If anyone has the advice on the formula for winning it’s Tom Shipley. He is a serial entrepreneur and consultant to some of the world’s leading eCommerce brands and he recently joined me on the podcast for an amazing discussion. Tom has helped create some of the world’s biggest brands today.
Below, you will find a few highlights from our conversation. Be sure to listen to the whole thing to learn every drop of wisdom from Tom about the formula for winning.
How did you first get started and involved in Leadership?
“Everything goes back to your roots. I love creating things from nothing. Sometimes as an entrepreneur, it’s in you to solve big problems and to create something out of nothing and something significant. The foundations of everything, my leadership, and entrepreneurship, I learned in the Israeli army special forces.”
“When I look at it, as I learned about how to build teams, I learned about pure tenacity, pure grit, not quitting. I learned a good soldier is one who improvises. So that means that it’s not about resources, it’s about resourcefulness, it’s about a high level of trust.”
What does it take to be an Entrepreneur or Business Owner?
“I go back to what I started with and it’s clear. I find out about something, I do my research, and I manifest my reality. I like to think that I won’t let people outwork or out-hustle me. And that’s what it’s about, it’s about that focus and the tenacity, but it starts with the manifestation of what you want and then going out there and doing it.”
When did it finally start to click with you?
“It started two years ago, and over the last five months, I’ve become a different person. One of the biggest challenges we all have; is that we have limiting beliefs. The more we go through in our life, the more our brain tries to protect us and creates these loops in our heads.”
“And it is physiological, the loops that our brain creates, and getting outside those loops and those mental models we have, those stories that we tell ourselves. It doesn’t happen naturally without a lot of pain, but what I’m doing is creating the momentum of thinking about opportunities and thinking about my life without barriers, without constraints, without limits!”
What has been your secret to a Winning Formula?
“What I do with every single idea is I try to put zeros onto the idea. What if I add a zero to this idea? What if I add a zero? Now it’s no longer a $10 million business or a $50 million, or a $500 million business, but it’s a billion–dollar business. What would that mean?”
“What it means is that we figure out a better way to build a consumer product, a good company, a CPG company. It means that we figure out a way to buy small brands and lower multiples, get multiple arbitrages on that, and a systematic way to systematize the back-end while keeping every brand unique.”
“It means that we’d have a better mouse track and we were reinventing and reimagining the way CPGs are coming!”
“It’s a paradigm. And the first question to ask is, what would be the idea without any limiting beliefs? Then what happens if I added zeros on, what would I become? Next, the question is, what would have to be true for this to happen?”
“Then I’d go and create my operating assumptions for it to be accurate and start working on it. You do need to have the right team, but now you can build those building blocks with your roadmap. And you don’t need to know how to do something, you just need to know the who that knows the how, and you either hire them or you learn from them, period.”
”But a lot of it is asking the right questions and changing the way you’re wired. What you’re doing right now, could you imagine yourself doing this 10 years from now? 10 years from now, what are you going to be thinking about the level that you’re playing at right now?”
What’s next for you?
“When you come up with the concept and you have leverage, you can create momentum behind the idea, and then you find the right operator that can execute at the highest level. You’re talking about equity participation that is disproportionate to the person you’re bringing in.”
“This is my model now. I’m finding operators that operate at a tier-one level that are focusing right now on tier three opportunities and giving them opportunities to have that billion-dollar business.”
“Because here’s the secret: The bigger the idea, the bigger the concept, the easier it is! The easier it is to recruit the right talent, the easier it is to bring in investors, and the easier it is to bring in the team and the resources necessary to accomplish that.”
In your opinion, What do S.M.A.R.T Businesses do?
“As a military guy, I’m always looking for the force multiplier. The biggest force multiplier you have in your business is your team and your people because you can only accomplish so much yourself.”
“But making sure that you only have tier one operators that are grand tier-one operators, and that doesn’t mean they’re the smartest people in the world. What you have them designated for, if they’re great, you can have a high level of trust, and they follow through every time.”
“If they’re smart, can learn, grow, build a team, and they’re givers. Having an organization where the team works well together in a highly productive environment is the winning formula.”
“The biggest competitive advantage you have is the ability to respond quickly. The culture of your team enables your response. Yes, a plan and focus metrics are very, very key to success, but ultimately culture is that force multiplier with a really strong team.”
To listen to the full episode of the most comprehensive podcast about strategically building and growing your business, the S.M.A.R.T way, click on any one of these platforms and subscribe!
