Transcription
There's one idea in this book that once you get it, it almost feels like cheating because you see a clear path to grow rapidly, everything becomes simpler, and most of your problems just solve themselves. It is a business book, but it applies everywhere in life. And the author is someone who's worked with countless entrepreneurs to apply this framework to grow their companies 10 to 100 times bigger in only three years.
Before we get into the core idea, let me tell you what the book is about in general. >> [snorts] >> So, in a nutshell, he goes through a specific process on how to do it. And it's very similar to the one that I talked about in the previous video on how this guy made $100 million in 12 months using a simple journaling exercise.
Basically, you start by taking your current goal and massively increasing it either in size, for example, you go from 1 million to 10 million or 100 million, or you shrink the timeline massively. So, instead of achieving something in 10 years, what would it take to achieve it in 3 years? And then secondly, you view everything through that lens where the path just becomes crystal clear and it forces a new level of thinking to find a way to reach that seemingly impossible goal by actually doing less.
And it's not about doing more work because we all have the same 24 hours in the day. Just because someone is getting 10 times the result doesn't mean that they work 10 times more hours than us, right? But it's about working on the right things, on the things that are the highest leverage activities. And also, bigger goals are not necessarily harder. It's just a different path, right?
And this is what this book helps you do. It helps you find the right path to work on the right things because there's a thousand things that you could do right now in your business or in your life or whatever result you're after. But this forces the three to five things to come to the surface that are the highest leveraged ones that actually will get you to a way bigger goal in way less time.
For example, I was talking to a subscriber recently who booked a call with me and he had an agency where he was making $50 to $100,000 profit per month. And there's a thousand things that he could do to grow it, right? He could build a new way to get customers. He could optimize one of dozens of processes, whether it's the sales process, the onboarding process, uh hiring people, whatever it is, right? And here's the thing. I don't know his business. I don't know the industry, but I'm a brainstorming partner on these calls where I challenge assumptions and we usually start by stretching the goals. So I was like, okay, what would it take to get to 10 million in profit? Not in the next 10 years, but in the next 3 years. And what he realized was that what he was working on currently was not getting him there, especially not in 3 years. And instead, he would have to work with very different clients that pay him way more, way more profitable, and also change the service that he was focusing on, one that was way more impactful, instead of doing all these other things that he was currently trying to optimize.
And this brings me to the most impactful idea which this whole video is about. >> [snorts] >> Once you stretch your thinking, it changes your perspective and how you view everything, right? And it becomes crystal clear that there's only a few things that you can work on that will actually get you to that big goal and most other things are just not going to get you there. And you realize, I can't focus on this product or this type of client anymore. I can't hire someone who only performs at this level who needs to be managed, or I can't focus on this little side project anymore. Whatever it is, right? You filter everything through that lens.
And this is what the author calls the floor, which is basically the minimum requirements in the projects you pursue, the people that you work with, and also what you demand of yourself, right? Your own performance and your own standards for yourself. And the author visualizes it really well with this graphic here. You have this frame or this perspective that determines what you see. And it's all based on your current goals and your current level of thinking. And it determines what is relevant and what is irrelevant. And when you look through the frame of your current thinking, your current goals, there's all these things that you could pursue. But when you raise your floor and you set the frame higher, almost everything becomes irrelevant, falling below the floor. There's only two or three things that will really get you there. And everything else is just not going to make the cut.
And in the previous video, I talked about the most important skill being at a certain stage, our ability to say no to projects, to ideas, to uh things that we could do. And it's not saying no to bad ideas. That's easy. That's obvious. But specifically saying no to great ideas that will work, that will make good money, that will get results, but they're just not exceptional. And raising your floor helps you do exactly that. It helps you say no to the things that you know, you can just clearly see they're not getting you there. And that's how your current problems solve themselves. And you save literally thousands of hours of wasted effort.
Because think about this, the things you're working on right now, whatever it is, think for yourself. What is it right now that you're working on? Tweaking the sales process a little bit more, finding a solution for clients who are difficult to work with, or just dealing with a team member that is underperforming. You realize it just doesn't matter 'cause it's not getting you to that exciting place. And going back to the analogy I used in the previous video where it's like a maze. Any problem you have is like a maze that you're trying to solve or a puzzle. It's almost like you're in the wrong maze. So, you could solve it for sure, but when we zoom out and we think bigger, we realize we're in the wrong maze. It's trying to solve the wrong puzzle to begin with. And we see that if we only work on this one big thing, like, I don't know, making the product exceptional or writing a viral book like the author did that sends him more customers that he can handle. All the other stuff like optimizing the the sales process and optimizing this and that, it just doesn't matter. It makes all your current problems and things you're working on irrelevant and it also eliminates the 10 other problems that you otherwise would have wasted time on after that once you solve this one. You can work on 10 problems that are very difficult and time-consuming, or you tackle that one big problem that makes all of them irrelevant and it's not more work, it's just reallocating resources, taking it away from all these small things that we're focused on to this one big thing.
Einstein has a really good quote on this. "We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them." Also, pass me the salt. He was having dinner with his family when he said that. So, the point is, you can't keep thinking at the same level to solve your problems. By thinking bigger, they just often times solve themselves. You think small, you focus on small problems, you get small results. You think big, you focus on big problems, you get bigger results.
But I might hear you say, "What if I don't want to have a massive goal? What if I don't want to make a hundred million trillion dollars in two years and then hate my life? What if I just want something simple?" Yes, I'm fully with you because this is what the channel is about: is about how to achieve your goals faster while also enjoying the journey and the process of it. 'Cause what's the point of playing a game if it's not fun?
And here's how we can still use this exact process. See, another subscriber that I talked to was making, I don't know, let's just say a million a year. And he didn't want to make 10 times or 100 times more in in less time. Um, and again, I'm not a business expert guru. I just help them get clarity, whatever they want. If they want to shut down the business and live on a fish farm, I don't care. The way we stretched his goal was not by just multiplying it by 10 or 100, but by adding constraints that then raise our floor. He wanted to make $10 million in profit, more than he is making now, but also have a team of less than 10 people, be in peak physical health, eventually have a family, and be a great dad, and be able to travel 3 months at a time when he chooses to. I would argue that that's a much more ambitious goal than making $100 million while hating your life, being fat and miserable, and having kids grow up with daddy issues because he was never present.
From there, it became very clear to him what he needed to focus on and what he had to say no to. He can't build a product or a service that requires a ton of people. He must have incredible people on his team and he's got to be able to automate it for at least a few months at a time so he can travel. Every time he has a decision to make, he can filter it through that lens, through that floor. Will this get me to this?
And if you think about it, this is how we can apply it in every area of our lives for literally anything. And actually, we already are applying it, but maybe not consciously. And of course, you and I have a big vision for our career, our business, or our finances. But what about our relationship? What about how we spend our time day-to-day? What's my floor for who I surround myself with or how I treat my body?
Think about it. Dating to find a life partner versus just dating to find someone to not be lonely is very different, right? Your floor rises like crazy when you know what you're looking for. With friendships, are you around people who are, you know, they're just they're just nice to be around or people who will show up at your funeral and, you know, maybe you show up at their funeral, but depending on who goes first, like maybe you can make it a reverse race to death like Brian Johnson and just outlive them. I don't know. How we spend our free time, right? Like there's people who when they have free time, they book a trip, they have a peak level experience with people they love, and then there's people who, you know, they just chill on the couch and do nothing, and it's kind of boring.
I mean, even down to the movies that you watch, right? Like how many times are you watching a mediocre movie? You're in the cinema and you could just walk out be just like, "I I don't know. I paid for the movie so I'm trying to get my money's worth here." Just walk out. Like the amount of friends that are watching subpar series on Netflix and they haven't watched Game of Thrones yet. I'm just I just grab them and shake them. I'm like, "Game of Thrones is one of the greatest pieces of television ever created." And they go, "Ah, but it's so many episodes." And it's like, "You're going to watch stuff for the rest of your life anyways, right? You're going to watch movies and series." Well, 95% of what you're going to choose to watch is going to be worse than this. So, just just calm down, Leon. We've been through this before. It's just just accept it. It's fine. So, some people just make bad decisions. It's okay. And yes, I know the ending. Whatever. It's still a great series. >> [snorts] >> My point is, if you haven't watched Game of Thrones, just raise your floor, okay? Raise your standards. Pathetic.
Now, it's one thing to see the path. It's another to actually walk it. And again, saying no to things is scary. Whether it's rejecting a sub-optimal customer because they have money that they want to shove into your wallet right now, but you have to say no, right? Firing a team member is never fun. Often times necessary. And yeah, quitting a friend group that you know is familiar and comfortable, but not really fulfilling. Those are all scary things because the question is, "What if it doesn't work? What if I say no to these things? I reject it and then I take this new path and it's just I I just it just doesn't work or I can't do it."
And again, I've said this one before, but we are kept from our goals not by obstacles, but by a clearer path to a lesser goal. The default is you go with what you know, and you just currently know the current path you're on, which is smaller. But when you create clarity around the bigger path with the higher floor, clarity alone creates confidence, at least some confidence. And then from there, it just requires courage to go and do it. We can have the results before we take the actions. And when we start acting in accordance with these actions, we will change how we think about ourselves. We gain confidence in the process and then we get the result. Only after we've committed and we've made the courageous jump.
If you're an established entrepreneur and you would like to implement this process with me to get a clear path to a much more exciting goal, raise your floor. There's a link below so you can reach out to me. And under no circumstances should you watch this video next on how this random dude made $100 million in 12 months with a similar exercise just like this.