? How will I sell B2B? How will I sell retail? How will I sell e-commerce? How will I sell with influencers? Distinct sales channels, omnichannel sales. Start there. Ah, then I start taking the product, Caio, when creating the product, and I'll adapt the product to the way of selling. Phew, what if I make the product this way, will the sales argument be better or worse? Ah, no, you'll worsen the sales argument. So, wait a minute. So, let's change the product a little so I can give more sales argument. What is the storytelling of this product, man? This storytelling here is amazing. So, let's go with this storytelling. Let's mold the product to the storytelling. So, I'll think about the sale, the storytelling, the purpose. And then the product will be molded according to what you see will bring you more success in sales, and therefore, you will have more scale, which therefore will have more results, which therefore will have more equity. People don't do this. First, they think about the product. Ah, I'm passionate. Like, someone asked me a question in the Q&A boxes, I ended up not answering. Man, I saw that you love picanha, you love meat. How about setting up, how about having a cattle ranch? So, people think that people think like this, man. Ah, I love meat, I love guitar, I love music. You asked why I haven't opened a business with music several times. Because I will apply my effort and have less results. I have an effort versus results matrix. So, I will apply my time to what will generate more results. People confuse business with hobby. Music is my hobby. Each of my guitars costs, let's say, between 3 and 5,000. I have an airplane, I think I have a guitar, I even called it an airplane now, it's an airplane, right? It's almost an airplane. Wow, guitar. There's a guitar there for almost 6,000. It's an expensive hobby. Hobby: you spend money to do something you enjoy. Business: you invest your money to have more financial return.

How to build a sexy brand? The centrality of a sexy brand lies in its strategy, and this strategy has several components. What we visualize is age. Identity is the body. Like a human being has a body with skin, with muscles, right? And the brain is the strategy. We don't see the brain, but it's what determines how our body positions itself in the world. Uh-huh. So, the first essential point is to have a clear strategy. Only, that's where it is. How to build a sexy brand? You can do it the traditional way, which was the way coined by people who very intelligently developed this discipline and who are studied to this day, who are super valuable. How is one of the greatest scholars of this? But most of them are already dead. So, the answers and the way they offered respond to a time that is not ours. Uh-huh. Responding to this, I wanted to answer this question you asked me. Uh-huh. About my life, how I built a very desired, very sexy brand that leaves an inheritance for products even before they are born, they already have that inheritance, and that makes people sell much more. But if I put any little apple behind any product, it already goes further. Exactly. Exactly. Or, to make a joke with Apple again, you transfer that logo to anything, and you already look and say, "This is technological, disruptive, innovative, it's cool." I like to do this exercise, right? If I tell you that Apple is going to launch a car, can you imagine more or less what that car would be like? I imagine something futuristic, more minimalist, with those lines. It's either white, or it will be silver, or it will be black. It will be something in that orbit. It already creates desire. Wow, I would have an Apple car. It must be cool. There's a car. So, this product doesn't exist, but it's an heir. It's like a rich heir's son. So, this inheritance is already in his hands. It's obvious that he can blow this inheritance and ruin the family name, because if it's a bad product, it won't deliver what the brand promises, right? So, the product needs to deliver what the brand promises. But it's already born with a huge competitive advantage, which is being an heir. But if we look at the sexiest and most irresistible brands in the world, they are old. They took a long time to build, right? So, is time a factor? It has to exist for 80 years, right? Coca-Cola's life. Exactly. 30, 20 years. I said, wow, but can you do that in 20 years? Can you do that in three? In one? That was my question, right? When I went to the United States, I started observing brands that were having great results in a very short time and realizing what was different about them from what I saw in books. Uh-huh. And then I identified some things. So, if you take the great branding thinkers in Brazil, most of them are replicating what the books said. Uh-huh. Do strategy, you'll have the archetype with your personality, your clear positioning, there's a clear target audience, a consistently applied identity. Basically, that's it, right? I've worked with some, hired some, and also worked in a large agency, and that's not what these brands are doing. No. Samsung is a good brand. Uh-huh. And Apple too. Back then, what differentiated the two? All of them did exactly this pattern, but there were some other things that Apple did. But Apple is a bad case because it's already very big. If you look, for example, at Kim Kardashian's brand, SKIMS, it's a brand that is 5 years old and has a valuation of 4 to 5 billion dollars, which is about 20 billion reais in valuation. A brand of 4 to 5 years, a brand that is a phenomenon. You look at other brands like this in the United States happening. Mr. Beast's Feastables is one. But we don't need to talk only about them. Duolingo, I think it's a more famous case, but it doesn't have this, but it has similar behaviors. So, what I understood is that to create a sexy, rich brand, beyond what is traditional for a brand, you needed other elements. A story. And when I say story, I don't mean like the story of your brand, the story of the founder. No, you're going to take your client, transform him into a hero, and give him a cooler story than his current life. Wait a minute, there's gold in what you just said. There is. You said that you take... So, it's not because, generally, what is the brand's story? Everyone, everything started when my grandfather met my grandmother. Nobody is interested in that. Exactly. Nobody wants to know that. I'm not interested. I don't know your grandfather, I don't know your grandmother. It has nothing to do with them. People are interested in themselves. The world is made of people like this. We are interested. We are here to live our lives, right? So, you have to take your main character, which is your client, your target audience, transform him into your protagonist, into the protagonist of a story, and give him a journey, a story better than the one he's living today. And this was a realization I had because before I did marketing, I was a screenwriter, and I wrote movie scripts. I even became an actress at the time to pay for my college because I had a problem at home, I lost my father, he stopped giving me money, I had to become an actress. Then I went to work. I worked at Globo, I worked at Multishow. Wow, how cool. And then I thought, man, so there's the hero's journey. There's a narrative structure of novels and films that makes the film a blockbuster or a cult film. And brands want to be blockbusters, right? You want your brand to sell as much as possible. You don't want to have a cult brand that will win awards at Cannes and be praised by the advertising industry for being a very cool brand, but doesn't sell, right? So, there is a narrative axis that you do. You transform your client into the hero. Then your client has a desire for a happy ending, right? Uh-huh. And then he has the challenges he faces to reach that happy ending, and he has the enemies. And the journey. Your brand has to help your client. It has to make your client go from point A to the happy ending, overcome the enemy, overcome the challenges, have a better journey. For example, G4 Educação, where I was a partner, director of brand and marketing there. We thought a lot about this. Who is our hero? The entrepreneur, right? The entrepreneur and the executive. Uh-huh. These are our heroes. Okay. Then, when you look at your hero, your tendency is, ah, his challenge is that he wants to grow more. Okay. That's a challenge that the product solves. But what about the challenge that the product doesn't solve? What is it? Then you have to... This is what builds a brand. It's the challenge that the product doesn't solve. The product will solve part of the pain. The brand solves another. So, what will the product provide? Growth for this entrepreneur. It will make him grow more than he is growing today. So, the product solves this. What does the brand solve? The brand will make this entrepreneur, who today in Brazil is seen as an exploiter, as someone who wants to get ahead, as someone unworthy, be seen as someone who is a hero, who is making a difference, who is generating jobs, who is generating wealth, who is changing Brazil, who is moving the country forward. And he's doing this by fighting, besides fighting this culture that sees him badly, also fighting a government that delivers a very complex environment for him to prosper. So, these two here, my product doesn't solve, but my brand can help solve. And by being part of G4, he's not just joining to have a richer company and become richer, he's joining a movement to make Brazil a more prosperous country and be recognized for it. So, then we define a measurable metric. Case G4, for example, 1 million new jobs by 2030 generated by students. We did it every year at Nasdaq here in New York, showing how many jobs had been generated. So, the story is responsible for making this guy, who had a simple life but earned, working hard, [ __ ] became a movie character, man, he's a hero, he's changing Brazil, he's generating jobs, he's generating innovation, he's fighting against the [ __ ] government. It's much cooler to be this guy than the one who is there every day at work, punching the clock. And if you take this perspective in all brands, there's the same narrative. You take, for example, Boca Rosa, where you were. All of them. Boca Rosa: ambitious women. Our target audience: women who want to grow professionally. Boca Rosa, inclusive, the idea for the brand emerged from this cultural analysis of things. So, this is something that a person who wants to build a sexy brand needs to have. Good. A cultural analysis. So, for example, today, most women work, right? Most of them. I know there's a trend of feminine energy, of women staying at home, but most women work. A large part of women have the desire to have their own wealth, to build wealth. And then you think, wow, women study more than men. That's a fact. It's data. Uh-huh. Data. She graduates, there are more women in graduate school, there are more women in postgraduate studies. She studies more than men. Okay. The woman, besides studying more than men, also has more household chores. Most women still work more at home than men. Besides working more at home than men, she also spends more time caring for her appearance than men. We do makeup, women do eyebrows, nails, waxing, all of this takes time. And then she's more concerned with her body. This makes women have less time and less energy at work. If she wants to get rich, she needs to have more time and more energy. How can I help her through the product and through the brand? Why do women wear makeup? All beauty companies will say it's to look more beautiful. They will use the archetype of the lover, of seduction, and so on. Then I said, man, I was in Europe, I went to buy a work bag, inclusive, it's there. I wanted to buy a branded bag, I wanted a beautiful, chic bag to work with, because I spend most of my time working. So, I went to Gucci, to Louis Vuitton, to Prada, to Dior. And in Europe, these brands are separated between women and men. And I went, of course, to the women's section to look for a bag where I could carry my laptop and so on. And there wasn't any. There weren't any work bags for notebooks in these brands. I said, wow, I think these very rich, very chic, luxury brands don't make work bags. They only make them more for going out at night and so on. I said, ah, I'll look in the men's section because maybe there's a bigger bag that I can adapt and use eventually. And so on. All of them had work bags. Uh-huh. For men. All of them. None for women. Then I said, wow, for men, it's even the opposite. If there's no laptop... I said, who invented this bag? Exactly. Exactly. And then I said, wow, the brands have an old concept of women, outdated. Okay. When I went... This was before I worked at Boca Rosa. When I went to Boca Rosa, I noticed the same thing in makeup. Today, I came here to do this podcast with you, and while I was stopped at a traffic light, I put on my makeup because I didn't have time to put on my makeup before. So, makeup needs to be what? So that I can do this. If women put on makeup, you'll see women putting on makeup directly in the bathroom. We have several women here, in the car mirror, on the bus, in Uber, in any corner. It needs to be practical. It needs to be exact. It needs to be practical. It needs to be something that won't... So, I looked at the makeup, and what did we have? Liquid foundation. It's harder to apply. If you forget the brush, you can't apply it. And I've already forgotten. It happened to me. I was going to work, I was going to put on makeup, I had liquid foundation, I didn't have a brush, and then, how do I apply it? It's impossible to apply with your hand. It looked horrible. Okay. Powder. Loose powder. You're going to apply it in the car, you'll get your Blazer all dirty. You wear a black Blazer, you'll arrive looking like you have dandruff, you'll get all dirty. All women have gotten dirty with loose powder. There isn't one who hasn't gotten dirty. Then I said, wow, what a shame, right? Why don't we have makeup that's very simple? Like the ones I saw in foreign countries, like, you pass the stick, you pass it with your hand, like I pass my sunscreen when I go surfing, and it's 5 minutes. Why don't we have this? Then Bianca already wanted to make sticks, it was already a desire of hers. And then I said, man, there's something very cool here. Let me see who the owners of the makeup companies are. Who are the CEOs of the makeup companies? Let's see who these women are who are making this difficult makeup. They weren't women. They were all men. Uh-huh. Or there's a clear enemy here. The beauty of Brazilian women is in the hands of men. I can solve this. I'll found one. She already had it, right? She founded a company with two women. Her mother is the majority. A female team. She thought of makeup that is extremely practical, that you can feel beautiful, more powerful, because makeup gives power. I was coming here, I said to Lucas, "Wow, I think I forgot my makeup. If I forgot my makeup, I'm screwed. I can't record without makeup. I can't. I'm dependent." So, like, for me, it's part of my security, of feeling secure. So, you can feel secure in a very agile way that won't harm your time and will make you ready for your day-to-day. So, we designed the product that way. And the brand is this: it helps women achieve their boldest dreams. So, the first thing we can take, right? The first question I had for you is, what is a sexy, irresistible brand? Can I say that it's a brand where the person has a desire to live the journey of that hero? Exactly. So, when that desire exists, "I want this," then it becomes irresistible because that story that is told, I want it to be my story. Exactly. So, then we nail it down to the simplest level of understanding: what is a sexy brand? You want to live the story. The story that that brand promises. [ __ ] My dream is to live that story. So, that brand will be irresistible. Exactly. Then there's another element besides the story, right? And not discarding the old ones, you need to have clarity of the target audience. Everything starts with the audience. I made the entrepreneur the hero, the woman the hero. So, clear audience, clear positioning, and the promise. We can talk about that, it's simpler. Anything on Google, people find it. But besides the story, there's another thing: personality. When we talk about personality, people will say archetype, the brand's vibe, right? That's what people say. But the coolest ones aren't about that. It's about what? It's... I'll bring... let's use an English word, but translating it into Portuguese, it's like it gives you an attribute you want to have. So, for example, I want to be seen as a successful woman. Prada helps me do that. I want to be seen as an elegant woman. Wow, that's very good. Say it again. It's giving me an element of personality that I would like to have. The best brands will help you say to the world who you want to be, who you are. They will help you say to the world who you are, or to appear to the world who you want to be, even if you aren't yet. Even if you aren't. Exactly. That's why luxury brands started booming so much with logos. Because they weren't being bought for the products. They were being bought for the fact that people wanted to appear rich, even if they weren't. Because sometimes you buy at a street vendor, "I want to appear rich, I want to tell the world that I am rich." So, this brand helps me do that. Gucci, for example, was a brand that, inclusive, they did a rebrand now because of that, but it was used a lot. It was used a lot for people to say they are rich, through the logo being very clear. So, the best brands are those that help you say to the world, either who you are, or how you want to be seen. So, Chanel: elegance. Prada: success. Jeep: adventure. You are an adventurer. You have a Jeep. I am an adventurer. You see cities with Jeeps. Yes. There's a need for... They are somewhat rebellious, perhaps. Rebel. I'm a rebel. I'm a guy who has the courage to face the status quo. So, the brand gives you a personality attribute that you want to have. So, the first thing that is a sexy brand: check. The person desires to live that story that the brand proposes. If a person is there, and there are people who already have a brand, evaluating, man, is mine sexy? Is he on the right track? There are some elements. If you were to do a diagnosis, he would go for a consultation. Doctor, how do you think I'm doing? What do you think I should look at? Right off the bat, is there anything you can look at? Pay attention to the points here, the elements that make up an irresistible brand. There are some. Yes. If you have a strong community, like, you have a community. Opa, B. You have an engaged community. That's already a good sign. That's already a very good sign, and it's rare, right? You have a strong community. You have a defined personality for your brand. Good. Good. If you have a clear identity and strategy, too. You already have that. You need to know if you have it. And you have to look at the number of people who talk about your brand. The number of people who talk about your brand. This kind of identifies the promoters. Exactly. It identifies who really cares about you. I think these are the main points: having a community, having a clear strategy, identity, personality, and having a high number of people who talk about your brand. Now, the most important thing is if you are selling more than you expected. That's the most important thing. After all, all this strategy is to sell more, better, and more. Exactly. Exactly. When you receive a proposal from a company to partner with Optimus. Uh-huh. Be it a good company, to make it great, or a company that is doing poorly, and let's turn it around. When you evaluate that the guy has a bad business, man, what are Lázaro's premises for saying... A bad business? Ah, I'll tell you one that we have to be careful with, that we don't like to take. It's a guy who made a mistake.

So much in the sale and in the price that you cannot recover. There are companies that are like that. The inside part, man, we work with it and recover. If the guy's product got bad or if he put a product out and it started to get his brand and kill it with discount, discount, discount, wanting to sell cheap, cheap, cheap. The final consumer, he doesn't accept drastic repositioning, right? Some years ago, I can't mention brands, but this brand was sold to another company. Okay, but I had a company where the guy who launched it, before passing the company to me, wanted to have a product as good as Johnson & Johnson had, but cheaper. But inside, he had a better formula, better packaging, everything better, and it had been on the market for 7 years. I couldn't reposition the price. Price repositioning in the consumer's pocket, it falls. You are used to drinking something you really like, a product you really like, for R$1. If the guy puts R$2, you'll switch, brother. You can't double it. So, for example, what we think is very bad is an old company with a brand that was burned by the entrepreneur's desperation to save his cash, and he kept giving discounts, discounts, discounts for years. Repositioning this brand is much harder than doing a normal turnaround for any company. You will practically have to build a brand all new or make another new one. It's easier to launch another product than to reposition that one. So we don't like to take on businesses when we see that the company's problem is not internal, but in the consumer's head.

Do you have any preferences? Do you like companies that have this size, a specific margin? The margin is squeezed. The bigger, the better for us, because think about it: if I spend energy on a 10 million company, and I spend it on a 200 million company, it's the same energy, and my brain is the same. I earn more money here, understand? So, the bigger, the better. And the bigger, the easier to fix, right? Larger companies have more fat and muscle to burn. So you can, you have more room to maneuver within it. When a company is very bad or a commodity, let's put it that way, a commodity also doesn't have protection against idiots, brother. Protection against idiots is margin. Margin protects you.

Explain that. Protection against idiots. I think it's good. I know, but I want it to be like this: I buy this product here for R$10, and with tax, it costs R$12. I sell it for R$100. Look at my markup. This is protection against idiots. If this product costs R$12, I sell it for R$15. Any mistake, and you're in the red. There's no protection against idiots. No protection against idiots. Commodity, that's why it's just right, low margin. The executive and the owner have to be very efficient, very good, because if they make a mistake, they go into the red. For example, in the past, I started my career in the pharmaceutical industry, very high up. In the pharmaceutical industry, I had protection against idiots, and the company bet a lot on me. This is Novatis, and at the time, I was a guy with potential, but I was a motivated beast, brother. Why? Because I was learning. I was learning. I made a lot of mistakes. I made a lot of mistakes. If you say, "Man, Lázaro at 30 and Lázaro at 50, you can't compare." Why? Because I kept making mistakes, and I allowed myself to make mistakes once, never twice, three times, understand? From time to time, a ghost appears in your life, but you have to avoid them. So, protection against idiots is this: a company that has a cushion, a better contribution margin. That's why I like to sell things at a fair price, not cheap. When you sell cheap, you don't have margin, man. If you made a mistake, what do you think?

What margin do you like for a business that you find satisfactory? It depends on the segment, okay? Let's put it this way: if you have a traditional retail company and it has an EBITDA of 12, 13, a company, a pharmacy chain, if it has an EBITDA of 10, it's great, you know? Yes. Only if I have a supplement company with an EBITDA of 10, it's too bad. A cosmetics company with an EBITDA of 10, it's terrible. Yes. So it depends on the segment. So good or bad margins depend on the segment. But you don't, you don't, especially the scenario, right? For example, we were with a client yesterday here, at Vend. He was, well, he was doing a training, he wants to change, especially channels, because he's having what you said, right? He's having a loss of efficiency, and when you have small margins, you don't have fat to make mistakes. And the guy had a business, in the last line, it was, well, to summarize, he had a 6% margin. But you think, "Wow, man, a guy exposes himself to risk, has 50 knives in his neck, to have a 6% margin." If he takes his money and puts it in fixed income, he has 10%. And let me tell you something, some segments, supermarkets, net margin reaches two. If the guy is good, it's three. They have commodities, one. And believe me, take the listed commodity bags. Desperation, man.

Do you like to take companies that have their margins more squeezed because you know there's room to maneuver, depending on the segment? Yes. You take a supermarket. Oh, the guy is in the negative. Man, if I'm very good, I'll take him to 3% net profit. I'll take his EBITDA to 8.7. Man, it's very difficult. A wholesaler. So the big wholesalers you see out there, understand? They are difficult. Now, you take a pharmaceutical industry, and at this moment, we are analyzing a pharmaceutical industry there for us to do a turnaround. And he's in a negative situation, but he has enormous future capacity. That, if we adjust it correctly, the EBITDA can be 25%, 30% EBITDA, understand? So you always look at margins. You look a lot at the sector.

What is a sector you don't like? I know, but you say, and obviously, if someone is in that sector, it would be the side of, pay attention, pay attention. Gas stations. Understand? Because the margin is very low, man. What business do you not like? There are opportunities in everything, but the guy has to be good. The guy has to be good. The guy to have success today has to be good in this type of thing. For supermarkets, my friend, think about this: you have a 3% margin, and you have products that lose value every day. If you slip in losses, if you slip in waste, you're done. In a company that invoices 10 billion, and its profit margin is 100 million, 1%. Man, you can't make a mistake. If you invoice 100 million, it's 1 million, little man. You can't make a mistake, man. You have no chance. There isn't a sector I don't like. There are more difficult sectors. Difficult sectors, all commodities, but even more so, right? The agro, for example, the soybean market. Damn, soybeans reached 19, then it went to 94. My friend, if that happens to you, and you with a full stock, from 194 to 94, you have to pray, kneel, and there's nothing you can do. It's commodity, it's the market. You bought it, it was 194, you stopped selling because you held on, believing it would maintain or go up more, and it drops to 94. Today, depending on the region of the country, it must be 120, 140, 130. Soybeans.

Do you know many cases of people who are doing turnarounds because the owner robbed the company? Many. You see many cases where the guy, "Man, he robbed the company's cash." I'm in favor of the owner getting rich because he's putting his skin at risk. But there's a question I get a lot, like, "Man, I have a business, I started making a profit, how much do I take for myself?" There's no right answer, or it depends on what vision you have for your business, what size you want to have. You are not obligated to have any size. It's you who determines your vision. But how do you look at this area? I think the following: let's put it this way, if you see many owners robbing their own companies, many, countless, countless. And I see another mistake. I see the guy with negative results, the guy owing the state, not paying taxes, and anticipating dividends for himself. This is a crime. You cannot owe the state. Yes, you don't have accounting profit, how can you? How do you have dividends, and the guy anticipates dividends? You can have a pro-labore and high pay and pay taxes. You anticipate dividends with a company that is in the negative, you cannot. You have to have accounting profit. You have to have accounting profit. So, I see a lot of this, and the big mistake these guys make is seeing the cash movement and thinking that's profit. The guy thinks the money in the cash is 100% profit. You can't. You have to know how much your cash covers your working capital and what is free cash. Even so, free cash is profit. Lázaro, sometimes not. Sometimes free cash is for investment, and what's left is profit, right? People confuse cash with profit. That's wrong. Cash to cover working capital, and they confuse free cash with profit. Free cash can be profit if you're not going to invest anything. So it's free, you'll do whatever you want with it. The guy says, "Now, no, I want to grow my business, I'll have to invest more." So it's no longer free. Part of it goes where? To investment.

If we were to list things that break a company, then you've already mentioned one. I'll throw a ball, and I want you to talk about it, and we also make a list here. You've already said that it's the man who robs the company. That's one of them. The man who robs a company. That can break a company. Second thing you mentioned at the beginning of the podcast is "bicho" (animal/thing). The important thing isn't to make a sale, it's a good sale. Some people are making sales wrong, and with every sale you make, you put a hole in your bucket. Wait, I'll add one. I want you to talk about mismatched cash flow. The guy buys cash and sells on installment. So if this guy grows a lot, he goes bankrupt. Do you see many scenarios of people, and how to do it in this case?

Man, oh man, guys. I do this. I buy from my supplier, usually on short terms, and I give them terms. So the guy finances his own client. Let's put it this way: there are two ways. Sometimes the guy is buying short-term and selling long-term, but it's because of his business decision. Then I try to change it. I try to sell more short-term, buy more long-term, do this little game. But sometimes it's the market. Sometimes it's the market. So you think about this: if I have an adequate price, the pricing is adequate, if I have an adequate margin, and the money, I have a positive EBITDA, a lot. I have a net result in the P&L, great. But it's not reflecting in the cash. It's a mismatch. You have two ways to do this: either you make a capital injection, or you go to the bank to get money. There's no other way. If it's the market, if the mismatch is market, for example, the cosmetics sector, you usually manufacture, buy with up to 30 days. If you, especially if you're not very big, if you're very big, you get a bit more. But the credit card sale reaches 12. How do you do it? There's still a fee. So, first thing: look, no, I have more in the P&L, it's good. The P&L is beautiful, but my cash is bad. So if the P&L is beautiful and the cash is bad, you have the breath to pay loans. So you go to the bank, borrow, or if you have money, you contribute. Everyone who has a cash mismatch because of the difference between receivables, between you receiving and you paying, the difference between accounts payable and accounts receivable in terms of aging, it causes a cash mismatch. Either you contribute, or you get a loan to cover it. If everything is okay, the P&L is beautiful. If the P&L is bad, you have to address the cause, because cash hurts. It's a symptom. Cash is a symptom. Exactly. My problem is cash. Cash is never the problem. The problem comes before the cash. Yes, it just reflects everything that happens in operations. Opex affects Opex and affects cash. It affects extra operations. Cash is an indicator that every owner feels. Exactly. If he's not seeing the hole in his operation, when it reaches the cash, he'll see it. Then he'll say, "I'm doing something wrong." So, really, the first is the pain. Pain is never the cause, right? Pain is a symptom. So cash is where it hurts. And if everything is going well and it hurts in the cash, it's time. If it's time, you seek external resources, or you contribute. Damn, I don't have money. But if the P&L is beautiful, you have the condition to pay, right? You have a margin of R$ [__], you have an EBITDA of 25%, man, you can get it from the bank. A2A is expensive today. It's expensive, but you can. Now, if the guy has a low margin already, 8.5, if he puts it all into work, he'll have to first try to negotiate with his supplier and try to shorten terms. Then he'll have to get a much lower bank spread. You know, I have within the team, a team just to negotiate with the bank to get credit, and one to negotiate with the bank to pay. There's a team just to do that. And sometimes it's worth it for people to review their business model too, right? Many distribution channels, you arrive, you say, "Man, it's no use consulting this here. This house is rotten. It's about making a new architectural model." I'll tell you something: if a commercial guy knows very well that I'm talking about this, people, they have a lot of passion for direct sales, for multi-level. Man, if you don't have a margin, if you don't have a markup greater than, if you can't be in direct sales, if you don't have a markup greater than eight, you can't be in multi-level. Because you'll pay another level of commission. You can't. There are guys who arrive and say, "Oh, your clothing store, I want to enter the multi-level market." You can't. Oh, why not? You can't. It's not that you don't want to, you can't. Oh, but someone told me I can. They lied to you. This business model architecture is important, right? Very important. Understand? You have businesses that leverage a lot but cost more to get started, and then everything starts with product pricing, with product markup. That's why I said that sometimes the first thing I look at is there, because that's where errors usually happen, because the guy goes crazy to sell cheap, he prices badly, and then if you price badly too, in your company, you can't have diversity of sales channels, because there will be channels you won't be able to work with. Everyone says, "Let's be minimal and multichannel." No, there are times when less is more, right? Only to do that, you have to start right, pricing correctly, because if you don't have a markup, you can't. A good example of a perfect multichannel company, in my opinion, is Boticário. Only what sustains Boticário is good margins. Then he can have everything. He has this guy, he has franchises, this guy has his own direct sales. It's absurd, right? This guy has online, this guy has distributors, this guy has his own store. Man, he has everything. Understand? He has fantastic customer service. Understand? He has everything. But why does he have everything? Because he has the means to finance it. Then the guy sets up a business, prices everything wrong, and says, "I want to be Boticário." Damn, he dies and is reborn. There's no fixing it. Lázaro doesn't solve your life. Understand? It's not even a month that a company doesn't appear looking for me, and I say, "Man, you should have looked for me 5 years ago. Today I can't solve your problem."

Silvio gave you total autonomy. He gave a lot to what he didn't dominate. For example, on television, he didn't give it. On television, my friend, he said, "What are we going to put on the program? The call." It wasn't even worth giving it. No, no, no, no. You come in with your idea, and you leave with his. That which he dominated and literally worked, and didn't listen to anyone. And he had a problem. Sometimes I made, I've made many bets with him. I made bets. I set them up and told him, "You're wrong." Then the son of a bitch was right in the end, because he didn't have courage, man. Everything that went wrong in our hands worked in his hands. Everything that went wrong here worked there. Ask me, man, I don't know. I don't know if it's divine, Holy Spirit. I don't know. The guy has a vision and a sense that is inexplicable. You work with Flávio. Flávio must be like that too, right? Sometimes you must look and say, "Man, but it won't work." And if it works, it's not a principle. It's especially when the guy knows his zone of talent, his zone of power. My friend, Silvio beat me like this. I told him, "Silvio, no." He said, "Money is from hundred F." I said, "Then fine. If I lose mine, once he made a mistake with me." He came to me and said, "I want to do digital inclusion." I said, "What do you understand by digital inclusion?" This computer thing for others. I said, "You're going to give it away?" Philanthropy? I said, "No, no." "You're going to sell it cheap." I said, "Silvio, you can't sell it cheap because SBT sold it." It even sold it. And I went, in six months, I sold more computers than anyone in this Brazil, and I screwed myself. I had no margin, old man. Six months later, I went to him and said, "Look, look at the hole we're getting into." So, for whoever sent you to do this, I said, "You." And I didn't want to. I didn't want to sell notebooks. So in that, he made a mistake. In compensation, he already succeeded with me. He wanted to launch a little perfume for R$10, and I told him, "God forbid, no, no, no." And man, I have a 60% margin on perfume. "Silvio, you're going to launch a 30% margin." "No, no, it won't sell." He said, "Lázaro, the money is mine." But what was his logic? His logic was to have a lot of scale and a sub-margin and have a product that nobody had. A little 25 ml product for R$10. It didn't exist in Brazil. And I said, "Man, I'll do the best I can." We're talking about 20 years ago, right? Not 2010, 12. 12 years ago. 14 years ago. Then I launched the damn perfume against my will. And right at the launch, we had, it passed a little. We sold R$80 million. And the margin, which was 30, went to 45 because of the scale. In scale, I went to India, on behalf of Dora, to buy bottles. The essences, I didn't buy by the kilo, I bought in tons. Then I went from 15 to 45 in volume. The additional 45 already represented a good increase. And this didn't cannibalize. Then he would pass by me and say, "And then, perfume from hell, is it bad?" "It's terrible." I had to endure it. For me, it was terrible. If I were to do it alone. But then there was something else there, a certain entity that worked. So this type of thing also depends a lot, man. It depends on where you are. Lázaro, is this a good business? It depends on who. Understand? There are things that are good business for you, it's bad for me because I don't have your talent and your vision to do it. There are things that are good for me and bad for you because you don't have my talent, my vision to do a certain thing. So when people ask me, "Lázaro, where do I invest my money?" In what you dominate. It's the wisest answer I've learned in my life. You only put your money in what you dominate. If you don't dominate, there's no good opportunity. It's good for whoever has it.

There's something I admire a lot, your capacity, and you talked about building a team. You started building a team, teams, teams. And you see this differential of Nubank, the passionate crowd that works there. Yes. I know about two or three people. The crowd, man, you cut your arm here, the blood comes out purple. I don't know if it's an external impression. It's an external impression. But the ones I know there, if you cut here, the blood is purple. I like this purple blood culture. Understand? But it's not by chance that the purple blood is created. It's very intentional. So there's intentionality. How many people, sometimes, look at companies, businesses, and say, "Look at so-and-so's team." Say, "Man, how can this guy be so passionate?" Then they look at the current team and say, "Wow, I don't have passionate people like that." So how did you design this purple blood in people? So this is something that we were very intentional about from the beginning. On May 6, 2013, which was the first day, Ed arrived in Brazil that day with two suitcases, without speaking Portuguese. The first time he was setting foot in Brazil was the day we started working together, the three of us. And the first meeting we had, the three of us, was about culture. What culture did we want to have at Nubank? What were our values? What kind of direction would we give to people? What kind of people would we hire? What was important to us? So it was something that we let happen. We didn't, in the beginning, we had these conversations in a very assertive way so that everyone was on the same page and there were no deviations. Understand? So I see many, many companies starting, sometimes startups, and even large companies, reaching a point, "Oh, this culture thing, right? Oh, we need to build it." This culture. "Okay, let me explain. You already have a culture. You might not even like it. It might even be terrible, but it's already there." Culture doesn't let you slack off. Ah, it already exists. So we had this clarity that we needed to be very intentional. We had a lot of alignment, thank God. So it wasn't a fight. Understand? That I would say, "In our culture, we have to be passionate about the client." Then the other one, "No, there's nothing like that." We, very much, thank God, we converged very quickly. To the five values that we have as a company to this day.

What are the drivers, then? So, we have five values. And over 11 years, there were about two moments where we stopped and said, "Wow, wait a minute. Let me see if anything is missing here. Is there anything that no longer serves?" Man, we always go back to these five things. It's impressive. We were very happy with the articulation of these five things. The first is: we want clients to love us fanatically. That's our number one value. It's the top, the top of the list. That's it. The second is: we are hungry and want to be challenged and challenge the status quo. Legal. The third is: we think like owners, not like tenants. The fourth is: we want to have teams. We want to build strong and diverse teams. And the fifth is: we want to seek intelligent efficiency, not just cost cutting. Those are the five. And to this day, they are, they are what guide everything we do. And there's something we talk about a lot too, that everyone talks about the Nubank brand. Man, the brand, it's nothing more than the external tangibilization of the culture. Exactly. It's the reflection of what's inside, of what's inside. So, our culture is our strategy. Our brand is our products. It's all one thing. It's all very, very cohesive, you know? Very coherent. Understand? So this helps a lot. And then, reaching the point of building the teams, which you asked about, and when you have this clarity, this strength, about what you want to be, about what your values are, it's very easy to identify someone at the gate who is aligned or not. Understand? And one thing I talk about a lot too is that this has to be a very strong criterion in selection, because it's okay, you can even communicate this to your team, and you can even encourage people to go in a certain direction, but if they don't already have a predisposition to be aligned with it, they won't come from one extreme to the other. Understand? Uh-huh. They might not be here, but they have to be more towards here than there.

Some very strategic positions, do you participate in the hiring process? Ah, certainly. Many, many. What do you like? What is Cris Junqueira's standard, like, "Ah, one of the things I talk about a lot is that the person has to be into it." Man, so you keep digging for questions to know the extent of the person's hunger. Man, can I say? Normally, you don't need to dig for questions. Exactly, right? It's visible. I'll tell you a wonderful story. And it's marvelous. Not long ago, we hired an incredible person to be the Country Manager of Colombia. We had a great person too, Catalina, who founded Colombia with us and all. But it reached a point in her life where she wanted to do something else. That's fine, we supported her. She made a transition. And then I went to the market to hire a new person. And I talked to many executives in Colombia. Okay, man, tell me, tell me, what justifies a person sitting in front of me, co-founder, in an interview for Country Manager of Nubank in Colombia? What did she do? She sat in front of me and said, "So, but what's your differential?" "Ah, no, against this interest rate, for God's sake." My desire would be to say, "Look, if you came here to waste my time today, don't you have shame to ask me a question like that?" I swear to God, man. My desire was to get up and say, "You can go. You can go." "Oh, for God's sake, man. You don't have shame to waste my time like this?" Man, I was very revolted. You have no idea. I was very revolted. I wanted to kill the human being, because she, in fact, showed how much she wasn't into it, right? Exactly. She did the minimum of homework. Man, wow. But I was revolted. So revolted. I said, "I don't believe this person is asking me this." Ah, I ended it there. I didn't get up and throw her out. Elegant, as always. Educated. I gathered all my strength to be elegant, and not throw her out at that minute. But I certainly significantly shortened the conversation. And it's one of the, it's one of the very hard things to teach people to have this appetite. How to give ambition training is very difficult. I say that, there's a phrase I always say: you can teach a person everything, but you can't teach them to be into it, to really want it, you know? To have this, "being into it." No, you don't teach that. Either she has it, or she doesn't. You know, Thiago Nigro once said, and it stuck with me. He commented that he had watched that Nike movie, you know? Ah, and he said, "Man, that movie shows something that I believe in. I believe in it a lot too." That whoever wants more wins. I believe in it a lot. I believe in it a lot, man. Oh Jesus. A lot in this. Yes. And whoever wants more will be willing to do more, study more, work more, everything else. Man, it's because it's not just wanting, but wanting is the trigger for everything else. It's the trigger for action. It's the trigger for action. Everything else. Understand? Yes.

One of the best ways to package a teaching is by putting it inside a story. Yes. Because humans learn a lot through stories. Jesus was a great storyteller. Do you know that when I tell a story, I'm going to package knowledge, and that knowledge will perpetuate, and that message will spread? And there are many leadership stories in the Bible that bring absurd teachings. I like it, especially because there are some passages, and they bring us lessons, but there are also some warning signs, right? Uh-huh. Of what not to do. Perfect, right? For example, arrogance is the precursor to ruin. Uh-huh. So, leading with arrogance is the beginning of the end. But what stories do you like that have leadership teachings for you? Stories like that. In Hebrews 11, the Bible recounts the gallery of Heroes of Faith. Ah, practically all of them were leaders. So if you want to have different prisms of leadership, in the gallery of Heroes of Faith, you'll have several different personalities. Which one comes to your mind quickly? Man, we have Abraham, for example, who is the father of faith, who goes to an unknown place and becomes so prosperous that his shepherds start fighting among themselves because there's no space for the flocks. He becomes powerful. He is extraordinary. Now, a story that catches my attention is the story of Joseph, because Joseph is sold for being a dreamer. Man, Joseph typifies what many entrepreneurs are facing. What's my problem? You dream too big. How many people were expelled from a corporation because their dreams were too big, or were canceled by their own family, sometimes? Totally. And what's his problem? He's just a dreamer. Man, when you have, as part of your genesis, being a dreamer, it's not something you choose to do. It's who you are. You are born dreaming, you will die dreaming. I am a dreamer. Man, I love to dream. You are a dreamer, right? I am a dreamer. Man. So it's difficult when someone tries to tell me that the dream is too big, because for those who move on the scale of dreams, there is no big or small dream. Dream is dream. Period. I remember a phrase, I might not remember it perfectly, but like this: how much does it cost to give up a dream? It costs a dream. It costs a lot, right? It costs a lot, man. So you have a dream of having a family. Giving that up costs what? It costs a dream, man. So Joseph receives a dream, but he doesn't receive just any dream. Joseph receives a dream from God. And then when he presents it to his brothers, the Bible says that they start to quarrel even more. And then when Joseph approaches, the brothers say, "Why don't we end his story, or kill him, or sell him? Let's see what will become of his dreams from now on." That is, there is resistance to Joseph, but there is even greater resistance to Joseph's dreams, because everyone who is not dreaming gets bothered by those who dream. Because you imagine, why do you think this happens? Because it generates a denunciation. Catch this. Man, always when a straight tower is built, it denounces everything that is crooked. Very good that perspective. That's why it's very good.

There's a woman who, at Jesus' feet, man, and she's pouring expensive perfume at his feet, and she's washing and drying his feet with her hair. Then the Bible says that the men in that environment start criticizing Jesus within themselves. They say, "If he were a prophet, he would know who this woman is." Then another thinks, "If he were a prophet, he wouldn't let her touch him." Then Jesus says, "You are questioning her offering, but since I entered, no one has kissed me, no one has offered me water, no one has honored me, and this woman is honoring me with what she has best." What happened in that room? The level of her offering denounces their lack of offering. If someone wasn't delivering a lot, no one would notice that those guys weren't delivering anything. But when someone delivers a lot, it becomes very clear who isn't delivering anything. So, every time something true is established, everything false denounces itself. This is an example. You take a counterfeit watch. You take an original watch. You put them both here. You'll see by the weight, maybe by the sound of the mechanism. "Man, this is original. This is fake." But maybe without the original, you would have doubts about the fake. Why? Because when there is a higher scale of purity, it denounces the lack of purity of what doesn't have it. So, every time a dreamer establishes himself, whoever doesn't dream is denounced. Every time a visionary establishes himself, whoever doesn't have vision is denounced. How many times, man, since I was young, I was in some environment, and then I presented visions and dreams. I remember, I remember a statement that marked me once, in a leadership meeting, where I presented my project for that year, an annual agenda for the ministry. And then the guy said, "But paper accepts everything, brother." Then the meeting ended. I said, "Why did you say that paper would accept everything?" He said, "Putting a lot of ideas on paper is easy. Doing it is difficult." And there I realized that his resistance wasn't to me personally, but to my personality. That is, I dreamed, and I shared the dream I had. I envisioned, and I shared the vision I had. But this makes it very clear when you are in a team that is no longer dreaming, that is no longer envisioning. How do you protect your dream, man? You have to know. Oh, that's interesting. This is the moment to expose, to whom to expose. And if it's to expose, there are visions that God will give you. He will give them to you to say, "Speak." "What I heard." So Moses receives the laws. He comes down and says, "Oh, God gave me some laws here. I think it's good for us to follow." "Only there are things that he tells some men, he says, 'Oh, don't tell anyone about this. It's a secret.'" Or then, "Don't tell it now. Wait for the time." This is an example. Jesus' ministry, at 30 years old. Jesus already had a profession. Jesus had already learned in the temple and was already teaching. Jesus already had stature. Jesus already had majority age. Jesus, man, he was already a formed man at 30. He is baptized, and then the Spirit rests upon him, and the ministry begins. So Jesus already knew who he was for a long time, but he only starts after the Father says, "You can reveal yourself." And then he starts to reveal himself, and because he revealed himself, persecution begins, uprisings begin. Because there is something interesting. The enemy with visionaries, dreamers, with someone who carries something precious, when you are activated, your opponents are also activated. So when does the assassination of an entire generation of babies begin? Like, everyone will have enemies, no matter how much they don't want to. Man, enemies is a strong term. Yes. When I say enemies, a little lighter. But people who, in a way, will try. Sometimes the guy isn't your personal enemy, but he opposes. Not exactly. When I say enemy, it's because he won't contribute to your dream. Because enemies contribute to our dream, right? It's true. If we know how to transform it. That's it. If it weren't for the sale of Joseph's brothers, perhaps he wouldn't have reached Pharaoh. If it weren't for the assassination of a whole generation, Moses wouldn't have been placed in the basket and embraced by Pharaoh's daughter, wouldn't have become a prince of Egypt. So there are many things that enemies cooperate with, and that's why God allows opponents, enemies, to rise up. Because, but it's difficult to understand that a trial is part of the training, right? It's difficult until you understand. Then you'll have another challenge. You start to enjoy it. It's true, man. Before God, what I'm going to tell you: in 2018, I started to have some challenges of opposition. It reached a point where, when I understood the game, I knew that for every opposition, disloyalty, or injustice, if I kept quiet and sought God, a double honor would come. It was like that the first time, the second time, the third time. It reached a point where I already rejoiced when there was some kind of injustice, because I knew that a double honor would come in some way. So I even had to probe my heart, because at some point I started to desire it, understand? I remember moments we went through, and when it happened, I looked at my wife and said, "Love, wait. God will do this." I remember an event I participated in, man, and something very bad happened. I came down, I came down from the stage, and I said, "God will give us access to stadiums, because the seed of humiliation that we sowed today, we will reap double honor in a stadium." God opened stadiums. So, whenever God honors someone who was dishonored, wronged, persecuted, it's in a greater measure than what they tried to take from you, because he doesn't restore what they took, he overflows beyond what was taken from you. So enemies, opponents, they.

They are a gift, dear. I don't remember what the theme of the message itself is that I preach about this, but I say that the giants are not a problem. The giants are a passport. Every time we saw God taking a man to a new level, the passport was some kind of tribulation or test. No great man of God received anything great from God without being tested first. No Abraham leaves his comfort zone, goes into the middle of an unknown place, faces the desert. God asks him to give up his only son. When he is about to give him up, God says, "No, no, no." You can have him. We take the story of Joseph, sold by his brothers, made a slave, becomes governor. We take the story of David, persecuted by Saul in the middle of the desert. We take, dear, we take the story of Jesus. Jesus is with open arms, he says, "God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He gives up his spirit. That is the end of Jesus' story, but three days later he is resurrected from the dead. A few days later, he ascends to heaven and is sitting at the right hand of the Father, interceding for us. So even Jesus received a portion of glory after some kind of retaliation or injustice. Dear, he came to his own, and his own did not receive him. That is, what is more unjust than being sold by someone you chose with your own hands and being murdered by someone you came to save? So, at no point in history do we see God giving a double honor to someone who was not resisted in some way. So, resistance is natural, it is part of it, it is a gift from God. Now, every time you are activated in something, your opponents are also activated. It's like The Matrix, dear. The Matrix, man, I think it's an extraordinary analogy of the Gospel of the spiritual kingdom. You have the savior, Neo, who is the opposite, he is the One, he is the first. And there is a parallel reality, dear, the spiritual kingdom is that. And whoever is alienated thinks that's all there is, and whoever wants to take the pill and understand that there is more, begins to see things as they truly are. There is and there will always be resistances that we will face. And when are they activated? When you are activated. Here's an example, I don't know, I'll give my example. When I converted, and when was that, about 17 years ago, someone help me with the count there, 17 years ago. I've been married for 15. I converted 2 years before. There was a girl I was in love with in school, a platonic love, and nothing ever happened. I started dating my wife, and this girl calls me. "Are you okay? I miss you. I wanted to see you. How are you?" I said, "Man, this can't be God, because now that I've decided to have a proper life, I'm dating the pastor's daughter, I want to have a correct life." The girl I was always in love with appears. Why do some things, when you... things you always desired, suddenly appear at the moment you say, "Damn, now, man, why is a married man tempted to attract him? He won't face this betrayal, this temptation when he's single, but when he establishes a family, he has a wife, he has children, man, things will try to take away from you what God gave you. You have a family, you have a business, you have... you have access, you have places. Every time you are activated for something, a new level of opposition begins. But this is wonderful, man. Why? Because just as high performance generates a lot of pressure and opposition, a low-performance life also does. It's true, man. I remember the pressure of having to do shopping and not having money. I remember the pressure of my electricity bill being cut off and the Light car stopping there, the Enel car in Rio, and having a guy there disconnecting your meter, and you literally being without light for a few days. I know what the pressure is like to lead a church with 15,000 members with almost 200 employees. You have to have an inspired word every Sunday, touch thousands of people. But I also remember what the pressure was like to prepare a sermon when no one wanted to listen, to have to prepare our garage at home and preach to 15 people, dreaming of one day living this. So, we need to understand that pressures are part of the story of those who are leading in high performance and those who are leading in low performance. So, pressure is part of the journey, it's a gift. They become stronger, more resilient, you become more positioned, you become more connected, they improve your level of preparation. And that's why I believe that biblically, no leader forged by God was spared from processes. None of them. All were tested, all were stretched, all were pressured, all in some way were plundered but often restored even more. So, I think this speaks to a biblical dynamic. And I was thinking here that I have a great responsibility to represent the guys who are out there, you know, at home now. Basically, we have two groups: the guys who are listening, the guys who... the guy is leading, the guy is doing well, the guy is in a good moment. Yes. Do you know what? And there are people who think that in our lives, it's only when things are difficult. Yes. But sometimes the most valuable advice, man, in our lives, is when things are going well. For a guy who is doing well. If your audio were... if you sent an audio on WhatsApp, and it reached the WhatsApps of the guys who are doing well in life. Uh-huh. And doing well. Each one defines their own definition of what their scale of value is. Value. But what would be your audio for someone who is doing well in life? Man, look, it would be about the end. The Bible says that the end of things is better than their beginning. What the Bible teaches us is that it's not about being well, it's about finishing well. So, when I understand the value of finishing well, I realize that the moment is important, but it's not everything. Moments pass. There are three things that God gives to creation, and he holds them accountable for what he gave: time, talent, and treasures. What you did with the time I gave you, what you did with the talent I gave you, and what you did with the treasures I gave you. Man, the Bible even goes so far as to say in the Parable of the Talents that the master returns to settle accounts with those to whom he gave. To the one who did little, he received one measure. To the one who did much, he received another measure. But to the one who did nothing, even the little he had received was taken away. So, finishing well is reaching that place where Paul arrived at the end of his journey, saying, "Man, I have finished the race, I have fought the good fight, I have kept the faith." So, I think that's a good place for us to be. And for those who are doing poorly, for those who are doing poorly, there is good news, man. In God's time, it's always now. So, you are in your worst moment, you have the same raw material that was used for the creation of everything that exists. In the beginning, there was nothing, everything was made from nothing. You have the same raw material as the ministry of Jesus. He starts at 30 years old, from nothing. 2000 years later, we are still talking about him. You have the same raw material as Abraham's ministry. He leaves the land of his relatives, his known place, and goes to the desert with nothing. You have the same raw material as Moses leading the people in the desert. You have the same raw material as Joseph, captive, slave. Man, look, look how crazy. We love stories, you know, of people who are living something extraordinary, but we also love stories of new beginnings, you know? The Gospel is entirely based on new beginnings. So, you take Joseph's story. You stop to imagine Joseph. Joseph falls. He sleeps as a prisoner one night. The next night, he sleeps as governor. You take David's story. He is sleeping in the desert, fleeing from Saul. At some point in his story, he is sleeping in the palace, he is the king of Israel. That's why I return to this biblical principle: the end of things is better than their beginning. The Bible says, "Your weeping may last for a night, but joy comes with the morning." One thing that changed my life, man, is the understanding that the miracle is not for those who deserve it, the miracle is for those who did not give up. So, I am living many miracles, man. It moves me to talk about it because it's not that I deserve it, but because I didn't give up. That's why I lived many miracles that I lived. So, if I had given up after a few humble setbacks, I wouldn't be living what I'm living today. So, why is Fernandes living this? Because he deserves it? No, man, it's just because he didn't give up. There's an image that you've probably seen at some point of that guy who is inside a mine, and you see that he was very close to the diamonds, and he gave up. Just one more step, man. So, I'm always operating under the assumption that I'm a few steps away from a new breakthrough. Why shouldn't I give up, man? Because I'm a few steps away, and a new breakthrough always comes. So, if you are in your best moment, man, perpetuate this best moment because it's how you finish that counts. And if you are in your worst moment, it's just a moment. The moment passes.